As much as I loathe the central features of Christian theology and it’s sado-masochism I would never claim Christianity hasn’t ever made any positive contributions to civilization. On the other hand, if The Enlightenment hadn’t loosened the rigid hand of the Church on the affairs of state we’d all still be living in a medieval hell. A little familiarity with history is wanted in this discussion.
Sorry that you don't find the experiences in your life inspiring. But I guess if all you do is look backward all experience can be is a teacher. And if your logic as to why those who have access to the history always outnumber the Einstein caliber scientists is an example of the briliiant thinking of the stereotypical theist then I think you have proven conclusively that the stereotypical theist is an idiot.
Well what positive contributions has Christianity made that would not have occurred without that particular religion?
I know that almost every philosophical, religious, and scientific thread can degenerate into 'Christians vs Atheists!' flame war! Some people ONLY want that polemy, and bait constantly for it. I request that we stay on topic, regarding this epistemology of faith and science. The title SOUNDS like a juicy flame war, but it really isn't.. or shouldn't be.
Sincerity was not the issue. The ACTIVITY was. You can certainly use scientific methodology to test results of activities, to see if they return a useful data set. That was the poster's intent, it seemed to me.
The problem with this thread is that the first thing you have done is propose your own definitions of faith and science and then expect the discussion to follow based on the false premise that your definitions are the correct definitions. And if you want categorization of your examples you either have to prove that science and faith are mutually exclusive or you have to give more choices. Faith Not faith Science Not science For instance your " There is no god" is both Not Faith and Not Science.
The requirement is that there be a way to demonstrate that the hypothesis is false if it is indeed false. So, the Higgs boson could not be proven false, because we didn't have the equipment to do so. So, it was not part of science. Then, we built CERN, so we acquired the capability of running tests that would prove the Higgs boson hypothesis false if it was false. Today, there is no test that can be created to determine if ESP, etc., are false. Therefore, they remain outside of science. But, there is no possibility of that proving that ESP is false. The test may fail. But, that doesn't prove anything. Also, science wants to know how it works, and such tests don't show anything about how ESP works. This is the same as for ESP. Yes - imho, the very act of believing these things can have an impact - regardless of whether crystals (or whatever) actually have any power of their own. However in general, when people talk about testing the "power of prayer" or "the power of crystal pyramids" they mean that they want to test whether those items actually have power - NOT whether there is power in believing in those things. Science has no way of falsifying the healing powers of pyramids or prayer. There is no experiment which, if there were a specific outcome, it would show that pyramids and/or prayer have no power. The rules of scientific method don't allow for a hypothesis to be created if there is no possibility of proving the hypothesis false.
OK, but the discussion here is whether these ideas are part of experimental physics - scientific method. And, multiverse is very clearly outside of that world - the world we commonly refer to as science. There is theoretical physics and experimental science. Multiverse is something in the former - something we can not test.
No, "militant atheists" have most definitely NOT "co-opted science. There are many scientists who have strong religious beliefs. They just don't mix religious methods and assumptions with the methods and assumptions of science. The definition of scientific method has not changed for a long time. And, nothing you have presented suggests that it has changed in a way that is problematic. Again, you use this term "naturalistic". But, science (scientific method) is and always has been fundamentally based on the observation of nature. The assumption that we can meaningfully observe the universe is pretty much the only assumption of science. If you want to identify heckling, go for it. I'm sure it's around on all sides of all the issues on this entire board. If you want to claim that some accusation I made is false, go for that, too. I'm not all that interested in arguing about heckling or accusations unless I'm the perp, though. I'd rather stick to the topic.
I disagree with almost all of your post, but will limit myself to your last. " There is no experiment which, if there were a specific outcome, it would show that pyramids and/or prayer have no power." There certainly is. For crystals, give people who think crystals have power a box, some boxes have crystals, some do not. Compare the results. I suspect the 2 groups will have similar outcomes, which means the crystals have no "power". If one groups has a statistically significant outcome than the other, then crystals do have some sort of "power". For prayer, have a group of people pray for another person (probably a stranger, not in the local area so there can be no non-prayer interaction), don't tell the person who is the "recipient" of the prayers. Have many groups. If the recipients of the prayers have the same outcome as a control group, then prayer has no "power". If you are creative, you can come up with all kinds of experiments - repeatable experiments with measurable criteria - to test these things. If they show no cause and effect, then its safe to conclude there is no "power" in these things.
That would be an evidentiary based conclusion, or extrapolation of the data set. It would not necessarily be conclusive, as there could be alternate explanations. IOW, such a test that you describe, does not 'prove' the negative.. it can only provide evidence for the positive. For example: You arrange a test to examine a hypothesis of the existence of God. You randomly select 100 people with belief in God, and 100 more without, as a control sample. To prove God's existence, each person must ask God if He is there, with the added qualifier that the answer must be carved in a stone tablet, in Hebrew. You perform the test. Here are some possible outcomes: 1. None of the test group or control group had writing on their stone tablet. 2. One or a minority of the test group had a written on stone tablet, but none in the control group. 3. Some in both had writing. Etc. I would predict, as a natural skeptic and observer of the universe, that #1 would be the most likely outcome. If there was even one positive return from either group, it would take precedence over all the others, and would 'prove' some kind of supernatural event. But, even if all the outcomes are negative, you do not disprove the existence of God. There are other factors, when dealing with intelligent beings, and they do not have to respond in the manner the theorist dictates. If fire and brimstone descended and consumed everyone in both groups and the testers, you could not conclude, 'there is no God, since the outcome was not as specified.' Now, let's change the parameters of this test. Let's ask the people to describe God, and provide the reason for their belief. If a majority described God similarly, would that be proof? Not imo. There can be other factors, when dealing with sentient beings, including Indoctrination, cultural pressures, upbringing, or others. And would a consensus from the control group prove the negative? No, for the same reason. With sentient beings we can test outcomes, physically, for certain things.. smoking, exercise, diet, prayer/meditation, etc. But we cannot extrapolate anything conclusively about this data. There are too many unknowns, when dealing with life, sentience, and the metaphysical. This is exposes the limitations of empiricism and materialism in a broader quest for knowledge. By limiting any conclusions to material data, a whole universe of possibility is excluded. We cannot test the supernatural with natural methods, but that does not compel a conclusion of non existence. It just reveals the limitations of natural methods. Human beings have a spiritual/metaphysical aspect, evident from all of human history. The majority, in every race, culture, and geographical location have believed in, and attested to, a dimension outside of material analysis. That is compelling evidence, but it still is not empirical. Those who demand ONLY empiricism are correct in their conclusions, if they discount all other non empirical evidence. But all you can really conclude is that the supernatural cannot be tested by natural or material methods. Duh. Thank you, Captain Obvious. Ignoring the intuitive, the theoretical, the abstract.. is a crippling action, in any quest for knowledge. Those who exclude it in their epistemology become lame, as those who ignore the empirical become blind. IMO, it is the source of dogmatism and bigotry, getting out of balance with both aspects of our epistemology. Balance and circumspection are needed in any quest for understanding and knowledge. Those stuck in the material world are just as handicapped as those stuck in the metaphysical.
So how exactly does this test account for sincerity or the lack thereof? That makes one of us. I'm pretty sure if you found your experiences inspiring in the sense contemplated by Einstein, you wouldn't have racked up 20,000 posts on one message board in 5 years - to say nothing of their quality, assuming the term can rightly be applied to any of them. Were that the case, finding specific fault with that logic would be child's play; but somehow I don't expect you to get around to it any time soon. So how did praying to the devil work out?
So you can't actually debate or discuss issues. And the fault in your one attempt at logic is of course the IQ bell curve which you conviently ignore as the real reason not everyone can be an Einstein.Your Being at least two stadard deviations away from the mean on the left side I can understand why IQ wouldn't occur to you as an explanation.
These experiments have been carried out many times. Plus, there are far better ways to control such experiments. The subject of the prayer could be raising a dead guy or creating a small earthquake somewhere - cases where the subject of the prayer couldn't be affected other than by the prayer. We could go into the issues here. But, I think there is a much bigger issue. I've NEVER heard of a theologian who suggested man could start testing God to see what power God has. We're told in the Bible that "God works in mysterious ways". Every Christian knows for certain that prayer is not always answered. Really, the only question is whether it is EVER answered by a supernatural power. It just hits me as a brazen act for mankind to assume to test God's power.
I would propose that every religion has provided periods of organization and centralized authority needed by civilization. I DO NOT believe religion is contributing that today. Not that he's the only one, but our president has risen to power through a continuous stream of gross lies, hate for minorities exacerbating divisiveness, a history of sexual escapades, and actions that have been detrimental to the least among us for the benefit of the wealthy. I point that one case out only because WE of a Christian nation chose HIM to be out leader - counter to pretty much every last thing Christianity stands for. And, we did so when there were many to choose from. Whether or not Christianity has ever been a positive influence, it is absolutely failing us now.
One of the things most empires have in common is that the fall of the empire is preceded by the election of moral degenerates.
An interesting thought experiment. I’ll put aside the notion for now that the metaphysical and the physical are totally seperate realms. There’s one problem with this thought experiment. What if God does exist but refuses, or isn’t interested in, proving his/her/it’s existence? Over the millenia our species have prusumed we are of central interest to a deity of some kind. It’s only a presumption and it’s not carved in stone.
I am kind of thinking that Baptists.... who did not want to be controlled by Catholics, Pentecostals, Episcopalians or Presbyterians..... played a huge role in the level of freedom of religion that the USA Constitution has given to Americans........ I am thinking that Catholics.... who did not want their lives controlled by Baptists, Pentecostals, Episcopalians or Presbyterians..... played a huge role in the level of freedom of religion that the USA Constitution has given to Americans...... I am thinking that Episcopalians.... who did not want their lives controlled by Baptists, Pentecostals, Catholics or Presbyterians..... played a huge role in the level of freedom of religion that the USA Constitution has given to Americans...... I am thinking that Presbyterians.... who did not want their lives controlled by Baptists, Pentecostals, Episcopalians or Catholics......... played a huge role in the level of freedom of religion that the USA Constitution has given to Americans...... Etc., etc...... This can be compared with the level of religious freedom that Russian and Chinese Atheists gave to the average Chinese or Russian after they took over in their nations.....
Amen. As per the above, we even have people proposing to TEST God! Given God's response to Adam eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil (as an allegory or as literal) I'm really not so sure God likes this idea of submitting to testing by humans. Christianity is based in faith - not in testing God, requesting that God prove himself.
What an intriguing thought...... here is another interesting idea........ what if G-d doesn't care about what we care about....... in the same way that we care about it?????? https://www.near-death.com/reincarnation/experiences/mellen-thomas-benedict.html#a09 What if G-d..... is far, far, far, far more like Stanley Milgram Ph. D. than we religious types might wish to admit?????? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment Could our theological opponents...... turn out to be like......"the learner subjects??????"
