Did aliens or God create the human race?

[truthwolf1]

I always thought it was about consciousness after death.

[Condor]

hippies.

[sgreger1]

And some of you wonder about my avatar and sig... This thread is proof that all of you need to REPENT!!!

Is REPENT some kind of high proofalcohol or something? Never heard of it.

[wa3zrm]

And some of you wonder about my avatar and sig... This thread is proof that all of you need to REPENT!!!

[sgreger1]

I think it is how much game your dad had with your mom that determines that, but I am that practical naysayer of the group.

Through in the factor of Condom manufacturer QA department...

Ken

Lemme shower this karma on yo face real quick bitch. Oh shit, you pregnant? Well, i'm out, but bad karma on you for being a single teenage mother!

[devilock76]

Well, I don't agree with that. I believe it's the karma and consciousness of the transmigrating Atman from the previous lives that determines one's next birth. That makes most sense to me.

I think it is how much game your dad had with your mom that determines that, but I am that practical naysayer of the group.

Through in the factor of Condom manufacturer QA department...

Ken

[tom502]

Well, I don't agree with that. I believe it's the karma and consciousness of the transmigrating Atman from the previous lives that determines one's next birth. That makes most sense to me.

[sgreger1]

But that's based on our purely body status. Why is one person born Paris Hilton, and someone else born some starving kid in war torn Libya? I mean, why are certain people born healthy and in a good home, while others are born to a street walkin' crack whore? This goes beyond physical genetics, which may say why you have blue eyes, but this is past karma that leads the jiva to kae birth in a certain body.

Most would answer that by saying it's random essentially. Daddy Hiltons will eventually have baby Paris Hilton's, and crack whores in Libya will eventually have babies too. Babies are born to both parties since they are both humans and had sex. There isn't anything coordinating some system of "fairness', deciding who gets born where. You are born where you are born, it's pretty much random chance if you think about it.

[tom502]

Everyone has their own karma, but the Gita teaches to see all with equal vision, as the paramatma within.
While the caste system was, and in some ways still in existence in India, most all of the Vedanitic teachers I have known of was against caste by birth system. Sri Aurobind, Sri Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekanada, Baba Mutananda, Srila Prabhupada, Shri Ram Sharma Acharya.... I don't any Vedic teachers that supported the caste by birth system, I think it's more an ingrained cultural thing.

[Roo]

Does that leave room for pity and sympathy for the garbage-eater in Calcutta? I know that under the caste system it does not, but what about you? Just curious. Or do you think "well, you shouldn't have been such a dick in your past life". In my understanding the Hindu approach is more toward the latter, the Buddhist definitely the former. Having said that, one main impetus for Buddhism in the first place was to transcend the caste system. Tom! Nice to have you back. Hope you buy some snus and stick around a while.

[tom502]

But that's based on our purely body status. Why is one person born Paris Hilton, and someone else born some starving kid in war torn Libya? I mean, why are certain people born healthy and in a good home, while others are born to a street walkin' crack whore? This goes beyond physical genetics, which may say why you have blue eyes, but this is past karma that leads the jiva to kae birth in a certain body.

[Roo]

sgreg- I don't claim to be the know it all, but to me it is our developed consciousness that determines our next life along with our accumulated karma. I mean, nothing disappears, it's all an everflowing continuance. To me, if there was no reincarnation, we'd all be the same. For it is our past karma and degrees of consciouness evolution that brought us to this life, this planet, this body, into this family, etc. If there was none of that, which makes us all different, and in different circumstances(our karma from time without beginning) then we'd all have a blank slate and be like identical clones. As far as the population, well, in Indian thought, we transmigrate from all the various forms of life, insect, animal, all of them, evolving to human. And I don't think this all just applied to Earth, but the all of everywhere, and many species on Earth become extinct, or shrink, so those jivas could be coming back as humans, as well as humans are always coming back often in worse conditions than they were because of negative karma, and this could relate to other realms or planets too. Of course this is all philsophy and can't be proven objectively, but based on what I said above, it does make logical sense to me. More than just saying "it's Gods will", or "God works in mysterious ways", not that you or anyone else is saying that, but the goal to me, is to come up with something that at least makes sense to me, and everyone is at their own respective state of conscious awareness, so we all won't always agree, or see things the same.

Hi Roo.

I think instead of being the product of our past karma we are the product of our genetic history and the environment in which we matured. I do not think we would all be "clean slates" and for all purposes equal as each and every one of us comes from a unique genetic lineage, and our character is equal parts nurture to nature I believe.

Edit: didn't read sgreger's post before I posted. Pinker is an interesting thinker, I like his books for the most part.

[sgreger1]

sgreg- I don't claim to be the know it all, but to me it is our developed consciousness that determines our next life along with our accumulated karma. I mean, nothing disappears, it's all an everflowing continuance. To me, if there was no reincarnation, we'd all be the same. For it is our past karma and degrees of consciouness evolution that brought us to this life, this planet, this body, into this family, etc. If there was none of that, which makes us all different, and in different circumstances(our karma from time without beginning) then we'd all have a blank slate and be like identical clones. As far as the population, well, in Indian thought, we transmigrate from all the various forms of life, insect, animal, all of them, evolving to human. And I don't think this all just applied to Earth, but the all of everywhere, and many species on Earth become extinct, or shrink, so those jivas could be coming back as humans, as well as humans are always coming back often in worse conditions than they were because of negative karma, and this could relate to other realms or planets too. Of course this is all philsophy and can't be proven objectively, but based on what I said above, it does make logical sense to me. More than just saying "it's Gods will", or "God works in mysterious ways", not that you or anyone else is saying that, but the goal to me, is to come up with something that at least makes sense to me, and everyone is at their own respective state of conscious awareness, so we all won't always agree, or see things the same.

Hi Roo.

This whole thread is pretty much in the realm of philosophy, as are most interesting subjects. On the question of "If this weren't the case, than why are we all different, we would just have a blank slate" etc etc, I recommend reading a book called "The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial Of Human Nature, by Steven Pinker". Essentially, the reason we are all different can be thoroughly explained by genetics, in addition to the environment we grow up in (but mainly genetics).

[tom502]

sgreg- I don't claim to be the know it all, but to me it is our developed consciousness that determines our next life along with our accumulated karma. I mean, nothing disappears, it's all an everflowing continuance. To me, if there was no reincarnation, we'd all be the same. For it is our past karma and degrees of consciouness evolution that brought us to this life, this planet, this body, into this family, etc. If there was none of that, which makes us all different, and in different circumstances(our karma from time without beginning) then we'd all have a blank slate and be like identical clones. As far as the population, well, in Indian thought, we transmigrate from all the various forms of life, insect, animal, all of them, evolving to human. And I don't think this all just applied to Earth, but the all of everywhere, and many species on Earth become extinct, or shrink, so those jivas could be coming back as humans, as well as humans are always coming back often in worse conditions than they were because of negative karma, and this could relate to other realms or planets too. Of course this is all philsophy and can't be proven objectively, but based on what I said above, it does make logical sense to me. More than just saying "it's Gods will", or "God works in mysterious ways", not that you or anyone else is saying that, but the goal to me, is to come up with something that at least makes sense to me, and everyone is at their own respective state of conscious awareness, so we all won't always agree, or see things the same.

Hi Roo.

[devilock76]

Religion used to be a way to explain things we couldn't possibly understand, like why is the sky blue, where does the sun go at night, what is an eclipse.

Now it is used to try to back peddle around all the things science is now able to answer.

Chakras and reincarnation oh my.

The only PROVEN recycling of the human body is worm food...

Ken