reduce costly 'fashion show' competition

identify children as school children outside school

cultivate individualism through intellectual rather than commercial/financial means

enhance a sense of community

From my experience of other people's flatties, they pixellate more conspicuously, judder with fast action and never, ever display any broadcast content at the correct ratio resulting in artificially fat news presenters and people who fatten up as they walk out of the screen.

Throw in the same old rubbish remote design all tellies suffer from e.g. infra-red that you have to aim with a billion nonsensical buttons that aren't back lit and no dial for traversing all the trillion garbage channels and an upgrade seems pointless.

And it's not like movies are ever, ever in 16:9 so you get the black bars anyway!

No faith is the belief in something with inadequate evidence and in the case of God, lots of evidence to the contrary. Science is based on evidence.

'Science and a belief in God do not have to be mutually exclusive of each other.'

Indeed. There are scientific reasons why people believe in gods.

'I believe God intended us seek knowledge and question things...even Him.'

You can believe whatever you want but if it adversely affects the lives of others, you should be held accountable with reasoned inquiry.

E.g. I may believe that the sun sets in the Indian ocean every night because my parents and community say so but if I punch those who dissent from my belief I should be forced to face reason with evidence.

'For everything science brings to the table, it won't be able to prove "scientifically" that the universe and everything in it, is a result of random happenstance.'

That's your assumption. Perhaps it's akin to a 10th century peasant saying 'never' when conteplating the lunar landings.

'A time came when I realized that there would ALWAYS be something to be discovered..'

So?

'..I put my faith in God..'

But why?

Just 'a desire to know something' will suffice. Adding the word 'philosophy' is redundant. Philosophy as any kind of discipline has simply been superceded.

Wikipedia:

'The Big Bang is the cosmological model of the universe that is best supported by all lines of scientific evidence and observation.'

This model came about because the scientific evidence points to it.

"The only answers we can get from anything are the answers we are already looking for"

Not at all. The scientific process leads to all sorts of unexpected discoveries all the time e.g. Viagra.

Just as Chemistry replaced Alchemy Science replaces Philosophy. You cannot find the nonsense words you listed in science because they have been exposed as vacuous. Things move on. Philosophy is history, literally.

Oh? What if someone loves to his or her genitals to crowds? Is that beautiful? Is that god?

2. Current bibles differ greatly with the oldest known bible (Codex Sinaiticus).

3. The illogic of the trinity.

4. The contention that god loves us when there is suffering in the world.

5. The contention of human free will in the face of an omniscient, omnipotent god.

No, there is a severely big difference - the cell is fertilised with someone elses DNA and can become a functioning, multicelluar organism.

"At that point, the cell can't see, can't hear, can't even think. There is no consciousness, no feeling. The only thing it can do is multiply and eventually the cells that multiply specialize."

The fertilised egg divides and specialises until it becomes a functioning, multicelluar organism. A skin cell cannot do this.

"To say life starts at conception is a fairly simplistic view."

So? Why not say life starts at conception? Seems a fairly logical place to define it. Life begins when two organisms' DNA combines and leads to cell division - how about that? No room for fuzzy wiggling there.

"There is no specific moment where something not alive becomes alive."

Is that not a separate argument?