It's really not that much of an issue in the scientific community these days anymore, but more so most scientists prefer a more professional objectivity when it comes to topics they don't know much about or topics we simply don't have that many answers to yet.

I am thinking some scientists are Christian in the sense that their parents brought them up believing in a God and going to church. But perhaps 'being a Christian' doesn't really mean all that much to them?

I know a lot of people that say they are 'Christian', but do not really believe in anything specific when it comes to the topic. Except for perhaps a higher power kind of non-Christian God, very much like the people you've spoke about.

Personally I think these kind of beliefs are very similar to stating you simply experience life the way it goes but hope you can somehow influence the grand scheme of things for a bit; think of it as worshipping mere chance.

It's interesting though, because in my opinion it says a lot about the character of such a scientist if he or she really is willing to take things on blindly on faith so much as to believe in a religion with a story for which little to no evidence at all exists.

I am not surprised mathematicians are strange guys
A friend of mine had the chance to speak with one of them, one of the greatest at national level
" I believe that spheres, cubes etc really exist somewhere " he said " You mean in our mind , I suppose " my friend said
"No...no...I believe that they really exist, they must exist ...somewher ...I am sure..." He replied
My friend realized , after an hour or so, that he was not joking,,,

Well I think, this mathematician obviously was right.

If spheres and cubes would only exist in his mind, then he could not talk about their properties and be understood by other mathematicians. Thus spheres and cubes must have some objective reality.

This has of course nothing to do with a certain mathematician believing in some God, Allah, Buddha or whatever. Not only mathematicians but people generally are strange guys sometimes believing in strange things . BTW belief in some gods is not strange but is perfectly normal, this belief developed ten thousands of years ago during human evolution, and is still in our genes.

Of course I was jocking even though the story is true
I dont seriously think that an ideal sphere and other ideal objects really exist in a iperuranim world same as this guy and Plato believe

Among the mathematicians rank the smartest brains of the humanity, well but many of them are strange guys , to the least

I am reading in these days " The Riemann? hypothesis"
This mathematician cliamed to have discovered a theorem about the prime numbers but the demostation got lost

Well nowadays thanks to the power of the PC its hyphotesis hs been proved to be true for the first 3.000.000 prime numbers

The mathematicia are not happy yet , maybe one day , they claim,we will find a prime number which does not meet the Riemann's Hyphotesis

Strange guys

yes, like grigori perelman who solved the poincaré conjecture. he rejected the fields medal and doesn't cut his hair and fingernails because in his opinion it's not meant by nature to be done.

Yes, and it is believed to have occurred very late in evolution. Something that strikes me as rather odd. Why the need to overcomplicate things?

Because caveman clans who believed in an afterlife, and believed to be helped by a god, could fight more brave against other caveman clans who didnt believe such things.

Well, the whole afterlife idea is definitely a result of waging wars, but it's very questionable if it's actually truly beneficial in war. It's very questionable if, because people wanted to be able to answer other kinds of questions related to existence and unexplainable stuff, many cultures didn't believe in some form of religion anyways. Way before the very first war!

Which reminds me, that technology matters a lot more, fearlessness as can be seen from the genocide on Indians in Ancient America or even the Japanese in the second world war, ultimately can't win a war.

To some extent it's probably not even true that 'every' Indian was a brave person. Hollywood created that image inspired by incorrect depictions of old times. Sensational and often quite surreal, but not very close to the truth in most cases.

I really don't buy the 'it makes man brave' theory so much anyways. A good leader can inspire people even more and probably even without a promise of an afterlife (Obama just promises things will 'get better', same thing no afterlife ), just as long as you can 'fool' people what they are about to do is 'the right thing'... it's all equal.

Religion doesn't improve their physique or stamina or accuracy, where as natural drugs to some extent do. Shamans use to be sort of the priests of a village and I am sure it had everything to do with drugs. Add a bunch of impressive magic tricks and people will believe anything.

Regardless of an empty promise for an afterlife or other supernatural stories, it all doesn't change life on earth or even the outcome of wars and in fact some ancient but truly very religious cultures weren't very fond of waging war at all.

I think the main reason why religions got developed more and more up to this day has everything to do with our natural curiosity and our search for answers (beginning of life, question our existence, why do plants need water and sunshine, and by lack of that.. who or what made it fail? ...things like that).

When it comes to braveness, I think it's more courageous to not fear death without a promise of an afterlife anyways. Hah, when I think about it religion might even make people weaker in a sense!

The whole idea that cavemen must have been savages out to conquer more and more land is incorrect as well. Active competition between different groups is likely to have occurred from day one, as happens with many other species, but war is a very modern thing.

Oh HI,

Testing out my new IMAC forum capabilites now.



Gosh Nitro, are you still here?

Geez, this place is full of narrow minded knuckle-heads, but they did manage to convert "Silverman" after i left.

Yes, intolerant folks indeed.

Okay, my new IMAC and "objective C" are working, woo hoo!

See ya!

Very deep argumentation strategy...
..quick quick, before we convert you ...