The World Was Born Yesterday

[mingshey]

Maybe someone has once come to this kind of idea.
The world was born yesterday. The Creator made everything so that, when you investigate it carefully, you conlude that the world is billions of years old. And your memory before yesterday is carefully composed and implanted that you've been living your whole age. As if the androids in "Blade Runner" were made so.

And this is an example of a `generic time' creation theory. Just change "yesterday" into an arbitrary time in the past:
The world was born T time ago. The Creator made everything so that, when you investigate it carefully, you conlude that the world is billions of years old. And your memory before T time ago is carefully composed and implanted that you've been living your whole age.


Or more strangely, our whole experience is a memory to be implanted in the "to be created" future world. The world is not born yet. We are just being prepared to be made!

Well I don't say this very seriously. But who knows?

[Emma_85]

Have you been reading too much Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy?

[mingshey]

Well, what's HHGTTG? Probably a kind of SF?

[Keesa]

It's an interesting thought. I don't think that it is actually what happened, but I think that it's possible that it could have happened.

[bingley]

It was in HHGTTG, but I don't think it was original to Douglas Adams. I came across the idea before the radio series first came out. I can't remember who the idea was credited to, though. Somebody in the 1920s or 1930s, I think. [/i]

[Emma_85]

Maybe H.G. Wells, then?

[Keesa]

Is this a debate on the idea, or is it on the origins of the idea?

[bingley]

No, I think it was somebody who wasn't otherwise generally famous, though they may have been in certain circles.

[Raya]

What I find interesting about Mingshey's idea is that it assumes that there is a Creator who has made the universe *for a reason* and, consequently, has a reason for creating this deception about when the universe was created...

Now - personally, I do believe in the idea of there being a Creator. But to those of you who don't believe in one, how does this affect your stance on this theory?

[Raya]

Something else I thought of:

Suppose that the idea of the Deception (concerning when the universe really began) is true - but that it has nothing to do with the creation of the universe?

It could be that there is a Creator of the universe, but that this Creator is not the one responsible for the Deception. Or you can even assume that the universe began in some random fashion (i.e. wasn't created by a Creator), and that someone carried out the Deception...

[Kalailan]

and to add to fuel to the fire:

i once heard of a book in which someone finds an angel cub.
it looks like a baby, but it can talk. and that cub explains things about the world to the man.
he tells him the the world is really flat and that there is no such a thing as electricity, and that god just makes miracles each time we plug in a machine to the electricity or sail around the world, so that we will have something to investigate.

can't dissprove that!

[Emma_85]

Well... that would mean that each day is a miracle, and that God himself deceives us though, each time we send a satellite up into space and take pictures and so on... It would make God a deceiver really, which the first one avoids by not saying that God is the creator, the creator could just be some one in another world similar to ours, who's just creating a universe for his Physics’ project.
Making God a deceiver means that he would not be entirely good, which is something a monotheistic God has to be or it is not God we're talking of. Also God would have to do a hell of a lot of deceiving in order to make sure that the physicist, electricians and so on don't think that they are actually being deceived. That would make him really evil... God is evil ...
If this angel is just like a messenger from an evil creature that pretends to be God, then the theory would make more sense .

[Raya]

Now hang on a minute!!! Who says that God has to be good?
In my religion, God is just the creator of Good and Evil, and He is above and beyond such things...

But even if we take the idea that God must be Good: who says that deception is necessarily evil?
(Yes, I know Descartes thinks this... but he is just another person who ultimately can't know any better.)
Where on earth do we get this idea to associate Truth and Good?

[Emma_85]

In my religion, God is just the creator of Good and Evil, and He is above and beyond such things...

Well God is just God because he's everything that humans aren’t like. He's immortal, he's almighty, he's all-knowing and he's all-good.
I'm not a theologist, so I might be wrong, but this is what the idea of a one God is all about I thought.

Maybe you're right and deception isn't evil, because sometimes it can be good, but only in a very few extreme situations I'd say. To deceive someone means to give them wrong information, and as it's these information we base our actions on, we then base our actions on something, which is wrong. So I believe deception to be wrong.

You are right in mentioning Descartes. I wasn't even aware of it, but it must have been why I just said that. It's a strange feeling... thanks for reminding me where my thoughts are from...

[threewood14]

view my made up uncertainty principle
it kinda has something to do with what you are thinking

http://www.textkit.com/greek-latin-foru ... php?t=1466

__________
threewood14

[Jung He Fah Toy]

I know that everyone's view on religion could affect their ideas on this in many ways. To be breif, I do believe in a Creator of time. Time does not apply to the Creator and He is able to change it according to His will. Its almost like the creator is in control of time. He is everywhere in time and it doesn't apply to Him. I don't believe that the Creator must be pure good also, but He must be flawless and perfect.

If the Creator decieves us, is it wrong? I don't believe that it is in only extreme conditions. I believe that most people do not think that their lvies are bad. They may not have incredibly rich lives, but they are not bad ones. If the Creator has been decieving us the entire time, why would there be any reason to believe that it is wrong? We in reality may just be in a horrible place and the Creator may just be covering it up for us...

P.S. This reminds me of an episode of Star Trek with the V-Ger Episode...

[Saturnalicius Princeps]

If we know that someone is acting on information that we know to be untruthful, yet do nothing, are we doing anything wrong, or passively deceiving? If so, and God knew all truth, yet did not share all truth then God would be wrong, and a deceiver, at least passively. If not and there is no moral obligation to share the truth when one knows the truth, then is any passive deception wrong?

On Mingshey's theory, I seem to recall reading, quite some time ago, that this was the position of an article on creationism (of the evolution v. creationism debate). The author had felt that the world was created according to the biblical timeline, but that God had implanted fossils of dinosaurs and such to throw us off. I can't really recall whether the author attributed to a test of faith or a colossal joke.

[Jung He Fah Toy]

We can only do as best as our interpretation will carry us.