Originally posted by Ghost of a Duke We really needed someone to come forward who believed in reincarnation, for the thread to remain on topic. Perhaps Dasa will discover it next time he logs on.
Thanks, Ghost. That's what I was hoping.
I did, however, receive a most interesting PM, for which I am grateful, and for which this may have been worthwhile after all.
Originally posted by divegeester Interesting. You are a trinitarian I believe, one who therefore believes in the (non scriptural) noun "the eternal son". Did the son evolve or was he always pre-created as Jesus?
Jesus is the name of the man. Before he was incarnated on earth, he was the Word of John 1.
God doesn't 'evolve', he is the same, ever and always. There's no need for God to 'evolve'. Why people conflate God and man is a never-ending source of confusion to me.
Originally posted by moonbus I agree that simple solutions are not necessarily the true ones. The universe is complicated, so at least some explanations are probably going to be complicated, too. The wisdom of Occham's Razor consists in paring away superfluous assumptions. Magic is one of the assumptions to be considered superfluous whenever physical laws are sufficient to explain somet ...[text shortened]... ge that shifting the mystery from "the universe just exists" to "God just exists" is subterfuge.
I don't know that I'd call it subterfuge, per se. Subterfuge indicates a willful deceiving. It's more a shift in emphasis.
Originally posted by CalJust Isn't it strange that every topic inevitably ends up with evolution and creation and the ubiquitous Smugface video?
Oh well, it was a long shot anyway...
I certainly didn't mean to derail your thread, it just turned out that way. By the way, I'm not that enamored with reincarnation, easy as it is to let that explain some of the mystery of life and the universe. Perhaps that's why it holds popularity, even now, among some non-theists, as well as among non-Christian theists.
Originally posted by Ghost of a Duke We really needed someone to come forward who believed in reincarnation, for the thread to remain on topic. Perhaps Dasa will discover it next time he logs on.
I would've imagined that at least one of the non-theists in the thread would've professed some, if not actual belief, then perhaps at least a familiarity with it. The eastern philosophies have no problem with it, they even make it a core of their belief, along with karma, as you mentioned previously.
But then, a belief in reincarnation seems to also indicate a belief in a 'soul', which most atheists here are loathe to consider seriously.
Originally posted by Suzianne As much as I hate the concept that theists, and particularly Christians, are much of a 'hive mind' component, I do like the wording of this.
The 'Borg' part was less 'hive mind' and more 'assimilation.'
'The victory of the Christian church was one not of obliteration but of widening embrace and assimilation.'
Originally posted by CalJust As a respite from the interminable and ridiculous YEC, evolution, Flood etc threads, here is a subject that I have been interested in for a while.
I have heard that about half the world's population, of various faiths, believe in some kind of reincarnation.
Even in the Bible there is at least one reference to it. Jesus speaking to his disciples tells t ...[text shortened]... r more previous lifetimes? There has been quite a bit of publicity recently of such occurrences.
I'm no geneticist/scientist but if you die, where your body is not found for some time, and say a vulture lands on ya or a fly or a rat and takes a nibble or two does part of your DNA not become a part of it's? I know it's a stretch maybe but...
Originally posted by Great Big Stees I'm no geneticist/scientist but if you die, where your body is not found for some time, and say a vulture lands on ya or a fly or a rat and takes a nibble or two does part of your DNA not become a part of it's? I know it's a stretch maybe but...
Typically not complete DNA sequences. Some single celled organisms can use genes from other species, but it not usual with larger organisms and what they eat.
Atoms and molecules, yes those do get passed on.
In fact I read somewhere that in every cup of water you drink there is at probably at least one water molecule that Napoleon peed out at some point in his life time.
Yes, here it is:
http://www.peterallport.com/molecules.htm
Originally posted by CalJust 2. Does anybody here have a real life experience of remembering one or more previous lifetimes? There has been quite a bit of publicity recently of such occurrences.
No. But I do have memories of events which never happened.
Human memory is a most unreliable source for truth.
Originally posted by Great Big Stees I'm no geneticist/scientist but if you die, where your body is not found for some time, and say a vulture lands on ya or a fly or a rat and takes a nibble or two does part of your DNA not become a part of it's? I know it's a stretch maybe but...
I'm guessing the DNA would be completely destroyed by digestion. You don't have bovine DNA in you from all the cheeseburgers you ever ate, do you?