I can't agree more. Though that evolution thing - there are too many missing links, and too many former "proven facts" which had to be revised, that I'd like to look forward to a better theory, fitting to the facts known nowadays...

Let's keep in mind that some missing links and revisions do not necessarily destroy a theory that generally works pretty well.[/quote]

Isn't science sometimes just another kind of religion nowadays? There is dogmatic thinking in each scientific branch, and each one who follows one theory arguments against those who follow another theory, despite both being scientific based theorys...

We have plenty of people here that read or post that are interested in, and read about, science. But, they are not scientists. It would not be fair to say scientists are being dogmatic since we do not know the qualifications of the people posting. I do wish the people posting that are scientists would let us know that and what area they research in. Next, if and when a scientist adheres to only working on researching under only one guiding theory, at the expense of another theory that has not been discredited, then maybe that scientist is guilty of following a dogma. That does not discredit the scientific method. It discredits the individual scientist.

I think I had another idea or two to post about in relation to this, but they escape me now. I'll leave with an example. In a recent Discover magazine article, "epigenetics" was discussed. The article suggests that Lamarck was not completely wrong. It does not say it discredits evolution. Just that the story is more complex (like I keep saying)!

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Capitalize on this good fortune, one word can bring you round ... changes.

I was just wondering, what would constitute proof for the non-believers. Or, maybe this is a better way of putting it, what would constitute an undeniable "miracle" nowadays?

I think the atheist side of the debate especially, ought to weigh in on this: because if the atheists say "Nothing could persuade me that there is a Creator", then I'd accuse them of belief-based doctrine, ie an irrational faith in the non-existence of God.

Your logic is completely faulty. The black or void is an absence of light, while cold is only the absence of heat. Heat exists, but cold does not; it is only relative to less heat.

I am not a Scientist, I am a Technologist ... so I am not allowed to post <grin>

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It's good to be back amongst friends and colleagues

I am not a Scientist, I am a Technologist ... so I am not allowed to post <grin>

No, John, that's not what is being said.
I don't know about Chuck's intentions, but all thoughts should be welcome. Just that we should consider how those thoughts are informed.
I am merely pointing out that we should not take each others' arguments at face value. Are we sometimes guilty of reading someone else's work and then just "thinking hard" about whether it makes sense? To an extent, of course we are, since none of us could hope to reproduce all scientific experiments within the span of an individual human life-time.
What do you mean by "technologist"? What can you bring to the conversation from your studies or your work?

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Capitalize on this good fortune, one word can bring you round ... changes.

I was just wondering, what would constitute proof for the non-believers. Or, maybe this is a better way of putting it, what would constitute an undeniable "miracle" nowadays?

I think the atheist side of the debate especially, ought to weigh in on this: because if the atheists say "Nothing could persuade me that there is a Creator", then I'd accuse them of belief-based doctrine, ie an irrational faith in the non-existence of God.

Your logic is completely faulty. The black or void is an absence of light, while cold is only the absence of heat. Heat exists, but cold does not; it is only relative to less heat.

So the absence of God is a fact, while the existence of God is merely the absence of fact? And you say that your position is not a belief based system?

I disagree. The non-existence of God is not a provable fact, it is a belief. Your belief in "The Facts" is nothing superior to what religious people call "The Truth". Your faith (that's what I call it) that what is not presently provable, does not exist, is nothing but a doctrine of belief.

In analogizing to the black or the cold, I think that you're the one with the faulty logic. It's like saying that electricity or molecules or amoeba never existed before people knew about it and could prove its existence as a fact. I say: they were there all the time, waiting to be discovered. Or to be more exact: the undiscovered/unproven may or may not exist, but you cannot say with certainty that they do not exist.

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I was just wondering, what would constitute proof for the non-believers. Or, maybe this is a better way of putting it, what would constitute an undeniable "miracle" nowadays?

I think the atheist side of the debate especially, ought to weigh in on this: because if the atheists say "Nothing could persuade me that there is a Creator", then I'd accuse them of belief-based doctrine, ie an irrational faith in the non-existence of God.

Your logic is completely faulty. The black or void is an absence of light, while cold is only the absence of heat. Heat exists, but cold does not; it is only relative to less heat.

So the absence of God is a fact, while the existence of God is merely the absence of fact? And you say that your position is not a belief based system?

I disagree. The non-existence of God is not a provable fact, it is a belief. Your belief in "The Facts" is nothing superior to what religious people call "The Truth". Your faith (that's what I call it) that what is not presently provable, does not exist, is nothing but a doctrine of belief.

In analogizing to the black or the cold, I think that you're the one with the faulty logic. It's like saying that electricity or atoms never existed before people knew about it and could prove its existence as a fact. I say: it was there all the time, waiting to be discovered. Or to be more exact: the undiscovered/unproven may or may not exist, but you cannot say with certainty that it does not exist.

No one can prove an unrestricted negative is what I ment to say.

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I was just wondering, what would constitute proof for the non-believers. Or, maybe this is a better way of putting it, what would constitute an undeniable "miracle" nowadays?

I think the atheist side of the debate especially, ought to weigh in on this: because if the atheists say "Nothing could persuade me that there is a Creator", then I'd accuse them of belief-based doctrine, ie an irrational faith in the non-existence of God.

Your logic is completely faulty. The black or void is an absence of light, while cold is only the absence of heat. Heat exists, but cold does not; it is only relative to less heat.

So the absence of God is a fact, while the existence of God is merely the absence of fact? And you say that your position is not a belief based system?

I disagree. The non-existence of God is not a provable fact, it is a belief. Your belief in "The Facts" is nothing superior to what religious people call "The Truth". Your faith (that's what I call it) that what is not presently provable, does not exist, is nothing but a doctrine of belief.

In analogizing to the black or the cold, I think that you're the one with the faulty logic. It's like saying that electricity or atoms never existed before people knew about it and could prove its existence as a fact. I say: it was there all the time, waiting to be discovered. Or to be more exact: the undiscovered/unproven may or may not exist, but you cannot say with certainty that it does not exist.

You can not prove something does not exist.

And therefore "proof" is not the ultimate measure of existence, except as a doctine of belief.

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Science is unable to prove or disprove the existence of God. Science is quite capable of describing how the universe works. Religion is not very good at describing how the world works as the writers of religious texts did not have the skill or basic knowledge to accurately determine the causes and processes acting in the world around them.

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BOINC WIKI

Science is unable to prove or disprove the existence of God. Science is quite capable of describing how the universe works. Religion is not very good at describing how the world works as the writers of religious texts did not have the skill or basic knowledge to accurately determine the causes and processes acting in the world around them.

Being of a secular persuasion, I would tend to agree with you. But I personally know many deeply religious people that would strongly disagree with you. You see, they are convinced that they have "witnessed" (observed or been affected by) phenomena that confirms the existence of God. Unhappily, religious folk have not yet constructed The Religous Method in the same way that we seculars have constructed The Scientific Method. But they swear that the phenomena are out there and have been observed. So naturally, they are at a disadvantage in that regard.

In view of how profoundly affected some very intelligent religious people have been by their experience of such phenomena, I personally am not convinced that it is impossible to investigate the same.

And that's why I raised the issue the way that I did, in a secular fashion. I asked: from a scientific point of view, what sort of hypotheses, what sort of phenomena, what sort of experiments could in our secular view be put forward to "prove" the existence of God at some future point in time?

And for merely raising the question, Claudette accuses me of faulty logic. I used the existence of electicity, molecules and amoeba simply by way of analogy that phenomena that are presently ignored may nonetheless exist.

I hope that clarifies what I was trying to accomplish with the question.

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http://www.evolutionnews.org/2006/11/time_dawkins_vs_collins.html

TIME: Dawkins vs. Collins

TIME magazine this week has an interesting discussion between Richard Dawkins, author most recently of The God Delusion, and Francis Collins, author of The Language of God. It is worth reading. Two observations:

First, I just can’t figure Collins out. Dawkins says the question of God is a scientific one for which there could be evidence. Collins, on the other hand, says the question of God’s existence is not scientific but “outside of science’s ability to really weigh in.” That said, Collins also claims he does not like Stephen Jay Gould’s idea of NOMA where science and religion do not overlap. But then Collins uses evidence for the fine-tuning of the laws of physics to argue for God’s existence. So apparently scientific evidence can weigh in on the question of God. I’m not sure what I am missing here. But I guess the take home point is that in practice Collins does think scientific evidence can point toward design (for him, God) and away from chance.

Dawkins’s comments on NOMA are spot on. Say what you want about Dawkins, but he’s not afraid to call a spade a spade. “I think that Gould’s separate compartments was [sic] a purely political ploy to win middle-of-the-road religious people to the science camp. But it’s a very empty idea.” He thinks there are “plenty of places” where religious and scientific questions overlap. Except for the equation of Darwinists with “the science camp,” I concur.

Second, while Dawkins started off the debate claiming that the question of God was a scientific one for which there could be evidence for or against, later on, his argumentation contradicted this assertion—and Collins had the sight to call him on it. Just as noted philosopher Thomas Nagel wrote recently, Dawkins essentially eliminates a Designer for the universe not on evidential grounds but a priori. He claims that one cannot invoke God as an explanation because God is improbable (and who knows what magic calculus Dawkins is doing in his head to determine this improbability). The obvious problem, then, is that evidence for or against design doesn’t really matter. One could never be justified in inferring design—regardless of how good the evidence for it is! This is clearly a heads-I-win-tails-you-lose argument.

Collins spots this and says that science should by all means keep exploring the multiverse hypothesis and other materialistic alternatives to a designing intelligence for the fine-tuning of the universe, but he objects “to the assumption that anything outside of nature is ruled out of the conversation…you end up with a zero probability of God after examining the natural world….” One might say that Dawkins ends up with a zero probability before examining the natural world.

In other words, Dawkins says one cannot infer that the universe was designed because one cannot invoke an improbable entity like God. So the evidence doesn’t matter. Only Richard Dawkins’s calculation of God’s improbability matters; and no evidence for the design of the laws of physics is going to change this.

To see this same fallacy at work in another debate over God, check out philosopher William Lane Craig's dismantling of arguments by the popular historian of religion Bart Ehrman.

[N.B. The TIME piece was a debate about God. But, for the record, ID as a scientific theory cannot identify the God of the Bible or any other as the designer. ID studies natural objects and tries to identify patterns in nature which are likely the product of an intelligent cause rather than an undirected cause like natural selection. -Logan]

Posted by Logan Gage on November 7, 2006 1:24 PM

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Capitalize on this good fortune, one word can bring you round ... changes.

Science is unable to prove or disprove the existence of God. Science is quite capable of describing how the universe works. Religion is not very good at describing how the world works as the writers of religious texts did not have the skill or basic knowledge to accurately determine the causes and processes acting in the world around them.

so true, so they made it all up and made a best seller.

always look on the bright side of life

bump!

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Capitalize on this good fortune, one word can bring you round ... changes.

Scientists ONLY



hide it's the men in white coats

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion

Religion and science

Main article: Relationship between religion and science

Religious knowledge, according to religious practitioners, may be gained from religious leaders, sacred texts (scriptures), and/or personal revelation. Some religions view such knowledge as unlimited in scope and suitable to answer any question; others see religious knowledge as playing a more restricted role, often as a complement to knowledge gained through physical observation. Some religious people maintain that religious knowledge obtained in this way is absolute and infallible (religious cosmology). While almost unlimited, this knowledge can be unreliable, since the particulars of religious knowledge vary from religion to religion, from sect to sect, and often from individual to individual.
Early science such as geometry and astronomy was connected to the divine for most medieval scholars. The compass in this 13th Century manuscript is a symbol of God's act of creation.

The scientific method gains knowledge by testing hypotheses to develop theories through elucidation of facts or evalution by experiments and thus only answers cosmological questions about the physical universe. It develops theories of the world which best fit physically observed evidence. All scientific knowledge is probabilistic and subject to later improvement or revision in the face of better evidence. Scientific theories that have an overwhelming preponderance of favorable evidence are often treated as facts (such as the theory of gravity).

Many early scientists held strong religious beliefs (see Scientists of Faith and List of Christian thinkers in science) and strove to reconcile science and religion. Isaac Newton, for example, believed that gravity caused the planets to revolve about the Sun, and credited God with the design. In the concluding General Scholium to the Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica, he wrote: "This most beautiful System of the Sun, Planets and Comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful being." Nevertheless, conflict arose between religious organizations and individuals who propagated scientific theories which were deemed unacceptable by the organizations. The Roman Catholic Church, for example, has historically reserved to itself the right to decide which scientific theories are acceptable and which are unacceptable. In the 17th century, Galileo was tried and forced to recant the heliocentric theory.

Many theories exist as to why religions sometimes seem to conflict with scientific knowledge. In the case of Christianity, a relevant factor may be that it was among Christians that science in the modern sense was developed. Unlike other religious groups, as early as the 17th century the Christian churches had to deal directly with this new way to investigate nature and seek truth. The perceived conflict between science and Christianity may also be partially explained by a literal interpretation of the Bible adhered to by many Christians, both currently and historically. This way to read the sacred texts became especially prevalent after the rise of the Protestant reformation, with its emphasis on the Bible as the only authoritative source concerning the ultimate reality.[11] This view is often shunned by both religious leaders (who regard literally believing it as petty and look for greater meaning instead) and scientists who regard it as an impossibility.

Some Christians have disagreed or are still disagreeing with scientists in areas such as the validity of Keplerian astronomy, the theory of evolution, the method of creation of the universe and the Earth, and the origins of life. On the other hand, scholars such as Stanley Jaki have suggested that Christianity and its particular worldview was a crucial factor for the emergence of modern science. In fact, most today's historians are moving away from the view of the relationship between Christianity and science as one of "conflict", a perspective commonly called the conflict thesis (or the Draper-White thesis). Gary Ferngren in his historical volume about Science & Religion states:

While some historians had always regarded the Draper-White thesis as oversimplifying and distorting a complex relationship, in the late twentieth century it underwent a more systematic reevaluation. The result is the growing recognition among historians of science that the relationship of religion and science has been much more positive than is sometimes thought. Although popular images of controversy continue to exemplify the supposed hostility of Christianity to new scientific theories, studies have shown that Christianity has often nurtured and encouraged scientific endeavour, while at other times the two have co-existed without either tension or attempts at harmonization. If Galileo and the Scopes trial come to mind as examples of conflict, they were the exceptions rather than the rule.[12]

In the Bahá'í Faith, the harmony of science and religion is a central tenet.[13] The principle states that that truth is one, and therefore true science and true religion must be in harmony, thus rejecting the view that science and religion are in conflict.[13] `Abdu'l-Bahá, the son of the founder of the religion, asserted that science and religion cannot be opposed because they are aspects of the same truth; he also affirmed that reasoning powers are required to understand the truths of religion and that religious teachings which are at variance with science should not be accepted; he explained that religion has to be reasonable since God endowed humankind with reason so that they can discover truth.[14] Shoghi Effendi, the Guardian of the Bahá'í Faith, described science and religion as "the two most potent forces in human life."[15]

Proponents of Hinduism claim that Hinduism is not afraid of scientific explorations, nor of the technological progress of mankind. According to them, there is a comprehensive scope and opportunity for Hinduism to mold itself according to the demands and aspirations of the modern world; it has the ability to align itself with both science and spiritualism. This religion uses some modern examples to explain its ancient theories and reinforce its own beliefs. For example, some Hindu thinkers have used the terminology of quantum physics to explain some basic concepts of Hinduism such as Maya or the illusory and impermanent nature of our existence.

The philosophical approach known as pragmatism, as propounded by the American philosopher William James, has been used to reconcile scientific with religious knowledge. Pragmatism, simplistically, holds that the truth of a set of beliefs can be indicated by its usefulness in helping people cope with a particular context of life. Thus, the fact that scientific beliefs are useful in predicting observations in the physical world can indicate a certain truth for scientific theories; the fact that religious beliefs can be useful in helping people cope with difficult emotions or moral decisions can indicate a certain truth for those beliefs. (For a similar postmodern view, see grand narrative).

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Capitalize on this good fortune, one word can bring you round ... changes.

Can you say this in English?

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flaming balloons

Was Albert Einstein a Scientist? A "pure scientist" in Chuck's eyes? I think so.

Nope.

He was not a pure scientist iof he 'believed' in any thing at all. He professed to have some 'faith' of some sort. He professed to some sort of creator; that everything was somehow 'god'.

No it isn't 'god'. It's simple matter. That's what it is.

But people have to go around making their tiny little insignificant lives seem much much more important than it is.

What deluded fools hang out here. I had joined hoping I would find loads of like-minded actual uh, scientists.

What a let-down.

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Never Forget a Friend. Or an Enemy.

Your planet is quite strange.
You drink your gods blood and eat his flesh.

On my planet god drinks our blood and eats our flesh.
That's what makes him god.

;-)

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Qunpu' lo'taHmo' jIH yItamQo'

"The Goal of Science is understanding lawful relations among natural phenomena.
Religion is a way of life within a larger framework of meaning."
(Ian Barbour, "Religion and Science," pg. 204)

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LETS BEGIN IN 2010

I like science, as it is trying to understand the understandable

I dislike religion, as this is the lack of understanding of the indeterminate, and this leads to wars over the most trivial issues

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It's good to be back amongst friends and colleagues

"The Goal of Science is understanding lawful relations among natural phenomena.
Religion is a way of life within a larger framework of meaning."
(Ian Barbour, "Religion and Science," pg. 204)

This is a bit why I disfavor Barbour. True, religion in some/ many people's lives serves for a framework of meaning as he puts it. However he intimates there is not a different alternative.

I find that to be irksome.

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Founder of BOINC team Objectivists. Oh the humanity! Rational people crunching data!
I did NOT authorize this belly writing!