Science and God

Sebastian, what is the distinction between 'faith' and 'belief' in your note? What is the scientific explanation for the basis of belief/faith (clearly the concept exists) in billions of your fellow human beings detectable as far back in history as one is capable of determining? Faith is a human mechanism (an instinct) for coping with tomorrow.. one which allows us to function even though we do not have sufficient information... since no one I believe (sic) is privy to all information (foremost scientists too), including whether they are going to be alive or dead tomorrow.. then Everyone has 'Faith'. Its just a question of degree.. there is an argument that says that the less you know, less you are in control of your day to day life, the more faith you require to cope with the future. However, even though wisdom may mean you rely lesser and lesser on faith for your day to day activities.. to deny faith completely especially for perrenial question's is to be ignorant of the human condition. Mykle, you started by decrying science (also a constant in your writings) only to end up using scientific terminology (some of it beyond me) in your later postings. You also talked about 'misreporting of science' being the 'problem' but only to concede that you have indulged in 'misreporting science' yourself on this thread.. So, what is the conclusion that you have reached.. apart from that 'THEY' are controlling us and are responsible for all of our miseries.. 'THEY' being at different times on these phorums the Government, Capitalists, Fundamenalists, puppetmasters, the system, parents etc I could go on ad nauseum. Clearly science and religion are thought modes that apply to part of the picture of what it is to be a human being and claims for one or the other as all embracing just don't cut it in any analysis.. perhaps we (humans) need to move on to a new foundation that is believably more embracing, that incorporates both without necessarily using the tired old rhetoric of either... As for 'THEY', they are us, and if we do not like us then we can change ourselves for tomorrow.

I'm not sure about the theory of CP Snow. I don't think the problems of the world come from people such as myself or such as certain people who have strong religious faiths necessarily. The problems come when people are intolerant of the beliefs of others, and when those beliefs do them no real harm. That is a fault of some scientists and some religious persons a like. My respect for anything Nietzsche said on the matter is small, as the man was only interested in the destruction of science and Christianity in order to return to an age of autocratic elitism where the meek were made to suffer without remorse. However I understand that you were probably not speaking about this aspect of his philosophy, just the basic principle. I don't think we should try to unite the two belief systems. I believe we should see what is real and act upon that. If that is unity between the two then great, but the danger is that many among us might force the two together unnaturally. This I do not approve of. We must, to use Kant's words "Dare to know" and we must allow others to come to decisions without imposing our ways onto them or harming them.

Thanks for clarifying the dispute over who I was blaming 1leg. I agree with Suelynn it’s time to make room for the pink and fluffies. Before I finish I have to say that I sometimes wonder what you are on 1leg! You say “Shockingly, the reality is, we live in a perfect world.” I do not think your idea of perfect is anywhere near most sane people’s concept. You also say “ (If this sounds controversial then reflect on whether science would have been able to 'predict' humans in the age of the dinosaurs).” I have to say I’m not sure what sort of scientist the dinosaurs had! There are many more examples 1leg but I can’t be bothered to go on. I think we must envision a ‘perfect world’ or at least a better one - and try to figure out how to get there from here. Forging ahead is OK if you know where you are going but it is counter productive in you are going in the wrong direction. I do not like the American dream - it is too self absorbed, materialistic and callous : I’m alright Jack beggar you. It is failing but it will cause much pain in its death throes! I think we should ponder on exactly what progress is before we rush headlong into that brand new white tomorrow where an small elite rule and freedom, compassion and love lay bleeding all around. ‘nuff said.

I think science and religion can live comfortably side by side. If you think about it religion is a form of science, a means to explore inner worlds and the possibility of alternate realities.( or is that shamanism.) The grandfathers of modern science were the alchemists, searching for the elusive 'Elixir of life' I believ in God. Not sure if there is a God, but the thought of living in a world that has no meaning depresses me. So I choose to have faith, because it gives me hope. Guess that's why I love mystiism and mystery so much, a world without it just seems cold and hard. 'Religion is the opium for the people' I can't remember who said that. Give me some opium man, cause I surely need it. this world would be @!#$ without it. I like religion and I like science, I like my playstation which I have thanks to science and I like practising mysticism, which guides me and gives my life some meaning and fills up that empty space within, that craves for beauty. It would be great if religion guided the hands of the scientist. That way perhaps poor innocent animals wouldn't suffer so much under their cold scalpel and virus injecting experiments.

Shame on me for failing to communicate, especially the ideas of others accurately; frankly, I agree with the proposition that these apparent factions are limited sides of each other. Both, if stricly philologically examined, are inductive and deductive versions of the same, singular reality: at the subatomic level, all are the same. E always = MC2, bottom line, and provided they get there the rest is attributable to our failure, both 'sides', to communicate (check out Snow's lecture, you'll find it enlightening). Peace.

There are more then two arguments, there are thousands, and I doubt they're all the same even at the most fundamental level. They are different interpretations of the world we detect through our senses.

It was Marx that said it, Funk the opium of the masses. But he was talking about organised religion...

Perfect, as in you are perfect Mykle, because you are unique.. Science and Dinosaurs, a parable not meant to be taken literally, unlike those in the bible. But I agree, thats probably enough for now. Its tiring this putting the world to rights stuff.. and certainly not very creative. Good to retain a sense of humour though.

At last we are in perfect harmony 1leg :-))) Pax.

I get mixed up as to what I’ve said on which thread 1leg but Andrew pointed out that it was not science but certain scientists, and how they were reported by the media, that I really took issue with. I realised he was right and that the media was the main culprit : misleading people by sensationalising and misquoting modern theories to suit themselves. I’m not sure who runs the media any more but I know it’s a small group of probably less than a dozen people who control the global media. Rupert Murdock springs to mind but then he may be a front man for... I call them the Puppet Masters because they pull the strings and their puppet politicians dance and we are in turn controlled by their decisions. We are fed the video and sound bites designed to have a calculated effect on our outlook - propaganda. It is said you must fight fire with fire and so I use their own quotes and theories to point out how ludicrous some of them are if we think about them rather than taking them on trust.

Here is a little true story that is not really apropos but it should entertain and give me chance to catch up. Many years ago I was somewhat startled to hear the terrible news that the sun had gone out! I rushed outside but the sun looked no different. It seemed that scientists had calculated that there were far too few Neutrinos reaching Earth and that therefore the sun must have gone out. I waited for 10 minutes or so - I calculated that light would take almost that long to get here from the sun and I was allowing a minute or two to be on the safe side - still no difference. It transpired that even if the sun had gone out it would take hundreds, maybe thousands, of years before we noticed because the photons have to fight their way out of the suns photosphere. Oh yeah! Scientists have since decided that the sun has probably not gone out after all - but they are still convinced that their understanding of stellar mechanics cannot be wrong and that something happens to the Neutrinos on their way to the Earth. Of course they are right - the Neutrinos having heard about Earth scientists avoid the place like the plague.

I do not say that ‘They’ are responsible for all our miseries - there will always be misery - I just argue that we have allowed a small group of people to decide our fate whether or not we agree with their decisions. I maintain that we are subjected to continuous propaganda to try to convince us that what they are doing is either necessary or in our best interests - when in fact it is neither. I think we have got Orwell's ‘1984’ it’s just that they have a different facade. When ‘They’ become ‘Us’ then we are lost!

I try to avoid debates such as these coz it does my head in. I think of it all the time you see. the reason religions came about is because the universe is inexplicable. mankind (insert prefix 'wo' if feminist reading) needs to understand what its all about alfie and, because there is no explanation. The vast majority of humans need - certainly needed in ancient times - a tenet to hold on to; something to justify their existence in the abscence of a quantifiable 'reason for being'. Now, science cannot prove there is a god nor can it disprove it; in fact the early scientists probably came to be the early theologians such was their desire to prove the why and wherefore. Personally I do not think there is a God, based on 'scientific' fact but, equally, I cannot prove this apart from saying "bollocks, how can you thank someone for surviving ground zero by the skin of your anus and then justify the deaths of 3,000 others? Huh? I'm waiting...) But, I cannot say where we are in the universal drama anymore than than an eminent scientist because he does not know either. He knows how large the universe is - but that is only measurable with the instruments we have available to date - so he is talking crud when he espouses about our origins. bugger it, I'm fed up typing this. I was thinking about this in my car on Monday when they were talking about new planets being discovered on the radio. (the talk that is. the planets were at the edge of the universe)... ...and it got me thinking about what is beyond ..... and now we have the circle complete. ARRGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Joining this late and really grateful for some thought provoking, serious discussion. Talking about the idea of spirituality, and a creator, but not wishing to pin him/her down ( THis time folks!) to any particular religion. I have come to the point in my life where to deny a spiritual realm, a creator, is not only highly irational but from a puny human point of view incredibly presumptious. We all die, it's inevitable, we can have the gretest mind, an answer to the world, the universes's most complex questions, with our astute minds, and suddenly, we can get bitten by a bug and bang goodnight Vienna. All that confidence, all those lofty pronouncements, irrellevent. We are in the hands of something. This idea of randomness put along side the beautiful awesomeness(?) of the world we live in, the way we're made. DNA, genomes, Scientists discoverinbg the blueprints of an incredible mind. Scientists seeing how devastatingly minute and at the same time how vast, are they bowed in awe to a greater mind? No way they think `they` have they answer and some, (Not all) confidently see their discoveries as not the obvious incredible fingerprints of a Creative being, but `proof` that such a being doesn't exist

I just read your recent posting in the last ten and I really liked them both! I struck me that there is an aspect of the argument about God and science that I had not fully considered. Many people have been let down so often that they begin to lose their will to trust. Perhaps belief in God is the greatest gamble: it relies on faith and the rewards are apparently only forth coming when we pass over. Science on the other hand rewards us in the here and now. No matter how many footprints of God we see around us they can all be rationalised as seeing what we want to see. Science seems to challenge many of the old arguments that were used to bolster faith and makes it that much harder to sustain. Sometimes believing in God would be too easy: passing on responsibility to some higher power who knows what He is doing seems somehow like abandoning your fate to chance: while science says trust in me and together we can forge a brand new bright tomorrow. Is that the real issue - that science says man can be his own god and create heaven on Earth and religion seems to say, let it be, it will all turn out right in the end?

I totally agree Mark. Some of these small minded scientists are like arrogant youths who upon discovering sex - think they have invented it!

Hey 1legspider. We're talking about two different things here I think. You’re talking about faith from experience that I fully believe in, though I wouldn't use that word. I do believe that the sun will rise tomorrow, you could say I have faith in that, but in the religious sense I have no faith, no total or partial faith in something that I have no reason to believe in. I think the sun will rise tomorrow due to the fact that I have seen it many times, but I have never seen evidence of God or the supernatural. But I do want to say that of all the views that have been expressed on this thread I think funky_seagull has perhaps got the attitude that I would most relate to. After all I'm not saying religion is in any way morally wrong (unless it inflicts harm) only that I do not believe in many of its fundamental assumptions e.g. God.

Sorry, I forgot to mention my last posting was primarily to Sebastian. Thanks for your input Baron living up to the mordant bit I see. Just a couple of point that tends to confuse me: Did Einstein actually mean that all matter could be exchanged for energy according to the ratio E = MC2 or just that if a body lost mass M then E energy would be released. In other words are we talking 'binding energy' released when say Uranium splits into two separate elements or the actual process of the whole lot being converted into energy? Also since mass depends on speed and approaches infinity when the velocity of the body nears that of light why do particles that travel faster than light not have a much greater mass - or is that the extra energy is released as cherenkov radiation? *Note for anyone who is reading this and is not familiar with it Cherenkov Radiation, also spelled "Cerenkov", is electromagnetic radiation produced when electrically charged particles, such as electrons, travel through a substance, such as air, at a speed greater than the speed of light in that substance.

I agree with 1legspider ===============skydolphin

Oh by the way anyone who finds this thread interesting might enjoy 'Ghosts' in the Discuss Writing From ABC forum.

Sounds like you are another potential Buddhist Sebastian. All the benefits of religion but no God. I agree that Funky is on the right track.

as long as I am doing what is right, what is good for the benefit of my self development in accordance with what is good for humanity, weighing and balancing self interest with public and believing in my road of life the road of pure hearted people and virtue I am peaceful. Now, here is a new thread by Nikoletta (skydolphin) and those that will dare to comment must be ready for really bad stuff that we have to eradicate =================skydolphin

Who are these 'small group of people'? Do you mean, for example, perhaps the terrorists on Sept the 11th, whose decisions impacted the lives of billions on the planet on a scale from those bereaved of their loved ones to those inconvenienced by extra security checks at airports.. Or perhaps you blame the governments of the Alliance for the war on terrorism who bombed the peasants in Afghanistan.. introduced draconian freedom limiting laws.. Perhaps Capitalism in the first place.. perhaps Communism for failing.. Perhaps the parents of those terrorists are to blame for not bringing up their children to respect human life, or perhaps Bush's ancestors for seeding his line.. I am merely suggesting that generally this is not a productive way for an individual to look at things (apart from debates on discussion boards) .. I suggest however, if you are a concerned individual, taking personal responsibility for ones own actions and choices in your circle of influence. In time your circle of influence will grow and you may directly impact the things that irk you.. do not devolve power and responsibility for your choices to others.. especially not to 'THEM'. Now, if everyone who is remotely concerned about injustice and fairness did this, rather than empowering 'THEM'... the world would become a 'better' place. I have found in my experience (and this is not directed at anyone in particular on this board), that those that complain most vehemently about THEM, do least to create a new future, but instead wallow in a puddle of negativity and ultimately selfish cynicism.. that leads nowhere. Of course, we all behave like this from time to time.. this could just be spider being controversial......