Last night I saw the whole of the Moon. Have you ever seen the whole of the Moon? Not a full moon, not the darkside of the Moon, the rest of the Moon. When there is a clear crescent showing you can sometimes see the rest of the Moon dimly. This is one of the most beautiful sights in the world, because it proves what kind of a Universe we live in. It is not the Universe of man at the centre, watched over by his man-shaped God.

The whole of the Moon is brought to you by the most amazing effect; the combination of starlight and EARTHSHINE. Light from stars hundreds of light-years away combines with light reflected from the Earth to gently illuminate the surface of the Moon, just enough for you to pick out the full circle clear against the black of infinity. I can never see it without producing a tear. Light from the sun has taken over eight minutes to reach us at the Earth, it is reflected off our continents, clouds and oceans to cross another quarter of a million miles of void to faintly illuminate the barren dust of our nearest neighbour. And it doesn't do it for us, it happened for billions of years before we ever saw it. Where in all the Bibles and good books of the world is there a single concept to compare with that?

The theists Universe is small and full of the stench of man. We atheists know that we are not the reason for the existence of the Universe. Our Universe has been there for many billions of years before we ever banged a couple of rocks together or talked to a man in the sky. The Earth is less than a third of the age of the Universe. Man is much less than a thousandth of the age of the Earth. Everywhere I look I see a greater Universe than any man-created God could ever conceive of. A Universe full of wonders. God made it. That is not an answer to anything. It is an insult to the Universe.

The Universe in itself speaks of a skillful creator.

I beg to differ. What is the purpose of an enormous Universe if God just wanted to keep a few pets? Surely a skillful creator could have done something far more modest and more purposeful. The only purpose I can see in the Universe is self perpetuation for the organized matter known as life. The rest of it just is. No doubt you pity me for my lack of vision.

I don't expect everything to make sense or have a purpose. That is not the way reality seems to work. Fiction works like that, every character helps the plot. Every action matters to the grand scheme.

Truth is infinitely stranger than fiction for one simple reason; fiction is suppossed to make sense. I feel a lot happier in my version of reality in which the Universe is not there for any purpose, it predates the concept. It also predates time. And my Universe is beautiful and vast. Vaster than I have the power to comprehend. It might be more complex than we as a species are able to understand, or it might not. There are no rules, there is no formal limit to our knowledge. It might be possible for us, collectively, to know it all. Or it might be too much. We may never know, but at least some of us will have a go at finding out.

Mysticism and theism teach us nothing about the world, just about the thoughts of other mystics and theists.

I found what i have read of your site to be very intersting and logical although i still beleive in God.

Evolution and God are usually viewed upon as two separate things, but i happen to beleive in both. I think God started the process of evolution and then let it go from there. This is why i dont really buy the thing with the blind spot as evidence of no God; evolution is evolution, God isnt going to just stop things to fix something that is apparently a flaw.

I completely respect your atheism, and i agree with a lot of the illogical things that go with christianity. I think a lot of that is a result of humans manipulating and contaminating and corrupting information and ideas though. God have filled so many empty voids in so many people's lives, that i cant see how that can be explained without a higher being. from my own experience, if i go through a period of time where i havent been praying or reading the bible or anything of that nature, i tend to feel down and start to feel empty. but once i realize that i am lacking in the area of praying and such and i start up again, i instantly feel rejuvenated and complete. God has a way of comforting you and i dont know if i could live as an atheist without that comfort.

i know i may just be insane or something, and a lot of what you say makes sence, but my faith means too much to me for some inconsistencies to change my mind about it. i try not to be closed minded, if i were, i wouldnt have even considered looking at your site. i hope that i made some kind of sence. if not, i apologise. im curious to see how you respond to this though. thanks for your time.

Well, I put in my site that I always reply to e mail so here goes:-

Open Mindedness.

Many people today see having an open mind as being some kind of ultimate virtue. I don't. It comes from teachers. We all had them. They instil in us a reverential attitude to learning and an open mind. It suits their purpose, it makes their job easier. For me an open mind is a tactic. It is a means to an end, not an end in itself. There is no point in giving a fair hearing to palpable bullshit. Astrology, alien abductions, conspiracy theories; all as much of a waste of time as religion.

God, the feeling.

I think I know what you feel. I get sudden uprushes of joy from within, sometimes for an obvious reason, sometimes not. The difference is that I do not think that they require a supernatural cause. I just sometimes feel happy to be alive. I had such a feeling on Friday, walking along feeling the warmth of an English April day. The sun warm on my face, the gentle breeze. The flowers and leaf buds all around me bursting into life. I was very glad to be alive and I wished that I had more talent so I could share that feeling with the world in some form of creative art. I have no doubt that any religious believer would have called that some kind of divinely inspired mood.

The night before I had seen the most beautiful sight since the last comet, the dark disc of the Moon illuminated by reflected earthshine, and surrounded by bright stars that I knew were planets. That made me fill up with tears and a joy to be alive, and joy that I could see that sight without feeling the need to ascribe it to any supernatural being.

I find it hard to understand how a person can believe in evolution but still believe in God. Evolution to me explains how complexity arose from simplicity. It is not a complete answer but it is as good an explanation as "It's done with computer pictures" explains to my son how a little boy can fly a pod-racer. It's just a film, Aniken is an actor. It just evolved, it is mind-buggeringly complicated and mysterious but ultimately we can understand the fundamentals. We exist because our ancestors survived and had the ability and motivation to reproduce, if they had lacked it we wouldn't be here. It is only part of the answer but it is as good an explanation as I need.

There can be no evidence that disproves the existence of God. Can you prove to me that there is no Loch Ness Monster? Pump the lake dry and there will still be people who believe. The bit about the blindspot in the eye doesn't disprove God. It makes it very hard to argue that God designed us the way we are, when it is so obvious that the shape we are in is an artefact of what we were before we became the self-aware ape we are now. If God had designed us from a handful of clay he probably would not have bothered to give us body hair and male nipples, not to mention Adam's superfluous navel...

God is an immortal myth not a mythic immortal. Once the idea of God has been created and spread it cannot go away. EVER. It can and will change. It is just possible that Christianity will be replaced by another religion, but very unlikely. It has proved itself worthy of memetic survival. And I will hazard a guess that Judaism will exist as long as the descendants of Abraham walk the earth.

I can guess two things about aliens from other planets. First they will have evolved and second they will have religions. Those two things follow from first principles, from the mathematics of replication. Whether they are based on carbon chemistry is open to doubt, but at least some of them will believe in some form of god. It is inconceivable that intelligence can evolve without the spread of memes. So don't feel alone or stupid because you believe in something that isn't there. There is almost certainly some other sentient being somewhere else in the Universe who is a million times more intelligent than yourself but who still believes in bogeymen. You can lose your religion if you want to. You just need to have courage. There are many millions of atheists out there who are living happy and healthy lives. You can feel born again as an atheist if you want to. Free to enjoy or suffer your life alone; as you always have been.

ATHEISM. Look at this word. ATHEISM? It is an attack AT HE, (god). Who ever he IS. M? Man? Monarch? Mother of mankind? Or is it AT HE or I the Soul of Man? You gain nothing by being atheist and dying. You have nothing to go onto. Then again you waste your time believing in a god who does not exist if you are of a religious background. But of course that is if he doesn't exist. If he does, you have much to gain. The bible contradicts itself all the time. But so does mankind. If christianity is the belief in one god. Is not atheism the belief in only mankind. So either way Atheism is an attack on yourself. If god exist, we are in his hands. If not we are doomed. Atheism is a gloomy look at the world, right or wrong. Its like telling a child to get A's in school then telling him he is hopelessly lost either way. Why should he try? He is screwed either way. At least with direction (religion) he has hope. People are nothing more than grown children. The bible calls us his children. We have much to learn after this life. Look at the enthusiasm you have after or leading up to the graduation of a college course. Going onto the next level, you can't wait. To prove yourself. To unleash yourself on the world. If you applied atheism to the same thing. It would be like, oh well, I did it now what? Atheism deprives you of greatness. Religion tells you, you have a common goal.

A-THEISM.

Atheism is simply the negative of Theism, the belief in a god or deity. My trusty little pocket dictionary says theism is "belief in creation of universe by one god". So atheism is simply not believing in the said premise. But all words have shades of meaning and mean what they are used to mean.

Seeing great significance in the juxtaposition of certain letters is a child's game. Like the joke about the dyslexic, agnostic insomniac who stayed up all night wondering if there was a dog.

Atheism is simply not believing in God or gods. Most atheists would also extend that non-belief to other entities such as angels, ghosts, spirits, the Easter Bunny and fairies. But most generalisations about atheists breakdown very quickly.

To me atheism does not deprive me of greatness, it removes deception. I have always been very poor at deceiving myself and so I naturally gravitate to atheism and cynicism, but that does not mean that I have no joy or wonder. I have a full measure of them from real life and exploring the ideas and the reality of this wonderful real Universe.

Martin,

I just wanted to give my opinion on one of your comments above. It is true that evolution is taught by 'educated' people today, but think about it a second. Look around you at the fantastic thousands of different lifeforms existing today, esp humans. If humans were made of computer chips, etc, you certainly would not conclude that random events caused their existence. Yet, somehow, the complex bioengineering incorporated in human physiology is attributed to MINDLESS random chance with, an IQ of zero.

The Bible very simply reasons with us on the idea: "For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God." (He 3:4; NASB) When you see a house, esp a modern one, you can obviously see intelligent design present. When comparing a house to one of nature's 'houses' (caves), there is no question which was one was formed by mindless chance, and which one was formed by minds. Yes the evolutionary "theory" (yes it is a "theory") leaves a lot to be desired. How so? After cutting through all the hype about the evolutionary theory, we get down to the bottom line. If, as the evolutionary theory says, ALL living things developed from a source thing, then we should find the ground spewing out all kinds of 'transitional' lifeforms showing the gradual changes from one lifeform into another. And since there are thousands upon thousands of lifeforms that live, and that have lived, it should not be that difficult to find the evidence. But the actual record of professed transitional lifeforms is sparse, to say the least. That problem also stumped Darwin, since he didn't find much of that evidence either in his day, but he hoped that someday it would be found. Darwinians are still waiting. Perhaps they are trying to find gold at the end of a rainbow, when the gold all along was IN THEIR POCKETS.

The Bible appeals to our sense of logic. In Genesis, it says that an intelligent force created all lifeforms. (Ge 1:1) And from what we have observed in our technological culture, complex machines are always created by someone, they just don't come into existence on their own, no matter how much time they have. Just some things for you to think about.

Sincerely,

James

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Want a FREE home Bible study? Have Jehovah's Witnesses questions? Go to the only authorized source: http://www.watchtower.org

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Evolution is mindless. That is the beauty and power of it. You have obviously failed to understand. There is nothing random about evolution. Differential survival and reproduction. If you want to understand evolution read "The Blind Watchmaker" by Richard Dawkins, this book addresses exactly the point you are making.

If evolution is a theory what is God? A discredited hypothesis.

Try an experiment.

Rocks have been around for millions and millions of years. Try to find a formation by mindless nature, that equals or surpasses the faces carved by minds on Mount Rushmore at the Black Hills National Forest of South Dakota. If nature can end up producing such complex things and diverse things such as elephants, birds, whales, humans, microbes, etc, etc, surely it can also carve out or form, something in rocks like mentioned above.

This dictionary defines "random" as, " by chance; with no plan, method, or purpose; casual." (1999 World Book Dictionary) Thus, then the opposite of something random means that it had a "plan", "method" or "purpose". Are not plans, methods, and purposes, attributed to intelligence? Thus if evolution (the creating of life) has "nothing random about" it, then that would have to mean that the creation of lifeforms had an intelligent mind that had a "plan" and a "purpose" for what that intelligence created, and used a certain "method" to carry out that plan and purpose. Thus, going by popularity, points to mindless evolution. Going by the EVIDENCE, is what points to an intelligent creator of all things.

"If evolution is a theory what is God? A discredited hypothesis." Yes, evolution is a "theory". A "theory" is not necessarily a fact. What is God? Again lets examine the EVIDENCE.

Is not evidence the crux of scientific investigation? As brought out last time, the fossil evidence of transitional lifeforms is not there in the required amounts needed to support evolutionary theory. And it has had quite a few years since Darwin's time to find them, even with the modern technologies of today. But what about evidence for God? What if you walked into a large storage facility that was full of toys, and gadgets, and gizmos, off all kinds and sizes, etc. Would you conclude that something mindless made them? Well, we find ourselves in a large storage facility (our earth) and when we look around we see 'toys' and 'gadgets' and 'gizmos' of every kind (all the multitudes of various lifeforms existing today) That is just some of the evidence of a very powerful Creator, behind it all. As molecular biologist Michael Denton said: "Between a living cell and the most highly ordered non-biological system, such as a crystal or a snowflake, there is a chasm as vast and absolute as it is possible to conceive." And he calls calls the Darwinian belief regarding living things arising by chance "the great cosmogenic myth of the twentieth century."

I understand your confusion when you have heard of such beliefs. Let me try to show you the BIBLE'S teachings. As mentioned before, God does not make anything "less than perfect". De 32:4, "The Rock, his work is perfect, and all his ways are just. A faithful God, without deceit, just and upright is he;" (NRSV) He did originally test Adam's and Eve's loyalty to him in the Garden of Eden. And since some important issues were raised in that Garden, God permitted them to live and have offspring, (if He didn't, we wouldn't be here today.)

God originally created man and put him in a beautiful garden-like place that had all kinds of delicious foods. (Ge 2:15,16) God also created man to live forever on the earth IF he continually obeyed. (Ge 2:17) Disobedience was the only condition that would bring death and end his eternal existence on this earth. When God created the earth and man, all His other living intelligent beings, the angels, saw what He did. They observed the situation that occurred in Eden. A rebellious angel, Satan (cowardly hiding behind a serpent), talked to Eve and told her that God had lied and that doing things her way could prove beneficial to her; that Eve would do better if she decided for herself what was right and wrong. (Ge 3:3,4) Eve took the bate, fell for it and disobeyed, and Adam later joined her. If God would have destroyed the rebels right then, all the other intelligent beings that God created would never know if Satan was right. Thus throughout all eternity there would be doubts if God's ways are really the best ways. And intelligent creatures at times, no doubt would forever challenge God's ways. So much for endless peace and harmony. God, in His wisdom and in His mercy, permitted the challenge to His sovereignty to continue, to prove that only His ways are correct. So, God had to settle the issue. But such an issue would take time so Satan could not claim that God didn't let enough time elapse to prove Satan's case. And that is where we find ourselves today. But the Bible shows that soon God will end this rotten world, and make all things new. (Re 21:3,4,) God will never punish anyone who doesn't deserve it. (De 32:4) Just as in the past, God today is warning all humankind that a day of judgement is fast approaching. Mt 24:14, "And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come." (NIV) This is being done globally, as we speak or write. My view of the Universe changes everyday as I improve my knowledge. That is the difference between scientific 'truths' and Bible "truth". Real "truth" does not change, since it is factual, like the teachings in the Bible.

I do not regard the bible as of any greater significance to the world than the story of Peter Rabbit or Cinderella. Sorry to burst your bubble. Any e-mail I receive that quotes the bible at me I file with the spam. If you have any views of your own I would be happy to debate with you. Your views are welcome. I have no interest in your fairy stories.

The bit about Mount Rushmore is a red herring. Why would any natural process want to make a carving of a face? How could that happen? If it did happen it would be a co-incidence, a very big one.

The opposite of random is not "planned", it is non-random. 1,2,3,4,5,6,7 is a non-random series of numbers. Is that hard to grasp? It does not need to have a plan to be non-random. The distribution of people across North America is non-random, but it was not planned.

Evolution is the essence of the non random. That which has what it takes to survive will survive. Doubt that? If you do then there is no point in debating. Once there is differential survival, and I cannot image any circumstance in which survival could be random, there will be non-random differential survival. Then evolution is. It simply must be. There cannot not be evolution. It is more fundamental than the laws of physics.

Your brain is not capable of understanding the concept of a billion years. I try very hard to imagine it, and fail. Such enormous time spans offer enormous opportunity for unlikely things to happen. The whole Earth is available to provide material and enormous lengths of time. A self-replicating molecule is a fantastically unlikely thing to happen spontaneously, but on the scale of the material available and the time available that fantastically unlikely event becomes reasonably probable. And it only has to happen once, by definition.

If there is one self replicating molecule in a substrate of chemicals of a simpler nature it will replicate. Then what will happen? Think about it. Let your brain off the leash and think about it. If such a chemical has a natural tendency to replicate nothing will stop it from doing so. So it will replicate as long as it has enough of the building block chemicals available. Then the entire local environment is full of these replicators. Then what must happen next? They cannot all replicate, some will fail. There will be differential survival, almost certainly non-random differential survival. That which has what it takes to replicate will replicate.

It is a very simple idea to understand. The fine detail is not fully understood. We do not know everything about it, but we are looking for the answers, not simply claiming that all the answers are already written down in an old book.

Evolution is not just a theory. It is totally accepted by the scientific community. The fine detail is up for debate, and is being debated. Micro-evolution, like the development of resistance to drugs in bacteria is as close to being a fact as any science ever comes. Macro-evolution, the study of the origin of species, is still controversial, still being openly debated by scientists. Any scientific contribution to the debate is welcome. The so-called creation science debate is spurious. Creation science is an oxymoron.

Do you want to feel even more special than as the chosen one of Jehovah? Well I think you are. You are a winner. Your parents were winners, and you grandparents, they didn't die in childhood, same for your great-grandparents, and theirs. The same for all your ancestors, right back to the primeval slime, four and a half billion years of uninterrupted winning streak. If any one of those ancestors had been less well adapted to their environment then you would not exist. Survival of the fittest. They were fitted to their environment so they survived. The opposite of fit in this sense is not unfit, but misfit.

Even if you think that Jehovah created Adam in 4004 BC the power of Darwinism is still there to be seen. You are here because they survived and bred, not because they had faith. Think about that if you are ever allowed to use your brain for your own thoughts.

Keep the wonder, lose the faith,

Martin

PS. Any reply containing biblical quotes gets deleted unread, OK?

"want to"? I didn't know anything mindless could "want" anything. (unless of course you are speaking metaphorically)

Without getting into a semantics debate, I am sure somewhere down the line that something not random could be applied to something mindless. But based on those definitions from that dictionary, something non generally random, can imply intelligence.

> PS. Any reply containing biblical quotes gets deleted unread, OK?

Then my purpose for these discussions has ended, since I fully believe the Bible is the word of Almighty God, and the Bible's explanation for all existence is not through man's evolutionary theory, but through an all powerful intelligent Creator. Think about the 'programming' present in DNA. It boggles the imagination, the amount of data in that tiny thing. Yet, as you believe, natural mindless forces 'programmed' all that information into that miraculous strand. That to me would be the MOST MIND BOGGLING thing of all!

I usually like to end discussions with an applicable Bible verse, but I respect your desire not to see one. So all I can say is, IF there is a small chance that the Bible is really true, and IF what is says about a malevolent intelligent creature blinding many people's eyes to God's word, then you certainly would not want to be a dupe for that creature; I am sure. Perhaps some day you will see things differently.

The best to you and your family. (you don't have to respond to this letter, since we each are certain about our beliefs, and continued discussions would appear not to be fruitful, but only a time eater)

Sincerely,

James

Thank you for your good wishes. I have no desire to insult people who have strongly held beliefs no matter how crazy I may think them to be. You are right to think that we have little to communicate with each other. Your belief in The Bible is inconsistent with objectivity. Because you believe that there is ONE Bible that justifies the capital letter every time and that you seem sincere in your belief that this work of men contains The Word of The One God there is no room for discussion.

I believe that all bibles and all stories of all gods are equal, that is, equally wrong.

Your idea that there is a power in the world whose only desire is to do Evil is quite bizarre. Even more bizarre than the belief in a creator god. I can assure you that I have never been deceived by any force of the supernatural. To me the supernatural is an oxymoron.

You don't know how anything mindless could want to do anything. You are right, I was talking metaphorically. (actually I wasn't even talking, that was another metaphor) It is often a convenient shorthand to talk about inanimate things wanting things. Like water "wanting to find its level". You seem to use your dictionary as a weapon too, or as a drunk uses a lamppost, more for support than illumination.

Here is an illustration. A sieve. Dip your sieve in a stream and what happens? Things get stuck in the mesh. But not randomly. Only things bigger than the mesh will not pass through. Does this imply anything? Has the sieve got a purpose? Not necessarily. A similar effect could be achieved randomly by a series of twigs caught in the stream, they would catch leaves and other debris just as effectively as a man-made sieve or fishing net. Purpose and design are not necessary to perform a function. Everything you look at you view through your prejudices, you see purpose everywhere because your brain has been "designed" by evolution to do so. A purpose seeing brain is one that can avoid traps, either literal or figurative.

Just another little point; if your God Almighty is so all-powerful (exactly like a bronze-age chieftain might be) that he can create light then the sun etc. just by saying so, why does he bother with DNA? Why not just use his all-powerful mind to decide what will happen when two animals mate? You believe he has the power to know all, be everywhere and care about everything why did he bother with designing a mechanism that almost looks like it could run without him? Oh, silly me. Being a mere mortal, although created in His image, I cannot expect to understand His mysterious Ways. (should I have capitalized mysterious?)

Just ask your self who sold you those beliefs. The people who told you that faith without proof was better than science were the same people who told you that there was an Almighty God, that he talked to certain men long ago, that he would listen to your prayers, but any reply you heard was not from God but from the devil sent to tempt you.

I know you could not let yourself do it but I have got to try this; try to design yourself a religion. Try to put together ideas that go together and help re-enforce each other and protect the central dogma/bullshit from the attacks of doubt and even obvious disproof. How would you do it? You couldn't. It cannot be done in one go. But instead try to see how a religion could evolve once certain ideas got put together. "I believe in anything that is written down" is not a very good idea to form a religion, but add it to "This man over here has voices in his head that he says are from a sort of big man that made everything", then you are getting a bit better. Add in the idea that faith is better than proof and you are really getting somewhere. Next you need to explain why people are still not understanding what you are telling them, time to bring in another character who wants you not to believe, a bad person that is easy to hate...

Then you need to give a few reasons to spread the ideas. Rewards and punishments. But the best bit is that you are not doing it to reward yourself, you are doing it to save others from punishment. That is a cracking idea. You are giving all this bullshit to me because you are trying to do me a favour, and incidentally, of minor importance, sucking up to the biggest boss in town.

I can promise you that I am not writing this under duress, or taking dictation from a devil perched on my left shoulder. (Always the left, sinister that is...) I am doing it because I think that you might actually be happier thinking your own thoughts and not spending your entire waking life bent to the purpose of spreading these God-ideas that have neither a basis in fact nor any purpose. They survive because they have what it takes to survive. They don't do you any good, but you do them good. Not that they have any real existence in any tangible form. But then you have no difficulty at certain times, when it suits them, to believe in intangible things.

If you want to reply the same rules apply, I am happy to discuss your views only in your own words.

Is God lazy or stupid?

If I had the power to toss about a few thunderbolts at will with nobody around to stop me I wouldn't let anybody misquote me with impunity. But God seems to. There are thousands of mutually exclusive versions of the beliefs, nature, name, word and character of god or the gods. Yet he/she/it/they do nothing about it. Is this stupidity or idleness?

Oh, sorry, I forgot, we lesser mortals are not suppossed to ask questions about the motives of god. Says who? Errr... God?

You are gravely mistaken if you think God has done nothing about the different truth claims of the world religions. The truth is that He sent His Son to earth as the embodiment of all Truth, in human form. Can you think of anything more awesome than this?

Yes. I can. How about an idea that replicates itself, that is so infectious that it encourages people to kill and die for it. An idea that spreads and yet cannot be benefitted by spreading, because it is just an idea. An idea that is wrong.

You claim what you believe is the truth, sorry, the Truth, or His Truth. Who told you it was true? Who told you that it was His Truth? The same people who told you the story, the same people who told you that believing in the story without proof was better than believing in anything else, even with proof. If that isn't amazing I don't know what is. The idea has no intelligence or foresight, it isn't true or useful to anybody, it causes wars and leads people to die without raising children and yet it still spreads.

And I have little doubt now that this idea I am writing about is now being defended in your brain, your urge to kill me for doubting His Truth is being tempered by other messages, you will shortly resolve the conflict in your brain, pity me and pray for my soul. Now, that is an awesome idea!

If you ever get a chance to use your brain for your own purposes, other than spreading His Holy Truth (did I miss any capital letters?) why not pop in on my website and do some free-form thinking?

Keep the wonder, lose the faith,

Martin

By the way, I always capitalize "Earth" because it is real and our home, I think it deserves a capital letter if "I" do.

Did it ever occur to you that God can speak to someone's heart directly? I guess not, since you refuse to look for anything beyond what you can percieve with your physical senses. No, I don't want to kill you. I was in your position once. I will do this: I challenge you to explain where all this came from. If you can provide a credible explanation for all that is outside of the Hand of a Creator, so be it. I'll visit your website; unlike you, my mind is still open.

I went to your website, and it's definitely thought provoking. I was particularly intrigued by your thoughts about a theoretical "big bang". I suggest you comb through all those sources of information at your disposal; you'll find that the big bang theory (order out of chaos) is contrary to all known laws of physics.

Yes, I am sure it is. And the bible is full of excellent physics isn't it? Let there be light, then a couple of days later create the sun... If your God is so clever and talked to so many good men why did he not give one single shred of good physics to them? Why didn't he tell them that the world was a sphere?That light travels at a certain speed, that the Earth was not the centre of the Universe? Would that have caused some terrible paradox and destroyed creation? Why did he not tell them a single thing that they did not already believe, rightly or wrongly?

Why have you never doubted what they told you? Or considered why they told you it? I doubt things all the time. I question all my beliefs on a regular basis. I ask myself who told me the things I believe in and I question their motives. I don't have a perfect open mind, I accept that I can only have a finite picture of an infinite Universe, I cannot read everything, study everything, question every assumption. But do you ever question any?

In the meantime, I'll pray for you.

John

Will I notice? Do I care?

(unlike you, my mind is still open.) Sorry, but that tactic does not work on me. I do not subscribe to the view that an open mind is the ultimate liberal-freethinking virtue. To me truth is too important to leave hostage to falsehood. I do not believe that truth will win against dogma even in a fair fight. I don't play with that set of pre-suppositions. I am sure you thought you were taunting me by saying that I did not have an open mind.

To me the truth cannot be measured by an opinion poll. Truth is not relative, it does not vary with your point of view.

I have a filtered mind. I change my views when I find I have been wrong. I have changed my mind several times on fairly major points. My mind is not closed. Neither is it wide open and exposed to any passing dogma. I will not expose myself to dangerous ideas, flaky ideas and particularly to contagious flaky ideas.

I can see right through your religion. I know why it arose, why it spread, how it has evolved to survive. I admire it in the same way I admire a crocodile, for very much the same reasons; with respect, and keeping a safe distance.

All too often people accuse other people of having closed minds when they refuse to share the same views.

You challenge me to explain "all this". Why? Why does it need an explanation? Why do you seek a purpose in "all this"?

What is the purpose of, say, erosion? Or oxidation? Or gravity? The questions show the bias of your human mind. Most things do not have a purpose. I will hazard a guess that only the actions of self-conscious beings have purposes in the way you suggest. Everything else has purpose in only the metaphorical, abstract sense. The behaviours of animals seem to be working towards a purpose, but are they? We cannot really be sure. If you look at the way genes operate it can seem that they act as if their purpose is to survive and propagate. But it isn't. They seem to have those behaviours that seem to have those purposes but there is no engine within them to have a will or purpose. But if they did not behave in the way they do their apparent purpose would not be achieved. Just as if water did not find it's own level it's purpose of flowing into the sea would not be achieved. Genes and water molecules do not have any purposes, but it can be easier to see things as if they do. Just as it is easier to mend your car if you think that the fuel injector system has the "purpose" of introducing a fuel-air mixture into the cylinders. But it too has no will. To anticipate your argument here I do not think that whether or not there is a designer makes any difference.

The hills to the east of me make the area where I live very wet. They cause relief rainfall. Is that because they have been designed to do that? Or is it that the hills formed where they are because forces deep in the earth long ago just happened to push upwards on that particular bit of the crust. Those forces did not plan to make my garden very wet. To put it crudely, shit happens. Those hills do not have a purpose. Neither does the Universe. Neither does life. It is just your suspicious mind that sees reasons behind everything. Goats don't just die, evil people make them die. There must be forces at work here with human characteristics, plans and purposes. The explanation of why your brain seeks these explanations is quite enlightening. The answer is again evolutionary, it usually is :-)

Because there is no purpose outside of the human world I don't bother looking to find an explanation for everything. I am glad that some people do though.

I can't furnish you with a convincing explanation of "all this". But I can hope to show you that most of the questions you are asking are not sensible questions. "Why is the sky blue?" Is a boring question, easily answered, and I keep forgetting the answer, it is not a profound or helpful question. "Why are we here?" Is a question that is easily answered, but most people find the explanation unsatisfying. But that does not mean that there is a better answer that will be satisfying. We are here because all our ancestors survived every trial and managed to breed. That is it. The answer. If you still don't find it a satisfying answer that is not my problem, neither does it make the answer wrong.

"Did it ever occur to you that God can speak to someone's heart directly? I guess not, since you refuse to look for anything beyond what you can perceive with your physical senses." I find this a strange question. Yes of course that idea has occurred to me, and I have dismissed it fully.

My heart pumps blood, it does not think. I do not believe there is a God. I believe that those people that claim to hear the voice of God are deluded. The prophets should have been given psychiatric help not followed by gullible people.

Yes I do refuse to look at things beyond my physical senses. If I experienced a voice within my head that seemed to come from outside of "me" I would not assume that I should listen to it, quite the contrary. I can say that I am glad that I have never had any "foreign" voices in my head. Not every thought I have comes from the same "level of consciousness" but they are all my thoughts.

People who have voices within their heads are dangerous people. "External" voices can make people do things that they know logically are wrong, but an external justification can make anything right. If a voice told me to take my son to a mountain top and kill him I would be asking for help from the next person I saw. Men who respond to voices like that should not be venerated, they should be treated.

Prove it!

What do you want me to prove? I said I do not have a fully open mind, I keep bullshit at bay. I have my own opinions and I express them. I change my mind when I find I have been wrong. I have done so on several occasions. I have nothing to prove, I do not have unfounded belief in impossible things, I do not feel the need to prove everything I believe in because I am not making exceptional claims about my opinions. What should I feel the need to prove?

Keep the wonder, lose the faith,

Martin

Quite simply, you have said that you believe things happen entirely by chance. You claim that is the truth. Truth must be based on a preponderance of evidence to be true. Where is your evidence? Science has never been able to prove random chance rather than intelligent design. Yet you say "shit happens" as if that is the absolute truth. This you say without offering any proof. So don't tell me "lose the faith" when you are taking something that has not been proven true completely on faith. It appears that you are the one who lost the wonder.

Keep the wonder, lose the faith,

Martin

That is a signature file. It simply ensures that I sign every piece I write and I include my URL. Don't take it too personally. There are a lot more elaborate and annoying signatures out there.

Can you prove to me that shit doesn't just happen? That God decrees that shit happens? I am getting bored with this. You don't believe in science you believe in faith. So why should I jump through the hoops that you hold out for me? I am not a scientist. I get paid to be a salesman, but I am not very good at it. To be good at selling you have to believe in your product despite evidence to the contrary. Have you ever had a career in sales? You will probably be a natural.

I will leave it at that. Let's agree to differ. I'm thoroughly bored with this correspondence. If you seriously want to learn about the way the universe really works I will suggest some books that have been written by people within the last thirty years who wrote in your language and not only accepted the possibility that they might be wrong, they actually welcomed the challenge. Unlike the book you want me to read, written in a language that nobody now speaks by people who would like to see you roast for all eternity if you denied that they were right.

Insulting the men who penned the words of scripture does not make those words any less the Truth. Here is some truth you can check any way you please: Evolution is as much a religion as Christianity, with some important differences. The most important difference is in the absolute fluidity of efvolutionary thought. Every new scientific discovery forces modification of the theory. We are now to the point where highly respected scientists are suggesting that life came here by the hands of aliens from outer space. You don't have to like that fact, but you ought to check it out to see for yourself. At the same time, the Bible,which you reject and ridicule out of hand,has consistently been proven to be true with each new relavent archeological discovery that is made. You can blow that fact off, but if you check it out, you won't be able to deny it.

"Insulting the men who penned the words of scripture does not make those words any less the Truth." Using a capital letter does not make it the truth either.

"Here is some truth you can check any way you please: Evolution is as much a religion as Christianity, with some important > > differences. The most important difference is in the absolute fluidity of efvolutionary thought. Every new scientific discovery forces modification of the theory." Is that suppossed to be a NEGATIVE feature?

"We are now to the point where highly respected scientists are suggesting that life came here by the hands of aliens from outer space." So? It sounds rather unlikely and would not solve any mysteries of life but it might be true. Whether I like an idea has very little relevence to the truth of it.

"You don't have to like that fact, but you ought to check it out to see for yourself." [ -yawn-] "At the same time, the Bible,which you reject and ridicule out of hand, has consistently been proven to be true with each new relavent archeological discovery that is made. You can blow that fact off, but if you check it out, you won't be able to deny it." Creation science is an oxymoron. (look it up)

I never ridicule anything out of hand. The bible is hardly worth any effort to ridicule, you bible-bashers do it far more diservice than I ever could. The bible is a series of books written by several men over a few thousand years. It was written for different reasons by different people at different times. The language varies, the author varies. Some books were collected together on a couple of occasions and edited after a fashion by other men. Some books made it, others did not. The bible contains history, genealogy, mythology, poems and songs. The idea that this collection of writing should be considered The Truth, the only truth and the whole truth is just completely barking mad.

You wear your bible belief like a turtle wears a shell. It protects you and defines you. You never climbed in, you can never climb out. You just grew together.

If you saw somebody falling out of a 'plane from 20,000 feet without a parachute, but they thought they had one, would you tell them? If you don't tell them they will die. If you do tell them they will die anyway, but in panic. Interesting dilema.

Smile as you hold that rip chord... I'm smiling already. I do not fear death.

oo000oo

So, you're saying the fact that all the consistency of mud is a GOOD thing? Every time a new scientific discovery is made, it tends to drive another nail in the coffin of evolutionary theory. Yet people like you still accept it as the gospel. You constantly have to change what your version of the truth is, yet you call me "barking mad" because I place my faith (as opposed to yours) in the God of the Bible. Everything you say about the Bible being a collection of books written over many years is right. Yet you neglected to mention one thing. As I said before, the Bible has consistently been shown to be accurate in its information AND its predictions. There have been well over 200 prophecies shown to have been fulfilled as they are spelled out in the Bible. You can't find that kind of accuracy even in scientific discovery. Yet you say those who place their trust in what is written in the Bible are "barking mad", Yeah Right!

oo000oo

"So, you're saying the fact that all the consistency of mud is a GOOD thing?" Yes. The job of science is to find the truth that is out there not to find support for the "Truth" we already know, that is the job of creation science and the like. Many so called scientific breakthroughs turn out to be misguided, the results of bad scientists wanting to take a short-cut to fame and fortune.

"Every time a new scientific discovery is made, it tends to drive another nail in the coffin of evolutionary theory. Yet people like you still accept it as the gospel. You constantly have to change what your version of the truth is, yet you call me "barking mad" because I place my faith (as opposed to yours) in the God of the Bible." I do not have a gospel. Any idea that I hold to be a fact is open to challenge. I am very confident that there will be some new idea soon that helps to explain better the origin of species. Evolution is obviously part of the answer but there is a mystery in speciation, or at the very least the truth, if we know it, has yet to be fully explained to the satisfaction of many non-scientists such as myself.

"Everything you say about the Bible being a collection of books written over many years is right. Yet you neglected to mention one thing. As I said before, the Bible has consistently been shown to be accurate in its information AND its predictions. There have been well over 200 prophecies shown to have been fulfilled as they are spelled out in the Bible. You can't> find that kind of accuracy even in scientific discovery."Where in the bible is a description of the shape of the Earth, the size of the Universe or the scale of the atom? Minor little details that an all powerful God could have passed on to his prophets. God was not averse to blowing the minds of prophets in his young turn-them-into-salt days, why didn't he once pass on some real knowledge?

If you send me a biblical passage with some great explanation and de-coding analysis that will show nothing except the resourcefulness of the faithful. No bishop taught that the world was a sphere in the dark ages, the time when biblical analysis was at its height.

What is the difference between the ideas of men who you would class as lunatics and prophets? There are many thousands of people alive today who know with the same certainty you show that they have received a message from God. God has told them to kill their wives and children, to burn down churches, to walk around in orange tracksuits, to rape women and to avoid draft to the army. 99% of rational people rightly say they are deluded. Your prophets wrote their stories long ago and you have been told that they were correct. You have been told that their words are the words of God and you have been told that to believe without evidence is a virtue. You will defend to the death, whoever God wills to die, your beliefs in the legitimacy of these "revelations" of men long dead.

Why has God not revealed any new works of biblical importance for nearly two thousand years? Why has he never spoken to anybody outside the Judeo-Christian world? Why does the nature of God seem to change over time? Vengeful, jealous and fond of cremated goats one century, caring and nurturing the next? The simple, scientific explanation of these facts is that all "voices from God" come from the same source, a diseased mind. That explains everything far more elegantly than any of your explanations.

Why the ideas are passed on is not a mystery. Where they come from is not a mystery. Why people believe some but not others is not a mystery. Why people like you continue to argue as if you were rational is not a mystery. The only thing I cannot understand is why I have wasted so much of my time on you. I will have to stop. I have a life to live and I don't want to waste it any more.

oo000oo

Admittedly, the Bible doesn't contain a lot of information about the details of God's creation (though there are some interesting things in it, like a fairly detailed description of the water cyle in the book of Jeremiah-penned several hundred years before the advent of the study of meteorology). God never expected men not to learn. The Bible is replete with exortations to learn, study, and acquire knowledge. That in and of itself doesn't make God any less God or the Bible any less true.

"No bishop taught that the world was a sphere in the dark ages, the time when biblical analyses was at its height". Actually, the dark ages were a time of profound ignorance and suppression of the Bible. Translations into the common languages were forbidden out of fear that people would find out what the Truth was. It was not until the time of Luther and Tyndale that the Bible began to be at all understood. The time biblical analyses is at its height is now.

"What is the difference between the ideas of men who you would classify as lunatics and prophets?" The prophets of the Bible have consistently been right. "Your prophets wrote their stories long ago and you have been told that they were correct." No, the prophets foretold events and history proved them correct.

"You have been told that their words are the words of God and you have been told that to believe without evidence is a virtue." Actually, God repeatedly challenges people to prove him. Evolutionists expect us to believe what they say when all scientific evidence contradicts them. At least what I believe is grounded in proper science. Why has God not revealed any new works of biblical importance for nearly two thousand years? What's the point? Why does the nature of God seem to change over time? It doesn't. Why has he never spoken to anybody outside the Judeo-Christian word? He has. "The simple scientific explanation of these facts is that all 'voices from God' come from the same source, a diseased mind" Diseased minds don't generate accurate information. The men who penned the words of the Bible have been consistently shown to be right.

"The only thing I cannot understand is why I have wasted so much of my time on you" I guess it's because I have had a response for everything you have said and you can't really refute me. Someone you consider "barking mad" has offered you a rational argument for believing something you think is rubbish and you can offer no real rebuttal. Quite simply, you know I'm right and you can't stand it. What makes it even worse for you is that I won't stop answering you. If you try to rebut me again, I'll just keep answering you back. I guess it would be better for you to quit now.

So unless I hear from you again,

God Bless You.

John

oo000oo

Thank you saving my soul. I will be in Church on Sunday. I had this voice in my head telling me to do this. If you find me there on Sunday you will know I am not mad because it has come to pass.

oo000oo

If you're going to insult my intelligence, at least use good grammer!

oo000oo

What was wrong with the grammar? It was just a quirky mix of tenses. I have a great respect for your intelligence. To hold the views you do in the current world requires a great deal of skill and mental athleticism.

Have you read the page on my site titled "Willett's Wager"? In that I suggest that views such as yours will hold out for ever and will rise above any logical challenge. We could go on for ever trying to beat each other over the head with logical arguments but that will never settle the matter, for a start your logic and mine seem like oil and water. I will give up the attempt. It does not matter to me that you hold the views you do. I have given the attempt to talk some sense into you a good shot but it is obviously a wasted effort. You have such a good set of defence mechanisms that you will only change your opinion if you choose to.

I feel like a cougar that has tried to eat a porcupine, and then decided that porcupine meat probably doesn't taste nice anyway...

Life is short. Believe what you want. If you ever get to doubt what you have been told by your Good Book and it's promoters then I will be happy to exchange thoughts with you again.

oo000oo

I appreciate your respect for my beliefs. I hope you don't think I was trying to "beat you over the head" with my beliefs. I rather enjoyed the exchange. It is dialogue with someone who dissagrees with me which helps me engage my mental capacity a bit more fully. I work in a brake factory, so you can imagine the mindless monotony I have to endure daily.

I'm sorry about that last comment I sent you. I've just gotten used to people resorting to sarcasm when they run out of logical arguments for what they believe, and it tends to make me react a little quickly. You have proven to be very good at making your points. The problem you have is that so much of what you believe defies logic. The only reason I say that is because I've been told so much of the things you've said for most of my life, and I've found so many contradictions in them.

For instance: how can the earth be 4.8 billion years old when it is a known scientific fact that the sun is shrinking at a rate that would have put it at a size large enough to swallow the earth 4.8 billion years ago?

I don't know. But known scientific facts have a tendency to be proved wrong later, especially those that "forbid" what seems to be the reality. Lord Kelvin dismissed all of geology as a waste of time in a few brief words when he "proved" that the Earth was too hot to be as old as geologists declared it. The geologists knew he was wrong but couldn't prove it. The proof came later when the heating effect of radioactive decay was discovered. I strongly suspect that you know nothing about the shrinking of the sun other than what has been passed to you by an excited creation defender who scours the scientific reports ignoring the 99% that is inconvenient and seizing on the few nuggets of potential controversy.

If Darwin's theory was supposed to be supported by the fossil record, why are there absolutely no "links" from one species to another in the fossil record? Besides, there is simply no evolutionary process of the type described by evolutionary theorists going on now. Salmon stay salmon no matter how long the species sticks around. Even if all the salmon die out, no salmon egg will ever produce a hen. Yet evolutionary theory has the belief that a salmon can produce a hen, given enough time and the right amount of circumstances, at its core. The chances of that ever happening (as a man so well-read as yourself probably already knows ) are beyond the realm of impossibility.

I am not sure whether your misunderstanding of the basic theory of evolution is due to ignorance in the sense of not knowing or ignorance in the sense of ignoring. If you are simply unaware of how evolution works (you can read that as supposed to work, I am sure you will) then I can strongly recommend an excellent book on the issue that addresses the point exactly. Climbing Mount Improbable, by Richard Dawkins. Dawkins explains quite simply and with wonderful style how things as spectacularly unlikely as the complex organisms we see around us can be explained without any need to postulate anything particularly unlikely. The Mount Improbable of the title is the enormous amount of improbability required to explain any complex organism. It is not difficult to explain how it is done, it is done exactly the same way as you would climb a mountain, one small step at a time. A salmon will never evolve into a bird because it can survive better by being a better salmon. Birds became birds because being a bit more birdlike was better than being what they were before, at every step.

The one thing I hope you've noticed in all our conversations is that I've not once quoted scripture to you. All I've done is give you facts easily verified or disproven with a little research. I know most athiests hate having scripture quoted to them, since they consider the Bible to be an antiquated and irrelevent work, and most Christians are totally clueless to this fact. So I've tried not to insult your intelligence by quoting from a work you hold in such disregard.

Nevertheless, I will tell you that it matters very much to me that you hold the views you do. We both strongly hold to our views; however unlike my views, which will make absolutely no difference to my life or yours if they're wrong, the views you hold to will, if they're wrong, ultimately decide your fate in eternity.

So please indulge me for a few moments.

Have you ever really questioned the things YOU were taught? You're awfully sure of yourself in your writings, but do you really know beyond the shadow of a doubt that what you believe is "rock solid"? You constantly tell me ABOUT the Bible, but do you know what is in it. Have you read it for yourself, or are you just regurgitating what you've heard someone you highly respect say about it? Do you even bother to find out if anything I've said to you is true or false? Or do you just dismiss me and those like me out of hand because you're just to smart to take Christianity seriously? I can see how one might find it easier to blow someone off as a nut case rather than do the intellectually honest thing and consider the possibility that the Bible might have relavance in the 21st century. Is this your stand?

Obviously, I can't answer those questions for you. I don't really want you to respond to this, though you seem to be the guy who has to have the last word in any discussion. All I really would like you to do is ponder the things I've laid out. If you really respect old "barking mad" me at all, just please do that.

I am constantly questioning everything I have been taught. I was taught Christianity, I have learned atheism. I always need to know why somebody is telling me something, I know it is rarely for my own good. You are constantly going on about science. Have you ever done any? Have you ever read any scientific books? You quote science very selectively. I have come across "creation science" websites that cobble together a huge list of reasons why creation is right. They are mutually contradictory. Proof one relies on a convenient fact that is then disputed in proof two. Proof twelve proves that the Earth cannot be more than 12,000 years old, proof thirteen shows that the Earth is less than half a million years old but more than 200,000 years old. These proofs are not science. Most scientific theories turn out to be wrong.

Science as a whole is a slowly emerging picture that becomes clearer and clearer. Sometimes a big change happens and a man will become a legend, far more often a scientist will try to make a big change in the picture and will be shown to be wrong.

The Bible is not a mystery to me. I have heard it read many times, I have tried to read it and failed. It doesn't grip me. I am fed up with people telling me to open my mind to the ideas they are pushing. Christianity has had far too much of my time and attention already. It is a bogus series of ideas that mesh well together to create an illusion of sense.

Why not answer this one question:- Why did God tell the writers of the Bible the truth in the way he did, in one place, in one culture? Why did he just happen to choose to tell The Truth, the only truth, to the people who had the luck to be living at the heart of the ancient world. The people who had the right crops, animals and technology to spread themselves and their message of the only version of the truth to the lands their descendants (the carriers of the message, not the genes) would over-run. Why did he not tell the truth to a small tribe of pygmies or to some Amazonian Indians? He could have done so easily. If the truth will always win out then he could have given it to one of the meek who were supposed to inherit the Earth, or even to all men, at once.

The idea that the Truth is what is carried in the saddlebags of those who conquer is just too fishy for me to believe. It stinks. The whole idea of one truth revealed by God to one group of people simply stinks.

I was brought up in a Christian family. All my relatives were and are Christian. Nobody told me to be an atheist. I simply made up my own mind. I have had a lot of exposure to the Bible. I have heard it read many times by people who tried to make out that it had wonderful significance. I was not convinced. I found it all to be a colossal waste of time. I tried to read it for myself on several occasions but I can never get beyond a couple of pages. It is not a good book. It is of no more value to the world than any other book of a similar age. I have not ignored the Bible, I have just been totally under-wealmed by it. I do not subscribe to the idea that if two hundred million people read something and spend a lot of time on it that it must be significant and they could not possibly be wasting their time. They are.

Prayer is a con trick. Any prayer that is seemingly answered is a miracle, any that is not answered is due to either a lack of faith or because God has some other mysterious plan in mind that we are not even allowed to speculate about. Can you see any difference between the prayers of the Christians and the incantations of witches, shaman, witch-doctors, druids or priests of Baal? Naturally you can, you are right, they were wrong. I have a much simpler explanation for it.

Not only am I interested in science I am also interested in history. Looking back across history and assuming that all religion is the equivalent of an infection gives you a very good insight into what has happened. A much better insight than the idea that the truth was written down once by people who have passed it on to everyone they meet for their own good. Religious ideas are memes, ideas that replicate themselves because they can. They spread not because they are good for us but because we are good for them. If you can prove to me that you have understood what I have just wrote I might consider continuing the correspondence.

This is a simple magic trick that will amuse adults and children alike.

From a pack of playing cards take out a black two, the two of clubs or spades. Hold it side-up at arm's length, close your left eye and with your right eye look very hard at the spot on the left; now move it very slowly towards you, still looking hard at the left spot. For a while you will see both, but at a certain distance the spot on the right will vanish then re-appear as it comes closer. Now move it slowly away from you again; it will vanish and re-appear.

The explanation is very simple. The consequences are mind-blowing.

There is a blind spot in everyone's vision. This trick allows you to convince other people that you can make things disappear by the power of concentration or by saying some mumbo-jumbo incantations. The killer is why there is a blind spot.

There is a blind spot in your vision because your eyes are inside out. They are inside out because of a fluke of evolution. If you, as a camera designer or a creator-god were to sit down and design an eye you would naturally put the clear bits at the front, then a lens, then photo-receptors and finally nerves or wires to transmit the data back to wherever it was to be processed. That much is obvious. It cannot possibly be a better idea to put the nerves between the squishy liquid stuff and the photo-receptors, can it? If you did that you would need a software work-around to convince the animal that a donut shaped image was normal... That can't be sensible can it? But this is what happens in every animal that is descended from the simplest fish. Eagles have a donut vision, we do, anchovies do.

For me that just about wraps it up for God.

Oh, if the trick doesn't work for you then you can exclude fish from your family tree.

It doesn't work for squid or octopuses, they evolved eyes with lenses and retinas but were lucky enough to do it the sensible way around, retina in front of the nerves. Once evolution takes a particular turn it cannot go back. No animal could evolve from having eyes inside out to eyes the sensible way round without being blind in the intermediate generations before evolution can re-adjust the focus. Evolution cannot work on genetic material in the digestive system of another animal. If a mutation is not as good or better to the host individual it will not be passed on. Evolution always proceeds by single steps. Just as a river will only ever flow downhill, it will never take a short detour uphill to save itself the bother of meandering.

Our eyes are inside out, we have to make the best of it.

At least it allows us the opportunity to amuse small children.

Martin

As an atheist I post on alt.agnosticism because I see agnostics as a challenge. Like so many men find lesbians a challenge. By saying that you are an agnostic you show that you are open to persuasion, you don't simply believe what you have been told to believe.

I know the difference between not knowing there is a God and knowing there is not a God.

I have dabbled with philosophy and found it very heavy going, like algebra but without right answers. I don't bother with it much now. I let philosophers get on with wasting each other's time. Summing up my philosophy:-

1] There is such a thing as truth. And it is. (It just is, that is all truth does.)

2] The cat is dead before you open the box and the tree always makes a sound when it falls.

3] Relativity only works with space and time, not truth.

4] I exist.

5] God don't.

6] There is no meaning of life.

7] Life is far too easy to reproduce to bother recycling.

If you have spent several years in academic institutions you will have been fed the line that philosophy matters. That is hardly surprising. I was fed the line that my degree subject mattered. The idea that there are 6 billion versions of the truth and all are equally valid is liberal mumbo-jumbo. "You say I'm right and I'll say you're right."

There is no connection between a bit of a dead rabbit and the lottery results. Whatever a few thousand people might think. I have my version of reality, it is almost certainly wrong in many ways, but I do my best to improve the fit between my idea of truth and the fundamental reality. Reality is what exists whether or not you believe in it. I know I cannot change reality, but I can improve my own image of reality. Academic philosophers never find the answer for the same reason Jerry Springer never ends his discussions with a simple "she's right, he's wrong" conclusion; they get paid to keep the debate going, and to believe that it matters.

A few tips for the recent student:-

1] The subject that any lecturer teaches is important, to him, it pays the bills (which also exist whether or not we believe in them).

2] An open mind is a teacher's friend, it makes his job easier. If he get you to think that having an open mind is the supreme virtue then his job is even easier.

3] No, there doesn't have to be something in it. 100,000 lemmings can be wrong. As can 2 billion Christians or even every sentient being in the Universe.

4] Relativity doesn't work with truth. Neither does democracy or rule of law.

To me agnosticism is a cop out. There either is or is not a god. What you think you can know is something else. It has to be a matter of judgement, there cannot be a proof. I see it as a simple matter. Imagine there is no god. Imagine two philosophers sitting on a deserted beach. One postulates there is a God. Suddenly everybody has to take sides. The idea of god can never be disproved and will never go away. I make one prediction about alien life; some of them believe in god. I have no idea whether they will have brains but some of them will believe in mysterious invisible unprovable gods. This is a simple piece of mathematics, certain ideas will always spread and can never be disproved. It is inherent in the concept of communication between intelligent entities. And even when we are aware of how the ideas spread and why they were invented and why they spread they still spread. And people still waste their lives away talking about them...