There can be no scientific proof of God

wil

wil

UNeyeR1
Veteran Member
Messages
25,004
Reaction score
4,378
Points
108
Location
a figment of your imagination
rather than getting into it and derailing another thread.....
I said:
There can be no scientific proof of God - the very suggestion is an oxymoron.
Click to expand...
Why is that?

If science suddenly found a worm hole that they were able to peer into and see all these white clouds, folks walking around in robes, a fellow on a thrown with his son at his feet and an escalator leading upto a pearly gate and streets paved with gold and a selection of virgins.... and they were able to continue to peer into this hole, peer reviewed, published in journals, all of us watching 'Heaven live at Seven' the new reality show....

You'd deny it?

Or what if the theory of everything indicated the web of connectedness of all things and discovered we are all one being interacting with ourcellves, would not the panentheist be validated?
 
From a scientific perspective while it is true science no longer can disprove the exitence of G!d (it is even hard to imagine, for me, how anyone could ever have made that claim), it is not true that science cannot proove the existence of G!d. That would entail an experiment to falsify the contrafactual (to prove that science can disprove the existence of G!d) and the last sentence just stated that was not possilbe.

This is not to say science will proove the existence of G!d, only that it could.

Pax et amore vincunt omnia. Radarmark
 
Proof of God?

Such high aspirations, don't you think?

How about just conquering: Card counting, or Weather predictions?

We should see the mystery of the Majesty of Creation and our small part and parcel station-in-life and embrace it.

Fearfully feel the fear!
Fearfully embrace the fact of our mundane existentialism--- and then seek the sublime in it. We are one with the sublime.

After thousands of years of evolution, war, fallen civilisations and countless come and gone biographies of the multitudes ---we should stop seeking the mundane and weepingly appreciate the magic of the vistas of life at every step.

Having said that,

Why did human civilisation take thousands of years to invent the "velocipede"???

So much big talk of ancient cultures . . . yada yada yada . . . yet it took mankind millions of years to evolve and then still, many epochs later --- the most elementary contraption of locomotion remained as an un-carved block . . . I guess, until Mankind's level of consciousness had evolved to the point of understanding higher ways of transport like that which have never been seen before:

History of the bicycle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

No sooner than 100 years after the invention of the bicycle . . . mankind landed on the moon. But by then the atomic bomb had been dropped twice and other such seeds had been planted for every season under heaven.
 
Why the reaction? It just means "it is possible that science could prove the existence of G!d". Personally I think the odds are very much stacked against such a thing occurring... say a billion-to-one.

Pax et amore omnia vincumt. Radarmark
 
radarmark said:
"it is possible that science could prove the existence of G!d" . . . Personally I think the odds are against such a thing
Click to expand...

But the scientists doing this come from a species that required a billion years to come up with the idea of a bicycle.

Talk about haughtiness.
 
There is no agreement on what God is and is not. So it is not possible even to begin talking about proofs, scientific or otherwise.
 
would you first need to define God in order to prove Gods existence ?
 
Well, there are many examples of scientific discoveries or proofs that were just explorations of existence. The definition of matter, space, and time really had nothing to do with why Einstein developed relativity. And sub-atomic processes never even entered Planck's mind when he postulated the constant.

Sorry, brothers and sisters, you need to know science, not rhetoric to refute science.

Pax et amore omnia vincunt. Radarmark.
 
radarmark said:
This is not to say science will proove the existence of G!d, only that it could.
Click to expand...

Radar - could you give an example of a hypothesis that could be tested to prove the existence of God?

i.e. show us the scientific method in action here, put a little meat on the bones of your claim that science could prove the existence of God :)
 
I cannot, but that does not mean it cannot be done. What I said was:

"It just means "it is possible that science could prove the existence of G!d". Personally I think the odds are very much stacked against such a thing occurring... say a billion-to-one." (see post #4 above).

So for most people this would translate to "impossible". I am just not really fond of absolutist statements.

I am interested in this sort of thing (see "Science of the Web" thread). But proving the existence of G!d, well beyond my capability. The point is that science no longer proves the non-existence of G!d (thank you Descartes, Newton, LaPlace... but your ideas did not pan out) and concievably someday prove the opposite case.

Pax et amore omnia vincunt. Radarmark
 
IowaGuy said:
could you give an example of a hypothesis that could be tested to prove the existence of God?

i.e. show us the scientific method . . .
Click to expand...

If I'd to whisper into Radar's ear:

The scientific concensus amongst theoretical physicists & mathematians in the final frontiers of scientific explorations of the question of creation (from the formation of quarks & atoms all the way through to meta & theoretical explainations of physics) cannot be explained by way of "chance". IOW, even the big bangs 'innate impetus' cannot be explained away by otherwise 'inert factors'.

IOW, physicists & mathematians hit a brick wall explaining chaos begetting law & order.

Tell em about that Radar . . . if I could be so presumptuous to suggest as the seed of the response.

PS: Am I wrong?
 
radarmark said:
Well, there are many examples of scientific discoveries or proofs that were just explorations of existence. The definition of matter, space, and time really had nothing to do with why Einstein developed relativity. And sub-atomic processes never even entered Planck's mind when he postulated the constant.

Sorry, brothers and sisters, you need to know science, not rhetoric to refute science.

Pax et amore omnia vincunt. Radarmark.
Click to expand...
Sounds to me like you are talking about discovery rather than proof.
 
Ah, in science there is not "proof" if by that you mean "proof of absolute truth". In modern scientific methodology the crucial test is falsification. In this sense Newton was falsified by Einstein and no one has fulsified him (yet). And Carnot was falsified by Planck (and nearly everyone falsified by Bohr, Heisenberg, Schrodinger, Dirac, von Neumann--the founders of quantum).

One discovers a "more correct" theory of something, collect "confirming evidence", test for "falsifiability", and publish. The proof is scientific, objective, and verifiable...as science uses those terms.

I do not think any scientist believes in "proof of absolute truth" with the exception of tautologies in deductive logic (heck, induction is totally unproved, but it works), the arithmatic (things like "2+2=4", and here Godel's theorems prevent us from ever proving even algebra "absolute truth"), or obstensive definitions (this means we all point to something of a particular color and call it "green").

I do however, IG, have the beginnings of a case or experiment or notion for an experiment for the existence of G!d. Quantum says without "consciousness" (remember this is notional and I retain the right to refine terms) experiencing the "measurement" a quanta (from a string to the whole universe) will never "collapse" into a "definate state". Okay, with really poerful telescopes we can "see" the definate state of the universe 14.5 or so billion years ago. If we refine the experiment to collect data for the first hours of the universe's existence (I am not an expert here, and do not know how far we see back is forward from the big bang) and show a "collapse" is there from and even earlier time (we see that now at that 14.7 billion years), then there must be a consciousness that is either 1) existent in that ball of 1,000 degree Kelvin, 10,000 psi environment (or whatever the real numbers are) or 2) there must be a consciousness outside the universe interacting with it.

Now, this may not be the Aryan definition of G!d, or even most religions' definitions of G!d..... but it is a big stp towrds mine.

Really, IG give me some serious scientific feedback on this and I can promise I will try to look up data and make calculations. Two major problems, I do not know if it is "do-able" (like test of super-string are not "do-able not) and I do not fully understand what a negative (falsifying) result could be. A conumdrum. Thanks, pal.... just the mental exercise was worth the last month on this site.

Pax et amore omnia vincunt, Radarmark
 
radarmark said:
Ah, in science there is not "proof" if by that you mean "proof of absolute truth". In modern scientific methodology the crucial test is falsification. In this sense Newton was falsified by Einstein and no one has fulsified him (yet).
Click to expand...

Reminds me of an Einstein quote:

"No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong."

- Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
 
Nanos gigantium humeris insidentes.

[We are] "dwarfs standing on the shoulders of giants".

Sir Isaac Newton


And I am more like a mite hidden in the hair of Einstein.
 
radarmark said:
Ah, in science there is not "proof" if by that you mean "proof of absolute truth". In modern scientific methodology the crucial test is falsification.
Click to expand...
Precisely, someone must first come up with something about God and then see if anyone can falsify it.

So far, all notions of a personal, active God can be falsified or if not, are certainly very questionable based on the mess that we call human existence.

Only those that define God in a non-personal passive way stands on firmer ground. But, if God is non-personal and passive, why bother giving that the label God?
 
radarmark said:
I do however, IG, have the beginnings of a case or experiment or notion for an experiment for the existence of G!d.
Click to expand...

Awesome, keep putting flesh on it. Even if it doesn't turn the world of physics on its head I'm sure you (and all of us reading your posts) will learn something.

radarmark said:
Really, IG give me some serious scientific feedback on this and I can promise I will try to look up data and make calculations. Two major problems, I do not know if it is "do-able" (like test of super-string are not "do-able not) and I do not fully understand what a negative (falsifying) result could be. A conumdrum.
Click to expand...

Alas, my expertise is not in physics. I will do my best to provide feedback on your scientific method, but I am more knowledgeable about subjects such as ecology, biology, soil science, and hydrology as I studied these in grad school and work with these disciplines in my day job and hobbies. My last Engineering Physics class was back in the early 90's, Excel 95 had not yet been released and I was using Quattro Pro spreadsheets and before that Lotus 1-2-3 :cool:

I'm sure the members of this forum can give you some feedback on the G!d angle of your idea/experiment. Maybe you could also post your ideas on an Internet physics forum for some scientific feedback from people knowledgeable in the fields of physics and astronomy.

radarmark said:
just the mental exercise was worth the last month on this site
Click to expand...

I agree, this interfaith forum is great for mental exercise!
 
Let us hpe we can get some others interested in this. Got me in such a left-brain space I came up with a thought on how to notionally prove time-irreversability using process philosophy (is this scientific? dunno, may write to a couple of my physics mentors, Henry Stapp is a big believer in Whitehead)

Thanks!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top