New blog on science and faith

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Anselm33

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I’ve begun a new blog on science and faith and would welcome courteous, informed visitors and commentators of all religious beliefs (atheist to doctrinaire, even unto geocentrists).
Here is the web site:
rationalcatholicscientist.com
 
Awesome! Can’t wait to read and hopefully participate.

Do you plan on getting in on the Darwinism debate? I’ve been sinking my teeth into writings from all sides and would love to hear your perspective.

Additionally, I wanted to ask if you have heard or read anything of Fr. Robert Spitzer S.J? He has a clear grasp of contemporary physics and presents a solid, rational catholic perspective.
 
Orangebookbag said:
Awesome! Can’t wait to read and hopefully participate.

Do you plan on getting in on the Darwinism debate? I’ve been sinking my teeth into writings from all sides and would love to hear your perspective.

Additionally, I wanted to ask if you have heard or read anything of Fr. Robert Spitzer S.J? He has a clear grasp of contemporary physics and presents a solid, rational catholic perspective.
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Thanks for your comment. The question of Darwinism (evolutionary mechanism being survival of the fittest) is, I think, secondary to other issues—religious faith as rational, creation, free will, mind/consciousness. So I won’t go into the Design vs Darwin controversy in much detail.
I’m a member of the Magis group founded by Fr. Spitzer (have quit being a moderator on the Magis Facebook page because I couldn’t take the snarky, rude and uninformed comments of the evangelical atheists who would troll the site), but I agree that Fr. Spitzer is very well-informed on scientific, philosophic and theologic issues and presents the theist case very well in his book, “New Proofs…”
However, as a retired practicing physicist I don’t agree entirely with his view of what science is all about and what can and can not be demonstrated (not “proved”) by use of the scientific method. But he does have a tremendous grasp of various fields, a real polymath.
 
Evangelical atheists seem to only go after Christians. I think its our Biblical Philosophy, of turning the other cheek. They stay for away from religions that routinely resort to violence, even to the point of passivating them.

Evidence challenging Darwin ‘could be valid,’ explains Catholic scholar

Irvine, Calif., Sep 9, 2010 / 05:49 am (CNA).- Commenting on recent evidence that Darwin’s theories on competition driving the survival of species may be wrong, one Catholic expert explained that the new information “could be valid.” In an interview with CNA, Jesuit priest and scholar Fr. Robert Spitzer, also weighed in on the subject of evolution and its compatibility with Catholic theology.

Media outlets have recently buzzed over emerging evidence that the drive for habitat or living space – not competition, as scientist Charles Darwin believed – may have driven the survival of the species.

A recent study conducted by Ph.D student Sarda Sahney and colleagues at the University of Bristol and published in Biology Letters, used fossils to study evolutionary patterns over 400 million years of history, according to the BBC.

In their study, the research team proposed that big evolutionary changes happen when animals move into empty areas, challenging the idea that intense competition for resources in overcrowded habitats is the major driving force of evolution. The recent study ultimately critiques Darwin’s widely held view that organisms clashing for dominance where only the fittest survived is what led to the evolutionary process.

CNA interviewed former president of Gonzaga University and noted scholar Fr. Robert Spitzer, who confirmed that “Darwin assumed that competition was what was driving the development of human species and particularly the dominance of one specie over another.”

However, “there is no way of reaching back in time and finding empirical evidence of that fact.”

The priest explained that “Darwin’s theories are based on a series of inferences,” which are rooted in genetics, fossil evidence, empirical evidence and even mere conjecture.

“For all intents and purposes then, the argument that space may have driven the development of species or one species’ dominance over the other could be very much valid and, frankly, just as valid as competition,” Fr. Spitzer said.

“Both theories could be valid,” he stated, adding that the development of species could also have been driven “by another explanation that we don’t yet know of.”

Fr. Spitzer then weighed in on the issue of evolution and the Bible and whether the two are at odds with one another.

catholicnewsagency.com/news/evidence-challenging-darwin-could-be-valid-explains-catholic-scholar/
 
Kasama said:
Why not debate it right here?
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Because there is not enough length to go into matters like belief, faith, “limits of a limitless science” and because there are too many uninformed, snarky posters–that’s why I haven’t visited this forum for about a year. (Sorry if that last comment is unChristian, i.e. uncharitable, but then I’m just a cranky old physicist.)😉
 
Anselm33 said:
Because there is not enough length to go into matters like belief, faith, “limits of a limitless science” and because there are too many uninformed, snarky posters–that’s why I haven’t visited this forum for about a year. (Sorry if that last comment is unChristian, i.e. uncharitable, but then I’m just a cranky old physicist.)😉
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Just dazzle them with scientific facts.
 
Kasama said:
Just dazzle them with scientific facts.
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I’d like to, but the problem is there is no such thing as scientific facts. There are scientific theories, confirmed by experiment/observation, but the same observational data can be interpreted often by different theories–e.g. the orbits of outer planets can be interpreted both by classical Newtonian theory and by general relativity. I am of the anti-realist picture of science (see works by Van Fraassen) that there are no scientific “laws”, only models, most of them mathematical, which we construct to make sense of the world around us.
 
Anselm33 said:
I’d like to, but the problem is there is no such thing as scientific facts. There are scientific theories, confirmed by experiment/observation, but the same observational data can be interpreted often by different theories–e.g. the orbits of outer planets can be interpreted both by classical Newtonian theory and by general relativity. I am of the anti-realist picture of science (see works by Van Fraassen) that there are no scientific “laws”, only models, most of them mathematical, which we construct to make sense of the world around us.
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The Bible says that God created everything from nothing. Science confirms this with the Big Bang, in which scientists say the entire universe came about from nothing. Intelligent life was not introduced until the earth was ready. Dinosaurs ruled the earth for 150 million years without ever becoming intelligent. Insects existed for about 300 million years, but never became intelligent. Why? Because the earth wasn’t ready for the introduction of intelligent life. At any other point in history, we would be trapped in a permanent stone age. God introduced intelligent life when everything was in place for advanced civilization. The billions of gallons of fuel we need for our cars, the gas we need for our power plants, the organic matter we need for our rubber and plastics, etc. If you step back and look at the big picture, everything was done logically and in steps.

If the moon were to disappear, scientists say that all life on earth would die. Mercury, Venus, Mars, etc. tilt 90 degrees orbiting he sun. The moon stabilizes the earth like an outrigger on a canoe, keeping it on its axis. If the moon is removed, all the ice from the north and south poles go to the equator every 11 years. This would kill all life larger than algae. We loose the moon by 1.5” every year. 4.5 billion years ago it was 15 times the size in the sky and kept the earth rigidly on its axis, but every wave was a tsunami and the land rose 200 feet wherever the moon was over. Now the moon is in the sweet spot, the same size in the sky as the sun. The sun is 400 times the diameter of the moon, but the moon is 400 times closer. This is the most stable time. We loose the moon 4.5 billion years from now. The problem is; How is the moon in this perfect position exactly the only time when there is intelligent life? This razor thin period in time, in 9 Billion years. This is an impossible coincidence.
 
Kasama said:
The Bible says that God created everything from nothing. Science confirms this with the Big Bang, in which scientists say the entire universe came about from nothing. Intelligent life was not introduced until the earth was ready. Dinosaurs ruled the earth for 150 million years without ever becoming intelligent. Insects existed for about 300 million years, but never became intelligent. Why? Because the earth wasn’t ready for the introduction of intelligent life. At any other point in history, we would be trapped in a permanent stone age. God introduced intelligent life when everything was in place for advanced civilization. The billions of gallons of fuel we need for our cars, the gas we need for our power plants, the organic matter we need for our rubber and plastics, etc. If you step back and look at the big picture, everything was done logically and in steps.

If the moon were to disappear, scientists say that all life on earth would die. Mercury, Venus, Mars, etc. tilt 90 degrees orbiting he sun. The moon stabilizes the earth like an outrigger on a canoe, keeping it on its axis. If the moon is removed, all the ice from the north and south poles go to the equator every 11 years. This would kill all life larger than algae. We loose the moon by 1.5” every year. 4.5 billion years ago it was 15 times the size in the sky and kept the earth rigidly on its axis, but every wave was a tsunami and the land rose 200 feet wherever the moon was over. Now the moon is in the sweet spot, the same size in the sky as the sun. The sun is 400 times the diameter of the moon, but the moon is 400 times closer. This is the most stable time. We loose the moon 4.5 billion years from now. The problem is; How is the moon in this perfect position exactly the only time when there is intelligent life? This razor thin period in time, in 9 Billion years. This is an impossible coincidence.
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Everything you say is correct, and it’s compelling evidence for the Strong Anthropic Principle, with which I agree, but it isn’t science–it’s a proposition that can’t be falsified.
The only small bit of all this that was scientific was Fred Hoyle’s prediction of the excited nuclear level for Carbon-12, found experimentally, which explained the unlikely abundance of Carbon-12.
 
Anselm33 said:
I’d like to, but the problem is there is no such thing as scientific facts. There are scientific theories, confirmed by experiment/observation.
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One of my favorite philosophers of science, Karl Popper, makes a strong case that you cannot positively ‘prove’ anything with science, but you can very reasonably falsify a bunk theory.

How do catholics regard Karl Popper? I know of some theists who find his protege Kuhn’s paradigmatic view of science particularly appealing.
Popper was staunchly critical of Freudian, Marxist, and neo-Darwinist thought. I’d say that makes him an ally and a bold free-thinker. Thoughts anyone?
 
I think it’s a mistake to discuss from a standpoint of what you mean by the word “faith”, or what we usually mean, because post- EnDarkenment illiteracy has most people swallowing the Bertrand Russel definition of the word. I suggest discussing it from the standpoint of what it *actually *means, the historical meaning as it’s developed in Christendom from the Hebrew and as it and its cognates are actually used in speech.

Faith is an act of the will by which one adheres to another who is known, as in being faithful to one’s spouse.
 
neophyte said:
I think it’s a mistake to discuss from a standpoint of what you mean by the word “faith”, or what we usually mean, because post- EnDarkenment illiteracy has most people swallowing the Bertrand Russel definition of the word. I suggest discussing it from the standpoint of what it *actually *means, the historical meaning as it’s developed in Christendom from the Hebrew and as it and its cognates are actually used in speech.

Faith is an act of the will by which one adheres to another who is known, as in being faithful to one’s spouse.
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👍 I like that definition! You might also be interested in one of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy articles on Faith, plato.stanford.edu/entries/faith/
 
Orangebookbag said:
One of my favorite philosophers of science, Karl Popper, makes a strong case that you cannot positively ‘prove’ anything with science, but you can very reasonably falsify a bunk theory.

How do catholics regard Karl Popper? I know of some theists who find his protege Kuhn’s paradigmatic view of science particularly appealing.
Popper was staunchly critical of Freudian, Marxist, and neo-Darwinist thought. I’d say that makes him an ally and a bold free-thinker. Thoughts anyone?
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I agree with Popper, although not all philosophers of science do, that the criterion of falsifiability distinguishes a valid theory from nonsense. In the words of Wolfgang Pauli, reviewing a paper, “It’s so bad it’s not even wrong!”. (This is also the title of a book debunking string, M-theory by Peter Woit, “Not Even Wrong”.)
 
I wish I could join in, but I think the discussion is a little over my head.
 
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