I am hard-pressed to imagine something that is 'beyond the mind'
As for our senses, they are continually amplified by scientific instrumentation.

For me, a cult is characterized by having a leader who ruled his follower by an iron fist and demand a total dedication to 'cause. ,and brain washing is continually applied no diisent is harboured I think about Dvid Koresh and Jones of Guyana. None of today's main religions for this criteria, they all tolerate somemdissent. ISIS coes fit in as did Nazism.

There. the former chasm of difference between the Wiccans and the Nazis. The former do not have the murderous ideology and the genocidal history.

I suppose it all comes down to belief in the existence Divine=GOD. I think that the strongest argument for Hos existence is our inability to prove his non-existence. I think that the Black Swan principle should apply here. It takes just one black swan to prove that not all swans are white. It needs just an extraordinary event that is unquestionable supernatural to prove the existence of GOD albeit in an inductive logic way. I think that many dentists derive their beliefs in a deductive way. However, that is not the position of the world's dominating religions whose claims to authority os based on 'Miracles'

Intriguing stuff, but what has it to do with the subject?

Given sufficient time (much longer than the age of the universe) the egg could unscramble itself 'naturally..however. There are instances of man-made unscrambling. The German intelligence service
managed to unscramble the shredded STASI file.

As DingiJones pointed out science and the supernatural are by definition mutually exclusive, so non of the events you mention would change the mind of the scientific world. It would result in a frenzy of new scientific and conspiracy theories.

Your conclusion is the same as mine albeit better expressed. However. I wonder what would happen faced with a phenomenon that can not be explained in even the most speculative way.
I think that the explanation of it being created by 'sufficiently advanced civilization must have its limits.

I am familiar but its relevance depends on what A Clarke meant by 'Magi'. is it the magic = supernatural;
or the magic used when we try to describe something amazing (work like magic). If you show q native
of the Andaman Is a torch he would consider as magic-supernatural. On the other hand, if Isac Newton came across a TV set he would, because of his scientific mindset consider it as magic-amazing.

The intelligence and curiosity of chimpanzees should not be underestimated. Whatmore, opportunity
plays a crucial role in evolution. The fire' was nor 'invented' because someone was looking for a better food preparation method but because someone observed the effect it has on meat.
Curiosity is likely to chimpanzees to deserted cities and presents them with an
unparalleled opportunity and mental/verbal challenges.

If each domino is, say 50% taller than the preceding one but has the base side the metastability will increase and the energy amplified. I guess it all depends on the geometry of the dominoes.
At certain proportions and with no friction there might be translatory movement of the dominos rather than tipping over. There will not be amplification in that case.

I am not sure that the definition of chain reaction implies amplification.
However, you can get amplification if you have a row of dominoes of increasing size,
Regarding your effort to move a truck, it might have not much effect on the truck but it would have an effect on you i.e shortness of breath or bruised palms. It all stems from Newtonian laws.
I cannot think of any application of force that doesn't have an effect.

Back to physics!
I might have missed it, but what is 'present' has not been defined in the course of the long debate.
Presentism can make sense only if time is pixelized. (Planck's Constant??)

My understanding of comtabilisim is that under certain circumstances you can make your own free will choice which is not deterministic. It is a bit like 'eating the cake and having it' but many philosophers
agree with it.

I would not describe as a blueprint as that would smack of a 'design'.
what I am saying is that that if one believes on determinism, one has to conclude that the shape of the universe at any time was determined during the infinitesimal small stretch of time post the big bang,

If you are able to choose you than by implication you are already not a blank page, you already have a personality with some sort of bias. Also, randomness is in the eye of the beholder. Randomness is a pattern which is impossible to describe mathematically. There is not such a thing as 'random choice'
When you choose a lottery ticket number 'at random' it is not really random. Your choice is through some unconscious bias.

The emotional appeal of Life after death seemed to derail your rationality. What is wrong with Tim's healthy scepticism about your belief?

In the tapestry of time and space, Bill lives forever. His existence cannot be wiped off. The universe would be different without the causal effects of his having existed.

To csalisbury.
You must be an optimist in hoping that answer which eluded humankind for thousands of year will
found in the discourse of the Forum. Nevertheless, it is a thought-provoking question/````

The causal criteria referred to is that of David Humes who lived 150 before the birth of modern physics.
I think that according to Relativity even the temporal criterion is not valid.

Look at the treatment given by Muslim countries to their minorities: the Copts, Yazidis., Armenians...
Over the century the Christian population of the Middle declined from 20% to 2%, Doesn't tell you
why the Jew fled the Muslim countries fled to what is their ancestral land?

[reWhaply="god must be atheist;372313"]

Not what I meant. of course, Jews fleeing from Arab countries 1948-1950 were received in Israel by open arms. Their descendants form by now the majority of Israel's Jewish population.

The I/

The Palestinian refugee problem was created 72 years ago. When you consider the wealth of the oil kingdoms and their need for manpower you realise that the problem that it could have been settled long time ago (and to a large extent it did) Unfortunately, keeping number of the descendants of those refugees at the borders of Israel who claim 'the right to return' became a political aimed at the destruction of the state of Israel. Incidentally, there was also a Jewish refugee problem created by Jew fleeing Arab countries to Israel.

That is is not going to happen/ Unlike the Jews of Europe, the Muslim minorities have powerful backers in the Muslim majority countries where they could flee if it comes to the worst. Also, we have now media
UN etc.. although that did not prevent the genocide in Rwanda. I agree that had the Uigurs not been living in the strategic area of Xinjiang, the persecution would less severe.

There is a Chinese imperialism for you. I started in Tibet in 1950 with the occupation and destruction of Tibetan culture and population the province with Han Chinese who now outnumber the indigenous population. However, from the Chinese point of view Uigurs are a greater threat to Chinese hegemony than Tibet because they are Muslims, a worldwide religion with brethren in neighbouring countries and nd therefore possibly viewed a fifth column. Please note that Thailand, the Philippines, Srilanka and Myanmar mirror the Chinese attitude. Whilst not justifying any of these, Islamic fundamentalism is a factor.

The Jewish court which sentenced Jesus had no temporal powers. The Romans were the ones who crucified Jesus, probably because they considered him as a potential rebel. Suggest you study the history of the Jewish rebellion against the Roman rule.

Nowdays, the

"This, to me hides an important distinction. There is collateral damage and there is intentional targeting of civilian populations, like say in Dresden. I don't think things like this shortened the war. And I don't think the German bombing of civilian London helped their cause and perhaps actually made the British more determined."

Nowadays the bombing of Dresden coming less there three months before the collapse of the Third Reich and killing many thousands would be considered as war crime comparable to The Russian bombing of Aleppo. However, the timeline context cannot be ignored. It came after many German the bombing of purely civilian targets starting with Guernica. Rotterdam was bombed after the Dutch surrendered jus for the sake of 'teaching a lesson'. And, the Red Army liberated Auschwitz a month
earlier thus revealing the enormity of the German Genocidal crimes. Whilst two wrongs do not make right, the bombing of Dresden has to be viewed in the general context of WW2.

I think that metaphysical identity deals with physical identity. But even aking your example, reading the same thing at 3 am would evoke a different image/interpretation than reading it at 3 pm.

But not all is lost! We still have the handfull of the righteous (the LibDem)
And, I would not count. on five years. History os in an overdrive.

The situation in Afghanistan has been deteriorating for the last 10 years. I think that what we view as 'deterioration' is, unfortunately, the norm for Afghanistan. It the mixture of ethnic-religious groups the geography and Islamic fundamentalism that causes it. The Afghan government will stumble on but will survive.

I think that trainability provides some measure of an animal's intelligence. It is a facet of adaptability to changing circumstances which essentially does not differ from that required to adapt to a changing habitat. An animal needs certain intelligence to perceive how to respond to a person's command for its own good. You can train several species of mammals but I don't think you can train iguanas or pythons.
I am not of course condoning some aspects of animal training.

The debate seems to me to be sterile since so far none of the participants define the meaning of Truth.

Quite an interesting episode.
Apparently, genetically dingos are not different from the domestic dog and can be trained if starting from puppyhood. Conversely, it does not take long for domestic dogs to go feral. I wonder whether the 60.000 years of domestication. Is it possible that the domestication process just added a veneer on an unchangeable underlay?

OK. Taking the analogy of body parts with various functions. What are the demarcation lines between the three entities? Does the Holy Spirit deal with different matters than those dealt with by Jehova or Jesus?

Where is the evidence?

You got a point, but I still think that the belief in Miracle Cures is a good example of Divine Nepotism. You might be the best person in the world but you will be doomed if you do not follow our (weird !)
rituals. That approach is, of course, common to all, monotheistic religions.

I am a non-believer. I should point out that belief in cures by holy men and holy places exist also among Jews a Moslems but. unlike in Catholicism, they are not sanctioned by mainstream establishments.

Amazing program? Haven't you heard about entropy, chaos, and randomness?
And incidentally, there cosmic constants and ratios, most of which are part of the so-called 'fine-tuning

So, it took the ultra-fine balancing of fifty or so constants and ratios to create life on one planet in an insignificant solar system in an unremarkable galaxy. Any outcome that relied on such complex balancing is unstable by definition and would not bode well for the future of Life.

Actually, all I had in mind in starting the debate is to imply that that the world as it is does not point to having an element of 'Design' as defined in terms of engineering or art. No reflection about the design capabilities of (non-existant in my view) God. I suppose one might view Evolution with its purposefulness as emerging intelligence. It is created through the entopic flow but does eventually self-destructive. It cannot exist in a Heat Death universe.