Simtropolis Religion Thread

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

3 hours ago, igotthis said:

I think that religion is man-made. It is all organized under rules that a set of elite created to impose upon the masses for digestion and control. If there is a God, it is not something man can ever understand and, as a limited-minded man, I would think is more of a deistic-turn - likely not caring about worship or even caring we exist. I tend more toward 'there is no god, or at least nothing to worship".

What a surprise!  You'll find yourself more convinced as you learn more about the universe and people that organized religions are just another business.  For anyone of any rank to say he knows the mind of God is a sin of presumption and is about the deadliest there is if there is a hell.  Even Joan of Arc knew better than to fall into that trap.  When the examiner asked her if the was in a state of grace she said, "If I am in a state of grace I pray God will keep me there.  If I am not in a state of grace I pray that He will put me there."  This saved her from the fire for at least a day.  Beware of charlatans who are "Saved".  They have no way of knowing that, and making such as statement is as damning as it comes.

[igotthis 12]

Sorry, I'm new here and was being gentle. I am termed a hard atheist. It is all bunk to me. Maybe something made everything, but given multiverses and the expanding universe, I don't think we can really ever understand. Perhaps some day - and it will likely surprise us to no end. Certainly nothing of an organized vein - that is solely an anthropocentric POV.

IGT

[Linoa06 1,374]

46 minutes ago, A Nonny Moose said:

What a surprise!  You'll find yourself more convinced as you learn more about the universe and people that organized religions are just another business.  For anyone of any rank to say he knows the mind of God is a sin of presumption and is about the deadliest there is if there is a hell.  Even Joan of Arc knew better than to fall into that trap.  When the examiner asked her if the was in a state of grace she said, "If I am in a state of grace I pray God will keep me there.  If I am not in a state of grace I pray that He will put me there."  This saved her from the fire for at least a day.  Beware of charlatans who are "Saved".  They have no way of knowing that, and making such as statement is as damning as it comes.

I like this interpretation. There may be a God, but for anyone to claim to know God's will (and who doesn't literally follow their holy scriptures - but who does that?) is hypocritical and incredibly petty.

[igotthis 12]

A lot of people who argue there is a God asks a lot of the same questions, but the answer is right in front of them.  Apologists then make arguments to fulfill this lack of knowledge.

For example, common questions are "how did things come to be?" or "why is there Evil?" or "Am I destined for this (or that)?". It is all pretty silly. Basic answers to the three examples are below.

1) Chemistry. Organic Biology. The "fire and brimstone" of early Earth. All the components were there.

2) It was a major issue early on, before the creation of "Free Will" by apologists who needed to maintain control.

3) There is no such thing as destiny, especially if you buy into Free Will. One cannot be free to choose a course but expect that it is their fate to do so.

Anyway, I will stop my rant.

IGT

[Ocram's Razr 963]

2 hours ago, igotthis said:

A lot of people who argue there is a God asks a lot of the same questions, but the answer is right in front of them.  Apologists then make arguments to fulfill this lack of knowledge.

For example, common questions are "how did things come to be?" or "why is there Evil?" or "Am I destined for this (or that)?". It is all pretty silly. Basic answers to the three examples are below.

1) Chemistry. Organic Biology. The "fire and brimstone" of early Earth. All the components were there.

2) It was a major issue early on, before the creation of "Free Will" by apologists who needed to maintain control.

3) There is no such thing as destiny, especially if you buy into Free Will. One cannot be free to choose a course but expect that it is their fate to do so.

Anyway, I will stop my rant.

IGT

1) I agree with the Rare Earth Theory, which means that Earth is a special planet and the conditions that made intelligent life on this planet do not currently exist on other planets in this galaxy. [Astrobiology]

2) Evil is common because selfishness pays when one isn't caught and delayed punishment is psychologically ineffective when performed according to modern ethics. [Psychology]

3) Destiny and Free Will are indeed mutually exclusive. [Logic] My interpretation is that an omniscient being can see every possible future and wants to make his/her/its ideal future happen. [Linguistics, Theology, Philosophy] An immortal being perceives time differently from mortal humans, even with perfect memory. [Logic, Sci-Fi & Fantasy narratives] As an individual with free will, I can try to follow my destiny (and I have been given many strong signs that some never receive in a lifetime) or reject it. [personal experience] In the grand scheme of things, small choices by individuals don't matter as much as overall trends, and the trend is seemingly on course towards Revelations within a century. [Logic, Philosophy, Theology]

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

The agnostic's prayer:  Oh God, if there is one, save my soul if I have one.

When one looks closely into the physical world, especially now with things being revealed by the LHC, one wonders where all this order comes from considering that what we mostly have is chaos.  While it is well known that everything tends towards entropy, that must have been one whiz of a big bang to provide so much energy at the outset.  I don't buy the no-space, no-time theory of what, if anything, was present before the big bang.  I believe big bangs are cyclic, but that it is a very long cycle.  It seems that at the moment everything is still flying apart.  You could look at the conversion of energy to matter in the cosmos to be a step towards entropy. 

Trying to find a first cause for any of this (a deity, if you like) is a muggs game.  Such a being would be so far above us as to be totally unfathomable.  The rest is hysteria.

[igotthis 12]

2 hours ago, A Nonny Moose said:

The agnostic's prayer:  Oh God, if there is one, save my soul if I have one.

When one looks closely into the physical world, especially now with things being revealed by the LHC, one wonders where all this order comes from considering that what we mostly have is chaos.  While it is well known that everything tends towards entropy, that must have been one whiz of a big bang to provide so much energy at the outset.  I don't buy the no-space, no-time theory of what, if anything, was present before the big bang.  I believe big bangs are cyclic, but that it is a very long cycle.  It seems that at the moment everything is still flying apart.  You could look at the conversion of energy to matter in the cosmos to be a step towards entropy. 

Trying to find a first cause for any of this (a deity, if you like) is a muggs game.  Such a being would be so far above us as to be totally unfathomable.  The rest is hysteria.

I wouldn't be too surprised if Big Bangs were cyclical, and I agree we wouldn't be around to know it. With regard to chaos/entropy, I do think that it cannot exist without an element of order because of natural laws. Chaos is a wild thing, but it can't help but give birth to some order. It really is all physics.

IGT

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

One singularity ... two singularities ... three ...

Eons beyond eons.  We can never know.

[Fantozzi 4,067]

Lately I thought - with all this different religions - this can only work if there are separated heavens. Somewhat like separated rooms. After death a christ gets in his christian heaven and a muslim gets in his muslim heaven. What shock, if the divines would fail about that and the christ would arrive in the muslim heaven or the muslim in the christian heaven. Out of question!

It can't be any different - there must be different heavens for every theistic religion.

But ...

... if they are different there must be some kind of border - a wall, a folding screen, a hedge, well, some kind of border between them.

But then ...

The definition of the eternal, the endless, the infinte ... isn't it exactly this: it is for ever? So there can't be an end to the endless otherwise it can't be the endless. But where there is a border - this can't be endless, it is defintely ... well ... bordered. 

So something in this thinking is wrong in general.

There are only these two possibillitys of thinking

Either life after death is eternal and so there can be only one heaven - or there are different heavens but they can't be eternal.

Or ...

... well ... or nothing.Nothing else works to me.

 

But there is one of those possibiltys that I prefer. To imagine moslems and christs and jewish are sitting together for a eternity and they quarrel on - seens to me much funnier than the thought, they sit alone in their rooms for a while without the chance to notice - if we don't agree this might go on forever.

[MintberryCrunch 83]

Well, most religions teach that only the members of that religion will be the ones in heaven. According to South Park, Mormons are the only people allowed in heaven

Kind of reminds me of an idea a drunken  Barney Gumble suggested on The Simpsons:

Barney: All I'm saying is that when we die, there'll be a planet for the French, a planet for the Chinese...and we'll all be a lot happier!

Lisa: Mr. Gumble, you're upsetting me.

Barney: No I'm not!

 

 

 

[Ocram's Razr 963]

Meh, I wasn't prepared for spirituality. I know now that religion without spirituality or faith is mostly useless for the soul. So I'm back in my old habits (funny how Seattle and my family affects me) loving my life by laughing at misery.

[igotthis 12]

Sorry, guys. I am pretty confirmed in the idea that there is no heaven, let alone several of them. Just as there is no hell, let alone 7 levels.

We are one planet around one star in a universe of billions+ of stars. We aren't special. In fact, we mean nothing in the scheme of things, if there was a scheme - which there isn't.

 

 

EDIT: Please remember that this site has a PG-13 policy.

[Ocram's Razr 963]

22 hours ago, igotthis said:

Sorry, guys. I am pretty confirmed in the idea that there is no heaven, let alone several of them. Just as there is no hell, let alone 7 levels.

We are one planet around one star in a universe of billions+ of stars. We aren't special. In fact, we mean nothing in the scheme of things, if there was a scheme - which there isn't.

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20120821-how-many-alien-worlds-exist

We are likely the only extant [and communicating] civilization in the galaxy. However, I appreciate your Nihilism. A world as horrible as this one currently is can only be explained by Nihilism or Revelations.

[BLANKBLANK 4,414]

A true nihilist does not care about anything, in fact he would not even profess to being nihilistic because that means believing in something. Believing in not believing anything is still believing in something.

[LexusInfernus 908]

14 hours ago, Ln X said:

A true nihilist does not care about anything, in fact he would not even profess to being nihilistic because that means believing in something. Believing in not believing anything is still believing in something.

Its not a matter of belief. You don't have to believe that the universe doesn't care about you, thats just a simple observable fact.

Also, more importantly, nihilism does not mean you don't care about anything or that you don't believe in anything. Nihilism means you don't believe that life has any (intrinsic and or objective) meaning or value, that morality does not inherently exist or that (objective) knowledge does not exist. Basically you believe that nothing has any objective or intrinsic value. 

[Fantozzi 4,067]

2 minutes ago, LexusInfernus said:

Its not a matter of belief. You don't have to believe that the universe doesn't care about you, thats just a simple observable fact.

That makes me courious. How do you observe that? With a telescope? Welfare?

[LexusInfernus 908]

Just now, Fantozzi said:

That makes me courious. How do you observe that? With a telescope? Welfare?

Does the universe bend to your will? Does it reverse entropy because you ask it to? Does the universe stop operating and change its operating when you are gone? Then it doesn't care. Life goes on, with or without you. The universe continues to exist and operate as usual, with or without you.  

[Fantozzi 4,067]

39 minutes ago, LexusInfernus said:

Does the universe bend to your will?

Yes. If the chosing was up to me, I would prefer to live forever.

39 minutes ago, LexusInfernus said:

Does it reverse entropy because you ask it to?

I'm not shure, I should ask this. To reverse entropy would kill earth anyway. But if - which language should I use? Does the universe speak german? And what media should I use? If I find the right language and instrument, I will immediately report here.

 

39 minutes ago, LexusInfernus said:

Life goes on, with or without you. The universe continues to exist and operate as usual, with or without you.

So does care. Or ... it's not me to have do it alone?

 

If you regard evolution - from the big bang until the wakening of consciousness - as a chain of logical events, nature had to strike a billion of lucky punches to arrive there.

Now look on you. Look at me. Look at those 7 billions people living on earth.

How many lucky punches did nature do on you? On me? If nature would constantly do this big amount of lucky punches - whe should have seen more of them in our lifetime.

There's something wrong with fortune. It isn't equaly distributed, To explain our existence you need an uncountable amount of lucky fate, but in life there isn't. Where is is this luck, if you look around in the existing world? But history of nature was like a barrel filled with luck.

So why is nature - as it's explained by science - so much different than our lifes? Aren't we a part of nature too?

Why mankinds being is full of miseries and anguish and the universe is full of luck? And always - so filled with logic?

A little glimpse and we wouldn't be. But nothing went wrong in evolution. From the big bang to us - a straight logical line.

If I do things, 9 times I fail, one times I succed.

How is this possible? Where is the LOGIC in that?

 

[LexusInfernus 908]

8 minutes ago, Fantozzi said:

If you regard evolution - from the big bang until the wakening of consciousness - as a chain of logical events, nature had to strike a billion of lucky punches to arrive there.

Now look on you. Look at me. Look at those 7 billions people living on earth.

How many lucky punches did nature do on you? On me? If nature would constantly do this big amount of lucky punches - whe should have seen more of them in our lifetime.

Winning the lottery when you bought only 1 lottery ticket requires luck. Winning the lottery when you own all the lottery tickets in existence? No luck at all. Winning the lottery then becomes a statistical certainty. So, to get to life on earth, and our lives in particular only appears lucky if you believe that our entire existence, our entire universe is unique, that only one of them exists. But if literally an infinite amount of universes exist? Our existence suddenly becomes a statistical certainty. 

8 minutes ago, Fantozzi said:

There's something wrong with fortune. It isn't equaly distributed, To explain our existence you need an uncountable amount of lucky fate, but in life there isn't. Where is is this luck, if you look around in the existing world? But history of nature was like a barrel filled with luck.

So why is nature - as it's explained by science - so much different than our lifes? Aren't we a part of nature too?

Why mankinds being is full of miseries and anguish and the universe is full of luck?

Your argument only makes sense when you use luck and ascribe a inherently positive meaning to it, and then contrast it against something to which you clearly can't describe something positive. Hence, our universes configuration, and therefor our existence gets an inherently positive meaning, which you then contrast to the miseries that afflict mankind, which is negative and that makes the whole thing seem unfair.

Here a nihilist would point out that argument starts out wrong. Our existence wasn't lucky, it was statistically unlikely provided you believe this universe is unique. It therefor does not have the inherent positive quality that comes with using the word luck. It also makes the whole contrast pointless, as there is no useful contrast to be made between the occurrence of a statistical improbability that would be our existence and the miseries of mankind. One doesn't exclude the other, nor makes the occurrence of the other seem more or less fair.

Though if you want, you have just provided the answer to your initial question.There is your proof that the universe doesn't give a damn, because we aren't naturally exempt from misery and anguish any more or less than any other living being. 

[Fantozzi 4,067]

1 hour ago, LexusInfernus said:

Winning the lottery when you bought only 1 lottery ticket requires luck. Winning the lottery when you own all the lottery tickets in existence? No luck at all. Winning the lottery then becomes a statistical certainty. So, to get to life on earth, and our lives in particular only appears lucky if you believe that our entire existence, our entire universe is unique, that only one of them exists. But if literally an infinite amount of universes exist? Our existence suddenly becomes a statistical certainty. 

I got stuck here.

You mean our nature is only one ticket, meanwhile a planet has all tickets? Again - is mankind different from the rest of nature?

I try to argue and therefore not to imagine -  as long as there is no other species discovered that is like us, trying to discover what is beyond our horizon, I must call it a fact, that we are unique. As long as there is no objective sign of the contrary, it would be FALSE to state the contrary. I hope you are firm with Carl Poppers basic rule: as long as a finding is not proved wrong it must be held as true. There is no aprovement that there is other living in universe  to our knowledge . As known as today, our planet is the only one. Or do you have knowledge beyond this? So please share.

Otherwise call this a fact. As discussion leads to nowhere with people joining some kind of 'private religion'.

[igotthis 12]

19 hours ago, OcramsRzr said:

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20120821-how-many-alien-worlds-exist

We are likely the only extant civilization in the galaxy. However, I appreciate your Nihilism. A world as horrible as this one currently is can only be explained by Nihilism or Revelations.

I am not sure how you came to the conclusion we are possibly the only extant civ in the galaxy, from that article.

I suspect that Earth is not the only planet in the universe with life. As to intelligent life - I'll rephrase - cognizant life, I don't know, but I would feel very anthropocentric if I thought we were the only ones to have existed in the past or today. We can't know anything about it. We can't place a call to Andromeda or the Horseshoe Nebula (the name might be off). We are only just now finding planets around stars. We really know nothing.

As to nihilism - I wouldn't say I am a nihilist. I believe life and concepts have the meaning you give them. I would say that living a life has a goal of living it well - and I don't mean "live fast, die young". Just enjoy it, respect it, and know that when it is over it is over.

IGT

[Ocram's Razr 963]

Drake used unrealistically optimistic guesses for the values. However, today's skeptical estimates results in one currently communicating civilization per galaxy. I said "extant civilization" as a synonym to a civilization that currently sends out radio signals. Using the same skeptical estimates, life is relatively common, artifacts of past civilizations could be found (if we survive to develop FTL), troglodytes are rare but our ancestors weren't unique.

[LexusInfernus 908]

22 hours ago, Fantozzi said:

I got stuck here.

You mean our nature is only one ticket, meanwhile a planet has all tickets? Again - is mankind different from the rest of nature?

I try to argue and therefore not to imagine -  as long as there is no other species discovered that is like us, trying to discover what is beyond our horizon, I must call it a fact, that we are unique. As long as there is no objective sign of the contrary, it would be FALSE to state the contrary. I hope you are firm with Carl Poppers basic rule: as long as a finding is not proved wrong it must be held as true. There is no aprovement that there is other living in universe  to our knowledge . As known as today, our planet is the only one. Or do you have knowledge beyond this? So please share.

Otherwise call this a fact. As discussion leads to nowhere with people joining some kind of 'private religion'.

No, I mean that our existence is a statistical inevitability due to the size of all of existence. 

And while I agree with Popper's rule, its not wrong to point out that our capacity to observe is at this point so limited that calling humanity as a species 'unique' is premature. Indeed, while we haven't directly observed signs of intelligent life somewhere else, the sheer size of this universe alone makes it statistically unlikely that we are alone. 

[Fantozzi 4,067]

2 hours ago, LexusInfernus said:

No, I mean that our existence is a statistical inevitability due to the size of all of existence. 

There are about 100 billion bacteria in my bowel. If I take their perspektive, my bowel is a Galaxy too. And there are so many galaxies like me.

Well some people believe in god, some in the universe, in it's greatness and the cold (most part of the universe is at absolute cold) space.

But if the universe doesn't care, why should the positive state be more probable than the negative state?

Couldn't we be more sincere and say: we don't know everything. What's this talking about 'possibilities'. What is the content of a sentence like "Probably there is life in outer space."

This sentence has the same quality as saying: "Probably there's a bacteria in my bowel that likes to read books."  Why to believe in a positve universe but not in a positive bowel? Where's the difference?

Would you count every grain of sand on all the beaches, because the possibility is hight that one of this grains is intelligent and wants to communicate with you? But with the matter in universe you are trusting this procedure?

I can't see the differences between matter and matter. Maybe the universe carries some 'holy matter' ?

If you say, the universe is indifferent on the one hand and on the other hand you say it may offer life on other planets - well than you are a believer, some kind of god-fearing person.

The only thing: your god is cold and empty and doesn't love you. This way, believing in the universe, you create a god as everyone would do who wasn't loved enough by his/her mother.

 

[igotthis 12]

1 hour ago, Fantozzi said:

There are about 100 billion bacteria in my bowel. If I take their perspektive, my bowel is a Galaxy too. And there are so many galaxies like me.

Well some people believe in god, some in the universe, in it's greatness and the cold (most part of the universe is at absolute cold) space.

But if the universe doesn't care, why should the positive state be more probable than the negative state?

Couldn't we be more sincere and say: we don't know everything. What's this talking about 'possibilities'. What is the content of a sentence like "Probably there is life in outer space."

This sentence has the same quality as saying: "Probably there's a bacteria in my bowel that likes to read books."  Why to believe in a positve universe but not in a positive bowel? Where's the difference?

Would you count every grain of sand on all the beaches, because the possibility is hight that one of this grains is intelligent and wants to communicate with you? But with the matter in universe you are trusting this procedure?

I can't see the differences between matter and matter. Maybe the universe carries some 'holy matter' ?

If you say, the universe is indifferent on the one hand and on the other hand you say it may offer life on other planets - well than you are a believer, some kind of god-fearing person.

The only thing: your god is cold and empty and doesn't love you. This way, believing in the universe, you create a god as everyone would do who wasn't loved enough by his/her mother.

 

You can't really compare bowel flora to a galaxy, or even to a planet. And unless you have been eating books, I doubt any bacterium has seen a book. =)

Furthermore, believing in the statistics and chaos of the universe does not equate to giving it godhood. It is all a matter of physics, chemistry and biology.

 

IGT

[LexusInfernus 908]

1 hour ago, Fantozzi said:

There are about 100 billion bacteria in my bowel. If I take their perspektive, my bowel is a Galaxy too. And there are so many galaxies like me.

Well some people believe in god, some in the universe, in it's greatness and the cold (most part of the universe is at absolute cold) space.

But if the universe doesn't care, why should the positive state be more probable than the negative state?

If the universe does care, why would that make the probable state any more likely than the negative? Whether the universe cares or not for whatever goes on inside it, that has zero bearing on the actual existence of whatever goes on inside it. 

To use your bacteria example, the existence of bacteria in your bowel does not depend on whether you care for them or not. And frankly, do you on a daily basis care for your gut bacteria? Does their individual well being concern you? Do you mourn the death of each little bacteria cell and rejoice for each new born bacteria? Nah, to them, you are just as much an uncaring universe as our universe is to us. 

1 hour ago, Fantozzi said:

Couldn't we be more sincere and say: we don't know everything. What's this talking about 'possibilities'. What is the content of a sentence like "Probably there is life in outer space."

This sentence has the same quality as saying: "Probably there's a bacteria in my bowel that likes to read books."  Why to believe in a positve universe but not in a positive bowel? Where's the difference?

Hardly. One is an informed guess, the other is just contrived to make a point. Life happened once under a certain set of circumstances, given the sheer size of the universe, it is not unreasonable to say that those same circumstances happened elsewhere as well. Its not even unreasonable to imagine that there is even a possibility of life happening under a slightly different set of circumstances. What is however incredibly unreasonable is to suggest that despite the limitless number of places in the universe, life is so unique that it only happened once. 

Reading books on the other hand? Well you need all kinds of stuff to happen besides the presence of life itself, and that stuff just doesn't happen with bacteria.

 

[Fantozzi 4,067]

My last try on this. Didn't think I make just an statistic example and than whe argue about my bowel - in a "religious threat". That' somekind of funny, isn't it?

I would suppose, that you wouldn't call it a strategy to collect all the grains of sand together on a big mountain and then expect soon there will jump life out of it. This is the biblic idear, how god created life, he took some materia and blew soul in it. This myth don't become more logical if you extend it on the universe.

You say it even yourself. You use the world 'circumstances'. If scientist want to create life they don't follow the biblic path as your argument does. They try to determine what the circumstances are and to reproduce this: 'the causal chain - the chain of "if and then"' for creating life. With chances it isn't the same as with materia (I deal with Aristoteles and his difference of 'proteron' and 'hysterion' here, so chances are a priori given, they don't exist the same way as materia exists) - this was your example with the 'lottery ticket', which you used, if I'm right, as a metaphor for chances, for circumstances. As a scientist, working in a laboratory, you might agree, that the size of your laboratory, the amount of probes and so on - this all wouldn't be much important. More important would be you have a plan, a strategy, some knowledge to get ahead. Because about changes you can't talk the same as on planets or bacteria. I kow people they aren't able to change a specific behaviour. They do the same mistake over and over again. That there are a million of possibilites to behave don't count for existence, if you repeat only one of them day by day.

So changes aren't evenly distributed on materia/existing things. At least I don't know any law, that verifys this To distribute them evenly you would need a plan, a strategy, a metaphysical-pysical law to achieve that. As chances are soething metaphysical and materia is something physical.

Now that's were I get stuck:

The argument a big universere makes more changes for biological life than a small universe can only work, if this means the circumstances are distributed better in a big universe than in a small universe. This would mean the amount of materia would have an influence on lifes creation.

With this argument, everything that appears in a big amount should have an evolutionary better change to reach a higher, more complex level. But bacteria remain bacteria and grain of sands remain grain of sands. And me, i have to suppose, this is equal, no matter how much there are. So chance or circumstances aren't entropic the same way as materia is - I would suppose. Or as someone sang: some guys have all the luck.

Saying, with universe it is different, there, the sheer amount of materia rises changes for the circumstances of biologic processes - in my opinion, this isn't a logical argument. This is a simple belief.  

There is somethin missing. An evidence that with the higher amount of materia also the conditions are getting better. This had to be explained before, in my opinion. First you had to put evidence in the fact, that the universe is life friendly, than you could say, the bigger it is, the more chances for life it will carry.

But if you say the university is hostile to life - how can you argue, it sheere greatness makes life probable?

That's my problem in this thinking. Are my worries understandible? Life needs certain conditions. And to make this simple equation, materia = conditions, in my opinion this isn't enough. Otherwise I'll have to eat some book, to care about my bowels education.

 

Edit:

Is there any physical law, that confirms this? With the amount of space and materia the chances that something happens arises? If someone knows this - please share.

[Ocram's Razr 963]

@Fantozzi

If you checked my link to BBC, you would see that planets with the right conditions to support the creation of life are rare but there are enough acceptable planets found in our neighborhood to extrapolate to an estimation of many planets in this galaxy likely harboring life of some sort. However, Earth was especially lucky to have enough meterors & asteroids crashing into it to supply it with necessary elements and a moon.

 

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20120821-how-many-alien-worlds-exist

[Fantozzi 4,067]

Yes. I read this story before. But from my point of view, this is mythical belief, not science.

Clash some mud and aspirate it - the person, who invented this way of creating life was called Prometheus.

Mary Shelley redid this, just a little bit more modern, as Dr. Frankenstein didn't take mud, but body parts from death people and he didn't apsirate them, but used electricity. The magic of electricity...

And shure, today the same old myth is narrated again with more modern terms.

But if you open the bonnet of this shiny sports car called 'popular science' there are myth who are powering this car.

 

How science appears in TV or popular magazines - that's exactly the same as the holy mass in the middle ages. You know, by this time, churches had the function of media to. You went there to get information about what promi has died, whos cow was ill - and then came the priest with it's science-story, how earth was made and men and the birds in the air. And those wonder stories were fascinating. And people got their world view from them.

Now the same 'wonder storties' are told in TV about the colourfull big bang, about space travel and scientists hunting for aliens. It are exactly the same stories, only they are wearing different clothes today. Myths aren't like logic. They can change their aspect, they are perfect quick-change artists. Therefore it needs a good education on the past to recognize them.

And those who can't recognize myth as myth - well, they behave always the same if you discuss with them. They will defend their believings till the very end. And therefore it's easy to recognize them as believers. Because belief you can loose, knowledge not. If your knowledge is aproved wrong you get instantly more knowledge or a better knowledge, so to recognize your mistake it's immediatly a win to you. Programmers know that, if they find the error line in their code, they aren't disapointed, they have the feeling, they gained, not they've lost. This is dealing with knowledge. But as believers are afraid of loosing something, they will even defend the error lines in their code. And the same way they will defend the myths in those popular science stories.

 

 

[Fantozzi 4,067]

Sorry, me again.

@LexusInfernus

I don't argue if your statements are wrong or wright. I'm not able to judge this. I argue, there is a step missing in the argumentation to make it possible for me to prove it wrong or right. That's why I came up with Popper. The equation "more materia = more chances for life" can't be proved wrong or right as long as there's no 'term', no calculation or method, that shows how you got there.

@OcramsRzr

And almost the same: Drakes calculation is based on the assumption that every earth like planet creates life. I'm not able to argue for or against that as long as I don't know what's the reason for this assumption, what are the biological or physical or evolutionary laws that make this belief plausible.