Blog debate : Proof of Evolution

[brinny]

Originally Posted by brinny
HE cannot be detected with human senses. I've never seen Him, touched Him, smelled Him. His existence is sensed through the inexplicable. Because He is inexplicable. That part of me that is inexplicable believes. It's called faith.

But you can sense him. Therefore you have a sense of some kind to be able to detect him. If you don't have this sense, then you can't detect him or know he's there.

So, which is it? Can you tell your god exists, yes or no?

Are you suggesting by detecting Him that He can be captured. placed in a box, placed under a microscope? How does one do any of that with something that is inexplicable or explain a faith or sensing of the existence of something that stems from an inexplicable part of them?

 

[sandwiches]

Are you suggesting by detecting Him that He can be captured. placed in a box, placed under a microscope? How does one do any of that with something that is inexplicable or explain a faith or sensing of the existence of something that stems from an inexplicable part of them?

Nope. That is not what I am suggesting at all.

What I am trying to point out is the incongruence of your belief. You claim that god cannot be sensed by humans but YOU can somehow sense him and know he exists. You claim he's inexplicable, yet you explain a lot about his motives, his works, and his methods.

So again:
Is your god beyond our senses, yes or no?

 

[Wiccan_Child]

then why is it not called a fact? Is anything in science considered fact?

There are such things as scientific facts, claims which are so well-evidence that they're as good as an actual fact. Assuming our senses aren't lying to us, it's a fact that stars exist: we see starlight, and infer that there is an object that emitted them.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

Are you suggesting by detecting Him that He can be captured. placed in a box, placed under a microscope? How does one do any of that with something that is inexplicable or explain a faith or sensing of the existence of something that stems from an inexplicable part of them?

Because it's not inexplicable. If God exists, and if he interacts with the real world, then we can say things about him. They may be vague statements, but they are statements nonetheless. For one thing, we can say something about his abilities (if he begins to heal every case of cancer, we can say that he is at least powerful enough to heal cancer).

 

[brinny]

Originally Posted by brinny
Are you suggesting by detecting Him that He can be captured. placed in a box, placed under a microscope? How does one do any of that with something that is inexplicable or explain a faith or sensing of the existence of something that stems from an inexplicable part of them?

Nope. That is not what I am suggesting at all.

What I am trying to point out is the incongruence of your belief. You claim that god cannot be sensed by humans but YOU can somehow sense him and know he exists. You claim he's inexplicable, yet you explain a lot about his motives, his works, and his methods.

So again:
Is your god beyond our senses, yes or no?

hmmmmm...the sensing there was something way bigger than me came in looking at the night sky when i was about 7. Couldn't explain it then. Can't explain it now. That's what inexplicable means.

Looking at the night sky is not looking at God. It's wondering about what's behind such vastness that evokes such wonder. Where it came from. Who is behind it.

 

[sandwiches]

hmmmmm...the sensing there was something way bigger than me came in looking at the night sky when i was about 7. Couldn't explain it then. Can't explain it now. That's what inexplicable means.

Looking at the night sky is not looking at God. It's wondering about what's behind such vastness that evokes such wonder. Where it came from. Who is behind it.

So, can you or can you not sense god in some way?

 

[brinny]

Originally Posted by brinny
hmmmmm...the sensing there was something way bigger than me came in looking at the night sky when i was about 7. Couldn't explain it then. Can't explain it now. That's what inexplicable means.

Looking at the night sky is not looking at God. It's wondering about what's behind such vastness that evokes such wonder. Where it came from. Who is behind it.

So, can you or can you not sense god in some way?

Now? Yes, i sense His Holy Spirit. His Holy Spirit works within me to work those changes that bear spiritual fruit. The Holy Spirit softens my heart when i am sorely tempted to knock the socks off someone. The Holy Spirit enables me to forgive. The Holy Spirit brings forth joy in my heart that was not there before. The Holy Spirit beings me to conviction for unkind thoughts or behaviours. Yes, I can sense His Holy Spirit. His Holy Spirit causes me to weep at the suffering of others and prompts me to compassion to alleviate suffering and to speak out for those who are unable to speak out for themselves. The Holy Spirit is a Lifter of my head, and teaches me i am a child of the Most High God. I sense God the Father. I climb up on His lap and lay my weary head on His chest. This God, my Father, my Abba, rejoices over me with singing. Yes, I sense Him now.

 

[sandwiches]

Yes, I sense Him now.

So, on a scale of 1 - 10, how would you rate this divine experience you've had today?

 

[CoderHead]

I sense God the Father. I climb up on His lap and lay my weary head on His chest. This God, my Father, my Abba, rejoices over me with singing. Yes, I sense Him now.

Literally, or figuratively?

 

[thaumaturgy]

How does one put something inexplicable under a microscope, something that is not visible to the human eye, beause it is beyond our senses?

First:
many things that are "unseen" by the human eye are measured and evidence found for them. (cf "electrons", "atoms", etc.)

Secondly:
If the thing cannot be experience by our "senses" (whatever they be) how do you know it is there?

If it cannot be experienced by most observers similarly then what is the difference between this and one person's imagination?

How do limited human beings, who are so fallible and weak that they die, take an eon of time, or anything that is beyond our understanding, and put it under a tinker toy, of sorts, like a microscope?

"Tinker toy"? Sorry I am always amazed at how easily non-scientists denigrate science.

Yes humans are fallible. Even the humans who originally told you all about God. To my knowledge there is nothing written about God that was not written by a human.

The point isn't that anyone is saying God does or does not exist, the point is that science cannot work with the "ineffible".

Again, another example from my daily life:

I currently have two chemicals that when they touch one substrate do one thing but when they touch another they do something completely different. I can't for the life of me figure out what the key difference is apart from the substrate. So I run experiments. Today I have completed two that I thought sure would answer the question. They didn't do what I expected them to do.

Now there are two possible reasons:

1. There is some other factor about the substrates that is controlling the reaction.

2. God was angry with me and decided to suspend the laws of chemistry for the past two days but only in my lab.

WHICH do you think is a more reasonable approach to advancing my work?

It could be #2, sure, God can do anything! But will that in any way assist in figuring this puzzle out? Because those who want the "God Hypothesis" invoked in science must deal with this as a very real possibility.

Now, put yourself in my place. Your career and your ability to pay your mortgage and put food on your table and feed your family rest on the results.

Do you go to your boss with hypothesis #2?

 

[thaumaturgy]

Yet they are still tinker toys, aren't they?

No. I challenge you to explain how an SEM works. Oh yeah, do it from "first principles" without reference to a textbook. Start with the concept of the electron.

Tinkertoys.

I am sorry but there are a lot of really amazing pieces of equipment and amazing elegance in chemistry labs.

Microscopes are great. Try a Transmission Electron Microscope some time. I actually saw the layers of carbon atoms in a graphite material using one years ago as part of my research. Do you realize how AMAZING THAT IS????

 

[Cabal]

Again, another example from my daily life:

I currently have two chemicals that when they touch one substrate do one thing but when they touch another they do something completely different. I can't for the life of me figure out what the key difference is apart from the substrate. So I run experiments. Today I have completed two that I thought sure would answer the question. They didn't do what I expected them to do.

Now there are two possible reasons:

1. There is some other factor about the substrates that is controlling the reaction.

2. God was angry with me and decided to suspend the laws of chemistry for the past two days but only in my lab.

WHICH do you think is a more reasonable approach to advancing my work?

It could be #2, sure, God can do anything! But will that in any way assist in figuring this puzzle out? Because those who want the "God Hypothesis" invoked in science must deal with this as a very real possibility.

Now, put yourself in my place. Your career and your ability to pay your mortgage and put food on your table and feed your family rest on the results.

Do you go to your boss with hypothesis #2?

Apart from anything else, why?

The really funny thing is, if God did create everything in 6k years and is just fudging the scientific results in evolution and cosmology, he's doing it in an awfully consistent way.

 

[Hespera]

hmmmmm...the sensing there was something way bigger than me came in looking at the night sky when i was about 7. Couldn't explain it then. Can't explain it now. That's what inexplicable means.

Looking at the night sky is not looking at God. It's wondering about what's behind such vastness that evokes such wonder. Where it came from. Who is behind it.

i think it would be super polite and really only fair if god would provide something a little more solid to work with, as far as believing in his existence.
As it is, its way too easy to think of the experiences and evidence that people talk about as being nothing more than wishful self delusion.

After all.... there are thousands, and thousands more that are gone now, of religions that people really believed in, still do believe in, and where they could no doubt report having similar sorts of experiences to prove that THEIR religion was the one true one.


There seems nothing unique to christianity in this regard.

Sooooo.... I remained totally unconvinced. ESPECIALLUY in christianity, that seems to require believing not just in god, but in noahs flood and some other stories that dont strike me as remotely believable.

 

[Cabal]

then why isn't it called a fact, plain and simple?

Perhaps there is confusion due to the fact (sorry) that the fact and theory being described have the same name.

The theory of gravity is what describes how mass attracts each other over distance.

The fact of gravity is when we see something fall to the ground. "That's gravity", we would say.

Same word, different applications.

(Whereas, sometimes theories have different names than the facts they describe. The temperature of a gas is an observable fact; the theory used to describe how that temperature arises has a very specific name, statistical mechanics, so maybe if we were discussing that there wouldn't be this theory/fact confusion over the same actual wording.)

 

[laconicstudent]

then why is it still a theory?

Oh, I must have missed this. Brinny, Gravity is also still a theory. Does that make Gravity less true?

 

[Agonaces of Susa]

Brinny, Gravity is also still a theory.

Gravity is not a theory. It's an observation.

Universal Gravitation is the so-called "theory" which is really a hypothesis and no theory at all since Newton made no claim about the cause of gravity.

"Newton attempted to explain the force of gravity on two hypotheses: the existence of a medium, or ether, and action at a distance. The first hypothesis he rejected as being physically absurd, the second as contrary to reason. Newton had, therefore, no theory of gravity." -- Melbourne G. Evans, physicist, 1958

Does that make Gravity less true?

 

[laconicstudent]

Gravity is not a theory. It's an observation.

Um, everyone else disagrees. Gravitation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Universal Gravitation is the so-called "theory" which is really a hypothesis and no theory at all since Newton made no claim about the cause of gravity.

Graviton - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Agonaces of Susa]

Um, everyone else disagrees. Gravitation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

LOL. You don't understand the difference between gravity and gravitation.

Gravity is an ancient observation.

"The atoms, as their own weight bears them down...." -- Lucretius, philosopher poet, 54 B.C.

Gravitation on the other hand is a 17th century hypothesis.

F = G x (m1m2)/r^2

Huge difference.

Do you claim that gravity did not exist prior to Newton?

Graviton - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wikipedia is not peer-reviewed. Oh the irony!



Gravitons will never be observed or experimented upon because they do not exist.

Can you please show me a peer-reviewed journal that claims gravitons have been observed and experimented upon in the laboratory?

 

[laconicstudent]

Gravitons will never be observed or experimented upon because they do not exist.

Can you please show me a peer-reviewed journal that claims gravitons have been observed and experimented upon in the laboratory?

Not yet, admittedly. They are still hypothetical. I was just pointing out that a mechanism has been proposed.

There are these experiments running LIGO - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Virgo interferometer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Agonaces of Susa]

Not yet, admittedly. They are still hypothetical.

Like I've said, you don't believe in scientific evidence. You only believe in imaginary hypotheses.

There are these experiments running LIGO - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Virgo interferometer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"It is claimed that the LIGO and LISA projects will detect Einstein's gravitational waves. The existence of these waves is entirely theoretical. Over the past forty years or so no Einstein gravitational waves have been detected. How long must the search go on, at great expense to the public purse, before the astrophysical scientists admit that their search is fruitless and a waste of vast sums of public money? The fact is, from day one, the search for these elusive waves has been destined to detect nothing." -- Stephen J. Crothers, astrophysicist, August 2009