No, Robert. Life did not exist on Mars until we find evidence of it. Just like a higher intelligence (god?), right?
We should have found evidence for god already. If, not, god does not exist.
There's a big difference between the chance of life existing on Mars vs the chance of there being a god.
Why might we think there is or has been life on Mars? Because we already know that life is possible. We know the conditions that let life arise. We think Mars may now have those conditions, or may have had them in the past. It is therefore reasonable to suggest that life may be there, or evidence of it's existence in the past.
Why might we think there is or has ever been a god? We don't know anything of the sort is even possible, there are no confirmed existence of anything of the sort. We don't know what conditions are needed, or if there are any which would permit it, it certainly doesn't seem to fit in with the standard model of physics which we have confirmed to be accurate in ludicrous detail. It is therefore only a matter of personal desire that a god is ever entered into a discussion of the way this universe runs based on superstition and a refusal to confront our preferred beliefs with the evidence.
No, Robert. You will not find an explanation for everything simply because you feel that you are entitled to evidence.
What is the origin of the laws that govern quantum mechanics?
How did non conscious matter give rise to conscious matter?
I'll answer for you - you don't have a clue.
Don't feel bad, no one does.
No one understands quantum mechanics.
No one knows the origin of consciousness.
I certainly think there ought to be good reasons to believe the things you believe. In that respect you'd better have evidence if you want to convince me.
We don't know the cause of the laws behind quantum mechanics, but it seems very unlikely that the invention of an imagination which COMES from the laws of physics is retroactivly responsible for those laws.
Consciousness is the product of brains, which are the product of chemistry. Quantitatively we are struggling to understand because this is a very complex subject, but qualitatively this is the origin.
We do very definitely understand quantum mechanics, in so far that we use it all the time with high success to predict things that gods have never imagined were possible.
What people are talking about when they say that nobody understands quantum mechanics, what they mean to say is that there is no good easy to understand physical model you can hold in your head to explain what's happening in terms of things flying around and bouncing off eachother. It can be fully expressed in terms of mathematics, but not in terms of everyday objects we interact with because the objects we interact with are at the end of a very long chain of reactions involving trillions and trillions of quantum objects which in total give us the world we see on a macroscopic scale.
People understand very well how to use quantum mechanics, and how the rules work, and what that means for interactions. What they don't understand is how that works intuitively. It can't be compared to billiard balls, or waves, or fields exactly, but combinations of all those things which is confusing, because macroscopic objects ony disply one of these aspects very prominently. But with careful consideration it is possible to explain these phenomena on a macroscopic level by understanding the quantum mechanics that underlies it.
It is a counter-intuitive subject, but not beyond understanding.
We aren't smart enough to know, Robert.
Your limited understanding amounts to ignorance.
Maybe there are limits to our understanding of life that we will never be able to overcome. That is a more humble approach to the mystery of life/creation instead of all the bombast that is spewed by materialists.
There may well be things that are just beyond our ability to process. That doesn't mean we can know nothing about them. Infinity is a good example, or the square root of -1.
Even though we will ultimately never be able to hold the universe in our minds in it's fullness, we can certainly know something about something, and that ain't bad at all. And even with the little that we do know, god seems very unlikely indeed. Why would you imagine knowing more would reverse that trend?
This is the trouble with Atheists. It's their "I'm smarter than you are" attitude that's annoying.
You are projecting. I don't think i'm smarter than you. I think i'm willing to look at alternative explanations that don't always INSIST that there must be a god in there somewhere. I was a believer once. I didn't stop believing because i was suddenly smarter than anyone else. Instead i just took seriously the idea that god doesn't HAVE to be a part of my explanation of the world. once i did that i found that everything hums along just fine without god, so why bring him back in when there is nothing to suggest that he should be there?
You are very anthropocentric. You seem to believe that human beings are capable of scientifically explaining everything, or that we are arriving close to an explanation of everything because we are who we are.
Science has been great at unraveling mysteries and discovering more mysteries as a result. To conclude that all will be explained, without the need for a god, because god does not exist (or whatever the hell you want to call it) is arrogance.
anthropocentric? In a sense. Not in that, "everything is made for us" but perhaps in that anything that we think matters, matters in relationship to us because we are humans. That doesn't connote any real significance to things other than our own value of them. The sun wouldn't and couldn't care if all of humanity were wiped out tomorrow. We are concerned with the things which concern us. That's no great mystery.
Our ability to explain phenomena is not dependant on who we are necessarily, except it's difficult to imagine an understanding being which doesn't share at least some of our characteristics.
It really comes down to this for me.
It isn't difficult to explain reality without god. When you add god back in, it becomes impossible to explain reality. Since reality is evident, i doubt a god had anything to do with it.
How is it arrogant to suggest that a story which has clear roots in human imagination, historical origination, cultural limitations, demonstrable factual ignorance, astounding anthropocentric delusions of granduer and almost no correlation with what we've been able to discover through evidence probably isn't the One True Reason for Existence?
