God of Gaps is one of God's holy names

[George-ananda]

As a believer that the material reality is all a play of Consciousness/God/Brahman, I don't care for the term 'God of the gaps'.

The entire universe is a sign and play/drama of God. The parts science understands and doesn't yet understand (the gaps) are all God's creative aspect.

 

[setarcos]

So, how does one demonstrate for you the legitimacy of these questions:

1. Why does anything exist? (Why do I exist?)
2. Why am I aware of myself existing?
3. Why does existing involve suffering and death?

Are you suggesting that we should simply not ask these questions because we don't have any answers for them that can be "demonstrated" scientifically?
I'm pretty sure I just did that.

How do you define your atheism? Is it just something you choose to believe or something you've come to believe for particular reasons?

 

[setarcos]

Miracles are just the operation of laws that the vast majority don't know about yet.

Take a 14th century person and put him in the 21st century: that strange carriage moves by miracles. Touch a wall and light appears - must be a miracle. A piece of metal flying in the sky like a bird but does not flap it's wings? That is truly a miracle.

I think your mistaken. Miracles are by definition suspensions of the laws that we think we know about. What I think you mean is that no one has seen a true miracle because no one knows how reality works in its totality. On the other hand simply saying that miracles don't happen because you believe they will eventually be understood in a natural sense or assume that if not understood eventually they are still subject to laws we just don't know about is no proof that miracles don't happen.
Incidentally, even the so called laws we think we have....haven't been proven. Or perhaps you can give me an example of one that has and what its proof is?

 

[setarcos]

Obviously as an atheist, I don't see any point in questions that presuppose there is an overarching purpose to human existence. I prefer to think that ought to be demonstrated first, before the question has any true value. However as far as science is concerned, it's limitations should surely be demonstrated, rather than simple assumed with unfalsifiable ideas?

How about you, how have you come to define your world view as atheist?

 

[setarcos]

Scientific theories explain why aspects of the natural world behave or appear as they do. Gravity explains why an apple would appear to fall towards the earth, evolution explains why there is such a diversity of life. Scientific laws generally are smaller more concise explanations of how parts of those theories behave.

In consideration of the fact that we don't yet know what gravity is or how it actually does what it does how does it explain anything? How is it that evolutionary theory "explains" anything since it is scientifically untestable and the further the biological sciences develop the more untenable the contentions of the theory becomes?
Scientific "laws" are not explanations. They are collections of data subject to probabilistic analysis. You can't escape faith in science.

 

[setarcos]

Yeah, Bible is the proof. Circle, circle, circle.God too does not answer 'why'? I have asked many a times, "What compelled you or drove you to create the universe?" Has he told you something?

I think you know that God is God and you are you and God is beholding to no one to give an answer to anyone for anything. Or perhaps God has answered but you refuse to see or ignore the answers given for what they are.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

Are advances in science constantly pushing God into the dustbin of history?

Advances in science are removing jobs that a deity is thought to have done.

Once, man had no better ideas for why the sun rose and set than that a god was pulling it, or that thunder meant that Thor was angry. There was no idea of things like that happening without conscious agency. And so, people prayed to those gods or offered them sacrifices to appease them, to prevent Thor from killing them with one of his bolts..

Then modern science took off with the first wave of scientists being the ones who showed how gases behave, planets orbit, and current pass through circuits. This all happened automatically, and without supervision. No angels were needed to push charge through wires. The universe could run itself day to day without a ruler god. But how did it get here? We still needed a designer and builder god. One huge gap had been filled in. One less job a deity was needed to perform.

So, the deist god emerged, the god that builds universes, but doesn't run them. It just leaves.

Then came the second wave of scientists that showed us how the universe could assemble itself into galaxies of stars without a builder god, and how the tree of life could emerge from a single primordial population of replicators. That's most of the building right there, two more jobs no deity was needed to perform, the gap being getting from material evolution (Big Bang) to biological evolution, and the emergence of consciousness. Another gap is the source if any, and history, of the earliest universe, before the Planck time.

And we have naturalistic hypotheses for two of these - the multiverse hypothesis and abiogenesis hypothesis. If it can be shown that these are also naturalistic processes, what job is left for a God? The author of consciousness? That's an incoherent claim and self-refuting claim - that the source of consciousness was already conscious when it did this.

Another job suggested for a god is the fine tuning of the universe, but this is also an incoherent argument. Why would a God need to finely tune the laws of nature unless it was constrained by laws which the deity must respect? Who created the laws that govern the necessity for a god to fine tune the laws of nature? If the laws of nature could only be one kind of way to permit life, and the universe runs all on its own, then what does it need with a god?

Furthermore, the multiverse hypothesis offers a naturalistic explanation - all possible universes arise, some instantly collapsing, some expanding to fast for nebula to condense, some existing for a million years but ever spawning life, and some like this universe, able to sustain material, chemical, biological, psychological, and eventually, cultural evolution over cosmological time.

If all substances and processes can be accounted for naturalistically, one can go further than saying gods are not needed. Perhaps one can say that the involvement of a god in this universe is impossible. Is a god possible in the melting of ice? The process can be explained without a god, but what I'm asking is how a god could possibly be involved anyway. To do what? Push the water molecules off the ice cube and allow them to run and evaporate?

So, yes, the need for deities has been steadily declining for centuries now, and that is what is meant by the God of the gaps.

If there are no gaps, then the nature can be explained without introducing the idea of God.

Yep. That's why those gaps are so precious to so many.

God isn't about the how, it's about the why. And science can't answer the why.

Neither can religion, if by answer we mean more than an unevidenced claim involving unevidenced gods and their purposes and intentions. Science says, "We won't guess." Religion says, "No problem. Hold my beer."

So, how does one demonstrate for you the legitimacy of these questions:

1. Why does anything exist? (Why do I exist?)
2. Why am I aware of myself existing?
3. Why does existing involve suffering and death?

Are you suggesting that we should simply not ask these questions because we don't have any answers for them that can be "demonstrated" scientifically?

Ask, yes. Answer, no.

They're questions worthy of consideration, but religion offers no answers better than guesses. What value is that? Why call guesses answers? The questions reman unanswered even after the guessing. To those who say God did it because it pleased Him, I can say Norm did it because [insert fiction here] with no more or less explanatory or predictive power.

Just as the OP is trying to preserve a valuable role for his deity, so too are you trying to imply a valuable role for religion, although I think that you don't call you god beliefs religion.

And this comes full circle to your thread on scientism, or the claim that some people put too much reliance on empiricism for answers. I realized by the time that thread was a few dozen pages long that my complaint was the opposite - the excessive reliance on some in methods that generate nothing, and the repeated mantra that there are things that exist that science cannot detect. I'd like to call that antiscientsm. It's what allows people to just say whatever they wish were true absent any evidence, and condemn science for not being up to the task of finding their imagined realms and their denizens. It's excessive reliance on guessing. And it generates no knowledge.

What's the sine qua non of a wrong idea, apart from contradictory evidence (Bob is dead. No he isn't- look!)? What the difference between astrology and astronomy that accounts for why one is considered a wrong idea and the other correct? Wrong ideas don't work. Astrologers are guessing, and generate nothing of value in the process. Astronomers are observing and generalizing using mathematics that allow the accurate prediction of a lunar eclipse, for example. Religion is in that first category. I generates no answers, just like astrology.

 

[Sheldon]

This is mad (well, obviously ).

"God did it" is the one answer science would never, ever give, to anything.

COUGH***scientism***COUGH...

 

[Sheldon]

perhaps God has answered but you refuse to see or ignore the answers given for what they are.

No true Scotsman fallacy....

 

[Sheldon]

As a believer that the material reality is all a play of Consciousness/God/Brahman, I don't care for the term 'God of the gaps'.

The entire universe is a sign and play/drama of God. The parts science understands and doesn't yet understand (the gaps) are all God's creative aspect.

Can you demonstrate something to support this idea beyond a bare unevidenced opinion?

 

[Sheldon]

How about you, how have you come to define your world view as atheist?

Well my worldview is too complex to encompass in one post, but as an atheist it just doesn't include a belief in any deity or deities.

 

[George-ananda]

Can you demonstrate something to support this idea beyond a bare unevidenced opinion?

The teachings I follow are from Advaita Vedanta (non-dual=God and creation are not-two Hinduism). The teachings are supported by the direct experiences of an untold number of rishis. sages and saints of the past and present.

Rishi (Sanskrit: ऋषि, romanized: ṛṣi) is a term for an accomplished and enlightened person. They find mentions in various Hindu Vedic texts. Rishis are believed to have composed hymns of the Vedas. Post-Vedic tradition of Hinduism regards the rishis as "great yogis" or "sages" who after intense meditation (tapas) realized the supreme truth and eternal knowledge, which they composed into hymns.

And 'No' this cannot be demonstrated to you through physical observation.

 

[Wildswanderer]

There are gaps in our understanding, but not in God's creation. Nothing exists that he didn't start and design.

If there are no gaps, then the nature can be explained without introducing the idea of God.
But what about the miracles the Jesus has demonstrated?

 

[Suave]

Are advances in science constantly pushing God into the dustbin of history?

No, the area of the unknown is expanding faster. 94 percent of matter is Dark Matter and Dark Energy, and nothing is known about them. Unknown, except for me.

The matter is of 4 types, one of them is Invisible Non-Living Matter: Dark Matter and Dark Energy. Another one - Invisible Living Matter: angels, souls of people. Scientific evidence is in the file:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/356990154_To_solve_all_problems_and_Quantum_Gravity

So, learning more, mainstream science will either discover God or say: "Reality does not exist - we are in the Matrix. We are all in the Zuserberg Meta-Universe."

Physicists have no idea how Super-Massive Black Holes could appear in all galaxies in a short time. Did God do this miracle? Atheists would reply: "you are not a child to believe in fairies and gods."

I am very glad that children like fairy tales. In general, the world is very similar to a fairy tale, for example, giants and unicorns are mentioned in the Bible. In the Bible, the dead are raised. The UFOs like some flaming fast dragons fly across the sky.

A fairy tale is when both reality and illusion. Illusion is when a logical contradiction, a paradox. Illusion from God is useful and inevitable. And in science, there are such paradoxes that will never be eliminated. For example, the Hilbert's Grand Hotel with an infinite number of guests: more about it (and other illusions) is in

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/356587583_RIEMANN_HYPOTHESIS_AND_BASIS_OF_KNOWLEDGE

200 as well as 3000 years ago people believed in God of Gaps.
The God of Gaps is there even today - 94% of Universe.
Why today people do not believe in God of Gaps?


If there are no gaps, then the nature can be explained without introducing the idea of God.
But what about the miracles the Jesus has demonstrated?

I presume computational resources are finite, thereby our simulated universe would be performed by dividing up the space-time continuum into individually separate and distinctive points. Analogous to mini-simulations conducted by lattice-gauge theorists modeling nuclei based on Quantum Chromodynamics, A grid-like space-time's observable effects have been studied from these computer simulations which utilizes a 3-D grid for modeling elementary particle movements and interactions with other matter. Anomalies found in these simulations suggest that if we are in a simulation universe with an underlying grid, then there'd be various amounts of high energy cosmic rays coming at us from each direction; but if space is continuous, then there'd be high energy cosmic rays coming at us equally from every direction.
In a simulated universe, we'd expect to observe cosmic rays travelling predominately along the axes of the lattice of our simulated universe/Matrix, this implies the existence of a simulator (a.k.a. -God) , this would be in stark contrast to cosmic rays being observed emanating equally in all directions of unconstrained space; this would imply our universe is not structured like a constrained numeric simulation

 

[Suave]

Atheist: "How did particles, electrons, photons appear?"
Science: "God did it."
Atheist: "How did He do it?"
Science: "Because He is Creativity itself and a Miracle itself. He did it by a miracle."

Perhaps most nullifidians and theist could agree a Simulator( a.k.a. - God ) might be able to alter or disrupt the laws typically governing of our simulated universe, enabling the appearance of miracles. Right?

 

[PureX]

How do you define your atheism? Is it just something you choose to believe or something you've come to believe for particular reasons?

I’m not an atheist. I’m an agnostic theist.

 

[sun rise]

I think your mistaken. Miracles are by definition suspensions of the laws that we think we know about. What I think you mean is that no one has seen a true miracle because no one knows how reality works in its totality. On the other hand simply saying that miracles don't happen because you believe they will eventually be understood in a natural sense or assume that if not understood eventually they are still subject to laws we just don't know about is no proof that miracles don't happen.
Incidentally, even the so called laws we think we have....haven't been proven. Or perhaps you can give me an example of one that has and what its proof is?

From an Eastern perspective there are powers called siddhis or powers that can be developed through various austerities and other practices. If you believe such things are real, then we don't know how it works but we do know how to develop such things.

So to me, motive is key. If someone shows up, demonstrates "miracles" but does it from the desire for power and fame, people can be misled. If you believe that Jesus did perform acts called miracles, then there was a Divine purpose not a human egotistical purpose.

 

[Viker]

God of the gaps.
Aliens in the gaps.
Bullocks.

 

[PureX]

Ask, yes. Answer, no.

They're questions worthy of consideration, but religion offers no answers better than guesses.

Why is that a problem for you? Science can’t even offer us that. Also, a great deal of our concept of reality is just our guessing.

What value is that? Why call guesses answers? The questions reman unanswered even after the guessing. To those who say God did it because it pleased Him, I can say Norm did it because [insert fiction here] with no more or less explanatory or predictive power.

Yes, you can. But the question is will doing that help you live a better life? A great many humans live better lives by choosing to believe in the “answers” that their God ideal provides them. That’s why they choose to believe as they do.

Just as the OP is trying to preserve a valuable role for his deity, so too are you trying to imply a valuable role for religion, although I think that you don't call you god beliefs religion.

I understand the difference between belief and faith, so I can choose to trust in my idea of God without having to pretend that I know anything about it. But I also understand that a lot of people don’t understand the difference, and so for them, religious belief is an important asset.

And this comes full circle to your thread on scientism, or the claim that some people put too much reliance on empiricism for answers. I realized by the time that thread was a few dozen pages long that my complaint was the opposite - the excessive reliance on some in methods that generate nothing, and the repeated mantra that there are things that exist that science cannot detect. I'd like to call that antiscientsm. It's what allows people to just say whatever they wish were true absent any evidence, and condemn science for not being up to the task of finding their imagined realms and their denizens. It's excessive reliance on guessing. And it generates no knowledge.

Do you see what a ‘gnostic’ you are?

All science can tell us about reality is physical functionality. That’s the how, not the why. And most humans want and need to feel that they know or, can know, why. Yet you seem to continue to just ignore this need. And even resent it. Yet it’s a need that drives humanity to not only do science, but to do art, and philosophy, and to be better human beings. And these things are very important. Functionality is good, of course, but it does not transcend these other human endeavors. Or the needs that inspire them.

Evidence is just evidence. Physicality is just physicality. It’s not the whole of reality or existence. And that’s why people can and will sometimes ignore them in favor of other aspects of reality and existence. And that’s ok. Humans need more from their experience of existence than functional physical knowledge.

 

[setarcos]

I’m not an atheist. I’m an agnostic theist.

I stand corrected.