To: K-list
Recieved: 1999/12/13 02:45
Subject: [K-list] Re: Re Artifical Life
From: Martin Thompson
On 1999/12/13 02:45, Martin Thompson posted thus to the K-list:
16:44:18 Sat, 11 Dec 1999
revo at revo <revoATnospamerols.com> writes:
>It seems modern science is similiarly in a philosphical struggle with
>those of us who have a spiritual world view. I realize there are those,
>my self encluded, who believe that science and spirituality are not in
>conflict but are merely different ways of looking at reality. Yet there
>are those scientist, who object to any spirituality and insist that only
>matter, energy and scientific laws exist. According to these scientist
>there is no god and nothing spiritual. I feel that if they can create
>life their world view will gain greater acceptance.
>
Many scientists do say that there is no god and nothing spiritual, but
in fact such a view would seem to me to be unscientific. It might be
more accurate to say that there is no scientifically good evidence for
the existence of god or spiritual phenomena, but one cannot go further
than that, it seems to me. It is also worth noting that absence of
evidence is not in fact evidence of absence, although such is normally
taken as indicating the likely situation.
To me, the presence of me and the Universe are evidence that something
is going on, but what exactly, I can't say as I don't have enough
information!
I consider the big spiritual problem really as how to reconcile the
material with the spiritual. To my mind, neither can be discarded as
both are part of the "All That Is." Thus any spiritual beliefs that seem
to deprecate material reality, to me, invalidate themselves. Similarly
for material beliefs that don't accept that there must be more than
meets the eye.
As for artificial life: in my view, of course it is possible. The same
with artificial intelligence, artificial love, and so on. Natural forms
of these things exist, so it must be possible to duplicate them and
maybe even improve upon them. I strongly suspect that *all* natural
phenomena are entirely physically based and so are capable of being
constructed at will, given sufficient knowledge, resources, etc. If this
was not the case, the working of the natural world would rely on events
that break the rules just to keep working. Potentially, that is the
answer, but I doubt it.
The crisis for spirituality is, I think, like this: if humans are just
machines constructed mainly from carbon compounds, which is what the
evidence clearly indicates, then what validity do our inner experiences
have?
The crisis for materialism on the other hand, is: what the heck is an
experience anyway? Many materialists point to brain waves, neurons, and
so on, but atoms bouncing about are not the same type of thing as an
experience, however closely they can be shown to correlate in time and
space. If the question of an experience can be answered, then the next
difficult question is: how did the laws of Nature come to be?
--
Martin Thompson martinATnospamtucana.demon.co.uk
London, UK
Home Page: http://www.tucana.demon.co.uk
Free Regular Income: http://www.virtualis.com/vr/mthomps4/vrp.html
"Everything I do and say with anyone makes a difference." Gita Bellin
DISCLAIMER!
Home | Archive Index | Search the archives | Subscribe
K. List FAQ | Kundalini FAQs | Signs and Symptoms | Awakening Experiences | K. list Polls | Member Essays | Meditations | List Topics | Art Gallery | Cybrary | Sitemap | Email the moderators.
symbol.