I guess part of it is what to do with a religious claim.
If you say: "God created us all", that's fair, but there doesn't seem to be anywhere to go from there. I can either agree with you or disagree, but I can't really discuss it.
If you say: "God created us all", that's fair, but there doesn't seem to be anywhere to go from there. I can either agree with you or disagree, but I can't really discuss it.
The simulation hypothesis, to me, is not terribly surprising or interesting. Why wouldn't someone be able to create a simulation like ours at some point? I am not following why Musk's belief is stupid? Yeah, obviously there's another layer above, and this doesn't explain that much, but I don't understand the stupid part.
God is something else. For one, not all gods in religions are the same. The Christian God is not a mere simulator. He's everything that ever was (i.e., final level), he's super powerful, and, most importantly, as far as Christianity is concerned everything that God does is right.
Well, it might not be interesting in terms of answering what I consider to be the truly fundamental questions (the answers for which I'd also argue are outside the realm of thought), but it definitely is interesting in terms of what can be accomplished or understood within the realm of thought, just as many other things are.
Simulation could be said to be probable. I recall reading a piece of math done on the subject and it seemed a lot more probable than the alternative. Contrary to the God idea, where the probability seems impossible to measure.
This seems like the wrong place to use "stupid", and terms like that mostly exist as a shaming tool rather than for truth exploration, so I tend to be suspicious of anyone using them, especially if they claim to be informed enough to know better than to use them.
When I was a new Christian back in 1990 I was a bit baffled by the anti-intellectualism I witness among my friends at a local Pentecostal church. I found a sufficient answer in the book "Fit Bodies Fat Minds: Why Evangelicals Don't Think and What to Do About It".
So I think it's fair to say many people have had the experience of talking to people of faith who know what they believe, but they don't know why they believe it. I'll give you that.
But consider this: Harvard, Yale, Oxford, and Princeton are all Universities that started off as Christian seminaries. Their roots are founded in the idea that academics and reasoning are inherently noble pursuits.
Given that, it's not too surprising that religion can affect things without being true. The moral parts of religion are a lot more interesting and influential than the creationist parts, but the creationist parts make it sound true.
But what are the arguments for the creationist parts? The Bible simply says, in the beginning there was this and that. Most arguments after that are more about the fact that Jesus existed and made miracles, and therefore he had unusual powers, and if he had unusual powers, perhaps what he said was true.
I've never seen any from the ground up evidence about creation itself. Intelligent design to me is a counterargument more than an argument, and, apart from that, I haven't heard much at all.
Have a look at thebibleproject.com, and the "Read Scripture" app on iPhone/Android. The Bible has a record that is truly worth a read: first printed book ever to be published (Gutenberg), the most translated book on the planet, the most printed book in all human history, more archaeological artifacts and manuscript evidence than any other book.
With a pedigree like that, doesn't it warrant an honest investigation into its central message?
The key here is that they started off as Christian seminaries. Are they any longer? Perhaps this same reasoning led them to stop being Christian seminaries in the first place.
Did you even bother to search their websites?