to think we no longer live in a Christian country

[orlantina]

More than 53% of people have no faith - according to a recent survey.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41150792

That figure changes to 71% amongst 18-25 yr olds.

It surveyed 3000 adults - so it would be interesting to look behind the stats but it seems that more than half the country have no religion.

Christianity is still probably the most common religion out there.

Should this have implications for areas of national life?

Life cannot be started in a laboratory from nothing. Nobody mentioned there was no other life in the Universe, we were talking about in our solar system., that we know of.

A new study suggests that there are around 700 quintillion planets in the universe, but only one like Earth. It’s a revelation that’s both beautiful and terrifying at the same time.

Astrophysicist Erik Zackrisson from Uppsala University in Sweden arrived at this staggering figure — a 7 followed by 20 zeros — with the aid of a computer model that simulated the universe’s evolution following the Big Bang. Zackrisson’s model combined information about known exoplanets with our understanding of the early universe and the laws of physics to recreate the past 13.8 billion years.

Zackrisson found that Earth appears to have been dealt a fairly lucky hand. In a galaxy like the Milky Way, for example, most of the planets Zackrisson’s model generated looked very different than Earth — they were larger, older and very unlikely to support life. The study can be found on the preprint server arXiv, and has been submitted to The Astrophysical Journal.

And that's all down to LUCK??

And what about the life on Venus that we just havent discovered yet? They are no doubt looking through their methane clouds on their scalding hot planet thinking "wow, what are the chances that we just happen to live on a planet perfect for us, it must be god!"

Earth is the only planet we know of SO FAR that has life, its foolish to be utterly certain that that means its the ONLY one with life, or that all life must need the same environment that we need. Even some earth creatures at the very bottom of the sea can only live in conditions that would kill us!

Why should there be anyone specifically representing certain groups of people. If we want true integration we shouldn't be distinguishing certain groups thereby setting them apart. People should be judged on merit alone regardless of faith, colour or gender. We are all equal human beings. It should be irrelevant what faith, colour or gender we are

I couldn't have put it better myself

Having "representatives" of whatever-it-is can occasionally be useful, but all too often what it really means is that those advocates are hoping to secure special treatment, frequently at the expense of others

Storm there could very easily be, but that still doesn't change the facts of what we know. Earth seems to have been chosen for us humans. Precision made.

Life cannot be started in a laboratory from nothing.

THIS ^

There is the old joke where a scientist gets in touch with God and says - 'i can create a planet, and life on it"

God says "Oooo-kay. Show me."

Scientist says "Come to my laboratory" Once there,the scientist goes to his bench, and empties onto it a bag of soil. "All I need to do now - "

"Hang on a minute" says God. "For a start, you can get your own dirt . . . "

I would favor people being allowed a certain number of days off to spend as they see fit on religious observance. I do agree that the UK would probably want to keep Xmas but that is more cultural than religious (unless it is the religion of santa!) but we could certainly call it the midwinter festival instead to make it more inclusive and it is only 2 National Holidays. Other than that allow people 7 (or however many bank holidays we now gets worth) of religious observance holidays. Many will still take Easter but many would also take Eid (or both of them, I think there are two Eids). Those of us who are aetheist would take whatever we felt like!

"Storm there could very easily be, but that still doesn't change the facts of what we know. Earth seems to have been chosen for us humans. Precision made."

Youre totally misunderstanding my point - life fits the available environment, not the other way around. It only seems designed for us because WE have evolved to fit IT.

Theres a species of Moth that used to be white and lived on white-barked trees. When all the coal-burning pollution turned the treetrunks black, the white moths turned into black moths, because the white ones were no longer camouflaged on the black trunks and were eaten while the darker ones survived. Would you say then that god precision-designed those trees to now be black for the benefit of the black moths? To the black moths, it certainly seems that way - they are black, the trees are black, perfect god-designed environment for them?

My point is that life on Venus has evolved to be perfect for Venus, life on Earth has evolved to be perfect for Earth. Any life that wasnt a perfect fit would be supplanted by a form that is a better fit.

And that's all down to LUCK??

Yep. Amazing, isn't it?

That we are all here by fluke; by a random stroke of luck; by everything aligning at one particular time to create the perfect conditions is, in my opinion, even more beautiful than the notion of an omnipotent being/big creator/divine force/big sky fairy (delete as appropriate) just whacking it all together because he felt like it.

Science is beautiful.

I am amazed at all these "there must be a god because it is statistically highly improbable that life evolved otherwise" arguments.

1. Science currently can't explain everything therefore there must be a god. 500 yrs ago we didn't know the Earth revolved around the sun. It didn't mean it didn't happen - just that we weren't scientifically advanced to know that. Science can't currently explain all.... doesn't mean they won't be able to in another 500 years.
2. There are 7squillion planets in the galaxy and ours is the only one with life on therefore there must be a god. How do you know? Have you been and looked? We haven't studied the planets in own solar system fully. Also the argument that distant stars are too old and have cooled too far to currently sustain life on nearby planets doesn't mean there wasn't once life.

The whole point of having a faith is... I assumed... faith. That means believing something in the absence of evidence. Arguing that statistics proves the existence of god isn't faith it is pseudo-science and as both and aetheist and a chemist it provokes me to argue. Tell me you believe and leave it at that and I won't argue you with you. You are entitled to believe whatever you like, just don't argue with me that there is a factual or scientific basis for your belief!

I would march for the rights of anyone to practice any religion they like. I would prefer you not teach christianity to my child as fact in school. Teach RE and discuss how people of different faiths worship and what they believe - fine. Just don't tell her any of this is "True". It isn't it is faith.

Thank you heart

After a bad day at work, your posts have given me a good laugh

God gave us this planet, and created it for us, what we do with it is a different matter

You can't possibly state that as irrefutable fact. Unless you can provide proof.

It isn't a fact, it's your belief which is different

Do you know what always makes me laugh. You get the worlds leading authorities, scientists, physicists etc who have studied the origins of the universe, some of the most intelligent people in the world no doubt.

They don't have all the answers, there's so much they don't understand, but if they are blown away and baffled by the fact that out of 700 quintillion planets in the Universe, earth seems to have been precision made for human life, a few mumsnetters will come along and say stuff like, "yeah ain't science wonderful" without batting an eyelid.

A good job our scientists didn't have such unimaginative foresight lacking brains, otherwise we'd still be thinking the world is flat. It really does make you,sound a bit silly when you talk like you know better than them. In other words, if they are blown away, baffled, awestruck etc so should we be.

You're easily amused then araiwa aren't you. But no worries i've had a little chuckle too at some of the posts.

cath it isn't my thing to talk science and the universe normally. My faith certainly isn't because of the universe, just that when people ask for proof, how can you give it them. Saying "because i believe " is meaningless. Therefore sometimes i, and others often try to compensate that by talking about the miracle of life, the universe etc. I understand what you mean though and it's a very good point.

Who designed god?

The odds of an omnipotent being existing by chance are 1:1*10^93487265

That is a one with ninety three billion four hundred and eighty seven million two hundred and sixty five zeros after it. Therefore any deity would have to have been designed by an even more powerful and intelligent designer. Lets call him Cronus.

So Cronus created God, Satan etc and the cosmos, but God & Satan rebel against Cronus and create their own universe within the cosmos. 13.5 billion years later God is pissed off looking at stars and planets whizzing around and creates some dumb animals on one rock, lets call them dinosaurs. 200 million years later God is bored again because Satan has buggered off to Hell, so kills off all the dinosaurs and replaces them with humans. 200 thousand years later god gets real frustrated goes on a rampage and kills off all the humans bar 8. He than redesigns human DNA so that they dont live as long but is so depressed he decides to commit suicide by arranging for himself to be crucified. Three days later he realizes that was a bad idea as he is immortal and buggers off leaving the universe to fend for itself.

2 thousand years later, without a god to oppress them, humans have evolved intelligence and created robots with AI, which a few years later become self aware.

A robot called Marvin creates a time machine, accidentally travels back in time to far (15 Billion years before the universe existed) and is so embarrassed by the error changes him name to Cronus so his friends can't roast him for the mistake. ....

The odds of this happening by chance are so unimaginable it MUST have happened.

I have my own religion.
Karma.
I have not been bought up with any religion at all does that make me atheist? I believe in my own karma so I do believe.. tricky one this.
Do I think this is no longer a Christian country?
No I don't think it is.
But I don't think it's particularly a bad thing. Why would it be ?

I'm sorry, but "the worlds leading authorities, scientists, physicists etc" are not "blown away and baffled by the fact that out of 700 quintillion planets in the Universe, earth seems to have been precision made for human life"! This is one of the most ridiculous statements I have ever seen on Mumsnet - and I've been on the Brexit threads!

700 quintillion planets in the Universe The author of that paper has said that religious people have played 'Chinese whispers' with his study. And having life on Earth is no different than winning the lottery. It is highly improbable but someone wins it every week.

You can't be serious, hearts - really?!

CardinalSin

"I'm sorry, but "the worlds leading authorities, scientists, physicists etc" are not "blown away and baffled by the fact that out of 700 quintillion planets in the Universe, earth seems to have been precision made for human life"! This is one of the most ridiculous statements I have ever seen on Mumsnet - and I've been on the Brexit threads!"

This ^
x 700 quintillion

8008 that was glorious. :)

hearts and other religious types. Cosmos is on Netflix. Watch it.

Without wanting to sound ageist, how old are those of you who believe in a god? Of the many people I know my age (early forties) only a tiny handful believe in a god. Most of my younger friends do not at all. None of the teens I know do. The religious folk are all 50+. I think religion will die out with them.

"but if they are blown away and baffled by the fact that out of 700 quintillion planets in the Universe, earth seems to have been precision made for human life"

THEORY: All scientists are blown away and baffled by the fact that out of 700 quintillion planets in the Universe, earth seems to have been precision made for human life.

METHOD: We tested this theory by asking some of them.

RESULT: They arent.

Yay science!

Fresh i've already said, the odds of winning the lottery are 14 million to 1.
The odds of us being here in conjunction with the moon and sun has been described as "a tornado tearing through a scrapyard and all the pieces landing to compose an aeroplane".
A stupid comparison and not worth mentioning, funny though