When it comes to religion, are you a hypocrite?

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten

Why is your faith in science any more justified than my faith in God?

That's a question I've wanted an answer to for years. I hope you wrestle it out of someone.

You haven't looked hard enough then, because the answer is both obvious and has been around for years. Just ask a scientist.

[Az]

RJ is a scientist.

[Ecthy]

*nods*

*nods*

*nods*

[Dauphin]

[Rogan Josh]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
You haven't looked hard enough then, because the answer is both obvious and has been around for years. Just ask a scientist.

Well, since I don't know your 'obvious' answer, perhaps you will enlighten us?

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
You haven't looked hard enough then, because the answer is both obvious and has been around for years. Just ask a scientist.

Isn't talking to yourself one of the first signs of insanity?

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh
Let's assume that a new effect was discovered tomorrow which was inconsistant with modern science, i.e. it can't be expained by our current theories in principle, not just because the maths is too hard. Would you

1. entertain the possibility that it could never be explained by science?

2. be 100% sure that it is, in principle, explainable, ie. that some scientific theory exists that would explain it, even if we do not (or never will) know it?

If you say 1 then you are admitting that there may be things beyond science. So why is it so difficult to entertain the idea that there is a god?

If you say 2 you are displaying a faith in science. We do not know and can never prove that everything in the universe is explainable. Why is your faith in science any more justified than my faith in God?

I believe that there are laws of nature that would could explain the phenomena. As far as I am concerned nature must be able to understand itself. Whether these laws can be explained in a scientific manner, I wouldn't be sure.

* - Laws of Science, with few exceptions, are inaccurate approximations of the truth, and are of limited range of application. If scientific laws are inaccurate then presumably there must be some other laws which are accurate, which are not approximation to the truth but are literally true - these are Laws of Nature.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh
Well, since I don't know your 'obvious' answer, perhaps you will enlighten us?

I gave it my previous post.

DD, what do you mean? I was talking to Drake.

[Gangerolf]

[Rogan Josh]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
I gave it my previous post.

Do you mean this?

To answer Rogan's question, considering that we have literally tens of thousands of historical precedents for things which were previously inexplicable being proven as explicable science, and not a one for something being proven to be the work of a god, then assuming their is a natural explanation for phenomenon is far more rational.

First of all, tens of thousands is a bit much. Secondly, these have almost entirely been discoveries in a rather narrow range of environments. Furthermore, the use of science is not in question here - it is undeniably useful and has proven to be so over the years. I am not attempting to knock science. But, as Big Crunch points out, we are presumably just seeing approximations of some 'theory of everything' and therefore are only testing one aspect of nature. The question is: is this really 'everything'? Is everything describable by 'laws'? If you believe it to be true then you must, like BC, leave behind notions of free-will and sentience.

I personally do not believe this to be the case. I think there will be some part of the universe which is not correctly desribed by the 'theory of everything' and cannot be in principle. In other words I believe there are phenomena were the principle of scientific reproducability breaks down.

By contrast you (and BC) are saying that all experiments are reproducable (in principle if not in practice). This is an assumption. It is an assumption I make in my work every day, and has never been shown to be false, but it is still an assumption. There is absolutely no need nor evidence for this to be true. What is the difference between believing in this and believing that there is an invisible unicorn (of any colour) on the moon?

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Cruddy
That chipamzee could still do it in much less than 3 months, assuming reasonable breaks, at random.

With training - oh, half a day?

But you have to first train the chimp to use a mouse to click on various boxes

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh
Let's assume that a new effect was discovered tomorrow which was inconsistant with modern science, i.e. it can't be expained by our current theories in principle, not just because the maths is too hard. Would you

1. entertain the possibility that it could never be explained by science?

2. be 100% sure that it is, in principle, explainable, ie. that some scientific theory exists that would explain it, even if we do not (or never will) know it?

If you say 1 then you are admitting that there may be things beyond science. So why is it so difficult to entertain the idea that there is a god?

If you say 2 you are displaying a faith in science. We do not know and can never prove that everything in the universe is explainable. Why is your faith in science any more justified than my faith in God?

1. No. Such events occurred more than once in the history of science. Why should we think this one is different?

2. Explain "explainable"

Why is it so difficult to let go of a concept that has utterly no basis in facts? You are a scientist, aren't you?

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh
I personally do not believe this to be the case. I think there will be some part of the universe which is not correctly desribed by the 'theory of everything' and cannot be in principle. In other words I believe there are phenomena were the principle of scientific reproducability breaks down.

By contrast you (and BC) are saying that all experiments are reproducable (in principle if not in practice). This is an assumption. It is an assumption I make in my work every day, and has never been shown to be false, but it is still an assumption. There is absolutely no need nor evidence for this to be true. What is the difference between believing in this and believing that there is an invisible unicorn (of any colour) on the moon?

1) No evidence (or sampling) has been made into the existence of the invisible pink unicorn, whether pro-or anti. We have not attempted to confirm or deny any hypothesis.

2) Evidence (or sampling) has been made into the correctness of scientific laws, phenomena have been explained. We can thus say that we have a degree of confidence, how high is up to your interpretation of the data.


Now compare to someone testing the bias on a coin.

1) Person one does not toss their coin at all, and so is completely unsure if it has any biases.

2) Person two tosses their coin several times, and on each occasion it comes up heads.

Based on these facts who has the more acceptable claim that their coin is a two-headed coin, or biased? Clearly person 2). Of course this does not mean that its the case, just that one claim is more believable than the other.