Does science prove gods existence?

[inocente]

It may be your claim that Jesus never speaks of proofs, but he certainly implements them all of the time. Read the article that I cited in my last post.

The problem with insisting on faith alone is that there is no need to ever specify what it is that you have faith in.

If the truth is important, then knowing what is consistent with the truth is a key element of following or living by the Truth. To claim one must merely have “faith” as an undefined expectation in terms of what precisely that faith involves leaves open numerous possibilities. Reasoning allows greater clarify in terms of Who you have faith in along with providing some guidance as to when and why a mountain might need to be moved from here to there. Or do you suppose God will provide all the prompts, via a large TelePrompTer in the sky, and leave none of the determining up to you?

I have never, by the way, witnessed you moving a mountain from here to there, so I am skeptical that you know of what you speak or that you have faith of the specific kind required to move mountains. Or even that you know what it takes to obtain that kind of faith.

It certainly cannot be merely a generic “faith” with no defined object that magically produces the power to move mountains, can it? I have faith that the chair I am sitting on will hold me, does that mean that little faith allows me to move mountains? It hasn’t yet produced that level of transcendent energy, but I’ll keep working on it.

Well, no really. Moving mountains doesn’t really interest me, unless “mountain” is a metaphor for my lack of resolve to do good or the will of God.

Man, as far as I can tell, is a rational animal. That involves doing the right things for the right “reasons.” Determining the right things is a matter of having a good heart. The right reasons is a matter of having a good head. Moving mountains willy nilly or “just 'cause” and for no good reason (there is that word again) doesn’t strike me as all that important in the bigger scheme of things.

So, I guess if your goal is to move mountains, then go ahead and work on your “faith” in order to obtain such power over the created order. I have no such ambitions. For me, knowing the truth and living it simply and completely is sufficient.

I would say, as an end in itself, knowing God (the Truth) is much more desirable than having faith in God, no? In other words, faith could be a vehicle for coming to know God, but, ultimately, it is the apprehending, knowing or “coming face to face” with God, the Truth, that is the important thing.

It is because we are separated from God by a shadowy veil that faith is required, but when that veil is removed, knowing and loving will completely displace faith.

In the meantime, faith and reason are both means of coming to know God. Two wings working in tandem.

I would think most of us know Christ in the same way we know anyone else. We don’t go looking for logical proofs for the existence of our mother. A proof isn’t a mother. We can never know our mother by looking at a proof of her existence. Not only is a proof redundant, it isn’t her.

Faith and love are forms of nonverbal reasoning, which often can’t be put into words. But that doesn’t make them less valuable or silly, as if the only real knowledge must be verbal. We are not computers, we can see truth in abstract art or wordless tone poems, we don’t need everything to be in words and numbers.

Perhaps some men belittle non-verbal reasoning as too girly, and at the extreme, sufferers of Asperger syndrome might need some form of argumentation as they have big problems with interaction and nonverbal cues and so on. But the rest of us just know Christ without any of that. Faith is a gift. Don’t Catholics call faith a theological virtue, along with hope and charity? Is a proof a virtue? Nope, don’t think so.

I don’t agree that reasoning excludes the non-verbal, to me that’s like scientism in trying to limit where we are allowed to find knowledge.

As far as faith moving mountains, Jesus said it, so it’s not something to be brushed aside as an embarrassment. Are you saved by your logical proofs or by the gift of faith? A mustard seed of faith moved that particular mountain for you, while a mountain of proofs could not.

 

[inocente]

There you go using reason (aka philosophy + logic) again. Stick to the fundamentals of your faith alone paradigm, please.

Haven’t you been convinced by your own arguments (ironically) that faith alone is required to convince anyone that faith alone is all that anyone needs?

I find it quite funny that someone could use metaphysical wittering as their chosen method to dismiss metaphysical wittering. C’est la vie, apparently.

You are tripped up by your insistence that the only valid kind of reasoning is verbal.

Surely, it isn’t your claim that because Stephen didn’t make the mountain of stones “move from here to there,” he didn’t have any faith to speak of, not even the size of a mustard seed, are you?

Your constant tripping up must hurt by now.

Do you know this is not a photo of comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenkois, or do you have no faith your non-verbal reasoning abilities? Which do you think would be the best way of getting to know her - a logical argument of her existence or actually meeting her?


en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghan_Girl

 

[Peter_Plato]

My OBJECTIVE, observer independent existence is obvious to anyone.

Oh, I know about this view - I was merely expressing a little sarcasm. So your “willingness” criterion - namely that demons cannot be “found” because they are not “willing to be found” is just another nonsense - after all they are “found” by the exorcists despite the demons’ “reluctance”. Somehow those exorcists perform some physical activity (possibly some special prayers?) which overcomes the demons’ unwillingness to be found and then the exorcists perform some other physical acts (burning some incense, maybe?) and the demons find themselves exorcised… against their “will”, presumably. Poor little buggers, being harassed all the time.

So the oft repeated disclaimer - namely that the supernatural entities are not subject physical detection and they cannot be influenced by physical activities was just negated - by YOU.

As I said before, I am willing to learn more about these pesky little demons, but you said that you have no idea about the details. All you suggested that: “IF there would be no physical signs, then there would be no need for exorcists”. How “convincing”!

They aren’t “subject” to physical detection alone and they cannot be influenced by physical activities alone. You forget that the Church’s involvement is not a purely physical one, but one guided by the Holy Spirit who is not a physical being. It is by the power of the Spirit that demons are exorcised, so, no, my point didn’t “negate” anything.

Demons are not known or detected unless they choose to make themselves known or allow themselves to be detected - that is on their dime not by scientific or purely physical determinations; this implies scientific investigations are worthless BECAUSE demons do not act in the regular and repeatable manner required by scientific investigation. What a demon does today says nothing about what it will do tomorrow - a necessary condition for experiments to provide reliable data. I don’t see why this is so difficult for you to grasp. Demons are not objects of the type science studies, they are agents with their own rules of etiquette.

So physical manifestations cannot reliably be used to prove anything about demons nor prove they exist, since the evidence is entirely up to the whim of the demons themselves. If they want to go into stealth mode after a series of consistent manifestations, to “prove” they don’t exist, after “hinting” they do, is entirely up to them since science is powerless to control them or the “evidence” they can produce at whim.

The Church does not rely on physical evidence to “prove” anything. It is the power of the Holy Spirit which is relied upon. Much more reliable since the full scope of reality is available to Him, not merely the physical side.

It is not true to say physical evidence for demons either does or does not exist. Physical “evidence” for them occurs but since it is not “physical” in the sense of caused by determinable or consistent physical laws of causation, it cannot be used to “prove” anything about them. Which is why scientific means are pretty much useless with regards to proving anything about them - they don’t “sit still” as good little subjects the way science expects. That is why the Church does not rely on physical evidence, but on the Spirit.

 

[inocente]

Not at all.

Faith is indeed reasonable. However, my Catholic faith proclaims that the knowledge that is attained through faith surpasses reason.

See the magnificent encyclical: Fides et Ratio for more.

I dropped that into MS Word which told me it’s 35 768 words - is there a Lite version?

*It’s a little peculiar to see you posting a Words-of-Jesus-ALONE paradigm here.

From whence does that come?*

I guess from knowing God. Like this:

Thousand are thine eyes, yet thou hast no eyes;
Thousand are thy forms, yet thou hast no form;
Thousand are thy lotus feet, and yet thou hast no feet;
Thousand are thy noses to smell, yet thou hast no nose.
I am enchanted with thy play.
It is thy light which lives in every heart,
And thy light which illumines every soul.

From an entirely unreasonable Sikh bedtime prayer by Guru Nanak, sung here by Snatam Kaur

 

[PRmerger]

I dropped that into MS Word which told me it’s 35 768 words - is there a Lite version?

google.com/search?q=synopsis+of+fides+et+ratio&oq=synopsis+of+fides+et+ratio&aqs=chrome.0.69i59j69i57.7949j0j7&sourceid=chrome&es_sm=122&ie=UTF-8

 

[PRmerger]

I guess from knowing God. Like this:

Thousand are thine eyes, yet thou hast no eyes;
Thousand are thy forms, yet thou hast no form;
Thousand are thy lotus feet, and yet thou hast no feet;
Thousand are thy noses to smell, yet thou hast no nose.
I am enchanted with thy play.
It is thy light which lives in every heart,
And thy light which illumines every soul.

From an entirely unreasonable Sikh bedtime prayer by Guru Nanak, sung here by Snatam Kaur

Not the words of Jesus.

#irony

 

[Peter_Plato]

I would think most of us know Christ in the same way we know anyone else. We don’t go looking for logical proofs for the existence of our mother. A proof isn’t a mother. We can never know our mother by looking at a proof of her existence. Not only is a proof redundant, it isn’t her.

The problem IS precisely that most of us don’t “know” Christ in any obvious way, at all. So apologetics and evangelization are exactly the means by which to “arrange a meeting.” The difficulty is that coming to “know” someone, anyone, requires a sustained willingness and trust to get to really know them, as them, rather than as the superficial impressions we have ABOUT them.

I have never met your mother, so in order to “meet” her, prior to getting to know her, I must be convinced that a number of things are true about her in order to get me to the initial “meeting place,” so to speak. I have to be brought face to face with her by those “facts” about her - where she exists, what she is like, that she is worth meeting, etc., etc. those are all assumed by you “knowing” her, they are not assumed by those who don’t. Obviously, there are many people in the world who stand in the same relationship to Christ as I do regarding your mother. The question is arranging the meeting and how that is to be done.

Someone hesitant about meeting a blind date will require a great deal of “proving” to convince them that getting to know that person is “worth it” for them. Whatever means possible may be necessary and since man is a supposedly “rational” animal, reason would seem to be a legitimate means.

 

[inocente]

I don’t understand, friend.

Either the universe began to exist, or it has always existed. What is your POV?

There’s a guy called, now what’s his name, it’s on the tip of my tongue … Thomas Aquinas. He’s big on proofs. He proved light is instantaneous. It isn’t of course, but he proved it so it should be. That’s the benefit of metaphysical proofs, you can prove anything and everything. You just have to learn to ignore all the philosophers who prove the opposite

Aristotle proved heaven is a celestial sphere where God lives, around the outside of the universe, with Earth at its center. Thomas was big on Aristotle, but Aristotle proved the universe always existed, so Thomas moved a few words about and viola, he proved the opposite. Take your pick.

So my pov is people argue about this but no one knows for sure.

Y tu?

 

[Peter_Plato]

As far as faith moving mountains, Jesus said it, so it’s not something to be brushed aside as an embarrassment. Are you saved by your logical proofs or by the gift of faith? A mustard seed of faith moved that particular mountain for you, while a mountain of proofs could not.

Certainly, but how was it determined that any particular mountain ought to be moved in the first place? Or whether the “gift of faith” requires that a mountain of proofs to be eroded?

Speaking of embarrassment, I didn’t see you standing by my side when Hee_Zen was imputing my credibility by implying I was/am an embarrassment to rational men everywhere. I am also not averse to being treated as an embarrassment - it comes with the territory.

 

[inocente]

Speaking of embarrassment, I didn’t see you standing by my side when Hee_Zen was imputing my credibility by implying I was/am an embarrassment to rational men everywhere. I am also not averse to being treated as an embarrassment - it comes with the territory.

I ran out of time and haven’t read from #226 onwards but noticed this plea. It would be a new experience to stand on your side, and I’m certainly happy to adjudicate for a small fee.

 

[PRmerger]

There’s a guy called, now what’s his name, it’s on the tip of my tongue … Thomas Aquinas. He’s big on proofs. He proved light is instantaneous. It isn’t of course, but he proved it so it should be. That’s the benefit of metaphysical proofs, you can prove anything and everything. You just have to learn to ignore all the philosophers who prove the opposite

Aristotle proved heaven is a celestial sphere where God lives, around the outside of the universe, with Earth at its center. Thomas was big on Aristotle, but Aristotle proved the universe always existed, so Thomas moved a few words about and viola, he proved the opposite. Take your pick.

So my pov is people argue about this but no one knows for sure.

Y tu?

Yo? My credo: God is Creator. God made everything. That means that God created the universe.

That’s pretty much basic theology. (As a side note: DD who is in 6th grade in Catholic school is still on this lesson in her lamest of lame religion book: “God made you! God made the world!” No wonder modern Catholics’ knowledge of the faith is so abysmal. sigh!)

If God made the universe, it cannot be eternal. That’s basic logic.

Just to be clear: you are saying that you don’t know for sure if God made the universe? Is that a correct assessment.

 

[Peter_Plato]

There’s a guy called, now what’s his name, it’s on the tip of my tongue … Thomas Aquinas. He’s big on proofs. He proved light is instantaneous. It isn’t of course, but he proved it so it should be. That’s the benefit of metaphysical proofs, you can prove anything and everything. You just have to learn to ignore all the philosophers who prove the opposite

The beauty of Aquinas is not that he proved or disproved anything, but rather that he gave proofs laid out in such a complete and orderly manner that if the the premises hold one can be certain that the conclusions also do. Perhaps some of the premises have been disputed and some found to be untenable or unlikely, but we do know what would necessarily follow if those premises were true.

Another mistake that people make is assuming that because the premises Aquinas begins with are now in question or untrue that the conclusions are therefore, also, untrue. That is, however, the fallacy of denying the antecedent.

Aristotle proved heaven is a celestial sphere where God lives, around the outside of the universe, with Earth at its center. Thomas was big on Aristotle, but Aristotle proved the universe always existed, so Thomas moved a few words about and viola, he proved the opposite. Take your pick.

So my pov is people argue about this but no one knows for sure.

Y tu?

Again, your depictions of both Aristotle and Aquinas are incorrect. Aristotle didn’t “prove” anything about the Earth being at the centre. He gave “proof for” the notion. That means based upon the truth of the premises, the conclusion necessarily follows. Obviously, Aristotle didn’t have access to the tools we now have for ascertaining the certainty of the premises, so we have a best guess argument based upon best guess premises for his time. Ditto with Aquinas. That is not to say their logical skills are in dispute.

Aquinas, by the way, didn’t “prove the opposite,” he famously claimed we couldn’t be sure. For his time, he was correct - he couldn’t be sure. Today, however, we are coming very close to certainty that the universe didn’t always exist. Contrary the belief of some on this thread, who, unlike Aquinas, do not give “proofs” for their cherished ideas.

You have a rather common misconception about what “proofs” do, as clear from your “no one knows for sure” comment. Logical “proofs” depend on the certainty of the premises - the conclusions necessarily follow from those premises as long as the terms are not ambiguous and the logical form of the argument is valid. The question always is, “How certain are we that the premises are true?”

Knowing “for sure” sets the bar unreasonably high. The question is whether we can be reasonably certain of what we think to be true.

Hee_Zen, for example, premises his arguments upon his belief that the physical world is all that exists, he, therefore, concludes that any argument premised upon the existence of supernatural entities MUST be false. Unfortunately, he cannot, with any degree of certainty at all, prove that the physical world is all that exists - despite that he did attempt to do so earlier in this thread - because he should know that such a proof requires him to be certain with regard to the premise that the physical world alone exists. However, that the physical world alone exists cannot be established without some serious question begging on his, or anyone’s, part.

 

[Hee_Zen]

It is not true to say physical evidence for demons either does or does not exist.

Obviously you are not familiar with the third law of logic: “Tertium non datur”.

The first law: A is A (the law of identity).
The second one is the law of (non)contradiction: A and ~A is the null set.
The third one is the law of excluded middle: A or ~A is the identity set.

 

[Hee_Zen]

Hee_Zen, for example, premises his arguments upon his belief that the physical world is all that exists, he, therefore, concludes that any argument premised upon the existence of supernatural entities MUST be false. Unfortunately, he cannot, with any degree of certainty at all, prove that the physical world is all that exists - despite that he did attempt to do so earlier in this thread - because he should know that such a proof requires him to be certain with regard to the premise that the physical world alone exists. However, that the physical world alone exists cannot be established without some serious question begging on his, or anyone’s, part.

You are truly irrational. I have said many times that I am willing to consider actual evidence for the supernatural, and you still keep on spouting this nonsense.

 

[Hee_Zen]

Hee, would you mind addressing all of these questions posed to you a while ago?

Nope. There is no requirement to respond to all the posts, and I pick and choose which ones I reply to.

 

[Peter_Plato]

. sigh!)

If God made the universe, it cannot be eternal. That’s basic logic.

Sorry PR, but at the risk of losing the zero credibility I already don’t have, I beg to differ.

This depends upon whether A Theory or B Theory of time - or various possible permutations of them - holds. The universe could exist eternally in the sense that a book - complete with a beginning and an end - may exist eternally and still be eternally “written” by an eternal author to contain a beginning and an end within.

The time signature inside the book or universe does not apply “outside” of it. God’s act of creation of the universe does not depend upon the “time constraints” contained within the universe. As eternal Creator, his act of “creating” the universe could not have been accomplished at some “past” time since God does not exist in time. The creative act itself would be eternal - not in or constrained by time.

From an eternal perspective, there was not “a time” at which God created the universe, although it would be entirely consistent to say, merely, that God eternally “creates” the universe. From our time constrained reality, the universe has a beginning - akin to the first word in the first chapter of the time scheme within the book - and an ending - the last word in the last chapter. However, our view of time inside the universe need not and does not apply to God as Creator. He is not constrained by nor does he abide in “time.”

Ergo, as a creative act, the universe, could be “eternal” even though it has a beginning, duration and ending contained within the dimensional enclosure of its essential nature. We cannot suppose the universe as an entirety necessarily exists “in time” merely because time exists as a dimension within the universe. Time cannot be “forced” upon whatever reality exists extra-universally, so to speak, merely because it is a constraint within the universe.

 

[Winterwolf00]

You are truly irrational. I have said many times that I am willing to consider actual evidence for the supernatural, and you still keep on spouting this nonsense.

It’s okay he strawmans me as well, I don’t think he can get around his stereotypes and pre-conceived notions.

 

[Al_Moritz]

You are not in the position to criticize others, since you neglected the extensive rebuttals to your little article about naturalism being “self-contradictory”. All you “proved” was that you have no idea what “self-contradictory” means and what the “naturalist view” entails.

Extensive ‘rebuttals’ in your post (thread page 9 below)? I did not find it worthwhile responding to them because you hadn’t even understood my argument. Also, your alleged rebuttal of physical determinism of thought that includes “The immaterial aspects of the physical reality are not governed by physical laws of the ontological objects” suffers from the same problems that Peter Plato already had pointed out and you have failed to address (posts #88 and #89).

Yes, the statement “Naturalism is true” is self-contradictory because the very act of its assertion is self-contradictory under naturalism – the assertion cannot logically be made under naturalism, it is not merely false. This will be obvious to anyone who reads my argumentation, except perhaps to you and Winterwolf who suffer from ideological preconceptions that in certain matters prevent you from rational, logical thinking.

But I see that your ‘rebuttal’ only quotes from the first two paragraphs of my article, which leads to the suspicion that you haven’t even read the rest of it. No wonder that you got hung up on the “self-contradictory” issue if you didn’t even follow the argument.

So no, I don’t think my credibility is on the line here. But yours is – I still expect an answer to Peter Plato’s posts #88 and #89, which refute your attempts to establish that free thought or actions are possible under naturalism.

But I suspect you don’t answer these rebuttals because you are not able to. You cannot establish that free thought is possible as an emergent property from the physical world. And many naturalists have come to the right, logical conclusion that under naturalism free will and thus free thought (free choice of thought) indeed cannot exist, see for example:

Why you don’t really have free will
by Jerry Coyne

Logically, the author also rejects moral responsibility under naturalism, even more sharply outlined in this article of his:

You Don’t Have Free Will

Edit: correction, “your attempts”

 

[Peter_Plato]

Obviously you are not familiar with the third law of logic: “Tertium non datur”.

The first law: A is A (the law of identity).
The second one is the law of (non)contradiction: A and ~A is the null set.
The third one is the law of excluded middle: A or ~A is the identity set.

The physical universe either does or does not exist. Demons either do or do not exist. Fine.

What you are claiming is that if demons exist they either do or do not interact with the universe in such a way that their existence must be provable or disprovable merely by their interaction with or within the universe. That claim or its negation in no way depends upon an identity set, but on the capacity of the instruments of science to detect the interaction.

I am not claiming that demons both do and don’t interact with the universe, I am merely claiming the tools of science cannot establish, with certainty, whether they do or don’t at any point.

Sure, a convicted offender coming before a judge is either guilty or not guilty of the crime for which he is accused, but that does not mean the judge knows or can ever know that fact with certainty. The same holds true with regard to the position of science via a vis demons.

Merely because the third law of logic exists does not mean we are capable of applying it infallibly in every case.

For the benefit of Winterwolf and for the sake of improving his strawman ID skills, Hee_Zen was implementing a strawman.

 

[Peter_Plato]

It’s okay **he strawmans me **as well, I don’t think he can get around his stereotypes and pre-conceived notions.

Correction: “He strawmans the strawmen.”