Lawrence Krauss says “forget Jesus, the stars died so you could be here today”:
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This is the kind of stuff I love to hear over and over again, but, and I know he was just making a joke, I have a problem with the words here, “so that,” and “kind enough.” I resolve to lighten up by tomorrow. Happy New Year, all you stardust!
Hahah! I love it!
brilliant
What wonderful synchronicity – I have just watched for the first time since it was originally broacast 29 yers ago the first episode of Carl Sagan’s “Cosmos”. Indeed – “We are all made of star stuff”. Another 12 episodes to be re-discovered over the coming weeks.
Happy New Year :)
my hubby bought me the whole set on DVD last year. they have some great new add-ons from his contemporaries included.
The teleological language that bothered Kodie bothered me a bit too, but, otherwise, I liked this clip.
They didn’t just die for you, they fucking stayed dead too.
Unlike Jesus.
No they reincarnated into our sun our planet and you.
Something about this out of context makes me feel that, because I’m made of the same stuff, I too could explode at random so some star that doesn’t exist might be created. I think I read a poem about that too.
Stars do not explode at random, and your mass is not bige enough to even heat up a 5W light bulb, so no explosion for you unless ou gets sucked into a big giant star and becomes part of it.
I don’t know about that. My mailbox exploded yesterday.
LOL yep. This clip is taken from a wonderful talk that Krauss gave at AAI last year in which he rather elegantly explains how, using quantum mechanics, you really can get a universe from nothing. In quantum mechanics, when working with nothing, you always get something. It’s a bit reminiscent of the way Douglas Adams describes the Hitchhiker’s Guide entry for ‘sex’.
The whole talk (well worth watching) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ImvlS8PLIo
Did it bother you because it seemed to you that he meant it literally, because he was (loosely) paralleling the “Jesus died for you” gospel, or…?
It bothered me, just a bit, because I think atheists need to be careful not to slip into similar patterns of thought and speech as believers, lest they think we’re using language in a religious manner and come back with the “atheism is just another religion” ploy. They speak about God’s purposes and rot like that all the time, so I want to be careful to avoid speaking that way myself. That may just be a quirk of mine more than a lapse on Krauss’ part. In fact, I know it wasn’t a lapse on his part, because the parallel with Jesus was, in fact, quite clever. So, put it down to being my issue rather than Krauss’.
Basically the same for me. In the wrong heads, this sounds like the stars have some anthropomorphic benevolence and intention of creating humans and everything we see, like some version of intelligent design, like maybe someone who thinks intelligent design is science may be able to use this as part of their argument or arrange these facts into what they perceive is a scientifically credible theory. Ergo, “proving” god because stars exist, and this guy just implied they have benevolent intention. You really do have to be careful so it doesn’t sound like the same nonsense they speak.
The earth, the stars, the heavens, the cosmos all “speak” of the true nature of things and yes, we are “made” out of the same astral “stuff” since, in the beginning God made the heavens (the vast expanse, space and spirit types “above” us) and the earth (solid matter, ie our physical bodies, etc). While the spirit types are “above” meaning superior, they are also found within us.
Consider the magnetar (its mysterious, extreme attraction properties) and black holes (perhaps a more ominous sign), quasar’s, pulsars. the sun and moon, etc, these all speak of deeper truth’s, secrets of the heavenly realm. Have you considered Judges 5.20, that the “stars” fought in their courses (their alignments) against (evil) Sisera? Haven’t we seen (with our modern, mega-scopes) stars “fighting” of sorts, being created, killed off or the consequnces thereof?
This is why man longs to peer into the heavenlies, for in so doing he see’s into the very nature of his own being and existance. Didn’t even Galileo teach us (at great peril) that things are Heliocentric and not the other way around? What does this speak to? Christ is the center, He who is “before all things and through whom all things were made” and that his “mercies are new every morning” since the sun is a constant, doesnt change (I the Lord do not change it says in the OT book of Malachi). And didn’t your beloved Einstein prove the attraction/gravity/magnetism of the Sun actually draws us in as we get closer? (now I’m hearing from the book of James,”draw near to God and he will draw near to you”).
Now I’m no astrologist nor an Einstein (which is plain for all to see, ha) I know you will all summarily dismiss what I have shared here, but how is it that I have “ears to hear” as JC put it, I can see the signs which are all around us, and in us. The question is, why can’t you guys? What’s the difference? (I know, I’m nuts you say) but what if I’m not? What if?
How does one peer into the majesty of space and all its wonder and conclude that its all meaningless, coincidence, random, etc? Has He not told us that the heavens declare his handiwork? All the best.
“Now I’m no astrologist …”
Nope, but what you say makes about as much sense …
I think I’m hearing that you’re attributing some sort of consciousness to the natural phenomenon of stars and black holes. You may as well assign life and consciousness to a chair. The starts don’t actuall “fight”. Nor do they “speak” and when a star “dies”, while the effect is almost infinitely grander, there is no more consciousness snuffed out than if you burned that same chair to release its energy to warm your toes.
We have thought. Stars do not. WE have decided that there MUST be reason. Nature just is…. nature has no need for reason.
Please. With a little imagination and enough rambling you can attach symbolism to anything. If the Sun revolved around Earth you’d find significance in that instead.
Your far-fetched interpretation of Judges 5:20 makes that obvious. The passage is about the stars helping the Israelites in a battle against the war chief Sisera, which to most people would suggest that the Bible authors thought of the stars as some sort of angelic creatures who could choose to join a battle (cf. the heavenly hosts) rather than being inanimate colossal fusion engines. Now you suddenly want the passage to be symbolic of cosmology because it suits your purpose, in the process making the reference to Sisera completely nonsensical – except of course I’m sure you have some additional explanation that also makes Sisera symbolic of something else entirely.
Look at the prophecy of stars falling to Earth on judgement day. It makes sense to an uneducated mind that believes the stars are creatures involved in a battle, or simply just little bright dots pinned to a sky canopy. But it becomes absurd and embarrasing once you know what stars really are.
If the universe is evidence of God’s handiwork you’d at least think that the Bible, the word of God, could get the cosmology correct.
“If the universe is evidence of God’s handiwork you’d at least think that the Bible, the word of God, could get the cosmology correct.”
He’s just testing us don’t you know …
god did not make the heavens and the cosmos- the cosmos made us then we invented god, grow up. P.S. we invented Santa too
Pictures or it didn’t happen!
You know, if the moon had actually turned out to be made of green cheese, someone would find a passage in the Bible that they would interpret as meaning exactly that.
“How does one peer into the majesty of space and all its wonder and conclude that its all meaningless, coincidence, random, etc?” By not jumping to unwarranted conclusions. You might as well say, because I’m looking at something I can’t understand, and which I find a little bit awe inspiring, and perhaps a little bit frightening, there must be an omnipotent being. That’s the silliest damned thing I’ve heard all day.
It’s interesting but of course you can never get past the question: who made the stars? or why? We need answers to these questions – even if, as I suspect there is no answer.
I am ultra surprised there are no crazy Christians claiming the world is only a few thousand years old commenting. Realizing thats your made up of dead stars humbles me and reminds me my life is short and worthless!
I believe in some power of creation which is in every atom of our body and universe. Something like Neo Paganism or theory of Gaia. Why that? Because you can believe in that and believe in science but Abrahamic religions turns all the time around the man. For Christians,Muslims or Jews only humans are important in that universe and that is wrong and made up from people. Sorry to offend this religions but you only need to read this books like old and new testament, quran and you find so many mistakes inside
Heh… and you don’t find errors in non-Abrahamic superstitions? If you find fulfillment with such, that’s great, but don’t try to make it like your chosen tales are “scientific.” I myself find many Wiccan ideas fascinating, but that doesn’t give me reason to actually believe them.