h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

What I mean by the same person is exactly as i think you perceive it to be..

"Is it that the person (body ) forms a continuous path through (PERCIEVED) space and time?"
Yes. In the current life frame of about 70 -100 years.

We do not recall our past persona, otherwise reincarnation would be proven.
Therefor I have no concept of any former selves.
This seems correct to me, because recollection of former self, would impinge on the perception of current self.

I'm talking about the difference between body and spirit.

The spirit/soul/ is the 'eternal' energy, the body is the un-eternal which is a physical experiencer.
If something changes, it is not eternal it is changable .
Something that is eternal cannot change by definition.
If it becomes something else it is not eternal it is different to what it was.
Therefor the body is not eternal because it changes (into other energies) but the soul/spirit does not change and is therefor more likely to be considered eternal

So Hass, in spite of what you start by saying, your real belief is that 'the same person' consists in having the same soul/spirit. OK then. How do you know whether soul/spirit A is the same as a later soul/spirit B? Locke thought it was because B can remember being A, but there are problems with that!

We obviously have different opinions on exactly what is meant by infinite. The way I see it is it's impossible to add anything to infinity - it's quite hard to explain this, as I said before it's pretty much impossible for us to actually conceive of eternity - it is not just something that is expanding forever but is an endless expanse in an unchanging static state. I'm not sure about the relationship between space and matter (I had a hard time in GCSE physics) but the way you put it it sounds more like theory than scientific fact. Also (I'm probably remembering this wrong) wasn't the red shift effect more to do with the expansion of matter, not the expansion of space? If you think of space and matter (as I do) as completely seperate, unconnected things (admittedly more due to willful ignorance than anything else) it is possible to imagine an infinite space.

No
There is no 'same person'
There is body and there is soul.

Bodies vary, to suit the experience chosen in that particular life. Souls remain the same, but person isn't the right word to describe soul.
Just as caterpillar isn't the right word to describe butterfly.

"How do you know whether soul/spirit A is the same as a later soul/spirit B? Locke thought it was because B can remember being A, but there are problems with that!"

I/we don't know.
Does it matter?
What we are knocking our heads against in this conversation are 'improvables'.
When we have a complete unprovable, we have the freedom of choice to choose what satisfies us on all levels.
If we have faith that God exists, then God exists in our faith.
It's a complete and simple concept.
It makes me sad though that some people then have to monkey around with that idea and come up with cruelty and injustices ( as perceived by me) and call them God too.
If you imagine an angry, wrathful and vengeful God then this also is 'real'. to the believer.
It seems like a bad choice to me. To make a God that is as infallable as man.

I arrive at my beliefs, from experience, intuition , logic applied to the unknown, and my own version of common sence.
I'm not intelligent in terms of education, but I am smart by nature.
I don't know the meaning of very many of the long words used here and can get horribly lost in the scientific minutia.
but much of that arguement seems besides the point in response to the initial question.

I can understand that someone without my experiences would have different views and values.
I am merely using my perception to evaluate the unknown, because my perception of things is the only real thing I can own.

If this version of events, makes me feel comfortable and happy, if it satisfies my intellect and it harm no one, then I can choose to believe it or not as the case maybe.
That is what you can do with the unproven.

about the reincarnation thing where u say u have absolutely no memory of your past, Stephen Hawking was born 300 years after the death of galileo, a bit of a conection there.

I started my very own debate about the meaning of life, so far no one has said anything so if u r interested go to http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/classic/A944642 and start another debate, i am really interested in the results.

Besides, on the whole reincarnation issue, there have been quite a few cases where subjects in a state of deep regressive hypnosis have recalled events experienced by other people, sometimes living hundreds of years ago, as though they were their own. It's not my choice of belief but it's not exactly a completely unfounded one either.

Yep. Your way of separating space and matter conceptually is unconventional. Let's look at that in particular, in a kinda basic way. I guess you will accept that space allows the existence of distance/separation that kind of thing. Hard to imagine unless you have a coupla bits of matter to have a distance between, or a length of matter with a size. In fact, if you had empty(matterless) space, what would it be like? It wouldn't be space, it would be nothing.

If you run those together it makes a nonsense of physics and discussion of the size of the universe. An infinitely large nothing is still nothing. Kinda like infinity times zero.

There's some good reading about infinity right here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/alabaster/A414523

"Stephen Hawking was born 300 years after the death of galileo, a bit of a conection there."


This sems a little tenuous to me.

So, the human body could just be considered an electrical-type conductor for new experiences? Feelings/experiences that just aren't available to our spirit if we remain in the ether without a lifeform? That is a very interesting concept, although it does fall outside the perimeter of what society has accepted as 'faith' so far. I guess we would have to question a lot of non-material asumptions we have accepted on, well, anything anyone has told us to be true that we have not experienced first-hand.

You can count me in!

I read on a page about someone who named a cat 'Lucky'. If I chose to reply to that person that once I had a cat named Lucky, but it got run over by a car, so now I won't name a cat Lucky anymore; he would be free to interpret that as stated. He may also read a deeper meaning into it, and choose to rename his cat something so that it not suffer the same fate as my cat. He may even go so far as to tell his friends that he chose to rename his cat based on irrefutable evidence that cats named Lucky were involved in fatal auto crashes at a rate of 100% based on data that he had received on the Net, and so he had chosen another name. If his friend started a do-gooder society, Save The Cats, he could probably, within a few years, receive a government grant to research the alarming rate in which cats named Lucky were killed in auto crashes. Religious zealots could hold candlelight vigils outside car factories to decry their inhumane lack of cat deflectors on the fronts of vehicles. Years later, smart-**s teenagers would start an organization on a laugh and go around naming cats Lucky just for the h**l of it; their parents would be forced to spend thousands of dollars committing them to mental institutions. Grandma would have a heart attack from embarrassment.

Diversity
"So, the human body could just be considered an electrical-type conductor for new experiences?"
Feelings/experiences that just aren't available to our spirit if we remain in the ether without a lifeform?"

That's the way I see it.

If you look at it like that and can understand it.
no experience in life is truly good or bad, because everything has value.
I believe that we are reborn in different scenerios to help us to experience, everything, so that we can get understanding from it on a personal level and having understood it move on/evolve to the next thing.

Ah, so that's where I went wrong when I changed my name to 'Innocent Bystander'.

YEs
It's all about the illusion of safety in being with the majority, even if the majority seems to be illogical.
We can think from our experience 'hey this cat/lucky thing is all nonsence, but I'm not going to make waves and put myself at risk by speaking out.
The best you might be able to do would to call your cat Lucky in secret and never tell anyone ! ,biggrin>

The reason why what I said about pregnancy not proving adultery is because I am referring to proper Islamic law. I have asked and was confirmed by two Muslim scholors I know. The reason why there is differents in opinion is because many people say they follow Islamic law but on some things they do not follow. As for example the theft thing. In some places they follow it correctly in others they do not and or abuse the laws. Another thing worth remembering is that there are a lot of sights out there that say they where written by Muslims but are not and some try to discredit Islam plus different sects in Islam follow the laws differently. Some are harsher than others.
If you think about it lodiclly with about proving adultery and rape you will see it can't happen. Say A woman is raped many years ago befor DNA testing. (Just dealing with the womans side here OK) She has a baby and says she was raped. The man says he did not do it. The evidence for rape reguires four witnesses. There are no witnesses. So he can not be charged. To prove she had done adultery also needs four witnesses. So if know one saw her get rapped then know one saw her commiting Adultery either so how can she be charged with Adultery. There are no witnesses to it and so what if she has had a baby that does not come in to the law side of the aspect.
I was only dealing with the four witnesses thing here but I think you can see my point.

Adib

See what I mean ?

I have already answered this about the four witness thing but any way lets look at Pakistan at the moment. It is not under proper Islamic law and the president is not a proper Muslim either. Trust me I know. Saudi Arabia depends on where you go. Some parts follow Islami law properly some ares do not.

As for the womans evidence being half the wieght no its not.
If she is giving evidence to some thing then it is not. What you are referring to is that when witnessing a contract or similer thing then you need two women. This is because as the mans role is to do the work and provide for the family it is presumed that men will have more experience in contractual affairs than women as most women stay at home or get a job if they wish but it is there choice. So to make it fairer to the woman who may have less experience in this role than the man two are required so if they forget then they can remind each other. It is reconising that it is most likely the man who is to be doing this so a woman performing a contract or witnessing it would be at a disadvantage to the man.

Adib

You will find most of that stuff about the big bang in the Quran.

Adib

So the thing is to call your cat 'Felix'. Dammit, that's just Latin for lucky anyway!

No Adib. I'm sure you've got it wrong. The woman needs four witnesses to prove rape. Nobody needs any witnesses to prove adultery if she's pregnant and her husband has been abroad for the past year!

If Islamic law takes scholars in order to understand it, it is not justice. Everyone should be able to understand in advance whether they are likely to be doing wrong or not.

Ok just read what you all have been going on about. Wow.
Ok.... Where to start. Well as for the Universe expanding what about Read shift from stars. If some thing moves away from us it has a more reder colour and if approaching it apperas blue. When first discovered it gave rise to the idea of the expanding universe and then it was also found out that it was not just moving away from us the stars where moving away from each other. Einstein said that the universe had to be expanding because of the laws of physics of how they are and he changed it because at the time it was accepted to be still.
He later on in his life said that this was one of the biggest mistakes in his life after it was found out that the universe was expanding.

Adib