Atheism is incompatible with science

[+joc]

58 minutes ago, Will Due said:

 

"The early stages of life evolution are not altogether in conformity with your present-day views. Mortal man is not an evolutionary accident. There is a precise system, a universal law, which determines the unfolding of the planetary life plan on the spheres of space. Time and the production of large numbers of a species are not the controlling influences. Mice reproduce much more rapidly than elephants, yet elephants evolve more rapidly than mice."

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Anything you quote from the UB is completely and utterly dismissed out of hand.  So don't do it.  If that's your entire life view...you have nothing!  Really.

[Alchopwn]

Having now pretty much read thru this forum, I would offer the following position.

The claim here is that Atheism is incompatible with the Scientific Method according to Marcello Gleiser, as it is rejecting God without evidence.

I disagree.  Lets take Christianity for example.  The claims of Christianity are put together in the form of the New Testament, drawing on the Old Testament as support.  The claims are that there is a deity who created everything, is all-powerful, totally benevolent, knows everything, is perfect.  In short the Bible is the evidence.  So let us interrogate the Bible...

The fact is, if the Bible were truly representing such a deity, it would be a perfect document, without error, for it is created by a deity who knows everything, including when errors are present.  As the deity in question is totally benevolent, they will not allow innocent people to be misled by falsehoods or errors in their book, and have infinite power to go back in time to correct those errors.  Better yet, the people who perform the translations normally have to pray and draw the holy spirit into themselves to help them in their work.  In short, as an extension of an infinite divine power, there should be no errors in the Bible, but the errors start on the first page and don't let up.

Lets talk about Firmaments.  In Hebrew and Aramaic, the word we use for firmament translated into English would be "ceiling", and the belief was that the realm where humans dwell, has corners and a ceiling, and the stars are embossed onto that ceiling, hence their ability to fall from the sky.  The Book of Enoch, in the Apocrypha goes into greater detail than the Bible about angels opening huge doors to let the winds in, and using a sieve to create rain i.e. stage craft effects.  We have been into space, and into the air.  So tell me, who while travelling in a jet has ever seen the chorus of angels operating the weather?  Nobody.  Now if that is wrong, and everybody knows it is wrong, then the claims for this deity all evaporate.  

In short, an Atheist only needs to disprove the claims of scripture to dismiss the evidence for a deity as there is no other evidence.  THAT is totally scientific.

[Habitat]

13 hours ago, Alchopwn said:

In short, an Atheist only needs to disprove the claims of scripture to dismiss the evidence for a deity as there is no other evidence.  THAT is totally scientific.

Quite true, if a text is claimed to be divinely inspired, but can be shown to contain falsehoods, then we certainly can't be accepting of it being the "word of God". But it has no bearing whatever on whether the divine is real.

[psyche101]

14 hours ago, Will Due said:

"The early stages of life evolution are not altogether in conformity with your present-day views. 

Yes they are, there is overwhelming evidence to support the evolutionary process as we know it. Fossil resords, DNA, vestigial bones and organs all support each other for a good clear picture. 

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Mortal man is not an evolutionary accident. There is a precise system, a universal law, which determines the unfolding of the planetary life plan on the spheres of space.

The alleged precise law is the ecosystem. Species have to adapt to it or perish. We are the only species that has taken control of our environment. 

Darwin's finches illustrated this well. 

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Time and the production of large numbers of a species are not the controlling influences.

In fact they are though but proportionally. 

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Mice reproduce much more rapidly than elephants, yet elephants evolve more rapidly than mice."

Link

That makes no sense as there is no goal for evolution. Species adapt to needs, stable environments slow down change as there is no need for it. The speed of evolution is determined by the environment. Its not a set pace. 

The UB is only showing how nonsensical it is again. This stuff is just as wrong as its astronomical claims. Does it actually get anything right? 

Edited May 21, 2019 by psyche101

[psyche101]

15 minutes ago, Habitat said:

Quite true, if a text is claimed to be divinely inspired, but can be shown to contain falsehoods, then we certainly can't be accepting of it being the "word of God". But it has no bearing whatever on whether the divine is real.

Nothing indicates that the divine is real at all. Its a man made idea that some are overly attached to. The only way hid exists is through mags imagination. 

Nothing in nature at all indicates a god would or should exist. Everything that is know about the god idea is all stuff we made up. 

There is simply no good reason at all the think the divine even exists. 

[Will Due]

12 hours ago, psyche101 said:

Does it actually get anything right? 

 

"TO THE unbelieving materialist, man is simply an evolutionary accident. His hopes of survival are strung on a figment of mortal imagination; his fears, loves, longings, and beliefs are but the reaction of the incidental juxtaposition of certain lifeless atoms of matter. No display of energy nor expression of trust can carry him beyond the grave. The devotional labors and inspirational genius of the best of men are doomed to be extinguished by death, the long and lonely night of eternal oblivion and soul extinction. Nameless despair is man's only reward for living and toiling under the temporal sun of mortal existence. Each day of life slowly and surely tightens the grasp of a pitiless doom which a hostile and relentless universe of matter has decreed shall be the crowning insult to everything in human desire which is beautiful, noble, lofty, and good."

 

Spoiler

 

"But such is not man's end and eternal destiny; such a vision is but the cry of despair uttered by some wandering soul who has become lost in spiritual darkness, and who bravely struggles on in the face of the mechanistic sophistries of a material philosophy, blinded by the confusion and distortion of a complex learning. And all this doom of darkness and all this destiny of despair are forever dispelled by one brave stretch of faith on the part of the most humble and unlearned of God's children on earth."

 

Spoiler

 

"This saving faith has its birth in the human heart when the moral consciousness of man realizes that human values may be translated in mortal experience from the material to the spiritual, from the human to the divine, from time to eternity."

 

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[Alchopwn]

On 5/20/2019 at 9:52 PM, Alchopwn said:

Having now pretty much read thru this forum, I would offer the following position.

The claim here is that Atheism is incompatible with the Scientific Method according to Marcello Gleiser, as it is rejecting God without evidence.

I disagree.  Lets take Christianity for example.  The claims of Christianity are put together in the form of the New Testament, drawing on the Old Testament as support.  The claims are that there is a deity who created everything, is all-powerful, totally benevolent, knows everything, is perfect.  In short the Bible is the evidence.  So let us interrogate the Bible...

The fact is, if the Bible were truly representing such a deity, it would be a perfect document, without error, for it is created by a deity who knows everything, including when errors are present.  As the deity in question is totally benevolent, they will not allow innocent people to be misled by falsehoods or errors in their book, and have infinite power to go back in time to correct those errors.  Better yet, the people who perform the translations normally have to pray and draw the holy spirit into themselves to help them in their work.  In short, as an extension of an infinite divine power, there should be no errors in the Bible, but the errors start on the first page and don't let up.

Lets talk about page 1 and Firmaments.  In Hebrew and Aramaic, the word we use for firmament translated into English would be "ceiling", and the belief was that the realm where humans dwell, has corners and a ceiling, and the stars are embossed onto that ceiling, hence their ability to fall from the sky.  The Book of Enoch, in the Apocrypha goes into greater detail than the Bible about angels opening huge doors to let the winds in, and using a sieve to create rain i.e. stage craft effects.  We have been into space, and into the air.  So tell me, who while travelling in a jet has ever seen the chorus of angels operating the weather?  Nobody.  Now if that is wrong, and everybody knows it is wrong, then the claims for this deity all evaporate.  

In short, an Atheist only needs to disprove the claims of scripture to dismiss the evidence for a deity as there is no other evidence.  THAT is totally scientific.

 

[Alchopwn]

13 hours ago, Habitat said:

Quite true, if a text is claimed to be divinely inspired, but can be shown to contain falsehoods, then we certainly can't be accepting of it being the "word of God". But it has no bearing whatever on whether the divine is real.

I am sorry but I MUST disagree with you in the most strenuous fashion on this point, but I do so respectfully.  From the Bible, our understanding of the character of God is limited, but is defined in the text, by the term Almighty.  We are told that God knows all as he may grant the gift of prophecy to his followers, and we are told that God is totally good and the standard against which all goodness is judged.  We are also told that God is perfect.

Now IF God were real, and perfect, there is no way that this incredibly benevolent entity could possibly stand by and allow people to be led astray by a false scripture where they are depicted incorrectly.  Furthermore this God would KNOW ALL the errors, and would be ALL-POWERFUL enough to fix those errors.  PERFECT and BENEVOLENT deities could not allow innocent people to be led astray, and would be led by their benevolence to use their immense power to insure this never occurred.  I could understand a benevolent deity allowing other evils in the name of freedom of choice, but when the central doctrine of their followers is flawed, the deity MUST intervene, or they aren't benevolent, or perhaps they aren't all-knowing, or perhaps they aren't all-powerful, or perhaps they aren't perfect. 

At some level, errors in the Bible disprove everything about the claims made for the nature of God clearly expressed within the Bible.  Now as for Christians, there is slender to zero evidence for their beliefs OTHER than the Bible, wherefore these claims of the divine's reality?  Now bear in mind that if you think I am being overly cruel towards Christianity, that I can certainly offer a similar treatment for Islam and the Koran, and Judaism and the Torah if necessary.  I can also offer solid disproofs for the other major religions of the east if necessary, and for the pantheist beliefs of the old European cultures of antiquity.  In short, there is no proof for the existence of deities, but that is not to say that humanity is not possessed of some extraordinary faculties.

[Habitat]

6 hours ago, Alchopwn said:

Now IF God were real, and perfect, there is no way that this incredibly benevolent entity could possibly stand by and allow people to be led astray by a false scripture where they are depicted incorrectly. 

Pure supposition on all fronts. If silly people gossip inaccurately about you to other silly people, are you at pains to "set the record straight" with either of those parties, or just accept that some people handle the truth carelessly, and studiously ignore them ? Any God that can be qualified by the value judgements of humans, is not much of a God candidate, in my opinion. I accept I know nothing about God, and can't know anything, in the normal understanding of the word "know". Ideas of "probabilities" and "proofs" are the last word in idle speculation. If you could understand what God is, you would be God. And I doubt God has a craving to be better understood, if, as I say, it is a matter beyond understanding, nothing can be done to "set the record straight" with believers.
 

[psyche101]

13 hours ago, Will Due said:

 

"TO THE unbelieving materialist, man is simply an evolutionary accident. His hopes of survival are strung on a figment of mortal imagination; his fears, loves, longings, and beliefs are but the reaction of the incidental juxtaposition of certain lifeless atoms of matter. No display of energy nor expression of trust can carry him beyond the grave. The devotional labors and inspirational genius of the best of men are doomed to be extinguished by death, the long and lonely night of eternal oblivion and soul extinction. Nameless despair is man's only reward for living and toiling under the temporal sun of mortal existence. Each day of life slowly and surely tightens the grasp of a pitiless doom which a hostile and relentless universe of matter has decreed shall be the crowning insult to everything in human desire which is beautiful, noble, lofty, and good."

 

  Hide contents

 

"But such is not man's end and eternal destiny; such a vision is but the cry of despair uttered by some wandering soul who has become lost in spiritual darkness, and who bravely struggles on in the face of the mechanistic sophistries of a material philosophy, blinded by the confusion and distortion of a complex learning. And all this doom of darkness and all this destiny of despair are forever dispelled by one brave stretch of faith on the part of the most humble and unlearned of God's children on earth."

 

  Hide contents

 

"This saving faith has its birth in the human heart when the moral consciousness of man realizes that human values may be translated in mortal experience from the material to the spiritual, from the human to the divine, from time to eternity."

 

Link

 

 

 

 

 

 

So that's a poetic long winded preachy way of saying that it doesn't get anything right? 

'The unbelieving materialist'?  Crikey Moses. 

Gosh Will, with all due respect, that's some preachy hippy nonsense. It's not providing anything other than what a few want to hear. 

Is that where you got your ideas on Punctuated Equilibrium? 

[Alchopwn]

10 hours ago, Habitat said:

Pure supposition on all fronts. If silly people gossip inaccurately about you to other silly people, are you at pains to "set the record straight" with either of those parties, or just accept that some people handle the truth carelessly, and studiously ignore them ? Any God that can be qualified by the value judgements of humans, is not much of a God candidate, in my opinion. I accept I know nothing about God, and can't know anything, in the normal understanding of the word "know". Ideas of "probabilities" and "proofs" are the last word in idle speculation. If you could understand what God is, you would be God. And I doubt God has a craving to be better understood, if, as I say, it is a matter beyond understanding, nothing can be done to "set the record straight" with believers.
 

My point was that I only have to disprove the scripture to disprove the deity.

I confess I also like the argument that "if the deity is described as intrinsically unknowable, then how can anyone claim to know anything about them?" as you put it.  My only criticism is that this dumps us back into agnosticism, and frankly, if the only evidence is in scripture, then I prefer to tackle that evidence which makes the claims directly.  In the case of monotheism, as everything depends upon scripture being true, when it is proven false there is no need for agnosticism.  In fact then, only atheism is gnosis.

[psyche101]

4 minutes ago, Alchopwn said:

My point was that I only have to disprove the scripture to disprove the deity.

I confess I also like the argument that "if the deity is described as intrinsically unknowable, then how can anyone claim to know anything about them?" as you put it.  My only criticism is that this dumps us back into agnosticism, and frankly, if the only evidence is in scripture, then I prefer to tackle that evidence which makes the claims directly.  In the case of monotheism, as everything depends upon scripture being true, when it is proven false there is no need for agnosticism.  In fact then, only atheism is gnosis.

I'd like to know why people find God a valid idea at all. There's nothing other than old human stories to even posit gods existance. There's simply no good reason to consider any God actually exists. 

Why is God even an option? Absolutely nothing in nature suggests the very man made idea is valid. 

[Alchopwn]

14 minutes ago, psyche101 said:

Why is God even an option? Absolutely nothing in nature suggests the very man made idea is valid. 

While I completely agree with you psyche101, people who view the world thru a religious lens see every living thing and every connection in the ecosystem, not as the product of evolutionary niche-ing but as "part of God's intricate and unknowable but beautiful plan".  The very thing you can look at and say "proof God isn't needed", they look at and say "proof God exists".  You would think that in the 21st Century with all the staggering advances of science that people would look at religion and think "it's an artifact of our primitive past", but people who find themselves over-run by a scientific and technological conversation that they barely begin to understand have fled shrieking back to the comfort of a myth about a judgemental sky tyrant and his hippie son to make sense of the world.  Faith is like truthiness truthiness link,  you know it isn't true, but you want it to be, so you treat it as if it were actually true, and get angry with people who tell you it isn't for "persecuting" you.   This is not the response of a rational adult of course, but if you have't realised that many adults are not rational by now, consider this your turn to be informed... and sorry about that, I know how depressing it must be.  This is why I consider that it is unimportant to make rational arguments against theism.  That will never sway a theist.  The only arguments that will ever sway a theist come from the scripture they believe is the font of wisdom and truth about the divine.  It is only by discrediting the scripture that you discredit the religion.  You'd think that their evangelical masters getting rich on their faith would be enough, but no.  I personally see it as a public service to help Christians realize they are being treated as rubes by a pack of unscrupulous charlatans hiding behind the mask of a god who isn't there.  My pet peeve is the prosperity gospel prosperity gospel link which is the exact opposite of the alleged message of Jesus about a life of virtuous poverty.  That horrible doctrine has destroyed the social values of the religious people more than any other, by giving them cause to hate their neighbor for being poorer than them.

Edited May 22, 2019 by Alchopwn

[Podo]

9 hours ago, psyche101 said:

I'd like to know why people find God a valid idea at all. There's nothing other than old human stories to even posit gods existance. There's simply no good reason to consider any God actually exists. 

Why is God even an option? Absolutely nothing in nature suggests the very man made idea is valid. 

I would think that it comes from a time before we had the ability to understand the world around us. Gods were a valid explanation when you had no ability to ever come to a conclusion. 20,000 years ago when we had no way to determine how lightning worked, for example, it is rather straightforward to think that some large creature is creating it. In the modern day, "I don't know, let's find out" is a much easier pill to swallow because we understand so many things already. For the ancients to declare "I don't know" about basically everything would have been very difficult for most people, as evidenced by the mass amount of myths and bogus explanations that they came up with for everything.

In the modern day, however, there's no reason for deities to be an option. We understand enough about the universe to know how to find further answers, we should have no need for inventing fantastic explanations for things. Some people really want to cling to their stories, is all.

[+DieChecker]

12 hours ago, psyche101 said:

I'd like to know why people find God a valid idea at all.

 

3 hours ago, Podo said:

In the modern day, however, there's no reason for deities to be an option. 

Meh. You're looking for evidence to support belief, when evidence ruins belief. The point of religion is to comfort. There's no reason to have a evidenced being to allow for comfort. Hope in an afterlife is supernatural in its entirety, so I don't know what those people would require evidence either.

A better question would be why humans require a afterlife, or supernatural comfort. Rather then attacking the deity, treating the need should be the way to fight religion. No one is going to give a rat fart if you show a lack of evidence. 

Since that's probably never going to happen, we'll always have religion.

[+DieChecker]

On 5/20/2019 at 4:52 AM, Alchopwn said:

In short the Bible is the evidence. 

The Bible is the word of God as written by men. It's a written history that is used to teach, not a science book.

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The fact is, if the Bible were truly representing such a deity, it would be a perfect document, without error, for it is created by a deity who knows everything, including when errors are present. 

The Bible is inspired by God. Not created by God. The Christians of the first 300 years had no Bible, and usually no texts at all. They were none the less Christians.

Assuming the Bible should be perfect is just that.... an assumption. 

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In short, as an extension of an infinite divine power, there should be no errors in the Bible, but the errors start on the first page and don't let up.

It is true that there are contradictions. No one should argue against that. But that is because it was recorded, and compounded together, by men.

Where is it written that God demands, or even suggests, there should be a definitive Bible? There is no such commandment. 

People over the centuries, who had oral/written histories/texts collected everything together, and decided what to keep, and put together in one format. It is that simple. No God involved, just the recording of all mythology in one document.

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In short, an Atheist only needs to disprove the claims of scripture to dismiss the evidence for a deity as there is no other evidence.  THAT is totally scientific.

And, completely irrelevant since belief requires no evidence other then what the believer actually Believes.

Like showing a politician the statistical, or financial, or ecological, errors in their platforms... They aren't going to change, regardless of the evidence, unless they see profit (votes) in it for them.

Show the world how they can get more comfort then from turning to religion and you'll turn the entire world. 

[psyche101]

5 hours ago, DieChecker said:

Meh. You're looking for evidence to support belief, when evidence ruins belief.

Exactly the point though. Evidence does explain properly those things many believe. 

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The point of religion is to comfort. There's no reason to have a evidenced being to allow for comfort.

That's also a strange conundrum. How does one continue to draw comfort of we know the belief is just a remnant of old ideas? 

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Hope in an afterlife is supernatural in its entirety, so I don't know what those people would require evidence either.

Self validation. Again I think many know an afterlife is not a viable idea these days so many seek validation of beliefs, and get angry when some bring reality to the table. 

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A better question would be why humans require a afterlife, or supernatural comfort. Rather then attacking the deity, treating the need should be the way to fight religion. No one is going to give a rat fart if you show a lack of evidence. 

That seems self evident. People fear death. It's the ultimate injury one can't heal from. Nobody likes the idea of leaving loved ones behind and missing out in what is to come. The afterlife idea soothes that fear like a balm on a burn. 

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Since that's probably never going to happen, we'll always have religion.

I really question that. As we learn more, and schools bring vast amounts of information to individuals, surely more will start to ask 'why do people believe in a God?' We are barely out of the fire and brimstone age which was quite effective at maintaining those validations to seek comfort in. Those days are rapidly fading away which has to affect the next generations who have better answers to questions of existance than old stories. 

Even now with the information available I honestly wonder how people can see the god idea as a valid arguable position. Nothing supports the idea, and science continues to chip away at old myths. 

[Habitat]

39 minutes ago, psyche101 said:

Again I think many know an afterlife is not a viable idea

CORRECTION !  many think they know an afterlife is not a viable idea.

[psyche101]

2 hours ago, Habitat said:

CORRECTION !  many think they know an afterlife is not a viable idea.

Its not a viable idea Hab. Been through this. Your personal opinion is that physics is wrong and that one has to be irrational to rationally consider the concept. That's about as valid as claiming that you have personal visits with God in your backyard or claiming the universe has a centre that can be seen as a fuzzy patch by astronomers, or insisting creationism is the real truth and scientists band together to hide that. Just put on your Napoleon hat and join the que with the rest of the 37% bud. The adults are speaking. 

[Habitat]

5 minutes ago, psyche101 said:

Its not a viable idea Hab. Been through this. Your personal opinion is that physics is wrong and that one has to be irrational to rationally consider the concept. That's about as valid as claiming that you have personal visits with God in your backyard or claiming the universe has a centre that can be seen as a fuzzy patch by astronomers, or insisting creationism is the real truth and scientists band together to hide that. Just put on your Napoleon hat and join the que with the rest of the 37% bud. The adults are speaking. 

Tell me when you have managed to convince yourself.

[psyche101]

26 minutes ago, Habitat said:

Tell me when you have managed to convince yourself.

I don't need convcing Hab, quite plainly that's your gig. Most have figured out by now that your projecting your own insecurity on others to avoid validation as the only people who validate your ideas are crazier than you. 

[Habitat]

2 minutes ago, psyche101 said:

I don't need convcing Hab, quite plainly that's your gig. Most have figured out by now that your projecting your own insecurity on others to avoid validation as the only people who validate your ideas are crazier than you. 

Well past being convinced, but here you are, talking about something you are certain is "non-existent". I don't know, that is not a hobby many have !

[+Sherapy]

1 hour ago, Habitat said:

Well past being convinced, but here you are, talking about something you are certain is "non-existent". I don't know, that is not a hobby many have !

There is nothing odd or ominous about being on a forum, in a section on skepticism, practicing critical thinking skills on a variety of perspectives. Psyche’s goal is to examine the arguments to shed light on the assumptions, false premises, and logical errors. His objective has been to engage in discourse that seeks to uncover these errors, assumptions of logic so the best conclusions are being advanced. IMHO, Hab., you would be served better in the Spirituality and Beliefs section an area that connects like minds for the sole purpose of sharing in your mutual journeys of the supernatural with no one challenging their plausibility. 

 

 

 

Edited May 23, 2019 by Sherapy

[eight bits]

9 hours ago, DieChecker said:

The Bible is the word of God as written by men. It's a written history that is used to teach, not a science book.

Not much of a history book, either.

[psyche101]

1 hour ago, Habitat said:

Well past being convinced, but here you are, talking about something you are certain is "non-existent". I don't know, that is not a hobby many have !

This is a discussion forum for views skeptical of extraordinary claims. The discussion forum only exists for this reason. How many have a hobby of telling posters that they should not post in a skeptical view in a forum created for skeptical discussion? That's a lot weirder isn't it?