Is it Rational to Believe God Exists?

[Charlemagne_III]

Here is a paper where it is argued that, under certain assumptions, the universe will collapse in 36500 billion years or less (Big Crunch).
arxiv.org/pdf/astro-ph/0409264v2.pdf
According to wikipedia, supporters of one of the multiverse hypotheses include Stephen Hawking, Steven Weinberg, Brian Greene, Max Tegmark, Alan Guth, Andrei Linde, Michio Kaku, David Deutsch, Leonard Susskind, Raj Pathria, Sean Carroll, and Alex Vilenkin.

And I suspect all of those you cite are self professed atheists or agnostics. Do you happen to know?

As you point out, a hypothesis it is … this Big Crunch … not even a theory. A desperate ploy by atheists in the physics department.

There is no scientific evidence that the universe will draw back into the Cosmic Egg.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Hmmm. Not very specific is it.

But, you see, if prophecies are too “specific” they are dismissed as impossible to have been foreknown or some other pretext put in place for disallowing them.

Consider the prophecies in Daniel concerning the coming of the Messiah, Isaiah concerning the Suffering Servant, Jeremiah concerning the exile and Jesus concerning the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem. The presumption is that these could not have been known in such detail beforehand, therefore they weren’t - the texts had to have been written after the fact, purely because preannouncing such details would be beyond the realm of acceptable possibility for the debunkers.

Apparently, disbelievers have both sides covered and a fine thin line - an infinitely thin one, in fact - has to be walked regarding what constitutes an “acceptable” prophecy.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

And I suspect all of those you cite are self professed atheists or agnostics. Do you happen to know?

As you point out, a hypothesis it is … this Big Crunch … not even a theory. A desperate ploy by atheists in the physics department.

There is no scientific evidence that the universe will draw back into the Cosmic Egg.

All theories are “desperate ploys” to understand the universe. There are a wide variety of theories regarding the origin of the universe. The majority of them came from “atheists in the physics department” and many of them are past finite. Scientists know that they don’t know the actual answer, if they employed your strategy and just picked past-finite models “because God” they would be terrible scientists.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

I’m always amused by the way “emergent” is used as if it is an explanation rather than a cloak for ignorance. As far as I know no one has ever attempted to give a scientific account of the emergence of insight from neural impulses.

That’s because there are a whole lot of pieces to that question, and many of them are not well understood (or well defined.) It could be that our *perception *of “insight” is significantly different from how “insight” actually works. If someone were to explain to you how insight might work, you would reject it because you actually cared about the question “how do I come to *perceive *myself as insightful?” In other words, our lack of knowledge could be leading us to ask ill-formed questions and come up with reasoning that is not even wrong. To say that insight is an emergent behavior is a fairly broad hypothesis, but it has a definite meaning even if all the component parts are not yet figured out.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Scientists know that they don’t know the actual answer, if they employed your strategy and just picked past-finite models “because God” they would be terrible scientists.

Einstein was a terrible scientist?

Albert Einstein Theories of Relativity

“I have never found a better expression than “religious” for this trust in the rational nature of reality and of its peculiar accessibility to the human mind. Where this trust is lacking science degenerates into an uninspired procedure. Let the devil care if the priests make capital out of this. There is no remedy for that.”

“I want to know how God created this world. I am not interested in this or that phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know His thoughts, the rest are details.” (Einstein, as cited in Clark 1973, 33).

“My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind.”

I don’t think you could argue that Einstein was just saying “because God,” yet he allows reason for God to put fire into the equations.

Religious scientists do not require their theories to be vetted for agreement with the Bible.

What they find as a rule, however, is that scientific theories are generally consistent with their belief in God and the Bible. This is true of both Evolution and the Big Bang. The Church embraces the viability of both discoveries, and a Catholic priest was instrumental in developing the discovery of the Big Bang.

“True science to an ever-increasing degree discovers God as though God were waiting behind each closed door opened by science.” Pope Pius XII

 

[JapaneseKappa]

Einstein was a terrible scientist? [the criteria was people who pick a theory “because God” are terrible scientists]

I don’t think you could argue that Einstein was just saying “because God,”

…So no, Einstein was not a terrible scientist.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

…So no, Einstein was not a terrible scientist.

But as you know, Einstein was also saying “because God.”

 

[JapaneseKappa]

I don’t think you could argue that Einstein was just saying “because God,”

But as you know, Einstein was also saying “because God.”

I guess you sure showed me.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

But as you know, Einstein was also saying “because God.”

Where?

bmj.com/content/343/bmj.d7679
How fast does the Grim Reaper walk?
Conclusion: The Grim Reaper’s preferred walking speed is 0.82 m/s (2 miles (about 3 km) per hour) under working conditions

That paper isn’t bad science because they invoke the Grim Reaper. It’s a cute rhetorical way to explain their conclusion. All I hear in your quotes from Einstein is “My religious beliefs don’t make predictions about my science, but I see science as a way to improve spiritual understanding.”

If you wanted a better quote, you should have used his “God does not play dice” quip. That is a more damning bit of evidence that his religion might have prejudiced his science. However, I suspect that in that case he was using God in the same rhetorical sense that the above paper was using the Grim Reaper.

 

[Aloysium]

. . . Religious scientists do not require their theories to be vetted for agreement with the Bible. . .

:twocents:

Science deals with much more trivial matters than those revealed in scripture.
However, whatever area of science, it’s importance is in the application; it is all about human factors. Science cannot be divorced from morality.

Science does allow for a deeper understanding of scripture, providing us with an appreciation of what the Bible is not about.
On the other hand, if any scientific theory is in conflict with the truth revealed by God, it would be wise for the scientist to re-examine his assumptions, methods, interpretations and conclusions.
You address Freud in another thread. He is an example of people who fall by the way-side - trendy and taken seriously for a while, but ultimately supplanted because they failed to connect the fullness of reality.

 

[Tomdstone]

On the other hand, if any scientific theory is in conflict with the truth revealed by God, it would be wise for the scientist to re-examine his assumptions, methods, interpretations and conclusions.

Not sure. Take for example the truth revealed by God in the Bible that slaves should obey their masters.
1Peter 2:18
Slaves, be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust.
Ephesians 6:5
Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ.
But science detects no essential scientific difference between a slave and a master. Why should the scientist waste his time re-examining his assumptions, methods, interpretations and conclusions that there is no biological, chemical or physical difference between a slave and his master? It is only by the brute force of weaponry in the hands of the master and the threat of death to the slave that the slave must live under the yoke of the slavemaster.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

:twocents:

Science cannot be divorced from morality.

Apparently the scientists who created nuclear weapons thought otherwise and some of them (including Einstein and Oppenheimer) later regretted their lack of moral insight.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Where?

“My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind.” Albert Einstein

How else can this be interpreted other than as a claim that God’s thoughts are behind the laws, and therefore God did it, and we should admire his superior unlimited spirit?

 

[tonyrey]

That’s because there are a whole lot of pieces to that question, and many of them are not well understood (or well defined.) It could be that our *perception *of “insight” is significantly different from how “insight” actually works. If someone were to explain to you how insight might work, you would reject it because you actually cared about the question “how do I come to *perceive *myself as insightful?” In other words, our lack of knowledge could be leading us to ask ill-formed questions and come up with reasoning that is not even wrong. To say that insight is an emergent behavior is a fairly broad hypothesis, but it has a definite meaning even if all the component parts are not yet figured out.

How can it be definite if there is no explanation of the mechanism(s) by which the brain comprehends events? Insight is a unique phenomenon that is totally distinct from electrical activity. It is comparable to the leap from purposeless molecular structures to purposeful living cells. Primitive man intuitively recognised the difference between mind and matter, between conscious persons and inanimate things. No one has ever succeeded in bridging the gulf between them or even suggesting an intermediate stage.

This is because science is essentially analytic whereas authentic philosophy is both analytic and synthetic. The sum of the parts is greater than the parts. The organs of the body do not explain how the mind and body function as an entity. Modern medicine has progressed in its holistic approach to mental and physical disorders rather than confining itself to the treatment of symptoms. The atomistic view of reality is hopelessly inadequate and outdated. Hume’s view that the mind is "a bundle of perceptions is flawed because it is self-destructive. What is it that gives the “bundle” its unity, identity and continuity? How can a “bundle” know or understand anything?

Charity begins at home and so does knowledge! Pascal was correct in his conclusion that “Thought constitutes the greatness of man.” Every conclusion we reach presupposes the reality of insight and understanding. It is self-contradictory to believe we cannot know anything. Materialism and scepticism are both inconsistent in their reliance on the power of the mind to destroy the existence and power of the mind. Our sole certainty, as Descartes pointed out, is the irreducible fact that we are thinking. We cannot explain away the mind or thought in terms of anything else because it is the very foundation of every hypothesis, metaphysical system and scientific theory that has ever existed! That is why it is eminently rational to believe in the Supreme Mind.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Charity begins at home and so does knowledge! Pascal was correct in his conclusion that “Thought constitutes the greatness of man.”.

There is a great quantum leap from consciousness to self-consciousness, comparable at least from the leap of inanimate matter to animate matter. Dogs worry about the next bone to conquer. Men worry about the next planet to visit beyond the stars.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

That’s because there are a whole lot of pieces to that question, and many of them are** not well understood **(or well defined.) It could be that our *perception *of “insight” is significantly different from how “insight” actually works. If someone were to explain to you how insight might work, you would reject it because you actually cared about the question “how do I come to *perceive *myself as insightful?” In other words, our lack of knowledge could be leading us to ask ill-formed questions and come up with reasoning that is not even wrong. To say that insight is an emergent behavior is a fairly broad hypothesis, but it has a definite meaning even if all the component parts are not yet figured out.

A whole lot of qualifiers there.

 

[Aloysium]

Not sure. Take for example the truth revealed by God in the Bible that slaves should obey their masters.
1Peter 2:18
Slaves, be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust.
Ephesians 6:5
Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ.
But science detects no essential scientific difference between a slave and a master. Why should the scientist waste his time re-examining his assumptions, methods, interpretations and conclusions that there is no biological, chemical or physical difference between a slave and his master? It is only by the brute force of weaponry in the hands of the master and the threat of death to the slave that the slave must live under the yoke of the slavemaster.

This is complicated and not something I had in mind in the quote you refer to.

I do have some thoughts on what you say:

• The working poor today in most places have it worse than slaves in the past.
• I do obey the government, my earthly master. There is a line drawn if I am asked to participate in sin, but otherwise, they run the show.
• Science at least in the past, was used to justify the hierarchical structure of society as being in place because the masters were naturally fitter to rule than the slaves. This would be the more modern, earthly equavalent of the divine right of kings.

I was thinking of deterministic theories involving human behaviour and of course a view that there is no essential difference between collections of molecules and plants, plants and animals or animals and man.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

“My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind.” Albert Einstein

How else can this be interpreted other than as a claim that God’s thoughts are behind the laws, and therefore God did it, and we should admire his superior unlimited spirit?

Which is totally different from choosing one model over another “because God.” That quote is making a religious claim (that God is revealed in science.) I object to making scientific claims for religious reasons (i.e. that a scientific claim is correct because of a religious belief.)

 

[Bradski]

But, you see, if prophecies are too “specific” they are dismissed as impossible to have been foreknown or some other pretext put in place for disallowing them.

That could be a reasonable argument in some cases. Although it’s entirely inapplicable in this case.

We’re not looking for predictions. We’re looking for explanations. That is, how did all this come about. And apart from the fact that the bible says it all started at one particular instance (an idea to which practically all belief systems on the planet adhere), there is nothing whatsoever in Genesis that has any resemblance to what actually happened.

If you want to treat it as a basis for understanding the cosmological, geological and biological history of the planet, then good luck

 

[Bradski]

Schroeder got his Ph.D. in physics from M.I.T. Just so you know he is no lightweight Creationist.

There is one thing that lightweight creationists (almost all of them) and heavyweight creationists like the good doctor, with PhDs coming out of their kazoo, have in common.

The clue is in the name: they are all creationists.