Heaven, Souls, Dimensions

Destroy004 · 05-22-2006, 04:07 PM

My friend wrote this and i thought i would share kinda interesting NOTE it is long and it is his opinion only

This happened shortly after I became aware of some processes within the administration of my church that I didnt necessarily agree with involving economic policies and the treatment of churchgoers. I began to question the church and its practice, and sought after a deeper understanding of the Bible and its relation to everyday life, without the corruption that the adult population had drawn into religious practice to gain economic superiority. Science and Religion are always in conflict, right? Or has science simply not caught up yet? Or is religion simply a method of supplanting peoples fear of death by creating an image of Heaven? How can heaven even exist?

Ok so now to the fun part. Ill use this analogy of the Farmers cows. This farmer has two identical cows (we will call them twins for the sake of this argument), and they grow up side by side on the farm and live a long, healthy life. Both cows are the same height, weight, color, and virtually identical by almost every means of judgment. One day, the farmer comes out to feed the cows, and one of them has just died. Laying next to the other cow, the farmer looks at them both. They are both still the same size and color, and virtually every other physical characteristic but one; one of them is alive, and one of them is dead. What makes the one that living alive and what makes the other one just a pile of matter lying on the ground? There is some force that makes the living cow alive, that the dead cow no longer obtains that same life-force, what I will call a soul. Well, what happened to that force? It couldnt have just disappeared; Conservation of energy states that the total amount of energy (including potential energy) in a closed system remains constant. In other words, energy can be converted from one form to another, but it cannot be created or destroyed. In modern physics, all forms of energy are exhibit mass, and all mass is a form of energy. So this energy that was keeping the cow alive, could not just be destroyed; there was no burst of light or expellation of heat when the cow died, and it still rests at roughly the same temperature that living cow is at (it cooled down a little from laying there while I explained conservation of energy).

Destroy004 · 05-22-2006, 04:09 PM

So where did the soul go? To answer that question with the answer I have come up with, I will have to explain some stuff about dimensions, but im going to keep this brief because I really dont like math, though I do well at it. Ok so there are something like 46 known dimensions to exist, of which, we can explain only a few, because these few dimensions are the only ones that our senses can percept, or we can physically fit into. The first dimension is a dot, existing at the origin (X=0, Y=0). The first dimension is the x axis (yes that same x that you hated in algebra, if you dont like math, you might want to skip this paragraph), and everything in the first dimension exists on a horizontal line (X=anything, Y=0). The second dimension is the y axis, and everything in the first two dimensions exists in either a horizontal or vertical plane, like a flat picture. The Third dimension is the Z plane, and protrudes forward and backward from the origin, and gives way for matter to exist upon (Im sure you all have heard of 3d, or 3 dimensional). The fourth dimension is time as a function of space; objects within 0-4 exist within a time frame, in the time dimension. To make this easier to comprehend, think of a timeline, and an object exists somewhere on the timeline from the beginning of time to the end of time. As for the rest they are widely debated as to what they form, and how they function. They could create alternate universes, etc, and more are proven the deeper scientific study draws into them.

Theoretically, the soul of the dead animal could have trespassed into dimensions which we have no perception of; and no way to sense. We can only visually percept dimensions 1, 2, and 3. If the soul transferred into another dimension, it would leave without a trace, much like occurred in the tragic death of the cow (its sad, but at least the farmer knows what is for dinner). This alternative dimension that the soul travels to could be anything; it is beyond our perceptible abilities to acknowledge the physical nature of this universe. In biblical theology, the soul goes to heaven or hell, at the decision of God, which scientifically could exist as alternative universe. Perhaps, when one dies, the soul breaks the dimensional barrier to seek the resting place, as described in biblical context. There is a variety of evidence that would suggest this is true; one very common is the near death experience, in which people often describe being in a tunnel walking towards the light. Is the soul be leaving the body, then drawing back prior to actual death?

Now ill go in a slightly different direction; Light is a function of time; by this I mean that we perceive light in relation to the time it took for us to absorb it into information through our eyes. It travels at the speed of light (who would have imagined that?), or roughly 670,616,629 mph. At that rate, it takes about 8 and a half minutes for the light from the sun to reach the earth to put things into perspective. Everything you see around you is a function of light, even this computer screen your staring at. Your eyes absorb the reflection of light off of everything, and the visual field is only visible because light is reflecting off of the objects that exist in the first three dimensions. That light takes a given amount of time to travel from the object to your eye (albeit, a very small amount of time), so everything you see is actually delayed from when it actually happened. As you approach the speed of light, time slows down. The light around you is traveling slower respective to your speed; and if you reach the speed of light, time stops completely. To make things even more strange, scientific theories (yes, they are considered theories, because they have not been physically tested yet) suggest that if you travel faster than the speed of light, you will go backwards in the time dimension. Theories have also suggested how to travel forward in time, but I think I would confuse my readers (and myself), if I have not done so already, by exploring those ideas. Im sure some time with google will bring up some clarification for those inquisitive minds that absolutely must know.

Before I go any further, I will attempt to justify why the events in the Bible can be assumed to be mostly accurate. There is always error when it comes to humans writing it (Im sure many of you more scientific people have found errors in my writing), so that is why it is mostly correct. The gospels were written by disciples and viewers of Jesus Christ, and what they recall happened and the events that took place. They were written/released within enough proximity to the actual events that took place, that if the had flat out lied about any of it, they would have been put in a pit and stoned to death or some other form of punishment. The documents simply would not have survived 2000 years and still have the following it has today if the events that took place within its covers were not based on truth and fact.

In the context of the Bible, Jesus was seen in more than one place at roughly the same time after being crucified. Scientifically, if the divine spirit of Jesus were simply able to travel faster than the speed of light, this was not a magic trick. His ability to predict the betrayal by Judas and his own death can simply be viewed as a function of time, and time travel in this respect. If he was indeed the divine spirit, the creator developed the world and thus knows the functions and methods of its existence, and can do whatever necessary to accomplish its goals. Thus, it is conceivable that the messiah could in fact return on the day of judgment, or when the world ends (which he presumably knows already).

If God exists in an alternative universe that we know as heaven, the he would not visually exist in the first three dimensions (unless the spirit took on a material body). So those that say I will believe in it when I see it, will never see it, and thus shut themselves off to what could exist because of their limited senses. The concept of religion is based on faith for this reason, the same way a blind man walks faithfully into the crosswalk when he hears the chirp (go into a major metropolitan area sometime, the crosswalks chirp when it is time to walk). Heaven could be all around us, but not existing by material means and thus incomprehensible to any known measuring force. The miracles performed in the context of the Bible and world around us could simply be the acts of a divine will, as a result of unexplainable forces.

For those that believe in the big bang theory that the universe as we know it once existed as one huge ball of matter than exploded, and is flying away from itself, I have one simple question; how did the matter that was the initial ball get there in the first place? Going back to the conservation of energy idea, it could not have simply formed from nothing. If the writings in Genesis are based on truth, it is conceivable that the creator place the ball of matter in the beginning to begin the universe, and begin the world as we know it. As Voltaire once stated, I cannot imagine how the clockwork of the universe can exist without a clockmaker. There is so much intricate detail and balance required to support life that the simple existence of the world as we know it is nothing short of what we would call a Miracle. The big bang theory is entirely possible, even within the Bible.

For those that believe in evolution as a function for disproving religion; how did life begin? Did life spawn from a rock? In order to evolve, it has to evolve from something living. And yes, microevolution is possible and proven; that is, evolution on a small scale that is the result of an adaptation to ones environment. However, there is little to support macroevolution; the idea that we all came from some pond scum and evolved into the walking, talking, and thinking beings we are today. Simply the time factor drawn from data collected in studying evolution results in a time period that would extend significantly past what we know as to be the beginning of the earth, let alone the beginning of life.

Fidelis · 05-22-2006, 04:18 PM

The problem is that the "life force" or "soul" that your friend is referring to is simply the cow's consciousness, which is an entirely physical phenomenon. In order to sustain its consciousness (and other vital biological functions) the cow much consume and metabolize food. That is where the energy to sustain the cow's "soul" comes from. There is nothing magical or mystical about life.

When the cow dies, the energy is dissipated by several methods--heat radiation, decay, etc. Your friends supposes that there isn't enough of a release at the moment of death, but why should there be? There's no reason to believe that just because a cow's heart stopped beating that the stored energy in the cow should suddenly be released.

I probably know just as much as your friend about neuroscience, and I think that we'd have to do some serious research to be able to have a meaningful conversation about this topic. Your friend sounds smart, but he's wading into this issue without much understanding about how consciousness works. That will likely lead him to incorrect conclusions.

edit: And his discussion of evolution at the end is superficial.
edit: Ugh, and his discussion of the gospels is even worse.