How can you have evidence for God?

AZBlogger said:
Here is an interesting excerpt from a New York Time article about scientists and their belief in God.

According to a much-discussed survey reported in the journal Nature in 1997, 40 percent of biologists, physicists and mathematicians said they believed in God - and not just a nonspecific transcendental presence but, as the survey put it, a God to whom one may pray "in expectation of receiving an answer."


The link to this article is:
nytimes.com/2005/08/23/national/23believers.html?pagewanted=print

Some scientists have found that the universe is too complicated and sophistacated to be an accident. The more they probe for scientific answers the more they are overwhelmed by the impossiblitiy of it all. Science is great at providing reasons for why things work, but it falls short in the area of creation.
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Scientists can also be ideological and cheat on their wives, it doesn't mean they always know what's right. The universe does not look like it was made to accommodate the human species, the fine tuning argument has serious flaws. Science doesn't have nothing to say about the origins of the universe. It sure as hell has more interesting and accurate things to say about it than a bunch of pious desert dwelling wanna be holy men.
 
Crunchy Cat said:
How 'we' can exist? An adequate planet (Earth), adequate energy (our sun), and the laws of physics result in difference detection machines that collect energy to persist (i.e. all life on Earth).



It's not that ellaborate. I'll try and make it simpler so the point isn't lost. Various models of the universe show it being a structure in parent environment. The parent has resources for causing, reclaiming, or modifying universes. Much like conservation of energy in our universe the same would apply to the parent. Our universe' energy would be a transference from the parent.

Now naturally you are going to ask about the parent (where did it come from)? The question simply might not apply (I'll explain more below).


I am communicating what various models predict... not necessarily facts. A topmost parent (aka: reality) is not beyond the laws of physics. It IS the laws of physics. It doesn't begin, it doesn't end, it's not a cause, and it's not an effect. It simply "is". From a human perspecitve, that's a really difficult concept but it becomes easier to understand with a simple question:

-->Does "nothing" (as in the absence of everything / anything) exist?

Can you point out a single instance of nothing? Can anyone? The answer of course "no"; therefore, "something" always exists.



Reality is alot of things but simple is not one of them. We can track a causal chain but eventually the question "how did it start" no longer makes sense.



A static reality isn't a life form and we can observe pieces of it, make predictions about it, and test predictions for validity (that makes things very possible). A 'creator' is always claimed to be a sapient omnipotent life form that is non-observable, non-predictable, and non-testable. The reason different words / phrases are used to label them both is because they are very different concepts. Realistically; however, 'creator' is simply an projection of human traits on reality.
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I do believe that reality has always existed. It must be that way or we could not be here. It seems like we are making some of the same points. We differ on fact that reality must fit your definition of a non-sentient object. Just because something is observable doesn't mean there is no conscience invovled. It doesn't mean there is a concsience involved either, but you are telling (correct me if I'm wrong) that this "reality" can't be self aware. Why can't it?

If you saw a wooden box sitting in the middle of a field would you assume that it was intelligent design or naturally occurring? You'd probaby say it was too precise to occur naturally so some intellgence must have created it. Consider how much more infinitely complex even the simplest life form is than a wooden box. Why then is it so hard to conceive that we were a design and not an accident? Isn't it at least a possibility?
 
spidergoat said:
Scientists can also be ideological and cheat on their wives, it doesn't mean they always know what's right. The universe does not look like it was made to accommodate the human species, the fine tuning argument has serious flaws. Science doesn't have nothing to say about the origins of the universe. It sure as hell has more interesting and accurate things to say about it than a bunch of pious desert dwelling wanna be holy men.
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You truly are simple minded. Enjoy your prison of ignorance.
 
It's more simple minded to succumb to anthropomorphism and think intelligence is the epitome of the universe's wonders.

If the flesh has come into being because of the spirit, it is a marvel; but if the spirit (has come into being) because of the body, it is a marvel of marvels.​
 
AZBlogger said:
If you saw a wooden box sitting in the middle of a field would you assume that it was intelligent design or naturally occurring? You'd probaby say it was too precise to occur naturally so some intellgence must have created it. Consider how much more infinitely complex even the simplest life form is than a wooden box. Why then is it so hard to conceive that we were a design and not an accident? Isn't it at least a possibility?
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So you are saying that the first cause was something intelligent and sentient?

If so, then you are contradicting yourself by insisting every complex thing must have a designer.
 
spidergoat said:
That's called taking a risk. I agree it can be a successful strategy, and it is employed in science when we make a radical hypothesis, but we do not neglect to test it. That involves experimentation, or in your example, trying an on-line business or cramming for a test. I don't dismiss the God hypothesis because it's radical or risky, but because it fails the test.
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As in school and in business, many fail. Some succeed.


But what exactly do you mean by the "God hypothesis" and what is the test for it?
 
greenberg said:
Sure. But how good is it to live with such an explanation of the cosmos?
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The same way I live with the fact that rainbows are no longer supernatural and explained scientifically.

I can appreciate rainbows just the same after the magical element has been removed.
 
AZBlogger said:
I do believe that reality has always existed. It must be that way or we could not be here.
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Although most models agree, I would suggest following the evidence and not taking a position of firm acceptance in the meantime.

AZBlogger said:
It seems like we are making some of the same points. We differ on fact that reality must fit your definition of a non-sentient object. Just because something is observable doesn't mean there is no conscience invovled. It doesn't mean there is a concsience involved either, but you are telling (correct me if I'm wrong) that this "reality" can't be self aware. Why can't it?
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Reality has cross sections of sapience (ex. humans) and as a whole displays no behaviors that are indicative of sapience. It doesn't learn, it doesn't change it's mind, it doesn't express emotion, it doesn't show interest, it doesn't communicate, etc. In other words it's not sapient because it is observably not so.

AZBlogger said:
If you saw a wooden box sitting in the middle of a field would you assume that it was intelligent design or naturally occurring?
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I would assume it was human-designed.

AZBlogger said:
You'd probaby say it was too precise to occur naturally so some intellgence must have created it.
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No. I know that humans create wooden boxes and no other known processes on earth do.

AZBlogger said:
Consider how much more infinitely complex even the simplest life form is than a wooden box. Why then is it so hard to conceive that we were a design and not an accident? Isn't it at least a possibility?
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We already have strong evidence of how humans became what we are today and it has everything to do with natural processes. It is neither design nor accidental. It's simply the way reality works.

Reality is not human and we can project all the human qualities on that we want and it doesn't change the fact that it does not have those qualities.
 
Crunchy Cat said:
That's a big part of it. Valuing emotional satiation more than truth.
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That is presuming that the person already knows the truth, and that the truth is ugly, too painful to accept, hence they opt for delusion.

Which suggests that the philosophy behind your understanding of the Universe is that the Universe is ultimately a place hostile to humans. That it is impossible to have both truth and happiness.
So when you have to choose between truth and happiness, you choose truth. And you devalue happiness, so that you enable yourself to live with (what you think is) the truth while actually being unhappy.
 
Enmos said:
No.
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Then why did you say that:

No wait.. you say that living in delusion is better than to hold rational explanations, because it makes you happier.
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-?

I didn't say that living in delusion is better than to hold rational explanations, because it makes you happier.

Living in delusion would be better than to hold rational explanations in the case if truth and happiness were mutually exclusive, and one favored happiness over truth.
 
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