Theology and Falsifiability

[Michael]

Such a test is not valid because you will judge the method by the outcome. If someone still claims that they didn't detect God you will say that they did it wrong.

And if they fail to find "dark matter" in controlled experimentation at LHC as you originally predicted in your mathematical models, they must have not looked in the right place. Give me a break. The hypocrisy around here is so thick you need a machete to cut through the nonsense.

 

[Michael]

I have found that religious explanations don't actually explain anything about the reality around us.

Irony overload from a guy that's peddling an invisible sky hypothesis that is based on 95 percent placeholder terms for pure human ignorance. Oy Vey.

 

[Michael]

A drive or desire to find truth and clarity may indeed underlay religious thought, but that doesn't mean that religious thought actually yields truth or clarity.

That's very true of course, but it's not unlike "science" in that respect. Science is based upon a noble desire to "find truth", but there is no guarantee that any given theory or hypothesis actually yields truth or clarity.

 

[Michael]

As mentioned before, you discount negative results and stay with your conclusion anyway.

And so do you:

Thunderbolts Forum • View topic - Lambda-CDM - EU/PC Theory - Confirmation Bias

 

[Chriliman]

To sum up the general point I've been trying to make in regards to faith:

If one struggles to trust in a person, or idea, or concept even after it's been well evidenced that the person is trustworthy or that the idea or concept is reliable, then they aren't practicing any type of faith. Faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.

Faith has to do with trusting in a future outcome or past event based on past/present experience or observation. It's not engaged when there's direct evidence for something because you don't need faith to accept something that's right in front of you. It's the future or past for which there is no direct evidence for that faith can be engaged.

Many have faith in the scientific method because it has proven to be useful in determining true things, this means they anticipate future truths being revealed through the scientific method despite the fact that they have no direct evidence of those true things now. This is what faith in science means.

If you see even just a sliver of truth in what I'm saying then lets focus on that and hopefully come to an agreement.

If you want to insist that I'm wrong and that faith is always unreasonable no matter what, then that's your dogma and you're welcome to it.

Thank you to zippy2006 for allowing me to impose my thoughts on your thread. Hopefully you find them useful and not distracting from your OP. If the latter, I will discontinue.

 

[Loudmouth]

Many have faith in the scientific method because it has proven to be useful in determining true things, this means they anticipate future truths being revealed through the scientific method despite the fact that they have no direct evidence of those true things now. This is what faith in science means.

This differs from religious faith which produces no verifiable predictions or observations to test its trustworthiness. This gets us back to falsifiability. If there is no outcome that could show religious faith to be untrustworthy, then how can we trust it? If we have to assume that religious faith is right now matter what, aren't we removing any idea of testing for trustworthiness?

If you want to insist that I'm wrong and that faith is always unreasonable no matter what, then that's your dogma and you're welcome to it.

What we are saying is that religious faith is unreasonable. Again, there are many meanings to the word "faith", and they are not interchangeable.

 

[Michael]

What we are saying is that religious faith is unreasonable.

"Unreasonable" by who's subjective standards? You can't and won't even address the problems that you have with the complete lack of falsification potential in your *own* supposedly "scientific" belief systems about reality, so what exactly makes you an expert on what is "reasonable" and what is not?

 

[Steve Petersen]

They assume no such thing. The multiverse is simply a "what if" at this point.

It is actually a possible result of the mathematical modeling of the Big Bang.

The Elegant Universe - Wikipedia

 

[Chriliman]

This differs from religious faith which produces no verifiable predictions or observations to test its trustworthiness. This gets us back to falsifiability. If there is no outcome that could show religious faith to be untrustworthy, then how can we trust it? If we have to assume that religious faith is right now matter what, aren't we removing any idea of testing for trustworthiness?

You don't have to assume my faith or anyone else's faith is always right in order to question it and come to your own conclusions. I hope we can agree on that at least.

What we are saying is that religious faith is unreasonable. Again, there are many meanings to the word "faith", and they are not interchangeable.

You can't say "religious faith is unreasonable" without knowing all the reasons people begin believing in God. You don't know all the reasons, which means there could be reasons which are actually reasonable, even if you claim to have never come accross them.

What you're saying is analogous to saying, "There are no black swans because I've never come accross any."

No, there very well may be good reasons to believe in God, even though you claim to have never come accross any.

 

[Michael]

It is actually a possible result of the mathematical modeling of the Big Bang.

The Elegant Universe - Wikipedia

And even the mathematical model of the big bang is unfalsifiable. Mutliverse claims are just one *more* unfalsiable element that can be *added* to the *other four unflasifiable elements* which already exist in LCDM.

 

[Loudmouth]

It is actually a possible result of the mathematical modeling of the Big Bang.

The Elegant Universe - Wikipedia

That's what makes the multiverse model a "what if" worth developing further. The tough part is finding a way to test it.

 

[Loudmouth]

You don't have to assume my faith or anyone else's faith is always right in order to question it and come to your own conclusions. I hope we can agree on that at least.

How can you question a unfalsifiable belief? If all possible answers support the belief, then what good are the questions?

You can't say "religious faith is unreasonable" without knowing all the reasons people begin believing in God.

I have yet to hear a reasonable argument based on evidence in support of religious faith. What I do know is the reasons that people give.

What you're saying is analogous to saying, "There are no black swans because I've never come accross any."

To further the analogy, theists claim that black swans do exist. However, they can't offer any evidence that black swans do exist.

In order to cover up for the lack of evidence they invent reasons why no black swans can be seen. We are told that black swans are supernatural, so they can't be seen with the naked eye. We are told that black swans speak to people in ways that no one can hear. We are told that black swans appear to people, but in ways that no light is interrupted. We are told that black swans make people write about black swans. No matter what, a belief in black swans is upheld by unfalsifiable beliefs in the face of no evidence.

No, there very well may be good reasons to believe in God, even though you claim to have never come accross any.

Can you name any of these good reasons?

 

[Michael]

That's what makes the multiverse model a "what if" worth developing further. The tough part is finding a way to test it.

Lovely how you simply ignore the other four "what if' aspects of big bang theory, and you refuse to allow for real "falsification" of any specific unfalsifiable claim based on any actual experimental result. If you did allow for ordinary laboratory falsification mechanisms to apply to the big bang hypothesis, exotic matter theory ("cold dark matter") would be long dead and buried by now.

 

[Michael]

How can you question a unfalsifiable belief? If all possible answers support the belief, then what good are the questions?

What's the point of even "testing" your belief in cold dark matter when you simply ignore all negative results?

 

[Michael]

To further the analogy, theists claim that black swans do exist. However, they can't offer any evidence that black swans do exist.

In order to cover up for the lack of evidence they invent reasons why no black swans can be seen. We are told that black swans are supernatural, so they can't be seen with the naked eye.

Kinda like your "dark" stuff you mean?

We are told that black swans speak to people in ways that no one can hear.

Ya, and I'm frequently told that only the high priests of astronomy might be able to "see" the dark stuff. Sometimes they claim that the invisible stuff in the sky emits x-rays, other times gamma rays, yada, yada, yada. When they actually "test" those claims however, they find nothing.

The amount of irony in your black swan analogy just busted the irony meter.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

My point is that they intentionally assume the multiverse exists in order to explain phenomena that they observe in this universe. I agree, that not all scientists do this, but many physicists do.

Do you understand the difference between assuming something and hypothesizing something? Because it sounds like you don't...

Reasonable faith is based on good reason. Yes, I agree that some reasons may not be good and so should be disregarded when they're found to be bad reasons.

That didn't answer my question, actually.

I agree, some beliefs are based on bad reasoning, but the belief was formed before it was made known that the reason was bad. No reasonable person believes something that is clearly wrong to them.

No "reasonable" person does so, indeed. But that's kind of what makes them "reasonable". So once again you didn't really address the point. You just made a rather silly tautology... like "a bachelor is not married". Well...duh.

You see no difference between proof and evidence?

I do know the difference. But it seems like you don't.
Very little things are established by proof. Most are merely supported by evidence.
And things supported by rational evidence, do not require "faith" to be accepted. Because you have evidence - you have no need for "faith".

Again, "faith" is the excuse people give to believe something when they have NO evidence (or proof), but wish to believe anyway.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Yet LCDM *is* "taken on faith" starting with the "space expansion" genie.

You guys are *utterly unbelievable*! You're simply in pure denial of the "faith" aspects of "science". Admittedly multiverse theory wasn't the strongest argument, but it's yet *another* example of a perfectly "acceptable" idea in "science" that defies falsification. There is no requirement of 'falsification" in "science". That's a false atheists MEME, nothing more.

"Reasonable" faith as it applies to cosmology would be postulating a *proven* cause/effect relationship in the lab as the potential cause of some phenomenon in uncontrolled space. We might never be able to "prove" the idea entirely, but at least it's on good empirical footing.

"Regular faith" is postulating a *never been seen in the lab* cause as the assumed "cause" of something in space. It's not any different than creating a *supernatural* definition of God, particularly if the idea defies empirical testing in the lab altogether (space expansion).

You mean like when an atheist holds "faith" that they can just handwave away an idea due to some perceived lack of falsification potential?

Ow goody. A most original rant on cosmology again.

 

[Michael]

Ow goody. A most original rant on cosmology again.

The atheists/agnostics are simply forced to avoid the topic because it blows their whole "falsification" argument out of the water. Who do you think you're fooling anyway?

 

[Michael]

Do you understand the difference between assuming something and hypothesizing something? Because it sounds like you don't...

What exactly is the empirical tangible difference between "assuming" that space expansion is a valid cause of photon redshift, and *hypothesizing* that it happens?

 

[Chriliman]

How can you question a unfalsifiable belief? If all possible answers support the belief, then what good are the questions?



I have yet to hear a reasonable argument based on evidence in support of religious faith. What I do know is the reasons that people give.



To further the analogy, theists claim that black swans do exist. However, they can't offer any evidence that black swans do exist.

In order to cover up for the lack of evidence they invent reasons why no black swans can be seen. We are told that black swans are supernatural, so they can't be seen with the naked eye. We are told that black swans speak to people in ways that no one can hear. We are told that black swans appear to people, but in ways that no light is interrupted. We are told that black swans make people write about black swans. No matter what, a belief in black swans is upheld by unfalsifiable beliefs in the face of no evidence.



Can you name any of these good reasons?

No matter what reasons I suggest, it all depends on your threshold of acceptance. In the future, you may come accross what you deem as a good reason to believe in God, which may have nothing to do with our discussion today.

Anyhow, I leave it at that. I wish you well!