GLEE –
Of course there is. If I affirmatively state, and offer to defend, “there is no God” then that is my thesis. It is “thesis” as in “hypothesis,” at least in the realm of science, and “there is no God” is a perfectly fine thesis. It’s just unprovable, as is “there is a God.”
Surely you see that this is equally applicable to unbelievers who say “God does not exist.” Science says to them equally “without evidence, your thesis is worthless. Find evidence!”
It is the proven absence of something. I can prove, as an affirmative (or positive) proposition, that I was not out dancing last night. (I was at work with other unfortunate colleagues – i.e., witnesses.) It can be proven (and has been proven) that zinc does not improve the common cold. It can be proven that people cannot breathe underwater. Just because these theses all contain negative language does not transform them into negative propositions. They are still affirmative (positive) propositions, subject to positive proof. So, in theory, would the idea of God be, if He was natural/rational/subject to proof in the first place. But since God, as a belief or an idea, is not subject to proof (any more than any other purely abstract concept is) at all, His existence can neither be proven nor disproven.
Don’t get me wrong; I have plenty invested in the existence of God. I just don’t make a point of attempting to cram my beliefs down other people’s throats, nor do I have anything invested in proving to you that I am right, such as would lead me to be snotty and disdainful about whatever it is you happen to believe. The context of my comments is this thread, and this thread alone – not everyone in the wide world who might make money off religion. (BTW, JAB has very gracefully apologized for his attitude; I bring it up not to jump on him again but to explain the context of my remarks, though frankly I thought that was evident.)
Sigh. I have never said that the scientific method has anything to do with faith. The scientific method is explicitly limited to that which is quantifiable and testable, and therefore has nothing whatsoever to do with faith, which is definitionally the acceptance of a thesis in the absence of proof.
I consider that a quibble, but have no argument with you making it. I do reserve the right to quibble back, however.
And here is my quibble: This is not correct. Science uses experiment to prove theories, not to construct them. Hypothesis precedes experiment, or how do you know what you are experimenting for?
You seem to have the thread cast members mixed up, which is no surprise without a program. The only religious “ceremonies” I routinely attend are Protestant Sunday services.
I doubt very much it has the same effect as participating in a religious ritual, unless you find a good meal to be spiritually, as well as corporeally, fulfilling.
Actually, “science” as a general proposition recognizes the extra-rationality of religion as a whole – recognizes, in effect, that it can have nothing to do with religion since religious beliefs are totally unamenable to proof. Science therefore generally does not try to explain (in the sense of proving) religion at all. Therefore, science would not embrace either of your theses above, since they, like almost everything else involving religion, are unprovable.
I never said that magick existed; personally, I don’t believe it does. My point is that if you or JAB or anyone else cannot prove that magick does not exist – and you can’t, at least not as the term is used by most of the posters here – then you ought not to be derisive about it. I realize that you, personally, have not been derisive, but “you shouldn’t oughta do that” was the point (and the only point) I was trying to make.
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