Is there Hard Evidence?

[De_Maria]

De Maria i don’t think you understand what I am saying…

What are you unclear about?

Did you say that we could see atoms? The article I linked says that we can only see what the machine shows us. Data. It’s like a computer where you put in variables and it comes out with a report. If the (name removed by moderator)ut is incorrect, the output is incorrect. Some scientists say that when they look at the computer screen, they are looking at atoms. But that’s like saying the sun rises in the morning.

We know that the sun doesn’t rise. The world turns so that we can see the sun. But who will say, “the earth has revolved again so we can see the sun.” No, we say, “the sun has risen.”

In the same way, they don’t say, “the atomic microscope is showing us the data that represents atoms.” No, they say, “we can see the atoms”.

Do you see what I’m saying?

 

[Roseeurekacross]

I am a scientist, in my time I have played on fancy expensive machines that show us really tiny things. It’s amazing what one can find. Don’t presume it’s always about print outs on a computer either. After all we discovered most of the elements and developed atom bombs before we discovered computers.

A powerful microscope relies on sight, not computer printouts. Someone has to look down the lense and find things visually.

You said

Your just transferring your faith to a machine.

My faith in what? Atoms or God?

Ps google can we see atoms for some nice pictures.

 

[De_Maria]

I am a scientist, in my time I have played on fancy expensive machines that show us really tiny things. It’s amazing what one can find. Don’t presume it’s always about print outs on a computer either. After all we discovered most of the elements and developed atom bombs before we discovered computers. A powerful microscope relies on sight, not computer printouts. Someone has to look down the lense and find things visually.

I guess I was wrong. I was just going by what that guy said in that excerpt I produced.

My faith in what? Atoms or God?

Faith in your eyesight.

I’m not questioning your faith in God.

 

[AlNg]

Let’s look at a dead body. Why is it dead?

There are various reasons. Possibly one of the organs has failed. This can happen for example in the case of a heart attack. Or the body has been invaded by cancer cells.

 

[MPat]

De_Maria:

Let’s look at a dead body. Why is it dead?

There are various reasons. Possibly one of the organs has failed. This can happen for example in the case of a heart attack. Or the body has been invaded by cancer cells.

I’d say that the context shows that this question is to be understood not as “How did it become dead?” (which is the question that you answered), but more like “What does ‘It is dead.’ mean?”.

 

[De_Maria]

De_Maria:

Let’s look at a dead body. Why is it dead?

There are various reasons. Possibly one of the organs has failed. This can happen for example in the case of a heart attack. Or the body has been invaded by cancer cells.

And then what happened? What is the difference between the body when it was alive and when it was dead?

 

[AlNg]

What is the difference between the body when it was alive and when it was dead?

The biological functions that sustain life have ceased.

 

[De_Maria]

What is the difference between the body when it was alive and when it was dead?

The biological functions that sustain life have ceased.

You have it backwards. Life sustains the biological functions. When life ceases, the biological functions, cease. And another word for life, is the soul.

 

[Scowler]

The biological functions that sustain life have ceased.

A slight correction: the “biological functions” ARE “life”. The only functional definition of “life” is: “complex responses to complex stimuli”. Of course this is a very vague definition, since the concept of “life” is also vague. Some biologists accept that viruses are “alive”, others don’t.

 

[MPat]

The only functional definition of “life” is: “complex responses to complex stimuli”.

Nonsense.

The only way in which it can be true is if that suspiciously vague “functional” ends up being simply the name of the definition (hopefully it is not).

This definition is not even the only materialistic definition of life. For example, Engels (yes, the one from “trinity” of Marx, Engels and Lenin) wrote (Notes and Fragments for Dialectics of Nature. Engels 1883): “Life is the mode of existence of protein bodies, the essential element of which consists in continual metabolic interchange with the natural environment outside them, and which ceases with the cessation of this metabolism, bringing about the decomposition of the protein.”. See? No “complexity” required!

Of course, it is not the only definition. For example, Thomistic philosophers define living things differently. To cite Edward Feser (Edward Feser: Stop it, you’re killing me!): “Living things, the Scholastic holds, are those which exhibit immanent causation as well as transeunt (or “transient”) causation; non-living things exhibit transeunt causation alone”, “Immanent causal processes are those which terminate within the cause and tend to its good or flourishing (even if they also have effects external to the cause).”. And the form of a living thing is given the name “soul”.

 

[AdamP88]

What kind of HARD evidence can you bring up for your basic beliefs? For example, what hard evidence is there for an “immortal soul”? Or any “soul” for that matter.

None…that’s why it’s called faith. IMO, the teachings of the Church just make sense.

Also if there is no soul or no afterlife, then why should anything have a moral weight at all? I mean, if I’m just going to cease to exist after I die then why shouldn’t I just do my best to get as much pleasure as possible out of this life before I kick it, regardless of who I hurt along the way.

For me, the most convincing evidence of God’s existence is that we exist. Something had to start it all. The probability of this universe just popping into existence one day seems remote.