Is natural science a scam?

[Della]

The claims of the Church, Luvya are verifiable for those willing to look at the evidence. I don’t believe you have. We can believe the Apostles because we see the fruits of their teachings. We can see God in everything if we are looking for him. And yes, the scientific method, as we moderns know it, was developed by Catholic scientists. I never said no one had made any investigations into the natural world before that, but a systematic means of doing so did not exist before they developed it. Until then it was hit and miss and quite disorganized. There’s a reason Latin is the universal language of science. Give props where they are due.

If God never spoke to you, he chose not to. But belief in him is not based on personal experience alone–not yours nor mine. Anyone anywhere who tries to do what is right and seeks after him, no matter how they think of him, is acceptable to him. So, Christianity does not have the corner of the market on truth–the Catholic Church has never claimed it alone has the truth. Truth is truth because it is found everywhere. And God is truth, as he is love, and life, and beauty, and many other attributes. If you can’t see that, then you may never see it, but God knows your heart and intentions. That is what he judges us by. If you have a good heart and good intentions (not ego-driven but truly unselfish) you have nothing to fear and nothing to worry about in this life or the next.

St. Augustine said: “Love God and do as you please” because he knew that in loving the One who is ultimate love, who proved it to us by dying on the cross and rising from the dead, then we can do nothing bad, but be good and do good. That’s all I have to say. We’ve taken the thread off topic enough. I won’t try to prove anything by criteria that doesn’t fit the topic. It’s pointless. Nor do I debate people for the sake of it. I am here to provide information that will point others in the right direction. The rest is entirely up to them. I give you to God and say be good and learn to trust even when it doesn’t appear to make sense for our senses can only take us so far and then they fail us. Only trust can give us all we need, for without it we cannot love and without love what are we?

Not that I need or even want the “final word” but I am done with this thread, which has gone off topic and petered out. So good night and God bless everyone.

 

[tonyrey]

Science is certainly not a scam because it has been amazingly successful in its rightful domain - that of physical objects. Unfortunately that has emboldened some scientists to claim that it will eventually explain everything, notably all human behaviour. That is where it becomes a scam because it seduces people into believing we are the authors of morality, we are the ones who determine what is right and wrong and we are entitled to do precisely what we like with our own body. Ironically they fail to realise that if we can explain ourselves they have no choice whatsoever in the matter! They are the victims of the ultimate scam - reminiscent of the temptations of Jesus by the devil:

You shall have absolute power (although in reality you are completely powerless!)

 

[Betterave]

There is plenty of evidence, but it’s not the kind of evidence you’d necessarily be willing to accept. The proof is, as they say, in the pudding. Theology is more like baking a cake than testing a theory. If the cake is good, the theology is good.

So how is theology like baking a cake?

And the Catholic theology is good–it lines up with how people really are and is the real remedy for what is wrong with the human soul. That’s its purpose, not to prove the existence of God or angels, etc.

I disagree, and I think “Catholic theology” does too. Why would you say this?

God does exist because Christ has been raised from the dead. If Christ is not alive then neither is Christianity. It’s as simple as that. Faith is faith in a Person not in teachings/theories.

Isn’t it both??

 

[Betterave]

There are two problems with your claims.

Some of them pertain to the past. Claims about the past cannot be substantiated the “usual” way, since we have no time machine to go back and verify them. We need to rely on testimonials. But testimonials are only accepted when there are several, independent witnesses, preferably from differing viewpoints. There are no witnesses for the Biblical claims, only second-, third-hand descriptions, made by unknown authors. The fact that some of the events in the Bible are corroborated by independent authors does not lend any credence to the “rest”.

There is a problem with this claim: it is methodological, and methodological claims cannot be substantiated in the “usual” way, since their purpose is to determine what counts as, or constitutes, the “usual” way. So how do you propose to substantiate your methodological claims here? You can’t seriously just proclaim that they are true and expect everyone to accept your say-so?

The other claims you (in general, not personal you) make pertain to the present and as such they are subject to the scientific verification. Just an example: “prayers bring on positive, verifyable results”. When a test is peformed, these claims all belly-flop. There are no significant claims that can be verified. It is all fluff.

You are again begging the question with your methodological presuppositions. Also, there’s this to consider :
A self-confessed atheist has become a believer after mocking God by sarcastically praying for his mother to win the lottery. However, his joke prayer was amazingly answered as the next day his mother won $1 million on the New York Lottery Sweet Million game.
catholicvote.org/discuss/index.php?p=17605

If you read the whole article (which is short), it also raises some fairly obvious points which should put a check on some of your fairly obvious question-begging.

 

[Windfish]

Science leads to the truth and dismantles all kinds of illogical reasoning.

Thank you,
Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk

Can you explain what that means? What is “truth,” here? Water boils at 100 degrees Celsius are the kinds of descriptions science provides. That is truth?

 

[Prophesy]

Can you explain what that means? What is “truth,” here? Water boils at 100 degrees Celsius are the kinds of descriptions science provides. That is truth?

I would say that that is a truth. It is a different type of truth than a theological truth. The same goes for iron’s specific heat capacity being 0.444 J/K*g or human’s being homo sapiens sapiens or the typical human carries 46 chromosomes or E.coli do not like citric acid, etc.

Science can be done to dismantle false ideologies, we can use math to discuss why the earth is not flat, etc.

-Prophesy

 

[Cristiano]

Empirical science by itself has a very limited say about the universe. It is limited to our 5 senses, 3 dimensions and time. It has to be observable, repeatable and predictable…

The only problem is that there are probably more than 5 senses and 4 dimensions.

 

[Prophesy]

The only problem is that there are probably more than 5 senses and 4 dimensions.

Yeah, I was just thinking that there’s been a decent chunk for 4 dimensional math.

-Prophesy