# Does current science prove the existence of god? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 6, 2006, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619 "2006-06-06T15:39:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Othersider](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/cab0a1/32.png) [@Othersider](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Othersider)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/41 "2006-06-09T03:55:18Z")
It’s likely there are still some people out there who think science and theology must be mutually exclusive. I’m pretty sure they aren’t. Still, as several knowledgeable posters already said, science neither proves or disproves God’s existence. Could it? Possibly. But I imagine if it had already, it’d be on the news or something all over the world and we’d all have heard about it by now. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/42 "2006-06-09T06:07:38Z")
> [@Othersider](#): > > It’s likely there are still some people out there who think science and theology must be mutually exclusive. I’m pretty sure they aren’t. Quite a few people, because they are. People have tried to mix the two together for centuries, and it never works. Science either disproves religious beliefs, or has nothing to say about them; religion corrupts science whenever it influences it. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 6:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/43 "2006-06-09T06:23:59Z")
> [@Der Trihs](#): > > Quite a few people, because they are. People have tried to mix the two together for centuries, and it never works. Science either disproves religious beliefs, or has nothing to say about them; religion corrupts science whenever it influences it. That mixing them doesn’t work certainly doesn’t prove that they are mutually exclusive - it just means that if they aren’t, theology fails whenever challenged by science. Sure, theology covering the “why” of things and science don’t intersect. But for the past 2,000 years or so theology also covers the what and how. Theology is the original theory of everything. Just because non-fundamentalist theologies have retreated into being a theory of the inexplicable doesn’t mean that we must ignore what they started as. We know more about science than people 1,000 years ago, but do Christians and others claim we know more about god? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/44 "2006-06-09T09:58:42Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > We know more about science than people 1,000 years ago, but do Christians and others claim we know more about god? That simply makes them more incompatible. Science advances; error is discarded and new facts are discovered. Religion is stuck in the Bronze Age. ---
**Author:** ![seoulsoul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@seoulsoul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seoulsoul)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/45 "2006-06-09T19:28:48Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > The answer to the OP is if science had proven the existence of God, you would have heard about it already. It wouldn’t be something you would have to find out about from persusing the Christian section of Barnes & Noble. In my post it’s pretty clear I didn’t find this book at B&N. 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/46 "2006-06-09T19:37:13Z")
> [@seoulsoul](#): > > In my post it’s pretty clear I didn’t find this book at B&N. 😕 I didn’t mean “you” literally. I just meant that scientific proof for the existence of God would be front page, screaming headline, 24 hour news on every channel. It wouldn’t be something that _one_ could only find in a book which is _typically found in_ the Christian section of chain bookstores. To put it bluntly, the genre of Strobel’s books is Christian witness. They’re not really journalistic exercises (despite the pretext) and they’re certainly not science. ---
**Author:** ![seoulsoul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@seoulsoul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seoulsoul)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/47 "2006-06-09T19:49:22Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > I didn’t mean “you” literally. I just meant that scientific proof for the existence of God would be front page, screaming headline, 24 hour news on every channel. It wouldn’t be something that _one_ could only find in a book which is _typically found in_ the Christian section of chain bookstores. To put it bluntly, the genre of Strobel’s books is Christian witness. They’re not really journalistic exercises (despite the pretext) and they’re certainly not science. I understand now more better :smack: But I meant my question in a rhetorical sense ---
**Author:** ![seoulsoul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@seoulsoul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seoulsoul)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/48 "2006-06-09T19:54:00Z")
> [@Skald the Rhymer](#): > > At the end of the book, does God disappear in a poof of logic? In the second book I mentioned, yes he does. ---
**Author:** ![seoulsoul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@seoulsoul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seoulsoul)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/49 "2006-06-09T20:01:37Z")
> [@Der Trihs](#): > > Religion is built on faith; science is based on facts. The two don’t mix very well. > > Envy; science makes religion look bad, because it actually works. > > Nope. There isn’t even any _evidence_ for a god, much less proof. So why do so many mix the 2? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/50 "2006-06-09T22:06:13Z")
> [@seoulsoul](#): > > So why do so many mix the 2? Envy and a desire for validation on the part of the believers. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/51 "2006-06-09T22:18:55Z")
> [@Der Trihs](#): > > religion corrupts science whenever it influences it. I don’t think this is quite fair. Many scientists, both in the past and present, are at least partly motivated towards scientific inquiry because of their faith, and their desire to explore (as they see it) God’s creation. If your view (and, while I’m not religious, I have respect for this view) is that God created a miraculous universe full of incredible things, then what purer form of worship could there be than to explore and study those things? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2006, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/52 "2006-06-09T22:55:26Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > I don’t think this is quite fair. Many scientists, both in the past and present, are at least partly motivated towards scientific inquiry because of their faith, and their desire to explore (as they see it) God’s creation. That’s not an attempt by religion to shape science; that’s religion influencing someone’s career path. > [@MaxTheVool](#): > > If your view (and, while I’m not religious, I have respect for this view) is that God created a miraculous universe full of incredible things, then what purer form of worship could there be than to explore and study those things? The problem is, not everything is wonderful; people who engage in that sort of “natural theology” tend to have their faces rubbed in that fact. They tend to respond one of three ways; deny that the unpleasant things exist, or feel betrayed and seesaw towards the position of hatred/contempt for nature, or they try to redefine “wonderful”. For example IIRC correctly, the idea that sex is and should only be about reproduction came from religiously motivated studies of cows and sheep, with the result that the sexual behavior of such animals was interpeted as natural and therefore God’s Will. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2006, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/53 "2006-06-10T00:06:12Z")
> [@Der Trihs](#): > > That simply makes them more incompatible. Science advances; error is discarded and new facts are discovered. Religion is stuck in the Bronze Age. If by incompatible, you mean religion doesn’t work worth a damn answering scientific questions, then I agree. If by incompatible you mean that religion doesn’t think it should be able to answer scientific questions, I disagree. 200 years ago many very rational religionists thought that scientific investigation would validate their god. Scientific discoveries, and Darwin especially, showed they were wrong. That many of the more rational religions today say that theology doesn’t cover god is more a function of this failure than any inherent wisdom. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2006, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619/54 "2006-06-10T00:30:33Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > If by incompatible, you mean religion doesn’t work worth a damn answering scientific questions, then I agree. Yes. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-current-science-prove-the-existence-of-god/359619.md?page=2)