[Ghostavo]

Science, by its very nature, does not prove, it disproves.  Try again.

Bertrand Russell says hello.

Science starts by someone making a falsifiable hypothesis and then proceeding to attempt to disprove it. The more effort it takes without it being disproved, the more strength that hypothesis has. After taking a large beating without being disproved, people start calling it a theory.

The incredible claim lies in the sentence "There are gods." therefore, it is their responsibility to make a falsifiable hypothesis regarding the theory of gods and proceed to try to disprove it. Since you cannot make such an hypothesis (with a concept of god people are happy with), we would assume the reasonable.

Going against that would be like what Russel described in the teapot argument.

[NGTM-1R]

Um, no.

Yes. Nothing is ever proven, merely supported. Science is the iterative process of becoming less wrong, not the creation of truth (which is in itself not a scientific concept). You have confused science and philosophy.

Your own position is equally unfalsifiable as the position you argue against. That is the nature of unfalsifiable claims: you cannot conduct science with them at all, and your attempt to do so is a failure of your intellect. You claim the factuality of something for which, by nature, there can be no facts. It is an abomination against all rational thought.

Going against that would be like what Russel described in the teapot argument.

First, the teapot isn't unfalsifiable anymore. (No really, it's not. It'd just be a pain in the ass.) Second, Russel doesn't know his ass from his elbow. You are also busy conflating science and philosophy and so is he. If you cannot know the answer to a question, the only intelligent, responsible answer is "I don't know."


As for myself, I freely admit my atheistic stance is because I prefer to believe it is that way; but in the event such a being or beings exist, I have a backup stance. This is that they must be destroyed. No one may be morally trusted with such power.

[Ghostavo]

If you cannot know the answer to a question, the only intelligent, responsible answer is "I don't know."

Not in this case it isn't. If we follow that misguided logic, the answer to almost everything you can think of is "I don't know.".

It is illogical to assume that an incredible claim can be true just because. The answer to any question that depends on a state that may change during the course of the question for instance. Example:

"Are you on Earth?"

How do you know at that moment that aliens didn't teleport you to a plot of land on another planet identical to where you live but where bananas are called green and living mustaches walk the streets?

[Scotty]

That has to be one of the flimsiest straw arguments I've ever seen.

It is trivial to derive that we/you are on Earth because all other possibilities are readily (and easily) falsifiable, which is the whole point of formulating a hypothesis ("I am on Earth"): to remove from consideration things which cannot be true (in other words: falsifiable) to get a better picture of what can be true.

With respect to the discussion, God cannot be disproven (is not falsifiable), and can therefore not be discounted.

[Ghostavo]

That has to be one of the flimsiest straw arguments I've ever seen.

It is trivial to derive that we/you are on Earth because all other possibilities are readily (and easily) falsifiable.

Prove that you are not on a planet identical to Earth, which isn't Earth.

or...

Prove that there isn't an armada of space nazi yellow invisible tuna flying behind the moon.

[Scotty]

Differentiate the two.  If nothing differentiates them at all (including the people, interactions therewith, and chance occurences) then I am on Earth no matter which body I am on.  If I started on Earth, I am still on Earth, because we know that matter cannot move faster than light, and I have been on this planet all of my life.  Therefore, I have not left whatever planetary body I started on.

We know there is not an armada of space nazi yellow invisible tuna flying behind the moon because invisible doesn't mean undetectable and we've sent enough probes and other craft to the moon and past the moon to know that the space immediately around it is unoccupied.

If your supposed armada is completely undetectable by any means up to and including collison then they do not exist, and the discussion is moot.

[Ghostavo]

Differentiate the two.  If nothing differentiates them at all (including the people, interactions therewith, and chance occurences) then I am on Earth no matter which body I am on.  If I started on Earth, I am still on Earth, because we know that matter cannot move faster than light, and I have been on this planet all of my life.  Therefore, I have not left whatever planetary body I started on.

We know there is not an armada of space nazi yellow invisible tuna flying behind the moon because invisible doesn't mean undetectable and we've sent enough probes and other craft to the moon and past the moon to know that the space immediately around it is unoccupied.

If your supposed armada is completely undetectable by any means up to and including collison then they do not exist, and the discussion is moot.

The Earth doesn't have an invisible undetectable rock on a field somewhere in England, that planet has on its version of England.

Regarding the limit of the speed of matter, according to the same logic, since you cannot prove a theory, you don't know that.

Regarding the armada of space nazi yellow invisible tuna flying behind the moon, they are invisible to radar and other detection aparatus and move out of the way of anything that tries to pass there...

P.S.
I'm not going to stand here trying to reiterate the teapot argument with increasingly sillier situations. It is unreasonable to believe in something incredible, falsifiable or not, without concrete proof.

At a moment an incredible claim is being made, you have no proof, hence it is unreasonable for you to say "I don't know."

[Polpolion]

cannot be tested for which makes it impossible to prove or disprove, rendering the theory false by default.

wtfamireading.jpg

if you have two halves of a brain you'll realize why this is paradoxical.

ed: additionally, false != not believed in, which should be obvious. of course, using words incorrectly on the internet is probably the least of all of our worries.

ed2: furthermore, it is unreasonable to say that you "know" the answer to an unprovable claim because you by definition can't know. A more proper response would be to ask "does it matter?"

[Ghostavo]

But that's the thing, you cannot, with 100% certainty, "know" anything. Hence my argument that you can assume incredible claims without evidence, as being false.

[Scotty]

Ghostavo:  You fail science forever.  I suggest taking some classes or otherwise educating yourself before trying again.

[karajorma]

To be honest I think you all are having an argument about semantics without realising it. Words like true, false, proof and belief have completely different meanings in common usage compared to what they mean in a discussion about science.

Since you've basically failed to agree on which set of meanings you're going on you're just going to go round and round in circles forever.

[Polpolion]

But that's the thing, you cannot, with 100% certainty, "know" anything. Hence my argument that you can assume incredible claims without evidence, as being false.

Not true. With some basic definitions you can "know" lots of things, like much of mathematics. I'm sure I don't need to tell you how important math is in everyday life. Furthermore, even in layman's terms `know' and `believe' are not the same thing. Though it's not like much of this matters in layman's terms because the layman generally has no need of a rigorous proof. And chances are if you're discussing the existence of a god, it's pretty meaningless to conclude that "there is (a/no) god" when the distinction between the two is essentially academic.

To be honest I think you all are having an argument about semantics without realising it. Words like true, false, proof and belief have completely different meanings in common usage compared to what they mean in a discussion about science.

Since you've basically failed to agree on which set of meanings you're going on you're just going to go round and round in circles forever.

I came into this thread and I saw Luis Dias use a paradox like it was a legitimate piece of support for his argument. I'd even go as far to say that `true', `false', `proof', and `belief' have different meanings still when you talk about logic (as opposed to science or casual use), but that doesn't mean it's ok to say that if you can't empirically prove something it's false.

[redsniper]

Since you've basically failed to agree on which set of meanings you're going on you're just going to go round and round in circles forever.

HARD LIGHT PRODUCTIONS: Bringing modders round and round in circles forever

[Goober5000]

Christianity is most certainly falsifiable.  It makes several specific claims about humanity and God's relationship thereto.  Here are just a few ways that Christianity could be proven false:

1) Any person other than Jesus living a life free of sin
2) The achievement of world peace
3) The elimination of poverty
4) The extinction of the Jewish people group
5) Finding Jesus's body or skeleton

Note that various people throughout history have tried all five of these.

Note also that there are four kinds of evidence: archeological/material, eyewitness, documentary/historical, and scientific/theoretical.  One simply cannot focus on scientific evidence and disregard the other three.

[karajorma]

1) Even if Christianity was proven false by any of those criteria, do you really believe anyone would stop being a Christian?
2) Many of those while falsifying Christianity aren't exactly experiments that could be carried out.

[Luis Dias]

I came into this thread and I saw Luis Dias use a paradox like it was a legitimate piece of support for his argument. I'd even go as far to say that `true', `false', `proof', and `belief' have different meanings still when you talk about logic (as opposed to science or casual use), but that doesn't mean it's ok to say that if you can't empirically prove something it's false.

What are you rambling about my bad use of anything? Such an event is utterly impossible, mind you .

As far as the discussion of science is concerned, people ramble a lot about how science is about proving hypothesis to be wrong, forgetting apparently that the use of it is to get hypothesis that can actually be useful, i.e., predict future empirical events.

In that sense, religion fails astonishingly, and that's probably why theologians insist that religion is not science at all .

Hey, but for all of you to get a sense of the really bad thinking process that is named "theology", just get this palmfaced example, here:

http://www.reasonablefaith.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=7645

So Christian theologians of all stripes have to face the challenge posed by animal pain. Here recent studies in biology have provided surprising, new insights into this old problem. In his book Nature Red in Tooth and Claw: Theism and the Problem of Animal Suffering, Michael Murray distinguishes three levels in an ascending pain hierarchy (read from the bottom up):

Level 3: a second order awareness that one is oneself experiencing (2).

Level 2: a first order, subjective experience of pain.

Level 1: information-bearing neural states produced by noxious stimuli resulting in aversive behavior.

Spiders and insects—the sort of creatures most exhibiting the kinds of behavior mentioned by Ayala—experience (1).  But there's no reason at all to attribute (2) to such creatures. It's plausible that they aren't sentient beings at all with some sort of subjective, interior life. That sort of experience plausibly does not arise until one gets to the level of vertebrates in the animal kingdom. But even though animals like dogs, cats, and horses experience pain, nevertheless the evidence is that they do not experience level (3), the awareness that they are in pain. For the awareness that one is oneself in pain requires self-awareness, which is centered in the pre-frontal cortex of the brain—a section of the brain which is missing in all animals except for the humanoid primates. Thus, amazingly, even though animals may experience pain, they are not aware of being in pain. God in His mercy has apparently spared animals the awareness of pain. This is a tremendous comfort to us pet owners. For even though your dog or cat may be in pain, it really isn't aware of it and so doesn't suffer as you would if you were in pain.

Talk about "armwaving". Don't you guys ever worry about inflicting pain on your pets! He may seem to be suffering like hell to you, but he's not a human, has no soul, and so because of my scientifically-sounding-made-up-**** we can be sure that he's not really feeling pain.

So all christian theology hinting that pain is based upon mankind's sins is saved as a theory!! Alleluiah, brother, for we all have witnessed the power of Alice-in-Wonderland-Logic-MegaCircuit!

[Polpolion]

I came into this thread and I saw Luis Dias use a paradox like it was a legitimate piece of support for his argument. I'd even go as far to say that `true', `false', `proof', and `belief' have different meanings still when you talk about logic (as opposed to science or casual use), but that doesn't mean it's ok to say that if you can't empirically prove something it's false.

What are you rambling about my bad use of anything? Such an event is utterly impossible, mind you .

As far as the discussion of science is concerned, people ramble a lot about how science is about proving hypothesis to be wrong, forgetting apparently that the use of it is to get hypothesis that can actually be useful, i.e., predict future empirical events.

In that sense, religion fails astonishingly, and that's probably why theologians insist that religion is not science at all .

Hey, but for all of you to get a sense of the really bad thinking process that is named "theology", just get this palmfaced example, here:

http://www.reasonablefaith.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=7645

Science doesn't deal with `true' and `false', unless by `true' and `false' (or correct and incorrect, or whatever you want to call it) you mean `probably' and `probably not'. These sets of words mean very different things in just about every context. There is no way to possibly determine the existence of a deist god, likewise there are no scientific tests you can do to either confirm or hurt that idea. You just can't figure it out, and given how meaningless it is, no one really cares unless you make an equally meaningless claim that you know such a god either exists or doesn't exist. (well of course he either doesn't exist or exists, but hopefully you know what I mean )

In contrast, you can make fairly strong inductive arguments that a Judeo-Christian god doesn't exist, and there are scientific ways to test for his existence. This, however, doesn't absolutely prove anything, especially considering how ill-defined `god' is not matter what religion you belong to.

[MP-Ryan]

To be honest I think you all are having an argument about semantics without realising it. Words like true, false, proof and belief have completely different meanings in common usage compared to what they mean in a discussion about science.

Since you've basically failed to agree on which set of meanings you're going on you're just going to go round and round in circles forever.

Thank you for that injection of sense.  If I had to read anyone else say science proves anything to be true, I might scream.

The scientific method assumes the null hypothesis, unless there is sufficient evidence to reject it which favours an experimental hypothesis.  The null hypothesis is always that the proposed explanation being tested is the least probable explanation (or false).  Always.  Rejection of the null does not mean the experimental hypothesis is true, or similarly not false, it just means there is a greater weighting of evidence in favour of the experimental hypothesis.

Science never "proves" anything to be "true," but rather collects evidence that shows a particular explanation is the "most probable" by eliminating alternatives with less evidence supporting them.  Big difference.

This is why a grasp of statistical probabilities is required to understand science in general.

[Scotty]

Science never "proves" anything to be "true," but rather collects evidence that shows a particular explanation is the "most probable" by eliminating alternatives with less evidence supporting them.  Big difference.

Thank you for explaining it in a manner better than I could.

[Ghostavo]

Wait, so when I say it, I fail science forever, but when MP-Ryan says it, it's true?