Faith and Reason.

[Neosutra]

God hasnt been disproven? Which definition of god hasnt been disproven?

And please tell me you didnt quote Akum's Razor to me. That is one of the weakest religious argument ever put forth. First, it doesnt tell me which god to follow. Secondly, it assumes you make no tradeoffs or lose nothing by becoming a theist.

And I asked for specifics, not for you to dictate reasons people may or may not believe. I know the various reasons, I want to know YOUR reasons.

Edit: To Max -> So muslims/catholics can use the scientific method in their every day life, but not apply it to their fundamental beliefs on life?

[Maxxthepenguin]

Edit: To Max -> So muslims/catholics can use the scientific method in their every day life, but not apply it to their fundamental beliefs on life?

There are religious people in the scientific community, dig around without sounding like it's a witch hunt and they're not hard to find. It's better to ask them than me. A lot of them can make it work.

My best guess is simply compartmentalizing and reinterpreting the meaning of their faith. Or the simple recognition that the scientific method isn't necessary to apply to every aspect to their lives

[Eratosthenes]

God hasnt been disproven? Which definition of god hasnt been disproven?

God is set up to be unfalsifiable. Ask theists if they can name something that would convince them there isn't a god. I've never seen one answer.

[Neosutra]

Not really, they simply dont apply that standard to those beliefs, which is hypocritical and takes a huge dump on the responsibility they have as an educated scientist. I would LOVE for one of my coworkers to give me some applied reasoning for their faith that was based on something more than them just "choosing to believe", but Ive never found a person like that.

Theists are theists for the same reasons regardless education/background. The educated/intelligent people just have less of a valid excuse for continuing their superstitions, when they already have valid explainations for the occurances those superstitions were invented to explain.

[Maxxthepenguin]

Not really, they simply dont apply that standard to those beliefs, which is hypocritical and takes a huge dump on the responsibility they have as an educated scientist. I would LOVE for one of my coworkers to give me some applied reasoning for their faith that was based on something more than them just "choosing to believe", but Ive never found a person like that.

Theists are theists for the same reasons regardless education/background. The educated/intelligent people just have less of a valid excuse for continuing their superstitions, when they already have valid explainations for the occurances those superstitions were invented to explain.

What's wrong with those people again? Assuming they don't let it get in the way of what they're doing, I'm not sure what the issue is.

How can somebody being religious betray a concept created by religious people?

[Meian]

Read only a bit and wondered how it got this far in a day's time.

So far, most of what I read, has been athesists agreeing with one another on their stand of "I'd love if these religious people gave me proof about religion" and some stating that they don't have a problem with those who are religious yet I keep seeing almost ranting about such people; weither this is because they are around extremeists thinking they are being pushed by them or some other reason I am not sure.

[Neosutra]

What's wrong with those people again? Assuming they don't let it get in the way of what they're doing, I'm not sure what the issue is.

How can somebody being religious betray a concept created by religious people?

They betray the scientific community. People look to their scientist/educated leaders as foundation for their own beliefs. This was brought up in threads with woozie, but theists believe that a physicists that believes in god must have applied the same intensive deductive reasoning and standards to that belief as they do in their physics research, which just isnt the case. You cant devote yourself to a standard of knowledge, and yet represent yourself as the complete opposite in your personal life.

Why do you think people misquote Einstein so much to be a theist? They take comfort that someone vastly smarter than them agrees with them and validates their beliefs. However no such analysis occurs, no such standard is enforced, and these people give false support to dogmas that had no legs to stand on to begin with.

[Tristam]

Nothing inherently wrong with a scientist being religious so long as their beliefs don't cloud their interpretations of data. They just seem happy with describing what is currently unknown about the primary causes of natural phenomena to be unknowable or the work of a god.

Most scientists don't talk about religion atall, it's just not something that comes up at work.

[Melchiah]

I think what Neosutra is getting at is that if you want to argue that an intelligent designer built the universe using repeatable and quantifiable methods that as of yet we don't fully have a handle on, then rock on. But as for a God who exists outside of time and space that miracled us all into being with a thought, and that we should not explore what makes this God a god, and how he pulled off this circus because he is god and therefore unknowable, that's just absurd.

The problem that rational people have with religion is the cop-out crap answers they give to the hard questions. Instead of admitting that they don't know, or that their set of beliefs might not be 100% accurate, they just fling dogma about how you just have to believe, because God wants you to believe in him without any justification.

Look, "because I said so" stopped working when I started thinking for myself. No rational person is going to accept that as justification for anything. Anyone who does is too weak-minded to think for themselves, thus they allow the church to do it for them.

[Neosutra]

Any scientist that affirms the belief that the universe is in any way unknowable and/or designates the unknown to a diety has no respect from me Tristam, and deserves none.

[Maxxthepenguin]

They betray the scientific community. People look to their scientist/educated leaders as foundation for their own beliefs. This was brought up in threads with woozie, but theists believe that a physicists that believes in god must have applied the same intensive deductive reasoning and standards to that belief as they do in their physics research, which just isnt the case. You cant devote yourself to a standard of knowledge, and yet represent yourself as the complete opposite in your personal life.

Just because it's the process for finding and validating new information in scientific fields doesn't mean it has to be followed in their personal life. And no, theists, as you like to call them, don't look to scientists for validation at all. Man, if we applied the scientific method and scientific standards to everything we did and thought, we wouldn't get anything done. Trust and trusting intuition have their place.

But that's philosophical.

Why do you think people misquote Einstein so much to be a theist? They take comfort that someone vastly smarter than them agrees with them and validates their beliefs. However no such analysis occurs, no such standard is enforced, and these people give false support to dogmas that had no legs to stand on to begin with.

Einstein didn't subscribe to a religion, but talked about some personal version of a god. Hell, he even went out and said he wasn't an atheist. His views on god aren't simple at all, don't try to simplify them.

[Tristam]

Any scientist that affirms the belief that the universe is in any way unknowable and/or designates the unknown to a diety has no respect from me Tristam, and deserves none.

Not saying I agree with them, but I think it's very possible for great scientists to believe in irrational things. I've seen some models fail utterly that certain very well meaning and intelligent people just had a very difficult time letting go of (due to personal investment in the effort to support that particular model). And there's no coordinated stance from the scientific community on religion, except in matters where evidence and faith collide, we honestly have no opinion.

[Meian]

In the end...
Everyone's reactions summed up:
"There is no God."
"No proof no belief."
"I say I have nothing against those who believe but I discriminate their intelligence and rant anyway."
"I am a hypocrite who pushes my athesist ideology onto those with faith just as those with faith pushed their ideology onto me."

/thread

or moved to spam

[Tristam]

And no, theists, as you like to call them, don't look to scientists for validation at all. Man, if we applied the scientific method and scientific standards to everything we did and thought, we wouldn't get anything done. Trust and trusting intuition have their place.

But that's philosophical.

I disagree that people don't look to scientists for validation, argument from authority is one of the oldest tricks in the book, but that dosen't make it right. Same with the galileo gambit.

I also disagree that the scientific method isn't valuable in daily life, trial and error is part of humanity and humans were practicing rudimentary forms of emprircism well before civilization. In video games alone people use a form of the scientific method every day.

[Melchiah]

Yeah that's textbook BRP Rule right there.

[Neosutra]

This thread was specifically designed for these types of debates Meian, so get the fuck out if you have a problem with it.

@ Max: If we applied thought and standards to everything we did/thought we would do more than "get stuff done", we would probably have world peace, no hunger, no religion, and be flying in our fusion powered sex mobiles by now. And you missed my point about Einstien. The point was that people take comfort when they think a scientist believes in their superstitions, as they believe that this intelligent/educated person applied that intelligence/education to their beliefs, which isnt the case.

[kuronosan]

I am a scientist, and I still believe in God. There's nothing wrong with that.

And I don't need your respect, either.

As far as religion goes, the belief is not the problem. It's the defense of that belief that is the problem. If you were to go to any scientist during the age of discovery and tell him the world was round you'd get imprisoned like Galileo was. Scientists are not always right and neither are religious people. What's important is that you have faith in what you stand by.

Science, for me, has never failed me. Then again, neither has my faith in a higher power. That doesn't mean I believe in Jesus or prophets and angels and anything else, it just means God has not been proven to not exist. Logically, his existence can be disproved. Scientifically, it hasn't. For all we know, God could be some alien guy from Zeti-Alpha Prime Quadrant 6 who just came by, farted on a group of phosphates, and began the synthesis of proteins.

The fact that people forget religious books are allegorical is what the problem is. Not only that, the books (mainly the bible) contradict themselves at times.

The bible is honestly the best example of this. Only the bible would preach love and tolerance one minute and the next condemn the same to hell. These are stories that teach you how to live morally and how to live right. Unfortunately people get so passionate about the lessons they are supposed to be learning that they go and preach to other people and get all defensive and angry when you don't believe them because way back when big meteors rained down on Sodom and Gomorrah.

It's beyond retarded how people will claim knowledge on the bible and just pay attention to the shit they're supposed to preach to others instead of the things they should be applying to themselves.

Having been raised Catholic and attended a lot of Catholic masses, I can safely say that Catholics are probably the most hilarious of all. I refuse to renounce my faith under any circumstances but still something that never sits well with me is why I'm supposed to go tell my problems to some guy in a robe so he can relay it to God so I can be forgiven just urks me. Especially since when I die, apparently I am at the Pearly Gates and I get to confess anyway.

So what's the difference between confessing now and confessing then?

I think religion, physiologically, is good for people. That's why I support it. Psychologically, however, it's very bad in high doses. When abused, it's nothing more than a crutch for people who can't think for themselves and need to find reason in times of insanity.

Why else do you think people who start thinking for themselves start attending church less? They don't need to depend on someone else's point of view anymore.

Some people aren't so lucky.

Anyway, that's all I have to say about that. Science and Religion aren't a bad mix. Extremes of both are.

[Melchiah]

Let's try an exercise: Someone find me a miracle, not recorded in the bible, that has not been or cannot be duplicated by scientific methods.

You see, you can't call anything fact unless it can be duplicated or you witnessed it directly. Therefore, I will posit that everything miraculous recorded in the bible is bunk until someone duplicates it in front of me. And I'm for damn certain that no one alive today witnessed Moses parting the Red Sea or saw Jericho fall to a trumpet blast, thus to claim those things as fact based on uncited documentation is pure fallacy, and it wouldn't be accepted for anything else, so why do we accept those things as the story of our history?

[Neosutra]

What definition of god do you believe in then kuro? And what type of scientist are you? And to be clear, i stated any scientist that stated part of the universe was unknowable, or attributed things unknown to dieties deserve no respect, which does leave some leeway for half way diest, even if I disagree with them.

Also, what is the reason for that belief? Do you believe there needed to be a god for this universe to form? Is there some other motives?

[kuronosan]

Because they're not stories of our history.

You ever heard tall tales? Paul Bunyan and his Giant Ox didn't really exist, but they embody a symbol of American heritage. John Henry Irons wasn't really a steel drivin' man who laid down millions of miles of railroad track single-handedly, was he? There isn't really a Jersey Devil or Blair Witch or Ghost of Abe Lincoln, is there?

Yet if all these stories turned out to be true, there could be a perfectly logical explanation for it. I'm betting 200-300 years from now, if humans still exist, that people will tell stories of a Legendary Aquaman named Michael Phelps who swam the oceans 10 times over. William Wallace can shoot bolts of lightning out of his ass, etc, etc.

Is this sinking in yet? The bible is 80% story, 20% historical. Heck, for all you know, a volcano could have erupted and destroyed the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah... his wife looking back and being reduced to dust is symbolic in its own right.

Again, the problem with religion (or science, for that matter) is that if you take fiction or near-fiction too literally, you start to have problems.