A couple of months ago, I had posted on here looking for some ideas on books and other places to look for information on religion, as I recently developed an interest in learning about different faiths and their premises. Several of you had asked me to post what I learned, so here it is! Unfortunately, I really didn't have the time to get into it as much as I wanted, and much of what I have looked at so far is related primarily to Christianity because that's the primary influence I'm surrounded by right now. I only got the time to really start delving into this during the last 10 days or so, so I have a long ways to go. Here's what I've looked at so far though. Any suggestions on other sources are of course appreciated. <I>The Case for Faith</I>: This was an interesting book trying to challenge eight of the most common emotional and intellectual problems people have with Christianity (like "why is Jesus the only way to heaven"). It was written by an atheist-turned-Christian journalist, and it was done by interviewing and challenging Christian theologists on these issues. Overall, it was pretty good - I certainly learned a lot. It did have some weaknesses, though. First, it was of course slanted towards Christianity. At times, I had "but what about this" questions and would really have liked to have been present at the interviews. I also would have liked a reverse of the same strategy - taking scientific or other weaknesses to atheists and challenging them to explain those issues. He also challenged many atheist views to show God existed, but then kind of assumed God existing = Christianity is right. There was a leap of logic there that I found lacking. Anyway, overall, this was a good read. I liked that the interviewees didn't always have clear answers and were honest about it.) <I>The Science of God</I> - I'm in the middle of this one right now. Its again Christianity-based, but much more hard-core science. I've only covered one major issue - the idea of six days of Genesis vs. 15 billion year old universe, and this was absolutely fascinating. I was expecting the standard "the six days are a metaphor" type explanation, but he shot that down from the start, saying there's no evidence in the Bible for this at all. Instead, he went into quantum physics and the idea of changing speeds of light. The math was a bit over my head, but the general concept was amazing. Basically, he tried to show that using the cosmic equivalent of 24 hours - a day on Earth slowed to the speed of time in a universe still expanding (based on wavelengths of background cosmic radiation) - the universe comes out to 15.75 billion years old. In addition, each of the days corresponded amazingly well to what the Bible says happened on each of the days - and it was done using unbiased science. In other words, as far as I can tell, it wasn't an arbitrary setting of the length of a day, etc. I'm very interested to read the rest of this book and see what it has to offer. <I>The Purpose Driven Life</I> - This is a book about how to live a Christian life. It's more for Christians than for someone looking to learn I think, but oh well. I've only started this - it's supposed to be read over 40 days, so that's what I'm doing (I'm on day #3). Immediately, it brings up a discrepency with the first book. Whereas the focus of that was on the idea the God gave us free will, this book more or less said things are predetermined - when we're born and will die, etc are all known by God beforehand. If that's the case, then everything seems predetermined, meaning we don't have free will. I'm curious what the rest of this book will say, but it seems a little pushy. I'm not expecting too much of value here. <I>The Bible</I> - Well, I didn't really expect to read the Bible, but one was given to me for my birthday (long story), so I might as well. As you might guess, this also is slightly slanted towards Christianity. I've only read about 10-15 verses, but I do find it very interesting - I've never actually read any of it before, so seeing the actual stories is kinda cool. As I learn the stories, I am very interested to learn how much historical / achaeological evidence there is for the people, places, and events mentioned. Those are the ones I've started. I also have <I>The Case for Christ</I>, which is written by the same author as the Case for Faith. This one tries to show the historical proof of Jesus as the savior. I read one chapter and it made too many references to prophets and other things that I'm not familiar enough with, so it's on the backburner until I have a stronger foundation. I've also ordered <I>Religion for Dummies</I> as a starting point to looking at all the major religions. Unfortunately, all my reading so far has been pro-Christianity, so I can't say I've gotten an unbiased view of this stuff like I had hoped, but the history has completely fascinated me. I'm going to be going through more and more of this stuff over the next month of my break, so I'll post more as I go through additional sources if people are interested. I'd also love to hear (especially from the scientists on this board) what y'all think of the evolution issues (macro vs. micro) and the ideas of the Six Days of Genesis. Those are the two big issues that have been covered in most depth so far in those first two books. Both made strong arguments that fossil evidence doesn't support the idea of macro-evolution, but instead shows all major phylums of life showing up around the same time. The problem with these types of sources is that it's hard to know whether this is biased or factual. Merry Christmas!
I'm sorry, but this sounds so stupid, its laughable. Give it a hundred years, we'll have all sorts of "new math" and then a brand new amazingly accurate theory can be brought to light. Your list is extremely Christianity based - as in 100%. DO you know anything about Tao-ism?
I'm sorry, but this sounds so stupid, its laughable. Give it a hundred years, we'll have all sorts of "new math" and then a brand new amazingly accurate theory can be brought to light. It does sound a bit kooky, but the logic is actually fundamentally sound. Like I said, the math is a bit above my head, so I can't vouch for that. The basic logic is that on Day One, the Earth didn't exist, so why would we use Earth days? Instead, he translates the Earth day into a generic universe day. From my understand, we know that time slows down with higher gravity, and we can actually calculate how much. We also can see exactly what it was the instant of the big bang based on the length of these background cosmic radiation waves. The formula basically converts our 24 hour day to the length of a 24 hour day at the first instant of the Big Bang. Then again for the 2nd day, etc. I don't have the book with me, but the days basically come out to half-lives from 15 3/4 billion years ago: day 1: 15 3/4 billion to 8 billion or so day 2: 8-4 billion day 3: 4-2 billion day 4: 2-1 billion day 5: 1-0.5 billion day 6: 0.5b - 0.25b My numbers are a bit off - the actual numbers that came out had day 6 starting at 0.25b years ago. Anyway, while it does sound a bit freaky, the math used is independent of the Bible - it's pure science, and isn't really considered to be "out there", from what I can tell. In other words, the logic is sound, and only one set of numbers can come from it. Like I said, though, this book is designed to support Christianity, so it certainly can be biased. However, the logic used is far beyond anything I've seen or heard from people in the past. I'm curious if anyone has heard this argument before, especially those who specialize in the field of science.
I forgot to mention - where it does get to be a little bit less definitive is fitting the six days of Genesis into the time frames provided. He admits that this is a little more difficult, but he does make it work reasonably well. This is where there's certainly more potential bias in trying to support Christianity.
But people have only been around from 5-10 million years or so, if you believe in science & evolution. If you don't believe in those things, then why even use science at all. It is my opinon that some of the most fundamental facts about the world that sciene has "taught" us contradicts so enormously with the basic teachings of the bible (old and new testament), that there is absolutely no chance that any of it can be supported in any way. The earth is just as likely to be a big old body of water with a humongous turtle floating on it and us living on the turtle's back until the world ends and it starts over again - which, though not precise or exact at all, is akin to the ancient Mayan beliefs about the world.
isn't that still a metaphor? God is infinate ... all power, ect .. ect... It really doesn't matter. Whether you're using quatum physics math or whatever or day 1 is a 'metaphor', God has all power. Use your imagination ... there are countless ways 'the 6 days' could have came about...and quite frankly, if you are infinate with all power, you could have done every one of them, and then undo it, infinity times over. It will never be explained, because we can't comprehend it.
I was given that book by a group of my christian friends in order to "save" me. They know I'm a logic driven, "show me the money" kind of guy, so they thought it would appeal to me. And it did, at first. I was anxious to see how they could prove the existence and stories of Christ. However, they kept quoting and referencing the bible as a source. That's kind of cheating. Because the bible is to be taken on faith.. that faith is supposed to be "proven" in this book. It's less of an introductory book to christianity, and more of an intermediate book for those who wish to reaffirm their faith.
I don't know why it's said that time slowed down at the beginning of the universe. Theory of relativism states that time slows down at higher speed, so unless the author can prove that the whole universe was moving, and moving at a higher speed than it is now just after the big bang, I don't see how time would slow down at then. Also, I'm not sure that time slows down in proportion to higher gravity. It would be like saying that a clock would run slower here on earth than it does on the moon, which I doubt. Well, I guess it's time for me to brush up on physics to find out the answers. Gulp.
It would be like saying that a clock would run slower here on earth than it does on the moon, which I doubt. According to the author, this is the case. In addition to travelling at fast rates, time slows with higher gravity. For example, the wavelength of light from sunlight is slightly shorter (or longer - can't remember) than that originating on Earth -- but the amount is neglible at these levels. If I remember right (I don't have the book on me), it's something like 1/1,000,000 shorter or something like that. However, at the level of the big bang, the amount is obviously more significant, and that's seen in the wavelengths of CBR, which originated at the time of the big bang. Again, this is an area that I don't have the physics background in. These things were presented as simple fact, so I assume they are true (the science in the book is supposedly mainstream and sound, and the author is a scientist).
Time does slow down as gravity increases (as velocity increases, too). Time runs slower near objects that are more massive. Some university once conducted an experiment where they showed that clocks on airlines run slower than land-based clocks.
Major -- that's awesome you're seeking like that! if you ever have a chance to hear lee strobel (the author of case for faith) speak, go do it! he may write from a pro-christian bent now...but this dude was so atheist before. as for the 7 days in genesis...that stuff was never that important to me. ultimately, genesis is a revelation from God to a people thousands of years ago...if he had used quantum physics to explain the creation of the universe it would have been a meaningless message to those people. i think the problem with many Chrisitans and others is that they want the Bible to be a science book, and it's just not. it spends very little time explaining why it rains...or why the sun sets each day...or how exactly the earth was formed...you get a lot of that in pagan mythology, but you just don't find it in the Bible with any specificity. my faith isn't without reason...but reason isn't the bulk of my faith, either. God's reason seems to turn ours upside-down (the last become first...the widow actually gives more than the rich..etc) it's difficult to comprehend the infinite. what is funny to me is when people say it's cheating to cite the Bible. as if the modern-day writer has more authority to speak of Jesus than his contemporaries did. so we gather together some commission 2000 years later to tell us that the people back then really didn't see what they claimed they saw...or they were all mass hallucinating when they claimed they saw the resurrected Christ. ultimately, these men and women left their homes and moved across the globe spreading the news of what they encountered...they didn't seek for conquest of new lands...but rather suffered like crazy for their faiths. they saw something to believe that this man had been resurrected, as best i can tell. and i find that reaffirmed in my own faith through the Holy Spirit. the strongest evidence for a Creator is the creation, itself. the more science tells about the world and the universe we live in, the more i see a Creator. order down to the finest detail in a universe that otherwise moves to entropy. the strongest evidence i have for Christ is in the hearts of those I've seen Him change. absolutely amazing.
