Maybe God doesn't want to be found via the scientific method

[Quintessence]

Yes.

The scientific method is the best way to decipher reality. It is derived from reasoning by answering the question how can we know what is in reality and how can we explain it.

If you can come up with a method that is better than a scientific method me and probably the rest of the world would be happy to hear it.

This is an older post in the thread, but I think it's worth bringing up here. One of the issues I have with the notion of "proving" god has to do with how we define "reality" in the first place. The "reality" as acknowledged by the scientific method is a fairly limited rendering of that concept. It is in part because of this that science has limits as a discipline. It is not very good at dealing with Idea as a component of reality, only the impacts of Idea on human behavior.

By Idea, I basically mean anything which can be said to exist in the "mind" but resists reductive quantification by the scientific method. This would include abstract concepts like "love" or "aesthetics" and "justice" but also concepts like "deity." Attempting to scientifically prove these concepts doesn't tend to work very well. They clearly exist in some fashion of the meaning of existence, but science as a method is poor at framing them for understanding (or when it does frame them, it misses some of their essence).

This is where things like personal experience come into play, and with deity specifically, an individual can readily have personal experiences that they attribute to deity. But I'll leave that thread hanging for the moment.

 

[Skeptisch]

...an individual can readily have personal experiences that they attribute to deity. But I'll leave that thread hanging for the moment.

Sounds a little selfish, doesn’t it?

 

[Acim]

TAn obvious contradiction is: If you can do anything you can change the future, but if you already know the future you cannot change it.

Plausible workaround is that the concept of future is unreal, instead describing an illusion. Such that if change appears, it is changed now, but perhaps perceived later in illusion of future.

You are running into the same problem that Madhuri was. You are saying that everything is god or at least part of your god, yet you have no way of justifying this or proving that reality is in fact so. This statement is not proving anything but is just a continuation of your previous definition and can therefore be ignored.

This reasoning here is also how I argue the physical is not real. There is nothing within the physical to provide objective evidence of the physical, therefore the fundamental proof is lacking and resulting proofs within physical are arguably illusions of objectivity.

Not nessecarily. That would be like me saying you understand everything about yourself since you are you. That is demonastrable not true. The size of something does not create nessecary intelegence for it, so the statment that this enitiy knows all would also go unproven.

Again, if it is illusion of self that is unknown, it would be workaround to what is deemed not proven. To say we don't know ourselves seems like plausible assertion. To conclude we know that we don't know ourselves would in essence tell us that we know everything (there is to know).

These virtual particles that you are refeering in quantum physics do not pertain to the same definition of nothingness.
'Nothing' in philosophy does not equal 'nothing' in physics.

This assertion is explaining nothing. It is merely denying something.

 

[Quintessence]

Sounds a little selfish, doesn’t it?

Don't all experiences ultimately center around the individual, though (e.g. are "selfish)? To expand on that line of thought a bit, individual experiences are colored by personal worldview and by whatever the loci of focus is. By a certain way of defining "selfishness" it makes all human experience and interpretation of reality self-centered.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

But my point is still valid: it's about LIMITS. Do you really believe our limits are contained to the eyeball or the ear drum?

I believe my limits are about the same as yours. If you're able to know God, then I can investigate the claim. If no evidence for him exists for me (or others) to examine, then I can be sure that any claims you give about him must be unfounded suppositions on your part.

 

[Acim]

It is in part because of this that science has limits as a discipline. It is not very good at dealing with Idea as a component of reality, only the impacts of Idea on human behavior.

By Idea, I basically mean anything which can be said to exist in the "mind" but resists reductive quantification by the scientific method. This would include abstract concepts like "love" or "aesthetics" and "justice" but also concepts like "deity." Attempting to scientifically prove these concepts doesn't tend to work very well. They clearly exist in some fashion of the meaning of existence, but science as a method is poor at framing them for understanding (or when it does frame them, it misses some of their essence).

I still wait on evidence for existence of "science" and "scientific method" using scientific method.

If no evidence for it exists for me (or others) to examine, then I can be sure that any claims we give about it must be unfounded suppositions on our part.

 

[tumbleweed41]

I still wait on evidence for existence of "science" and "scientific method" using scientific method...

Science and the scientific method are simply systems of building and organizing knowledge in the form of testable and verifiable explanations and predictions.

They are not material objects that require verification for existence.
Nor are they supernatural suppositions that are unverifiable.

 

[Landerage]

The existence of something is a scientific question, so please post a good argument against this claim.

There's no such thing as proove to you the existence of something. The first facts you get from anything, you get by evidence and not by argument/proove/science, then the facts that comes after are usualy built on those evident facts. So everything is theorical

 

[Landerage]

Science and the scientific method are simply systems of building and organizing knowledge in the form of testable and verifiable explanations and predictions.

They are not material objects that require verification for existence.
Nor are they supernatural suppositions that are unverifiable.

That's another reason to folow those who have greater wisdom and intelligence then each of us

 

[The Sum of Awe]

I was just kidding Madhuri

 

[tumbleweed41]

That's another reason to folow those who have greater wisdom and intelligence then each of us

Or better yet, seek knowledge in the form of testable and verifiable explanations and predictions.
This is how one ejects ignorance and becomes wise and intelligent.

 

[Splarnst]

That's another reason to folow those who have greater wisdom and intelligence then each of us

Who?
...

 

[Landerage]

Or better yet, seek knowledge in the form of testable and verifiable explanations and predictions.
This is how one ejects ignorance and becomes wise and intelligent.

Science makes you more intelligent but never more wise

 

[Landerage]

Who?
...

The prophets sent by God

 

[Oneatatime]

I said he's obviously not interested in being detected on some barometer we've created. I'm raising the issue that it doesn't he's undetectable or we should stop looking

From the perspective of getting a better understanding of the natural world there is little or no value in the question of Gods existance because it can't be subject to experimention in order to be proven/disproven (In the provisional science sense of the words) and so offers nothing to our growing knowledge.

The main reason people continue to look for God is because they want confirmation of their faith in Gods existance. The flip-side of this are those who raise the issue because they dislike or are irritated by others faith in God because they themselves don't have faith in God and find the whole thing silly.

 

[McBell]

Would it be so hard for the big guy to remain undetected from senses such as these?

Ah, so "the big guy" likes playing hide and seek?

 

[tumbleweed41]

Science makes you more intelligent but never more wise

Never?

 

[McBell]

Science makes you more intelligent but never more wise

Your transference is showing.

 

[St Giordano Bruno]

Maybe this so called "God" does want to be found via religious indoctrination.

 

[idav]

Science makes you more intelligent but never more wise

Omni-science would make it so you wouldn't make a wrong decision. At that point wisdom would depend on your goal.