It occurred to me the other day that maybe the reincarnation theory is wrong, and what actually happens is you relive the same life over and over again? This would explain deja vu.

The long version is this. I was also thinking of how people can't imagine the universe having always been and always will be, but curiously, nobody would argue that numbers have always existed?

Maybe God doesn't exist but numbers do. There is even circumstantial evidence for this, which is the fact that even God cannot make 2 + 2 == 5, which negates one of the supposed powers that God is supposed to posses, namely, omnipotence.

In theory, if you have a sufficiently long number, it could define your whole life. You and everything you experience. Why not? Unlike the "real" universe, there are no limits to the capacity of numbers. You can have any combination at all, defining every atom in your body and all the stuff you see in front of you.

Furthermore, conciousness works on the anthropic principle, that is, there are infinite random combinations, and most of them end up not creating conciousness, yet, some will necessarily hit on the right combination to make conciousness, and therefore, if you're concious, you must be one of the right combinations. The end justifies the means.

I'm actually a disbeliever myself. One of the reasons is that this would probably lead into the horrible thought that you're alone in your own creation. After all, how would this explain other entities interacting with you?

One possibility is that numbers that are relatively close define the same type of entity. So for example, a large part of a number would define your home planet and then the minor part would define you and your friends. But still, it seems all these number are independent of each other, so you could have your own definition of people within your life that had nothing to do with someone else's definition.

Does any of this make sense? I hope not. I actually like God, and would hate to lose a friend like that.

I wouldn't call reincarnation a theory. Doesn't a theory need evidence?
I believe that the reason humans are instinctively contemplating god and reincarnation is because we're scared to die. Not because we are cowards but because it's an evolutionary instinct. If we weren't scared of dying we wouldn't be here today.
It is fact that we all die at some point or another and that's why people make up things like reincarnation to keep themselves calm and to remind themselves that they have a purpose (be it imaginary).

Here's an experiment:
Just think that tomorrow you won't be here and you'll never be see or do anything ever again. Logically, you shouldn't care because when you're dead your brain is inactive and you won't care. But, you still feel that you want to do something about it.
I believe that that is to do with biology. Even so, there could be many factors contributing to it anyway.

It seems to me that "universe" has come to be accepted as something different than the entirety of existence. The definition tends towards more practical and scientifically observable limitations. Which makes some sense as anything else isn't going to be provable, manipulable, or otherwise have a practical purpose to us.

But considering that it sounds like you're trying to find a reason to hold on to your faith, I'll try to give you one by suggesting that it seems reasonable to me that there's room in the totality of existence for God so long as you don't cling to the notion that a single person or book holds all the answers you will ever possibly need and should never be questioned or permitted to evolve. That's not to say that a person or book couldn't have valuable insights for creating an ordered society and should be ignored. But if science is the study of God's creation then it stands to reason that as more things are learned and understood, old ideas need to either evolve or be put aside so that true growth can be obtained.

Personally, I believe that the fundamental elements of existence are concepts. That God, time, space, and math cannot exist without the idea of those things. It seems to me that concepts can be used to define what a concept is and therefore doesn't have any prerequisites for its own existence. Everything within the universe is essentially an evolution of concepts and their interaction with other concepts.

It occurred to me the other day that maybe the reincarnation theory is wrong, and what actually happens is you relive the same life over and over again? This would explain deja vu.

Sorry, but that doesn't make sense. How do you exactly relive the same life over and over again? Does the universe reset itself after X million of years?

This would explain deja vu.

The ongoing professional theory is deja vu is just a hiccup in your sense processing in your brain. So you get two perceptions at the same time, but the brain can only deal with one, so it picks one, the remaining one is a sensory echo that we perceive as deja vu. What causes this hiccup is debateable, everything from missed/improper synapse firing (likely) to perception singularity theories dealing with the brain having a phase imbalance and accidentally perceiving out of "proper" temporal order (unlikely)...

which is the fact that even God cannot make 2 + 2 == 5,

But... but... 2 + 2 = 5 for extremely large values of 2!!!!

That God, time, space, and math cannot exist without the idea of those things

I was always fascinated by a very simple primitive, the triangle. Those circles, lines, all the interesting and non-obvious correlations (I guess not all have been discovered yet). Almost as if it's designed to be like that.

Does anybody think that triangles are designed? I guess not.

I'm thinking nowadays that all the "complexity of life" "complexity of the universe", these fantastic symmetries and correlations and structures and the "grand design" and all the shit is just a big illusion and not really different from all the wonders of a single triangle.


Um..... maybe it was off.

Basing a decision whether or not to believe in God on a dogma such as "God is omnipotent" is silly.

Everything you know (and everything I know, everything any of us know) about God, you know directly or indirectly from members of the world's biggest and oldest criminal association. Many of the leaders of this association were the biggest whoremongers known in history (all the Medici popes, for example) the biggest mass murderers in history (Leo, for example, incidentially a Medici, too). Some sold out their "sheep" to Hitler ("Pius" Pacelli). Let's stop with the christian chastity before I get to child abuse or the Vatican City real estate scam.

There exists a long, sad tradition of reciting a fictional work that a few power-hungry zealots wrote at the councils of Nicaea over three decades after the life of Jesus of Nazareth, which was severely rewritten at least four times (probably more often) since then.

What was written down as the so-called "word of God" has nothing to do with God or with anything God may have done or said. Entire evangelions were censored out because the zealots didn't think they would fit their purpose. Others were almost completely rewritten to fit into their idea of a religion. The idea of a single god is as much modern fiction as his omnipotence.

So please, don't try and make a decision about whether or not to believe in God based logic on anything you have "learned" about God.

Believing or not believing -- whichever way gives you peace of heart is ok, but you need to make this decision without dogma (because the dogma is wrong).

Also, assuming that God is omnipotent for a moment: What makes you think that he could not make 2+2 = 5 if only he wanted? But why would he want to do this only to prove his power to you?

(The Greek gods would probably ask the first person they meet whether 2+2 is 5 and smite him upon saying "no". You know, with thunder and lightning, fire and brimstone. Then they'd ask the next person if he shares that opinion.)

[quote name='kseh' timestamp='1346784985' post='4976533']
That God, time, space, and math cannot exist without the idea of those things

I was always fascinated by a very simple primitive, the triangle. Those circles, lines, all the interesting and non-obvious correlations (I guess not all have been discovered yet). Almost as if it's designed to be like that.
Does anybody think that triangles are designed? I guess not.
I'm thinking nowadays that all the "complexity of life" "complexity of the universe", these fantastic symmetries and correlations and structures and the "grand design" and all the shit is just a big illusion and not really different from all the wonders of a single triangle.
Um..... maybe it was off.
[/quote]

Now see, where you went wrong was in forgetting that triangles consist of vertices. I'm not sure how you could miss that one

You seem to be subtly poking at my post but I must be tired or something. Was the whole thing sarcasm or just the triangle bits? I wasn't looking to suggest that anything in existence was designed though I may have given that impression.

I wouldn't mind subscribing to a more contemporary scientifically accepted view of the make up of existence but from what I understand the accepted view is that it's essentially made up of energy but it seems to me that energy can be further defined and thus not a truly fundamental building block of existence. It's a logic block I can't get my mind around.

I see where you're coming from and possibly obtained your "revelation." Such things can't truly be known without dying though, as much as anyone would want to speculate one way or another.

The ongoing professional theory is deja vu is just a hiccup in your sense processing in your brain. So you get two perceptions at the same time, but the brain can only deal with one, so it picks one, the remaining one is a sensory echo that we perceive as deja vu. What causes this hiccup is debateable, everything from missed/improper synapse firing (likely) to perception singularity theories dealing with the brain having a phase imbalance and accidentally perceiving out of "proper" temporal order (unlikely)...

I tend not to believe professional theories, because they are also part of a dogma which much like the other dogma is self reinforcing. Notice I didn't say that it only reinforced material beliefs, because scientists routinely break that rule. For example, extra dimensions of string theory, Einsteins curved space, dark matter, and so on.

In the case of deja vu, it's simply a foregone conclusion based on the orignal scientific dogma that everything has to be resolved through partical interaction, nevermind what particals are or who put them there. So, when it's convenient, they use the material argument, but then promptly invent exotic materials or dimensions when their equations don't work out or disagree with observation.

It seems to me that "universe" has come to be accepted as something different than the entirety of existence. The definition tends towards more practical and scientifically observable limitations. Which makes some sense as anything else isn't going to be provable, manipulable, or otherwise have a practical purpose to us.

I agree, and I believe there is a practial theory that describes the material universe very eloquently, and this theory has been buried a long time ago. You see, when Newton came up with his gravity "theory", many people were asking "what is the mechanism of gravity", because Newton's "theory" was only a description of what happens, not how it happens. Well, not many people know that Newton had an adversary who gave exactly such a mechanism. Unfortunately, since this adversary was an unknown and Newton was the mathematics chair at Oxford, politics not science now dictate who's right and who's wrong. This was the greatest blunder in human history.

I'm guessing it will take another thousand years for us to correct this, and the only way to do so is to go around the mainstream scientific community which now just like then is based on politics, popularity, money, and hurd mentality more than anything else. Luckily, power has been returned to the people through the Internet, however, it takes a lot of effort to undo the damage that the dogma has caused. The underground is also filled with crackpots, just like the mainstream. So, good luck to anyone trying to make sense of "scientific" theories.

I see where you're coming from and possibly obtained your "revelation." Such things can't truly be known without dying though, as much as anyone would want to speculate one way or another.

What if I'm correct and you either go on to the next life or relive your life again? In other words there is no heaven or time in between when you get the answers to such questions. In that case you can only figure it out within your lifetime. Then again, if you're not meant to do it, you never will.