Because he made this comment at the time of his first book:
“If we discover a complete theory, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason – for then we should know the mind of God.”
But you just actually described an empirical experiment with a real-world, measurable outcome.
I realise it was intended as an analogy, but if faith, as a tool, is not subject to external verification, how could you ever know it’s the right tool - or that you were in fact using it correctly?
Faith does not need scientific evidence to be certain.
Faith needs scientific evidence to be right.
got it from here:
We can only speak about God existing in a way that affects us if God intersects our universe in some way - like the sphere intersected Flatland. If God stays in his cosmic plane forever, then to our point of view him existing and not existing are equivalent. If he does intersect our universe, then he should be leaving some sort of evidence of his existence, one way or another.
Pretty much all established religions (not counting wishy washy god views like deism) have God interacting with us at some point. They must - otherwise there is no reason at all for their existence. It would be like a fan club for Kilgore Trout novels which Phil Farmer did not write.
Then can he create a stone too heavy to lift, or a four-sided triangle? The usual answer to this is that God does not have to do logically impossible things to be omnipotent. But if you throw out logic, this becomes a reasonable dilemma again.
We’re not attempting to disprove all versions of God - just trying to see if any make sense. It is not hard to define existence in a way which includes all useful Gods - the ability to act or be acted on, for example. And we’re not concerned with how he spends his time outside the material sphere, just if he ever has interacted with the material sphere. That I can’t see a candle’s glow in the infrared doesn’t mean I can’t see it in the spectrum of visible light.
Let me try to put this in logical order.
A rational belief in God requires some evidence justifying (but not proving) the existence of this god, and this evidence requires that this God has interacted with the physical world. Otherwise believing in God is less justified than in believing in the teapot around Saturn - we know Saturn and teapots both exist.
If God has acted on the physical world there can be in principle evidence of this.
If there is evidence of it, this evidence can be evaluated using rational means. This includes comparing reports of people speaking to god - it does not require physical evidence.
If there is no such evidence, or an evaluation of the evidence given shows it to be bogus, then we can conclude that there is no good reason to believe that God has ever interacted with our world, which either means he does not exist, exists but cannot interact with the physical world, or exists, can interact, but does not give a crap about us. If this is true faith in God is equivalent to faith in the existence of something that someone made up, like Luke Skywalker.
Sigh. Mathematical theorems are proved without use of the scientific method, so your proposition is falsified. In any case it is a meta-statement about the scientific method. The scientific method can never make absolute judgements, especially in cases like yours. It might be used to test the relative effectiveness of faith and the scientific method in specific areas (maybe diagnosis of the cause of an ailment) but that is far from what you are saying. so your example falls apart.
Let’s take this example, though it is kind of an inverse of the god question. You can never prove that your spouse is faithful, but you can prove that she is unfaithful. If you want, you can hire a detective to increase the odds that you know what is going on.
However, you can get strong evidence that she is unfaithful without conclusive proof. Cite - many blues songs. Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In had a continuing bit where Dick Martin’s kids looked just like neighbor Dan Rowan. Someone ignoring evidence that his faith is wrong is often considered a fool.
Most religions provide supposed information about what their god has done, is doing, and will do. Where checkable they have been pretty much completely wrong. If your God stays out all night and comes home missing various items of clothing, maybe it is time to wake up and smell the holy water.
Because his wife at the time was religious, and he feared offending her.
I’m not personally a fan of militant atheists and militant [insert religion here], and so I choose not to engage. I do not fault people for seeking truth, but I’m not one for having conversations if there is a lack of civility.
If you’re really interested in delving into this sort of thing, I have a few thoughts:
-
Both religion and atheism make the assumption that something does or does not exist without hard evidence - which has been discussed. I would argue that some atheists make the same argument as you, though worded differently. You say, “I have the feeling.” Some atheists say, “I don’t have the feeling as there is no evidence for me to do so.” Both rely on a feeling, if you think about it. Admitting you’re making the leap (loose Kierkegaard reference there) will make you look more reasonable. To some. If that is you’re intent.
-
Some atheists assume an objective reality, and some theists assume a subjective reality. Look into arguments against an objective reality.
-
I’m not sure how you interpret the Bible. I will say that there are some beliefs that a third or so of Christians adhere to (that’s one stat I’ve read, likely biased) that are relatively new in terms of Church history. Start with some Plato, read notes on the Torah by rabbis, and kind of work your way down from there to get a sense on how Christian theology has evolved. Atheists read religious texts and commentary, too. And hey, it might make for good conversation.
-
While you’re reading, note the slew of scientists who have been OK with the idea of a higher power. Heck, exploring the world might even be how they express spirituality. Or it might just pay the bills. Whatever. The thing here is that there isn’t much of a conflict between faith and the natural world, because hey, we’re talking about two different things (another loose Kierkegaard reference).
Although in the end, if people judge you, they judge you. And if you’re trying to convert, eh, in the end we all have some level of free will (Well, some argue against that but that line works for the sake of this post) and people need to figure out what is true for them. Just as well, even if they decide on Christianity, there’s a chance that the only thing they’ll with which they’ll agree with you is the existence of God.
I’ve never yet met an atheist who relies on a “feeling” that there is no God. As you note, most of us atheists point to insufficient evidence. We see no compelling evidence for God, and thus simply default to the null hypothesis.
Most atheists are aware of Cartesian Doubt, and the fact that objective reality cannot be demonstrated in an ironclad manner. What we do is acknowledge, yes, this might be a dream, or a delusion, or a sim. Then we shrug, and go about our business, not on the “assumption” of an objective reality, but, rather, on the “presumption” of an objective reality. The alternative is pointless.
Who among us has not “tried to wake up” from the world-dream? But it doesn’t work. There is no established process of dealing with an illusionary world. There is, however, a well-established process of dealing with a presumably-real world: go to work, love your family, have dinner, discuss epistemology with strangers on an internet discussion board, and go to sleep. Repeat as necessary.
I don’t actually believe in the real world; I just don’t have any other practical plan than to interact with it as if it were real. I’m told some mystics have escaped maya by deep meditation. Lucky bastards!
Many do. Alas, many are dismissive, and reject religious scholarship as a waste of time. I find it absolutely fascinating, and immerse myself in it. (But I also immerse myself in Tolkien scholarship…so…)
Agreed. It’s a matter of personal preference. I like asparagus, and I don’t believe in Krishna. Someone else may differ. I think that tolerance of differences, as far as possible, is a core value of liberal democracy. Protection of all civil rights is key. Religious freedoms do not come before secular freedoms…but should not lag behind either.
You’d be well advised to search for and read some of the many threads on this subject before assuming that atheists (and theists) tend to say one thing or another.
First, in nearly 40 years of discussing this subject on-line, I have run into exactly one person who claimed he could prove there is no god. And he was a jerk. (Not on the Dope.) Atheism makes no assumptions. No god is the null hypothesis, since there are a near infinite number of possible gods, and no reason to assume one or the other. Now. atheism just means lack of god belief, so there is no requirement for an atheist to withhold belief for a good reason, but for the most part most do have good reasons. And not feelings. I personally grew up believing as the default, and because those who did not believe tended not to come out of the closet. I became an atheist when I discovered how the Bible was actually written. I have scientific training, I’d be willing to consider god belief if anyone had any good evidence of any god. Haven’t seen any in nearly 40 years? Got some?
Try kicking a rock if you want evidence of objective reality. I took Theory of Knowledge in college, and I know this problem well. We do thousands of experiments on the accuracy of objective reality a day. The outcome cannot prove the existence of objective reality, but p is 10 ** - googol by now,
Naturally religious leaders justify whatever their holy book is either by denying reality like the Fundamentalists or by weaving weird chains of justification of the obvious absurdities in the book. So do the Baker Street Irregulars. Both holy books are fiction. I hope you have read some real history on the origins of the Bible.
But oddly the more recognized the scientist the more chance he is atheist. I read a fascinating collection of original writing by scientists from Copernicus up to 1800. What was interesting was that mention of God as justification for physical events dropped dramatically as science advanced, up to Laplace telling Napoleon that he had no need of that hypothesis. You might ask yourself why MIT gets along with one small (but beautiful) chapel for the entire campus. Some are believers, of course, since humans are good at compartmentalizing their beliefs. But believers are way underrepresented, which, given the pressure to believe in our society, is telling.
What I’m looking for is some rational justification of belief. Not because I’m about to become religious again, but out of fascination why intelligent people believe such nonsense. We have many very smart Dopers who are basically deists, a belief which is unfalsifiable. We have some who refuse to discuss it. We have some who have had internal experiences which had a great impact. And we have some whose reason for belief is illogical and incomprehensible. We are very differently open to spiritual experiences. I don’t have a spiritual bone in my body - even when I did believe it was hardly passionately. Perhaps that has a lot to do with it, far more than any gods.
Still, ultimately, it could be a dream, illusion, or holodeck sim. Science has (wonderfully!) tested the degree of consistency of the illusion, but there is no possible test that can falsify the claim, “It’s really just a dream.”
What science actually does is footnote that possibility, then ignore it, and go on measuring the charge on the electron. It cannot be disproven…or even meaningfully tested; thus, it is called by that wonderful technical term “nonsense.” The idea that it is all a dream is nonsensical.
And, sure, it hurts when I kick the rock… But maybe my brain is in a jar, see…
I see.
The quote in question is actually stolen from The Da Vinci Code, and is a crock of total bullshit.
To take just one of the most glaring falsehoods, there is no passage anywhere in Hindu scripture which makes the claim that Krishna was presented with gold, myrrh and frankincense at the time of his birth.
Please, please, please do a little bit of basic fact-checking next time.
One thing is certain;Faith is not fact, and everything one hears says writes or teaches is of a human being. There is nothing that was ever written, taught ,said or thought that wasn’t from another human, so one’s beliefs are in the human they choose to believe, not God!
Scripture was written by humans, So one’s belief is in humans. Because some human said they talked to God and he talked back is not necessarily truth!
The Koran has as much right to be called God’s word or any other writings It was told and accepted by humans believing in another human.
I prefer Fact.
But that’s just poetic language that he was using to end the book with. He didn’t actually believe in a God.
If I say “Oh my God!” that doesn’t mean that I’m not an atheist.
Faith can’t be a tool to find out anything-it makes no sense whatsoever. One doesn’t first have faith, then go out to find something to have faith in.
I suppose one could use faith experimentally.
Say our objective-minded subject has faith in X for a year. Then, in contrast, he has faith in Not-X for a year. To the best of his ability, he then assesses which stance most seemed to reflect reality.
Note that a good many atheists on this board have, essentially, done exactly that: they were raised in the faith, but left it, and find their new viewpoint more realistic. (And, to be sure, a handful have taken the reverse path.)
You can tell if she is faithful, if she has never left your sight! But what a terrible way to live.
Once faith is proven then it is no longer faith,but fact. some people need faith in a higher supreme being to get along in life, just like some people need medication for their health. Faith can be used for good or evil depending on how it is used.If a person spreads an untrue story because they believe it about another, that is evil.I would guess that is why bearing false witness against one’s neighbor is considered a sin. A forgotten commandment for some believers, and a lot during election time. Because one repeats something they are told with out checking the facts is a bad thing.