Official Call For Papers

[Michael]

Inflation, like any concept in science, doesn't need your worship or love.

It's a good thing too because it's never going to get it. IMO God doesn't "need" anything from humans.

I think it's the "added a bit of math to the mix" part that is kind of important there.

It's like adding math to invisible elves, pointing to the sky and claiming "see, my math proves that invisible elves did it." I'm afraid it's "trumped up" math as far as I can tell.

Please be technically correct, it is not that I refuse to accept the presence of a creator...it is that I fail to see reason to assume there is a creator.

Likewise I fail to see reason to assume there was a "creation event". You have a very selective rejection process by the way. No human ever claimed to have "seen" inflation or to have had a relationship with inflation. Many humans have claimed to have a relationship with a creator, and your personal experiences or lack thereof are entirely subjective.

If adding in unnecessary factors to a model improves the model then indeed I am doing something terribly wrong and my "beliefs" are hamstrung.

You don't need inflation or dark energy so your beliefs are hamstrung IMO. Worse yet, you're railing against a creation theory that cannot be taught in class and buying into another creation myth that is just as irrational as YEC yet you don't even bother to notice it, nor do you react to it with the same level of hostility. You're more than happy to come over here to a religious website and complain about one creation theory, yet you blithely accept another creation mythos that is just as unsupportable as any other creation myth. Why? Why be so selective about your crusades against creation theory?

 

[thaumaturgy]

It's a good thing too because it's never going to get it. IMO God doesn't "need" anything from humans.

So a being who, according to some sects, asks for our love and worship and if he doesn't get it punishes people for eternity in torment doesn't "need" our love and worship? So that makes that conception of God just cruel.

(I am sure that is not the conception of God you have, but there are countless Christians out there who do have that very concept. In fact any version of Christianity with an eternal torment-filled hell is exactly that.)

It's like adding math to invisible elves, pointing to the sky and claiming "see, my math proves that invisible elves did it." I'm afraid it's "trumped up" math as far as I can tell.

Well, I believe I've made my point quite clearly with resort to Dirac's anti-matter conjecture from his calculations.

Just because the math adds up doesn't mean it is necessarily true, but it certainly adds a reason to believe it to be a real concept.

You have a very selective rejection process by the way. No human ever claimed to have "seen" inflation or to have had a relationship with inflation.

And you seem to have a rather selective process for reading what I have written. That is a strawman argument against my position. I don't think one needs to see God (or electrons for that matter!) in order to have some idea of how to model their action and understand that they have a "reality" to them.

In the case of God the relationships I've seen others claim seem rather different from person to person. I suspect people who feel their relationship with God is so real they will strap explosives to themselves and obliterate innocent civilians is no less "real" to them than the person who feels their relationship with God compels them to feed and clothe the needy. But they both appear to be quite different experiences. It is a model that doesn't "explain" anything because it uses the same input to come to completely opposite conclusions.

The fact that I don't have any sort of relationship with God indicates to me that I further have no reason to assume there is a God.

I do, however, have reason to believe people can "feel" any number of things. The human brain is quite capable of explaining everything "experienced" by one's feelings.

I rather assume that simpler explanation is the one that is accurate. Of course since I am a scientists I am also quite sure I could be wrong.

Many humans have claimed to have a relationship with a creator, and your personal experiences or lack thereof are entirely subjective.

Do you say that to anyone who has a relationship with a supernatural being based on feelings? Are you stating that all religious feelings are equally true?

Worse yet, you're railing against a creation theory that cannot be taught in class and buying into another creation myth that is just as irrational as YEC

This is plainly incorrect. YEC requires many attributes that fail since it "bleeds over into" standard, testable geology. Ultimate origins of the cosmos and events prior to 10[sup]-32[/sup] seconds after the Big Bang are far more conjectural. YEC has been soundly trounced not by dogmatism but rather by steady exploration of what the earth shows (and please note the E in YEC stands for Earth. Ergo we can investigate the claims which fail on just about every conceivable test.) Obviously the only exception is the immediate "creation event" which, in this particular mythology occurs in orders not matching our understanding and quite close to the creation of the earth itself.

YEC was the dominant hypothesis in geology when the field started. It was later falsified through investigation of unrelated phenomena.

If it were true it would be because of a confluence of so many independent and amazingly unlikely events that it would blow any statistics and probability theory out of the water. It would require the wholesale tearing apart of all known physics within the past several millenia which would leave a mark.

yet you don't even bother to notice it, nor do you react to it with the same level of hostility.

Well, considering that you have yet to prove that any of the things you are complaining about are being taught to children (YEC is) I don't much care about it as an educational concept. YEC is religion taught as alternative to "science" which is aimed at children who cannot process the difference.

Inflationary hypotheses is conjectural physics meant to explain the mathematics and is taught to college students and graduate students who can process the difference.

If you fail to see the differentiator there then we have little to discuss.

You're more than happy to come over here to a religious website and complain about one creation theory, yet you blithely accept another creation mythos

So it finally took this many posts to get to the meat of the matter? This is all a "religious" discussion? The bad atheists come into your yard and leave messes? I thought we were talking about the physics and mathematics of cosmology and the inherent philosophical underpinnings of science.

that is just as unsupportable as any other creation myth. Why? Why be so selective about your crusades against creation theory?

I am clearly not on a "crusade" in support of Inflation. That is not readily apparent from what I've posted (especially my last post which clearly states my relative ambivalence about Inflation). I believe the BIg Bang because it appears to explain the science I am shown. Inflation appears to be a tweak to explain a subtlety of the whole system.

But again, Inflation and dark matter/dark energy are still quite conjectural. As the numerous citations I've referenced in this discussion make it appear. Unlike God, there is clearly something that needs to be explained (in the case of gravity and dark matter). God, however, usually serves only to fulfill a "feeling" or "perceived need" in the mind of believers.

YEC, on the other hand, is far more likely to be incorrect based on nearly 2 centuries of solid, observational science. After all, I thought that was precisely your crusade. There is a huge mountain (mountains) of evidence against YEC and in favor of Old Earth standard geology.

So you see, I do have a reason to "crusade" against outdated disavowed non-science. And I don't have a real crusade for Inflation.

YEC is a religious concept taught in order to get religious dogma into the heads of children, the other is conjectural physics and extremely high level theoretical physics at that, taught to college kids in an effort to explain the physical appearance of the universe and make the math add up.

If that isn't a clear differentiation, then please show me one that is.

 

[thaumaturgy]

You've gone so far as to become a "evangelical atheist" on a religious website. Your claim doesn't jive with your actions.

I'll stop ya there n00B. You can easily look up all my posts from the past couple of years. I am anything but an evangelical atheist.

If you would like to ping anyone on here you can verify that I have stated many, many times on this board: I WOULD NEVER WISH TO TAKE ANYONE'S FAITH FROM THEM.

Example 1 LINK
Example 2 LINK
(Just as a couple of examples)

You can easily search and verify this point. I do however like to discuss science, science philosophy and even religion.

I used to be a Christian, so please don't tell me what I refuse to believe or what I am doing.

Thanks!

 

[Michael]

So a being who, according to some sects, asks for our love and worship and if he doesn't get it punishes people for eternity in torment doesn't "need" our love and worship? So that makes that conception of God just cruel.

Indeed. I don't happen to subscribe to "some sects". FYI, I am a "Universalist Christian" and I believe Jesus will redeem everyone eventually. I certainly don't believe that God punishes human beings. I tend to believe Jesus when he said "Love your enemy" and "be perfect' as God is perfect. You might reread Mathew 5 sometime. That hardly sounds like a vindictive creator to me.

(I am sure that is not the conception of God you have, but there are countless Christians out there who do have that very concept. In fact any version of Christianity with an eternal torment-filled hell is exactly that.)

Yes, I agree and that is probably why I became an atheist too. Such concepts of God really do more harm that good IMO, and I do hear you on that point.

Well, I believe I've made my point quite clearly with resort to Dirac's anti-matter conjecture from his calculations.

Dirac's equations were all "testable" in the classic (empirical) scientific manner. Compare and contrast that with inflation or dark energy.

Just because the math adds up doesn't mean it is necessarily true, but it certainly adds a reason to believe it to be a real concept.

Yet if I pilfer your math about "Godflation' and "God energy", you still lack belief in God even though consciousness is the one thing that *DOES* exist on Earth. Why?

And you seem to have a rather selective process for reading what I have written. That is a strawman argument against my position. I don't think one needs to see God (or electrons for that matter!) in order to have some idea of how to model their action and understand that they have a "reality" to them.

So how about explaining why you lack belief in God, yet you don't lack belief in inflation again? Surely you must understand that your own life experience are completely subjective and the fact God is not 'real to you' does not mean God is not real to others and real period.

In the case of God the relationships I've seen others claim seem rather different from person to person.

My children have a very different relationship with my wife than I do. Many times my friends don't necessarily all get along and experience each other just as I experience them. Does everything experience President Obama in exactly the same way? Humans are all very unique individuals. Why would I believe they would all have exactly the same relationship with each other or with God?

I suspect people who feel their relationship with God is so real they will strap explosives to themselves and obliterate innocent civilians is no less "real" to them than the person who feels their relationship with God compels them to feed and clothe the needy.

I'm sure that's probably true as well. Is that the fault of the individual or God? Doesn't even the OT say "Do not kill"? When did Jesus kill for God? Didn't he say "Love your enemy" and 'turn the other cheek'? Jesus seemed more than willing to sacrifice his own life to leave a lasting message of love, not destruction. Jesus never "killed" anybody and in fact he prevented others from engaging in such activity. That didn't stop Protestants and Catholics from killing each other in Northern Ireland for generations. Humans do weird things with their free will.

But they both appear to be quite different experiences. It is a model that doesn't "explain" anything because it uses the same input to come to completely opposite conclusions.

I think you're only looking at a very few extreme cases and not looking at the bigger picture. Most followers of Islam believe and live in peace. Their experiences of God are not so different from mine in many respects. Their beliefs are somewhat different but that is to be expected. No two people even experience our President in exactly the same way so why would they have the same opinions about God? It seems to me that most followers of religion are loving individuals with many similar beliefs.

The fact that I don't have any sort of relationship with God indicates to me that I further have no reason to assume there is a God.

Do you have a relationship with inflation or dark energy? Do you reject the need for these things with that same hard core attitude? If not, why not? If that is you only criteria for judging the validity of a specific theory, why apply the rule haphazardly and inconsistently?

I do, however, have reason to believe people can "feel" any number of things. The human brain is quite capable of explaining everything "experienced" by one's feelings.

Yet you don't believe they can 'feel" the presence of God?

I rather assume that simpler explanation is the one that is accurate. Of course since I am a scientists I am also quite sure I could be wrong.

IMO you are wrong and your criteria for rejection of an idea is inconsistent. If it were consistent, you would be just us upset about *all* creation myths, not just some of them. The only criteria that seems to "turn you off" is the notion of a 'creator' not the physical impossibility of faster than light expansion, or any of the things that I would expect. The only thing you seem to have a chip on your shoulder about is the idea of an intelligent creator. IMO you were "led astray" by "bad dogma" that was handed to you as a child. I also believe you're being cheated by the bad dogma of Lambda-CDM theory.

Do you say that to anyone who has a relationship with a supernatural being based on feelings? Are you stating that all religious feelings are equally true?

What exactly gives rise to awareness and feelings in your opinion? If feelings are not limited to humans (I assume you would agree with that statement), then what makes you think that a creator would not have feelings or be incapable of making humans aware of them?

This is plainly incorrect. YEC requires many attributes that fail since it "bleeds over into" standard, testable geology.

Likewise Lambda-mythos requires many attributes that fail and "bleed over' into standard testable cosmology. EU theory has been lab tested for over 100 years, but I'll bet you've probably never even heard of Kristian Birkeland, Dr. Charles Bruce or Hannes Alfven. If you have, you're in a very small minority. I doubt anyone mentioned their whole body of work to you in school.

Ultimate origins of the cosmos and events prior to 10[sup]-32[/sup] seconds after the Big Bang are far more conjectural.

It's pure conjecture that all matter and energy was ever condensed to a single point in the first place! All creation myths begin with *assumptions* about a need for a creation event that may or may not have ever occurred in the first place. All creation myths are conjectural from the very start.

YEC has been soundly trounced not by dogmatism but rather by steady exploration of what the earth shows (and please note the E in YEC stands for Earth. Ergo we can investigate the claims which fail on just about every conceivable test.)

So ho do we kill of inflation or dark energy based on empirical testing? I'll grant you that YEC can be shown to be incorrect based on the standard scientific method, but it absolutely impossible to falsify YCC (young cosmology creation) theory because inflation and dark energy don't show up in a lab and they never will. Furthermore the dogma of the industry keeps ignoring those dark flows and holes in the universe. There's no conceivable empirical test to kill off that dog of a theory because there was never an empirical test to support it.

Obviously the only exception is the immediate "creation event" which, in this particular mythology occurs in orders not matching our understanding and quite close to the creation of the earth itself.

YEC was the dominant hypothesis in geology when the field started. It was later falsified through investigation of unrelated phenomena.

Likewise I'm quite confident that Lambda-mythos will eventually give way to plasma cosmology/electric universe theory. When it does eventually occur, you and other atheists will eventually have to embrace the notion that we live inside an electrical universe and electrically wired structures can and do give rise to awareness and consciousness. There is in fact a "scientific" way to view and relate to a "creator".

If it were true it would be because of a confluence of so many independent and amazingly unlikely events that it would blow any statistics and probability theory out of the water. It would require the wholesale tearing apart of all known physics within the past several millenia which would leave a mark.

Dark energy and inflation are not "known physics". They haven't been around for millenia. In fact they were all created in the last 30 or so years and none of them show up in a lab test. That's a problem.

Well, considering that you have yet to prove that any of the things you are complaining about are being taught to children (YEC is) I don't much care about it as an educational concept.

Come on, turn on the TV and watch a show on cosmology tonight. I guarantee you they will talk about "dark energy'" and a creation event they can't justify via "real" (empirical) science. Do you really think that children don't hear this stuff?

YEC is religion taught as alternative to "science" which is aimed at children who cannot process the difference.

Ditto on Lambda-CMD theory. Even adults can't seem to tell the difference between religion and science.

Inflationary hypotheses is conjectural physics meant to explain the mathematics

No. The mathematics does not requires that the universe expands faster than light, or that the universe is 13.7 billion years old. These 'explanations' are not even 'explanations' because nobody can show that inflation actually exists in nature. It's purely an ad hoc construct created by a single individual that happened to "catch on".

and is taught to college students and graduate students who can process the difference.

Baloney. It's all over TV all the time and everyone get's exposed to these faith oriented ideas, not just graduate students of astronomy.

If you fail to see the differentiator there then we have little to discuss.

If you fail to acknowledge the fact that you would not be satisfied with YEC being restricted to college level "science", then we will continue to talk past one another. It's not "ok" only because it's taught to "older" people, nor does it automatically become "science" only because you are allowed to 'have doubt' in the dogma.

So it finally took this many posts to get to the meat of the matter? This is all a "religious" discussion?

Er, not from my perspective. It's all about 'science' or lack thereof.

The bad atheists come into your yard and leave messes? I thought we were talking about the physics and mathematics of cosmology and the inherent philosophical underpinnings of science.

I thought so too. I'm not sure where you got that idea. FYI, BB theory was started by a Catholic priest, so let's not get too carried away here. I'm not blaming atheists for the whole mess, but it is a mess.

 

[Michael]

I am clearly not on a "crusade" in support of Inflation.

No, but you don't reject it the way you reject the notion of a creator. Why is that? Why do you accept some forms of religious creationism and not others?

That is not readily apparent from what I've posted (especially my last post which clearly states my relative ambivalence about Inflation). I believe the BIg Bang because it appears to explain the science I am shown.

What you were "shown" is no more "science" that YEC. It's YCC on a slightly longer, and equally unjustifiable timeline.

Inflation appears to be a tweak to explain a subtlety of the whole system.

That's like trying to explain the subtleties of creation with invisible elves.

But again, Inflation and dark matter/dark energy are still quite conjectural.

They don't exist and yet you believe they do. God does exist and yet you believe he does not.

As the numerous citations I've referenced in this discussion make it appear. Unlike God, there is clearly something that needs to be explained (in the case of gravity and dark matter).

That "something" can be anything that exists in nature, like current flow, or simply due to the fact that astronomers botched their mass estimates in a big way. In no way does that justify them filling the gaps of their otherwise falsified theory with metaphysical mumbo jumbo.

God, however, usually serves only to fulfill a "feeling" or "perceived need" in the mind of believers.

"Feelings' are every bit as "real" as "thoughts". God serves many purposes to many individuals, just as atheism "feels" right to you for the time being. You certainly can't justify your beliefs via science.

YEC, on the other hand, is far more likely to be incorrect based on nearly 2 centuries of solid, observational science.

Ditto on Lambda-mythos. It's incorrect as those dark flows and holes in the universe demonstrate. Dark energy isn't real. You have a "feeling" it might be real, but you certainly can't empirically demonstrate that it is real.

After all, I thought that was precisely your crusade. There is a huge mountain (mountains) of evidence against YEC and in favor of Old Earth standard geology.

My point is that this statement applies to *ALL* creation myths, not just one of them as you seem to believe.

So you see, I do have a reason to "crusade" against outdated disavowed non-science. And I don't have a real crusade for Inflation.

That is purely a subjective choice on your part. You have no need to crusade against YEC anymore than you have a need to crusade against inflation theory. You simply choose to crusade against one, and give the other one a free pass. I'm simply pointing out to you that your actions are inconsistent.

[QUOTE\YEC is a religious concept taught in order to get religious dogma into the heads of children, [/quote]

My children watch shows on astronomy all the time and they've heard how "inflation' and dark energy move the universe too. It's still bad dogma.

the other is conjectural physics and extremely high level theoretical physics at that,

It is *NOT*, I repeat *NOT* physics. It is "religion" because inflation and dark energy don't physically show up in a lab. They are creations of the human mind, nothing more. It's only "high level" dogma that is being peddled onto an unsuspecting population just like all creation myths.

taught to college kids in an effort to explain the physical appearance of the universe and make the math add up.

Elf math could add up too. So what if we slap on math to God energy? Does that make it real?

If that isn't a clear differentiation, then please show me one that is.

The "clear differentiation" is "empirical" in nature. Inflation doesn't show up in controlled experimentation. Current flows do show up in active experimentation. Dark energy doesn't power auroras, but "current flow" has been shown to do so. "Current flow" is an empirical part of "reality", whereas dark energy and inflation theories are 'myths" invented by human beings and they lack empirical support. Empiricism is the point of differentiation, not what "feels right" to you or me.