Faith and Science NEW MEDIA SMACKDOWN!!!!!!!

[_MrStakhanovite]

STFU

[_bcspace]

Atheist Bear chortles at your faith.

Oh Lord, will you please turn this bear into a Christian?

[_Stormy Waters]

I like this thread so here is my contribution.

A Universe not made for us
What if I'm wrong

[_Hoops]

Atheist Bear chortles at your faith.

Oh Lord, will you please turn this bear into a Christian?

I would have thought you would want him turned into a Mormon.

[_huckelberry]

"A universe not made for us."

I remember at age 12 or 13 discovering the incomprehensible vastness and mystery of the universe. It was an exciting and wonderous shock. I may have lost some of the suprise but I do not think I have lost the wonder or appreciation of the mystery. Our life has adventure.

There is something I find quite puzzling about the Sagen speach and illustrations. I do not hear so much an argument but a series of images designed to take the hearers thoughts to a certain point. While following that I am not suprised with his observation that people in the past used things they were familiar with to create images of what they understood much less such as what life after death might mean. Of course they did. Sagen takes that observation, adds that we know religious leaders can make mistakes, an unremarkable observation, and then pitches us into images of us all falling through a trapdoor into a bottomless meaningless freefall. We are in desperate need of some sort of saving is suggested by these images. The images remind me of those in Jonathan Edwards sermon," Sinners in the hands of an angry God." Then as an image of a solution at the end we are presented with a spaceship leaving Earth. Are we to find salvation from our problems on Mars?

I got a bit of sense that Sagen and I see something of the same problem, human hostility greed shortsightedness endanger us all. So is there a technological fix?

I am puzzled by Sagen alteration of Edens tree of the knowlege of good and evil into a prohibition against learning. Sagen interpretation fits his rhetoric but is foreign to the text. The Bible is presenting the problem of human violence, it has no prohibition on learning.Sagen is not dumb, he is amplifing his rhetoric. But more than that, perhaps he is deflecting attention from his uncertainty about just what it is we need to figure out in order to save ourselves.

I suspect some people get overly impressed with simple history of religion theory imagining that religion is primarily about explaining lightning and storms for prescientific people without scientific explainations..This forgets that religion is much more about how humans can keep their soul healthy and strong to be able to live creatively and with courage in our community and in our mysterious universe..

[_Stormy Waters]

You make some fair points against the video I linked to. Mainly I posted it because I thought it fit the theme of the thread though ("New Media smackdown"), since it's a series of crisp images accompanied by beautiful music and narration.

There is something I find quite puzzling about the Sagan speach and illustrations. I do not hear so much an argument but a series of images designed to take the hearers thoughts to a certain point. While following that I am not suprised with his observation that people in the past used things they were familiar with to create images of what they understood much less such as what life after death might mean. Of course they did.

I agree, this point doesn't really hold any weight. Everyone relates through things that they already know.

Sagan takes that observation, adds that we know religious leaders can make mistakes, an unremarkable observation,

I think overall the point that he was making is that since religions contradict each other, that religion isn't a good way to discover truth.

Sagan ... then pitches us into images of us all falling through a trapdoor into a bottomless meaningless freefall. We are in desperate need of some sort of saving is suggested by these images. The images remind me of those in Jonathan Edwards sermon," Sinners in the hands of an angry God." Then as an image of a solution at the end we are presented with a spaceship leaving Earth. Are we to find salvation from our problems on Mars?

I believe that Sagan is saying that if there is no God that gives our lives a purpose, then it presents a humble outlook on life. That we are on our own, and that meaning of life is only determined by the meaning we assign to it. Whoever did the visuals for the video added the spaceship I believe as a suggestion of one of the common goals we could work to if we so desired.