Is science inherently atheistic?

[mijopaalmc]

Originally Posted by JoeBentley

Yes. Things other then reality.

Why is it so hard for you to understand that reality has a subjective component?

It may not all be subjective, but part of being human is having a subjective experience of the world that differs from other humans' subjective experiences.

[JoeBentley]

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

Why is it so hard for you to understand that reality has a subjective component?

It may not all be subjective, but part of being human is having a subjective experience of the world that differs from other humans' subjective experiences.

Subjective doesn't mean "Get to make crap up."

You seem to be just going through a list of words in your head hoping one of them means "I get to make crap up." Let me save you the trouble. None of them do.

[mijopaalmc]

Originally Posted by JoeBentley

Subjective doesn't mean "Get to make crap up."

You seem to be just going through a list of words in your head hoping one of them means "I get to make crap up." Let me save you the trouble. None of them do.

You don't seem to have the slightest clue what I'm arguing, so you make stuff up about what I have said.

See how subjectivity works?

[Skeptic Ginger]

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

Why is it so hard for you to understand that reality has a subjective component?

It may not all be subjective, but part of being human is having a subjective experience of the world that differs from other humans' subjective experiences.

So the fact humans don't all experience the Universe the same makes you believe reality actually varies?

Or are you saying because humans have subjective experiences they must be by their nature outside the realm of science to investigate? If that were true about 80% of medical research would need to be tossed out.

[Skeptic Ginger]

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

You don't seem to have the slightest clue what I'm arguing, so you make stuff up about what I have said.

See how subjectivity works?

No, your comments were an objective observation. It may be that Joe's conclusion was or was not correct, but he was looking at objective evidence, words on a web page.

[mijopaalmc]

Originally Posted by Skeptic Ginger

So the fact humans don't all experience the Universe the same makes you believe reality actually varies?

Try again. This time, use a little less straw. If you don't understand, remember you always ask for clarification instead of assuming you have sole access to some objective evaluation of what I really said.

Originally Posted by Skeptic Ginger

Or are you saying because humans have subjective experiences they must be by their nature outside the realm of science to investigate? If that were true about 80% of medical research would need to be tossed out.

Try again. This time, use a little less straw. If you don't understand, remember you always ask for clarification instead of assuming you have sole access to some objective evaluation of what I really said.

Originally Posted by Skeptic Ginger

No, your comments were an objective observation. It may be that Joe's conclusion was or was not correct, but he was looking at objective evidence, words on a web page.

In other words, you and JoeBentley have objectively misrepresented me.

[punshhh]

Originally Posted by westprog

If the multi-universe explanation of the anthropic principle is true, then there must necessarily be an infinite number of universes with all possible gods in them.

Quite, with infinity if you let a principle in the door you end up with it coming out of your ears.

For example if a race like humanity managed to survive for an infinite period, they would sooner or later become god. Indeed they would have produced an infinite number of universes to drive the point home and they really really really...(ad infinitum) would not accept that they don't exist. Whatever the scenario on the ground.

[punshhh]

Originally Posted by HansMustermann

Not really. That is flawed in more than one way.

1. The most obvious is: that's a big if. It's like saying that if the Tooth Fairy explanation for finding a dollar under the pillow is true, then necessarily the Tooth Fairy has a huge quantity of teeth. Well, yes, but as long as there is no data to even suggest that that if is true, there is no real reason to go any further with it.

And seriously, there is nothing in the anthropic principle that needs multiple universes, much less infinite ones.

Take the standard analogy of a puddle on the sidewalk, wondering how the pothole is so neatly made that it fits it perfectly. Or indeed that it's even a pothole instead of a bump, which wouldn't support a puddle. There isn't really any need to postulate infinite potholes, and in fact there can't even be infinite potholes in a finite universe. But really, there is no need for even more than one. If that were the only pothole in existence, nothing would be different for that puddle.

Plus, there is no evidence that those constants CAN be in any other relationship to each other, than the existing one. A lot of them become exactly 1 in Planck units, for example. The funky values with many decimals in SI units are just artifacts of our using arbitrary units that aren't multiples of the Planck ones.

But at any rate, wondering why they have exactly those values may well be just like wondering why a piano wire produces frequencies 1x, 2x, 3x, 4x, and so on of a base frequency. And wondering about what infinite universes there may be where harmonics may be at 3.14x of the base frequency. But in reality when you start to understand how that wire vibrates, it becomes clear that there is no way for the harmonics to be anything else than integer multiples of a base frequency.

2. Even exploring the implications of that "if", it still doesn't follow that every nonsense you can imagine must exist in them. Even IF some basic constants could take other values in a given range, there is still no reason to assume that a certain combination would even produce gods at all, much less talk about all the possible gods.

Basically imagine that you had an oscillating circuit, you know, the simplest one consisting of a capacitor and a coil, and let's add a resistor in the loop representing the wires. There are infinite possible combinations of those 3 values, but none of them will make the circuit sprout legs and walk across the table. None of them will make it sentient. None of them will make it be an internal combustion engine. None of them will make the circuit be a god.

Just because there are infinite combinations, doesn't mean that it includes every silliness that you can imagine.

Similarly there is no reason to assume that another combination of constants for the universe will produce gods at all. I mean, seriously, how many Gods did you measure, to have any reason to assume such a silliness?

In fact, the vast majority of those universes wouldn't even support life at all, much less intelligence. Most of them wouldn't even support anything more complex than hydrogen, if even that.

Are you familiar with contemplating infinity in spacetime? Or have you passed the point where you refrain from it?

[punshhh]

Originally Posted by Beelzebuddy

Basically, this, and a large part of the reason it is so insulting is because - for honest scientists - it's very rarely true.


Also this. I don't think it gets communicated enough that to scientists, having insufficient evidence for your claims is kind of a big deal in and of itself. So scientists say "there's no evidence for god," and theists say "yeah, so what?" and the scientists say "but there's no evidence for god," and then they both just kind of awkwardly look at each other because the full import of that statement got lost along the way.

To bring it back to the topic at hand, having no evidence for or against something's existence does not mean it's a maybe. It's not a neutral position at all, but a blanket invalidation of all existential assertions which woud rely on that evidence. And since "gods don't exist until proven otherwise" is quite an atheistic stance, science is inherently atheistic because of it.

I agree, however I am finding difficulty in what those same scientists would use as a definition of said god.

[Skeptic Ginger]

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

Try again. This time, use a little less straw. If you don't understand, remember you always ask for clarification instead of assuming you have sole access to some objective evaluation of what I really said.

I was just replying to what you posted. If you were misunderstood at least try to enlighten us rather than just saying we missed something.

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

Try again. This time, use a little less straw. If you don't understand, remember you always ask for clarification instead of assuming you have sole access to some objective evaluation of what I really said.

One asks for clarification when one is aware they are misinterpreting what was posted. I don't see that I was.

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

In other words, you and JoeBentley have objectively misrepresented me.

So you say.

[Skeptic Ginger]

I think you are at a disadvantage, Mijo. You are defending an outdated paradigm.

[westprog]

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

So you assert.

You don't actually seem to understand that "should" is about a future course of action.

Should a woman's desire to control her reproductive capabilities override a man's desire to have child with her? Use science to demonstrate your answer.

I'm fairly confident that you won't shake SG's faith in science. It's fairly solid.

For the rest of us, there's clearly two aspects (at least) to every action. What we want to happen, and how we achieve it. In that respect, we differ from our cave-dwelling forebears only in the extent of knowledge. In the area of deciding our desires, we are no different.

That we are able to look into our own minds and calculate the process which produces our desires is interesting, but it doesn't change the fact that we have such desires, and there is nothing remotely scientific about them. How could there be? The notion of a preferred course of action is not a concept that applies to science.

Meanwhile, SG will, while missing the point, accuse me of missing the point.

[Skeptic Ginger]

Originally Posted by westprog

...

That we are able to look into our own minds and calculate the process which produces our desires is interesting, but it doesn't change the fact that we have such desires, and there is nothing remotely scientific about them. How could there be? The notion of a preferred course of action is not a concept that applies to science.

Meanwhile, SG will, while missing the point, accuse me of missing the point.

For you, I don't believe it is missing the point, it's just accepting a different reality as the universe you exist in. For the Universe I exist in, trying to discover it for what it is, based on the evidence the scientific process does the best job of ferreting out, turns out to be the most successful method of ferreting out reality.

[mijopaalmc]

Originally Posted by Skeptic Ginger

I was just replying to what you posted.

No, you weren't. You constructed a straw man and knocked it down.

Originally Posted by Skeptic Ginger

If you were misunderstood at least try to enlighten us rather than just saying we missed something.

That implies that you made an honest attempt to understand what I said. Given that you were content with your straw man, your attempt to communicate with me does not seem to be honest, especially since you are not will to acknowledge the possibility that you just didn't understand.

Originally Posted by Skeptic Ginger

One asks for clarification when one is aware they are misinterpreting what was posted.

No, one asks for clarification when one is not sure that one understood. You assumed that you understood and responded accordingly.

Originally Posted by Skeptic Ginger

I don't see that I was.

Of course you don't, but, given that you don't understand when to ask for clarification, it's not surprising that you didn't think you had misinterpreted me.

Originally Posted by Skeptic Ginger

So you say.

Yeah, I do.

Originally Posted by Skeptic Ginger

I think you are at a disadvantage, Mijo. You are defending an outdated paradigm.

You are at the disadvantage since you don't know what a paradigm is.

Originally Posted by westprog

I'm fairly confident that you won't shake SG's faith in science. It's fairly solid.

That's not my intent. I think that science produces solid knowledge of the empirical world but that there are entities in this world that are not amenable to empirical falsification.

[westprog]

Originally Posted by Skeptic Ginger

For you, I don't believe it is missing the point, it's just accepting a different reality as the universe you exist in. For the Universe I exist in, trying to discover it for what it is, based on the evidence the scientific process does the best job of ferreting out, turns out to be the most successful method of ferreting out reality.

Meet the new paradigm, same as the old paradigm.

When human intelligence first emerged, it tried to discover what the universe was and how it worked, and it made decisions based on:

• What would happen if I did something.
• What I want to happen.

And er... that's it. Same now as it ever was. What difference does rooting inside one's mind make? Let's see - I know that my desire for ice cream, or sex, or the new Avengers film is entirely due to certain electrochemical reactions in the brain so... er, I still have to decide what. I. want.

[westprog]

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

That's not my intent. I think that science produces solid knowledge of the empirical world but that there are entities in this world that are not amenable to empirical falsification.

That's the faith you won't shake. I base this on having gone through this discussion many times now.

[Skeptic Ginger]

Originally Posted by westprog

Meet the new paradigm, same as the old paradigm.

When human intelligence first emerged, it tried to discover what the universe was and how it worked, and it made decisions based on:

• What would happen if I did something.
• What I want to happen.

And er... that's it. Same now as it ever was. What difference does rooting inside one's mind make? Let's see - I know that my desire for ice cream, or sex, or the new Avengers film is entirely due to certain electrochemical reactions in the brain so... er, I still have to decide what. I. want.

Well why bother to understand morality or the Universe at all? If you are a slave to your brain reflexes it's no wonder you look to a fictional god to guide you. It sounds comforting.

[Skeptic Ginger]

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

No, you weren't. You constructed a straw man and knocked it down.

That implies that you made an honest attempt to understand what I said. Given that you were content with your straw man, your attempt to communicate with me does not seem to be honest, especially since you are not will to acknowledge the possibility that you just didn't understand.

No, one asks for clarification when one is not sure that one understood. You assumed that you understood and responded accordingly.

Of course you don't, but, given that you don't understand when to ask for clarification, it's not surprising that you didn't think you had misinterpreted me.

Yeah, I do.

I'm sorry. I see nothing here to go on. You complain I didn't get your meaning but you make no attempt here I can see to articulate what I got wrong or missed.

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

You are at the disadvantage since you don't know what a paradigm is.

par·a·digm

Quote:

1. One that serves as a pattern or model.
2. A set or list of all the inflectional forms of a word or of one of its grammatical categories: the paradigm of an irregular verb.
3. A set of assumptions, concepts, values, and practices that constitutes a way of viewing reality for the community that shares them, especially in an intellectual discipline.

[checks definition] Yep. Seems to be what I thought it was and what I described. [/check def]

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

That's not my intent. I think that science produces solid knowledge of the empirical world but that there are entities in this world that are not amenable to empirical falsification.

[checks paradigm definition again] Yep. Fits with what I thought it was and what I described. [/check def]

I am confident that we are operating under two different paradigms. Whether mine is wrong or is correct and will eventually replace yours remains to be seen.

[Last of the Fraggles]

Originally Posted by westprog

That's always a proviso of science. It doesn't involve belief - which is not a scientific concept. It's simply not part of science to include supernatural explanations, for anything.

It's part of science to exclude supernatural explanations, I agree. That's why it's atheistic. That was a long way to go to agree.

[Aridas]

Originally Posted by punshhh

Quite, with infinity if you let a principle in the door you end up with it coming out of your ears.

For example if a race like humanity managed to survive for an infinite period, they would sooner or later become god. Indeed they would have produced an infinite number of universes to drive the point home and they really really really...(ad infinitum) would not accept that they don't exist. Whatever the scenario on the ground.

o.O

The concept that you seem to be thinking of is, basically, "Given an infinite amount of time, everything possible will occur, provided that certain forms of mutually exclusive conditions are not in play."

This is as opposed to the concept that you're trying to put in play, which is, basically... "Given an infinite amount of time, something that may well not be possible WILL occur. And WILL occur an infinite number of times." That's even ignoring that you didn't state what form humanity would survive in, which could certainly have significant impact on the validity of your later unfounded assertion.

As for the anthropic principle... strong or weak? The two are certainly different, and neither demands that there are infinite universes or westprog's following assertion that all possible gods must then exist somewhere. There's a remarkable number of god concepts that are still mutually exclusive, still, even under those conditions.

ETA

Originally Posted by punshhh

Are you familiar with contemplating infinity in spacetime?

Given how many ways that I could take that, I'm not going to reply to each. Infinity is an amusing concept, though, in general, and I've often had a bit of fun with applying it to space and/or time.

However, I'm afraid that I am not certain what point you're attempting to make, in relation to the post that you quoted.

Originally Posted by punshhh

Or have you passed the point where you refrain from it?

So... by the language you chose, it sounds like you're asking "Do you do X? Or do you not not do X?" By the context and a desire to make it coherent, "Do you do X? Or do you find doing X beneath you?" seems the more appropriate way to take it.

[IanS]

Originally Posted by IanS
Quote:


I did not say I did Know. I said "perhaps" that is the case. But, if you insist on arguing about it, then you can just tell us ...

... what experience do you have in science research?

Originally Posted by westprog

I'm not arguing. I'm telling you. You have no idea what I am, or what my qualifications are for discussing this subject.

Well why are you “telling me” or telling anyone here about that? You were not accused of being scientifically ignorant. What I said to you (repeat!) was that "perhaps" you do not have direct experience in research science, do you?

You simply ducked the question entirely, twice (whilst saying instead “I’m telling you”!). OK well I’m not going to be so arrogant as to say that I’m specifically “telling You” anything … I’m just asking you what science research experience and qualifications you actually do have? So what’s the actual answer to that? …

… repeat - What experience and qualification do you have in research science?


Originally Posted by IanS
Quote:

I have already answered that, very directly in the example of Darwin’s publications in the 1800‘s.

Darwin seems to be a good example because his explanation of evolution, particular as it later became applied to the evolution of Homo sapiens, is a very direct refutation of earlier religious beliefs (still held by many today of course) that God actually made Man.

That research into evolution has unequivocally shown that Homo sapiens evolved from earlier species. And that Man was therefore definitely not created by a miracle from any God.

Apart from Darwin’s famous first publication in 1859, On The Origin of Species, Darwin also wrote several later books on the subject of evolution, inc. in 1871 a book dealing directly with the Descent of Man from earlier species. All of that is of course extensively discussed in Wikipedia -


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Origin_of_Species


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Des...elation_to_Sex


At that time, circa. 1850’s to 1880’s, afaik Darwin was not alone in choosing to publish genuine scientific research in the form of a book, rather than as a shorter discrete paper in one of the early scientific Journals.

The fact that Darwin, in the mid Victorian era, was publishing his work as a book, does not make it in any way inadmissible as a genuine scientific publication describing “new” and “original” research - everyone accepted at that time, and all of science accepts today, that Darwin’s publications are most certainly genuine scientific research. And that simple confirms something that has been accepted all along - when religions make predictions or statements of fact which are subject to scientific confirmation or refutation - such as evolution, the age of the Earth, and so on - then science can have something to say about it.

Originally Posted by westprog

Darwin's work was not explicitly atheistic, and if he makes reference to god in it, then please feel free to point out the section where he does so.

Well why on earth did you say that? That’s another completely irrelevant comment which has nothing at all to do with what I said in the example of Darwin’s work, does it?

I did not say, or even imply, that Darwin’s work was quote “explicitly atheistic”. I never suggested anything of the sort.

What I said about Darwin was - his explanation of evolution has lead inexorably to the unarguable fact, and it’s experimental and theoretically detailed explanation, of how Homo sapiens arose on earth as the product of evolution from much earlier species, going back to species of other animals and even plants which otherwise appear to have no visible connection to humans (they are of course connected, by evolution, as Darwin originally showed 150 years ago). And in that very direct and frankly unarguable sense, Darwin’s work and the work of his immediate successors has very clearly refuted all religious claims about man being created by a miracle from God … Homo sapiens/humans appeared on earth solely and purely by a processes of evolution from a series of less & less closely related life-forms, and that is a “Fact”.



Originally Posted by IanS
Quote:

If you want something different from Evolution, from more modern research papers, which directly refute the role of a God, then the paper by Vilenkin, Guth and Borde does precisely that in a very direct way -
Again, in his most recent book, Hawking explains why that paper on the No Boundary Condition, is actually a refutation of the claim that God made the universe. Hawking explains why the No Boundary Condition is a model which specifically excludes creation by any supernatural means (The Grand Design, Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow, Bantam Press London, 2010). Hawking had of course given similar explanations before in A Brief History of Time.

Just to be completely clear about the above - what Hawking and Vilenkin are doing in those books, is explaining in laymen’s terms for a popular audience, how and why certain of their earlier research papers on the origin of the universe, are specifically and directly excluding a supernatural cause (such as God) for the Big Bang and for the existence of what we call “our universe”. There's an issue for cosmologists in the current understanding of the universe. The fact that the universe apparently appeared out of nothing seemed to be evidence of either a creator, or some not understood creation event.

However, a number of cosmologists, such as Hawking, have come up with models which (in very crude terms) treat the universe as a four-dimensional object, rather than a three-dimensional object that gets created at a particular point in time. This certainly addresses a particular technical point whereby creation seemed to be implied in the model of the universe then prevalent.

Originally Posted by westprog

This doesn't have anything to do with the metaphysical nature of the universe, or whether the universe was created. It replaces a previous way of looking at the universe with a more sophisticated model..

Well it certainly does have everything to do with a so-called “metaphysical view of nature” if that “metaphysic view” is attempting to claim some alternative explanation to what we have learned from science and from the publications of scientists like Hawking, Vilenkin, Guth, Linde etc. Because their most recent publications show very clearly how our universe can come into existence from the internal interactions of vacuum fluctuations in the initial null field density, leading directly to an inflationary big bang.

That explanation, which is not yet a fully fledged theory (it’s too early for that), is scientifically and mathematically precise and solid, and it excludes any intelligent God from any part of that process. It shows how our universe would inevitably appear from what we should properly regard as the “nothingness” of the null initial filed density.

And that is most certainly a refutation of any suggestion that God was ever involved.

And since most people here will not have access to the original research papers in Phys Rev. and Phys Lett, I am pointing out that both Vilenkin and Hawking have explained in quite some detail in their most recent popular level books and in layman’s language (ie leaving out all their GR and QM Field Theory calculations) why those scientific explanations do specifically exclude God … and in both those books, both of those authors specifically say that God is excluded.

How much clearer can anyone be!

Originally Posted by westprog

It's not surprising that a more advanced model explains something that wasn't understood before. The mistake is in the view that this somehow cancels out all possible versions of god - because it replaces a model which depended on the earlier faulty scientific understanding...

Oh dear - you are doing the same thing yet again. I did not ever say that it quote “cancels out all possible versions of a god”. How many times does this need to be explained! Look, what’s being said is this (to re-state the above yet again) …

… the models recently explained by the above authors (and others) show how our universe may have arisen, and in fact should arise, purely due to inescapable (Heisenberg principle) vacuum level fluctuations in an overall null field density. That’s now a well explained processes from GR and QM which fits all known current laws of physics, and specifically excludes any action from any God (we are talking in this thread about “God”, ie not “any possible god”, but about THE god of the Bible and the Koran … and I made that specifically clear several times in my first few replies here).

So, to spell that out in words of one syllable - what the models of Vilenkin, Hawking, Hartle, Guth, Linde and others shows, is that our universe should arise as an inevitable result of QM level fluctuation in the inn Initial Field Density. In those models, that is an inevitable and inescapable consequence from all known physics. And as each of those scientists have made clear, it specifically excludes God.

OK, clear enough now?

If you don’t believe that, then you can confirm it very easily by just reading Vilenkin’s simple book, and then read Hawking's last book (re No Boundary Condition) … both of which books are explaining the specific research papers they published earlier (and fully referenced in my previous post).



Originally Posted by IanS
Quote:

But much more generally, as I said earlier, you must know perfectly well that every single scientific paper ever published, which now amounts to many millions of papers, describe how all known events and process occur in our universe by entirely natural means, and never in any of those discoveries and explanations is a God ever found to be part of the explanation. And in none of those millions of papers is any ultimate explanation given. A segment of a train of explanations is given.

Originally Posted by westprog

I don't think that the absence of any mention of god in millions of scientific papers implies that science can therefore reasonably deal with the issue of god....

Far too many double negatives in your sentence, making it read like garbled mumbo-jumbo.

However, to repeat - it’s perfectly obvious that the reason few scientific papers ever make specific comments on God, is because religious claims about God are completely without evidential foundation and completely unscientific … claims like that have nothing at all to do with real research science and scientific accuracy.

But I just explained to you in Technicolor detail (repeatedly) why it’s an unarguable fact that all scientific papers are either directly or indirectly excluding any possibility of God in any of their discoveries and explanations … that’s why God is not mentioned, because he is specifically not found to be any part of the evidence or any part of any genuine scientific explanation for anything. And in particular, if you do want direct scientific mention of God’s exclusion, then I have just given that to you in detail in the reference to the papers and lamens-language books from Hawking and Vilenkin and the others … read those - they are a specific and very direct exclusion of God as creator of what we call “our universe”, and they are the direct explanations given in their actual papers in Phys rev and Phys Lett. (two of the most prestigious of all physics journals). You could not get anything clearer than that!



Originally Posted by IanS
Quote:

The fact that scientific authors conventionally and invariably choose not to spell out the blindingly obvious by specifically adding a sentence to say " the explanation given here rejects any suggestion that a God and supernatural events are necessary ", is irrelevant and entirely unnecessary - all of those papers give their explanations in a way which clearly excludes supernatural acts as any part of the process.

Originally Posted by westprog

That's a complete cop-out. I don't expect every scientific paper which implicitly refutes the god concept to mention the fact, but I do expect that if science "excludes supernatural acts" then there should be at least one paper which bothers to mention it. There isn't because science doesn't deal with the issue. ....

Dear me, come on let’s have some real honesty here - what I wrote above is not remotely any kind of “kop out” at all … if you expect serious physicists, chemists and mathematicians etc., to write genuine research papres bothering to add a sentence telling their scientific research readership, that their paper which never mentions God and which finds absolutely no evidence of the claimed “supernatural”, is “ an explanation which contradicts claims of a supernatural miraculous Biblical God” then you must be incredibly naïve (sorry about that) about what serious science researchers and their journals are publishing - they are absolutely not going to waste words diverting sentences into utterly irrelevant and self-evident remarks like that about ancient ignorant religious belief in supernatural gods, devils, and miracles etc.

But as I have just explained to you in several posts now, you can in fact find precisely that statement of God’s exclusion from no lesser scientists than Hawking, Vilenkin, Guth etc. in the papers, and explicitly in their books written as layman’s accounts omitting all the QM and GR maths … those books (and their papers) actually spell out very specifically why God is excluded from those models describing the likely route by which our universe formed.

[punshhh]

Originally Posted by IanS

That explanation, which is not yet a fully fledged theory (it’s too early for that), is scientifically and mathematically precise and solid, and it excludes any intelligent God from any part of that process. It shows how our universe would inevitably appear from what we should properly regard as the “nothingness” of the null initial filed density.

So there is an incomplete mathematical model.

Quote:

And that is most certainly a refutation of any suggestion that God was ever involved

. What is the mathematical symbol for god in these equations?

Quote:

And since most people here will not have access to the original research papers in Phys Rev. and Phys Lett, I am pointing out that both Vilenkin and Hawking have explained in quite some detail in their most recent popular level books and in layman’s language (ie leaving out all their GR and QM Field Theory calculations) why those scientific explanations do specifically exclude God … and in both those books, both of those authors specifically say that God is excluded.

Perhaps the god of genesis, but this has already been accepted from the time of Darwin. Are you addressing some creationists?

Quote:

How much clearer can anyone be!

So you are saying that god didn't create the world in six days? Yes I got that part.

Quote:

Oh dear - you are doing the same thing yet again. I did not ever say that it quote “cancels out all possible versions of a god”. How many times does this need to be explained! Look, what’s being said is this (to re-state the above yet again) …

This is your cop out, just what kind of god is being refuted here?

Quote:

… the models recently explained by the above authors (and others) show how our universe may have arisen, and in fact should arise, purely due to inescapable (Heisenberg principle) vacuum level fluctuations in an overall null field density. That’s now a well explained processes from GR and QM which fits all known current laws of physics, and specifically excludes any action from any God (we are talking in this thread about “God”, ie not “any possible god”, but about THE god of the Bible and the Koran … and I made that specifically clear several times in my first few replies here).

Ah yes the God on a throne with a white beard.

Quote:

So, to spell that out in words of one syllable - what the models of Vilenkin, Hawking, Hartle, Guth, Linde and others shows, is that our universe should arise as an inevitable result of QM level fluctuation in the inn Initial Field Density. In those models, that is an inevitable and inescapable consequence from all known physics. And as each of those scientists have made clear, it specifically excludes God.

So our universe "should" arise as an inevitable result of QM level fluctuation in the initial field density.

Presumably this was after the Planck Epoc?

How did this emerge from a singularity? Indeed what exactly is a singularity in this case?

Sure the laws of physics emerge in an inevitable symmetry once the process has begun, along with inflation etc.

So what? how did this event arise from what was already existing? whatever that was? What is this "field" of which all physical matter is composed?

Are you proposing that all this happened spontaneously within nothing, some kind of void?

It sounds like your proposing some kind of supernatural process somewhere along the line, if its not just turtles all the way down. Now are you grasping what is referred to when metaphysics is mentioned?

[HansMustermann]

Originally Posted by punshhh

Are you familiar with contemplating infinity in spacetime? Or have you passed the point where you refrain from it?

There is a difference between contemplating infinity and just imagining BS in it.

I mean, seriously, I'm reminded of the ancient and medieval views, where because there's some unknown space on the map, they'd imagine giants and dragons and Amazons and headless people living there. Which you can probably see why it's bogus. Just because there's some unknown space that-a-way, doesn't mean that the laws of reality start behaving differently there. If nobody has ever seen a dragon here, and indeed has no evidence that such a beast could even exist, there is no reason to just assume that things will be so fundamentally different 1000 miles in that direction as to have dragons.

Plus, see that oscillating circuit example. Just because you can have infinite combinations of resistance, capacity and induction, doesn't mean you can imagine any miraculous stuff existing in that infinity. It'll still be an oscillating circuit for any of those values. Imagining that because there are infinite possiblities, you can imagine it turning into a pony somewhere in that infinity is just silly.

Ditto for the infinite universes explanation to the anthropic priniciple. We're not talking infinite universes -- IF that exists -- as in "any stonking stupidity you can imagine", but as in having an interval of values that each of a handful of constants can take. It will still be a big amount of energy that "condenses" (for lack of a better word) into elementary particles, if the values of those constants allow it. Which in turn form atoms and/or heavier nuclei, again, up to what those constants allow.

There is nothing in that setup that allows it to be anything else than a universe full of particles. No more, no less. It doesn't mean you can go into dada land and imagine gods there just because it's infinity.

Originally Posted by punshhh

Quite, with infinity if you let a principle in the door you end up with it coming out of your ears.

For example if a race like humanity managed to survive for an infinite period, they would sooner or later become god. Indeed they would have produced an infinite number of universes to drive the point home and they really really really...(ad infinitum) would not accept that they don't exist. Whatever the scenario on the ground.

No, that's just plain old illogical. If you leave a brown dwarf for any amount of time, it'll still be a bunch of hydrogen atoms. At most it might accrete more hydrogen and become a main sequence star, or it might be gobbled by a much heavier object, but even infinity won't make it be a magical flying pony. And if you leave a universe whose laws don't allow omniscience -- e.g., because there's a finite speed at which information can travel, and because some stuff is just about to exit the universe that's even theoretically observable with that constraint -- then the same will apply after any amount of time. You still won't find omniscient gods.

And if you have a universe that will die a heat death after a finite amount of time, then after that time you won't find any humans. Not just you won't find them become gods, you will find them just dead.

Just adding infinity doesn't mean the laws of reality will change. It's fundamentally illogical to take something that has constraints, and pretend that any buzzword, "infinity" included, lets you confabulate stuff based on ignoring those constraints.

I'll return to that piano wire example. No matter how much time passes, if it's fixed at both ends, it will still have the constraint that any resonances are multiples of the base frequency. You can't use "contemplating infinity" as an excuse to postulate that eventually it will have a resonance at 3.14 times the base frequency. That constraint isn't going to go away just because you used the magic word "infinity".

[HansMustermann]

Originally Posted by punshhh

So there is an incomplete mathematical model.

. What is the mathematical symbol for god in these equations?

Perhaps the god of genesis, but this has already been accepted from the time of Darwin. Are you addressing some creationists?

So you are saying that god didn't create the world in six days? Yes I got that part.





This is your cop out, just what kind of god is being refuted here?

Ah yes the God on a throne with a white beard.

So our universe "should" arise as an inevitable result of QM level fluctuation in the initial field density.

Presumably this was after the Planck Epoc?

How did this emerge from a singularity? Indeed what exactly is a singularity in this case?

Sure the laws of physics emerge in an inevitable symmetry once the process has begun, along with inflation etc.

So what? how did this event arise from what was already existing? whatever that was? What is this "field" of which all physical matter is composed?

Are you proposing that all this happened spontaneously within nothing, some kind of void?

It sounds like your proposing some kind of supernatural process somewhere along the line, if its not just turtles all the way down. Now are you grasping what is referred to when metaphysics is mentioned?

Err, no, just because you're unable to understand how it works without a god, doesn't mean there's anything supernatural about a universe without a god. In fact, on the contrary, there is absolutely nothing supernatural about those theories. They're firmly rooted in data and understanding of natural phenomena. Which is, you know, by definition natural.

But really, if you have an objection, let's see your maths and data. Thinking you can object to science just based on what you don't like to imagine is just cute in its silliness.

And, really, that goes for philosophy too. If any kind of metaphysical considerations are in conflict with stuff measured from reality, then that's your hint that those metaphysical considerations are wrong. I'm sorry, but no amount of baseless navel gazing can override reality.

[laca]

Originally Posted by westprog

I suggest you address that idea to the people who don't want to permit science to study human beings. I dare say there are such people.

Certainly. Such people should be denied healthcare.

Originally Posted by westprog

However, even if every last detail of how human beings make such a decision is known, the decision still has to be made, and science won't make it.

Of course not, because, ummm, science is not a sentient being able to make decisions. What science can do however, is help in making better decisions. That's its main purpose.

[laca]

Originally Posted by mijopaalmc

Why is it so hard for you to understand that reality has a subjective component?

It may not all be subjective, but part of being human is having a subjective experience of the world that differs from other humans' subjective experiences.

Yes. But that does not make reality subjective in the least.

[punshhh]

Originally Posted by HansMustermann

Err, no, just because you're unable to understand how it works without a god, doesn't mean there's anything supernatural about a universe without a god.

I realise that I can't know how it works with a god, just like I realise I cant know how it works without a god.

Quote:

In fact, on the contrary, there is absolutely nothing supernatural about those theories. They're firmly rooted in data and understanding of natural phenomena. Which is, you know, by definition natural.

The supernatural bit is the properties of the singularity.

Quote:

But really, if you have an objection, let's see your maths and data. Thinking you can object to science just based on what you don't like to imagine is just cute in its silliness.

My objection is with the conclusion. Yes there is no requirement in how the physical universe behaves for a god (at least from our perspective). But to derive a conclusion from this consistency that there are no gods, in the light of our clearly limited understanding of existence is jumping to an assumption.

Quote:

And, really, that goes for philosophy too. If any kind of metaphysical considerations are in conflict with stuff measured from reality, then that's your hint that those metaphysical considerations are wrong. I'm sorry, but no amount of baseless navel gazing can override reality.

I see no conflict, only a blindness or conceptual horizon beyond which we (or should I say science) cannot see.

I accept these limitations, do these theoretical physicists accept them?

[HansMustermann]

Originally Posted by punshhh

I realise that I can't know how it works with a god, just like I realise I cant know how it works without a god.

Sure, but that doesn't make them equal. That would be the Nirvana fallacy.

Originally Posted by punshhh

The supernatural bit is the properties of the singularity.

I'd think that anything which is derived from tested knowledge about nature, is by definition not supernatural. But really, just because I can't properly imagine a Tyrannosaurus Rex, doesn't make it supernatural. It would have to actually break the laws of the natural to be supernatural. Ditto for that singularity.

But ultimately it doesn't matter. Even if we admit that we don't exactly know what was there at moment zero -- and really, we only have indirect conclusions we can draw about what was before the universe became transparent -- it doesn't mean one can make up a fairy-tale to fill the gaps. Lack of knowledge is lack of knowledge. It doesn't mean that one can just use wild flights of imagination to pretend to "know" the unknown.

Originally Posted by punshhh

My objection is with the conclusion. Yes there is no requirement in how the physical universe behaves for a god (at least from our perspective). But to derive a conclusion from this consistency that there are no gods, in the light of our clearly limited understanding of existence is jumping to an assumption.

I don't think many people even propose to prove that negative. What is a scientific position is merely that there is no reason to assume one, in the absence of any data that would need a god.

And also, basically, yes, not to just jump to conclusions. Because ultimately that's what the theist hypothesis always gets to. "The universe must have a cause, therefore gays can't marry." It's never left at there just being a possibility of a god, invariably what follows is knowing WHICH God, what does he want, that he cares about you personally, etc.

And that's a problem that usually gets glossed over. The thing is, there are also infinite possibilities for God. Just as random examples of Gods that are nothing like the Christian ones, and would explain Big Bang just as well, include for example:

1. Scientist God. Let's say a guy makes a simulation of a universe. He wants for example to test some prediction about how a universe would evolve for a given set of constants. He may not even be interested in life, or at best may just be interested in whether it's possible, or on what percentage of the planets it reaches sentience. He won't care personally for each of the trillions of simulated beings, any more than I care about the computer-generated pedestrians in SimCity. And he almost certainly won't bother creating an extra universe just to reward you for believing in the guy running the simulation.

2. Someone Else's God. If you look at the first page of Genesis, we're told that God created all the stars and galaxies just to have some pretty lights on a planet he created. What if the universe was indeed created like that, but not for OUR benefit? What if we're just a by-product of a galaxy created just so it would be a pretty light in the sky on some planet in the Andromeda galaxy?

Basically out of trillions of planets that can probably support sentient life, a God that cares about not even just one planet, but really just a small backwater country like the OT God, by sheer probabilities, chances are that we're not the ones who matter for that God.

3. The God of the previous universe. Let's say a God already created a universe, got sick and tired of it, raptured everyone who was worthy, and imploded the whole damned thing right back as a doomsday. Then it blows up again. So technically that God is still the cause of the universe, since he's the cause of the singularity (or near-singularity) that exploded.. But that God isn't there for us, because that new creation wasn't his purpose, but just a side-effect of his imploding the universe he was actually caring about.

Etc.

Plus, even for a God that cares about this universe, as I was saying in another thread, even just taking the basic issues like murder, rape, slavery, etc, and how much a God is for or against each, there are literally trillions of combinations, i.e., of imaginable Gods. Whichever you pick, by sheer probabilities, you're almost certainly wrong.

So I may not be able to exclude _a_ God, or not even your God, but I can pretty confidently say that whichever it is, you're probably wrong.

And, really, I don't think anyone has any particular need to take it to 100% disproof. At that point there's no reason to believe in any particular God anyway, even if we actually knew that _a_ God exists but not which. When we also have no reason to assume that any exists to start with, then there is even less reason to believe in one.

Basically not being able to completely disprove the existence of gods is pretty much irrelevant anyway. And, as I was saying, not many actually take that pointless task.

Originally Posted by punshhh

I see no conflict, only a blindness or conceptual horizon beyond which we (or should I say science) cannot see.

I accept these limitations, do these theoretical physicists accept them?

I'd think accepting them is built right into the scientific method, innit?

[Jorghnassen]

There are days where I find self-professed skeptics arguing in circles funny.

But I get bored. Still, the cognitive dissonance and complete lack of awareness of confirmation bias amuses me. Now where's my popcorn?

[Beelzebuddy]

Originally Posted by punshhh

I agree, however I am finding difficulty in what those same scientists would use as a definition of said god.

Well, whaddya got?

Originally Posted by HansMustermann

1. Scientist God. Let's say a guy makes a simulation of a universe. He wants for example to test some prediction about how a universe would evolve for a given set of constants. He may not even be interested in life, or at best may just be interested in whether it's possible, or on what percentage of the planets it reaches sentience. He won't care personally for each of the trillions of simulated beings, any more than I care about the computer-generated pedestrians in SimCity. And he almost certainly won't bother creating an extra universe just to reward you for believing in the guy running the simulation.

I would care about the pedestrians, if the sim ever bothered to include them. SimCity has never reached anything remotely close to a sane model for commuting. Overloaded transportation never spills over into the next viable alternative, which creates a hard cap on city density vs transportation efficiency - no railroad-fed skyscraper techno-industrial megalopolises for you, Mr. Steampunk Hipster. It's enough to make a body hit all the disaster buttons at once and see what happens.

[westprog]

Originally Posted by Last of the Fraggles

It's part of science to exclude supernatural explanations, I agree. That's why it's atheistic. That was a long way to go to agree.

We started there. I expected this to go around in circles, and it has. The error seems to be in ascribing beliefs to a methodology.

[HansMustermann]

Well, what I'm saying is: you may care about the transportation numbers, but not about whether one particular pedestrian worships you properly or whether he/she is gay.

And while, yeah, SimCity may not have enough details, there are games like the Tropico series which actually do simulate every single man, woman and child. They're not just random figures to show some animation on the street. Every single one of them is a real simulated person with needs, stats, simple behaviours like going to the nearest hospital even if they have to cut through the jungle all the way across the island when ill, finite amount of funds to spend on stuff (it actually matters if after wage and rent they can afford to see a movie too), political opinions, and finite knowledge. E.g., they have to actually stop and talk to someone who saw your secret police assassinate a dissident, or they won't know it.

And judging by the edict to permit same-sex marriage and how it works, some of them are gay.

I can honestly say that I never found myself caring that deeply about them or their ideas. I mean, sure, I wanted the economy to go well, and that they, as an aggregate "they", have enough food and entertainment and a decent life, but I don't even see the point in deeply caring whether an individual simulated figure thinks bad thoughts or doesn't believe in me. Or that the kindergarten teacher is a lesbian and married to one of the high school female teachers.

[HansMustermann]

Originally Posted by westprog

We started there. I expected this to go around in circles, and it has. The error seems to be in ascribing beliefs to a methodology.

No, the only error is your strawman that someone is ascribing beliefs to a methodology. And the only going in circles is yours too. You return to that ridiculous strawman yet again.

So, really, if the idea of ascribing beliefs to a methodology bothers you, here's a simple solution that would have spared us all the bother of going in circles about that stupidity: just stop bringing up that strawman.

[westprog]

Originally Posted by laca

Of course not, because, ummm, science is not a sentient being able to make decisions. What science can do however, is help in making better decisions. That's its main purpose.

Which again, is something that is pretty well universally agreed. There might be people who don't think that decisions should never involve knowing anything about the universe in which the decisions are made, but I find it difficult to imagine how they would be able to function.

What is at issue is the claim, explicit or implied, that science is able to make the decisions by itself - (or, for those picky about anthropomorphising the discipline, people are able to make the decisions using science alone).

[Last of the Fraggles]

Originally Posted by westprog

We started there. I expected this to go around in circles, and it has. The error seems to be in ascribing beliefs to a methodology.

No the error seems to be that, while you agree science excludes supernatural beliefs and is therefore atheistic, for some reason you don't want to admit this.

[Last of the Fraggles]

Originally Posted by westprog

And er... that's it. Same now as it ever was. What difference does rooting inside one's mind make? Let's see - I know that my desire for ice cream, or sex, or the new Avengers film is entirely due to certain electrochemical reactions in the brain so... er, I still have to decide what. I. want.

If the desire for something is purely a chemical reaction then you don't have to decide what you want at all. Your desires and wants simply arise from the reactions going on in your body.

I didn't choose to have blue eyes, didn't choose to have light brown hair and didn't choose to enjoy raspberry ripple ice-cream.

The issue is then how best to satisfy my wants and desires and the best way to do that is to employ a scientific approach.

[laca]

Originally Posted by westprog

Which again, is something that is pretty well universally agreed. There might be people who don't think that decisions should never involve knowing anything about the universe in which the decisions are made, but I find it difficult to imagine how they would be able to function.

What is at issue is the claim, explicit or implied, that science is able to make the decisions by itself - (or, for those picky about anthropomorphising the discipline, people are able to make the decisions using science alone).

What you mean is that people are not able to make every single one of their decisions based on science alone. I hope at least, otherwise you're just plain wrong.

I agree that people are unable to make all of their decisions based on science alone. I also think that we should strive to make as many decisions as possible based on science alone. The world would become an unimaginably better place. And I think this is where theists and science get in conflict, because theists are allergic to anything dispelling their illusions, slowly but surely, one by one. Unfortunately the human mind seems very capable of keeping the delusion one step ahead of the game no matter what.

ETA: I find your sig highly ironic in light of your last remark...

[westprog]

Originally Posted by laca

What you mean is that people are not able to make every single one of their decisions based on science alone. I hope at least, otherwise you're just plain wrong.

No. I mean that it is impossible to make any decision based on science alone.

Quote:

I agree that people are unable to make all of their decisions based on science alone. I also think that we should strive to make as many decisions as possible based on science alone. The world would become an unimaginably better place. And I think this is where theists and science get in conflict, because theists are allergic to anything dispelling their illusions, slowly but surely, one by one. Unfortunately the human mind seems very capable of keeping the delusion one step ahead of the game no matter what.

ETA: I find your sig highly ironic in light of your last remark...

[westprog]

Originally Posted by Last of the Fraggles

No the error seems to be that, while you agree science excludes supernatural beliefs

Yes.

Quote:

and is therefore atheistic,

No.

Quote:

for some reason you don't want to admit this.

Your error is in assuming that a methodological stance equates to a metaphysical belief. It doesn't.

[Skeptic Ginger]

Originally Posted by Jorghnassen

There are days where I find self-professed skeptics arguing in circles funny.

But I get bored. Still, the cognitive dissonance and complete lack of awareness of confirmation bias amuses me. Now where's my popcorn?

While I love that cartoon and find sometimes it couldn't be more true, I actually find it beneficial to refine my arguments and beliefs and occasionally learn new things in these otherwise useless discussions.


OTOH, there are some forum members it is more useless than not to engage.