The only thing science needs to win the debate

[Voodoo Child]

The only thing science really needs to prove in order to win the debate over religion is show that the foundation of all true knowledge is material, empirical, and quantifiable

It occurs to me that science only conflicts with religion when religion makes statements that can be tested or investigated scientifically. All science would have to do to win this debate is show that empirical knowledge of the world is best determined by naturalistic investigation.

 

[Voodoo Child]

We have an illusion of unlimited information and accessibility, yet it has desensitized us to such a degree that we can't recognize any truth anymore. We are, truly, caught in the Matrix. Have you ever wondered why the movie had so many Christian imagery? How was Neo resurrected from death? By Trinity's love.

Can't lose something you never had. Neo didn't lose the truth, he found out that he never had it. The real question is whether Zion is real or whether the Matrix is actually real.

 

[TheVisitor]

The real question is whether Zion is real or whether the Matrix is actually real.

===============

Zion is real......It is the Bride of Christ.
The many membered body of believers that make up His elect.
They are "the city".
Christ dwells there with them on the throne of their hearts.
The kingdom of heaven is in you.

 

[Mystech]

Originally posted by Jenyar


You say: at least I do not propose to have all the answers. Why has ignorance such a precious commodity? You don't propose to have any answers because you are growing up in a post-modern, relativistic society where it is simply non-PC to claim anything. I call it the 'counter-enlightenment': What we have gained through reason, we are losing by reason.

Jenyar, what exactly do you hope to accomplish with this? You'er barking up the wrong tree. I know exactly what sort of mentality you're trying to describe her, as Ayn rand put it those who claim that man can not have knowledge, while at the same time completely ignorant of the fact that they have just professed knowledge. This is not at all what James R is doing, though.

He is saying that for something to be known we have to have enough evidence to draw a conclusion on it. On matters such as the begining of the universe, guess what, there just isn't enough evidence of anything that we can yet measure or observe which can possably lead us to any sort of relyable conclusion. There is a lot of wisdom in being able to say that you just don't have enough information to make a judgement. Man CAN know anything if he has enough information to work with, because all events have causes and all causes have effects, and all are observable in one way or another, as such we can conseiveably know anything so long as we can find out it's cause, or observe enough about the effect. Without either of those things we just have to throw up our arms and, for the time being, say that we don't know, and that's all James R is doing.

If you think that mankind should, for some reason, have the answer to every single question in existance right now at this very moment, then you're going to be pretty dissapointed, the world is a big and complicated place, and though we're doing a pretty good job of it, we still have a lot of learning to do.

 

[Mystech]

Originally posted by Jenyar
God is the elusive knowledge. Why does all wisdom come from God? Because only He "knows". What we know is what we see and experience. The first Christians saw and experienced the fulfilment of Jewish scripture and the resurrection of Jesus. That has become my history and my future. Instead of "not yet", all I can say is "already". It has already been made known, and therefore I know. The only "not yet" is what has not yet happened, not what I do not yet know.

This is belief without knowledge, a condition known as faith. It's a disease of the mind, but it's treatable, all you have to do is understand critical thinking, and understand how man gains knowledge. I'll give you a hit, it's not through god, and even the most dementedly religious devout will have to admit that if he has any hold left on his sanity.

 

[Jenyar]

Mystech - let me correct you: faith is belief based on knowledge that you reject. Subtle difference.

I know how people gain knowledge. I have seen my share of children growing up. And I have seen a kid learn more about life from Faerie Tales and mythology than from test tubes. Does that make the knowledge they gained unsubstantiated dribble? What if they start to apply it - hard work, honesty, trustworthiness, love. Useless knowledge, is it?

Yes, you don't need the Bible or any religion to teach you those ethics. Which just shows you how valid they are.

A child who knows what love is, IMO, is far wiser - and sane - than a brilliant critical mind who doesn't.

 

[TheVisitor]

Well said Jenyar.
I agree

 

[Bridge]

we have observed substantial evidence for blackholes. I didn't say we had to observe anything directly.

That's the approach many of us theists use. We haven't seen God directly but we have observed substantial evidence for Him.

 

[boygenius]

Originally posted by Cris
Boygenius,

Why?


Are you sure? Could an ancient caveman conceive the idea of a modern computer and then create it? People work with things they know and can manipulate and then transform them very slightly into improvements or something else. People aren’t creators they are catalysts causing existing objects to combine, interact and evolve. People are just a part of nature as everything else. We just happen to interact with the rest of nature by using our intelligence.

Computers would not be quite advanced as they are today if rather than having people create them, they just didn't exist until all the wires just happen to fall into the right order. Your comparison of animals getting new systems and organs without an intelligence behind it to the growth of computers, who have intelligent creators, is illogical. And no, people a few thousand years ago could not think of the ideas necessary for a modern computer. And did they have modern computers back then? No. Computers begin and 'evolve' because there are people making them and thinking of new ideas. Why should we believe that animals just randomly suddenly have a new bodily system or organ, rather than something set them up this way? Computers only 'evolve' because there are people that think of new ideas for them and create them. Even computers weren't around until someone thought of them and made them.



The Christian story is that God created us intact as we are now. I believe there is no precedent for anything completely new and complex ever having been designed and created. Everything we know and experience are the result of a long preceding set of adaptations, improvements, and adjustments.

Sounds to me like you start off with the assumption that the universe came from absolutely nothing, but it is possible for things to 'slightly evolve.' What would be more unbelievable: someone telling you they walked into a room and found a computer, or someone telling you they walked into a room, and a piece of the ceiling fell off, and part of the table cracked off, and the wind blew, and it happened to make a computer?

 

[Mystech]

Originally posted by Jenyar
Mystech - let me correct you: faith is belief based on knowledge that you reject.

Just so we're on the same page, what knowledge would that be, exactly? If you're talking about anything in the bible, you sure as hell can't KNOW that anything in there is true, and though certain locations and people may have existed, there's not a damned scrap of evidence that any of the events happend even remotely as described, and in fact there is good evidence wich runs quite to the contrary.

 

[Raithere]

Originally posted by Jenyar
Those were rhethorical questions demonstrating the fallacy of asking science questions. If it were ever possible to answer a rhethorical question, you did: that is the realm of philosophy (which is what we're doing here - we're philosophizing about science).

As I attempted to point out; it depends on the questions you're asking. Science is the best system we have for answering certain types of questions. For other questions, such as ethical values, science does not provide answers (although sometimes the knowledge it can provide can be a useful part of answering those questions).

Is my computer the product of science? No. It is the product of (very rich) people who applied what we learned from science. I did not see science get out of bed at 5am to drive to the factory. Science is observation and implementation - a tool.

It depends upon how you view it. Strictly speaking, you are correct. Science manufactures no products except data and knowledge. However, without science technology would not exist, therefore things like your computer, your car, and the factory are the indirect products of science.

God is concerned with our lives as people, not our enterprises and advances in science. Let me put it another way: Trying to prove God from the perspective of empirical science alone, is like trying to hit Him while swinging a stick with your eyes closed, and then saying that He does not exist because you struck only air.

It depends upon how God works. If God works through randomly distributed miracles or only through influencing people's actions, you are right; science will never be able to 'detect' him. However, if as some suggest, God's actions have reliable and measurable effect upon people or things then it should be quite easy to demonstrate a statistical effect. Thus far, the results are negative.

~Raithere

 

[one_raven]

Originally posted by Jenyar
I know how people gain knowledge. I have seen my share of children growing up. And I have seen a kid learn more about life from Faerie Tales and mythology than from test tubes. Does that make the knowledge they gained unsubstantiated dribble? What if they start to apply it - hard work, honesty, trustworthiness, love. Useless knowledge, is it?

Yes, you don't need the Bible or any religion to teach you those ethics. Which just shows you how valid they are.

Useless? No. Not at all.
But it IS "Faerie Tales and mythology".

So, what your logic implies is that the Bible is not more factual or important than a children's Faerie Tale.
I agree 100%!!

Originally posted by Jenyar
A child who knows what love is, IMO, is far wiser - and sane - than a brilliant critical mind who doesn't.

Who is arguing that?
Have that child design the computer you are sitting in front of, however.
The Bible is just as valid as the next collection of parables designed to teach philosophy.
And just like all other colletcions of parables, it is not based on fact intended to spread "knowledge" but it is based in ideas intended to spread "wisdom".

There IS a difference between knowledge and wisdom.
Do you agree?

Without wisdom, knowledge is worthless at best and destructive at worst.
Without knowledge, however, wisdom is worthless at best and destructive at worst.
The Bible (just as all other books of the type) does not share knowledge, rather wisdom.

Science, is the source of ALL knowledge.
The Bible is one source of wisdom.

Wisdom, by the way, is entirely subjective.
What you see as wise, I may see as naive and vice versa, and NO ONE can prove either standpoint using science.
Knowledge is objective.
Either it is true, or it is not.

Originally posted by Bridge
That's the approach many of us theists use. We haven't seen God directly but we have observed substantial evidence for Him.

For example?

 

[Bridge]

one_raven

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by Bridge
That's the approach many of us theists use. We haven't seen God directly but we have observed substantial evidence for Him.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



For example?

The fine tuning in the universe.

In his book, The Cosmic Blueprint, Professor Paul Davies argues that:

This "...is to me powerful evidence that there is 'something going on' behind it all. The impression of design is overwhelming." [p. 203]
Emeritus professor, Jay Roth says:

It is "the piling of coincidence on coincidence, everyone of which is vitally necessary for the development of a stable star with a planet that can support life. These physical properties of the universe lead me to favor a Designer or Creator..." [Cosmos..., p. 198]
Astronomer George Greenstein inquires:

"As we survey all the evidence, the thought insistently arises that some supernatural ...Agency must be involved. Is it possible that... we have stumbled upon scientific proof of the existence of a Supreme Being? Was it God who... crafted the universe...?" [The Symbiotic Universe, p. 27]
Cosmologist Edward Harrison concludes:

"Here is the ... proof of the existence of God... The fine-tuning of the universe provides prima facie evidence of [God's] design..."
After reviewing Ross' book, The Creator and the Cosmos, Dr. Kyle M. Cudworth of Yerkes Observatory, University of Chicago writes:

"Current research clearly indicates the universe was created with many characteristics fine-tuned for our life. ... the Creator implied by the scientific evidence is exactly consistent with the God revealed in the Bible."

 

[Voodoo Child]

Holy shit! My hand is the same shape as this glove. My hand must have been designed for it. This is freakin' me out... omigod.. omigod.. omigod...