galiel

Precisely. Science is not about "proof" nor about absolute "Truths" [tm]
Science is the most consistently and universally applicable tool we have devised to develop useful models of the empirical world. It is not just another religion with a different god. The process by which science evolves is diametrically opposed to the way religion is created. Your fundamental confusion about this fact leads you to repeat misstatements about the nature of scientific inquiry and the value it provides to our world understanding and to our ability to better humanity.

Similarly, skepticism is a process, not an end, or a dogma. It is a tool applied to help avoid Type I statistical errors (i.e., believing in things that aren't true). The way people intuitively evaluate the utility of something is by witnessing the results. For example, if someone tells you that he has developed a new invisible parachute that allows you to jump from a tall building, and he cannot demonstrate that it works, I doubt you will take a 'leap of faith' off the roof of that building, no matter how impressive his credentials and no matter how many people have read his book. Similarly, I am sure that you don't try to will the lights to come on when it gets dark, you know by experience that when you flick the lightswitch, the light will come on. If it doesn't you will not suspect divine intervention, because experience, either direct or vicarious (learned), has taught you that the problem must be a gap in the electric circuit. You then you a logical process of elimination to determine the cause: the light bulb, the plug is still in the wall, the circuit breaker, etc. If none of these work, and you notice that all the other lights in your neighborhood are also out, you will deduce a local popwer outage.

All these are illustrations of common sense scientific empiricism at work. Even the most ardent of zealous fundamentalists applies these tools every day. Can you PROVE, definitively, that each past, current and future instance of your lights going out will be caused by a break in an electrical circuit as opposed to, say, an evil pet kitten applying its mind-rays to bend light back on itself? No, you cannot PROVE that. However, the level of probability is so low, due mainly to the lack of supporting evidence or historical documentation, that you don't consider your "belief" in electrical circuitry to be worthy of questioning much.

The same is true of religious belief, if believers did not choose to park reason and logic and life experience at the door, as they have been so strongly conditioned to do by the overwhelming mass of conditioning imposed by their belief system, their religious hierarchy, and their theistic peers. The probability of a "god" existing is so low as to be unworthy of constant review, if one applies the same rational metric that one applies when looking both ways before and keeping ones eyes open when crossing a street.

Being a true atheist is the antithesis of blind faith.

nXile

Sometimes it's hard for me to figure out the difference between pointless bickering and pointful bickering...

Maybe the argument is that we ALL have faith:

Some of us have faith that it is up to us to prove there is a god (the scientist, maybe?).

Some of us have faith that it is up to God to prove himself to us (the non-seeking skeptic, maybe?).

Some us have faith that proof is not needed (the mindless religious, maybe?).

And thus all of us find ourselves on paths that trace back to one of these three areas of "faith."

Have I over-simplified? There doesn't seem to be much of an argument though...

nXi|e

rdalin

Others have dealt with the most of the points you made in your post, but I felt that this particular one should be specifically answered.

You apparently feel that this is a reason why science is not to be trusted. From my standpoint, however, it's a perfect illustration of why science can be used to explain the universe, and religion can't.

Scientists, being human, make mistakes. Many scientists have dismissed things that later turned out to be true. When presented with evidence, however, they changed their minds. That's the way science works. Its practitioners are fallible and imperfect, but as a rule they'll abandon their fondest beliefs if there is good evidence to the contrary.

Your paragraph proves exactly the opposite of what you were trying to demonstrate.

galiel

I should clarify that by "true atheist" I do not mean "true" in the sense of adhering to some dogma, or in the sense that all ahteists think alike or follow some "atheistic bible". I mean "true" in the sense that one has arrived at one's atheism through a process of freethought--that is, through the application of standard methods of scientific inquiry and critical thinking to the question "is there a god?"

Philosoft

Why on earth would you use the word "faith" to describe any of the above positions?

I have "faith" that the burden of proof is on the positive claimant? Bizarre. <img src="confused.gif" border="0">

Jayhawker Soule

You cannot rationally dispute the Faerie Kingdom or little green men, you are "agnostic-atheist" with regards to Vishnu, and you "lean more to the Judeo-Christian-Islamic God". I'm curious as to your method. Why do you not 'lean more to' Vishnu and the Faerie Kingdom, while maintaining an "agnostic-atheist" stance toward your Judeo-Christian-Islamic God construct?

gcomeau

Since the points regarding what actually constitute atheism have been dealt with in the other replies and it has been pretty well established that almost nobody says "I know 100% for a fact that there are no gods" I'll just comment on this:

I believe you're missing the point. Such statements are made to call attention to a common flaw in ID thinking. To briefly summarize it, ID folks commonly make statements such as: "If variable X was different by only amount Y then life as we know it would not exist! The odds of variable X being EXACTLY that vakue is so minute that it MUST have been designed that way!"

The "life as we know it" part is especially important. Hopefully you see the problem already, but just in case:

"If Hole_In_The_Ground X was just slightly different in shape then Puddle Y as we know it would not be able to exist! The odds of Hole_In_The_Ground X being EXACTLY the shape that it is is so minute that it MUST have been designed that way just so Puddle Y could exist!!!"

Anyone who doesn't see the problem with the concept after that may just be beyond hope.

And as for the universe being "intentionally designed as it is"... what exactly would you propose it was designed for? To provide lots and lots of near-vacuum?

Design implies purpose. That purpose should be evident in the design. What purpose does effectively limitless empty space serve?

If it was truly like the Parthenon, it would also show clear evidence of being worked. To return to the watch as an example, we know of no natural processes which precision machine metal components and then assemble them together. We also know that people (such as ourselves) DO perform such tasks... so when offered the choice between which of the two is responsible...

Neither the Parthenon nor the watch is at all analogous to a universe.

Because the determination of design isn't based on complexity in the frst place. Trying to make it based on complexity leads you straight into a questionm begging argument when you deny a designer for the incredibly complex God.

Yes, and no, respectively.

Ask any scientist and they'll tell you... NO. It's a guiding principle. Parsemony is a valuable tool but it isn't some kind of law.

I suggest you don't ever say that to a scientist, you'll likely get a rather lengthy lecture. I've witnessed many of them.

"Theory" means an entirely different thing in a scientific context than it does in general usage. "Theory" is science's highest accolade... you can't just go around calling any old hypothesis a "Theory".

And the reason that happens is because scientists spend massive amounts of time trying their very best to overturn a theory and disprove a hypothesis. If they can't survive testing and scrutiny they're relegated to the trashbin.

Theories are explanations. As such, they must have explanatory power. "God of the gaps" on the other hand explains nothing. It is simnply the result of running out to the current frontiers of scientific understanding, taking one step further, and declaring "here dwells God!".

God changes residences a lot...

And they actually do. Isn't that amazing!?!? When the evidence comes in and they are proven wrong they recant and move on. That's part of how science works.

Take a peek in at the Creation/Evolution exchanges and see how much of that is happening in the "God of the Gaps" camp. They're still making arguments that were refuted decades ago.

Proof is for math. Science deals with evidence.

I suggest that before you go on about how the ToE isn't 'proven' you find me a scientific theory that is. Failing that (which you will), find one with more supporting evidence. You probably think that's a simple matter... if so, you're in for a surprise. Before you respond I suggest you look into just how many diverse fields of study converge in modern evolutionary theory... all of them supporting it.

This hypothetical scientist, being aware of the existence of beavers and ducks, undoubtedly has their fossils as well... and dating them would find that all three species lived at the same time and thus likely shared a [/i]common ancestor[/i] rather than one evolving into the other. Your statement is all too like when the creationists try to claim that evolution says monkeys evolved into men.

-Grant

[ December 12, 2002: Message edited by: gcomeau ]</p>

Mooman_FL

ShadowyMan: Good point. And I agree that saying that it isn't quantifiable is simply based on technology currently present. The true answer as to whether it exist however isn't answerable now nor may it ever be. We just don't know... keep searching for the answer by all means

Biff the unclean: Wow... such hostility! Calm down a second and look at my arguments and avoid what I cautioned against was reducing my concepts to individual lines and trying to logic them to death... which you did poorly and with more dogma that you would care to admit.

I will take your first several arguments together since they were in response to a larger concept I already addressed with only one set apart from the others as a new issue:

I simply included the entire reference as found rather than be accused of chopping and selecting my reference. In no other part of my post do I say that I believe atheism to be immoral. Do not misquote me or project intentions on me. Ignorance does not equate to immorality (in response to your last statement in that section). I can freely admit that there are many things of which I am ignorant. I only take exception to those that can't do the same.

That being said on to the reply to your arguments:

My argument for irrationality of the denial of the existance of God (or angels little green men) stands. This one was an argument based on logic. Therefore combat it with logic not just the belief that we are probably wrong. Read my entire argument on the subject and address that.

As implicitly stated I do not say these things to convince. I find it unfortunate that you take it this way. I freely admit that there can be flaws in my logic or thinking but I have yet to see you argue it logically. If you want to dismiss my ideas out of belief that they are wrong then that is your perogative but it misses the point of the discussion as stated. Also see above discussion with ShadowyMan on the point I made here.

Not at all. Although I will admit that I maybe mistated myself... it is the technology that may be lacking not the method itself. You are assuming that your test can quantify everything which I have already addressed. Per my earlier argument this is an irrational standpoint and have even seen many of the atheist on this board admit that God (or a soul or little green men)could exist, but that they just don't consider it likely. This is more an issue then of personal believe and as such until evidence is supplied to everyones satisfaction one way or the other is moot. The question I proposed is whether this is a valid viewpoint of logic.

The fact that science has been wrong on many things is a matter of fact and history. This again is not to say that it is worthless... just a work in progress. Good examples were given (rhinoceros, and shark-attacks, also not mentioned was Newtonian physics). There are more examples of science having to revise it's thinking than I can recount here. I will let the evidence on that one stand as is.

You are once again ignoring the entire argument to nit-pick a point. Yes, it shows signs of being an artifact. I do not dispute that. You are discounting the "million monkeys" argument that reduces that assumption to a statistical probability and not pure fact. Whether the assumption is reasonable is not the point. Most would argue that the idea of a god is not reasonable, however possible it might be.

True, the teller can not support it with proof. Neither did the early explorers of africa supply proof of the rhinoceros. That didn't negate its existance. In either argument the question is can we discount something because we don't have personal proof. The explorers had personal proof and the people that scoffed at them didn't. Most theist that believe would claim some sort of personal proof. Whether it exist or not isn't the point of the argument so much as is the possibility and what that possibility means. Either way the proof for and against are equally unproved to the masses leaving the debate open which was addressed in my assessment of Occam's Razor.

The idea doesn't present the problem that what we know is wrong. It presents the idea that what we thinkmay be wrong. The fact that science constantly changes and evolves its views is indicative of the process. (see above examples) If you look at a stage from the auditorium all you see is the props, lights, curtains, actors, seats, audience, etc. That doesn't mean that is all there is to the theater. There is much more "backstage". Why can this not be the case here? I am only suggestion the concept of possibility not the proof of existance as I implicitly stated.

Whether or not a given answer is complex or not depends largely on how much your current views are questioned by the answer given. Changing your entirepoint of view is complex. But then if you have to do that then maybe you have the wrong view. Either way I ask you to change nothing, only to consider and think. If that process of self-discovery leads to a change that is your personal business and none of mine.

First of all let me state that biological evolution is far from being law. If it was declared so then I missed the paper providing incontrovertable proof. A much higher degree of proof is needed. It is taught in some schools as fact (erroneously) and in some as one of the possibilities. I only have to accept it as fact if I accept your view of "how it all works". On this I will simply say that the jury is still out since science has not stopped evolving itself. I agree that there are some truth evident so far in the theory, but that it is far from being complete. An actual provable example would be nice.

Which brings up the interesting point that there seems to be a double-standard on both sides of the argument. You want someone to accept as fact something that you can't prove (and a possiblity is far from being proof). On the other hand you condemn those that do the same thing. As such I have limited my argument to proving possibilities rather than fact. It is the possibilities that keep us thinking and moving forward.

For the GoG argument I have to disagree with you. itis true that science says "I don't know, let me see by looking." But the idea of where to look comes from leaps and intuition. We are given a model or hypothesis and then that hypothesis is supported or not based on what we find. It then moves to theory and the process continues. If it last it is made a Law of Nature. All of which have been known to have been changed at one time or another due to new data.

As I stated early man may have done the same thing, but they were limited on the data they could apply to the situation. The difference being that one is based on something you can quantify and the other might not be. The only thing I will add to this is my earlier statement that many theist will claim personal proof, but that would hardly satisfy science since each instance of proof has to be verifiable by all beyond reproach.
I nevered claimed that theism
was science. That is obviously not the case.

Again I will state in closing that I do not mean to be argumentative and I am not trying to convert. If you take it as such you are missing my point and I apologize for the inconvience you found. But I don't apologize for my views however if you can rationally refute my arguments to the existance of a possibility I will listen.

nXile

Philosoft,
I would ask the same question:
why would someone use the word "proof" or any derivitave of the word to describe God's existence? Who are YOU (singular second person, not Philosoft personally) to PROVE God's existence?

How arrogant is that (apparently I come from the mindless religious grouping)?

However, I'm not here to make pointless bickering, but pointful bickering....so...
I'm sorry my word choice of "faith" is a barrier to clear understanding. I am coming from a space where "faith" means "active being."

Thus using Philosoph's example:
"I have "active being" that the burden of proof is on the positive claimant"

in other words

"I live in a way that the burden of proof is on the positive claimant."

Words are blunt tools and I am a clumsy wielder. My apologies and I hope this helps clarify.

nXi|e

Mooman_FL

Heehee... I am quickly getting overwhelmed by the number of responses. And I see some valid points being made... and some that are flawed.

Just so you know I did not miss the point of Hawkings statement, but I have also seen it used to try and counter ID philosophy. That is an imperfect use at best. I am not saying that ID philosophy has the answer per se, simply a possibility.

As for the purpose of the design... well that is open to speculation but I do not agree that the design has to reflect a clear purpose. Look at most abstract art. What was the clear "observable without speculation" purpose? We don't know. You will have to ask the artist.