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We are
as similar and as different as our fingerprints. We all have them.
They are slightly different.
arthur
Arthur,
Now you are talking my
language.
I don't think there is any deep significance in our
being. The conditions were ripe for flesh rather than scales, so here we
are.
However, it's delightful that Man thinks he might
be special.
Harry
I
was thinking about the chance nature of human existence --both at the macro
and micro level.
That's what money is all about.
REH
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Monday, November 03, 2003 3:05
PM
Subject: Re: [Futurework] Our
mysterious universe
arthur
Life is a crapshoot.
Yes, but sometimes the dice may be
loaded.
Ed
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Monday, November 03, 2003
11:09 AM
Subject: RE: [Futurework] Our
mysterious universe
P.S.: Merton met his end
in a most ironic of possible ways. He was electrocuted while
plugging in an appliance in a hotel room. A great and powerful
mind overcome by a toaster. Try to explain that!
arthur
Life is a
crapshoot.
OK, here's my take on it. It's
something I posted to a friend recently:
Ken, one of my reference points on this kind
of thing is Thomas Merton, the American Trappist monk, who argued that
people have to approach the mystery of their being by using both
rationality and faith. As ever so many great scientific minds
have demonstrated, rational thought and science can give us an
enormous amount of information about the universe and our place in
it. However, there will always be a boundary between what we can
explain and understand and what we can't, and we really have no way of
knowing whether we have explained much about the state of our reality
or just a tiny bit of it. So, Merton argues, there is a boundary
and, no matter how far we push out into the unknown, there always will
be. He argues, further, that what lies beyond that boundary can
be treated in two different ways, either by denial or by faith.
Denial is the approach of the atheist - there is nothing out there
that we can't ultimately explain in rational terms. Faith is a
little harder to explain. The fundamentalist has faith, but
his faith is very close to the approach of the atheist in that he
defines and delineates what lies beyond the boundary and therefore
excludes mystery. Even though I'm a deacon in a Baptist church,
my own preference and path is agnosticism. I want to believe
that there is something immense, eternal and purposeful beyond the
boundary, but of course I cannot know.
Personally, I think that the two most
important components of religion are respect for mystery and
compassion for all living beings that share the mystery with us.
A book I read while in the slums of Sao Paulo a few years ago puts it
this way:
... in a creative universe God would
betray no trace of his presence, since to do so would be to rob the
creative forces of their independence, to turn them from the active
pursuit of answers to mere supplication of God. And so it is: God's
language is silence. The Old Testament suggests that God fell silent
in response to the request of the terrified believers who said to
Moses, "Speak thou with us, and we will hear: but let not God speak
with us, lest we die." Whatever the reason, God ceases speaking with
the book of Job, and soon stops intervening in human affairs
generally, leading Gideon to ask, "If the Lord be with us, why then
. . . where be all his miracles which our fathers told us of?" The
author of the Twenty-second Psalm cries ruefully, "My God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me?"
Whether he left or was ever here I do
not know, and don't believe we ever shall know. But one can learn to
live with ambiguity - that much is requisite to the seeking spirit -
and with the silence of the stars. All who genuinely seek to learn,
whether atheist or believer, scientist or mystic, are united in
having not a faith but faith itself. Its token is reverence, its
habit to respect the eloquence of silence. For God's hand may be a
human hand, if you reach out in loving kindness, and God's voice
your voice, if you but speak the truth. (Timothy Ferris, The
Whole Shebang, Simon & Schuster, 1997, p.312)
Hope this helps.
Ed
P.S.: Merton met his end in a most
ironic of possible ways. He was electrocuted while plugging in
an appliance in a hotel room. A great and powerful mind overcome
by a toaster. Try to explain that!
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Sunday, November 02, 2003
10:48 PM
Subject: RE: [Futurework] Our
mysterious universe
Keith,
I'm probably a lot closer to
finding out the truth than you are -- even with your emphysema. Yet,
I find no evidence at all for support of the myth, any myth. Even
one to guide me, whatever that may mean.
All my life I have enjoyed
speculation on the universe, and
what it may mean, if it means anything. But, always it is for
entertainment purposes and doesn't lead to much that is
important.
The major problem in discussions
of this sort is that you
cannot argue with faith. Faith requires no logical support, no
significant evidence, nothing.
The universe is in a period of
transition from what and to what nobody knows. When we are in this
transition nobody knows and we are unlikely to find out. This
transition will take 1000 generations, or one million
generations, of human beings.
How can we take a snapshot of what is now and extrapolate in all
directions with any sense?
So, enjoy your myths, as without
doubt you will. Just remember they are myths.
Harry
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