hey athiests! i'm chatting with a person from liberty university on yahoo

[Sava]

yes, science is one of the many tools of the devil...

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Lincoln
Finagle’s Rules:
3. Draw your curves, then plot your data.

Well, Duh.
The very core of scientific method is to think of a theory first, ad to confront the facts to see if the theory is true or not.

Murphy’s Law of Research:
Enough research will tend to support your theory.

Wrong. When empirical data doesn't support the theory, the theory is considered falsified. Its author has either to drop it, to change it according to the new findings, or to turn it from an absolute law to a quasi-law (i.e instead of saying "a --> b", he has to say "a --> greater likeliness of B to happen")

Corollaries:
1. The bigger the theory, the better.

Of course. A theory is more likely to be true if it has precise conditions, which eat much paper. For example, a theory stating "if you drop an object, it falls" is easily falsifiable because it isn't precise enough. For example, it is false when the object is already on the ground when you "drop" it, it is wrong in non-gravity circumstances etc.

Eddington’s Theory:
The number of different hypotheses erected to explain a given biological phenomenon is inversely proportional to the available knowledge.

Duh again.
When knowledge progresses, wrong theories get discarded, this is obvious. Until knowledge is reached, scientists do try-and-fail with their thoeries, until they find out.

Thumb’s Second Postulate:
An easily-understood, workable falsehood is more useful than a complex, incomprehensible truth.

The endeavour of science is to model the complex reality into something fathomable. That's why we have measuring tools, that's why we have models etc. They are not the "truth", but they are our description of "truth" so that we can understand it.

Ruckert’s Law:
There is nothing so small that it can’t be blown out of proportion

I'll keep that in mind when Rumsfeld will discover the HUGEOMGOMG piles of Saddam's WMD

Hawkins’ Theory of Progress:
Progress does not consist in replacing a theory that is wrong with one that is right. It consists in replacing a theory that is wrong with one that is more subtly wrong.

Absolutely. Since we can't grasp the too-complex "truth", we need the subtlest simplifications of it, as they'll be closest to the "truth"

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh


Yes, he is, but then you are a fvcking Christophobic lunitic.

Even if this was an obvious troll/joke, it was still tasteless.

[Lincoln]

The rules were a joke Spiffor...

[Lincoln]

I like Ruckert's law:


"There is nothing so small that it can’t be blown out of proportion "

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Lincoln
The rules were a joke Spiffor...

Yep, but many of these jokes reflect the reality of scientific mehtod.

And I looooooove Ruckert's law too. It simply rules, and applies to so many of the topics we're discussing here

[Lincoln]

Yea, we do have a tendency to follow Ruckert's law here.

[Starchild]

Everytime Lincoln posts that essay of his I just gotta dig out my own response I wrote years back. It's especially cool when Che replies with a big thumbs up. That makes my heart will with light and sugar.

Meditations from the Crystal Garden
Written : Sometime ago. 1999?

Now, this is not meant to be a direct attack against anyone or their beliefs, but the exploration of a thought that's been dawning on me for the past few hours.
I read Lincoln's THE EVANGELICAL ATHEIST last night, the second time I'd seen and read it since it was first posted. Like the first time I read it, it rubbed me the wrong way but I couldn't put my finger on how or why it did. I left the thread to find something else to read, as I'm too much of a moderate, worship-whatever-you-please atheist to stomach the "holier than thou/we're right your wrong" attitude displayed by both sides on occassion.

It was a pity that Lincoln's essay got cut off, as it's a good piece of writing. Especially the idea of an all consuming pursuit and worship of nothingness. That complete devotion to oblivion stuck in my mind.

Anyway, I'm wandering a bit. After I had exited the thread, my best friend came on ICQ and we started talking. The conversation turned into a debate about religion, one of the few areas were our opinions differ. I was arguing on behalf of science while he took the side of religion and God. Around midnight, the debate focused on the beauty of a poem. "How does science explain the beauty in a poem?" he asked. As I admitted, it could not. Science is amoral, able to tell us the most likely reason why something is the way it is, but cannot tell us if that thing is good or bad, beautiful or ugly. There was a glaring void, where science could not tread. "That," he said, "Is where God is."

I kept asking him though, "Why must God be there?" I was not happy with a void being there, but I could live with an unfilled vacuum. Alas, it got too late for us to continue and he logged off, followed by myself. As I drifted off to sleep, the void filled itself for me.

Lincoln's Ungod is a void. A vast expanse of nothingness. However, I know that I personally do not devote my time to the pursuit of nothing. Science cannot explain beauty or art or kindness. It can offer reasons for those things, but it can't explain them fully. There are places where science stumbles, falters, and has to admit it's shortcomings. In those places, my friend saw God. I realized I saw something else. I saw humanity.

Atheism, to me at least, is not about the pursuit of nothingness and extending the void. It is about people, all six billion of them crowded onto this world. With no God or gods, it falls down to us to strive to be better than what we currently are. I have to believe, if that is the right word to use, that the vast majority are honestly and truly good inside. That our species is nobler and kinder than we seem to be.

We are a flawed species, with half a dozen wars for each peace treaty and the cries of the innocent for each symphony. We have many, many shortcomings that are our responsibility. We are to blame for every atrocity, every injustice.

Yet this also means that every achievement, every thing of beauty that we've ever made, is our's and our's alone.

So thank you Lincoln, for your part in helping further my personal belief system.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
are you going to provide any counter arguments?

Counter arguments to what?

I have already put forth a specific example of what could be repeatable and consistent, yet cannot be considered as natural.

Originally posted by Jon Miller
I see no reason why this would not continue to be the case.

So are you arguing that everything will eventually be part of nature, thus they can all be known?

[Urban Ranger]

@ Starchild

I agree that atheism is about growing up, about getting rid of a crutch and to stand on one's own.

[Rogan Josh]

Originally posted by Starchild
Atheism, to me at least, is not about the pursuit of nothingness and extending the void. It is about people, all six billion of them crowded onto this world. With no God or gods, it falls down to us to strive to be better than what we currently are. I have to believe, if that is the right word to use, that the vast majority are honestly and truly good inside. That our species is nobler and kinder than we seem to be.

That is interesting because Christianity is almost directly opposite in viewpoint - that we are all flawed.

Do you honestly believe that the vast majority of huminity are 'good' inside? I don't I think most people are pretty much out for themselves.

I also suspect your idea of 'good' is quite west-orientated. I still don't understand how an atheist defines 'good'.

[Japher]

I have to believe, if that is the right word to use, that the vast majority are honestly and truly good inside. That our species is nobler and kinder than we seem to be.

That's Ja Mon

[Starchild]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh
I still don't understand how an atheist defines 'good'.

How about "Do to others what you'd have others to do you"? Or be a nice, happy person that cares about other people? Try to leave this world better than when you entered it? Do the least harm possible?

How does a religious person define good? It's Plato all over again. Is something morally right because God says so or do morals (goodness) exist independent of God? If it's the first, then the religious definition of good is baseless and down to the whim of God, which removes moral authority. If it's the second, then God isn't the source of morals and athiests are just as free to call upon that independent moral (good) guide as believers are.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
@ Starchild

I agree that atheism is about growing up, about getting rid of a crutch and to stand on one's own.

Right -- your claim that all religious people are childish is like, soooooooo intelligent and insightful.

[Japher]

How does a religious person define good?

As I see it; whatever the Pope says goes... Goes against idol worship and many of laws about false deities, but hey, who cares... Lets just pray to Marry, say that Jesus is God, and forget all the blasphamy...