Does science prove gods existence?

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Al_Moritz said:
That’s all nice and well, but it is still counterproductive and a turn-off to formulate things as such in a discussion where precisely the question of Gods’s existence and thus also the validity of the Catholic faith is debated.

And by the way, the quoted text clearly alludes to religious truths, not all truths. The laws of nature, for example, are not religious truths, but simply facts about God’s creation.
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Another person who has professed “all truth is Catholic truth”.

aschristintended.com/category/apologetics/

Just sayin’…

It’s not my idea. I rarely say anything new.

And it need not be taken in the absolute, literal, dogmatic sense.
 
PRmerger said:
Random post
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It would be nice if you stopped posting those annoying (and idiotic) animated GIFS, instead of presenting something worthy to read. Wasting other people’s bandwidth is inconsiderate - to say the least.
 
Winterwolf00 said:
Not really agnostic so much as realizing that there are things that don’t have concrete and simple answers.
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This, too, is very Catholic. 👍

That’s why we have such great theological giants in our Catholic world. Folks who think and write and examine and ruminate on reality and offer trenchant and insightful texts to assist us in grasping Truth.
 
Hee_Zen said:
SSDD. If my thoughts WOULD be determined by the laws of physics - either directly or indirectly then physically impossible thoughts would be impossible.

It is obvious that the electrons and chemicals in the brain conform to the laws of nature, but that has nothing to do with the thoughts themselves. Just like the electric state of the AND and OR gates in a computer cannot act contrary to the laws of physics, but those gates have nothing to do with what the program does. But I already explained this and you still don’t get it. Your loss, not mine.
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Oh don’t worry, I get your argument just fine, thank you.

But it remains flawed, in that it does not adequately support your idea that free thought can be an emergent property under naturalism. I am afraid until you answer the objections to your ideas formulated by Peter Plato in posts # 88 and 89 I will have nothing anymore to discuss with you. Have a good day.
 
Hee_Zen said:
SSDD. If my thoughts WOULD be determined by the laws of physics - either directly or indirectly then physically impossible thoughts would be impossible.
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How would we distinguish a “physically IMpossible thought” from a “physically possible” one?

Seems to me you would have to demonstrate a singularly unprecedented one-way causal relationship between physics/chemistry and consciousness or thoughts themselves.

Good luck with that.

Remember correlation does not equal causation, no matter how disposed you are to insisting that it must be.

You would also have to use a very stringent version of “determined by” to make your case. It can’t merely reduce to “somewhat influenced by.”

I suggest you read on the hard problem of consciousness to get a better sense of what is involved. Gorging on Daniel Dennett doesn’t count.
 
Hee_Zen said:
It would be nice if you stopped posting those annoying (and idiotic) animated GIFS, instead of presenting something worthy to read. Wasting other people’s bandwidth is inconsiderate - to say the least.
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You can turn off images in the Thread Options of your Control Panel, if you really are concerned about bandwidth.
 
Hee_Zen said:
SSDD. If my thoughts WOULD be determined by the laws of physics - either directly or indirectly then physically impossible thoughts would be impossible.

It is obvious that the electrons and chemicals in the brain conform to the laws of nature, but that has nothing to do with the thoughts themselves. Just like the electric state of the AND and OR gates in a computer cannot act contrary to the laws of physics, but those gates have nothing to do with what the program does. But I already explained this and you still don’t get it. Your loss, not mine.
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Stephen Meyer has a very interesting take on what the laws of physics or chemistry can or cannot logically explain.

He points out that the nucleotide bases on the DNA molecule follow very clear chemical laws for how they attach to the double helix, however what no law of physics or chemistry can possibly explain is the order in which they are sequenced because there is no bonding involved in the sequencing. Yet, it has been the precise and inexplicable sequencing of the bases along the spine of the DNA molecule that has permitted the development of the plethora of life forms on the Earth.

The arrangement of the bases has no explicable physical cause, yet the arrangement is the key feature in the development of life.

View the following video starting at the 58 minute mark for a more detailed explanation.

youtu.be/eW6egHV6jAw

I would suggest to you that your electronic gates, like the magnetism in Meyer’s visual aid and the chemical bonding in DNA “carry” the potential for the emergence of “freedom” but do not create that freedom itself.

The freedom “capacity” emerges, but only because the gates were designed with a kind of “open” architecture to enable it to. Electronic games, specifically, were so designed by electronic engineers and programmers. They did not just “emerge” but were designed as a medium.

Auditory language exists as a phenomenon because “sound” vibrations can be carried by molecules in infinite numbers of possibilities, but neither meaningful language nor music emerge from cacophony as necessary physical products of physical collisions.

That would be like claiming the meaning in these words on the screen simply emerges from the possibility of a computer controlling and ordering the pixels on the monitor in front of your eyes.
 
inocente said:
Not really. A leap of faith is just making a decision without objective proof or evidence. When you’ve finished all your research and something still appears inconsistent or questionable, then you have two basic strategies: stalk around it hoping to acquire some killer piece of data, or go with your gut.

Neither strategy is guaranteed - you can die of indecision or you can be burned. But given we have a limited time on this planet, waiting around forever is not an option.

Taking a leap of faith, aka going with your gut, is about trusting your instinct or intuition. We all do it all the time, atheist and theist, because our intuitive mind is lightning fast compared with our plodding conscious mind.
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Yes, and you have done quite a turn there towards Pascal, who also argued for intuition and instinct rather than proofs for the existence of God.
 
Hee_Zen said:
SSDD. If my thoughts WOULD be determined by the laws of physics - either directly or indirectly then physically impossible thoughts would be impossible.
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The other problem with the above suggestion is that what is signified by the thought would have to reduce to the laws of physics.

In other words, the semantic content of the thought, not merely the fact of the thought, i.e., the thought as “container,” along with the semantic content, would have to be reducible to physics.

Again that would mean the significance or meaning of the word, “pet,” for example would have to be reduced to the physics involved in forming the shapes of the letters on the screen or paper. There are no physical or chemical laws that could possibly account for an idea or the same idea had by different individuals, nor, for that matter, subjective identity itself. Especially when the same physical configuration of the word “pet,” for example, could signify a range of meanings. The physiological form of the thought in the brain, or wherever it exists could contain a range of meanings. The exact sensation of butterflies in the stomach, as Lewis points out could be caused by nervousness or indigestion.

I, as subjectively aware individual, cannot reduce to chemical interactions in my brain precisely because similar, if not identical, interactions similarly account for the subjective identity of others that are not me. They do not account for me as me.
 
CrossofChrist said:
So do you think we can know anything apart from the scientific method?
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The other question being, can we know everything by the scientific method alone?

Simply answered, no. The foundations and axioms of science and mathematics cannot be scientifically proven, but must be deduced or induced or imagined or intuited outside the science lab.

Every well rounded scientist knows that science is a subdivision of general philosophy. General philosophy includes a realm called natural theology. Natural theology is rooted in the reasonable inductions and deduction that lead us to a belief in God; not a belief that is perfectly demonstrable in the laboratory of natural science, but a belief that is reasonably demonstrated in the laboratory of the human brain and the human heart. It cannot be argued that the brain requires conviction without the consent of the heart. The fact that the brain remains restless and in a fever until the heart consents is proof enough for me that a relationship with God is as much a matter of the heart as of the head.
 
Charlemagne_III said:
The other question being, can we know everything by the scientific method alone?

Simply answered, no. The foundations and axioms of science and mathematics cannot be scientifically proven, but must be deduced or induced or imagined or intuited outside the science lab.

Every well rounded scientist knows that science is a subdivision of general philosophy. General philosophy includes a realm called natural theology. Natural theology is rooted in the reasonable inductions and deduction that lead us to a belief in God; not a belief that is perfectly demonstrable in the laboratory of natural science, but a belief that is reasonably demonstrated in the laboratory of the human brain and the human heart. It cannot be argued that the brain requires conviction without the consent of the heart. The fact that the brain remains restless and in a fever until the heart consents is proof enough for me that a relationship with God is as much a matter of the heart as of the head.
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👍 Anyone who tries to live scientifically is doomed to inanity or insanity. 😉
 
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