I was forwarded this interesting essay. I thought perhaps you might
find it amusing. If you have already seen it, you will notice that
I have made substantial revisions to the original. I dont know who
created it, and although I rewrote much of it, I can't quite claim it
as my own.
Hope you enjoy it.
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AN EXPOSITION ON THE ATTRIBUTES OF GOD, HEAVEN, AND THE UNIVERSE
I. God Is Very Large
First of all, a colleague of mine informed me that God is "large." I
rather liked this idea, since it greatly simplifies future postulates
(be patient, there will be many). Since large is a relative term, we'll
simply assume here that it means that God is larger than anything we can
imagine -- larger, say, than the national debt.
II. God is All-Knowing
My colleague also has shown me that "infinitely knowledgeable" seems to
be a widely accepted attribute of the deity. This implies that not only
does he know what is going on at 1400 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington,
at 3am Saturday morning, but likewise at the Kremlin in Moscow, the
Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, and even Dave's backyard in Altoona.
Obviously, at least part of God must be at all places at once. This
supports our a priori understanding of God's Largness. (See Assumption I)
III. God is Timeless
This is a natural expansion of assumption (II), for if god knows all
things at all times, he must therefore exist out of time. This is beyond
our three-dimensional experience (and observation) of the natural universe
as we are in stuck in time, so to speak, much like a boat on a river.
In other words, God is in all places at all times in the Universe, so God
is then a four-dimensional being, which supports assumptions (I) and (II),
and also explains why my catechism nuns (who seemed to have enough trouble
with Euclidean geometry) finally gave up and decided that god just looked
like a man.
IV. God Is Self-Evident
My colleague further suggested that I anticipate the queries of those
desiring formal logical proof of god's existence. To this extent I will
employ the a priori arguement that God is self-evident, referring the hard
skeptic to the "natural religion" essays of such Enlightenment figures as
Voltaire and Montesquieu. By self-evident I mean to say that everywhere
one looks, there is proof of God. The evidence of the creator is in the
design of the creation. This is not a defense of scientific creationism,
but is a logical construct that sets the stage for my next postulate:
V. The Universe is God (or vice versa)
This can be made very simple if one merely accepts this at face value,
and the following conclusion is thus: "If God is everywhere I am,
everytime I look, and is even in the places I am not, then he is more than
just IN all places at all times -- He IS all places and IS all times."
And since all places and all times necessarily defines the entire Universe,
it is logical to say that God IS the entire Universe.
VI. Not Only is God Large, but He's Curved Too!
Since God is the Universe, and available evidence shows the Universe to
be homogeneous and isotropic at all points, it is necessary that God
be homogeneous and isotropic at all points. Thus, he is either
spherical, flat, or hyperbolic (since these are the only geometries
that support the homogeneity and isotropy conditions). To help
decide which of these geometries represents our God-Universe, we need
to use another basic assumption about God, namely that "God has infinite
wisdom." This assumption was not supplied by my colleague (she quit
talking to me once I postulated that God is curved) but was instead
revealed to me by Sister Margaret Mary during catechism class.
Infinite and unbounded wisdom could not of course be contained in a
universe of finite shape and volume, so that rules out a spherical
Universe-God. We can extrapolate from this that He is either flat or
divergent. Since much of our available data could support a hyperbolic
universe, we will assume that God is divergent -- which is a convenient
assumption, since no one wants a flat God, after all. From this, we quite
straightforwardly conclude that he is five-dimensional and hyperbolically
curved.
VII. Heaven Is A 16-Dimensional Hyperbolic Space,
and I'm Going Straight to Hell
Since God's current residence is the area known as "Heaven," it is evident
that our Universe (God) actually resides within a higher-dimensional space.
In (III), God was shown to be intrinsically four-dimensional, but (VI)
showed that when his infinite wisdom is accounted for, the shape becomes
a five-dimensional curve. If Heaven is to be represented as a higher-
dimensional continuum within which our God-Universe exists, then it must
have 12 dimensions if it is flat, or 16 dimensions if it is hyperbolic.
Unfortunately, proof of this is beyond the scope of this essay, and I refer
you to any textbook on advanced Vector Calculus and Non-linear Dynamics
if you desire a formal handling of the theorems.
Anyhow, while it is not conclusive, it IS intuitive that since God is
hyperbolic, Heaven should also be divergently curved, therefore requiring
a total of 16 dimensions for a complete projection. This makes sense, also,
since it is common knowledge that everything in its natural form exists
in a hexadecimal system (and cgs units, too!), which is further
evidenced by the fact that the Universe was created in Sixteen days.
Note: The fact that the Bible describes creation as taking place in
six days (plus one for rest) is actually due to an exegetical error
committed by Priestly editors during the early Second Temple Period.
Since the Jews had just returned from their exile in Babylon, the
ancient Sumerian Mythology they had assimilated was highly influential
in their current Israelite Culture, and as we know, the ancient Sumerians
used a number system that was in base 6 (as opposed to our modern base 10).
The Rabbis, who were notoriously bad mathematicians, had much difficulty
with hexadecimal conversions especially in light of the fact that Hebrew
has no vowels. After much lively debate at the Mizpah Council in 512 BCE,
the Rabbis concluded that the original Oral Traditions surely must have
been in base 6, and thus miscalculated the Creation of the Universe by
10 days, as it was actually created on Thursday, November 2.
Furthermore, hexadecimal would be continually oppressed by the Vatican
until Martin Luther sparked the Reformation by nailing his 16 Theses to
the door of the Wittenberg church. It is also worthwhile to note that
512 BCE is two times 16 raised to the second power (!) and when divided
by the height of the Washington Monument, shows how the CIA actually
tricked the Nation of Islam into shooting Malcom X (!!) . . .
[ Editor's Note: The piece continues for some time, but does little more
than ensure me a seat near the front, right up by the flames. Let us
jump to the conclusion, and quickly : ]
. . . thus, it is entirely possible that the existence of God will be
definitively proven by a Unified Field Theory, should such a mathematical
construct ever be discovered. However, even in event that the existence
of a higher being is never formally proven mathematically, we must still
concur with Heisenberg's evidence that God does in fact play dice. (Sorry,
Albert!)
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PS I am not subscribed to the list, so mail any comments about its
appropriateness (or lack thereof) to me directly! :)
--_/_/_/_ _/_/_/_/ _/_/_/_ _______________________________ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ Robert W. Johnson _/_/_/_/ _/ _/ _/_/_/_ Dept. of Electrical Engineering _/ _| _/ _/ _/ _/ North Carolina State University _/ _| _/_/_/_/ _/_/_/_/ rwjohns3@eos.ncsu.edu --------------------------------------------------------------------
"We didn't evolve from no fish, we didn't used to have tails, and we ain't related to no monkeys you atheistic pinko meathead!"
-- Archie Bunker --------------------------------------------------------------------