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News & ArtsThursday, September 2, 2010
Science Big News About the Universe
Posted by Charles Mudede on Thu, Sep 2, 2010 at 1:57 PM
This piece of news is trending right now on Twitter: "Stephen Hawking says universe not created by God."
God did not create the universe, the man who is arguably Britain's most famous living scientist says in a forthcoming book.People really believe an ape made the universe? In our day and age, it's big news for a scientist to say an ape did not make the universe? Even Xenophanes, whose life and world happened over 2000 years ago, would have yawned at the story that's currently all the rage on Twitter. He wrote (and have in mind there were no telescopes, no Standard Model, no nothing in his time):In the new work, The Grand Design, Professor Stephen Hawking argues that the Big Bang, rather than occurring following the intervention of a divine being, was inevitable due to the law of gravity.
If oxen and horses and lions had hands and were able to draw with their hands and do the same things as men, horses would draw the shapes of gods to look like horses and oxen to look like oxen, and each would make the gods' bodies have the same shape as they themselves had.Enough said.
1
Fuck you, Charles. We all the know the universe spawns from the Lord Toad. ALL HAIL THE HYPNOTOAD.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yoJI-Tl9…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yoJI-Tl9…
2
Charles, you know that the Abrahamic religions (as well as many others) emphasize an intangible, non-corporeal God, right? The depiction of God as humanoid was a later product of Christianity. And it's pointless for science to try and talk about religiALL GLORY TO THE HYPNOTOAD.
4
"...any form of intelligent life that evolves anywhere will automatically find that it lives somewhere suitable for it."
Hawking is awesome.
Hawking is awesome.
6
Stephen Hawkings is multiples of smarter than me, but I though there were no natural laws (gravity or otherwise) in the first infinitesimal moments of the universe, before the quarks precipitated out. Where did this gravity come from?
7
ZOMG Stephen Hawking is a SOCIALIST!!
A GODLESS MUSLIM RADICAL CHRISTIAN SOCIALIST!!!
WE'LL ALL BE KILLED!!!!1!
A GODLESS MUSLIM RADICAL CHRISTIAN SOCIALIST!!!
WE'LL ALL BE KILLED!!!!1!
9
"If oxen and horses and lions had hands and were able to draw with their hands and do the same things as men, horses would draw the shapes of gods to look like horses and oxen to look like oxen, and each would make the gods' bodies have the same shape as they themselves had."
Really? Tell that to the Hindu, native American, ancient Egyptian etc.
Really? Tell that to the Hindu, native American, ancient Egyptian etc.
10
Hawking has been saying that for over 20 years. (See "A brief History of Time.") Sounds like a publisher trying to grab a few headlines, but it's not news. And it seems kind of pointless for Hawking to define God as a hypothetical being whose existence can be disproven based on the physical laws of the universe.
11
Except he didn't actually say that. What he said was there's no need to invoke God to explain the universe. That's a different statement. You'll seldom be surprised if you assume mass media gets science wrong.
12
@2
"The depiction of God as humanoid was a later product of Christianity."
Not true.... The Romans and Greeks got there before the Christians, and I doubt that they were the first.
"The depiction of God as humanoid was a later product of Christianity."
Not true.... The Romans and Greeks got there before the Christians, and I doubt that they were the first.
13
@9 Simply because a god had, often mutable, theriomorphic qualities, does not mean that the popular image of the deity was not predominantly humanoid.
@2 I don't think there's any evidence to support a theory of sophisticated theology in Abrahamic monotheism before the Roman Empire and the subsequent spread of Abrahamic monotheism throughout the Mediterranean world. More to the point, though the popular monotheistic conception of divinity is a man with a toga, a long white beard, and a muscled form (essentially Zeus minus the lightning bolt), Christian theology will still essentially postulate that god must, by necessity, by immaterial and supra-material. That nonsense about god "creating man in his own image," is just that--nonsense.
But again, Mudede was really more referring the popular, versus the theological, conception of divinity.
I have to say, I have the hardest time, sometimes, following the logical progression in anything Mr. Mudede writes, informing me that either his consciousness is more schizoid than my own, or I need to become a better autodidact.
@2 I don't think there's any evidence to support a theory of sophisticated theology in Abrahamic monotheism before the Roman Empire and the subsequent spread of Abrahamic monotheism throughout the Mediterranean world. More to the point, though the popular monotheistic conception of divinity is a man with a toga, a long white beard, and a muscled form (essentially Zeus minus the lightning bolt), Christian theology will still essentially postulate that god must, by necessity, by immaterial and supra-material. That nonsense about god "creating man in his own image," is just that--nonsense.
But again, Mudede was really more referring the popular, versus the theological, conception of divinity.
I have to say, I have the hardest time, sometimes, following the logical progression in anything Mr. Mudede writes, informing me that either his consciousness is more schizoid than my own, or I need to become a better autodidact.
14
We have to move past the primitive, tribal superstition. And the only way to do that is renew our determination to educate the children.
15
@11 - thank you. The actual thing Hawking said doesn't make as good of a headline, I guess: "It is not **necessary** to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going."
16
@12: God, singular. I'm talking about the monotheistic tradition of the Abrahamic religions, not divinities in general.
17
I'm going to have to put you in a box and close it.
Then tell me if the universe exists and if the universe made God or God made the universe.
Then tell me if the universe exists and if the universe made God or God made the universe.
19
@15:
Still, using "Occam's Razor", if indeed "it is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going", there is a clear implication in the statement that universe creation without God is a simpler, more concise explanation than creation WITH God, since the former requires one less element than that latter. If so, I don't see but that one must not inevitably be lead to the supposition that, if universes can be created spontaneously without the guiding hand/hoof whatever of an omnipotent, omniscient Supreme Being, then the very argument for the existence of such an entity is rendered completely irrelevant.
I presume it's this that has people all a-Twitter today...
Still, using "Occam's Razor", if indeed "it is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going", there is a clear implication in the statement that universe creation without God is a simpler, more concise explanation than creation WITH God, since the former requires one less element than that latter. If so, I don't see but that one must not inevitably be lead to the supposition that, if universes can be created spontaneously without the guiding hand/hoof whatever of an omnipotent, omniscient Supreme Being, then the very argument for the existence of such an entity is rendered completely irrelevant.
I presume it's this that has people all a-Twitter today...
20
You do realize, Charles, that you come across like a first-year philosophy student, right? You keep having these grand revalations that vary from "shit everyone else already knows" to "pseudo-profound stoner epiphany" to "obvious attempt to troll".
22
The mathematical physics was Steven Hawking's revenge for nature having hurt him. He showed that he could turn the rest of humanity into fools. Only a few see through it.
23
Ya see, it's as easy as this: if you don't know where something came from, such as time or gravity, you plug in one answer and one only: an infinite being of infinite power who is everywhere at once and has the power to create something out of nothing. Oh, and it's against the rules to then ask where this infinitely powerful being came from.
(Argument from Ignorance. If A="I don't know," A="God." One may replace The Universe with the term "God" at any time, though the word God is undefinable."
I still think it's more honest to just say "I don't know (but we're working on it)," than make stuff up. But that's really hard for a lot of people.
(Argument from Ignorance. If A="I don't know," A="God." One may replace The Universe with the term "God" at any time, though the word God is undefinable."
I still think it's more honest to just say "I don't know (but we're working on it)," than make stuff up. But that's really hard for a lot of people.
24
Sure the philosophizers got there first, Charles. But now we have convergent conclusions from an entirely different avenue of evidence. That's pretty awesome, just typin'.
25
I am changing my name to Schroedienkers Cat.
Maybe Damn Dirty Ape
Well..If I knew what happened to the cat I could spell his name....
Maybe Damn Dirty Ape
Well..If I knew what happened to the cat I could spell his name....
27
Just had a ridiculous argument trying to convince my ex-girlfriend that the universe is indeed infinite...and that any other dimensions are by definition normal to our own.
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