Godless Intelligent Design Theory

Moderator Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of the museum’s Hayden Planetarium, put the odds at 50-50 that our entire existence is a program on someone else’s hard drive. “I think the likelihood may be very high,” he said…Somewhere out there could be a being whose intelligence is that much greater than our own. “We would be drooling, blithering idiots in their presence,” he said. “If that’s the case, it is easy for me to imagine that everything in our lives is just a creation of some other entity for their entertainment.”

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/are-we-living-in-a-computer-simulation/

Tyson’s comment “it is easy for me to imagine that everything in our lives is just a creation of some other entity for their entertainment” compares well with a comment I made here:

Life is deadly serious to us and living things because it’s our life, but if God made them, they might not be much more to him than the toys characters in our video games or what Rube Goldberg machines are to us.

comment 113673 in Philosophy and Complexity of Rube Goldberg Machines

and newton’s response

Human suffering is just entertainment for this God of yours,Sal? Nice.

comment 113676 in Philosophy and Complexity of Rube Goldberg Machines

So, what Tyson says is comparable to what I’ve said about this universe being something that God constructs and destroys for his amusement and delight, not ours. The main difference is Tyson’s view of the “creator” is anti-Christian. Even though he might characterize the “creators” as a non-deity, they have an equivalent skill set as far as we are concerned.

Also from the same Scientific American article:

But some were more contemplative, saying the possibility raises some weighty spiritual questions. “If the simulation hypothesis is valid then we open the door to eternal life and resurrection and things that formally have been discussed in the realm of religion,” Gates suggested.

This is the ID theory akin to Hoyle and Tipler and Barrow.

Tipler outlined these same ideas decades ago in the book, Physics of Immortality: Modern Cosmology and the Resurrection of the Dead.

Tipler became an ID proponent of sorts as a consequence of his research.

87 thoughts on “Godless Intelligent Design Theory

  1. walto:
    Actually, I’m kind of surprised hotshoe hasn’t met any ISB fans before now. They were pretty big. I mean, Judy Collins even butchered one of their songs (‘First Girl I Loved’) onto the Billboard lists, IIRC.

    Their Scientology folk songs weren’t as good.

    Glen Davidson

  2. stcordova: According to the Bible, when Adam sinned, humanity became children of the devil.We may seem worthy to each other of better treatment than what God gives to us, but we are not the ultimate judge.

    Thanks. I think I get your position. But I have to say it would be considered insane if there weren’t so many others who join you. Your god is an incoherent god. Also, it seems an even more bleak worldview than the old Norse one; that doesn’t mean it isn’t true, but it sure must be sad to be you.

    When I accepted by faith that I was the object of God’s wrath outside of Jesus, then I no longer view God as a monster but rather humanity as sons of the 1st Adam who sold humanity’s soul to the devil and thus became sons of darkness.

    This seems more like blaming the victim than anything else. How could Adam sell the souls of all his descendants? And if God merely imposes an arbitrary condition as the price of getting that soul back, that’s just evil. Who am I to judge? Hey, somebody has to. If ordinary moral standards don’t apply to God, what good are they?

    Of course, in human terms we don’t feel deserving of all that is bad that happens to us.For myself, if I had the power to heal a child of juvenile cancer, I would, I have no reason to want his life to be miserable.It is not my place to mete out God’s judgment on other humans but to show grace and mercy and compassion as a symbol of God’s grace to me.

    That’s some twisted reasoning. What God does would be considered evil if you did it, and the reason you don’t do evil is to symbolize how God isn’t evil to you, personally?

    God is viewed as merciful because he has withheld the full force of his wrath.As bad a childhood cancer is, it is nothing compared to hell.

    So if I pull out a gun and shoot you in the leg, it’s merciful because I could have shot you in the belly instead? Or does this reasoning only apply to God? Anyway, isn’t that cancerous child still going to hell as soon as the cancer is done with him? How is that merciful? It appears that I’m going to shoot you in the belly in another 10 minutes anyway.

    So to answer your question, I can worship God because He has offered forgiveness in Jesus Christ and thus I’m spared from hell.

    Great for you, but why do you only care about yourself and not the multitudes who aren’t spared? I’m sure Eva Braun worshipped Hitler too, but it would seem to require some serious moral blindness to do so.

    I admire his power and ability to inflict such great retribution on his enemies, but I’m sad most of humanity, those outside of Christ, is the object of his eternal retribution.

    By “his enemies”, you mean all those children with cancer? And how can anyone possibly deserve eternal retribution? This is the most egregious case of the punishment failing to fit the crime that ever was. Anyone who admires that sort of evil has a big problem.

    The bad of this world will only be temporary for those that believe and confess in Jesus and have accepted the free gift of eternal life and forgiveness of sins.Hence for those who have received this gift and will be spared eternal retribution, it becomes possible to love God because He will be good to those that trust in Jesus Christ.

    Again, why the complete lack of concern for those who don’t trust in Jesus Christ? “I’m all right, Jack” is a morally bankrupt philosophy.

  3. John Harshman: Again, why the complete lack of concern for those who don’t trust in Jesus Christ? “I’m all right, Jack” is a morally bankrupt philosophy.

    Not unexpected, coming from someone who aspired to make a living by gambling.

    That is, taking advantage of the intellectually deficient and addicted.

  4. stcordova: it would be far more merciful for the majority of humanity if the Christian God does not exist.

    By the way, I have good news for you.

  5. John Harshman: (in response to stcordova) “By the way, I have good news for you.”

    LOL – Touché! A hit, a very palpable hit.

    Goodness gracious! I have to say that you sir, are indeed on a roll today!

  6. GlenDavidson: Their Scientology folk songs weren’t as good.

    Glen Davidson

    Yeah, that conversion was disturbing. Chick Corea too, right? Based on the stuff he’s done the last couple of decades, I think Robin Williamson dropped that nonsense, but I don’t know for sure. His last couple of recordings on ECM are good.

  7. walto: Yeah, that conversion was disturbing.Chick Corea too, right?

    Yeah, but it didn’t seem to affect his music in a bad way. Return to Forever songs are full of Scientology references if you know how to find them, but Light as a Feather is still a classic.

  8. walto: Yeah, that conversion was disturbing.Chick Corea too, right?Based on the stuff he’s done the last couple of decades, I think Robin Williamson dropped that nonsense, but I don’t know for sure. His last couple of recordings on ECM are good.

    I had never heard of them, so Googled a bit, and found the Scientology conversion interesting (to get off of drugs, I think). Just going off of some site’s list, Williamson and the rest were “out” of Scientology, except for “Licorice,” who disappeared, and “Sue” somebody who was probably still in it.

    Sometimes one needs to get over the dependency used to counter drug dependency. Many don’t.

    Glen Davidson

  9. stcordova: That’s up to you, but if the Christian God is real, one might do anything to avoid eternal punishment at the hands of such a cruel God.

    I self-identify as an Evangelical Christian.I’m a member in good standing in the Presbyterian Church in America.

    If your Christian god is as malevolent and cruel as you expect, why would you even believe it’s promises about heaven and hell? It would be perfectly in line with an evil trickster such as that God you worship to have one spend a lifetime of devotion and obedience to it, only to be thrown into the pit of fire at the end as the butt of the ultimate cruel joke.

    What you seem to be involved in is not worship, merely masochism.

  10. stcordova: Where else is there to turn?

    How about reality? Enjoy your life, be the best person you can be, and when it’s over, say “it’s over”.

  11. Mung:
    A truly cruel god would send atheists to heaven.

    to spend eternity with Ken ham and Sal.

    Twilight Zone did something like that.

  12. Mung:
    A truly cruel god would send atheists to heaven.

    Considering the expectations of heaven I’ve seen from some of you folk, I would actually agree with you here.

  13. Heaven is a place where nothing ever happens.

    There is a party, everyone is there.
    Everyone will leave at exactly the same time.
    Its hard to imagine that nothing at all
    could be so exciting, could be this much fun.

    Talking Heads, “Heaven.”

    Who knows, maybe nothing could be wonderful.

    There, we might be presuppositionalists each and all, marveling at its exquisite circularity.

    Glen Davidson

  14. GlenDavidson: I had never heard of them, so Googled a bit, and found the Scientology conversion interesting (to get off of drugs, I think).Just going off of some site’s list, Williamson and the rest were “out” of Scientology, except for “Licorice,” who disappeared, and “Sue” somebody who was probably still in it.

    Sometimes one needs to get over the dependency used to counter drug dependency.Many don’t.

    Glen Davidson

    Interesting, thanks. I don’t remember a Sue, but Licorice was an inessential back-up vocalist/tamborine shaker/muse type. The “band” was basically Williamson and Heron (who were both all kinds of awesome both at composition and at playing a ton of instruments). A friend of mine used to plagiarize their lyrics in a Yale poetry class very successfully (back when that sort of thing was harder to detect.)

    Their cult was kind of amazing. Very flower childy, barefoot and robes, extremely long hair, orgies, psychedelia, folklore, exotic brogues, etc. Kind of like Alice in Wonderland meets Vedanta. Scientology seemed pretty incongruous–though equally fantastic.

  15. Certainly the children have seen them
    In quiet places where the moss grows green
    Colored shells jangle together
    The wind is cold, the year is old, the trees whisper together
    And bend in the wind they lean

    Oh, next week a monkey is coming to stay

    If I was a witches hat
    Sitting on her head like a paraffin stove
    I’d fly away and be a bat
    Across the air I would rove

    Stepping like a tightrope walker
    Putting one foot after another
    Wearing black cherries for rings

    My personal favorite, along with The Minotaur.

  16. petrushka,

    Back when I occasionally played at coffee houses, I used to do one with the opening line “I hear the Emperor of China used to wear iron shoes with ease”. I think it was called “The New Moon is Rising” or something like that.

  17. Somebody – petrushka? – already mentioned A Very Cellular Song, which ends with Heron’s famous

    May the long time sun shine upon you
    All love surround you
    And the pure light within you
    Guide you all the way on

    But more appropriate for this thread is the middle of that same song:

    Amoebas are very small

    Oh ah ee oo
    There’s absolutely no strife
    Living the timeless life, I don’t need a wife
    Living the timeless life

    If I need a friend I just give a wriggle
    Split right down the middle
    And when I look there’s two of me
    Both as handsome as can be

    Oh, here we go slithering, here we go
    Slithering and squelching on
    Oh, here we go slithering, here we go
    Slithering and squelching on

    Oh ah ee oo
    There’s absolutely no strife
    Living the timeless life

    Evolution by drift in action, at least as seen through tripping hippy eyes.

  18. Not as appropriate for a wedding, however.

    I think it’s remarkable that someone could sit down and write an Irish blessing that sounds like it’s thousands of years old.

    The sentiment sounds more Quaker than Scientological.

  19. walto:
    Their cult was kind of amazing.Very flower childy, barefoot and robes, extremely long hair, orgies, psychedelia, folklore, exotic brogues, etc.

    I have a couple of their albums in vinyl, although have never listened to them. They belonged to my wife’s sister, and were originals from the late ’60s/early ’70s. Probably not in very good condition.

  20. You should listen to them, RB, especially if one of them is called ‘5000 Spirits or the Laryers of the Onion.’

  21. Mung,

    A truly cruel god would send atheists to heaven.

    Instead of torturing them for eternity for taking a particular position on a proposition? What a bastard.

  22. It does put an interesting spin on ‘discussion’ when one realises one’s interlocutor thinks that if they accept your position they stand a good chance of being tortured for all eternity. No wonder it’s hard to get through!

  23. Allan Miller:
    It does put an interesting spin on ‘discussion’ when one realises one’s interlocutor thinks that if they accept your position they stand a good chance of being tortured for all eternity. No wonder it’s hard to get through!

    I don’t think it’s fear of hell so much as fear of dying. It’s all in DeLillo’s White Noise . And I mean, that IS scary.

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