there is a god
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- teleos0
So is scientism.
- teleos0
My quote from before, in it's entirety:
"All reasoning presumes premises or intuitions or ultimate convictions that cannot be proved by any foundations or facts more basic than themselves, and hence there are irreducible convictions present wherever one attempts to apply logic to experience. One always operates within boundaries established by one’s first principles, and asks only the questions that those principles permit. . . .
There is, after all, nothing inherently reasonable in the conviction that all of reality is simply an accidental confluence of physical causes, without any transcendent source or end. Materialism is not a fact of experience or a deduction of logic; it is a metaphysical prejudice, nothing more, and one that is arguably more irrational than almost any other. In general, the unalterably convinced materialist is a kind of childishly complacent fundamentalist, so fervently, unreflectively, and rapturously committed to the materialist vision of reality that if he or she should encounter any problem – logical or experiential – that might call its premises into question, or even merely encounter a limit beyond which those premises lose their explanatory power, he or she is simply unable to recognize it. Richard Dawkins is a perfect example; he does not hesitate, for instance, to claim that ‘natural selection is the ultimate explanation for our existence.’ But this is a silly assertion and merely reveals that Dawkins does not understand the words he is using. The question of existence does not concern how it is that the present arrangement of the world came about, from causes already internal to the world, but how it is that anything (including any cause) can exist at all. This question Darwin and Wallace never addressed, nor were ever so hopelessly confused as to think thy had. It is a question that no theoretical or experimental science could ever answer, for it is qualitatively different from the kind of questions that the physical science are competent to address. Even if theoretical physics should one day discover the most basic laws upon which the fabric of space and time is woven, or evolutionary biology the most elementary phylogenic forms of terrestrial life, or paleontology an utterly seamless genealogy of every species, still we shall not have thereby drawn one inch nearer to a solution of the mystery of existence. . . . Even the simplest of things, and even the most basic of principles, must first of all be, and nothing within the universe of contingent things (nor even the universe itself, even if were somehow ‘eternal’) can be intelligibly conceived of as the source of explanation of its own being."
-The Atheist Delusion
- I love delving into epistemology.teleos
- the author of this is imposing a limit on the possible meaning of 'materialism'. Science IS the investigation of materlsm,mikotondria3
- and you DONT really love epistemology, you just think it's cool because it poses unanswerable questions aboutmikotondria3
- reality that you glibly answer with 'god'. That is intellectually bankrupt just like every single other facile pointmikotondria3
- you try to make here. You are a small, lonely little man, clinging wildly to a sinking philosophy, believing you willmikotondria3
- drown if you let go of you ideas of this 'other' in the universe, yet you will onlymikotondria3
- truly know yourself and your place in it once you let go of this childish raft of ideas.mikotondria3
- 7point340
can we all agree that some people who think they know it all need to shut the fuck up?
super.
now who all wants punch and pie?
- CGN0
OMG
- whats coming out of her ass?harlequino
- pixels7point34
- Anal angels?TheBlueOne
- robotron3k0
- please don't violate the sanctity of the tennis thread by invoking it's holiness is this thread abominationTheBlueOne
- yeah! keep the tennis thread pure!!!!
twokids
- TheBlueOne0
WHAT MANNER OF GOD WOULD ALLOW THIS??!!
- BRNK0
Teleos, the epistemological argument you posted simply says "Science can not prove that god doesn't exist, therefor he does." If that isn't a shining example of a "naked" argument, I don't know what is.
Our scientific knowledge is full of holes, true, but only religion is so arrogant as to claim it has the answers without so much as a stitch of evidence FOR it's claims.
Also, you never addressed my concerns about the societal cost of dogmatic ideologies, which is a far more pressing issue than the mental gymnastics of the epistemological proof of god.
- 7point340
so, then nobody wants punch and pie?
- what kind of pie?TheBlueOne
- lemon meringue?7point34
- Hmmm...no thanks.TheBlueOne
- chossy0
That hamster broken leg is so funny ha ha ha cheers blue one :).
- designbot0
"Our scientific knowledge is full of holes, true, but only religion is so arrogant as to claim it has the answers without so much as a stitch of evidence FOR it's claims."
Religion certainly doesn't claim to have all the answers. Speaking from a purely Christian standpoint, I can tell you that there are many unanswered questions. When you make statements like "without so much as a stitch of evidence FOR it's claims" In regards to topics such as the origins of the universe, science does exactly this. There is no real evidence to back up ANY of theories proposed by science on the origins of the universe.
Here is a few theories science has on the origins of the universe (without a shred of evidence to back them up)
"..life could conceivably have been seeded on Earth by an alien intelligence from another planet (Francis Crick and Leslie Orgel suggested something similar -- semi tongue-in-cheek). The conclusion I was heading towards was that, even in the highly unlikely event that some such 'Directed Panspermia' was responsible for designing life on this planet, the alien beings would THEMSELVES have to have evolved, if not by Darwinian selection, by some equivalent 'crane' (to quote Dan Dennett). My point here was that design can never be an ULTIMATE explanation for organized complexity. Even if life on Earth was seeded by intelligent designers on another planet, and even if the alien life form was itself seeded four billion years earlier, the regress must ultimately be terminated (and we have only some 13 billion years to play with because of the finite age of the universe). Organized complexity cannot just spontaneously happen."
-Richard Dawkins
NASA:
"The universe was created sometime between 10 billion and 20 billion years ago from a cosmic explosion that hurled matter and in all directions."
(http://liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/ac...UC Berkeley:
"The big bang theory states that at some time in the distant past there was nothing. A process known as vacuum fluctuation created what astrophysicists call a singularity. From that singularity, which was about the size of a dime, our Universe was born."
(http://cosmology.berkeley.edu/E...University of Michigan:
"About 15 billion years ago a tremendous explosion started the expansion of the universe. This explosion is known as the Big Bang. At the point of this event all of the matter and energy of space was contained at one point. What existed prior to this event is completely unknown and is a matter of pure speculation. This occurrence was not a conventional explosion but rather an event filling all of space with all of the particles of the embryonic universe rushing away from each other."
http://www.umich.edu/~gs265/bigb…)PBS:
There was an "initial explosion" of a "primordial atom which had contained all the matter in the universe."
(http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aso/dat...I think I have proven my point. Science goes to great depths to try and explain the origins of the universe. Instead of being grounded in "facts" they concoct theories that sound more like science fiction/fantasy.
I should note however, that contrary to popular belief there are many scientists who believe in God...it's sad that it is such a stigma in their community. Here's some other quotes from scientists....
red Hoyle (British astrophysicist): "A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature. The numbers one calculates from the facts seem to me so overwhelming as to put this conclusion almost beyond question." (2)
George Ellis (British astrophysicist): "Amazing fine tuning occurs in the laws that make this [complexity] possible. Realization of the complexity of what is accomplished makes it very difficult not to use the word 'miraculous' without taking a stand as to the ontological status of the word." (3)
Paul Davies (British astrophysicist): "There is for me powerful evidence that there is something going on behind it all....It seems as though somebody has fine-tuned nature’s numbers to make the Universe....The impression of design is overwhelming". (4)
Paul Davies: "The laws [of physics] ... seem to be the product of exceedingly ingenious design... The universe must have a purpose". (5)
Alan Sandage (winner of the Crawford prize in astronomy): "I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing." (6)
John O'Keefe (astronomer at NASA): "We are, by astronomical standards, a pampered, cosseted, cherished group of creatures.. .. If the Universe had not been made with the most exacting precision we could never have come into existence. It is my view that these circumstances indicate the universe was created for man to live in." (7)
George Greenstein (astronomer): "As we survey all the evidence, the thought insistently arises that some supernatural agency - or, rather, Agency - must be involved. Is it possible that suddenly, without intending to, we have stumbled upon scientific proof of the existence of a Supreme Being? Was it God who stepped in and so providentially crafted the cosmos for our benefit?" (8)
Arthur Eddington (astrophysicist): "The idea of a universal mind or Logos would be, I think, a fairly plausible inference from the present state of scientific theory." (9)
Arno Penzias (Nobel prize in physics): "Astronomy leads us to a unique event, a universe which was created out of nothing, one with the very delicate balance needed to provide exactly the conditions required to permit life, and one which has an underlying (one might say 'supernatural') plan." (10)
Roger Penrose (mathematician and author): "I would say the universe has a purpose. It's not there just somehow by chance." (11)
Tony Rothman (physicist): "When confronted with the order and beauty of the universe and the strange coincidences of nature, it's very tempting to take the leap of faith from science into religion. I am sure many physicists want to. I only wish they would admit it." (12)
Vera Kistiakowsky (MIT physicist): "The exquisite order displayed by our scientific understanding of the physical world calls for the divine." (13)
Robert Jastrow (self-proclaimed agnostic): "For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries." (14)
Stephen Hawking (British astrophysicist): "Then we shall... be able to take part in the discussion of the question of why it is that we and the universe exist. If we find the answer to that, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason - for then we would know the mind of God." (15)
- teleos0
“For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.”
- Robert Jastrow, Astronomer
- zarkonite0
why can't religion stick to moral issues instead of trying to explain physical phenomenons with magic?
What does religion gain by saying it knows how the universe was created or how our bodies function? does that make you a better moral authority? I sincerely don't get this obsession with being #1 at everything.
- Because essentially religion IS a monstrous claim about the physical universe...mikotondria3
- well, it's also a very profound moral and ethical compass. I think that's how it started really.zarkonite
- mikotondria30
Bullshit, does he - the theologians are sat around the bottom of the mountain, all drawing each other pictures of what is at the top.
"Its a little gift shop", shouts one, holding up a picture of a gift shop, " and if you say it's not, I'll keel you all"..
"No!, the top of the mountain is a paved highway.....look at this ancient clay tablet indicating it is so..."I would laugh in Robert Jastrows face if he said that to me, what a smug self-serving little bit of fake wisdom that is; it boils down to : "Scientists and theologians are both ignorant of some things, but theologians are cleverer".
Again, just bullshit.
- zarkonite0
@Desingbot
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The…
A theory, in the general sense of the word, is an analytic structure designed to explain a set of observations. A theory does two things:
1. it identifies this set of distinct observations as a class of phenomena, and
2. makes assertions about the underlying reality that brings about or affects this class.---
So a theory can be crazy and outlandish, it hasn't been "tested" yet. A theorem is slightly more certain. We are a long way away from facts here... This is what the scientific community in its whole puts forward when it talks about theories for the creation of the universe. No scientist is claiming to know these things for sure because the word theory implies as much in its definition. Organized religion generally makes the argument that there is no doubt that god created the universe, this is what most people find hard to swallow when so many "mistakes" on "facts" have been made over the course of human history by the same group...
- Salarrue0
lets quote the bible ha!
From heaven God shows how angry he is with all the wicked and evil things that sinful people do to crush the truth. 19They know everything that can be known about God, because God has shown it all to them. 20God's eternal power and character cannot be seen. But from the beginning of creation, God has shown what these are like by all he has made. That's why those people don't have any excuse.
They know about God, but they don't honor him or even thank him. Their thoughts are useless, and their stupid minds are in the dark.
They claim to be wise, but they are fools.
They don't worship the glorious and eternal God. Instead, they worship idols that are made to look like humans who cannot live forever, and like birds, animals, and reptiles.
So God let these people go their own way. They did what they wanted to do, and their filthy thoughts made them do shameful things with their bodies. They gave up the truth about God for a lie, and they worshiped God's creation instead of God, who will be praised forever. Amen.
