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Creation of Universe, Scriptures vs Science

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
Yeah. still, bigotry is bigotry. Maybe you dont know the concept of bigotry. So defend it and show your colours. :)
you-keep-using-that-word-meme.jpg
 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
Yeah, and what makes you believe it is now correct?
"Science" is not a thing, or a list of facts. It is a process.
Things that have been determined by science are often demonstrably correct.
Do you think the phone/computer you are using now was developed and built by guesswork?Do you believe it operates by magic?
As Richard Dawkins said... "Science works...b*tches".

 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
I suggest that it's not my thinking that's hidebound by dogma, it's yours.
I don't need to recruit physics, or logic, or reason to prove to my head what my heart believes with absolute conviction.
Wow. Did you really just write that without any sense of irony?

If the models whereby the universe began, and probably ends, with a singularity are correct, then there certainly was a moment of creation. What else was the Big Bang, if not that?
Your claim is just question begging or rhetorical slight of hand.
Creation requires a creator. There is no evidence for a creator therefore it is wrong to claim that the universe was created.
"A moment of formation" accurately describes the event without shoehorning in the unnecessary idea of god.
 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
No it is not disrespectful, because it is actually the Messengers of God that offer that exact challenge. It is impossible to produce words that will create a new loving humanity that are not given from God.
As you haven't defined what "a new loving humanity" is, we cannot make any predictions in relation to it.
Also, it is just more question begging.

This is what the Word of God Acheives
"The Word of God is the king of words and its pervasive influence is incalculable. It hath ever dominated and will continue to dominate the realm of being. The Great Being saith: The Word is the master key for the whole world, inasmuch as through its potency the doors of the hearts of men, which in reality are the doors of heaven, are unlocked. No sooner had but a glimmer of its effulgent splendour shone forth upon the mirror of love than the blessed word 'I am the Best-Beloved' was reflected therein. It is an ocean inexhaustible in riches, comprehending all things. Every thing which can be perceived is but an emanation therefrom."
This is just more meaningless spiritual platitudes. You are not actually saying anything that provides any information.

However, what is clear is that thus far in human history, the "word of god" has produced as much intolerance, violence and hatred as it has peace, love and understanding.
Your god needs to try much harder if he wants to be taken seriously by rational people.
 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
It’s certainly rhetoric, though perhaps not entirely hollow; Hawking made the point that theoretical science in certain areas had become so esoteric, and the calculus used to support it so complex, that only a handful of specialists were able to follow it in detail. It wasn’t just that four dimensional Euclidean space time, imaginary numbers and imaginary time are difficult concepts to get your head round: Certain concepts like Feynman’s ‘sum over histories’ theory requires calculating probabilities for every possible wave function at any given vector, and involves the concept that a particle has not one history but the history of every possible path in space time.

So Hawking had a point; theoretical physicists had to turn to the most gifted mathematicians to help with that sort of calculus. But no, I certainly wouldn’t have agreed with his rhetorical statement that philosophy was ever dead. Nor would the physicists who have turned to philosophers - Rovelli referencing Nagarjuna being a good recent example - to help them explain and conceptualise increasingly arcane Quantum ideas.
Just clarifying your position on mining Hawking quotes as an appeal to authority.
So it isn't Hawking's intellect that you are appealing to, only things he says that might, sort of seem to support your existing position.
Fair enough.
 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
The obvious response is, it shouldn’t. Science is the study of the material world, is it not?
But pretty much everyone who claims the supernatural exists also claims that operates in and affects this physical, natural world. Therefore there should be some means by which it can be detected.

If it is indeed entirely separate from and undetectable by this universe, then it its indistinguishable from "nothing".
 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
Science does not.
It does. It examines the evidence and arguments presented for those claims. Thus far, supernatural claims do not present any actual evidence or rational argument. So science has dismissed them.

Just gotta love how the argument in defence of there being no evidence for the supernatural is that there is no evidence for the supernatural.
 

RestlessSoul

Well-Known Member
Just clarifying your position on mining Hawking quotes as an appeal to authority.
So it isn't Hawking's intellect that you are appealing to, only things he says that might, sort of seem to support your existing position.
Fair enough.


I wasn’t mining for quotes, I came across a quote in A Brief History of Time which resonated with a point being made by another poster on this forum, so I thought I’d respond with Hawking’s words; he could be rather eloquent, which by no means all scientists are.

I wasn’t trying to support a position, so much as illustrate an observation. Then you jumped all over it like a bloodhound dismembering a fox, and completely missed the point; which, if I remember rightly, was the statistical improbability of the universe expanding in precisely the manner necessary for our corner of it to support intelligent life. That probability being so fantastically slight as to be almost worth discarding; if you’d read the whole quote without your blinkers on, you’d have noticed the reference to the anthropic principle and picked up on that, but you didn’t - you ran straight to Google, exactly as I said you would.
 

Subduction Zone

Veteran Member
I wasn’t mining for quotes, I came across a quote in A Brief History of Time which resonated with a point being made by another poster on this forum, so I thought I’d respond with Hawking’s words; he could be rather eloquent, which by no means all scientists are.

I wasn’t trying to support a position, so much as illustrate an observation. Then you jumped all over it like a bloodhound dismembering a fox, and completely missed the point; which, if I remember rightly, was the statistical improbability of the universe expanding in precisely the manner necessary for our corner of it to support intelligent life. That probability being so fantastically slight as to be almost worth discarding; if you’d read the whole quote without your blinkers on, you’d have noticed the reference to the anthropic principle and picked up on that, but you didn’t - you ran straight to Google, exactly as I said you would.
It may not have been intentional, but it was what you did. And you did act for quite a while as if that quote supported you. Those that defend evolution and other sciences are used to this dishonest technique. so of course he jumped all over you. If it was an accident the best move is simply to acknowledge your error and move on. When people admit that they screwed up others will almost always forgive them.
 

Sheldon

Veteran Member
I don't need to recruit physics, or logic, or reason to prove to my head what my heart believes with absolute conviction.

You think your heart is what enables belief? I'd suggest you re-examine that claim, and see the obvious irony in it.

Nor do I have any interest in proving it to you.

That much is abundantly clear, though I am dubious you can, and that is why you wave such requests away.

If the models whereby the universe began, and probably ends, with a singularity are correct, then there certainly was a moment of creation.

Nope, you are simply assuming and tacking on the word creation there. it's pure unevidenced assumption on your part, and of course is the very definition of a begging the question fallacy.

What else was the Big Bang, if not that?

Nothing in that scientific model requires or remotely evidenced design or creation from a supernatural deity using magic that has no explanatory powers whatsoever, and falls foul of Occam's razor. Perhaps you really ought to care about logic a bit more, and cast a critical eye on some of your irrational assertions you keep reeling off without a hint of irony, while decrying logic.

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What I am not willing to do, is listen to the carefully rehearsed rhetoric of inflexible fundamentalists, whether that fundamentalist be atheist or religious.

I don't need to recruit physics, or logic, or reason to prove to my head what my heart believes with absolute conviction.

I'm guessing the irony of those two incongruous assertions is wasted on you? Do you genuinely not see that you are the only inflexible fundamentalist here?
 

Sheldon

Veteran Member
Wow. Did you really just write that without any sense of irony?

Your claim is just question begging or rhetorical slight of hand.
Creation requires a creator. There is no evidence for a creator therefore it is wrong to claim that the universe was created.
"A moment of formation" accurately describes the event without shoehorning in the unnecessary idea of god.
I know, you have to wonder how many times it has to be explained to anyone that their clumsy unevidenced addition of the word creation, is a begging the question fallacy.

"The fallacy of begging the question occurs when an argument's premises assume the truth of the conclusion, instead of supporting it. In other words, you assume without proof the stand/position, or a significant part of the stand, that is in question. Begging the question is also called arguing in a circle."

Then again he just stated without a hint of irony that he "didn't need to recruit physics, or logic, or reason to prove to my head what my heart believes with absolute conviction."

Just before he asserted that "What I am not willing to do, is listen to the carefully rehearsed rhetoric of inflexible fundamentalists,"

I had to read it several times to be sure it wasn't a cleverly crafted windup I'd fallen for. I have to say I'm still not entirely sure, that I haven't been duped by a master of irony.
 

Sheldon

Veteran Member
But pretty much everyone who claims the supernatural exists also claims that operates in and affects this physical, natural world. Therefore there should be some means by which it can be detected.

If it is indeed entirely separate from and undetectable by this universe, then it its indistinguishable from "nothing".
If it supplies no data, then as you say, it is a) indistinguishable from the non-existent and b) demonstrably is not affecting the material physical universe, or there would be data to study as evidence, instead all we ever get is anecdotal unevidenced claims, argumentum ad ignorantiam fallacies and argumentum ad populum fallacies.
 

1213

Well-Known Member
Newsflash then, human beings were not created instantly in their current form by a deity using magic. They evolved roughly 200k years ago, (as have all living things) which makes humans a very young species in evolutionary terms. The implication being obvious for the religious idea that everything was created with us in mind.

Why do you believe so? If modern humans have existed about 200 thousands of years, why we see signs of major cultural development only from about 20000 years? Why computers were not built 190 000 years ago?
 

1213

Well-Known Member
...No human method can ever be completely infallible, quite obviously, but that is also true for religious claims, which rather contradicts the idea the claims and message are from an omniscient deity.

Yes, and because humans are infallible, it is quite stupid to make strong claims on basis of human understanding and knowledge.

And this is why I believe Bible is done with the guidance of God. If it would be just from humans, atheists would not have so many problems to understand it and they could show real errors in it, instead of dishonest interpretations and straw man arguments.
 

1213

Well-Known Member
"Science" is not a thing, or a list of facts. It is a process.
Things that have been determined by science are often demonstrably correct.
Do you think the phone/computer you are using now was developed and built by guesswork?Do you believe it operates by magic?
As Richard Dawkins said...

How can anyone take Dawkins seriously?

Many people can use a car without understanding deeply why and how it works. Same can be in many matters. However, if we think scientific fact is only something that can be demonstrated repeatedly, I have no problem with that. Most practical things are like that. For example computers, there is facts that can be tested and repeated and they work. And they actually work even if person doesn't understand deeply why they work. So, maybe it is wrong to say "science" is wrong, if it means just a method to examine world. Usually "science" means also the opinions of people that can be wrong, especially when they are claims that are not testable and not proven by anything. If "science" means only the method and what has been observed, it is never wrong, because it would only tell what was observed by some way. It would be nice, if it would be only so.
 

RestlessSoul

Well-Known Member
It may not have been intentional, but it was what you did. And you did act for quite a while as if that quote supported you. Those that defend evolution and other sciences are used to this dishonest technique. so of course he jumped all over you. If it was an accident the best move is simply to acknowledge your error and move on. When people admit that they screwed up others will almost always forgive them.


I’m happy to admit errors when I make them, as I often do. There was no error here - I was fully aware of how easy it would be to find quotes from Hawking in support of atheism; I predicted exactly that response. The quote, however, illustrated the point about statistical probability. It still does. Predictably, the point was completely missed by people who only seem capable of thinking in black and white - an awful lot of that goes on in this place.

Look, I’m not a binary thinker, and I’m not interested, really, in adversarial discourse. Im willing to consider a wide cross section of opinion, and learn from pretty much anyone. But some of the atheists on this forum are only interested in ill tempered and belligerent squabbles, point scoring, and ego massage. It’s very much to my shame that I bother engaging with them. It’s bloody tiresome tbh
 
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ratiocinator

Lightly seared on the reality grill.
Why? The theory of evolution can't be proven correct with scientific method.

:facepalm: Yet this whole statement says that you have no understanding of the scientific method - otherwise you would be expecting anything to be 'proved' by it.

If you want evidence that the theory of evolution is correct, then we have vast amounts of it that clearly show, way beyond any reasonable doubt, that it's a very, very good match to reality.

Evolution itself, of course, is an observed fact, which the theory of evolution explains.
 

TransmutingSoul

One Planet, One People, Please!
Premium Member
Your god needs to try much harder if he wants to be taken seriously by rational people.

Why do we blame God for our choices?

Practice makes perfect, if we want another to do that training for us, how does that help our own ability?

Regards Tony
 
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