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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/23/2008 9:30:09 AM | In response to ahoytheredave, actually you are quite wrong about everybody having humanistic values, if they did, there wouldn't be so much crime and violence in our world today. There wouldn't be unecessary wars, there would not be corruption on every level that we see, including governments; there would be alot more people helping one another than you see today.
To answer your question, "why haven't those with the strongest humanistic values solved all the world's problems?" Because there just hasn't been enough of those kind of people around to run governments and solve problems on a global scale. There has been plenty of influential people with strong humanistic values, such as the late Carl Sagan, but for the most part, anyone with strong humanistic values is dismissed as being weak or being a "liberal." There is and always have been power in numbers.
I do agree, however, that war does seem to be the greatest motivator for invention and innovation. But it is unfortunate that so many lives need to be lost in the name of war. But there does seem to be a continuous flow of progress that is being acheived independent of wars and conflict. For example, NASA, and space research has lead to the development of many practical technologies that we take for granted today, especially used in medicine.
Pharmaceutical research is another peaceful endeavor that continues to make advances, despite the bad reputation that drug companies have. Yes, they may be acting in the spirit of competition, but they also act very humanistically in some ways such as offerinf free medicine to low-income people and donating antiviral drugs to AIDS stricken Africa. It is unfortunate that the media seems to gloss over these minor facts. While it is true that drug companies make millions of dollars in profits, it also costs a minimum of 10 million dollars just to develop the drug and conduct the clinical trials necessary to get the drugs approved.
I think competition is good, up to a point, but society benefits the most when our resarch is directed toward good humanistic goals. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/23/2008 9:30:09 AM | I find this thread is a perfect example of why there is a lack of innovation to solve energy and environmental issues. Technology innovation has been my career. I know first hand what is involved in actually creating, developing, and delivering technology. If everyone could do it, then there would not be an issue would there?
It seems most of those posting here are at heart, socialists. To me, that pretty much explains the whole problem but as those embracing this mind set are clueless, I will attempt to explain although I doubt anyone who embraces a socialist mindset is capable of the dicipline to understand. Socialism is by its nature designed to eliminate the need for self dicipline in favor of state decision making.
Successful innovation in technology requires a mental dicipline toward a wider more complex focus, not a narrowing as typical of academia. Try to understand a multidiminsional space with vectors incorporating a wide range of physical properties interacting with a similar range of vectors for human interface, desires, and society. Socialism is a restrictive environment with artificial societal limits and simplistic, idealistic perceptions of humans. Such a narrowing of vision is counter to the wide focus required for innovation.
The motivation for innovation often comes from survival requirements such as in war. In war, the restraints of society are pretty much tossed aside. In a socialist environment, such restraints are amplified thus innovation attenuated. In capitalism and the free market, there are fewer restraints and the threat of starvation for failure real. Again, reduced restraints both from external and internal sources thus more innovation.
How many technologies have you conceived and how many have you delivered? I have quite a long record. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/23/2008 12:36:33 PM |
I find this thread is a perfect example of why there is a lack of innovation to solve energy and environmental issues. Technology innovation has been my career. I know first hand what is involved in actually creating, developing, and delivering technology. If everyone could do it, then there would not be an issue would there?
ahoytheredave , I admire your achievements as a tech engineer. It takes quite a brain and determination to get where you are. I claim total ignorance to exactly how the delvolping proccess of a new tech is done. But it starts only with a need and or a desire. This is all we are concerned about in answering this question. The how is done automatically after you have the need or desire.
The need comes as you said from survial requirements, but war is not a survial requirement. War is a counter to survival. Sure it brings new tech, but usually this tech is designed for destruction, which is also counter to our survial. Our planet is dieing very quicky,, and us along with it. War will only escalte this. Our need for surival, survival from our destruction of the Earth, is our modivator. Another modivator would be our desire to explore the unknown and learn. You do not need money in the equation for these needs to exist.
Also everyone does not have to be a tech engineer for innovation to prosper. But you would have more tech engineers in a socialistic society mainly because education is free. How many bright souls are out there who can not afford to go to school.
It seems most of those posting here are at heart, socialists. To me, that pretty much explains the whole problem but as those embracing this mind set are clueless, I will attempt to explain although I doubt anyone who embraces a socialist mindset is capable of the dicipline to understand.
I would be careful, on who you are calling clueless. Like I said before Einstien believes as I do. Your expertise is a tech engineer, you are basicaly a specialist. What is needed here is a cosmologist or a political scientist. One who is able to take general infomation from the specialists and put it into one big picture. Also I can counter your claim and say that anyone with a capitalist mindset is incapable of understanding me. But I do not believe so. There is less illiteracy and drop outs in Russia then North America. evidence that a socialistic society breeds motivation.
Socialism is by its nature designed to eliminate the need for self dicipline in favor of state decision making
I dont know where you get that from. There is not even an agreement in the world of exactly what socialism consists of. The need for self dicipline comes from yourself and our culture. I agree that people who work harder and make more achievements, should have more perks than the joe who sits on his ass all day and drinks. But nobody should be filthy rich. It is frankly a waste of resources for 1 person to have the wealth of 100 or 1000 people. Also I like to use the Star Treck Saga, as my anaolgy because I believe this Ideal is one our species should strive for. In Star Trek in the 24th century there is no money, no crime, no poverty on Earth. In Star Trek humans drive is not to aquire wealth, but only to better himself. I use that on myself. I live not for wealth, but to better myself and to learn all I can before I die. I believe this is our goal. You cannot have no poverty, no crime and no money in a capitalistic world. Therefore Capitalism is primitive and cannot solve our worlds problems.
I do not know exactly the details of what type of socialistic government would be best for human kind, but I do know that is the direction we have to go. At least with the basics, free food, free healthcare, free shelter, free education, no rich but higher standards of living for the achievers. free speech, free Courts and human rights.
How many technologies have you conceived and how many have you delivered? I have quite a long record
It does not matter how many you conceived or delivered. This is not an engineer question, it is a political & cultural one. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/23/2008 2:38:19 PM |
I claim total ignorance to exactly how the delvolping proccess of a new tech is done. But it starts only with a need and or a desire.
This is the first error. Needs and desires are filled by existing technologies, not new ones. That is why we are in an energy shortage. We desire abundant, clean, cheap energy. Existing technologies come up short in one or more catagories but we charge ahead. The "powers that be", now days often regulators, primarily socialist if not in name, set the path and make the tradoffs. Those who don't want the nuke, the bird wackers, the strip mine, the hydro project, etc in their back yard don't get to choose. "Its for the greater good" claim those who take away your property. That is the result of political and cultural leaders making technology decisions.
If you are not going to listen to those who are proven innovators in favor of "cultural leaders" when not in rehab or "political leaders" who have trouble with truth and honesty, then you get the predictable results. Cultural leaders often answer to no laws relying on popularity. Political leaders create the laws of man but such laws are applied haphazard and easily broken. Engineers work with the laws of physics. Interesting how the laws of physics cannot be broken even if we tried. The argument that the best technology solutions should be decided by cultural and political leaders is laughably tragic. The presumption is that engineers are not capable of empathetic decisions is insulting. One of the biggest decisions decisions I made in my career took the least time. I was offered a great deal of money to help develope a new generation nuke warheads. I am glad I did not live in a socialist state and could turn down such an offer on the spot. I work with former Russian scientists and engineers. Tell me about socialism. They tell me quite a lot about it.
Einstein was autistic, thus growing up socially challenged. His autistic obsession with a compass given to him by his father when he was 9 left him with an need to understand the forces that controlled that compass. He held that obsession to the grave. Even today, autistic people are challenged in school because of their social and language difficulties although the self isolation often gives them a focus the rest of us only wish we could have. In that focus, he was able to visualize the forces on his compass needle and create the special theory of relativity and later the general theory of relativity. He was a great scientist but not an engineer. He said he preferred socialism but that no such socialism existed even implying it was human nature that made it impossible. Instead of choosing a socialist society, or even a partially socialist one to live in, he chose a capitalist free market society to live in. | |
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Mr H2O
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Joined: 10/31/2006
Msg: 30 | |
| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/23/2008 3:09:46 PM | Currently a relatively small number of companies, primarily based in either the USA,
European Union or Japan, control one-third of the world's private assets.
-Placing these companies under democratic public ownership would mean
a plan to raise living standards is possible as is the creation of a socialist society.
The figures of those living on an income of less than US $1 a day are breathtaking.
In south Asia 43% of the population, 515 million people, are under this level.
In sub-Saharan Africa the numbers are 219 million and in Latin America 110 million,
respectively 39% and 24% of these two continents' populations.
Even in east Asia and Pacific, home of the 'Tiger economies',
446 million or 26%, have this low level of income.
Scientific innovation to level the playing field for the 6 Billion on the planet ?
Greed, power and profit will have to be overcome somehow. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/23/2008 7:09:48 PM | Amazing how these threads take off on such a political tangent.
For those "humanists" and "socialists," the greatest motivator for technological innovation is war, followed by greed and the desire for profit and power- not the benefit of humankind.
About the only kind of society that would fill me with more dread that one run by bleeding hearts would be one run by scientists, engineers, and technicians.
Fortunately for the rest of homo sapiens, the bleeding hearts can't quite get it together among them selves to take over completely (Democrats had both houses of Congress and the White house in '92-'94 and STILL couldn't agree on a health care plan, all they had to do was PICK ONE and vote it in), and the technogeeks lack the social skills or talent to gain any kind of real clout (Bill Gates has the smarts to realize he should stay out of politics).
I've always seen technology as a liberator of people, the ultimate social leveling tools. During the time of the Crusades, the fellow who could afford the better weapons and armor usually prevailed in a fight; with firearms, technology outweighed wealth and skill on the battlefield- a raw recruit with a musket could take out an officer on a horse at a distance.
Yes, technology may be owned and controlled by a very few who own and control it, but the gadgets they produce have a greater cultural leveling effect than the world has ever seen-
We're communicating over the most significant technological AND cultural equalizer in human history, right now. This internet thing is eventually going to make most, if not all political boundaries irrelevant, and it's probably already too late for "them" to stop it.
Probably the only real threat to it is insipid forum threads like this one. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/24/2008 2:50:12 AM | Doesn't matter what world your in, the best motivator is your own personal want (not need we ignore those to much).
As an example. I wanted a computer drawing tablet but the prices are way out of my range of spending, so I took an old web cam that someone was going to toss out, trimmed out excess parts, put it in the bottom of a box, covered the box with paper, stuck a LED in a ink pen, and wrote motion tracking software to track movements of the light on the paper. That worked nice but it was kinda sloppy. So then I ripped up a very old laptop I bought at a yard sale for $20, took the LCD screen out and wired it's control chip up to a LCD port, started to shine stuff into the LCD until I found something that'd generate a big enough blip on the data line to measure, spent a few hours fitting that into the pen in place of the led. It was accurate to 800 x 600 but occasionally the desk under the LCD would reflect the light just enough to light up more pixels than my software would accommodate causing jitters, took a few old t-shirts and layered them on the back of the LCD, now it works wicked good. It doesn't have the fancy stuff like pressure sensitivity or float point precision, but it works great for me and barely requires any processing power since the control board can interpret those pixels to x-y positions, only processing required is breaking the bytes apart into the x-y components.
Perhaps just get school science classes to teach more usable material and you'll see more useful stuff invented, like the process to make plastic is so easy with stuff that practically everyone has around their house right now, Acetone and Styrofoam, but they don't teach stuff like that in science classes. Carbon fiber can be used and fused to metals very easily using stuff we all have and produce on a regular basis, granted it wont be as strong as the commercial stuff without going for the fancy materials, but just about any fabric works as long the the resin is thick enough to fill the pores and is capable of solidifying at room temperatures. You can make a frog levitate with a magnet, I never knew that until I seen someone do it a month or two ago. It's not inventing creating stuff we already have mass produced but learning why the stuff you can make with everyday ingredients works and how it works, allows people to explore science on a more involved and interesting path than reading and calculating from textbook with little to no actual demonstration. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/24/2008 9:23:26 PM | My first patent was for a product desired by a large corporate customer to improve his employees productivity and quality. Our larger and more financially able competitors had told him what he wanted could not be done. My bosses asked me and I came up with a new, and patentable, technology that could do the job. I also said the whole product idea was bad. The reason was the actual users would be reduced to trained monkeys and would not want the product. I designed the product and first production units went to the field. My VP asked this customer VP if the product met his requirements and he replied it was exactly what he asked for and more with some added features. It was 10% of the cost of what it replaced and far more rugged. After the trials, my VP asked where the order was and the customer VP said his people didn't want it. So how does a product exceeding what a customer asked for and lower priced than expected fail? The reality is that one cannot assume "obvious" needs and desires will fly. Even though I got to play and invent, I predicted the human factor would kill the product.
My next product did not come from anyone else. It was completely mine both in technology and application. I had been proposing it for over a year without the slightest interest from management as it was unlike anything out there and they predicted the customers would not accept anything so radical. During a visit by the head of our holding company, our president spent the entire day reviewing products. Near the end of the day, the holding company president asked about any new products as intellectual property and market leading products are what they trade in. Instead of saying nothing and ending his job, he said I was working on something new and I was asked to make a presentation on the idea he had rejected. When this product went to field trials, we immediately ran into an unexpected problem. The customers testing the product would not turn them in for others to test. Its refreshing to be introduced to a bunch of applauding customers as the inventor of.... That gave me the freedom to go after a whole bucket of new technologies I had conceived and apply them to a well established mature product family with an array of established global competitors known for their "innovation". The result destroyed the competitor's market position and helped secure the sale of our holding company to an even bigger one. The number of lawyers who have made fortunes off my inventions is disgusting. At least patent law, so far, keeps them from removing my name from the patents even if I don't make anything from them. I have since changed industries and many of my former coworkers have been laid off. One of those recently laid off was the only one that could come close to understanding a little mathematical routine I had incorporated in one of the DSP algorithms. It was a derivative of one I had first conceived of as a freshman in college and received a failing grade for using it in an engineering project. The greatest hurdle to innovation is empowered stupidity.
Some of my concepts reside in notebooks as I doubt I would remember them as long as it would take to be enabled to develop them. I have probably forgotten hundreds of inventions but there seems to be an endless supply. I have tried various government and quasi-government entities to get funding but when it actually gets to the decision, if the bureaucrat political appointee can't grasp the concept, it doesn't fly. This thread is full of socialists who embrace the socialist model and it is laughable. I really have been there and done that. Capitalism and the free market are the only environments that spur innovation and only because it promises the inventor and investor reward. Even at that, lawyers, who are quasi-g0vernment functionaries, tax the innovation to near extinction. Innovation is a punishable offense and I have the scars. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/24/2008 10:38:54 PM | I knew a fellow in high school who, along with his Dad, invented a self-cooling beverage (beer) can: pull the tab and within 30 seconds the beverage (beer) was ice cold... cost (in 1970) about 5 cents per can.
Beverage (beer) company execs loved it. They thought it was great, but they didn't buy it, for two reasons:
1.) They didn't think it would sell more beverage (beer), and
2.) All they had to do was wait until the patent expired, and they could make it without paying royalties.
I designed an automatic bicycle transmission in 1975. Bike manufacturers didn't want it because
1.) it cost too much, and
2.) it wouldn't sell more bikes.
Harley-Davidson, in the 1960s or 1970s, hired Porsche to design a 4 cylinder, vibration-free motorcycle engine. It never went into production, because
1.) Harley-Davidson customers LIKE the sound of the uneven-firing V-twin, and
2.) They didn't think it would sell more motorcycles.
I sense there may be a common theme... | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/25/2008 7:43:05 AM | In all but the last case, a free market allows competitors to buy the IP and run with it. In the last case, it was a contract engineering exercise and Harley marketing execs probably knew their market better than the executive who ordered to development. Harley has since patented the sound of the V twin but I am not aware of any challenges. More recently, Porche designed the V-rod engine for Harley as an attempt to find a compromise between a solid modern engine design and the Harley ambiance. I understand it has not been as successful as hoped. Harley would do well to create another brand to sell to a different market.
Innovation must consider the people who will use it to be successful. Remember "new coke"? Marketing focus studies tend to produce results desired by the executives who commission them. People are not as simple as many marketing types consider them. They are complex and have many dimensions much like engineering physics. Without considering people in their complexity, one is risking wasting a lot of effort. Socialism takes innovation away from the innovators and puts the decisions in the hands of political committees who "earn" their position through political patronage. That means being squarely "in the box", not out of it. The opposite of innovation. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/25/2008 10:25:27 AM | | I think one excellent way to encourage innovation is to encourage children, teenagers, and young people into science and engineering. It seems many of the world's greatest scientists and engineers started from a childhood love of science and technology. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/25/2008 9:40:51 PM | | Again, look to free market-supply and demand. There is a lot of talk about demand for engineers and scientists but the demand is for cheaper (foreign) engineers and more engineering students to feed the universities. US society does not value engineers and scientists, they value celebrities, athletes, and the lawyers that keep them out of jail. It is so bad, US engineering schools have a higher enrollment of foreign students than American students. The tax payers underwrite a lot of the cost of building and maintaining engineering schools just to train foreign engineers and buy technology from overseas. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/26/2008 9:07:02 AM | ahoytherdae, you put down socialism, and you put down and complain about your capitalism indirectly. You are right US society does not value engineers and scientist, they do value celebrities, and athletes. Why is this??? Because they keep the people brain-washed with the media so as to keep them ignorant and suck thier money that they work hard for. You are not going to breed a culture that craves science in a society that is based on making money. This point you fail to understand. In capitalism you need
( money + Need or Desire + Idea = innovation ),
In socialism money is taken out
( Need or Desire + Idea = innovation ),
so logicaly, there is one less restriction to make innovation in socialism, so therfore innovation comes easier.
Why do you think that a person has to aquire wealth in order to come up with an idea and make it. I think a person would be happy enough just to have his creation just appriciated. I beleive that is true with you too. The way you talk about all your creations, you want people to appriciate you. How would you feel, if you made some amazing thing, that you made lots of money for, but nobody appriciated the hard work and thought you put into it.
You can have a socialistic society, that is based on learning, and understanding. We have a planet to maintain, we have a universe to explore, these our goal enough to keep innovation going without the need for money. Money gets in the way of these goals, and slows the progress down of these goal, so therefore slowing down innovation.
I will give one hypothetical example of how innovation is slowed by capitalism. Say Intel just came up with thier pentium 2 chip. You desgined a chip that would be = to say a pentium 5 chip. Intel has all the money so they buy you out. Now instead of Intel bringing out the pentium 5 chip next year. They bring out a pentium 3 chip, then the pentium 4 after that. This way they can make the most money, but this way also slows down innovation.
Another way to put it is, that it is better to make a technology alittle better each time, instead of alot better in Capitalism.
I have given you a logical argument. You say the socialists cannot understand. Well show me you understand and logicaly disprove my equations instead of by passing them. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/26/2008 9:49:27 AM | No hard-feelings ahoytherdae, We both want the same thing, A culture that is scientific. We are just at opposite ends on how to get this.
I also beleive another hindrance to scientific innovation is organised religion. But I do not want to get into this. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/27/2008 11:17:44 AM | Reward and fear are the basic motivators. Fear is an immediate motivator that produces actions with very little short term planning and virtually no long term planning. Reward produces goals and ambition. Socialism leaves reward up to the state and thus is driven more by politics than any contribution to society.
I think few people are capable of separating religion and science. Religion is all about beliefs where science only has conclusions and is open to changing those. If a someone wants some proof of a religious "belief", then they are entering science. Religion does not require proof. On the other side, if a campaign is mounted to claim some scientific theory as fact, then there will be plenty of people follow it religiously. It is the nature of people to embrace religious beliefs even if they don't see them as such. Faith gives people courage to take on tasks they would otherwise shy away from. The risk comes from those who use religious beliefs to control others. It could encompass topics such as evolution and creationism, or man made global warming. They are religious debates. The solution is not dominance of one over the other but understanding the difference between a religious belief and a scientific theory. I see little difference between the "perfection" of the socialist state and a religious state. Both are based on religious beliefs and often motivate through fear.
Capitalism is not based in religion but the "selfish" motive of reward. In our society, corporations, regulated creations of government, are the typical mechanisms enabling capitalism. Yes, Intel may buy some generation 5 technology then progress though generations 3 and 4 to maximize profit. In the mean time, someone might come up with generation 6 and sell it to AMD. Or the state could come along and say generation 1 serves the people just fine. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/27/2008 1:50:05 PM | Innovation is life itself, because people are born creative and curious, and then they seek to improve their lot by thinking up better ways to do things. You can't do better than providing a sheltered space where people are free to act on their inspirations.
Technology is a tiny domain compared to the natural universe. It shows how limited is our intellect that we labor at small inventions when surrounded by countless examples of naturally occurring mysteries. We cannot comprehend the complexity of the universe, or even any of its smaller parts, beyond some slightly practical theories we have invented to correlate with our experiences. The way to increase technological innovation is to set the stage, small as it must be, and then allow genius to happen in its own stuttering way.
I do not put any stock in abstract theories about politics and motivation supposed to enhance what happens in the mind, except as they share the provision for providing room for happy accidents to happen within individual minds. The most oppressive and the freest societies are background noise to anyone lost in thought attempting to solve a problem, as well as for anyone oblivious to the outside world as they trip along having a daydream. My incubator for great technology would be a long room with many shower stalls, since it is well known that most great ideas occur to people while taking a shower. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/27/2008 5:42:33 PM | Science cannot accomplish "anything" and secure perfect lives for everyone. Neither can socialism. The problem with human beings is not our environment.
Our problem is sin, disobedience to the God of the Bible, which comes from our inner hearts outward. Only the God of the Bible can save us by Jesus Christ.
That said, capitalism (this country has become closer to socialist, no longer capitalist) under God's rule and grace (Christianity) fuels amazing scientific discoveries and innovation, as evidenced by the past 18th and 19th Centuries in this country (USA) up to present day, where Christian assumptions and moral values are put to action. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/27/2008 6:06:26 PM |
That said, capitalism (this country has become closer to socialist, no longer capitalist) under God's rule and grace (Christianity) fuels amazing scientific discoveries and innovation, as evidenced by the past 18th and 19th Centuries in this country (USA) up to present day, where Christian assumptions and moral values are put to action.
Funny, the Persian Empire, and before that the Greeks and Romans (just a few examples) also had incredible leaps of scientific innovation. I'm just curious how you reconcile that with your world view.
And, of course, let's not forget it was Christians living in a FEUDAL societal framework and invading the Middle East that destroyed much of the Persian Empire and its scientific advances...
Just sayin', is all. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/27/2008 8:41:59 PM |
That said, capitalism (this country has become closer to socialist, no longer capitalist) under God's rule and grace (Christianity) fuels amazing scientific discoveries and innovation, as evidenced by the past 18th and 19th Centuries in this country (USA) up to present day, where Christian assumptions and moral values are put to action.
Funny, the Persian Empire, and before that the Greeks and Romans (just a few examples) also had incredible leaps of scientific innovation. I'm just curious how you reconcile that with your world view. And, of course, let's not forget it was Christians living in a FEUDAL societal framework and invading the Middle East that destroyed much of the Persian Empire and its scientific advances... Just sayin', is all.
All civilizations of the world came from the descendants of Noah after the global flood that wiped out all previous civilizations (approximately 4,000 years ago). Therefore all civilizations arose originally from ancestors who believed in the God of the Bible.
The Persian and Greek (and later the Roman) as well as other non-Christian civilizations such as the Mayan and Egyptian civilizations began with a monotheistic concept of god, which later degenerated into a pantheistic, occultic, mystical-evolutionist view, which degraded their empires from the inside. Their amazing accumulated engineering, astronomical, and other scientific knowledge "devolved" as their idol-worship and immorality exploded.
I'm not saying unbelievers can't "do science" I'm just saying that it's not consistent with a non-Christian worldview; that is, they borrow principles from Christianity in order to do it, all the while denying it.
Five principles of Christianity I am talking about (and there are many more, I just don't want to reiterate the Bible here--it's a big Book! LOL ) are: 1) "dominion"--the idea that mankind should work, multiply, spread over the earth and subdue the earth; 2) that God's creation in ordered, logical, consistent over time, and engineered because a perfectly rational, infinitely wise, loving, and unchanging Creator created it; 3) that man is capable of exploring the world and subduing it b/c God commanded it and man was made in the image of God; 4) that such things as transcendent, universal, non-material entities, such as thoughts, mathematics, and the laws of logic, can exist because God's creation reflects his character; 5) that God is the one Who unites the many, that our God is transcendent and immanent at the same time, so that we can apply logic (immaterial) to the material world around us, etc.
Regarding the destruction of the Persian empire, I was speaking of Christianity as a worldview, as outlined in the Bible, informing science, not really defending the actions of professing Christians who disobeyed God's Word (the Bible) for reasons that didn't have much to do with destroying science, as far as I know.
I don't know if you were saying that feudalism was a Christian societal framework, but I don't believe it was. The republican form of civil government based on liberty within restraint under God which was new in the world after the Reformation in what would become the U.S. was far more explicitly Christian than feudalism. As Christianity spread, forms of government did change, as populations became increasingly Biblically literate. Unfortunately, we seem to be in a civilizational (is that a word?) downswing at the moment.
I don't know the answers to everything; I have much to learn and research, I'm sure many of you here know more than I do, but my worldview is fairly consistent. I just don't think any other religion/philosophy/worldview explains the world as we know it better than Biblical Christianity does, for all the sins and faults of us individual Christians. | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/27/2008 9:34:41 PM | I find it amusing you think the Persians, Greeks, Babylonians, Romans, Mayans, Egyptians, or pretty much ANYONE but the Jews and (later) the Christians and Muslims were monotheistic. Monotheism is a pretty late development, as religions go.
I've just never seen ANY evidence that any of the above were EVER monotheistic. Except for the Jews, Christians, and Muslims, of course.
Then again, all OBSERVED evidence flies in the face of a world-spanning flood any time... I was going to say "8,000 years" but it's really EVER. The only observed evidence that would lead to such a story would be the flooding of the Black Sea around 5550 BC. http://www.robotwisdom.com/science/blacksea.html I can see the story getting blown up to a MUCH larger story over five and a half millenia, though.
As for Feudalism... Christian countries have been Feudal (generally monarchies) a LOT more often than they've been democratic Republics... and not all science and technology derives from the USA!!!!! That's actually a pretty laughable position, as Japan has driven more technological advancement in the last 60+ years than the USA by a wide margin, and the Industrial Revolution was driven by Europe. Hmm, what's Japan's religious standing? Pretty much Animist/polytheistic/Buddhist.
I think perhaps you lack perspective and have been listening WAY too closely to a very few people with a powerful agenda. You should get out more.
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/27/2008 10:18:09 PM |
I find it amusing you think the Persians, Greeks, Babylonians, Romans, Mayans, Egyptians, or pretty much ANYONE but the Jews and (later) the Christians and Muslims were monotheistic. Monotheism is a pretty late development, as religions go.
Actually, you have it backwards. The belief that polytheism came first and "developed" into monotheism is based on evolutionary philosophy of anthropology, which archaology continues to disprove. But thanks for acknowledging that monotheism is more advanced LOL
I've just never seen ANY evidence that any of the above were EVER monotheistic. Except for the Jews, Christians, and Muslims, of course.
Maybe you should get out more, read more books.
Then again, all OBSERVED evidence flies in the face of a world-spanning flood any time... I was going to say "8,000 years" but it's really EVER. The only observed evidence that would lead to such a story would be the flooding of the Black Sea around 5550 BC. http://www.robotwisdom.com/science/blacksea.html I can see the story getting blown up to a MUCH larger story over five and a half millenia, though.
Nonsense; there is a lot of evidence for a worldwide flood--the fossil record, for example. (You've lived over five and a half millenia? My, your observations of the Black Sea carry weight then.)
As for Feudalism... Christian countries have been Feudal (generally monarchies) a LOT more often than they've been democratic Republics... and not all science and technology derives from the USA!!!!! That's actually a pretty laughable position, as Japan has driven more technological advancement in the last 60+ years than the USA by a wide margin, and the Industrial Revolution was driven by Europe. Hmm, what's Japan's religious standing? Pretty much Animist/polytheistic/Buddhist.
Oh," a lot more often"? LOL okay.
Japan's "technological advancement" was a joke until after WWII, when the U.S. started to have major influence there. Yes, that is Japan's religious standing, sadly.
I think perhaps you lack perspective and have been listening WAY too closely to a very few people with a powerful agenda. You should get out more.
Hmmm, I was just going to say the same about you! | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/27/2008 10:58:00 PM | I'd love to be pointed to the archaeology that shows I've got it backwards. Seriously.
I could point you at some resources that explain the powerful desire among humans to create gods and religions from an EVOLUTIONARY standpoint, but I think it would blow your mind. Wouldn't want to be responsible for that. :)
And just because something's more recent, that doesn't make it more advanced. Bit of hubris there, eh? Thought that was one of your seven Deadlies... | |
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 7/28/2008 10:49:50 AM | Had to dig out some of my books, which are still in boxes from the move... but here is an Amazon link to a REALLY good book on Roman religion. Alas, it completely contradicts your assertion that Romans moved from the "correct" monotheism to the "degenerate" polytheistic/animist religion. Strangely, the corrosion and collapse of the Roman Empire tracks a lot more closely with them ADOPTING CHRISTIANITY AND BECOMING MONOTHEISTIC.
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| Finding peaceful ways to increase scientific innovation.
Posted: 8/4/2008 7:40:00 AM | The "creationist" concept does not look very far into a past they do not think existed so to them, arguments about spiritual aspects of say the sun, moon and earth embraced by ancient civilizations are meaningless.
If God speaks to us through his creations and our minds are his creation, then his "words" are best interpreted by science itself, not some writings penned by man. To claim the fossil records etc. are not true in favor of religious texts is to claim man is infallable and God is lying. I have yet to see why God would feel a need to deceive. The Christian church has a long history of repressing scientific discovery including the concept that the earth is round and orbits the sun. Religion does not embrace doubt but science does. Scientific innovation requires the rejection of previous accepted technology (beliefs). To make sure I offend both ends of the conservative/liberal spectrum, I see very little difference between the past repression of science in the name 0f religious beliefs and the similar attempts at repressing those who question the religious beliefs of the man-made CO2 global warming religion. | |
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