seriously disabled

Most people on Earth, including me, are living in poverty and there is not much we can do about it. People are held captive by their own flesh and blood. The way I see it the Earth could be thought of as a prison that houses tormented souls, held captive by their very own flesh and blood and tormented endlessly with painless death not being an option for them.

There is nothing in natural science that accounts for us having a inner world of sounds, pictures and sensations. David Chalmers calls this the 'hard problem of consciousness'. We simply don't know yet how something like consciousness can arise from the electrochemistry of the brain. So perhaps someone here can explain to me how consciousness can arise from chemistry?

Sometimes I wonder if I did something wrong in a past life that people treat me so badly. My life just sucks in every possible way. I have absolutely nothing good going for me except all the pain and the suffering. I guess that life is just extremely unfair for some of us. I fear that when my parents die, I will become a wanderer, a walker. I'll be homeless and end up dying of starvation because my lack of will to survive.

Life is a competition until the very end. Men compete with each other for resources and for access to women all the time.

Money is indeed everything from an evolutionary psychology point of view. Humans have evolved to compete for resources in order to survive so money is indeed everything I believe. Also if money makes someone happy then money is indeed everything for that person. Money get also get you beautiful women and money can get you a lot of other things which are important for survival or happiness.

John Cuthber, My knowledge is only based on what I read in advanced physics articles in Wikipedia. However I must admit that I'm just not smart enough to be able to understand the complex mathematics of quantum mechanics, classical electromagnetism, special relativity, quantum field theory, general relativity, particle physics and string and superstring theory. Although there are many books on this subject, this books are quite too expensive for me and I just don't have the money and the time to learn all of this. That is why in the world we live in, going for theoretical and mathematical physics is not a very smart career choice in my opinion and that is because theoretical and mathematical physicists do not make a lot of money compared to say someone who got a job in fields like economics, management, finance or industry, for example.

I used to be an atheist until I learned in quantum mechanics that something can really come from nothing. The vacuum isn't empty because where there is supposedly empty space there are constant quantum fluctuations with virtual particles continually popping in and out of existence. In fact, our entire universe might be a hologram or something like this. So if virtual particles can come from nothing (and they do it all the time) then why can't God?

We are often told that biology is only about chemical reactions but what about nuclear and sub-nuclear reactions? Do quarks have any influence on the way our body works?

Karma simply doesn't exist in my opinion and neither does God. My mother always tells me that there is no evidence for the existence of any loving God. There is too much evil in this world for Karma or a loving God to exist. Karma as a corrective force cannot exist because bad people never get punished for doing bad things to other people. Karma cannot exist because people who enjoy doing bad things to others never get punished for what they are doing while people who do good things to others are having bad things happening to them all the time. Good people are having very bad luck while bad people are having very good luck. Some of the nastiest people I know from high school are now having very good lives and have everything going for them while good people like me are having bad things and bad luck happen to them all the time. There is no justice in this world so Karma cannot exist as well as a loving God.

Lightmeow, There is no evidence of reincarnation or life after death. There is no sign whatsoever that there is life after death or that anyone actually came back to life after they have died.

There is no such thing as karma, only cause and effect. What I mean is that people who enjoy doing bad things to others will not necessarily get what is coming to them. If someone becomes a drug addict and dies of drug overdose, it's because the drugs were bad for their body to begin with, not because of some cosmic force that cares about what people do or sees humans as being special. Millions of innocent people die every year of disease and starvation, so was that karma too? Morality is just an artificial construct to keep order in society and in the grand scheme of things humans doing bad things to each other has no more meaning than a bear eating a deer for food.

Raz71, No I haven't read it yet but I will But in short, what does it say?

Metaman, There is no evidence that consciousness can exist outside our brains. That is because consciousness is probably created by the our brain and there is no evidence to prove otherwise. So when our brains dies (or stops working) as in brain death there is no evidence that our consciousness can survive in any form. There is also no shred of proof that there is life after death. I haven't seen anyone come back and tell me that there is something after this life. Like I said people believe what suits them but scientific evidence proves them wrong of course.

That's why I think that religion is so useless. Science can be revised and corrected in light of new evidence, religion on the other hand cannot. Those who are stuck on their faith will never want to admit that their religion is just wrong and that there is evidence to the contrary. Faith is just that, faith. It cannot be shown to be true or false. We believe what suits us and there are a great many beliefs to choose from. We can even go and construct our own personal belief.

Those who believe in God or/and an afterlife are clearly delusional. Scientific evidence shows us very clearly that there is no such thing as a God and also no afterlife. The fact that no one ever came back to life after they have died is proof enough for me that there is no such thing as life-after-death or a God.

Assuming that matter and energy cannot come from nothing (and there really is no evidence that they can) and assuming that there really is no God, then what really caused the big bang? What caused time to suddenly start ticking from t = 0?

There really is no evidence that something can come from nothing. Because if it does then why can't a tennis ball or even a grain of dust just pop into existence from absolutely nothing. The universe already exists for 14 billion years and during all this time we have seen no shred of proof that something can originate from nothing. What I think is that matter and energy are probably eternal in some way or have always existed in some form.

Why is there something rather than nothing? I know that matter and energy are interchangeable (one can be converted into the other) but can matter and energy come from nothing? Did the universe come from nothing or is there something which is eternal (has no beginning and no end) and this eternal thing is the cause of everything?

Why is intelligent life so rare in the universe and what do you think will be the future of humanity? Will humanity become extinct one day as the Earth will become uninhabitable in the future or will humanity find itself a new home among the stars (interstellar civilization)?

Although I'm not an expert on cognitive psychology and neuroscience I think that high intelligence must be genetic. Some people have an eidetic memory and excellent problem-solving skills which makes them very good at things like chess, physics and mathematics. The very best chess players probably have this kind of eidetic memory and excellent problem solving skills which makes them able to see far ahead into the game tree and remember variations in the game. For me chess, physics and math is extremely difficult because I don't have such a good memory and I don't have so good problem-solving skills. On a intelligence test I'll probably score about 70 which is low IQ.

Why are some people so good in physics and math while others constantly fail at these areas? How does genetics and cognitive psychology play a role in someone being very good in physics and math? How does the brain and genes of people like Albert Einstein, Paul Dirac, Stephen Hawking and Michio Kaku differ from those who are not good at physics and math?

Do people who are born deaf have mental sounds?

Could someone please give me a complete list of all the mathematics that I need to know in order to be able to understand quantum field theory and string theor/superstring theory/M-theory.

How can I post links here? In the old software it was easy but in the new software it doesn't work for me anymore and I cannot post links.

I think disease can cause it. And also genetics. Some people are genetically stronger and healthier than others. Some diseases like polio or diabetes for example can reduce pain tolerance significantly and cause allodynia. Fibromyalgia can also cause allodynia and pain hypersensitivity. And there is no cure for polio by the way. I don't know how to post links here but I wanted to link to Wikipedia and to several other websites but I can't.