Scientific Argument for God's existence

[variant]

You are free to believe so, but you should be aware that your belief is incompatible with our scientific knowledges; therefore you are actually rejecting our scientific knowledges.

Incomparable with your strange interpretation of scientific knowledge you mean.

Ideas are also things. Ideas in the minds of God would be things.

I'll repeat since you seemed to have replied before I edited:

It's a pretty broad category and accommodates your weird assertion that they must be mathematical models in the mind of a God.

Your assertion that disagreeing with your interpretation quantum mechanics is a rejection of scientific knowledge is also tiresome and foolish.

 

[mmarco]

Incomparable with your strange interpretation of scientific knowledge you mean.

Actually, I have quoted famous physics, such Heisenberg or Einstein, and I could quote many others. So, it is not only my "strange interpretation"; it's quantum mechanics which is "strange".

Ideas are also things.

I disagree. If you consider ideas as things, then probably you consider all the external reality only as an idea in your mind, which is solipsism.

 

[Michael]

A physicist worth the name would know better than to use an argument from incredulity to bolster unsubstantiated assertion and speculative fantasy.

And yet when astronomers cannot conceive of expansion not being the actual cause of redshift, and the expansion model is simply wrong, "dark energy" propositions are a good idea? Talk about unsubstantiated speculative fantasy.

 

[variant]

Actually, I have quoted famous physics, such Heisenberg or Einstein, and I could quote many others. So, it is not only my "strange interpretation"; it's quantum mechanics which is "strange".

I don't think either Einstein or Heisenberg would agree with your interpretation though.

I disagree. If you consider ideas as things, then probably you consider all the external reality only as an idea in your mind, which is solipsism.

Ideas certainly are things, I'm not sure it's even debatable.

What conclusions we could possibly reach from that are fairly limitless, even your own.

 

[Speedwell]

I think you are simply misunderstanding my meaning of the word "realization" = real situation behaving as described by the model.
I am not interested in discussing empty semantic issues

It's not mere semantics, it's a substantive issue. Yes, the real situation "behaves" and the model "describes." Mathematical models are descriptive, not causal.

 

[mmarco]

It's not mere semantics, it's a substantive issue. Yes, the real situation "behaves" and the model "describes." Mathematical models are descriptive, not causal.

But I have never said that mathematical models are causal; we can conceive many mathematical models which do not describe any real situation; it is obvious that mathematical models are not causal. If you think that I have implied that, you have certainly misunderstood my meaning.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

But I have never said that mathematical models are causal; we can conceive many mathematical models which do not describe any real situation; it is obvious that mathematical models are not causal. If you think that I have implied that, you have certainly misunderstood my meaning.

So yes, the observable features of the universe can be described in terms of mathematical models.

 

[Speedwell]

But I have never said that mathematical models are causal; we can conceive many mathematical models which do not describe any real situation; it is obvious that mathematical models are not causal. If you think that I have implied that, you have certainly misunderstood my meaning.

Well, I must have misunderstood something, because your discourse seems to boil down to

The behavior of reality can be modeled mathematically.
Mathematical models are produced by thinking.
Therefore,
Reality must be the creation of a thinking being...

 

[Halbhh]

Mathematics is a symbolic language humans have invented to describe the universe.

Why should it be surprising in any way that it can be used to describe the universe?

Number (as distinct from many forms of mathematics) seems even more fundamental than that to me. Even more basic. You could reframe it to be only about existence though. If something exists at all And is distinct, and then another thing exists, that's number, but...number could exist even if objects did not.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

...number could exist even if objects did not.

In what sense?

 

[Halbhh]

In what sense?

In my view, number exists even if only as an abstraction, regardless of whether the abstracting entities still exist, or will in the future, etc. That is, regardless of whether entities exist to realize or understand that basic idea.

 

[variant]

In my view, number exists even if only as an abstraction, regardless of whether the abstracting entities still exist, or will in the future, etc. That is, regardless of whether entities exist to realize or understand that basic idea.

In my view abstraction has to come well before consciousness, so I think it should be able to exist outside of some entity with consciousness.

Living beings for instance seem to me to need to "define" the world and maintain physical boundaries with it to exist and perpetuate themselves.

I don't think there are any objective abstractions though, boundaries and definitions are built and maintained by subjective entities, their maintenance of a separation of sorts, and their interaction with the rest of the universe.

 

[Halbhh]

In my view abstraction has to come well before consciousness, so I think it should be able to exist outside of some entity with consciousness.

Living beings for instance seem to me to need to "define" the world and maintain physical boundaries with it to exist and perpetuate themselves.

I don't think there are any objective abstractions though, boundaries and definitions are built and maintained by subjective entities, their maintenance of a separation of sorts, and their interaction with the rest of the universe.

Yes, usually some wide variety of various types and instances of abstractions are only relative to a culture or condition...

But not all are relative (I think).

One way to think about number as being some absolute basic thing in itself (just a wording), that is, independent of all entities or conditions, is whether totally unalike civilizations or intelligences would discover (find) it, on their own, and it would be the same thing. It's generally thought yes -- number would be, even math generally would be, as "universal language". But I only point to that being a common idea just to suggest it's worth considering. To me, it seems evidently so, though. Number -- 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 (regardless of base, so, 1, 10, 11, 100, 101, 110, etc. (base 2 if I remembered it the right way) is identically the same, in essence -- the universal language being number itself, and more generally, math). It would not matter where or how the intelligence exists, it would in some sense discover this absolute thing, this fundamental...thing, that exists outside of any constraints of any kind.

 

[SelfSim]

Living beings for instance seem to me to need to "define" the world and maintain physical boundaries with it to exist and perpetuate themselves.

Well I'm glad to see you're getting around to acknowledging that it takes a living being to come up with the concept of objectivity .. It is therefore, an artificial concept.

I don't think there are any objective abstractions though, boundaries and definitions are built and maintained by subjective entities, their maintenance of a separation of sorts, and their interaction with the rest of the universe.

Their 'separation of sorts' is an idealisation of convenience (ie: the 'expediency' you mentioned before) .. as is totally ignoring themselves and the role their mind plays in that idealisation.
The sooner that mind gets reintegrated with the idealisation, the sooner this thread might (hopefully) come to an end ..

 

[SelfSim]

.. It would not matter where or how the intelligence exists, it would in some sense discover this absolute thing, this fundamental...thing, that exists outside of any constraints of any kind.

.. and in order to do that, ie: 'discover', it must deny the abundant observational evidence remaining, which demonstrates just how it went about making that discovery .. and therein lies the evidence pertaining to its own constraints and its role in creating reality as it went about that business of 'discovery'.

 

[SelfSim]

In my view abstraction has to come well before consciousness, so I think it should be able to exist outside of some entity with consciousness.

How on earth could one rationalise such a notion? (I'm just curious here). I can't imagine any way that could possibly happen without invoking some kind of pure belief of some kind ..?

 

[variant]

Well I'm glad to see you're getting around to acknowledging that it takes a living being to come up with the concept of objectivity .. It is therefore, an artificial concept.

A living thing, not necessarily a mind.

Once things start to be physically systems that perpetuate boundary's like life does, it separates from the rest of the universe that simply exists as is.

I think this is where perspective, and the self come from, where the abstract comes from.

We've not got to something I would call a mind though, so I think we're still in the realm of the mind independent realities.

Their 'separation of sorts' is an idealisation of convenience (ie: the 'expediency' you mentioned before) .. as is totally ignoring themselves and the role their mind plays in that idealisation.
The sooner that mind gets reintegrated with the idealisation, the sooner this thread might (hopefully) come to an end ..

It is separate, that's the point. Life perpetuates itself and maintains boundaries, that's what it is. Well before life can ever produce something as complex as "concept".

This means that minds as we know them are a byproduct of this external, Independent, physical reality that they depend on for their most basic concept.

 

[Halbhh]

.. and in order to do that, ie: 'discover', it must deny the abundant observational evidence remaining, which demonstrates just how it went about making that discovery .. and therein lies the evidence pertaining to its own constraints and its role in creating reality as it went about that business of 'discovery'.

If the abstraction is undiscovered, it still exists, waiting for possible discovery. The laws of physics are evidently like this -- in an absolute sense existing independently of whether we discover them.

A famous example: E=mc^2 meaning that rest mass can be converted into energy: this is true whether or not we discover it, and it remains precise and accurate, regardless of our culture, or ability to understand or not. The rest mass converts to energy in fusion or fissions reactions of certain elements in exact and consistent ways that are utterly and totally independent of whether we know, and remain precisely the same regardless of which researcher or culture is discovering this already-existing firm and fixed law of nature.

 

[variant]

How on earth could one rationalise such a notion? (I'm just curious here). I can't imagine any way that could possibly happen without invoking some kind of pure belief of some kind ..?

I think abstraction at it's most basic point is when we start to have one thing stand in for another. It's not possible, as far as I know to have this kind of information flow in other physical systems.

A = B, it's as simple as that. The foundation of abstraction in minds is representation, where one thing stands in for another in a system.

As I said before life does this quite easily, encoding within one generation instructions for the next.

Life has a mechanical encoding aspect that I think arises to the level of abstraction. Populations of living things even react to the environment via this methodology.

So, rather than just defining abstraction as something that minds do, I think of it more like a long sliding scale originating from the process that creates minds.

 

[SelfSim]

So you need to know whether reality is mind dependent, or mind independent, before you’d know the answer to that question? (Is that right??)

How do you propose to go about knowing that, then?

It's your argument, so you need to tell us. If you want to insist that semantics is so important you need to support your position.

and I have cited my test and produced the resulting evidence in dozens of posts now .. but you have to actually look at them to see it ..

What this means is that I at least have a test for distinguishing reality which produces objective evidence, whereas you demonstrate above, by way of your declination, that you don't. Therefore I claim to know what's real (and can show it) ... and you apparently can do neither!