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Re: If God exists, what created God?

In article <3nfn5s$cdg@expert.cc.purdue.edu>, brynta@expert.cc.purdue.edu
(John Wayne Bobbit) wrote:

> >> Well how about this. We created atomic weapons. Most people would agree
> >that a 
> >> single atomic bomb is more powerfull than a single person.
>         As far as destructive power is concerned yes!
> >A single person can make many atomic bombs... How many persons can an
> >atomic bomb make???
>         As far as creative power goes no!
> 
>         However even with this objection in place his point is still
> valid.  It is clear that some technology invented by mankind can 
> outperform humans that are fit for the exact same task.  I'll bet the 
> microprocessor can beat all humans at math. Whats (856798*3 - 38456*7)
> in less than a thousandth of a second?  


I agree completely. There are not many things the human body can do which
can't be done better by something else. If you look in the animal kingdom
there are so many examples, the dolphin can swim much better, the eagle
can fly very nicely, the tiger can kill in the forest very effectively...
And, of course, technology does outperform man in many ways. 

What is the special quality of the human being? What can we do that no
machine or animal can do? We can make something like the Internet and talk
about philosophy on it! It is the more subtle questions we can ponder. We
can ask, "Why am I here?", "What happens after death?" and so on. This is
the difference and this is the special value of a human body. We shouldn't
waste this chance. The human body is a chance to escape from the cycle of
samsara, the repetition of birth and death. We have been in this material
world since time immemorial, sometimes in a human body, sometimes in a
dogs body, some times in a demigod's body in heaven and sometimes in hell.
This human life is a chance to get off the merry-go-round and return back
home, back to Godhead, to the spiritual world. There we can regain our
original sat cit ananda body. An eternally youthful spiritual body, full
of knowledge and full of bliss.. Isn't that what we all want? We don't
want to get old, we don't want to get sick and we don't want to die. These
things are unnatural to the spirit soul but they are forced upon us here,
in the material world. So how to go back to Godhead?

        utsahan niscayad dhairyat tat-tat-karma-pravartranat
        sanga-tyagat sato vrtteh sabhir bhaktih prasidhyati

"There are six principles favourable to the execution of pure devotional
service: (1) being enthusiastic; (2) endeavouring with confidence; (3)
being patient; (4) acting according to regulative principles (such as
hearing, chanting and remembering Krishna); (5) abandoning the association
of nondevotees; and (6) following in the footsteps of the previous
acaryas. these six principles undoubtedly assure the complete success of
pure devotional service.

>I wouldn't be too suppressed if
> in a few decades that a combination of robotics and artificial 
> intelligence, with of course an H-bomb strapped to his back, couldn't 
> be put together to form beings that are superior to humans in every
> way... This is just speculation but it all may be an innevitable
> next step in evolution...

This is an old one... It's not your idea. People have been postulating
this since the 50's (and maybe before). Artificial intelligence was a big
part of computer research and, undoubtedly, computers now do wonderful
things, however they could not be said to be in the slightest bit
intelligent. They have no independence. They only work on the command of a
human operator. Of course those commands can be (and are) recorded in the
form of computer programs and the computer can "play back" these commands,
but that's all they can do. Sometimes people write programs to make a
computer look intelligent, but all it does is follow the recorded
instructions... they can't think. 

We have seen no progress in this area and we will not see any in the
future because the "thinking, feeling and willing" part of a man, or even
an animal for that matter, is not a gross material thing. The contaminated
mind and intelligence are subtle elements and the spirit soul is purely
spiritual but the computer does not have these subtle elements. It's no
your body that does the thinking, your body can be (and is in the
Bhagavad-gita) compared to a machine. It is "yantrarudhani mayaya", a
machine made from the five material elements (earth, water, fire, air and
either). So you can make a computer to perform the tasks of the human
body, but it will always, as the human body is, have to remain under the
direction of a spirit-soul, a person.


                                   CHANT
             Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare 
                  Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare
                               AND BE HAPPY!
--

Madhudvisa dasa          |
                         |   S H E L T E R   I N T E R N A T I O N A L
                         |____________________________________________

      Different types of yoga are steppingstones on the path to Krishna.
References: