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The universe since the beginning of the Big Bang is roughly 13.7 billion years old and thus nothing we see can have occurred more 13.7 billion years ago. Since the universe is expanding, the light we see from distant galaxies was emitted when the galaxies were closer to us than they are now. That is, light that has been traveling toward us for 10 billion years may have originated in a galaxy that is now 40 billion light years distant from us. The universe is believed to be roughly 93 billion light years in diameter although we can only observe things that are up to 46 billion light years away. The reason we cannot see objects further than 46 billion light years is because objects beyond that distance are receding from us at a rate greater than the speed of light (c). Since we are receding from those objects faster than light can travel, any signal coming from them will never catch up to us. The amount of time the light takes to get to us represents how "out of date" an image is. If light from earth traveled 10 billion years to a distant star, they will see us as we were 10 billion years ago, although by then we will be much further away than 10 billion light years.

And I thought you were commenting on my journey to atheism post but I can see now you were not. My apologies. I'll switch over to the broader discussion as I'm really enjoying this. Unfortunately I'll be gone for a couple of days but I'll be back!

Because people prefer to know how the universe began over not knowing how the universe began. A god answers that question, the BB does not. I have no idea. Are you debating me or have you begun to debate someone who is not participating in this thread? That has nothing to do with kicking the can down the road. It applies to theists exactly the same way it applies to science. Saying god existed forever is no different than saying the universe existed forever. Yes. Clearly I didn't demand it. I'm an atheist, remember? Please name the contradictions and conceptual errors "my" god has. Given that all he did was push the start button then go on vacation I'm curious as to what those could be. No one said that and therefore I did not believe anyone. It came out of my own mind as I was trying to reason through whether or not god existed. Do you never have and discard ideas as you are thinking through things? WTF?!?! I don't care. I simply crave knowledge.

Same goes for nature as a preference over the supernatural. If there is no supernatural, what made nature? You are just kicking the can down the road, and it still doesn't get you an answer. "We don't know" applies to naturalists just as much as it applies to supernaturalists. There are also people who claim to know absolutely that there is no god. Well, you are a better person than me. The existence of the laws of physics that allow a hot dense mass of energy to turn into something complex enough to become self aware still fills me with awe. For there to be no reason behind this seems hard to believe, although believing in a deity is certainly no lesser stretch. It was not an easy choice for me and given the amount of theism in this world seems to indicate it is a difficult choice for many others. A comparison of creation stories has no bearing on what I do or don't believe. Why would I give a rat's ass what some prehistoric, scientifically illiterate people think about talking bushes and islands being created by an angry deity throwing giant stones? It took much more than a "superficial" effort to put me over the edge. To this day I would not be surprised and would laugh heartily if I ultimately found that a god did exist. "The jokes on me!" An indifferent creator is an answer to how we got here. An indifferent long-ago explosion doesn't even attempt to explain the origin of the universe, only its evolution after it was already here. The difference is huge.

I was not talking about humans, I was talking about everything. The universe. There is no evidence that says the origin of the universe (if it even had an origin) was natural vs supernatural. It was the fact that ANYTHING existed that gave me pause on my path to atheism. Similar to the deist positions of many of America's founding fathers; the idea that a god existed, created the universe, but then basically stepped aside and just watched things unfold. No interaction with humans. A reasonable person could argue this type of god explains the universe as well as any non-god based explanation, since it doesn't contradict any observations. I agree. Anything far enough beyond understanding will seem magical. Or perhaps supernatural... Especially when so much was not understood, and people had not yet arrived at the concept of "well, we eventually explained all these other things, so there is a good chance we'll be able to explain THIS eventually too".

As I transitioned from theist to atheist the last hurdle I had to overcome was the simple fact of existence. I began jettisoning the pageantry and hypocrisy of organized religion starting when I was about eight years old. (No surprise my teachers through 12 years of Catholic school found me to be a real PITA.) But the fact that anything existed at all was a real roadblock for me when it came to the final step over to the dark side. I imagine if I had never been exposed to religion or gods at all, I would have invented the idea myself to possibly explain how things came to be. It is easy to recognize all the rules and stories are nonsense, but how we got here seems to me a more fundamental question. At that point it is kind of binary; was it natural or supernatural? Given the lack of any evidence one way or the other it is not surprising that many people chose supernatural, even if only for that most basic question. I think that is a reason why so many people choose "none" when it comes to identifying their beliefs or religious affiliation, rather than choosing "atheist". They may think Christianity is ridiculous but are not ready to give up on 'god' completely.

Haha. Don't you know?

How would we know unless they told us?

While I understand the sentiment I don't think the comparison of the question of the existence of gods and fairies is quite fair. The question of the existence of god seems perfectly reasonable and has been asked by people since people began. Nearly every culture has an origin story. It can even be considered a scientific question; given existence, how did it come to be? While the proposed answer (god) has no scientific evidence, it is at least a proposed answer to a fundamental question that most everyone would like to know. The question of the existence of fairies on the other hand is rather minor. I for one don't even know what question their existence might be intended to answer. Not all people and cultures have wondered about the existence of fairies. So while you are correct we have no evidence that supports the existence of fairies at the bottom of your garden, asking if god exists would at least address some larger, more significant question.

I like 'cancel culture' as it lets the little guy make a difference in real time. If you are a racist today, you hear about it today. If you are polluting today, you hear about it today. No more letting your bad behavior go on for years before anyone can organize meaningful deterrence. The two downsides I see are that innocent people can be hurt before all the details come out, and that meaningful protest can be dismissed simply by saying "cancel culture" instead of actually addressing the complaint made against you. All sides participate in cancel culture, but they only call it cancel culture when it is directed against themselves. Otherwise it is presented as a reasonable response to poor behavior. I'm not sure but it seems to me like conservatives claim 'cancel culture' more than liberals, but that seems likely as conservatives by definition want to conserve things (attitudes, statues, mascots, etc.) that progressives often find offensive and believe need to be canceled.

Ah, I see. Thanks.

Perhaps I've misunderstood but I was under the impression that it was transgender rights where all the heat was now, not so much gay rights.

You misunderstood what I said. I didn't say "the adversarial system works best". I said the Kathleen Stock story (and the extended brouhaha surrounding society working out how to handle gender) was an example of "the adversarial system AT its best". I would say your examples were the adversarial system at its worst.

Lots. Why?

Was there something wrong with that post?

Three democracies! (although Putin has been a bad influence)

Regarding Kathleen Stock: I think because of the hypocrisy in politics recently it has become more obvious to me when people express views that are good for themselves or their group, rather than when their views are based strictly on some objective reasoning. Kathleen Stock falls into this category. I'm sure there is reason involved in her arguments to exclude trans women from the 'real' women group, but I think it likely she developed a reasoned argument in part to be able to exclude others from her 'space'; that is, the sex-based-female space. Kathleen's feminism resulted in her fighting to break into the sex-based-male space in her quest for equal rights while many men fought to defend their space from intruders. Now the shoe is on the other foot and people are fighting to get into HER space for equal rights (i.e. the sex-based-female space), and she is pushing back just as men did against her. Think of Mitch McConnell making a reasoned argument why when close to a Presidential election you should NOT confirm any Supreme Court Justices so the People can have a say in the selection (when the sitting President is a Democrat) then four years later following that up with a reasoned argument why when close to a Presidential election you SHOULD confirm a Supreme Court Justice since 'elections have consequences' (when the sitting President is a Republican). Personally I am not in the least concerned that Kathleen Stock is running into trouble. That is how society works through new paradigms. There is a lot of pushing, shoving and yelling, people get mad, some people get hurt, and in the end society has worked out a reasonably good approach to a new type of problem. The adversarial system at its best.

If you are headed to another planetary system you could of course turn your solar sail around to use it for deceleration.

So how does that work? Some (or all) people never completely rid themselves of the virus?

That is GREAT! I'll have to give that one a shot. Thanks!

Welcome Sid! Glad you decided to join us. 😃

Just an observer here, but are you claiming length contraction is an illusion, or are you simply trying to have someone help you understand where you might have gone wrong in your examples?

Overall I have no idea if your plan will work (sounds interesting to me though!) but for your mirror could you simply put a mirror on both sides of your object so that it reuses the photons as you suggest, but also gets pushed along with your craft. Having a larger mirror facing the sun than facing the craft could allow it to keep up with the craft.

You have not successfully made the case that there is One True Definition. If two different dictionaries have two different definitions, how do you get to claim one is the standard and the other is not? On another subject, why do you think everyone is "willfully" rejecting what you claim to be the "standard" definition? Did anyone check to see if these people using the supposedly wrong definition were even aware there was a "standard" definition in the first place, and that it didn't match their definition? And further, how could a disagreement about word usage be unsettling? Is this disagreement disrupting the world order in some way?

I'm not trying to be insulting, but you are clearly a religious bigot. You know of examples and are applying them universally, even when someone is giving you an example of how it was different for them. Not all religions and religious settings are as you claim.