Interesting video about evolution and origins.

[Brian2]

You still don't get it.

In order for science (or any rational person) to consider your god claims, you need to present something that indicates your god exists and is required to create everything. I.e. You need to demonstrate some reason for anyone to believe that any god is needed at all.

Until then, there's no reason to consider god claims (that includes your god, Zeus, Allah, etc.) when investigating natural phenomenon because you've given nothing that indicates that's even possible, never mind probable.

You really need to grasp this point.

I understand your point but try to tell you that there is evidence for God, just not the sort of evidence that science can use.
Saying that people with faith are not rational is not only demeaning but is also not a rational thing to say.

You don't know what it is, but you know characteristics about it ... how?

Through faith, through experiences of people, stuff like that. It is not rational to say that we cannot know anything about anything unless it is examined in a test tube.

You've told us this yourself many times. That your belief is based on faith and that faith is unjustified belief.

No, it is unjustified in your eyes, it is justified and rational to me.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

I understand your point but try to tell you that there is evidence for God, just not the sort of evidence that science can use.
Saying that people with faith are not rational is not only demeaning but is also not a rational thing to say.



Through faith, through experiences of people, stuff like that. It is not rational to say that we cannot know anything about anything unless it is examined in a test tube.



No, it is unjustified in your eyes, it is justified and rational to me.

But if the evidence cannot be used (verified externally, examined, shared, how do you know it is evidence? How does a person know it is real evidence and not just a product of their own imagination?

 

[Subduction Zone]

You have your experts like Dave Farina whose gushes with bias and misconstrues what James Tour says and throws in his own ad hominen comments about Tour and any of his comments about science or faith.
James tour is an expert in his field and also knows how close abiogenesis is to producing life and is just telling that to the world even if his own style is not diplomatic and he has some things to learn about how to be more diplomatic.



You would have to point out the time mark of those comments so I could comment on them.

No, Dave Farina is not an expert. He has a good basic knowledge of abiogenesis, but he never use the "Because I say so" arguments that Tour tries to use. He bases his arguments on the work of experts in the field. He has interviewed them and allowed them to explain their work. If you watched the debate you would have seen Farina constantly bringing up the papers that Tour did not want to discuss. All that Tour had was denial and an attempted high school level debate trick that Dave did not fall for.

And I didn't get the timestamps nor am I going to put myself through that again.

 

[exchemist]

You have your experts like Dave Farina whose gushes with bias and misconstrues what James Tour says and throws in his own ad hominen comments about Tour and any of his comments about science or faith.
James tour is an expert in his field and also knows how close abiogenesis is to producing life and is just telling that to the world even if his own style is not diplomatic and he has some things to learn about how to be more diplomatic.



You would have to point out the time mark of those comments so I could comment on them.

James Tour is an expert in his field, which is synthetic organic chemistry. He is NOT an expert in biochemistry, still less in the chemistry of abiogenesis. He has nothing to say on the subject of abiogenesis beyond reciting some personal prejudices. When it comes to that, he is talking out of his arse. If you insist on treating him as an expert, you are deluding yourself.

 

[Valjean]

I understand your point but try to tell you that there is evidence for God, just not the sort of evidence that science can use.
Saying that people with faith are not rational is not only demeaning but is also not a rational thing to say.

So how are you defining "rational?"
I think of it as implying congruence with empirical evidence and logical reasoning.

Through faith, through experiences of people, stuff like that. It is not rational to say that we cannot know anything about anything unless it is examined in a test tube.

You can "know" something personally, but, inasmuch as this knowledge is not empirically demonstrable or communicable; and since this individual knowledge differs amongst claimants, I consider it unreliable and non-evidence, in the common sense of the word.

No, it is unjustified in your eyes, it is justified and rational to me.

I'll grant it's justifiable to you, but rationality is a universal, algebraic system. If it were rational I'd expect it to be, at least, communicable, and hopefully empirically demonstrable.

 

[Brian2]

You're still not getting the point.

You have to show that there is a reason to insert god(s) into the equation in the first place!
And let's face facts here, you're not just talking about some obscure god concept, you are specifically talking about the very specific god you believe in.

What I am showing is that there is no good reason to presume that God does not exist or that He had nothing to do with creation or life.
Just because science cannot test for God or spirits and science cannot use the evidence there is for God, that does not mean that atheists or skeptics can therefore say that God is irrelevant and had nothing to do with creation or life.
OK in science I would need to prove scientifically that God exists before hypothesising that God created or gave life, but science is just a tool for studying the natural world and a help for discovering reality, but it is not our only tool and it certainly cannot tell us if God exists or not.
If science is the be all and end all for you when it comes to knowing what is real and what happened in the past etc then that is your reality, but not necessarily reality.
And I don't need to prove God's existence to you with the blunt tool of science, which cannot prove or disprove God. Maybe you need to prove to me that science is the only way.

Good grief.

What reason do we have to believe that spirits even exist in the first place? You openly admit there is no verifiable evidence. You openly admit, that your belief is faith-based. You openly admit they are undetectable. And you openly admit that you cannot even define what a spirit even is in the first place.
Yet in your mind, everyone else is supposed to consider their existence in reality, based on .... a whole lot of nothing, apparently. Sorry, but I want to believe in as many true things as possible and as few false things as possible and your "methodology" is useless in that quest.

No, your methodology is useless to tell us about things that it cannot test for, iow spirits.
If you refuse to listen to what people have experienced in relation to spirits that is a problem you have chosen for yourself,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, and your view of reality suffers accordingly.

I lack belief in spirits because there is no good evidence for them. I've asked you for it, and what response do I get? They are undetectable. Well great, that's the same evidence I'd expect to find of something that doesn't exist at all.

Typical skeptic twisting of what I said. Spirits are undetectable by science,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, not undetectable.
They can and do and have revealed themselves to people and you close your eyes to that.

Because it's not evidence. The Bible is filled with claims, not evidence.

History is full of evidence for the truth of the claims the Bible makes and so for the truth of the Bible God.

No they don't. Just those interested in being reasonable and rational, and believing in as many true things as possible while not believing in as many false things as possible.

I'd rather be free of the chains that limit my world to a small house with an electric light but no windows or doors.
Reality is bigger but you are chains to a tool that is a defective tool and does not show the whole of reality.

 

[Brian2]

I accept what Newton and other scientists have demonstrated, which has subsequently been objectively repeatedly tested and objectively confirmed to be valid.
Not because “Newton said” it.

I do not accept what Newton said about religion, which is not falsifiable nor objectively tested or confirmed to be valid…….
Do you?

In Newton's eyes, worshipping Christas God was idolatry, to him the fundamental sin. In 1999, historian Stephen D. Snobelen wrote, "Isaac Newton was a heretic.
(Isaac Newton - Wikipedia)
Do you accept what “Newton said”?

Nor do I accept Newton’s work in alchemy which fails to be objectively demonstrated or confirmed by repeated testing to prove valid; regardless of what “Newton said”.

I do not suffer from an “appeal to authority”
as you have demonstrated with your appeal to assuming what Tour and Garte is “noteworthy” because they “say” so.

I don’t go by what somebody “says”, but rather whether what they say is falsifiable, objectively demonstrable, tested and objectively shown to be valid…… the “god of the gaps” fails all of these tests.
You must ask yourself; why do you appeal to what Tour and Garte “say” while ignoring what the consensus of scientific method and data demonstrates?

So you don't mind if Newton and others believed in God and Jesus, it's his science that is important. But believing in God and Jesus these days, and that God has put understandable order into His creation means that an organisation is biased.

Here and now is your opportunity to present where this has objectively been demonstrated.
Please show me.
Remember it’s not about what anyone “says” but what can be objectively demonstrated.
Please share it with us!

We all know the game already. "Show me objective demonstration or God has not had any effect on anything in the world".
So to you God is a thing that can be manipulated and tested and made to demonstrate certain things.
But that is an irrational ask and is no more than a game that atheists play.

You have still never explained how since you don’t know what a spirit is…..
how you know “it is not part of the material universe”,
“not substances made from matter, which you can test”,
or that they have a will, much less “do things according to their will”.
Or if there is anything other than the material universe.
Again, what somebody “says” is only valid if they can objectively demonstrate that it is.
Please show me where any of this has been objectively demonstrated.


Here I’m having trouble taking you seriously.
It’s been explained to you repeatedly about the scientific method and how the position on various unsubstantiated propositions of gods or any other unsupported or dubious propositions fit into it; I’ll not waste my time further with your willful refusal to acknowledge the facts.


Wow, your reading comprehension is seriously lacking……
Your question:

My answer:

It is not a “no” to your question.
Your question is unfounded and nonsensical.
It is an invitation for you to put-up or shut-up on your continued misrepresentation of the scientific method and substantiate your claim of bias on the part of science against your preconceived notion of God.

So let’s try again…..
Put-up or shut-up.

Giving of life and creating the universe.
And no, I did not claim that science is biased, I asked you what you think about it.
Science cannot be biased, science is just a thing, a tool that humans use.
It is people who are biased whether they are scientists or not.

Of course science “keeps trying to come up with naturalistic answers to the origins of the universe and life”, they are the only answers which have objectively, repeatedly, and demonstrably been shown to have any validity.
Since no religious alternative has managed to do so, there is no rational reason to take them into consideration.
No serious person has ever denied this.
The denial is that science “seeks to discredit your God” or anyone else’s……it merely seeks to gain objectively demonstrable knowledge.
The fact your God is not falsifiable or objectively demonstrable is your concern, not that of science.

Yes science is just a tool and scientists keep using it to see where it leads.
And scientists come up with potential answers to question about the origins of life and the universe and keep testing those answers even though the answers are always no more than unverifiable naturalistic educated guesses.
And science has to ignore unverifiable or falsifiable things except for those answers it seems.
Certainly science ignores the possible existence of God even though there is historical evidence for spirits and God, but that is OK because that sort of evidence can't be used by science.
So results about origins are guesses but acceptable and an unfalsifiable God who has shown Himself in history is unacceptable. But don't keep saying I am slandering science. If anything I am slandering those who don't recognise how strange this state of affairs is in people,,,,,,,,,,, people who say how wonderfully rational they are.

Etc., etc…….
More strawmaning and mischaracterization of science as has been exhaustively explained to you which you willfully dishonestly continue to do.

Educated guesses are educated guesses, whether true guesses or not. How is that mischaracterizing science that guesses what might have happened in the past?
And nobody has shown me how educated guesses turn into the truth.

This is because it has proven to be a reliable and viable source of knowledge.

Interesting how you attempt to put the utterances of a select few scientists up as authoritative in an attempt to convince gullible people that your favored view of religion appears to be reasonable within their personal point of view as though their being scientists bears extra validity to their reasoning.
Almost as though you “hold science up high”.
All while trying to discredit, minimize, and mischaracterize the objectively demonstrable knowledge gained through science.

Yes science has proven to be a reliable and viable source of knowledge about how things work, but that does not mean that it is going to be correct about guesses of what happened in the past.
And yes being scientists gives their opinion about science more credibility than my opinion for example, even if scientists themselves have opposed opinions.
And yes I do hold science up high and so I agree with much of the educated guesses about what happened in the past,,,,,,,,,,,,,, so I'm not a YEC, and I make non fundamentalist interpretations of Genesis etc.
But NO, I don't try to discredit, minimise and mischaracterise any objectively demonstrable knowledge gained through science.
I try to show that some of this supposedly objectively demonstrable knowledge is not actually that and cannot be objectively demonstrated.
This IS science that we are talking about and which is supposed to be objectively demonstrable but is not,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, and that is OK by you.
But when a God who is a living spirit cannot be objectively demonstrated to exist by science, that means that this God does not exist.
Go figure.

 

[SkepticThinker]

It is not known that evolution can work without supernatural input.
That is just the assumption, as in "evolution is true and so every aspect of it has worked without supernatural input".

No. The assumption is that god(s) are required.
And it's an assumption that carries a ton of baggage and more assumptions.

 

[SkepticThinker]

I understand your point but try to tell you that there is evidence for God, just not the sort of evidence that science can use.

Then you don't understand my point.

Saying that people with faith are not rational is not only demeaning but is also not a rational thing to say.

Yes, faith is irrational belief. You've sufficiently demonstrated that yourself in this very thread.

And no, it's not irrational to point out irrational arguments. Exactly the opposite is true.

Through faith, through experiences of people, stuff like that. It is not rational to say that we cannot know anything about anything unless it is examined in a test tube.

This was in response to, "You don't know what it is, but you know characteristics about it ... how?"

So again, instead of invoking a rational argument, you invoke faith instead. See what I mean about faith being the excuse people give for believing something when they don't have good reasons/evidence? What good is a faith argument supposed to do for me or anybody other than yourself? Anything can be believed on faith.

So you don't know what a spirit is and can't define it, but you know specific characteristics about these undefinable things through ... faith. That sounds like just making stuff up to me. How do we know they're not just a figment of your imagination?

It's not rational to claim that something exists, without any ability to even define what the thing is, and then attribute unverifiable characteristics to that undefined thing by invoking faith, rather than evidence or a rational argument. And you wonder why rational people reject this? Really?

No, it is unjustified in your eyes, it is justified and rational to me.

And yet with your posts you demonstrate over and over again that these are not rationally-based claims you are making here.

 

[SkepticThinker]

What I am showing is that there is no good reason to presume that God does not exist or that He had nothing to do with creation or life.

This was in response to, "You have to show that there is a reason to insert god(s) into the equation in the first place!
And let's face facts here, you're not just talking about some obscure god concept, you are specifically talking about the very specific god you believe in."

It appears you didn't read it.

Also, I've pointed out to you umpteen times that nobody is presuming God doesn't exist. So I have no idea why you're saying this yet again. Especially in light of what I've just said to you, above.

Just because science cannot test for God or spirits and science cannot use the evidence there is for God, that does not mean that atheists or skeptics can therefore say that God is irrelevant and had nothing to do with creation or life.

If there is no evidence for such things, then we have no reason at all to consider them. That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.

You need to show there is some reason to include gods and spirits into our understanding of the world. Then you have to show it's the specific gods and spirits that you believe in (but can't even seem to define).

You really, really need to understand this point.

OK in science I would need to prove scientifically that God exists before hypothesising that God created or gave life, but science is just a tool for studying the natural world and a help for discovering reality, but it is not our only tool and it certainly cannot tell us if God exists or not.
If science is the be all and end all for you when it comes to knowing what is real and what happened in the past etc then that is your reality, but not necessarily reality.
And I don't need to prove God's existence to you with the blunt tool of science, which cannot prove or disprove God. Maybe you need to prove to me that science is the only way.

Show us there is some reason to consider your god(s) and spirits in the first place, and we'll do it. Simple. 'Til then, I have no more reason to believe in those than I do to believe in Thor or Apollo or invisible universe-creating pixies.

No, your methodology is useless to tell us about things that it cannot test for, iow spirits.

Then give us a methodology with which we can do so. Otherwise, you're just making stuff up and asserting it's true.

If you refuse to listen to what people have experienced in relation to spirits that is a problem you have chosen for yourself,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, and your view of reality suffers accordingly.

How does my view of reality suffer, exactly, by not accepting unevidenced faith claims?

Typical skeptic twisting of what I said. Spirits are undetectable by science,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, not undetectable.

Excuse me? You've repeatedly claimed that spirits are undetectable. When you've (repeatedly) been asked HOW DO WE DETECT SPIRITS? you've had nothing to offer but more empty assertions.

They can and do and have revealed themselves to people and you close your eyes to that.

Where and how? I have repeatedly asked you how we can detect spirits. Many, many times.

History is full of evidence for the truth of the claims the Bible makes and so for the truth of the Bible God.

Where? What? Why? This was in response to, "the Bible is the claim(s), not the evidence."

History is full of evidence of thousands of other gods too. How did you determine yours is the real one?

I'd rather be free of the chains that limit my world to a small house with an electric light but no windows or doors.

This was in response to, "No they don't. Just those interested in being reasonable and rational, and believing in as many true things as possible while not believing in as many false things as possible."

Pardon me, but it seems the method by which we limit our world to a "small house" is to lean on some ancient texts filled with fantastical claims, written by people who had a very limited understanding of the mechanisms of the world around them. It seems to me the "large house" view would include gathering data from the most reliable tool we've come up with to date for discerning fact from fiction - the scientific method.

Reality is bigger but you are chains to a tool that is a defective tool and does not show the whole of reality.

Science is the most reliable tool we have in helping us discern fact from fiction when it comes to the world around us. It's the methodology that has given us all verifiable knowledge we currently hold about the world around us. To call it defective is absolutely laughable. Especially in comparison with faith.

 

[Subduction Zone]

So you don't mind if Newton and others believed in God and Jesus, it's his science that is important. But believing in God and Jesus these days, and that God has put understandable order into His creation means that an organisation is biased.

One can still be a Christian and accept the sciences. One does not have to go to the extreme of calling one's own God a liar by stating that Genesis is historical. As history that book is self refuting. It still works as a collection of morality tales, fables, and metaphor.

We all know the game already. "Show me objective demonstration or God has not had any effect on anything in the world".
So to you God is a thing that can be manipulated and tested and made to demonstrate certain things.
But that is an irrational ask and is no more than a game that atheists play.

There is nothing unreasonable in demanding evidence for what one claims to be true. You don't believe in the Hindu gods. Why do you deny them? Oh wait, you have your own irrational beliefs. That is not the proper way to fight a rational belief.

Also your claims are even worse because some of your claims make God testable, if he cannot lie, so we can test the creation myths of Genesis, and it fails. We can test the Noah's Ark myth, and it fails. When you cross the lines into areas governed by the sciences you have no right to complain when others use that tool.

Giving of life and creating the universe.
And no, I did not claim that science is biased, I asked you what you think about it.
Science cannot be biased, science is just a thing, a tool that humans use.
It is people who are biased whether they are scientists or not.

The origins of life, are you asking about that? Or the fact that people are alive? Both can be answered by the sciences. Though there still are questions about abiogenesis many of the problems have been solved. Not all of them. But enough to reasonably state that at least one full explanation is within reach.

Yes science is just a tool and scientists keep using it to see where it leads.
And scientists come up with potential answers to question about the origins of life and the universe and keep testing those answers even though the answers are always no more than unverifiable naturalistic educated guesses.
And science has to ignore unverifiable or falsifiable things except for those answers it seems.
Certainly science ignores the possible existence of God even though there is historical evidence for spirits and God, but that is OK because that sort of evidence can't be used by science.
So results about origins are guesses but acceptable and an unfalsifiable God who has shown Himself in history is unacceptable. But don't keep saying I am slandering science. If anything I am slandering those who don't recognise how strange this state of affairs is in people,,,,,,,,,,, people who say how wonderfully rational they are.

And there you go disqualifying yourself from the discussion by using a bogus claim that has been refuted countless times and is also shown to be false by your ability to communicate here.

Educated guesses are educated guesses, whether true guesses or not. How is that mischaracterizing science that guesses what might have happened in the past?
And nobody has shown me how educated guesses turn into the truth.



Yes science has proven to be a reliable and viable source of knowledge about how things work, but that does not mean that it is going to be correct about guesses of what happened in the past.
And yes being scientists gives their opinion about science more credibility than my opinion for example, even if scientists themselves have opposed opinions.
And yes I do hold science up high and so I agree with much of the educated guesses about what happened in the past,,,,,,,,,,,,,, so I'm not a YEC, and I make non fundamentalist interpretations of Genesis etc.
But NO, I don't try to discredit, minimise and mischaracterise any objectively demonstrable knowledge gained through science.
I try to show that some of this supposedly objectively demonstrable knowledge is not actually that and cannot be objectively demonstrated.
This IS science that we are talking about and which is supposed to be objectively demonstrable but is not,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, and that is OK by you.
But when a God who is a living spirit cannot be objectively demonstrated to exist by science, that means that this God does not exist.
Go figure.

When you drop the false claim of "educated guesses" then you might be able to make a point. But as soon as you use that refute phrase you take yourself out of the discussion.

 

[Valjean]

What I am showing is that there is no good reason to presume that God does not exist or that He had nothing to do with creation or life.
Just because science cannot test for God or spirits and science cannot use the evidence there is for God, that does not mean that atheists or skeptics can therefore say that God is irrelevant and had nothing to do with creation or life.

True, science cannot test for God or spirits, but neither can you, or anyone else. All this 'evidence' you claim is subjective -- in your head, or testimonial -- in someone else's head. Personal belief, or even emotional certainty, is not usable evidence.

OK in science I would need to prove scientifically that God exists before hypothesising that God created or gave life, but science is just a tool for studying the natural world and a help for discovering reality, but it is not our only tool and it certainly cannot tell us if God exists or not.

Nor can any of this other, subjective evidence you cite. Personal belief or emotion may be evidence to you, but it's not communicable or testable, so it's not epistemically useful as evidence. It's not a useful "tool."
Aside: Note that science does not prove. It amasses evidence, forms explanatory hypotheses, and attempts to disprove them.
Mathematics proves. Sciences evidences.

If science is the be all and end all for you when it comes to knowing what is real and what happened in the past etc then that is your reality, but not necessarily reality.

But it's the only objectively evidenced reality.

And I don't need to prove God's existence to you with the blunt tool of science, which cannot prove or disprove God. Maybe you need to prove to me that science is the only way.

How about your showing me another, non-subjective way; a way that's not all in my head.

No, your methodology is useless to tell us about things that it cannot test for, iow spirits.

But so is yours, no?
In fact, yours isn't even a methodology.

If you refuse to listen to what people have experienced in relation to spirits that is a problem you have chosen for yourself,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, and your view of reality suffers accordingly.

I'm fine with listening, but I also realize that if their experiences and interpretations are insubstantial, ie: subjective, they're also unverifiable, so must be taken with a grain of salt.

Typical skeptic twisting of what I said. Spirits are undetectable by science,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, not undetectable.
They can and do and have revealed themselves to people and you close your eyes to that.

But they remain undetectable to those not experiencing them, hence: invisible. Is it not reasonable to defer belief in the invisible?
People make all sorts of claims. They claim voices, visions, and visitations. Should they be given serious credence with no other supporting evidence?

History is full of evidence for the truth of the claims the Bible makes and so for the truth of the Bible God.

I disagree. History is full of claims -- for all kinds of conflicting experiences. How is one to sort them out, without objective supporting evidence?

I'd rather be free of the chains that limit my world to a small house with an electric light but no windows or doors.
Reality is bigger but you are chains to a tool that is a defective tool and does not show the whole of reality.

Life in a fantasy world does have its appeal....

 

[Brian2]

They are the gaps where creator gods are presently found. Gods are not needed for the universe to have assembled itself from its initial hot, dense state, nor is intelligent oversight needed for reality to go about its daily activities, where the days turn into nights and the rain falls automatically. So, the faithful are left with the origins problem if they want a job for their gods - what started these off, and why are they just right for life and mind to evolve in them?

Of course, they create an origins problem of their own when they postulate a god as the answer. Where did this god come from? How is it even possible that one could exist? What laws maintain its structural integrity so that it doesn't evaporate like a cloud and forget everything it knows as it loses consciousness?

Yes if you start off with a creation then you can presume that no God is needed.
If you start off presuming that it is OK to ignore the possibility of a God and evidence for Him then you can also presume that life is no more than chemically based.

And here is a god of the gaps argument. We don't need gods to explain how the world operates every day, nor to have assembled it, so the god is relegated to inventing those laws and setting it all of - an origins job.

Yes origins is what God said He did, and that includes the laws of nature and setting it all off, and creating the material and we don't know where to draw the line. Science is just a tool and cannot draw lines and it cannot even tell us what happened back at the origins, all it has is educated guesses based on the idea that God did not do it.

Spirits can be treated as nonexistent until they manifest to the senses. The test of something's existence is its ability to impact other existent things in space and time. Things that exist only as figments of the imagination don't do that.

The experiences of people show manifestation to the senses.

Science has no need to hypothesize the existence of gods. To explain what? We have naturalistic hypotheses such as the multiverse and abiogenesis for the origins problems.

All there ever will be is educated guesses from science unless you start using the science of the gaps idea and say that science will one day find answers,,,,,,,,,,,, but they will not be verified answers unless someone goes back in time to take a look.

Are you aware of the recent hypothesis that the universe is filled with matter that generates a gravitational effect but doesn't radiate light (dark matter). The idea was useless until a physical finding was uncovered that couldn't be accounted for without some kind of dark gravitational source. Now, that idea is useful, but we still don't need an intelligent agent to explain anything.

That is an unverifiable belief that you have.

Assuming that you mean believing by faith, that's a flawed way to approach discerning what reality is and how it works. Evolution gifted us with the senses, reason, and memory because using them promotes fitness. You know this from your daily life. It's how we initially learn how our world works - what hurts and what feels good, and how to avoid the one and foster the other. It's how we know where to get a good Italian meal. We begin with experience and draw conclusions thereafter. Imagine using the method you suggested above to do that. Just first believe that you can get that good meal at McDonalds and begin associated all that entails with that belief. You're guaranteed to go wrong.

Image trying to use science to investigate the existence of spirits or a spirit God. It just would not work because science cannot test for spirits. It is unreasonable to want science to do the job.

The science works. It needs no more empirical confirmation that its foundational assumptions are valid. That a supernatural element exists or is needed is the guess, and not based in education, but wishful thinking.

Science works, but not in finding spirits and not in verifable answers for the origins of things and life,,,,,,,,,,, and even the chemistry of life.
That the supernatural exists is based on the experiences of people and the evidence God has given us in the Bible.

No, that is not a limitation of science (empiricism). It's a strength. Look at what an a priori god belief did to the Intelligent Design program. It made it into pseudoscience, wasted a lot of time and money, and sullied the reputations of those looking for that assumed god. Science goes to great pains to avoid that kind of observer bias, as with blinding the participants in a medical trial regarding who got the potential remedy and who got the placebo, because hopes and expectations influence judgment.

It is a limitation of science that it cannot test for spirits and so it should not be thought of as having been shown by science that God is not needed for anything.
Then ID comes along with wonderful reasons that an intelligence is needed, but because it cannot test for these things being true, it is not a real science and atheists like to say that ID has been debunked. But it hasn't, it is just not acceptable in science.

 

[Brian2]

What? You seem to be rambling at the end. It is rather amazing that you insist on calling science "guesswork" since that is what allows you to communicate here in the first place. You are accepting that guesswork when it is convenient and disputing it when it goes against what appears to be rather irrational beliefs. That is a bit hypocritical.

I'm just pointing out that you reject the unverifiable when it comes to the existence of God etc but accept it when it comes to science guesswork that cannot be verified.
And don't pretend that I am saying that all of science is guesswork, even though that is something I have come to expect from you.

 

[McBell]

Then ID comes along with wonderful reasons that an intelligence is needed, but because it cannot test for these things being true, it is not a real science and atheists like to say that ID has been debunked. But it hasn't, it is just not acceptable in science.

That is a rather interesting spin on it.

That ID just comes along and offers up an alternative to science...
To bad it just isn't true.
ID has tried for a very long time to convince it is actual science.
Since it is almost the polar opposite of science, of course it gets rejected as science.

You show up to a chess tournament with a deck of Uno cards, it does not matter how intently you claim that Uno is chess, you will be told that Uno is not chess.

 

[Subduction Zone]

I'm just pointing out that you reject the unverifiable when it comes to the existence of God etc but accept it when it comes to science guesswork that cannot be verified.
And don't pretend that I am saying that all of science is guesswork, even though that is something I have come to expect from you.

You are irrationally going after only one small part of science because it disagrees with your myths. That in a way is worse than denying all of science since that would at least be consistent. But no matter how much you complain it is hypocritical to pick the parts of science that you will accept and the parts that you rejection without a rational argument.

And I treat all unverifiable claims equally. I give them all the same "put up or shut up" challenge. I am not picking on your belief any more than I am picking on others. Once again, you should learn how to be consistent.

 

[Brian2]

A perfect example of confirmation bias……
Start with a presupposition and then interpret any data as confirming that presupposition while ignoring or mischaracterizing any contrary information.

The very first sentence from the link you apparently didn’t read…….

“Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one's prior beliefs or values.”

Thanks for demonstrating my point.

Yes I suppose it is possible to learn about something or someone before we believe it or they exist but it is not really knowledge about that thing of being until we actually believe it or they exist.
Do you gain your knowledge about something before you believe it exists? How does that work?
Why do you think that believing first means that I have confirmation bias?
(I'm not saying that I do not have confirmation bias, but imo I can see what I am doing and that what I take as evidence is legitimate)

 

[Subduction Zone]

Yes I suppose it is possible to learn about something or someone before we believe it or they exist but it is not really knowledge about that thing of being until we actually believe it or they exist.
Do you gain your knowledge about something before you believe it exists? How does that work?
Why do you think that believing first means that I have confirmation bias?
(I'm not saying that I do not have confirmation bias, but imo I can see what I am doing and that what I take as evidence is legitimate)

Once again you test it with objective, not subjective, tests. Tests of the sort "If this happens my belief is confirmed (that does not mean "proven") and if that happens my beliefs are false.

The best way to find out if one's beliefs are correct or not is to try to disprove them.

 

[Brian2]

Atheists don't withhold belief because spirits can't be proven. We withhold belief because there's no evidence they exist.
We withhold belief for the same reason we withhold belief in unicorns and gryphons.

You deny the evidence that there is for spirits and God. Isn't that confirmation bias.

Wouldn't faith be the opposite of knowledge?
Knowledge is belief supported by evidence. Faith is belief without evidence, ie: fantasy.

No, evidence does not prove things but causes belief in things.

Are you serious? First believe, then look for evidence?
How is that in any way reasonable? How can any reliable knowledge come from such a topsy-turvy methodology?

You should really look at the question I was answering.
Do you gain knowledge about something usually before you believe it exists? It is possible but it is not really knowledge about a particular thing before you believe that thing exists.

No. You're still seeing God as axiomatic. You're still beginning with the concept as a premise.

It is not testable by science because there's no evidence to test. It's not within the purview of science, or even epistomology.

We don't hide from things that don't exist, and the assumption of non-existence is the reasonable default. Do you hide from wyverns? Why not? -- because there's no evidence they exist? You've already stated that you begin with belief, and then look for evidence, so belief in wyverns has the same truth-value as belief in God, does it not?

You are just denying that there is evidence for God when there is. What we do with that evidence is another thing, but the evidence is there.

OK, so belief without evidence -- fantasy -- can affect one's afterlife? I see two completely unsupported premises here.

You're accepting the Christian narrative as the starting point of your argument; as a premise. This is not reasonable. You seem to expect others to accept your apologetics based on a presupposed narrative.

You just reject evidence when evidence exists.

How is it ever "reasonable" to believe in something without evidence? I see no reasonable arguments for unevidenced belief. You have a bizarre understanding of "reasonable."
Lack of need is a criterion for scientific investigation. If A, B, and C explain a phenomenon, why would it be reasonable to propose D as an additional criterion?
Science will consider D when there's either evidence of or need for an additional cause, till then, there is not.

No science won't consider D because science does not have evidence for D that it can use in science, so science just plods on presuming it is correct that A,B and C explain a phenomenon,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, even if it is unverifiable that this is the case.

It is the theists who seem to be exhibiting poor thinking.
Please explain this poor scientific thinking that atheists, logicians and scientists seem to exhibit. I see nothing pointing to the existence of God except the initial, unevidenced presumption you advocated above.

Science knows that certain things can be used in science as evidence and can be verified and falsified and so leaves out God.
It is atheists who are the ones who claim that evidence for God does not exist because it cannot be used by science. So atheists are the stupid ones, not logicians or scientists necessarily.

OK. Explain the need. Explain why it's reasonable to propose a magical personage involved. Explain why your magical God is more likely than known, physical mechanisms.

How would I do that? All I am doing is pointing out that there IS evidence for a God in the Bible and history and nature and experiences of people,,,,,,,,,,,, and that what God in the Bible tells us that He did has NOT been shown to have happened naturally and never will be,,,,,,,,,,, it is unverifiable, just as the existence of God is unverifiable.
You are the one who denies there is evidence for God and maybe that is the reason you probably have so much faith that nature could do the things that need an intelligence to do.

That's why science tests hypotheses, so they become more than guesses.

They become more likely guesses.

Huh?

Even if the science is spot on in how it would have had to have happened if it happened naturally, it cannot be said that the science could have happened naturally and it cannot be said that it did not happen another way.

So I change the highlighted word to make it make sense.

You're presuming Christian mythology, again. God did not plainly say anything. You haven't even established He exists. You could just as well state that Vishnu plainly said something.
How is science stepping into theology? Science ignores theology, it investigates evidence of observable phenomena.

You're presuming that what science says about something is in the purview of science.
You're presuming that God cannot have done it because you say there is no evidence for God.
You never seem to realise that if science says things happened in the past, it cannot be verified and in that way it is not real science.
Science is a dumb tool with big feet and tromps all over theology flowers because it does not know any better and is blind.
Scientists keep travelling where science leads and tromp all over the same flowers in their quest for knowledge within the rules of science.
So science can only use material evidence and so can claim that life is chemical based when that is no more than where the naturalistic scientific evidence leads and which ignores God.
But here is where the thinkers and philosophers and theologians step in and say,,,,,,,,,"You can't do that, it's BS"

Origin is a real, evidenced phenomenon.
Why do you say it can never b more than an educated guess? Haven't people been saying that about the cutting edge of science for centuries? Is heliocentrism an educated guess? the germ theory? techtonic plates?
Why do you insist in trying to wedge a magical personage into every current area of study?

Current areas of study are pushing against the area that God said He did. So what do you expect.
Why do you say that origin is a real, evidence phenomenon.
How can any conclusions of science in this area be seen as legitimate science when all it can be is educated guesses? How is it even possible that I need to explain this?

It's by far the most productive tool ever invented. Human knowledge has taken off like a rocket since science became the gold standard. Noting even compares. Certainly not religious mythology; that never got us anywhere.

So? Theology is not there to give us scientific knowledge and science is not there to give us theological knowledge.

Science knows its limitations. Religion, apparently, does not.
I challenge you: Explain how science is exceeding its limitations, being irrational, and making logical errors.. I think you're projecting.

Science is being rational and logical given the bounderies it can work within.
It is not rational and logical if it claims to have knowledge of everything in the past when all it has is educated guesses about what MUST have happened given only natural processes.

 

[Subduction Zone]

You deny the evidence that there is for spirits and God. Isn't that confirmation bias.

No, you need to show that there is reliable evidence for spirits and God and genies (sorry, big time Barbara Eden fan). You cannot just claim that there is evidence. You need to be able to show it. You need to be able to give the standards for that evidence and show that those standards are rational and reasonable. You cannot claim confirmation bias against others until you do at least that.

Please note, how many times have I tried to get science deniers to learn the standards of evidence for science? And my willingness to show do more than give the standards is the fact that I so often offer to "Go over what is evidence and why". But believers seem to only want to believe. They do not seem to want to know if knowing gets in the way of their beliefs.