Is science interested in finding God ?

[PureX]

I suppose, in a way, science is already looking for God.

If I were a scientist, and I asked myself how and where one would look for some observable indication of the existence of God, I would have to presume it would be in the organization of nature, itself. Perhaps something in the way nature is organized could provide a clue to the origin of that order. Something that could be recognized as uniquely intentional.

 

[Viker]

I suppose, in a way, science is already looking for God.

If I were a scientist, and I asked myself how and where one would look for some observable indication of the existence of God, I would have to presume it would be in the organization of nature, itself. Perhaps something in the way nature is organized could provide a clue to the origin of that order. Something that could be recognized as uniquely intentional.

Could it be that science is starring God in the face? And could it be that it's okay that science doesn't acknowledge what they are looking at is God? Maybe God doesn't mind this or need aggrandizement for it all?

 

[Pete in Panama]

I suppose, in a way, science is already looking for God....

Could it be that science is starring God in the face? And could it be that it's okay that science doesn't acknowledge what they are looking at is God? Maybe God doesn't mind this or need aggrandizement for it all?

Sounds like everyone is putting God in a box and is saying where God begins and ends. To me that's blasphemy, tho virtually anything we say about God falls short. Often I interchange the word "reality" for "God". w/o reality science could not exist, and we can also say that w/o God science could not exist. With God (or reality) science can be a useful tool. Not all powerful but useful.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

There are plenty of people who you consider good that have no problem walking into their backyard and spraying RAID on an ant colony causing tens of thousands of creatures to suffer and die a horrible death.

“But they are just dumb ants”, you claim

Well we are far closer to an ant then we will ever be to God.

I’m thinking you need to start reading better philosophers because good and evil, morals, values and ethics do not apply to God just like they don’t apply to a human in relation to an ant.

The difference is, off course, that ants aren't sentient creatures.
So the comparison is flawed imo.

Would you consider spraying chemicals to mass-kill a pinguin colony for example to be on the same level as spraying ants?
Or how about mass poisoning a group of cats? Or chimps and gorilla's?

Now you could say "they are closer to us then ants", and that's certainly true.
But that's not actually why there are ethical implications here.

The actual reason that there are ethical implications in mass poisoning dogs as opposed to ants, is the part of dogs being sentient.

This is why "animal rights" apply to dogs but not to ants.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

I suppose, in a way, science is already looking for God.

If I were a scientist, and I asked myself how and where one would look for some observable indication of the existence of God, I would have to presume it would be in the organization of nature, itself. Perhaps something in the way nature is organized could provide a clue to the origin of that order. Something that could be recognized as uniquely intentional.

Sounds like an attempt at painting the bullseye around the arrow.

 

[SalixIncendium]

The difference is, off course, that ants aren't sentient creatures.

Are you certain of this? There is evidence that points to the contrary.

Using the Birch et al. framework, Gibbons and her colleagues looked for different levels of scientific evidence for the presence of sentience in various insects.3 They considered six orders of insects: Coleoptera (beetles), Blattodea (cockroaches), Diptera (flies and mosquitoes), Hymenoptera (bees, wasps, sawflies, and ants), Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths) and Orthoptera (crickets, katydids, and grasshoppers). ​

​

They discovered that flies, mosquitoes, cockroaches, and termites showed strong evidence of pain, and beetles, butterflies, and moths showed substantial evidence of pain. Importantly, no insects failed any of the criteria that were used to assess their capacity for feeling pain. These data are essential to use in management, farming, and research.​

​

Insect Sentience: Science, Pain, Ethics, and Welfare

Compelling evidence suggests that many insects are sentient and feel pain.

www.psychologytoday.com

 

[Tinkerpeach]

The difference is, off course, that ants aren't sentient creatures.
So the comparison is flawed imo.

Would you consider spraying chemicals to mass-kill a pinguin colony for example to be on the same level as spraying ants?
Or how about mass poisoning a group of cats? Or chimps and gorilla's?

Now you could say "they are closer to us then ants", and that's certainly true.
But that's not actually why there are ethical implications here.

The actual reason that there are ethical implications in mass poisoning dogs as opposed to ants, is the part of dogs being sentient.

This is why "animal rights" apply to dogs but not to ants.

The difference is that ants are more sentient compared to us than we are compared to God or however that whole thing works.

The point is if it’s not morally wrong for us to kill ants it’s nowhere close to Gods right to kill us for any reason He wants

He is so far above us all all levels even more than we are above the ant.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

The difference is that ants are more sentient compared to us than we are compared to God or however that whole thing works.

That makes zero sense as ants aren't sentient.

The point is if it’s not morally wrong for us to kill ants it’s nowhere close to Gods right to kill us for any reason He wants

So you claimed, but as I pointed out, it is a false analogy.
The reason why killing ants isn't considered morally wrong is because ants aren't sentient.

If they were, mass-killing them would have ethical implications.

Regardless of "how far or how close" they would be to us humans.

Your view of morality, especially in context of how we treat other species, seems very bankrupt.
You seem to be saying that your god is morally bankrupt also.

He is so far above us all all levels even more than we are above the ant.

Again: it's not about being "above" or "below".
It's about inflicting suffering to sentient creatures.

Ants aren't sentient creatures.

 

[Aupmanyav]

.. I would have to presume it would be in the organization of nature, itself.

Science has some understanding as to how nature is organized, but unfortunately, it does not point to existence of any God.

Often I interchange the word "reality" for "God". w/o reality science could not exist, and we can also say that w/o God science could not exist. With God (or reality) science can be a useful tool. Not all powerful but useful.

Why don't you stick with 'reality, whatever it is', rather than calling it God.

The difference is, off course, that ants aren't sentient creatures.

I think that is not a correct statement, TagliatelliMonster.
No harm in killing things which trouble or endanger us. Stray animals have become a menace in India.

 

[Tinkerpeach]

That makes zero sense as ants aren't sentient.



So you claimed, but as I pointed out, it is a false analogy.
The reason why killing ants isn't considered morally wrong is because ants aren't sentient.

If they were, mass-killing them would have ethical implications.

Regardless of "how far or how close" they would be to us humans.

Your view of morality, especially in context of how we treat other species, seems very bankrupt.
You seem to be saying that your god is morally bankrupt also.




Again: it's not about being "above" or "below".
It's about inflicting suffering to sentient creatures.

Ants aren't sentient creatures.

Are we sentient compared to a God that can create a universe?

We have no idea at what level God exists at, perhaps there are things and realities all around us we don’t even know about because we are not sentient in Gods reality.

We may be even more ignorant than the ant when compared to God.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Are you certain of this? There is evidence that points to the contrary.

Using the Birch et al. framework, Gibbons and her colleagues looked for different levels of scientific evidence for the presence of sentience in various insects.3 They considered six orders of insects: Coleoptera (beetles), Blattodea (cockroaches), Diptera (flies and mosquitoes), Hymenoptera (bees, wasps, sawflies, and ants), Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths) and Orthoptera (crickets, katydids, and grasshoppers). ​

​

They discovered that flies, mosquitoes, cockroaches, and termites showed strong evidence of pain, and beetles, butterflies, and moths showed substantial evidence of pain. Importantly, no insects failed any of the criteria that were used to assess their capacity for feeling pain. These data are essential to use in management, farming, and research.​

​

Insect Sentience: Science, Pain, Ethics, and Welfare

Compelling evidence suggests that many insects are sentient and feel pain.

www.psychologytoday.com

I would expect all organisms that have at least a rudimentary neural network to have at least primitive properties we could call "sentient". Primarily the experience of pain, as that is a pretty universal and useful tool to alert for danger which in turn helps for self-preservation and survival.

But capacity for more complex emotion? Not really.

 

[PureX]

Sounds like an attempt at painting the bullseye around the arrow.

Paradox is the face of truth. The arrow and the target are just two aspects of the same expressed event.

The chicken and the egg are both expressions of the same phenomenon. It was never about which came first, as they are both the necessary participants of a phenomenological event that's happening. The truth of that event transcends them both. As life transcends the inanimate matterials that enable and express it, and as cognition transcends the animate life forms that enable it to explore it's own awareness.

We humans ARE the universe looking back at itself, in wonder.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Are we sentient compared to a God that can create a universe?

Being able to create universes, or anything else, is not part of that criteria.
So this question makes no sense to me.

We have no idea at what level God exists at

Or if gods exist at all, for that matter.

perhaps there are things and realities all around us we don’t even know about because we are not sentient in Gods reality.

There you go again with a rather bizar comment about sentience.

We may be even more ignorant than the ant when compared to God.

So?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Paradox is the face of truth. The arrow and the target are just two aspects of the same expressed event.

You seem unfamiliar wit the expression of "painting the bullseye around the arrow".
It's a saying to note that one is engaging in the fallacy of the assumed conclusion.
It's the practice of going into a question with pre-determined answers.

The chicken and the egg are both expressions of the same phenomenon. It was never about which came first, as they are both the necessary participants of a phenomenological event that's happening.

FYI: the egg came first, as chickens had egg laying ancestors that weren't chickens.

We humans ARE the universe looking back at itself, in wonder.

Sure. But you are missing the point.

 

[PureX]

Science has some understanding as to how nature is organized, but unfortunately, it does not point to existence of any God.

Science has no idea, as yet, how nature is being organized. We don't know the medium nor the mechanisms controlling that medium.

 

[cladking]

Science has no idea, as yet, how nature is being organized. We don't know the medium nor the mechanisms controlling that medium.

Most real scientists now days believe reality is organized mathematically but this isn't really logical since fudge factors called "constants" are needed in every real world equation. There are too many unknowns to believe the universe is strictly mathematical. Also there are facts like it's known that chaos is unpredictable and reality is too complex to predict. If prediction is impossible than it's impossible to model mathematically.

Life is a subset of reality and orders of magnitude more complex yet. Many people take the existence of life as being axiomatic and proof that it can arise naturally just as they take the existence of the universe as proof it arose naturally.

It is illogical to suggest there is no God and there's no evidence there is. Yet most believers in science are proud to believe there is no God.

I sympathize with @Aupmanyav's point but consider it irrelevant and as strongly favoring the existence of a Creator as the lack of one.

 

[Aupmanyav]

We don't know the medium nor the mechanisms controlling that medium.

Kindly explain this. What exactly you mean? What medium?

It is illogical to suggest there is no God and there's no evidence there is. Yet most believers in science are proud to believe there is no God.
I sympathize with @Aupmanyav's point but consider it irrelevant and as strongly favoring the existence of a Creator as the lack of one.

If there is no evidence for existence of any God, then why is it illogical? You are welcome to favor any view. Aupmanyav does not need any sympathy.
I have no problem with an unpredictable universe. Some stars explode without any apparent reason, though that will not happen with our sun. It does not have enough stuff to do that (that was S. Chandrashekhar). It needed to be one and a half times heavier to do that.

Supernova - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[PureX]

Kindly explain this. What exactly you mean? What medium?

We don't know. Existence is possible. But only within limited confines. Yet we have no idea by what means those possibilities and limitations are being imposed. We observe "laws" that control what is possible and not possible, physically. But we have no idea by what means those laws have been determined, or by what means they are being enforced.

That is the unknown "medium" I was referring to.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Why name it God? Because with that come thousands of fallacies. Eden, Adam, Eve, Serpent, soul, heaven, hell, rules, judgment, resurrection, end of days (for Christians) and similar things in most other religions (though not in Buddhism or Advaita Hinduism). That is where we falter.
That is where we get enslaved.

 

[PureX]

Why name it God? Because with that come thousands of fallacies. Eden, Adam, Eve, Serpent, soul, heaven, hell, rules, judgment, resurrection, end of days (for Christians) and similar things in most other religions (though not in Buddhism or Advaita Hinduism). That is where we falter.
That is where we get enslaved.

Any of us can name it whatever we like. As it remains a mystery. And any of us can imagine it to be anything we like, because it remains a mystery. Meaning that any imagined characterization of the mystery is possible.

So why does this bother you? No one is right, here, and no one is wrong. At least not that any of us can determine.