After some thought, I feel that Alwyn is right, as he has previously stated that he feels that "the most noble aspiration is to uncover the objective truth", and I would agree that science would be the best way.

However, if one knows me enough, you'll know that I am no religious person, and I personally do not believe in the presence of an omnipotent being, but then I would not totally reject it if it can be proven. Or rather, shall I say, the anthropic principle in the boundary conditions of the beginning of the universe can well be interpreted into a "proof" for an divine creator, but then again, I personally think thats a load of crap, even though i have nothing to prove it.

I have noticed how some evangelists jump on anything that seems scientific and seems to prove that god exists, but reject everything in science that clearly goes against their religious text.

For example, someone has commented that using the equation for the overall upward force on an aerofoil, a bee should not be able to fly. Some people immediately jumped on it and said, "Ha, so science is wrong, and hence religion must be right!" Come on, do the wings of a bee even look like an aerofoil? But that is a stupid example, i daresay 99.95% of the people, and even evangelists who heard it will doubt that that is the case.

The thing is that science is really more powerful than some think. Even though it seems that with science we cannot even predict the motion of three stars, it is not the case. Astronomy has the variables, physics has the equation, but maths hold the solution, so please, don't just bugger the scientists. Bugger the mathematicians or astronomers as well. (But then again, it is pointless to argue with astronomers. "look! my telescope shows something different!" "Ahh, i see. thats just &^$^$*^$%(*&%$%$#&*&*. The hubble space telescope is better because it has this $%&^$&* fuction that prevents &^%*$*^, and this (&^%(&$( function.....)

But then again, these are not proof against an omnipotent being. These are just some examples to show that many of the problems with religion to seemingly clash with science is due to ignorance. I'm not a religious person, so pardon me if i do not seem to be offering a balanced argument, but i really cannot think of any examples where science is wrong and religion is right.

I personally feel that there is nothing wrong with the people who have a religion, but it would be better to adopt something that is not based on something we cannot prove. If you don't want to change, its alright, but do keep an open mind.

(Sorry, the only philosophies i've heard a bit about is confucianism and legalism, the rest i have absolutely not idea what it is about, so pardon me if i am wrong) It seems to me that Confucianism works even though they do not preach on what happens to you after you die if you do something wrong, because they drill into you that humans are supposed to help humans, and they also tell you what would happen to you when you are still alive. It IS effective, and it does not hinder science.

My viewpoint for myself: Religion is effective, but I'll prefer secular humanism. Religion is not supposed to explain things, science is. Confucianism promotes loyalty, filial piety, benevolence, love, potileness, righteousness, humility and sense of shame (zhong ziao ren ai li yi lian chi) and does not assume anything about the world around us, except the love of mankind intrinsic in everyone. So, i feel religion is not for me. But I dunno about the rest. I personally can't think of any utilitarian reasons to believe that people can only adopt this certain religion, if there is something like confucianism.

This is in response to alwyn's response to my response to his response to my response to his blog.
Firstly, I am confident of the human race. I believe(and in a sense, assume) that there are no stupid people in the world. There are careless people, there are ignorant people, there are stubborn people, there are unthinking people, but there are no stupid people.

If people read up, spend some time thinking, take note of their actions, and keep an open mind, then we will not have a problem with stupidity, but rather, propaganda. Religious conflicts are caused and maintained by propaganda. (interesting read: http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/text/strife.php)

If the cause of one religion is to stamp out another, it would not be possible to bring so many religions and philosophies in Singapore without a massive conflict. People are clever enough to think for themselves what they want out of a religion. Example: tudung issue. Many muslims are willing to sacrifice some of the beliefs which they feel is not that vital to the goal of islam, and are willing to follow the government's policies on "equality and harmony" in education, for the greater good. It is not correct to say that religion cause people to care more for their god than mankind.

The reason why Singapore and Malaysia is able to bring about racial harmony, I feel that it is not that Singapore and Malaysia have different religions from those in the places where "interreligious" conflicts occur, rather, there difference is that the different religions are exposed to different sources of information. The Singapore government would not tolerate it if Mediacorp's news content in suria is drastically different from channel 8, and the society is generally intolerant to racist acts.

In summary, the 'members' of religions can think for themselves if what they are doing is correct; religions do not turn people into unthinking soldiers and resistance against science, but propaganda can.

In Singapore, we are rather lucky that we are shown "the two sides of the coin" when we look at an international conflict (not involving our countries interest), but do notice that our media also portrays Singapore is right and Malaysia is wrong during the water issue, and that China is right and Taiwan is wrong in the taiwan independence issue. On my on stand, I would not make any conclusions, as i admit that it is much easier for me to strong points in the arguments that the media wants to put forward, and i am unlikely to make an unbiased judgement. Nevertheless, the judgement that the government wants us to make would be in the interests of the country, if the government is a good one, and i would like to believe so.

With regard to the issue that there is no basis for religion, i beg to differ.

Consider the following argument:
Careless student says:
a=1. b=2 therefore a+b=3. hmm...and a+4=6(oops)

what a minute. does a even exist? How do you know it does? you are only assuming that there is something called a, can you prove it exists? If you can't prove it exists, it does not. Look: my equation shows that a=3 and i have concrete proof, so you are wrong, a does not exist. you don't even need a or b to solve the equation, 1+2= works fine too. and haha look, a+4=6...wtf man a is illogical! 1+4 is fucking 5, not 6! and also, in primary school we can score 100% with arithmethic, but we can only score 80+% in alegebra! therefore, a does not exist, it does not need to exist, its existence only causes trouble and confusion, and we should stick to arithmetic.

We don't need to believe in the presence of an omni-potent being to keep us moving. But some people prefer to do things this way.
We don't need algebra, but some people prefer doing things this way.
The fact that some people misunderstand other religions and use that as a justification to murder does not mean that religion is a fundamentally flawed concept.
The fact that some people make mistakes in their algebraic problems and hence are unable to get correct results for their experiments does not justify that algebra is fundamentally flawed.

That said, I summarise the points in my above analogy:
The fact that something cannot to proven to exist does not mean it does not exist.
Something does not need to be proven to exist for it to work.
The fact that something can cause problems if in the wrong hands does not mean it is a fundamentally flawed concept.
The fact that people can use something to prevent another more noble cause from being fulfilled does not mean that that thing causes nothing but harm.
The fact that there is an alternative to something does not mean that that thing is redundant.

Therefore, religion cannot be said to be a fundamentally flawed concept just because what they base their beliefs on cannot be proven to exist.

I am not against science, but I feel that science should not be considered a gauge of the development of human race. Just because science is the correct way to explain things, science does not come first, because science cannot make things work; we need the infrastructure first.

I am also not saying that we all need a religion, i am just saying that there is nothing wrong with any religion. Religions do not cause problems, they help in maintaining social cohesion, and just because blindly following a religion can prevent a certain aspect of science to be recognised does not mean there cannot be religion if one wants science.

Science and religions are not mutually exclusive. There will come a time when people use science to dismiss certain parts in religions, and religions do nothing more than their desired purpose. Despite the Inquisition, we now know that the earth goes around the sun, and many of us have heard of the theory of evolution. People can think, if it is within reason they will eventually accept it. That is why science has triumphed.

Religions cannot hinder people from thinking for themselves, that is why we have so many Christian, Jewish, Muslim and (alright alwyn,) Hindu scientists. If religion and science is mutually exclusive, then the human race would not have progressed till now. Interests that are mutually exclusive always lead to a conflict solvable only by annihilation of one of them, but currently i do not see an unresolvable "Scientific Ideal" vs "Religious Ideal" conflict. If it is resolvable by understanding, then it means that they are not mutually exclusive, but instead the conflict is caused by misunderstanding in the first place. It did not take the annihilation of the Roman Catholic Church to have Catholics believe that the earth goes around the sun. It just shows that the people controlling it misunderstand either the religion or the science to think that they are mutually exclusive and hence oppress Galileo's works.

Scienific progress and religion have coexisted for a long time in human history, and they can continue to do so. However, the root cause of the "conflicts" between different religions and science is ignorance, and large scale ignorance caused by propaganda leads to large scale conflicts. These "conflicts" can be solved by understanding of each other on both sides.

Okay. I admit that the previous post was made so that we can reach a conclusion where science and religions themselves can coexist. I admit that i have been swayed by religion myself and am unable to think from an objective viewpoint. However, i still feel that there is nothing wrong with the existence of religion.

Personally, having seen many clever people who can think for themselves, I believe that everyone does things for a reason. If what the founder of a religion wants is power and ostracising all who refuse to follow him, that religion would undoubtedly be very unpopular, and devotees would be few. However, what we are observing today is that there are only a few religions that are dominant in the world. Why is this so?

Religions are maintained by people, and what determines the influence of a religion is the population. A religion can gain the number of believers in two ways:

a) Converting non-believers

or

b)Helping their members prosper, which i have mentioned in my previous post, and will not elaborate further here.

Method a) involves a descision on the part of a person, and I personally believe that man is not only attracted to physical rewards and repelled from physical punishments, but is intrinsically kind as well. For example, normal people would want to save lives, make people happy, and alleviate the sufferings of other people. In order for a person to make a decision, he must consider:

1. What are the benefits?
2. What are the drawbacks?
3. Is it morally acceptable?
4. Is it morally noble?

Hence, the most attractive religion should benefit, should not harm, and should not make a person guilty, and should make a person feel noble. As mentioned in the previous entry, religions have many benefits. A drawback of religion comes when two religion's beliefs are in direct conflict with each other (even science and religion). Then again, to define conflict, conflict occurs when the interests of two parties cannot co-exist, for example, there is only one sweet, but 3 ppl want it, and we have a conflict. Most religions preaches things that are morally acceptable, and teaches people to do noble things and make them feel noble.

If the purpose of all religions is to maintain social cohesion, then it seems that religions are not actually in direct conflict with another.

Which is more important? To not kill, or to assert that there is only one god? I am optimistic that people can make their own judgement. Personally, i cannot think of any reason for religions to turn against each other if they have a common interest.

Science, however, does have a different objective from religion. The purpose of religion is not to explain or inform, but how can you have an omnipotent being who doesn't know anything? People want to know, and people would believe anything that is believable and soothing to the ear. I feel that religion has done a rather bad job in this aspect, BUT it is not the main purpose.

Science is meant to find out about our surroundings and ourselves, and its purpose is not always noble. I'm not saying Fritz Haber is not a noble person, but the fact that the discovery of Haber process is a major factor in extending the war that could have ended with the defeat of Germany due to insufficient nitrates to make explosives shows that science is a double-edged sword.

Both science and religion contribute to the progress of the human society, but in different aspects. We must realise that the purpose of religion is not to explain to us what the world is like, but how to live as a part of the society. We cannot gauge the progress of a society merely by its scientific accomplishments.

In short, I would like to put it this way: If the purpose of religion is to explain how things work and why things are, I would agree with alwyn that with the current amount scientific knowledge we have we do not need a baseless assertion on how things work, and that religion ought to be replaced by science. However, that is obviously not the case.

Humanism is a noble ideal, I would agree. However, humanism seems to be a superset of most of the philosophies and religions we have: they are all there to strive for the greater good of mankind.

Let me put it this way: For those with a religion, good for you, but realise that religion can be expressed in a utilitarian manner, and realise that if it is not for the benefits it brings, it could not have spread its influence so far, so cherish it. As for the "strange" parts, practice it if you want, but do make an effort to reason it out.

For those without a religion, adopt a philosophy. It helps. I would recommend Confucianism.

I feel that the tone on alwyn's blog (http://sealt6.blogspot.com) is too strong, and even as an agnostic myself i find it difficult to accept his argument with an objective mindset.

I am not religious, I am a free-thinker, and i find myself tending towards thoughts about the utilitarian side of a question, and this would be my emphasis on my following comments on alwyn's arguments against religion, particularly christianity.

I have not read the Quran, nor the bible, nor the Iching, nor the Analects of Confucious, but I feel that the goal of all religion and philosophy is peace. "Thou shalt not kill" is a classic example. There are no long-lasting or progressive society that is based on plunder, murder, treachery.

I find that the general guidelines of religion is to make people follow the "rules". Why should one follow the rules? It is only by following them that the society is likely to progress, and it is because progressive societies are more likely to yield a high population increase, we can roughly tell how successful a religion is in maintaining social cohesion by looking at the population of people. If a religion requires one to be polygamous, kill others, or steal, it would be unlikely to sustain itself for long because these acts lead to social instability, and an unstable society is unlikely to yield a high population growth.

Here I shall not argue about the presence or absence of an omnipotent being, because it is totally pointless to do so. However, we have to realise the benefits of believeing in the power of an omnipotent being.

We must realise that if rules are set and not enforced, there is no point having rules. If rules are to be followed, there must be a system of reward and punishment, regardless of whether spiritual or physical. Hence, the system of reward and punishment in afterlife is especially powerful. If everyone is to accept the "terms and conditions", then little enforcement is needed. The overheads of the society is then able to devote more resources to the development of infrastructure and a system of government.

Since ancient times, it has always been the intellectuals who are giving problems to the government, and it is usually during adolesence that people start to question about purpose and identity, and they have very good arguments to reach a conclusion. Inequality, red tape, vulnerability and purpose of doing things are usually what cause people to go against the government. One can be assured that mortals will never be able to create a perfect system that can ensure that all these are taken care of and will not degrade with time. However, by imposing an "afterlife meritocracy", all the red tape of judgement, gathering of evidence, and the appropriate verdict will be passed, and this would be good enough to make sure that people are deterred from the evils, since there is no flaws that can be found in this system.

Hence, stating from the utilitarian point of view, there are many merits of religion, which is costless maintenance of social cohesion, help one sort one's thoughts out and deal with the cruel facts of mortal life with a positive attitude.

However, I find that i would have to agree with alwyn that that religious sources are not in agreement with science(which we must agree is quite reliable; for now i haven't seen any methods of making carbon14 or radon decay in 5000 years by the amount which would by convention decay in 200 million years). From this fact alone we can draw a few conclusions:

1)Science is wrong.
2)The omnipotent being is wrong.
3)The prophet/gospel writers are wrong.
4)The text is not meant to be interpreted literally.

Assuming that the omnipotent being is perfect, we are forced to conclude that either one of statements 1, 3 and 4 are correct. 1 is certainly plausible, but i would like to mention that it would require a lot of effort to actually explain to the scientists why it is so, and i might add that the process of even undertsanding would daunt many.

i find that it is unlikely that 4 is the case. If the omnipotent being is perfect, then he must also have known all along that man would screw it up if the text is not meant to be interpreted literally. People who have read religious texts should also find it difficult to interpret it in any other way than literally.

i feel that 3 is the most likely situation. Afterall, no human is perfect, and it is not wrong to argue that a prophet can write in the holy text that he is perfect. By logic, if he is perfect, he is telling the truth by saying he is perfect. If he isn't, then he has lied and stated that he is perfect. Afterall, why are there 3 versions of the same text?

Hence, i feel that if it can be established that the writers of the books are wrong, we can bring this matter to a conclusion in a more tactful manner, as this would not offend any religion directly. I urge people not to take their own viewpoint as the only correct one, especially if their own viewpoint is obviously flawed. We can never establish anything concrete about whether science or religion is correct, because there is always a way for philosophers to bring them down.
The omnipotent being is still omnipotent, and science would be able to find more efficient ways for managing resources.

Let us not forget that the human society would not be what it is today without religion or philosophy. It is only with social cohesion and a suitable basis for specialisation that science is able to develop, and even with science we would need philosophy or religion to guide our lives, and to keep the society in place, and to uphold justice.

Note: Taoism, Buddhism, Confucianism and Hinduism are philosophies, not religions.

Proper English: "Your base has been captured. You have no chance of survival. Enjoy life while it lasts."

Japanese broken english: "All your base are belong to us. You have no chance to survive make your time."

Singlish: "I captured your base oredy lah! Anyway you die liao orbigood."

Mat english: "Your base oredy capture lah alemak confirm mati one!"

Yoda: "Belong to us your base does. I see your chance of survival is low. Join us and you can become the one with the force."

Yiyuan: "Your fucking ghetto base has been captured by me lah chee bye, and you shall be destroyed together with your dick to prevent you from enjoying, if you have one."

l337 5p34k: " 411 y0µ^ o 453 4^3 o310/\9 +0 _5. j00 h4\/ /\0 { h4/\ {3 +0 5_^\/1\/3 ma<3 _^ +1m3."

Eva: "Your base has been captured. Mission failed. Abort, Restart, Cancel?"

Jimr: "You suck shit."

and god said, "let there be light." and there was light. and because e=mc², there was mass. and because mass had a property called gravity tt obeyed a=gm/r², there were stars. and because pV=nRT, stars were hot. and because P=5.67^-8*T^4, stars shone. and because of some funny thing, the light from stars caused more light to be converted from mass to light by nuclear fusion. as time goes by, we shall realise that radiation, charged particles, pauli's exculsion principle, EM force, electron degenerate and neutron degerate are interphases of the struggle between light and mass

alas, all get pWnz3d by t3h gravity. which was created by mass. which was created by light. since light cannot get past the event horizon of a black hole, which is the gravity's proud piece of work, i shall say that mass is produced by, and is the nemesis of light.

light shall turn to mass, which shall cease the existence of light.

then, did god create something that would eventually destroy itself?

all the existence of planets, orbits, stars, and life, are nothing but the marks of the struggle between light(big bang) and dark(black hole). time is an imaginary(in the mathematical sense) scale between them. it does make me wonder, if all dimensions of the universe are geometrically perpendicular to each other except one, which lies on an imaginary scale, can it be said that it is only natural that the "beings" in that universe will be unable to observe the objects that lie across the imaginary dimension? or in a sense, is time entirely something that must be perceived in such a way when there is only one imaginary dimension?

hence, it seems that the term "eventually" seems inappropriate here.

how about let's say that something had always been there, but we cannot see it. all the way from light to dark, the route is already plotted, but because of the imaginary scale, or time, we cannot see all the objects at once. what appear to us as events are merely differences observed between one object and another along the time axis.

however, as the human brain is programmed to perceive the increase in entropy in the universe as the forward direction of time, we can say that gravity will eventually own all.

the weakest, yet being only attractive is its ultimate strength and binds the entire universe.

let us not forget that if not for gravity, the universe is nothing but cosmic background radiation. light and dark is in a constant and interesting struggle. the light has wun; the dark will win. and all that we see around us are the effects of the battle.

"do not underestimate the power of the dark side."

haven't blogged for a long time.

finally cleared my homework.

so many other things to do.

CT, sci competitions, CHAOS, RIBP, RE, greenwave.

i remember my friend asking my about astronomy competitions. i shall call him t.

t: what do u do during astronomy competitions? look at the stars?
y: no.
t: then?
y: answer mcq questions.
t: thats all? then isn't it like... damn easy?
y: err... well ... in a sense...but there are a lot of things to study.
t: like?
y: stars, constellations, space travel.
t: thats not much wad.
y: okay. let me test you. what will eventually happen to the sun.
t: it will eventually become a black hole and suck in everything in the solar system.

wow astronomy is so simple....