Atheism is incompatible with science

[Arbenol]

8 minutes ago, Mr Walker said:

He sees agnosticism as the correct starting  point for science.

 

Belief, or otherwise, in god is irrelevant to scientific inquiry. Therefore no proposition on it's existence is necessary as a starting point for science.

Atheism is no more incompatible with science than belief in god. Conflict only occurs when science reveals truths that are incompatible with dogmatic religious beliefs. When science reveals truths incompatible with atheism we can revisit the question.

Edited March 25, 2019 by Arbenol

[psyche101]

1 hour ago, Habitat said:

I would say it is basically just adding finer detail to the existing picture. Which is obviously extremely interesting and important work, or Billions would not have been invested in particle accelerators and the like. I'd say the main driver is technology, though, not "God" problems.

But those particle accelerators gave us 'the god particle' which many said what you are now saying avout virtual particles. Virtual particles when observed will answer the riddle of existance completely. The theory is sound, and like the Higgs, there's no good reason to think we won't find it. 

God is superfluous. This work is being done to know how the universe cans to be. Sure its not specifically made to discount God, but that is a side effect of discovery. 

You have said many times that such advances in science won't solve the riddle of existence, yet they are on track to do just that. I'm not sure why you think it's impossible to find an answer, when we have found one, our pursuit is simply verification, as hard a task as that is, it doesn't seem impossible. 

[Habitat]

1 minute ago, psyche101 said:

But those particle accelerators gave us 'the god particle'

Yet the man himself, (Higgs) was dismissive of the "god particle" talk. As I have said many times, even the most inventive of science fiction writers could not come up with a plausible scenario that has particle physics "explaining" existence, so what would sound plausible to you if you heard it ? Or are we to accept some unfathomable to the layman, mathematical formula ( again, no such speculation currently poses as a solution) as the answer, and take it on trust, like people took on trust the dogma of the church ?

[ChrLzs]

5 minutes ago, Habitat said:

Yet the man himself, (Higgs) was dismissive of the "god particle" talk.

...and they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.  I agree with Higgs, that calling it a God Particle is stupid.  So what?

Do you honestly think that is a useful analogy?  What's the evidence for a 'God Particle' in Poltergeistery?

 

Seriously, this junk is like herding cats...

Edited March 25, 2019 by ChrLzs

[Habitat]

5 minutes ago, ChrLzs said:

...and they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.  I agree with Higgs, that calling it a God Particle is stupid.  So what?

Do you honestly think that is a useful analogy?  What's the evidence for a 'God Particle' in Poltergeistery?

 

Seriously, this junk is like herding cats...

In case you hadn't noticed, this isn't the poltergeist thread !

[psyche101]

21 minutes ago, Habitat said:

Yet the man himself, (Higgs) was dismissive of the "god particle" talk.

That's a skeptical position. For all the whining from the so called spiritual people about skeptics, they don't seem to get the same apllies to everything. Even the Sciences they fear and despise so much. 

21 minutes ago, Habitat said:

As I have said many times, even the most inventive of science fiction writers could not come up with a plausible scenario that has particle physics "explaining" existence, so what would sound plausible to you if you heard it ?

Are you unaware of virtual particle theory? What Lawrence Krausses 'something from nothing' is entirely based upon? 

21 minutes ago, Habitat said:

Or are we to accept some unfathomable to the layman, mathematical formula ( again, no such speculation currently poses as a solution) as the answer, and take it on trust, like people took on trust the dogma of the church ?

There's the dumbed down version from the people you despise, like Sean Carroll who bring these theories to the layman in paperbacks so we can grasp it. I got it Hab. Seriously, if I can get it anyone can. Some just fear it. I suspect you are simply unaware of these resources and have never approached them. They bring the very difficult within grasp. 

[Habitat]

12 minutes ago, psyche101 said:

Are you unaware of virtual particle theory? What Lawrence Krausses 'something from nothing' is entirely based upon? 

This sounds eerily like Hawking's idea of the spontaneous creation of matter. No doubt your theory suffers from the same problem, the mechanism that allows "something from nothing", then needs to be explained, for its origins.

[hereticspl]

On 21/03/2019 at 2:05 PM, crookedspiral said:

Another blow to the New Atheist movement and it's claim that we live in a meaningless Universe.

I believe that atheism by it's very nature requires you to come up with your own meaning for existence. If they believed it was meaningless anyone who is an atheist would just lie down and die. Established religions are so afraid of that idea because it means that they lose control.

[hereticspl]

53 minutes ago, Habitat said:

This sounds eerily like Hawking's idea of the spontaneous creation of matter. No doubt your theory suffers from the same problem, the mechanism that allows "something from nothing", then needs to be explained, for its origins.

Something from nothing can be explained when nothing is assumed to be something we dont have the capability of detecting. Forces so obscure or minute that they evade current measurement but when they interact together form something that we can detect.

[eight bits]

3 hours ago, Mr Walker said:

For me it is very simple, rather than incoherent  

He sees agnosticism as the correct starting  point for science.

If you  go into any scientific investigation with a bias, this will affect  the outcomes of the experiment;  so (in testing for god) a scientist should begin from a neutral position

I don't know if that is how science actually works today,  but once upon a time,  we were taught that it  is how it SHOULD work 

I'm OK with taking a step back from the specific phrasing in the article. It's (presumably) a transcript of a spontaneus spoken interview, and maybe not a polished presentation of his thoughts on what is, perhaps we would all agree, a set of complicated questions.

There are a number of views about science in general, including social realism: that scientists are human beings and so all of them begin with biases. What science accomplishes in this view is to arrive at approximations to the truth despite those biases. Part of that is the systematic exposure of scientists' views to one another's criticism, the "social" part of social realism.

Maybe my bias has prevented me from seeing some possible explanation for the data, but because somebody else saw it, I am now impelled back into the lab to find out whether that is the explanation or not - even if I still think it's silly. Then what happens in the lab decides the issue. In other words, I don't have to be a saint, I just need other sinners with different initial views, different biases.

Actually, it sounds just like the kind of plan that would appeal to a bunch of apes

Regardless, science works for theist scientists, it works for atheist scientists, and it works for agnostic scientists (Huxley was a scientist by trade). It works for Trumpsters, and it works for Bernie boosters. It works for Red Sox fans, and Yankees fans. It even works for those who call soccer "football." None of that matters. You check it all at the door when you enter the lab.

The only time there's trouble is when somebody can't bring themselves to check their luggage at the door. In other words, dogmatism, specifically in the sense of being beyond persuasion by evidence, is what's incompatible with science. Maybe that's what the professor meant, that dogmatic atheism is incompatible with science. I'd agree with that in the sense that dogmatism as such is incompatible, but I don't know that that's what he meant, for the reasons stated in the earlier post.

 

Edited March 25, 2019 by eight bits
canine dogmatism is peachy

[Essan]

On 3/23/2019 at 4:13 PM, Will Due said:

 

Science is not in opposition to God because the scientific method works to reveal and clarify God's truths and laws.

Atheism is incompatible with science when it takes an antagonistic attitude towards God, based on what science discovers and reveals.

 

 

Science is not in opposition to nature because the scientific method works to reveal and clarify nature's truths and laws.

Religion is incompatible with science when it takes an antagonistic attitude towards nature, based on what science discovers and reveals.|

[Essan]

On 3/23/2019 at 4:33 PM, Will Due said:

 

Do you think the same can be said about scientists who are atheists?

That they don't let their personal beliefs bias their work?

 

 

Absolutely!

In the same way that they don't let their lack of any interest at all in Burundian baseball, or the fact they don't even know if baseball is actually even played in Burundi, bias their work

Edited March 25, 2019 by Essan

[+Noteverythingisaconspiracy]

Even if all we know about science should be proven wrong tomorrow it does not prove a god. All it would prove is that we don't know. 

"We don't know, therefore god" is not science.

[Will Due]

3 minutes ago, Noteverythingisaconspiracy said:

"We don't know, therefore god" is not science.

 

And also, it is not because we know science, therefore no God.

 

 

[danydandan]

23 minutes ago, Will Due said:

 

And also, it is not because we know science, therefore no God.

 

 

Out of curiosity, Will. May i ask if you'd change your opinion if a hypothetical experiment was carried out?

If your good self, an atheist and I came up with a set number of parameters for an experiment. Which would br agreed upon prior to conducting this hypothetical experiment. 

It the experiment came back negative, would you accept the result of this hypothetical experiment? 

Negative = Existence of God is not possible.

Edited March 25, 2019 by danydandan

[Will Due]

 

Hypothetical?

God doesn't play dice with the universe. Why should I?

But you go right ahead and roll the dice @danydandan.

 

 

Edited March 25, 2019 by Will Due

[danydandan]

3 minutes ago, Will Due said:

 

Hypothetical?

God doesn't play dice with the universe. Why should I?

But you go right ahead and roll the dice @danydandan.

 

 

You're going to quote an Atheist? 

Yeah it's a hypothetical question, so I'm right to assume no matter how much information contrary to your belief's, even if this information is 100% verified, you would not change your opinion?

[Doug1029]

13 hours ago, Habitat said:

Yet the man himself, (Higgs) was dismissive of the "god particle" talk. As I have said many times, even the most inventive of science fiction writers could not come up with a plausible scenario that has particle physics "explaining" existence, so what would sound plausible to you if you heard it ? Or are we to accept some unfathomable to the layman, mathematical formula ( again, no such speculation currently poses as a solution) as the answer, and take it on trust, like people took on trust the dogma of the church ?

The name "god particle" is confusing.  Proof that the particle exists in no way proves or disproves god.  What it does is explain some details of particle physics.  It means that physicists are on the right track.  It does not mean they are "there" yet.

Doug

[Podo]

12 hours ago, hereticspl said:

I believe that atheism by it's very nature requires you to come up with your own meaning for existence. If they believed it was meaningless anyone who is an atheist would just lie down and die. Established religions are so afraid of that idea because it means that they lose control.

That's a powerful assumption. I have seen nothing that would convince me that our existences aren't utterly meaningless, but that doesn't mean that I want to give up. On the contrary, it gives me the drive to make the best of what I have. I am incredibly privileged to even be alive, as are we all.

[hereticspl]

8 minutes ago, Podo said:

That's a powerful assumption. I have seen nothing that would convince me that our existences aren't utterly meaningless, but that doesn't mean that I want to give up. On the contrary, it gives me the drive to make the best of what I have. I am incredibly privileged to even be alive, as are we all.

I'm sorry I may not have worded that correctly but that's exactly what my point was. You have discovered your own reason to live. Your free.

[Podo]

6 minutes ago, hereticspl said:

I'm sorry I may not have worded that correctly but that's exactly what my point was. You have discovered your own reason to live. Your free.

No harm no foul! Glad we understand each other

[eight bits]

4 hours ago, danydandan said:

You're going to quote an Atheist? 

Say what? Perhaps I miunderstand which of the three lines of Will's post you were attributing to an atheist, but the usual attribution of "God doesn't play dice with the universe" is Albert Einstein.

If so, then the reference to God is figurative; nobody had proposed that God literally plays dice. That said, the statement is consistent with the generally deist drift of Einstein's statements that really were about his own views on the Question of God. The deist God doesn't actively participate in the natural world, with or without dice. Deists aren't atheists, however.

I suppose one could argue that Spinoza was an atheist (his Jewish congregation claimed so when it expelled him). and that Einstein's admiration for Spinoza would make Einstein an atheist, too. Both legs of that argument are a stretch, IMO, but ...

... since the topic is the claim that atheism is incompatible with science, and Einstein is a bona fide counterexample to that claim, I thought it worth pointing out the problem, or at a minimum making you work harder for it than simply to assert it.

Besides, now Will can't say I never did anything for him

 

Edited March 25, 2019 by eight bits

[Habitat]

3 hours ago, Doug1o29 said:

The name "god particle" is confusing.  Proof that the particle exists in no way proves or disproves god.  What it does is explain some details of particle physics.  It means that physicists are on the right track.  It does not mean they are "there" yet.

Doug

As I say, a few more pieces added to a large jigsaw puzzle, but how does that offer insight onto the existence of the jigsaw puzzle ? That is somehow does, or will, is a faith, and we are told by such people (those that think science is closing in on a "complete understanding") that faith is not good enough. I think it more akin to madness to have such a faith.

[Aquila King]

3 hours ago, Podo said:

I have seen nothing that would convince me that our existences aren't utterly meaningless, but that doesn't mean that I want to give up. On the contrary, it gives me the drive to make the best of what I have. I am incredibly privileged to even be alive, as are we all.

Meaning is what we humans create. It's that which we all individually choose to focus our lives on. And it's a hell of a lot better that way.

[ShadowSot]

21 hours ago, crookedspiral said:

It's funny that some people here completely dismiss the opinion of a respected theoritical physicist, specialized in cosmology and higher energy physics, complexity theory, an astrobiology when it does not support atheism. It's like what some religious people do, when their beliefs are challenged.

Two issues. First he's speaking out of his position. Nothing he actually spoke towards touched on his speciality. 

Second, his statement is a bit nonsensical. You can make the same claim about leprechauns, and I'd be interested in whether he states he believes in them or if he's agnostic to them as well.