Do you believe in God?

[Lain]

Yes, certain people might have dug up dinosaur bones and make a T-Rex out of them or observed galaxies 14 billion light years from us but they're doing that job and doing that research because they're the experts, so I'm quite happy to accept that the dinosaur skeleton they created or red-shift they observed is accurate.

👍

And not only that, but in science, one expert's findings are then verified or proven false by other experts. Science is always setting out to see if it can disprove its own findings, so if someone's scientific idea is wrong, it'll be proven wrong eventually. That's why, as a non-expert, I can have reasonable "faith" in science.

I've seen no compelling reason to put faith in religion and people who claim to have had religious experiences such as talking to God. Unlike scientific experts who EARN their expert status, these people who claim to have spoken to God or have god speak to them are just self-proclaimed. There's no evidence that they've truthfully conversed with God. For all we know, they're just making it up or perhaps they're insane. And before you have faith in God, you've gotta have faith that the people who've taught you about God actually knew what they were talking about. The fact that they've got a story about meeting God, or have faith because someone told them a story about meeting God, isn't good enough.

 

[TankAss95]

Right. Firstly I would like to remind people that an argument over the existence of God needs an inclusion of philosophy. We cannot argue over the existence of God through science. There is no generally accepted definition of what science means, but I believe that: Science is the ongoing process of discovering truth about the natural world.
'If God exists, then he must be outside the natural world, and therefore the tools of science are not the right ones to learn about him.'-Francis Collins
Let's take a look at the three main explanations for the universe's existence: It was created (ridiculous by science). It has just always been (not accepted and impossible by science). It created itself or, 'The Big Bang'(accepted by science, but to be quite honest, I find this impossible and stupid (as of yet)).
I would like to make a bold and confident statement: Science cannot explain where the world came from. I say this because the big bang theory needs certain answers to be explained: How could a random explosion produce the elegant and dependable laws of nature that govern it? What exactly went 'Bang'!? Where did the necessary energy and matter come from?Did anything exist before time, space and matter? How did the laws of nature come about? But most importantly of all: Why is there something rather than nothing?

 

[Azuremen]

Right. Firstly I would like to remind people that an argument over the existence of God needs an inclusion of philosophy. We cannot argue over the existence of God through science.

The existence of God would be checking for an external element. Much like checking the existence of water on Mars.

There is no generally accepted definition of what science means, but I believe that: Science is the ongoing process of discovering truth about the natural world.

Science is more than the process, it is a method. And it is pretty clearly defined on what it is.

'If God exists, then he must be outside the natural world, and therefore the tools of science are not the right ones to learn about him.'-Francis Collins

You should stop using these. It is just someone finding an easy excuse to avoid science. There is no supporting evidence that God has to be outside the bounds of science.

Let's take a look at the three main explanations for the universe's existence: It was created (ridiculous by science).

Creation isn't so much ridicolous as the notion of an eternal being doing it and then placing an arbitrary set of laws on the entire thing regarding an infinite small part of it.

It has just always been (not accepted and impossible by science). It created itself or,

This is just wrong. Einstein proposed a static, eternal universe initially. Pretty sure he knew science.

'The Big Bang'(accepted by science, but to be quite honest, I find this impossible and stupid (as of yet)).

Supported by science, and certainly no more ridiclous than a deity prodding the universe into existence to create some life on one of a million, billion, trillion rocks in the thing, and then to make them effectively dance to his whims.

Makes perfect sense to me

I would like to make a bold and confident statement: Science cannot explain where the world came from. I say this because the big bang theory needs certain answers to be explained: How could a random explosion produce the elegant and dependable laws of nature that govern it? What exactly went 'Bang'!? Where did the necessary energy and matter come from?Did anything exist before time, space and matter? How did the laws of nature come about? But most importantly of all: Why is there something rather than nothing?

You make a bold statement that just turns into questions; hardly confident.

Science explains exactly why this rock we are on formed, which was from previous star dust resulting from previous stars that died. Science explains the process in which life would come about, and we have created basic life now from non living compounds. Things get put together as we get the info.

Mean while, you talk as if this all sounds crazy and instead suggest that some all power guy made everything and did all this crazy stuff so he could watch us flounder about aimlessly on some rock in a corner of dot on the map? And that he has an EVIL brother/rival/whatever that just wants to make us all suffer? And he can't do much about it besides say "he, that is bad, no?" And that if I don't believe that his son (who is part of himself anyhow) came down here and died so I could be forgiven for some mistake 2 people (who populated the planet) made because of a talking snake? And that I'm only okay if I say "hey, that guy died so I could be forgiven for some stuff I didn't do?" Which also screws a lot of people that didn't hear about this savoir dude for hundreds of years because some book never got there, till some people came and spread the word by killing people?

Or that things just ran into each so much, so often, that eventually something had to happen?

 

[homeforsummer]

Right. Firstly I would like to remind people that an argument over the existence of God needs an inclusion of philosophy. We cannot argue over the existence of God through science.

...and yet I've lost count of the number of times you've tried to offer some sort of "proof" either that a well respected scientific method is incorrect, or that some random happening somewhere was the work of a higher power.

Either play by your own rules and accept that the existence of God is essentially entirely a philosophical method and no "scientific" (pseudo-scientific in reality) theory can in any way prove anything about Him, or accept that scientific theories such as the big bang theory are pretty good, well-researched theories that explain many of the things that many consider to be the work of God.

 

[TankAss95]

The existence of God would be checking for an external element. Much like checking the existence of water on Mars.

Science is more than the process, it is a method. And it is pretty clearly defined on what it is.

You should stop using these. It is just someone finding an easy excuse to avoid science. There is no supporting evidence that God has to be outside the bounds of science.

Creation isn't so much ridicolous as the notion of an eternal being doing it and then placing an arbitrary set of laws on the entire thing regarding an infinite small part of it.

This is just wrong. Einstein proposed a static, eternal universe initially. Pretty sure he knew science.

Supported by science, and certainly no more ridiclous than a deity prodding the universe into existence to create some life on one of a million, billion, trillion rocks in the thing, and then to make them effectively dance to his whims.

Makes perfect sense to me

You make a bold statement that just turns into questions; hardly confident.

Science explains exactly why this rock we are on formed, which was from previous star dust resulting from previous stars that died. Science explains the process in which life would come about, and we have created basic life now from non living compounds. Things get put together as we get the info.

Mean while, you talk as if this all sounds crazy and instead suggest that some all power guy made everything and did all this crazy stuff so he could watch us flounder about aimlessly on some rock in a corner of dot on the map? And that he has an EVIL brother/rival/whatever that just wants to make us all suffer? And he can't do much about it besides say "he, that is bad, no?" And that if I don't believe that his son (who is part of himself anyhow) came down here and died so I could be forgiven for some mistake 2 people (who populated the planet) made because of a talking snake? And that I'm only okay if I say "hey, that guy died so I could be forgiven for some stuff I didn't do?" Which also screws a lot of people that didn't hear about this savoir dude for hundreds of years because some book never got there, till some people came and spread the word by killing people?

Or that things just ran into each so much, so often, that eventually something had to happen?

I believe in a monotheistic God (although God is one being, he exists in the persons. The Father, the Son (Jesus) and the Holy spirit. This is not a committee however, but three divine persons of equal glory and power). Therefore the God I am arguing for (the Christian God) cannot be studied because he does not exist of matter or energy. I like to explain God as being the author of science. Kinda like the universe is his painting. We cannot study the painting to find the painter (I hope I am saying what I am trying to say).
The definition of science is not clearly defined at all. In medieval times 'science' meant all knowledge. Nowadays there isn't a generally accepted definition of what science is from philosophers of science.
I am not finding an easy excuse to avoid science. I am stating the fact that the God I believe in cannot be studied with scientific tools. And there is no accepted scientific evidence of God in the first place anyway (I think). I actually encourage and take interest in science, but I think that science cannot explain ultimate questions, and trying to is a waste of effort.
To be quite honest I'm not sure what you mean about that ridiculous part.
Well maybe I am wrong about the idea of an eternal universe was not accepted by science. Whenever I asked my science teachers at school about anything that included infinity they dismissed it.
Christianity is the only world faith based on the identity of it's founder, rather than on his (Jesus's) teachings, which means that anyone wanting to destroy Christianity must deal with Jesus Christ. The evidence for Jesus is overwhelming. Albert Einstein said: "No man can deny Jesus ever existed." Even Dawkins suggests that Jesus "probably existed".
Science does not explain why things happen, it explains how, and it does this never in certainty. I am confused at why you are so confident about the scientific explanation as to how life began. As far as I know it science cannot explain the origin of life, or in fact the origin of the universe itself. Just think of this: Before evolution can begin there has to be something capable of evolving, or rather before natural selection gets under way there has to be something to select. Look at DNA, an amazing molecule packed with a staggering amount of genetic information arranged in a highly organised code, or language, that allows all living things to function, grow and reproduce. It has been said that more information is housed in the DNA of each one of the trillions of cells in a human body than in the entire Encyclopaedia Britannica. Information theory expert Professor Werner Gitt said, "There is no known natural law through which matter can rise to information, neither is there any physical process or material phenomenon known that can do this." Where did this information come from? Surely this means that the information found in DNA must have had an intelligent source? Dawkins once said, "We don't know how life itself began."

Oh, and can someone please tell me how I can split someone's post into different sections so that I can respond more fluently, on the phone app? Thanks.

 

[arora]

Oh, and can someone please tell me how I can split someone's post into different sections so that I can respond more fluently, on the phone app? Thanks.

You can make the quote boxes manually, just type [QUOTE ] pasted text [/QUOTE ]

without the space before ]

pasted text

 

[Tesla]

Yes, Jesus existed, but Jesus Christ, the son of "God", did not.

 

[niky]

Actually... there is also some debate as to whether Jesus Christ, the man, existed. Though I doubt the early Church would have needed to invent an imaginary preacher rather than adopting an existing one to base its theology around.

 

[Hun200kmh]

Actually... there is also some debate as to whether Jesus Christ, the man, existed. Though I doubt the early Church would have needed to invent an imaginary preacher rather than adopting an existing one to base its theology around.

What Church needed a man to follow? The Christian one?

I can see the Monty Pythonesque sketch already, with one of the first popes asking his bishops "hey guys, who do we say we're disciples of in order to base OUR theology based on HIS teachings? "

 

[homeforsummer]

Actually... there is also some debate as to whether Jesus Christ, the man, existed. Though I doubt the early Church would have needed to invent an imaginary preacher rather than adopting an existing one to base its theology around.

That'd be my thoughts too. And not just the Christian church - he appears in the Qur'an and Torah too if I'm not mistaken, just devoid of any supernatural powers. I'm quite happy to believe that Jesus existed, but his "miracles" seem to be no more than the artistic exaggerations of a few sycophantic followers...

Kinda like the universe is his painting. We cannot study the painting to find the painter (I hope I am saying what I am trying to say).

Poor analogy. Provided you know the painter's hallmarks, you can quite easily study a painting to determine the painter. You can also study the painting to find out when it was painted, what materials were used and whether the painter was left or right handed, amongst other things.

If you were using the same analogy for the universe, and things like life are his hallmarks, we should be able to find evidence of God by studying the cosmos. Which we know isn't possible, of course.

The definition of science is not clearly defined at all.

noun /ˈsīəns/ 
sciences, plural

"The intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment"

Source

Seems clearly defined to me.

And there is no accepted scientific evidence of God in the first place anyway (I think)

We've been telling you that for probably a hundred pages now, but you seem happy to use the absence of scientific theory in certain fields to prove the existence of God, which isn't possible either.

I think that science cannot explain ultimate questions, and trying to is a waste of effort.

At what point do you draw the line though? It seems both defeatist and non-natural to just "give up" at some point and accept that science can't find the answer to something. The whole point of science is to find the answers, so as long as there are gaps in our knowledge we can use the tools of science to fill them.

As far as I know it science cannot explain the origin of life, or in fact the origin of the universe itself. Just think of this: Before evolution can begin there has to be something capable of evolving, or rather before natural selection gets under way there has to be something to select. Look at DNA, an amazing molecule packed with a staggering amount of genetic information arranged in a highly organised code, or language, that allows all living things to function, grow and reproduce. It has been said that more information is housed in the DNA of each one of the trillions of cells in a human body than in the entire Encyclopaedia Britannica.

I've literally lost count of how many times I've attempted to explain how early life developed in this thread and the evolution thread - several at least, since you first appeared in this thread. If you're coming back to this same point without having attempted to read what I've posted before, I'm wasting my time.

Information theory expert Professor Werner Gitt said, "There is no known natural law through which matter can rise to information, neither is there any physical process or material phenomenon known that can do this."

Newsflash: Creationist says we don't know scientifically how life developed. What a shocker. Using him to illustrate a point is immediately null and void.

Where did this information come from? Surely this means that the information found in DNA must have had an intelligent source? Dawkins once said, "We don't know how life itself began."

Unsurprisingly, I can't find that Dawkins quote anywhere on the internet that hasn't been taken out of context by creationists from whichever book he wrote it in. Until I've seen it in context I can't really trust it as a valid point.

 

[arora]

Unsurprisingly, I can't find that Dawkins quote anywhere on the internet that hasn't been taken out of context by creationists from whichever book he wrote it in. Until I've seen it in context I can't really trust it as a valid point.

Is it this?

An origin of life, anywhere, consists of the chance arising of a self-replicating entity. Nowadays, the replicator that matters on Earth is the DNA molecule, but the original replicator probably was not DNA. We don't know what it was. Unlike DNA, the original replicating molecules cannot have relied upon complicated machinery to duplicate them. Although, in some sense, they must have been equivalent to ‘Duplicate me’ instructions, the language’ in which the instructions were written was not a highly formalized language. such that only a complicated machine could obey them. The original replicator cannot have needed elaborate decoding, as DNA instructions and computer viruses do today. Self-duplication was an inherent property of the entity's structure just as, say, hardness is an inherent property of a diamond, something that does not have to be ‘decoded’ and ‘obeyed’. We can be sure that the original replicators, unlike their later successors the DNA molecules, did not have complicated decoding and instruction-obeying machinery, because complicated machinery is the kind of thing that arises in the world only after many generations of evolution. And evolution does not get started until there are replicators. In the teeth of the so-called ‘Catch-22 of the origin of life’ (see below), the original self-duplicating entities must have been simple enough to arise by the spontaneous accidents of chemistry.

 

[Encyclopedia]

Tankass95, I really do admire your enthusiasm, but I do suggest you read up a bit on scientific philosophy as well as check your sources of information critically.

Also, quotes from the bible are a particularly poor kind of argument as it has no meaning whatsoever to a non-believer.

This is not meant to be rude at all, it is an attempt of constructive critisism.

 

[TankAss95]

Tankass95, I really do admire your enthusiasm, but I do suggest you read up a bit on scientific philosophy as well as check your sources of information critically.

Also, quotes from the bible are a particularly poor kind of argument as it has no meaning whatsoever to a non-believer.

This is not meant to be rude at all, it is an attempt of constructive critisism.

No, I don't think your being rude at all. Firstly, although I have used inaccurate information from sources in the past, I don't think I have made any mistakes like this in my last two points.
As I have said before, Christianity is the only world faith based on the identity of it's founder (Jesus), rather on his teachings, which means that anybody wanting to destroy Christianity must first deal with Jesus Christ. Quoting the Bible is basically the only way to represent Christianity. Right now I'm not sure wether I should represent Christianity in this discussion, or just represent God (intelligent design).
My main point that I'm trying to get across is that I believe science is limited. I watched a program on the discovery channel yesterday. I think it was called 'Does God Exist' or something. It was basically Stephen Hawkins explaining the progress of Science, or more particularly, Physics. He thinks that the beginning of our universe can be explained through physics, and that there is no need for a God, because science's explanation is simpler, and therefore more believable.
During the program he mentioned events in which the catholic church discouraged or condemned certain types of science. This was all a bit unsettling for me to watch. I would like to make it clear that I in no way support the views of these people. I encourage science.
So he explained anti-matter, that we are not at the middle of the universe, that matter and energy were basically the same, and he very lightly touched on quantum mechanics.
After his explanation however, I felt a bit disappointed. He said that before the big bang there was no time, therefore nothing happened before it. I would have to research his work further, but I personally don't think this explains pure origin of his theory. Basically I ask, 'Where does dimension come from?'

 

[homeforsummer]

Is it this?

Could be, in which case the paraphrased quote has been hugely simplified and omits a great deal of important detail. Unsurprisingly.

I have used inaccurate information from sources in the past, I don't think I have made any mistakes like this in my last two points.

Apart from the ones I refer to in the posts you don't respond to.

 

[Encyclopedia]

text

So you base your belief that God exists at least partly on the fact that science isn't perfect?

How does that make a case for God? It seems like the god of the gaps theory to me. Thrust god into where there's currently no information/knowledge.

 

[TankAss95]

That'd be my thoughts too. And not just the Christian church - he appears in the Qur'an and Torah too if I'm not mistaken, just devoid of any supernatural powers. I'm quite happy to believe that Jesus existed, but his "miracles" seem to be no more than the artistic exaggerations of a few sycophantic followers...

If that were true then I find it very strange as to why the story of the crucifiction and all of the miracles performed by Jesus spread so rapidly without help by any organisation. The story of Jesus was actually opposed at the time. Why would people risk their lives telling people something they did not think was true?

Poor analogy. Provided you know the painter's hallmarks, you can quite easily study a painting to determine the painter. You can also study the painting to find out when it was painted, what materials were used and whether the painter was left or right handed, amongst other things.

If you were using the same analogy for the universe, and things like life are his hallmarks, we should be able to find evidence of God by studying the cosmos. Which we know isn't possible, of course.

Yeah okay poor analogy, but it does help me understand it. I like to describe God as the author of science.
I have to disagree with that other statement. I find many indicators in the universe that suggests a creator. Think about the perfect posistioning of our planet, along with the other factors that contribute to the perfect conditions for life that we live in.
Also think about the complexity of DNA.

Seems clearly defined to me.

I never argued over the definition of science, I just stated that many people argue over what science actually means. I was stating my view.

We've been telling you that for probably a hundred pages now, but you seem happy to use the absence of scientific theory in certain fields to prove the existence of God, which isn't possible either.

Well you are kind of right there. Science cannot explain the origin of theories. I believe that the origin of both the universe and life cannot be explained by the laws of nature. A supernatural event I believe is the only possibility for such events, and I believe that is the monotheistic, Christian God.

At what point do you draw the line though? It seems both defeatist and non-natural to just "give up" at some point and accept that science can't find the answer to something. The whole point of science is to find the answers, so as long as there are gaps in our knowledge we can use the tools of science to fill them.

That is perfectly true, except I find my view to be neither defeatist nor non-natural. I would be all means encourage the understanding of our universe, I am just saying that I also believe however, that science is limited. I strongly believe that science cannot explain the ultimate questions that we asked as children, and that encludes the questioning of the origions of the universe and life.

I've literally lost count of how many times I've attempted to explain how early life developed in this thread and the evolution thread - several at least, since you first appeared in this thread. If you're coming back to this same point without having attempted to read what I've posted before, I'm wasting my time.

To be quite honest I dont care about early life, I want to hear an athiest answer where the first life came from, and how. All life needs complex information such as DNA or RNA (I think). I doubt that protiens and other molecules can blindly bond without order to make such perfection and complexity.

Newsflash: Creationist says we don't know scientifically how life developed. What a shocker. Using him to illustrate a point is immediately null and void.

Play the ball, not the man. I'm sorry but I find that a childish response.
So do you know specifically how the first life form developed?

Unsurprisingly, I can't find that Dawkins quote anywhere on the internet that hasn't been taken out of context by creationists from whichever book he wrote it in. Until I've seen it in context I can't really trust it as a valid point.

It's from: Newsnight Review, BBC 1,9 September 2009.

So you base your belief that God exists at least partly on the fact that science isn't perfect?

How does that make a case for God? It seems like the god of the gaps theory to me. Thrust god into where there's currently no information/knowledge.

I think I have explained above.

 

[homeforsummer]

If that were true then I find it very strange as to why the story of the crucifiction and all of the miracles performed by Jesus spread so rapidly without help by any organisation. The story of Jesus was actually opposed at the time. Why would people risk their lives telling people something they did not think was true?

And yet it's also largely exclusive to the Christian religion, and yet not Islam or Judaism, both religions in which Jesus was said to exist. Why is it only Christians who saw the miracles?

I have to disagree with that other statement. I find many indicators in the universe that suggests a creator. Think about the perfect posistioning of our planet, along with the other factors that contribute to the perfect conditions for life that we live in.
Also think about the complexity of DNA.

It only seems "perfect" because we attribute perfection to it. We see evidence only for ourselves in the universe and think "well, we're the only ones here and we're perfect, so it must have been a God".

Sorry, but that doesn't wash with me. Most of the universe is spectacularly complicated. DNA is equally so, but it's still essentially just a certain mix of chemicals in a universe full of different mixes of chemicals.

I never argued over the definition of science, I just stated that many people argue over what science actually means. I was stating my view.

Err, no. You said:

The definition of science is not clearly defined at all.

....and I'm saying that's wrong. I gave you a clearly defined definition, the exact opposite of what you said. There's no argument about it.

Well you are kind of right there. Science cannot explain the origin of theories. I believe that the origin of both the universe and life cannot be explained by the laws of nature. A supernatural event I believe is the only possibility for such events, and I believe that is the monotheistic, Christian God.

In which case, why the Christian God? Why not another God? Are all the other religions wrong? There are more Hindus than there are Christians, does that make their view of the World's creation more right than yours?

To be quite honest I dont care about early life, I want to hear an athiest answer where the first life came from, and how. All life needs complex information such as DNA or RNA (I think). I doubt that protiens and other molecules can blindly bond without order to make such perfection and complexity.

In the absence of scientific evidence, "God did it" is not a suitable, like-for-like explanation. As Famine has stated several times in this thread, we can already explain everything that happened following an infinitesimally small amount of time after the big bang and a great many very intelligent people are still working to find what happened in that bit we don't know.

Likewise with life. If you simplify the process too much you end up with lots of gaps. Your knowledge clearly illustrates this - you're going from proteins to them miraculously bonding to DNA and assuming it's all perfect, rather than - again, as has been discussed over and over ad nauseum - the fact that all that took place over millions upon millions of years and that it certainly wasn't perfect for much of that time.

Play the ball, not the man. I'm sorry but I find that a childish response.

Then you find wrong.

You posted a link from a fairly well-known creationist, claiming him to be an "Information theory expert" when the only information he's prepared to accept is that of creationism. That makes his comment of:

"There is no known natural law through which matter can rise to information, neither is there any physical process or material phenomenon known that can do this."

...irrelevant, because he's speaking with a great deal of bias in his own beliefs. If Professor Stephen Hawking came out and said something like that having researched it deeply, then it'd be relevant to the discussion.

As it is, you can't use the "scientific evidence" of a creationist in order to illustrate a scientific point.

So do you know specifically how the first life form developed?

Not exactly, but I've explained the process in as much detail as I understand three or four times in this and other threads and I've no interest in doing so again. I'm not paid to know about it in great detail and my knowledge only goes up to a certain point. Since I'm not paid, I get bored of repeating myself after the third or fourth time when the people I'm discussing with didn't take the time to read it the first time.

It's from: Newsnight Review, BBC 1,9 September 2009.

Finally found a link to the show (in future, please provide it rather than making me search for it). It's getting late so I'll watch it and comment tomorrow.

 

[TankAss95]

^To homeforsummer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X10YnmX35GE&feature=youtube_gdata_player
Above is the link where Dawkins makes the statement. Watch from the beginning to around 2 mins in.
I'll respond to the rest of your post when I have time in the future.

 

[Akira AC]

I found funny how everything remotely relevant (as where the conception of god as a mental construction, as well some other things) is carefully avoided.

As I mentioned way back in this thread, I wonder what theists think about god as a mental/psychological construction and the probability of god being just an idea rather than an existing entity.

Of course such thing will most likely be overlooked, however it will prove an obvious point.

 

[homeforsummer]

^To homeforsummer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X10YnmX35GE&feature=youtube_gdata_player
Above is the link where Dawkins makes the statement. Watch from the beginning to around 2 mins in.
I'll respond to the rest of your post when I have time in the future.

Had a look at the vid.

Dawkins essentially says the same as any of the rest of us have been saying in this discussion:

- It's not a weakness of science not to know all the answers, as science is about the process of finding those answers.
- Filling in gaps in our knowledge with "God did it" isn't sufficient. It doesn't teach us anything about ourselves, it essentially puts a dog-eared sticking plaster over a wound in our knowledge.
- DNA didn't appear magically - individual genes formed before it, and our research doesn't yet fully explain how those genes were able to replicate with such accuracy (though as I pointed out above, it's important to remember that this process from having zero life to having the very, very simplest forms of life took millions of years, so accuracy in replicating genes was unlikely to be a quick process)

And this one deserves its own paragraph:
- The semi-creationist theory that God gave the building blocks of life a kick-start and left everything else to it is a bit weak - if he was able to do that, why not just build humans like they appeared in Genesis? Or indeed, why allow Genesis to be written if he knew it was inaccurate? If he was giving us a challenge to try and find how life on this planet began with him kick-starting it, why allow the book of Genesis to set human research back tens of hundreds of years when it could have been much less illustrative and much more literal?

And if God was only needed for that tiny, tiny jump from proteins to genes, why is it such a jump of the imagination to think that God was needed at all? We already know how protein forms and we can already explain DNA, there's just a few details in our knowledge yet to be filled in, and one day they likely will be.

Why is it so important to fill in that gap with God? Or is this some kind of automatic defense procedure from believers, that as many of their other beliefs are eroded away as science is able to explain more about ourselves and our universe, they become all the more resolute in filling in our (rapidly decreasing) gaps by saying it must have been God?

 

[Hun200kmh]

I don't understand how the Universe is a gap. The way I see it God is above, beyond, before, and after the Universe, the Universes. The Alpha and the Omega, beggining and end (concepts we use when in reality the very concept of God implies no beginning and no end -----> eternity is a much better word).

If one believes in the existence of God, then it's not a question of "filling" a gap. If it is just that then we're not talking about God.

If one doesn't, then there's the gaps to be filled. How di the Universe start? Big Bang. What before? Big shrunk. What before? Big Bang again. No beginning, no end and no God, just matter and anti-matter and whatever else, because science will fill all gaps.


To conclude: I think you're getting it wrong homeforsummer. Filling the gaps is science's specialty, not God's.

 

[homeforsummer]

Not at all. Believers who attempt to fill in science's gaps with deist explanations are getting it wrong.

Either believe that God created everything himself or believe that there's a scientific explanation for everything. Don't attempt to fill in gaps in scientific explanation with "God did it".

 

[Hun200kmh]

What about believing that God created everything and that everything he created works according to rules he designed?

In other words, why should God create a chaotic world, designed with the purpose of stopping us to understand the physical world surrounding us?

Science, in a way, is like reverse engineering. Faced with a creation already created, scientists try to figure out how it works, how it came to be and even how to replicate it or parts of it.

To believe - or not - in the creator of such a creation is the big question.

 

[Encyclopedia]

What about believing that God created everything and that everything he created works according to rules he designed?

In other words, why should God create a chaotic world, designed with the purpose of stopping us to understand the physical world surrounding us?

Science, in a way, is like reverse engineering. Faced with a creation already created, scientists try to figure out how it works, how it came to be and even how to replicate it or parts of it.

To believe - or not - in the creator of such a creation is the big question.

The problem is when people use those gaps of knowledge to justify the belief in god/gods though. Which a lot of people do.


As for your last sentence, that's what we are discussing.

 

[homeforsummer]

The problem is when people use those gaps of knowledge to justify the belief in god/gods though. Which a lot of people do.

As for your last sentence, that's what we are discussing.

^ This.

People are free to believe that God created everything if they wish (I'll disagree with them, but they're free to believe in it), but you can't use gaps in human knowledge as a way of proving that God exists - which many people are attempting to do. Lack of human evidence for something doesn't prove the existence of deist evidence.

 

[Touring Mars]

What about believing that God created everything and that everything he created works according to rules he designed?

In other words, why should God create a chaotic world, designed with the purpose of stopping us to understand the physical world surrounding us?

Science, in a way, is like reverse engineering. Faced with a creation already created, scientists try to figure out how it works, how it came to be and even how to replicate it or parts of it.

To believe - or not - in the creator of such a creation is the big question.

This begs an obvious question - why would a God (or anyone/thing else for that matter) create a universe, create time (and hence cause and effect), create life etc., that all appear to point to the same thing i.e. that the Universe and life did have a beginning? Of all the possible ways to create life on Earth, for example, why choose one of the myriad options that makes it look exactly like life has evolved??

This is a major problem for theists, because it implies that a) either the creator is disingenious and deliberately creating stuff that just looks like it wasn't created (but that it actually was) or b) it actually wasn't created.

Science just tells it like it is - and if actual observations can be explained without having to appeal to the guiding hand of some unspecified creator, then that's fine. If one believes in a creator and claims to know anything about them at all, then the onus is on you to tell the rest of us how you know this, who they are, and how they have done what you are claiming they have done.

 

[homeforsummer]

This is a major problem for theists, because it implies that a) either the creator is disingenious and deliberately creating stuff that just looks like it wasn't created (but that it actually was) or b) it actually wasn't created.

👍 And that leads me onto the question I posed before:

The semi-creationist theory that God gave the building blocks of life a kick-start and left everything else to it is a bit weak - if he was able to do that, why not just build humans like they appeared in Genesis? Or indeed, why allow Genesis to be written if he knew it was inaccurate? If he was giving us a challenge to try and find how life on this planet began with him kick-starting it, why allow the book of Genesis to set human research back tens of hundreds of years when it could have been much less illustrative and much more literal?

Why create a universe so that we may discover its workings, and then allow religion to propagate the massively stylized and inaccurate theory of creation as described in the Old Testament?

 

[Touring Mars]

Why create a universe so that we may discover its workings, and then allow religion to propagate the massively stylized and inaccurate theory of creation as described in the Old Testament?

Well quite.

Science is a product of the fact that we were never furnished with any information to begin with. And it would be quite wrong to think that, despite not being born with all the answers, our species was created with the ability to learn, hence that's why we were not given all the answers to begin with - as if a would-be creator had the option to, but just didn't for some reason. Our true history, as pieced together through actual, tangible evidence, tells a very different story....

I think Carl Sagan summed it up best: we are a way for the Cosmos to know itself. But it has taken billions of years for that self-recognition to occur - atleast in this neck of the woods anyway - but it's fair to say that life on Earth (specifically the human species) was not gifted any of that information - not by God, not by aliens, but that everything we know today was learned by the application of our intellectual abilities and reasoning skills... and those skills were not given to us by God, or by aliens, either - they were hard-earned by our species through a billions-year long struggle.

I personally find our real evolutionary history a stunning story - made even more amazing by the fact that it is actually true. Of course, it loses some of the magic if you choose to disregard the evidence and opt instead to believe that everything that we've achieved, everything that we know and will ever know, and everything that we really are, was all just handed to us on a plate by some nameless, eternally mysterious and totally inscrutible sky fairy.

 

[homeforsummer]

I personally find our real evolutionary history a stunning story - made even more amazing by the fact that it is actually true. Of course, it loses some of the magic if you choose to disregard the evidence and opt instead to believe that everything that we've achieved, everything that we know and will ever know, and everything that we really are, was all just handed to us on a plate by some nameless, eternally mysterious and totally inscrutible sky fairy.

This, one thousand times.

There's no excitement or challenge in religion or belief in God. You get what you're given and can take it or leave it, but you're essentially granted the right to waive a thirst for knowledge of our surroundings. You can appreciate your surroundings for sure, but the buzz is taken away from finding out how it all actually happens.

 

[TheCracker]

This, one thousand times.

There's no excitement or challenge in religion or belief in God. You get what you're given and can take it or leave it, but you're essentially granted the right to waive a thirst for knowledge of our surroundings. You can appreciate your surroundings for sure, but the buzz is taken away from finding out how it all actually happens.

Science = How It's Made
Religion = reverse Mythbusters