'Knowledge' of Existence

[Chriliman]

Great question. Because quite frankly, to even try to conceive of 'no beginning' boggles my brain to no end.

Just as so with the theory of relativity, as yet it is proven time and time again in sorts. And yet, I'm vexed to the workings of it all to this day...

So let's go with the basic intention of 'there never was a beginning'... If such a model was demonstrated 'true', the assertion of a creator would seem irrelevant, wouldn't it?

Not necissarily. Whatever 'it' is that never began would have to be something that's either not bound or became bound to the physical laws in our universe/multiverse. God would still fit either description as he is described has having no beginning, but also creating something that he's relationally bound to.

 

[gaara4158]

And I sympathize with you wanting to say that even though we see life only coming from life, and intelligence from intelligence that you can not accept that empirical fact and must then even without the empirical evidence, empirical evidence that you say you require, claim that we can "conceive" life from non-life. You can conceive anything you wish, but facts are facts. What would we see in the world if God exists? We would see life coming from life and intelligence from intelligence and that is empirical fact. The empirical evidence supports that life came from life and intelligence came from intelligence. Those empirical facts support God but do not support atheistic materialism.

This does not address the point I was making, and instead it repeats the same errors I've been pointing out to you this whole time. I understand your argument may seem intuitive and unimpeachable to you, but we tend to be hard-nosed philosophers around here. You need to make an effort to address the problems I've laid out for you. I'll copy-paste it here, then I'll expand.

The problem is you’re basing your argument on empiricism, and if you’re going to do that, you can’t postulate something that’s not empirically demonstrated as one of the premises in your argument.

First, yes, empirical evidence is required to demonstrate the truth of a claim. Some claims are such that empirical evidence is difficult or impossible to come by, and therefore they cannot be demonstrated to be true or false. The two positions we are pitting against one another are two such claims. I can't demonstrate the materialistic process by which inanimate matter becomes living and intelligent, and you can't demonstrate the existence of God. Full stop. No one has an advantage in this respect. We both hold that there is a non-demonstrated process behind the emergence of life and intelligence in this universe. I am suggesting that the process involves only things that have been demonstrated to exist. You are suggesting that the process involves things that have not been demonstrated to exist. This is where my advantage lies.

It's horribly naive to think that we could predict what a universe with God would look like vs. one without God. Obviously both the theist and the atheist's predictions are radically different for each condition. It's really not possible to say either way unless you have perfect knowledge of either the mind of God or the nature of reality. But maybe you possess one or both of these? If not, I suggest you retire this item from your argument.

Christian theology has as its foundation that God is an infinite being that was not created. There needs to be no chain of beings as God is the only un-created eternal Being. It can't be special pleading when the worldview holds such a belief as its core.

Then you must give up your claim that life and intelligence only come from life and intelligence, because God, being alive and intelligent, did not himself come from life and intelligence. Exception to this rule of yours is a given in both of our worldviews, so it cannot count in support for either one. This is another point you'll have to revise if you're ever going to trot it back out.

True, scientists do not adhere to any creed that they owe their ability to do science to God or the Christian worldview. Although, it is true, and if one wishes to ignore that or stick their head in the sand to do science then by all means it is possible.

If it's true, you need to explain why it's true, and you need to use an argument that's more than stomping your feet on the ground and saying "Because it is!"

I'm sorry but I had to laugh out loud on this one. For decades probably longer, atheists have used this dome thing as something ridiculous and proving the Bible wrong. Now you turn it around and claim that it doesn't mean dome. Typical to say the least. It was the same way with early atheists claiming the Bible was wrong about liquid being in the creation of the universe because they claimed it would be too hot for water to exist and it would be gas. The Bible had that prior to the discovery of the "perfect liquid". The materialist's gaps are being closed and the Bible seems to have had it right all along.

This response really disappointed me. Let's recap. I brought up the dome in reference to the firmament, which is widely understood to be a dome above a flat Earth with the stars floating around beneath its top and the Kingdom of Heaven lying beyond it. You produced an article with the words "Dome" "earth" and "space" in them as though that were confirmation that the Bible got another prediction right. I pointed out what an absurd stretch that was and you laughed. Do you just not care anymore, Oncedeceived? I don't mean to insult your intelligence, but the stars are actually far, far outside the "dome" described in your article, so it literally cannot be what the Bible was referring to. I can't imagine you truly believe what you're saying here.

Common sense would do the job.

Is that a wink to indicate you've been trolling me this whole time? Because common sense tells me the Bible, as usual, got something wrong.

That was just ritual. It was the separation and breeding practice itself that is what is at issue.

Funny how the important part isn't mentioned.

I didn't say this was a predicition. It isn't a prediction in fact. It was an observation that was spoken of within the Bible.

It's an incorrect observation, one of many found in the Bible that Christians love to twist and torture into submission to what we now know about science.

Perhaps not, but it is accurate.

The prediction was not accurate. It turns out that Isaac's descendants never even reached a fraction of the innumerability of the stars. If your point is that the Bible says there are too many stars to count and that's technically true, then congratulations. There's a sentence in your Bible that's not 100% incorrect. Is "not completely wrong" good enough to be considered a God-inspired prediction now?

What happened? They are happening, everyday, everywhere and at all times. The universe obeys the laws of gravity, whether we describe them or not.

No. We describe the laws of gravity because that's what we observe. Nothing is "obeying" the laws of gravity. Gravity is happening. You consider uniform patterns of behavior to be obedience to something. That's not correct. Uniform patterns are just that - uniform patterns. There's no apparent force acting on those patterns to make them be what they are, they just are. There may or may not be a reason for this. We just don't know. If you're going to quote Sean Carroll, at least get to know what he means in his quotes.

I am not a mathematician but this was shown to Chuck Missler:

Numerical Values

The Hebrew alphabet is alphanumeric: each Hebrew letter also has a numerical value and can be used as a number.

The q has a value of 100; the v has a value of 6; thus, the normal spelling would yield a numerical value of 106. The addition of the h, with a value of 5, increases the numerical value to 111. This indicates an adjustment of the ratio 111/106, or 31.41509433962 cubits. Assuming that a cubit was 1.5 ft.,3 this 15-foot-wide bowl would have had a circumference of 47.12388980385 feet.

This Hebrew "code" results in 47.12264150943 feet, or an error of less than 15 thousandths of an inch! (This error is 15 times better than the 22/7 estimate that we were accustomed to using in school!) How did they accomplish this? This accuracy would seem to vastly exceed the precision of their instrumentation. How would they know this? How was it encoded into the text?
Chuck Missler

I'm not touching this numerology stuff. I'll use a quote I've seen elsewhere to respond to this: This sort of analysis requires not only that we have the correct text, but that we dismiss or eliminate intentional design by the human author and coincidence. It also requires a lot of tedious mathematical work to prove or disprove, which is okay, but makes it inaccessible. I'm going to stick to my first impression because there's too much and far too tedious for me to validate or invalidate.
Chuck Missler is quite the character though, have you read his work on Nephilim and UFOs? His ideas are pretty out there.

The earth's shape was not what was being discussed. It was hanging on nothing remember?

What was being discussed was the Bible supposedly getting something right when scientists had it wrong. That's not what was going on in the case of the position of the Earth. I brought up its shape because it being spherical could have certain implications for possible positions it could be in, given what was observed. But let's not forget that the Bible put it crudely at best and incorrectly at worst. No points for that one.

Nothing has been confirmed but..."one thing is for certain: the Big Bang is not the beginning of the universe!" Now how is that certain when you just provided something that doesn't confirm it didn't?

I was being charitable by not assuming my source superseded yours, and instead was demonstrating that two high-caliber theoretical physicists disagree with one another on the topic we're discussing, suggesting the matter isn't actually settled. But we can default to the uncritical acceptance of the conclusion from my quote, if you like, and we can just say you were wrong again. I'm not fussy.

It would have been a problem if it had turned out untrue. As it was, it was true and changed shipping from then on.

No, it's a problem because no result could have made it untrue. It's a meaningless prediction. People already set courses in seafaring vessels regularly at that time. Those courses could easily be called paths. No prediction.

What empirical evidence do you have that shows that there are possible, more natural configurations of the fundamental constants that would result in more life, as we know it, or other configurations?

The Cosmological Constant refers to the rate at which the universe's expansion is accelerating. The CC for our universe is small, but not quite zero. It's just low enough that the stars don't all shoot away from each other unable to form galaxies or solar systems, and just high enough that the stars don't all crunch into each other. Zero, a much less arbitrary value, would be even more hospitable to galaxies and solar systems forming and therefore more hospitable to life.
"The cosmological constant problem is used by theists as the prime example of the fine-tuning of the universe that they claim as evidence for God. However, cosmologist Don Page, an evangelical Christian, has pointed out that the apparent positive value of the cosmological constant is somewhat inimical to life because its repulsion acts against the gravitational attraction needed to form galaxies. If God fine-tuned the universe for life he would have made the cosmological constant slightly negative.

Physicist Leonard Susskind calls the problem with the cosmological constant “the mother of all physics problems” and “the worst prediction ever.” The currently favored solution to the problem among physicists is called the “multiverse” in which our universe is just one of a great many others having a wide variation of values for the cosmological constant as well as other physics parameters. We happen to live in the universe suitable for us. Susskind notes that string theory has some 10500 possible solutions, each of which could correspond to a separate universe within the multiverse."
The Problem with the Cosmological Constant - CSI

 

[Oncedeceived]

This does not address the point I was making, and instead it repeats the same errors I've been pointing out to you this whole time. I understand your argument may seem intuitive and unimpeachable to you, but we tend to be hard-nosed philosophers around here. You need to make an effort to address the problems I've laid out for you. I'll copy-paste it here, then I'll expand.

First, yes, empirical evidence is required to demonstrate the truth of a claim. Some claims are such that empirical evidence is difficult or impossible to come by, and therefore they cannot be demonstrated to be true or false. The two positions we are pitting against one another are two such claims. I can't demonstrate the materialistic process by which inanimate matter becomes living and intelligent, and you can't demonstrate the existence of God. Full stop. No one has an advantage in this respect. We both hold that there is a non-demonstrated process behind the emergence of life and intelligence in this universe. I am suggesting that the process involves only things that have been demonstrated to exist. You are suggesting that the process involves things that have not been demonstrated to exist. This is where my advantage lies.

Can empirical evidence be demonstrated to be required to demonstrate a truth claim?

You seem to think that because material exists it demonstrates that only material exists. Its rather like claiming that because we can demonstrate what is in a cake we have everything we need to explain the cake. You have no advantage. You have the cake.

It's horribly naive to think that we could predict what a universe with God would look like vs. one without God.

We both live in the same universe that has the appearance of design in accordance with the fundamental constants and life itself. The appearance of design is determined by the very scientists who determine and demonstrate the measurements and research that have discovered those features. Some scientists have become theists due to those scientific findings. Some have tried to come up with alternate explanations. Regardless, of what explanation is given whether God or a multi-verse, the fact remains that the universe and life appear to be designed. That is evidence, empirical peer reviewed scientific findings. I don't find it naive whatsoever, to conclude that if the universe was designed, that it would appear to be designed.

Obviously both the theist and the atheist's predictions are radically different for each condition. It's really not possible to say either way unless you have perfect knowledge of either the mind of God or the nature of reality. But maybe you possess one or both of these? If not, I suggest you retire this item from your argument.

We as theists have the Bible which makes the claim that the universe should show the work of God. Again, that is not being naive, but a claim that comes from within the theist's worldview.

Then you must give up your claim that life and intelligence only come from life and intelligence, because God, being alive and intelligent, did not himself come from life and intelligence. Exception to this rule of yours is a given in both of our worldviews, so it cannot count in support for either one. This is another point you'll have to revise if you're ever going to trot it back out.

You then must go outside of Christian theism to counter the Christian worldview that God is not a created Being. God is the source of life and intelligence in the Christian worldview. It is totally cohesive in the Christian worldview that life and intelligence come from the source of both.

If it's true, you need to explain why it's true, and you need to use an argument that's more than stomping your feet on the ground and saying "Because it is!"

Perhaps you need to tell me what you are opposed to in this argument. Modern science was based upon the Christian worldview, which made science methodology possible. Do you deny that? Do you deny that the premise that the universe was intelligible and uniform came from this foundation?

This response really disappointed me. Let's recap.

I'm sorry. Did you take that to mean that I was laughing at you? Please know that was not the case.

I brought up the dome in reference to the firmament, which is widely understood to be a dome above a flat Earth with the stars floating around beneath its top and the Kingdom of Heaven lying beyond it.

Who's understanding? Where does the Bible claim that?

You produced an article with the words "Dome" "earth" and "space" in them as though that were confirmation that the Bible got another prediction right. I pointed out what an absurd stretch that was and you laughed. Do you just not care anymore, Oncedeceived? I don't mean to insult your intelligence, but the stars are actually far, far outside the "dome" described in your article, so it literally cannot be what the Bible was referring to. I can't imagine you truly believe what you're saying here.

Where did the Bible say that? I think we are looking at maybe something different here?

Is that a wink to indicate you've been trolling me this whole time? Because common sense tells me the Bible, as usual, got something wrong.

You can't take things out of perspective, this was just a different time. Do you seriously think that they were wrong about grasshoppers? They may have had a different perspective of the front legs than we do today. I just can't understand when people claim the "Bible" was wrong about insect legs. They would have to have never seen a grasshopper before to be "wrong". They had grasshoppers, we know they had eyes and they interacted with grasshoppers so something in the context of either language or perspective must be at the core of this rather than the "Bible" is wrong. It is nonsensical to belief that they were simply wrong about something they encountered probably as much as we do today.

Funny how the important part isn't mentioned.

40 And Jacob separated the lambs (emphasis mine) and set the faces of the flocks toward the striped and all the black in the flock of Laban. He put his own droves apart and did not put them with Laban’s flock. (emphasis mine)
He kept them from Laban's flock so his flock were all of the other genetic animals that were not white.

It's an incorrect observation, one of many found in the Bible that Christians love to twist and torture into submission to what we now know about science.

Science has brought to light many things spoken of in the Bible.

The prediction was not accurate. It turns out that Isaac's descendants never even reached a fraction of the innumerability of the stars. If your point is that the Bible says there are too many stars to count and that's technically true, then congratulations. There's a sentence in your Bible that's not 100% incorrect. Is "not completely wrong" good enough to be considered a God-inspired prediction now?

Well I don't know how many descendants there are of Isaac's. So I'll have to let that one go.

No. We describe the laws of gravity because that's what we observe. Nothing is "obeying" the laws of gravity. Gravity is happening. You consider uniform patterns of behavior to be obedience to something. That's not correct. Uniform patterns are just that - uniform patterns. There's no apparent force acting on those patterns to make them be what they are, they just are. There may or may not be a reason for this. We just don't know. If you're going to quote Sean Carroll, at least get to know what he means in his quotes.

So if you go and jump off a ten story building you are not going to obey the law of gravity and fall?
I didn't say that there was a force acting on gravity or any other law. Where did you get that?
Are you claiming that the Laws of Physics do not govern the universe?

I'm not touching this numerology stuff. I'll use a quote I've seen elsewhere to respond to this: This sort of analysis requires not only that we have the correct text, but that we dismiss or eliminate intentional design by the human author and coincidence. It also requires a lot of tedious mathematical work to prove or disprove, which is okay, but makes it inaccessible. I'm going to stick to my first impression because there's too much and far too tedious for me to validate or invalidate.
Chuck Missler is quite the character though, have you read his work on Nephilim and UFOs? His ideas are pretty out there.

I don't think this is original to him.

What was being discussed was the Bible supposedly getting something right when scientists had it wrong. That's not what was going on in the case of the position of the Earth. I brought up its shape because it being spherical could have certain implications for possible positions it could be in, given what was observed. But let's not forget that the Bible put it crudely at best and incorrectly at worst. No points for that one.

While a circle is not technically a sphere, the earth at the time was considered to be a flat square with four sides.

I was being charitable by not assuming my source superseded yours, and instead was demonstrating that two high-caliber theoretical physicists disagree with one another on the topic we're discussing, suggesting the matter isn't actually settled. But we can default to the uncritical acceptance of the conclusion from my quote, if you like, and we can just say you were wrong again. I'm not fussy.

You haven't shown by your source that it has demonstrated for certain that the universe didn't have a beginning.

No, it's a problem because no result could have made it untrue. It's a meaningless prediction. People already set courses in seafaring vessels regularly at that time. Those courses could easily be called paths. No prediction.

His Sailing Directions and Physical Geography of the Seas and Its Meteorology are the standard for today.

Maury's uniform system of recording synoptic oceanographic data was adopted by navies and merchant marines around the world and was used to develop charts for all the major trade routes:
Wiki

The Cosmological Constant refers to the rate at which the universe's expansion is accelerating. The CC for our universe is small, but not quite zero. It's just low enough that the stars don't all shoot away from each other unable to form galaxies or solar systems, and just high enough that the stars don't all crunch into each other. Zero, a much less arbitrary value, would be even more hospitable to galaxies and solar systems forming and therefore more hospitable to life.
"The cosmological constant problem is used by theists as the prime example of the fine-tuning of the universe that they claim as evidence for God. However, cosmologist Don Page, an evangelical Christian, has pointed out that the apparent positive value of the cosmological constant is somewhat inimical to life because its repulsion acts against the gravitational attraction needed to form galaxies. If God fine-tuned the universe for life he would have made the cosmological constant slightly negative.

Physicist Leonard Susskind calls the problem with the cosmological constant “the mother of all physics problems” and “the worst prediction ever.” The currently favored solution to the problem among physicists is called the “multiverse” in which our universe is just one of a great many others having a wide variation of values for the cosmological constant as well as other physics parameters. We happen to live in the universe suitable for us. Susskind notes that string theory has some 10500 possible solutions, each of which could correspond to a separate universe within the multiverse."
The Problem with the Cosmological Constant - CSI

This is one of the fundamental constants. Why Don Page would come to that conclusion is rather strange to me. Regardless, you haven't given me anything that demonstrates that other universes would give rise to life as we know it or other unknown forms.

 

[gaara4158]

Can empirical evidence be demonstrated to be required to demonstrate a truth claim?

This is a given under an epistemology based in empiricism, which you are attempting to use with your "we only see life come from life" argument.

You seem to think that because material exists it demonstrates that only material exists. Its rather like claiming that because we can demonstrate what is in a cake we have everything we need to explain the cake. You have no advantage. You have the cake.

No, that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that because material is all that we know exists, it is more conservative and parsimonious to suppose that any phenomenon we don't understand can be explained by material processes. It's rather like saying that although I don't know the exact ingredients in the cake, I'm fairly confident the cake is made entirely out of material. Your position is like saying because we don't know the exact ingredients of the cake, it's perfectly reasonable to assume the cake is non-material in composition. Clearly I have the advantage.

We both live in the same universe that has the appearance of design in accordance with the fundamental constants and life itself. The appearance of design is determined by the very scientists who determine and demonstrate the measurements and research that have discovered those features. Some scientists have become theists due to those scientific findings. Some have tried to come up with alternate explanations. Regardless, of what explanation is given whether God or a multi-verse, the fact remains that the universe and life appear to be designed. That is evidence, empirical peer reviewed scientific findings. I don't find it naive whatsoever, to conclude that if the universe was designed, that it would appear to be designed.

You never really explained what constitutes appearance of design so as far as I'm concerned that's simply a matter of opinion. Obviously naturalists disagree that there is an appearance of design in the universe, or if they do agree they explain it as a bug in our design-detection abilities, not a feature of the universe.

We as theists have the Bible which makes the claim that the universe should show the work of God. Again, that is not being naive, but a claim that comes from within the theist's worldview.

That is absolutely meaningless and does not address the point I raised. I could just as easily say we as naturalists have our empirical observations that the universe manifests the results of entirely natural processes. Obviously the way we interpret the state and behavior of the universe is going to be colored by our biases. It's incredibly, ridiculously naive to think that the facts of the universe only fit within one's own paradigm. That's why we're doing this whole exercise.

You then must go outside of Christian theism to counter the Christian worldview that God is not a created Being. God is the source of life and intelligence in the Christian worldview. It is totally cohesive in the Christian worldview that life and intelligence come from the source of both.

I don't think you appreciate the predicament you've created for yourself with this argument. If God is alive and intelligent, but was not himself created, then you believe that in at least one instance, life and intelligence did not originate from other life and intelligence. If God is not alive and intelligent, but merely the source of life and intelligent, then again life and intelligence did not originate from life and intelligence. Life and intelligence coming from life and intelligence has an exception in each of our worldviews, so you cannot use the fact that life comes from life and intelligence from intelligence as evidence against my worldview without also doing the same to yours.

Perhaps you need to tell me what you are opposed to in this argument. Modern science was based upon the Christian worldview, which made science methodology possible. Do you deny that? Do you deny that the premise that the universe was intelligible and uniform came from this foundation?

No it was not. Modern science was absolutely, positively, unequivocally NOT based upon the Christian worldview. You are co-opting the assumption of an intelligible universe as an exclusively Christian concept when it's not one. Everyone assumes the universe is intelligible, and yet not everyone is a Christian. Do you really mean to argue that Christians are the only ones with a worldview that can safely house a rationally intelligible universe, and everyone else is just borrowing from your worldview? I really, really hope this isn't going to devolve into presuppositional apologetics.

You can't take things out of perspective, this was just a different time. Do you seriously think that they were wrong about grasshoppers? They may have had a different perspective of the front legs than we do today. I just can't understand when people claim the "Bible" was wrong about insect legs. They would have to have never seen a grasshopper before to be "wrong". They had grasshoppers, we know they had eyes and they interacted with grasshoppers so something in the context of either language or perspective must be at the core of this rather than the "Bible" is wrong. It is nonsensical to belief that they were simply wrong about something they encountered probably as much as we do today.

If we can't agree with the Bible on what constitutes an insect arm vs. a leg, why should we expect to agree with the Bible on what constitutes a space-dome, or cud-chewing, or selective breeding, or sea-paths? This has been my point the entire time. The Bible's claims read like any Bronze Age shepherd's understanding of the world, just vague enough to be re-interpreted as accurate as soon as actual scientists discover a mechanism it might refer to, or discarded as a figure of speech if it is discovered to be entirely inaccurate.

40 And Jacob separated the lambs (emphasis mine) and set the faces of the flocks toward the striped and all the black in the flock of Laban. He put his own droves apart and did not put them with Laban’s flock. (emphasis mine)
He kept them from Laban's flock so his flock were all of the other genetic animals that were not white.

The important part being the biological mechanism behind the breeding. I'm sure people noticed goats could inherit their parent's traits before Mendel had his epiphany.

Well I don't know how many descendants there are of Isaac's. So I'll have to let that one go.

Hint: It's not 20 septillion

So if you go and jump off a ten story building you are not going to obey the law of gravity and fall?
I didn't say that there was a force acting on gravity or any other law. Where did you get that?
Are you claiming that the Laws of Physics do not govern the universe?

Your'e framing the statement incorrectly. The laws of nature don't govern, command, or otherwise coerce the universe. They are descriptions of how the universe behaves. Yes, the universe behaves according to certain patterns. We don't understand why that is. We can only observe the details of the patterns, and that's what the laws of nature are. Our descriptions of the patterns in nature that we observe.

While a circle is not technically a sphere, the earth at the time was considered to be a flat square with four sides.

Not by scientists.

You haven't shown by your source that it has demonstrated for certain that the universe didn't have a beginning.

I didn't have to. I just had to show that the scientific community was not in agreement that the universe had a beginning in the sense suggested by the Bible, and I did that.

His Sailing Directions and Physical Geography of the Seas and Its Meteorology are the standard for today.

Maury's uniform system of recording synoptic oceanographic data was adopted by navies and merchant marines around the world and was used to develop charts for all the major trade routes:
Wiki

Good for Maury. It has no bearing on the Bible's passing mention of paths in the sea.

This is one of the fundamental constants. Why Don Page would come to that conclusion is rather strange to me. Regardless, you haven't given me anything that demonstrates that other universes would give rise to life as we know it or other unknown forms.

I think you just don't understand the content of my post. Basically, life as we know it develops best in solar systems. Solar systems develop best in galaxies. Galaxies develop best in universes wherein the acceleration of expansion of space (the CC) is either zero or slightly negative. We are in neither such universe. Therefore, there are other possible values of the CC that would be more hospitable to life than this one.

 

[Chriliman]

I think you just don't understand the content of my post. Basically, life as we know it develops best in solar systems. Solar systems develop best in galaxies. Galaxies develop best in universes wherein the acceleration of expansion of space (the CC) is either zero or slightly negative. We are in neither such universe. Therefore, there are other possible values of the CC that would be more hospitable to life than this one.

How do you know galaxies develop best in universes with that CC if we’ve never actually observed a universe like that?

 

[Silmarien]

No it was not. Modern science was absolutely, positively, unequivocally NOT based upon the Christian worldview. You are co-opting the assumption of an intelligible universe as an exclusively Christian concept when it's not one. Everyone assumes the universe is intelligible, and yet not everyone is a Christian. Do you really mean to argue that Christians are the only ones with a worldview that can safely house a rationally intelligible universe, and everyone else is just borrowing from your worldview? I really, really hope this isn't going to devolve into presuppositional apologetics.

I'm going to disagree with both of you here.

Modern science emerged in the context of Catholic scholasticism. This is really not disputable, though the Christian West's encounter with Aristotle in the 12th and 13th centuries played a large role in the rebirth of empiricism. I don't think you can attribute what happened in the West specifically to Christianity, since the trajectory that the Christian East took was completely different. They never quite lost Aristotle in the first place, never collapsed after the Fall of Rome, and yet despite those advantages, didn't develop modern science. Perhaps they would have if the Ottomans hadn't conquered them, but Eastern Orthodoxy is on the otherworldly side and I doubt offered the theological resources to get science off the ground.

The Islamic world pretty much rejected its great Aristotelian thinkers (Averroës, Avicenna), moving towards Scripture based legalism instead of philosophical and empirical inquiry. Hinduism kind of denies the reality of the physical world, so would have seen no point in an empirical exploration of it. Meanwhile, the Buddhists tell you not to strive for anything at all. So it's really not the case that any other culture could have developed science, or even that they all view reality as intelligible.

I'm really only aware of two cultures that actually had what it took to develop modern science: classical Greece and Catholic scholasticism. Of those two, Greece is tricky, since it was much more intellectually diverse than the Christian West would become--you had the Pythagoreans, Platonists, Aristotelians, etc., who believed in truth and went about searching for it in one sense or another, but you had competing schools of thought like Epicureanism which mostly died out after Christianity took over. What we ended up with in medieval scholasticism really was an entire worldview aimed at obtaining Truth, which eventually turned its gaze towards exploring and understanding God's Creation. That was really a crucial step in the direction of modern science.

But I think a lot of that has to do with the historical development of Catholicism rather than specifically with a Christian worldview, so you could easily write it, as well as all the other oddities of the modern West, off as a historical accident. Or you could embrace Hegelianism and take a somewhat teleological view of history (though that's kind of a Christian heresy in its own right). Or you could attribute it to Christian revelation, but the stronger you push that, the more credence you lend to the Catholic claim of being the One True Church. I don't think most presuppositionalists would care for that technicality.

These are really interesting arguments, though. Some of the scary leftist apologists caught me in a similar one a while back by deconstructing humanism.

 

[Oncedeceived]

I'm going to disagree with both of you here.

Modern science emerged in the context of Catholic scholasticism. This is really not disputable, though the Christian West's encounter with Aristotle in the 12th and 13th centuries played a large role in the rebirth of empiricism. I don't think you can attribute what happened in the West specifically to Christianity, since the trajectory that the Christian East took was completely different. They never quite lost Aristotle in the first place, never collapsed after the Fall of Rome, and yet despite those advantages, didn't develop modern science. Perhaps they would have if the Ottomans hadn't conquered them, but Eastern Orthodoxy is on the otherworldly side and I doubt offered the theological resources to get science off the ground.

The Islamic world pretty much rejected its great Aristotelian thinkers (Averroës, Avicenna), moving towards Scripture based legalism instead of philosophical and empirical inquiry. Hinduism kind of denies the reality of the physical world, so would have seen no point in an empirical exploration of it. Meanwhile, the Buddhists tell you not to strive for anything at all. So it's really not the case that any other culture could have developed science, or even that they all view reality as intelligible.

I'm really only aware of two cultures that actually had what it took to develop modern science: classical Greece and Catholic scholasticism. Of those two, Greece is tricky, since it was much more intellectually diverse than the Christian West would become--you had the Pythagoreans, Platonists, Aristotelians, etc., who believed in truth and went about searching for it in one sense or another, but you had competing schools of thought like Epicureanism which mostly died out after Christianity took over. What we ended up with in medieval scholasticism really was an entire worldview aimed at obtaining Truth, which eventually turned its gaze towards exploring and understanding God's Creation. That was really a crucial step in the direction of modern science.

But I think a lot of that has to do with the historical development of Catholicism rather than specifically with a Christian worldview, so you could easily write it, as well as all the other oddities of the modern West, off as a historical accident. Or you could embrace Hegelianism and take a somewhat teleological view of history (though that's kind of a Christian heresy in its own right). Or you could attribute it to Christian revelation, but the stronger you push that, the more credence you lend to the Catholic claim of being the One True Church. I don't think most presuppositionalists would care for that technicality.

These are really interesting arguments, though. Some of the scary leftist apologists caught me in a similar one a while back by deconstructing humanism.

I agree with the Greek influence, and Catholicism is part of the Christian worldview. The geological area held to the Christian worldview. Roger Bacon a very important person in the birth of modern science said this:

"But there is still another very useful way; since the formation of judgments, as I have said, is a function of this science, in regard to what can happen by nature or be effected in art, and what not. This science, moreover, knows how to separate the illusions of magic and to detect their errors in incantations, invocations, conjurations, sacrifices, and cults. But unbelievers busy themselves in these mad acts and trust in them...Wherefore this science is of the greatest advantage in persuading men to accept the faith, since this branch alone of philosophy happens to proceed in this way, because this is the only branch that considers matters of this kind, and is able to overcome all falsehood and superstition and error of unbelievers in regard to magic, such as incantations and the like already mentioned....And now the wonderful advantage derived from these three sciences in this world on behalf of the Church of God against enemies of the faith is manifest, who should be destroyed rather by the discoveries of science than by the warlike arms of combatants."

And this: "Then this science as regards the commonwealth of believers is useful, as we saw in its special knowledge of the future, present, and past, and in its display of wonderful works on behalf of Church and state, so that all useful activities are promoted and the opposite are hindered both in the few and the multitude, as was explained. And if we proceed to the conversion of unbelievers, it is evidently of service in two main ways with numerous subdivisions, since a plea for the faith can be effectively made through this science, not by arguments but by works, which is the more effective way. For the man who denies the truth of the faith because he cannot understand it I shall state the mutual attraction of things in nature..."

William of Ockham was another who was important to the rise of modern science and wanted to combat Greek Philosophy. His principle of Ockham's razor is important today (even though it was not his original idea). He was a Christian philosopher.


And there is Jean Buridan, who Herman Shapiro (on Medieval Philosophy) states: "According to the estimates of modern scholars, Buridan was responsible for originating or developing some of the most essential ideas of the modern scientific tradition."

His theology was instrumental in his methodology: "Also, since the Bible does not state that appropriate intelligences move the celestial bodies, it could be said that is does not appear necessary to posit intelligences of this kind, because it would be answered that God, when He created the world, moved each of the celestial orbs as He pleased, and in moving them He impressed in them impetuses which moved them without His having to move them any more except by the method of general influence whereby He concurs as co-agent in all things that take place....And these impetuses which he impressed in the celestial bodies were not decreased nor corrupted afterwards, because there was no inclination of the celestial movements for other movements. Nor was there resistance which could be corruptive or repressive of that impetus."

So I am not sure if we really disagree or not. It was movement away from Greek philosophy and beginning a new philosophy that gave rise to the methodology and birth of modern science by Christian thought.

 

[Oncedeceived]

This is a given under an epistemology based in empiricism, which you are attempting to use with your "we only see life come from life" argument.

Yet, it can't be demonstrated that empirical evidence be required to demonstrate a truth claim...
So does that mean your assumption that only empirical evidence is required to demonstrate a truth claim is untrue? We make truth claims even when we can't demonstrate empirically for those claims. We can claim that the universe is older than five minutes old but can we demonstrate that empirically?

No, that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that because material is all that we know exists, it is more conservative and parsimonious to suppose that any phenomenon we don't understand can be explained by material processes. It's rather like saying that although I don't know the exact ingredients in the cake, I'm fairly confident the cake is made entirely out of material. Your position is like saying because we don't know the exact ingredients of the cake, it's perfectly reasonable to assume the cake is non-material in composition. Clearly I have the advantage.

Unfortunately, you are saying that and that is the problem. We can know all the ingredients of the cake. The material is know i.e. flour, sugar, etc. The knowledge of the material elements is just that, knowledge of the material. It says nothing about how that material became the cake. My position is not that we don't know the exact ingredients of the cake, but that we know what they are and they are not sufficient in themselves to give rise to the cake. The cake didn't create itself. The same could be said for a car, we know all the materials that make it work and how it works but the car didn't create itself. These are material things too, and we know they didn't create themselves. If we go to another planet and we find a cake lying on the surface of a rock we are not going to assume that it is part of the material of the planet and was created naturally. Life and intelligence is far more intricate than a cake but you expect me to believe that even without any evidence of life arising from non-life that life just appears on the surface of this planet and that it is a "natural" occurrence. Evolution didn't evolve. Only after life is present does the evolutionary processes act.

You never really explained what constitutes appearance of design so as far as I'm concerned that's simply a matter of opinion. Obviously naturalists disagree that there is an appearance of design in the universe, or if they do agree they explain it as a bug in our design-detection abilities, not a feature of the universe.

Scientists agree that the universe and life itself has the appearance of design:

Richard Dawkins: (I will use quotes that show that he doesn't believe the design is from God:

I have no explanation for complex biological design. All I know is that God isn't a good explanation, so we must wait and hope that somebody comes up with a better one.

Natural selection is the blind watchmaker, blind because it does not see ahead, does not plan consequences, has no purpose in view. Yet the living results of natural selection overwhelmingly impress us with the appearance of design as if by a master watchmaker, impress us with the illusion of design and planning.

The feature of living matter that most demands explanation is that it is almost unimaginably complicated in directions that convey a powerful illusion of deliberate design.

Paul Davies:
"There is for me powerful evidence that there is something going on behind it all....It seems as though somebody has fine-tuned nature�s numbers to make the Universe....The impression of design is overwhelming".

"The laws [of physics] ... seem to be the product of exceedingly ingenious design... The universe must have a purpose".

I hope the foregoing discussion will have convinced the reader that the natural world is not just any old concoction of entities and forces, but a marvelously ingenious and unified mathematical scheme. ...these rules look as if they are the product of intelligent design. I do not see how that can be denied.

Michael Turner:
The precision [of the fine tuning] is as if one could throw a dart across the entire universe and hit a bullseye one millimeter in diameter on the other side.

That is absolutely meaningless and does not address the point I raised. I could just as easily say we as naturalists have our empirical observations that the universe manifests the results of entirely natural processes. Obviously the way we interpret the state and behavior of the universe is going to be colored by our biases. It's incredibly, ridiculously naive to think that the facts of the universe only fit within one's own paradigm. That's why we're doing this whole exercise.

As you can see above, scientists are the ones making the statements about the appearance of design, even those that show their biases on their sleeves so to speak. Dawkins is a outspoken atheist as well as a biologist but he sees the design and claims everyone agrees that they see it. But you are right when you say it is due to our biases that we interpret that of which we do see. But to claim that there is no evidence of design or anyway to recognize it, is simply incorrect and goes against the empirical evidence for it.

I don't think you appreciate the predicament you've created for yourself with this argument. If God is alive and intelligent, but was not himself created, then you believe that in at least one instance, life and intelligence did not originate from other life and intelligence. If God is not alive and intelligent, but merely the source of life and intelligent, then again life and intelligence did not originate from life and intelligence. Life and intelligence coming from life and intelligence has an exception in each of our worldviews, so you cannot use the fact that life comes from life and intelligence from intelligence as evidence against my worldview without also doing the same to yours.

Tell me, don't you believe in your naturalistic worldview that there is something that is eternal? Either the universe, or the mulit-verse?

No it was not. Modern science was absolutely, positively, unequivocally NOT based upon the Christian worldview. You are co-opting the assumption of an intelligible universe as an exclusively Christian concept when it's not one. Everyone assumes the universe is intelligible, and yet not everyone is a Christian. Do you really mean to argue that Christians are the only ones with a worldview that can safely house a rationally intelligible universe, and everyone else is just borrowing from your worldview? I really, really hope this isn't going to devolve into presuppositional apologetics.

Please see the post I made to Silmarien.

If we can't agree with the Bible on what constitutes an insect arm vs. a leg, why should we expect to agree with the Bible on what constitutes a space-dome, or cud-chewing, or selective breeding, or sea-paths? This has been my point the entire time. The Bible's claims read like any Bronze Age shepherd's understanding of the world, just vague enough to be re-interpreted as accurate as soon as actual scientists discover a mechanism it might refer to, or discarded as a figure of speech if it is discovered to be entirely inaccurate.

I hope then that you don't use any Bible error arguments in your posts.

The important part being the biological mechanism behind the breeding. I'm sure people noticed goats could inherit their parent's traits before Mendel had his epiphany.

Now you move the goal post?

Your'e framing the statement incorrectly. The laws of nature don't govern, command, or otherwise coerce the universe. They are descriptions of how the universe behaves. Yes, the universe behaves according to certain patterns. We don't understand why that is. We can only observe the details of the patterns, and that's what the laws of nature are. Our descriptions of the patterns in nature that we observe.

How do you know? What evidence provided you with that conclusion?

Not by scientists.

Can you provide a source that demonstrates that scientists at the time of the Bible did not believe the earth was flat with four sides?

I didn't have to. I just had to show that the scientific community was not in agreement that the universe had a beginning in the sense suggested by the Bible, and I did that.

No, you didn't. Your source doesn't give any information on that.

Good for Maury. It has no bearing on the Bible's passing mention of paths in the sea.

Yet, because he was inspired by it, his work is still used today.

I think you just don't understand the content of my post. Basically, life as we know it develops best in solar systems. Solar systems develop best in galaxies. Galaxies develop best in universes wherein the acceleration of expansion of space (the CC) is either zero or slightly negative. We are in neither such universe. Therefore, there are other possible values of the CC that would be more hospitable to life than this one.

You are under the mistaken assumption that only one fundamental constant determines all this. That is not the case. Change one and it affects all, and then you open another can of worms.

 

[Silmarien]

William of Ockham was another who was important to the rise of modern science and wanted to combat Greek Philosophy. His principle of Ockham's razor is important today (even though it was not his original idea). He was a Christian philosopher.

William of Ockham is the most terrifyingly nihilistic philosopher I know of, and I'm an admirer of Friedrich Nietzsche. When a Christian theologian moves beyond good and evil and gleefully preaches a theology based on power, where the sovereignty of God means that he could just as easily annihilate a person living entirely according to his will, we've headed into dark territory.

The man basically blew up theism. With friends like this, who needs enemies?

So I am not sure if we really disagree or not. It was movement away from Greek philosophy and beginning a new philosophy that gave rise to the methodology and birth of modern science by Christian thought.

If your argument is that empirical science required movement away from Greek philosophy, I would strongly disagree. If Aristotelian metaphysics had been maintained, we might have avoided mechanistic materialism, hard determinism, bizarre mind/body dichotomies, and all of the other bizarre legacies of the Enlightenment. Western theism as an intellectual tradition is pretty much founded upon Greek philosophy, so if Christianity needed to shed that to give birth to science, that means it basically needed to commit suicide.

I do think that Western Christianity as a cultural paradigm was instrumental in bringing about modern science. A specifically Christian worldview isn't required for maintaining a coherent approach to science, though. A little bit of Aristotle goes a long way.

 

[Oncedeceived]

William of Ockham is the most terrifyingly nihilistic philosopher I know of, and I'm an admirer of Friedrich Nietzsche. When a Christian theologian moves beyond good and evil and gleefully preaches a theology based on power, where the sovereignty of God means that he could just as easily annihilate a person living entirely according to his will, we've headed into dark territory.

The man basically blew up theism. With friends like this, who needs enemies?

I was under the impression that he was a nominalist? I don't know much about him at all. I only have read snippets about him in reading about Christianity's input into modern science.

If your argument is that empirical science required movement away from Greek philosophy, I would strongly disagree. If Aristotelian metaphysics had been maintained, we might have avoided mechanistic materialism, hard determinism, bizarre mind/body dichotomies, and all of the other bizarre legacies of the Enlightenment.

I can't argue with that, but there was a drifting from the Aristotle philosophy focusing on experiment and experience.

Western theism as an intellectual tradition is pretty much founded upon Greek philosophy, so if Christianity needed to shed that to give birth to science, that means it basically needed to commit suicide.

I said that Greek philosophy was important: (I agree with the Greek influence, and Catholicism is part of the Christian worldview. The geological area held to the Christian worldview.)

I do think that Western Christianity as a cultural paradigm was instrumental in bringing about modern science. A specifically Christian worldview isn't required for maintaining a coherent approach to science, though. A little bit of Aristotle goes a long way.

I disagree, to maintain science at all is to assume uniformity and order which comes from Christian theology.

 

[Silmarien]

I was under the impression that he was a nominalist? I don't know much about him at all. I only have read snippets about him in reading about Christianity's input into modern science.

A nominalist, yes, amongst other things. I like voluntarism, but he got kind of scary with it.

I can't argue with that, but there was a drifting from the Aristotle philosophy focusing on experiment and experience.

That isn't a drift away from Aristotelianism, though. It's already an empirical philosophy that focuses on sensory experience. It was Aristotelian causality that went out the window.

I disagree, to maintain science at all is to assume uniformity and order which comes from Christian theology.

How so? Christian theology asserts uniformity and order, sure, but so did some of the Greek schools. I see no need to go all the way to revelation specifically to maintain science.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

William of Ockham is the most terrifyingly nihilistic philosopher I know of, and I'm an admirer of Friedrich Nietzsche. When a Christian theologian moves beyond good and evil and gleefully preaches a theology based on power, where the sovereignty of God means that he could just as easily annihilate a person living entirely according to his will, we've headed into dark territory.

The man basically blew up theism. With friends like this, who needs enemies?

...yeah, Ockham was kind of weird in saying that God's Will basically precedes God's Intellect. And a few of his other ideas were a bit off, too, weren't they?

If your argument is that empirical science required movement away from Greek philosophy, I would strongly disagree. If Aristotelian metaphysics had been maintained, we might have avoided mechanistic materialism, hard determinism, bizarre mind/body dichotomies, and all of the other bizarre legacies of the Enlightenment. Western theism as an intellectual tradition is pretty much founded upon Greek philosophy, so if Christianity needed to shed that to give birth to science, that means it basically needed to commit suicide.

I do think that Western Christianity as a cultural paradigm was instrumental in bringing about modern science. A specifically Christian worldview isn't required for maintaining a coherent approach to science, though. A little bit of Aristotle goes a long way.

Well, we might also say that Christian theism is a mixture of ideological and conceptual motifs intertwining both the Jewish religious mindset(s) of Midrash type philosophy with the Greek influences of thought that allowed it to .... *ahem*....better express itself during the 1st century and on. At least, this is how I'd put it, or something along this line. This would make sense to me since God, in Christ, intended to bring in the Gentiles, including the use of various appropriate aspects of their culture, and meld these in the Christian faith with other aspects of Jewish belief, some of which was already Hellenized and some of which wasn't so much and remained in tension with the Greek thought.

A Portrait Of Jesus' World - Hellenistic Culture | From Jesus To Christ - The First Christians | FRONTLINE | PBS

And 1100+ years later, after the Crusades helped the West bring Aristotle "back in" for consideration, we then see science beginning to flower again in Europe after being bandied around on a lesser level for several hundred years by the Muslims in the Middle-East.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

I was under the impression that he was a nominalist? I don't know much about him at all. I only have read snippets about him in reading about Christianity's input into modern science.



I can't argue with that, but there was a drifting from the Aristotle philosophy focusing on experiment and experience.

I said that Greek philosophy was important: (I agree with the Greek influence, and Catholicism is part of the Christian worldview. The geological area held to the Christian worldview.)

I disagree, to maintain science at all is to assume uniformity and order which comes from Christian theology.

Actually, the Muslims were using (and also criticizing) Aristotle and other ancient sources of knowledge to apply some moderate levels of science and mathematics for several hundred years in their Empires... so I don't think we can simply say that it was "the Christian ideal" that simply brought Modern science about all by itself.

Science in the medieval Islamic world - Wikipedia

 

[cvanwey]

Not necissarily. Whatever 'it' is that never began would have to be something that's either not bound or became bound to the physical laws in our universe/multiverse. God would still fit either description as he is described has having no beginning, but also creating something that he's relationally bound to.

No. If the universe(s)/muliverse(s) always was, then the best one might attempt to argue, is some sort of intervening 'change agent.' Hence, the claim for creation, or a creator, becomes a specious notion.

 

[Oncedeceived]

Actually, the Muslims were using (and also criticizing) Aristotle and other ancient sources of knowledge to apply some moderate levels of science and mathematics for several hundred years in their Empires... so I don't think we can simply say that it was "the Christian ideal" that simply brought Modern science about all by itself.

Science in the medieval Islamic world - Wikipedia

I don't think I said that "the Christian ideal" was the only impetus bringing in Modern Science by itself. Mathematics certainly had Muslim's mark and that was a necessary element but that is not what I at least am considering as the foundation of the methodology of modern science. Like I had said, Greek philosophy was also intertwined as well. However, it was the Christian thought of the people like Newton, Bacon, and most importantly probably Buridan who set up the ideas for modern scientific methodology or tradition.
Christianity and science - Wikipedia

 

[2PhiloVoid]

I don't think I said that "the Christian ideal" was the only impetus bringing in Modern Science by itself. Mathematics certainly had Muslim's mark and that was a necessary element but that is not what I at least am considering as the foundation of the methodology of modern science. Like I had said, Greek philosophy was also intertwined as well. However, it was the Christian thought of the people like Newton, Bacon, and most importantly probably Buridan who set up the ideas for modern scientific methodology or tradition.
Christianity and science - Wikipedia

Lol!................I think I'm losing track of just exactly which aspect(s) of either ontology or epistemology that you, @Silmarien, and @gaara4158 are wanting to discuss.

What are the four of us trying to focus on in this game of "Ring-around-the-Rosie"?

 

[Oncedeceived]

A nominalist, yes, amongst other things. I like voluntarism, but he got kind of scary with it.

I see.

That isn't a drift away from Aristotelianism, though. It's already an empirical philosophy that focuses on sensory experience. It was Aristotelian causality that went out the window.

How did it go out the window when it is still in use today? In what way?

How so? Christian theology asserts uniformity and order, sure, but so did some of the Greek schools. I see no need to go all the way to revelation specifically to maintain science.

In so much as the natural laws and the link to intelligibility of the universe.

 

[Oncedeceived]

Lol!................I think I'm losing track of just exactly which aspect(s) of either ontology or epistemology that you, @Silmarien, and @gaara4158 are wanting to discuss.

What are the four of us trying to focus on in this game of "Ring-around-the-Rosie"?

I feel more like I'm holding on to the tail and whipping in the wind.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

I feel more like I'm holding on to the tail and whipping in the wind.

Well, if I weren't spinning in space myself, I'd try to offer you a hand out of that situation.

 

[Silmarien]

And 1100+ years later, after the Crusades helped the West bring Aristotle "back in" for consideration, we then see science beginning to flower again in Europe after being bandied around on a lesser level for several hundred years by the Muslims in the Middle-East.

I'm not sure I'd point to the Crusades, specifically. The key was Al-Andalus, the Reconquista, and the Spaniards who started translating Aristotle from Arabic to Latin. That's where the real melting pot was!

What's really interesting is how the West lost Aristotle in the first place... apparently there was a link between Aristotelianism and Nestorianism, so when the latter got condemned, both groups took off and moved to Syria and a couple centuries later ended up in the Islamic rather than Christian sphere.

How did it go out the window when it is still in use today? In what way?

Aristotelian causality? It's largely not accepted today. The favored approach right now seems to be shoving your fingers in your ears and saying that you don't need a theory of causality, because physics.

In so much as the natural laws and the link to intelligibility of the universe.

Yes, but how is that specifically Christian? The Christian worldview provides a framework, but that doesn't mean that other frameworks can't get the job done too.