Can science prove or disprove the existence of a Spiritual existence? God?

[Road Warrior]

Science and the Scientific Method are terrific tools for obtaining a better understanding of the Natural Universe. Can it be used to understand the Supernatural Universe? Can it be used to prove or disprove the existence of the Almighty, God, supernatural forces or anything else which exists beyond our Natural Universe? I think not, but this article tries to make it sound like it can: Scientifically, God Does Not Exist - Science Allows us to Say God Does Not Exist - No Role for God in Science, No Explanation that God can Provide

Obviously the author of the article, Austin Cline, is a bit biased, but he is also smart enough to try focus most of his words narrowly yet he leaves the unstated impression that science can absolutely prove that God does not exist. Here he quotes Victor Stenger:

Hypothesize a God who plays an important role in the universe.

1. Assume that God has specific attributes that should provide objective evidence for his existence.
2. Look for such evidence with an open mind.
3. If such evidence is found, conclude that God may exist.
4. If such objective evidence is not found, conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that a God with these properties does not exist.

This is basically how science would disprove the existence of any alleged entity and is modified form of the argument from a lack-of-evidence: God, as defined, should produce evidence of some sort; if we fail to find that evidence, God cannot exist as defined.

Note narrow definition of God and his point "as defined". While he is correct within his narrow parameters, to extrapolate that idea to say "God does not exist" is beyond scientific capability. Even the "high priest" of Atheism, Richard Dawkins, admits "I cannot know for certain but I think God is very improbable". Fine. He guesses God is improbable but, as a scientist who is fully knowledgeable of the limitations of Science, he "cannot know for certain". If Dawkins can't know for certain, then why does a non-scientist Austin Cline believe he can know for certain?

 

[vepurusg]

Particular gods can be disproven using logic to 100% certainty; empirical methodology only suggest the improbability of things that are postulated to leave detectable evidence. If things are postulated to be undetectable, then Empirical analysis fails in providing evidence for those things-- logic can still do the job, though, and with 100% certainty, if the nature suggests a contradiction with itself or a logical truth.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Being detectable and leaving detectable evidence is not the same thing.

 

[Student of X]

Note narrow definition of God and his point "as defined".

Narrow is what the New Atheists do best! They can't swim so they hang out in the shallow kiddie end of the pool, acting as if their pathetically kindergarten pop-understanding is the end-all-be-all of religion.

Science is far too limited to 'prove' or 'disprove' the full range of human experience. Here is something of interest for the reading pleasure of RF.

Freeman Dyson
Institute for Advanced Study,
Princeton, New Jersey

This book begins with an extraordinary story about a harp - one that is typical of thousands of others in which somebody knows something without having any normal way of knowing. This kind of extraordinary knowing is typically called extrasensory perception, or ESP. Since I am a scientist, the story puts me in a difficult position. As a scientist I don't believe the story, but as a human being I want to believe it. As a scientist, I don't believe anything that is not based on solid evidence. As a scientist, I have to consider it possible that Elizabeth Meyer and Harold McCoy might have concocted the story or deluded themselves into believing it. Scientists call such stories "anecdotal," meaning that they are scientifically worthless.

On the other hand, as a human being I find the story convincing. I am impressed by the fact that Elizabeth Meyer is herself a scientist and would normally be skeptical of such anecdotal evidence. She understands why the majority of scientists do not believe her story. She is eager to maintain a friendly dialogue between skeptics and believers in ESP. She feels herself in many ways closer to the skeptics. But she does not have the luxury of not believing the harp story, because it happened to her and she knows it is true. I am convinced, not by the story itself, but the portrait that Elizabeth paints of herself as a scientist confronting a mystery that orthodox science cannot grasp.

The greater part of this book describes the history of ESP research, some of it is based on anecdotal evidence and some based on scientific experiments. The Society for Psychical Research, with branches in England and America, has been the main collector and publisher of anecdotal evidence. The society has been active for more than a century. It has published a large number of well-documented stories in its journal and in a famous book with the title Phantasms of the Living. A phantasm of the living is an episode in which person A at a moment of extreme crisis or danger is seen by person B hundreds of miles away. The society documented these episodes with firsthand testimony from A and B, recorded as soon as possible after the events. The evidence is of very uneven quality, and all of it is anecdotal.

The scientific investigations of ESP have been pursued with dogged determination for long periods of time, initially by Joseph Rhine at Duke University, later by Harold Puthoff at Stanford Research Institute, and recently by many other groups. The history of these efforts is murky, partly because there were some accusations of cheating in Rhine's laboratory, and partly because much of Puthoff's work was sponsored by the CIA under conditions of secrecy. Elizabeth Meyer gives us the clearest account of ESP research that I have seen, with an excellent bibliography of relevant documents. The results of the scientific investigations were in the end disappointing. Investigators claimed to have positive and statistically significant evidence of ESP, but the positive results were always marginal, large enough to be statistically significant but not large enough to convince a skeptical critic.

There are three possible positions one may take concerning the evidence for ESP. First, the position of orthodox scientists, who believe that ESP does not exist. Second, the position of true believers, who believe that ESP is real and can be proved to exist by scientific methods. Third, my own position, that ESP is real, as the anecdotal evidence suggests, but cannot be tested with the clumsy tools of science. These positions also imply different views concerning the proper scope of science. If one believes, as many of my scientific colleagues believe, that the scope of science is unlimited, then science can ultimately explain everything in the universe, and ESP must either be nonexistent or scientifically explainable. If one believes, as I do, that ESP is real but is scientifically untestable, one must believe that the scope of science is limited. I put forward, as a working hypothesis, that ESP is real but belongs to a mental universe that is too fluid and evanescent to fit within the rigid protocols of controlled scientific testing. I do not claim that this hypothesis is true. I claim only that it is consistent with the evidence and worthy of consideration.

I was asked to write this preface because I published in The New York Review of Books a review of a book about ESP with the title Debunked!, by George Charpak and Henti Broch. Elizabeth Meyer read my review and refers to it in her Chapter 12. In my review I said that ESP only occurs, according the the anecdotal evidence, when a person is experiencing intense stress and strong emotions. Under the conditions of a controlled scientific experiment, intense stress and strong emotions are excluded; the person experiences boredom rather than excitement, and so the evidence for ESP disappears. That, I wrote, is why scientific investigation of ESP fails. The experiment necessarily excludes the human emotions that make ESP possible.

After my review was published, I received a large number of angry letters in response. Orthodox scientists were angry because I said ESP might be real. True believers in ESP were angry because I said ESP could not be scientifically proved.

What I like best about Elizabeth Meyer is her eagerness, throughout this book, to maintain a friendly working dialogue between believers and skeptics. I am happy that she and I can disagree and still stay friends. (bold mine)

 

[Quintessence]

The scientific method has limitations. Although the majority of working scientists have an appreciation of this, the general public does not. I imagine if more people had a clearer understanding of what the scientific method can and can't do, we wouldn't even be having this discussion. Certain god-concepts can be falsified by the scientific method, others cannot. It depends on the specific nature of the claims and whether you can put a meter stick and statistics to it.

If I claim god is an all-present being and a subtle aspect of reality that transcends the physical, science can't touch that. Its methodology is ill-equiped to handle anything that can't be measured. We can use fields like sociology to understand people's perceptions of such a god, but the god itself is beyond empirical fingertips. If I claim this god is responsible for certain physical phenomena, science can't touch that either. There will be no empirical evidence for or against it. I like to encourage all religious folks to be aware of the possible scientific explanations for phenomena, but by no means do we need to limit ourselves to them.

 

[lunakilo]

Science and the Scientific Method are terrific tools for obtaining a better understanding of the Natural Universe. Can it be used to understand the Supernatural Universe? Can it be used to prove or disprove the existence of the Almighty, God, supernatural forces or anything else which exists beyond our Natural Universe? I think not, but this article tries to make it sound like it can: Scientifically, God Does Not Exist - Science Allows us to Say God Does Not Exist - No Role for God in Science, No Explanation that God can Provide

Obviously the author of the article, Austin Cline, is a bit biased, but he is also smart enough to try focus most of his words narrowly yet he leaves the unstated impression that science can absolutely prove that God does not exist. Here he quotes Victor Stenger:

Hypothesize a God who plays an important role in the universe.

1. Assume that God has specific attributes that should provide objective evidence for his existence.
2. Look for such evidence with an open mind.
3. If such evidence is found, conclude that God may exist.
4. If such objective evidence is not found, conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that a God with these properties does not exist.

This is basically how science would disprove the existence of any alleged entity and is modified form of the argument from a lack-of-evidence: God, as defined, should produce evidence of some sort; if we fail to find that evidence, God cannot exist as defined.

Note narrow definition of God and his point "as defined". While he is correct within his narrow parameters, to extrapolate that idea to say "God does not exist" is beyond scientific capability. Even the "high priest" of Atheism, Richard Dawkins, admits "I cannot know for certain but I think God is very improbable". Fine. He guesses God is improbable but, as a scientist who is fully knowledgeable of the limitations of Science, he "cannot know for certain". If Dawkins can't know for certain, then why does a non-scientist Austin Cline believe he can know for certain?

He is playing with words
Prove does not mean prove, it means argue that something is plausible.
Or that something seems the most sensible conclusion given det known data.

He is correct though that (unless we are talking mathemetics) that that is what the word 'prove' usually means when talking science.

I am not sure why he would 'Assume that God has specific attributes that should provide objective evidence for his existence.'
What is the argument for that?
And what would those attributes be I wonder
It is all very vague.

I am sure someone would pull out the existence of the universe or the existence of live as data supporting the conclusion that some sort of god does indeed exist.

 

[PolyHedral]

If I claim this god is responsible for certain physical phenomena, science can't touch that either.

Of course it can, if you make a prediction. If you don't make a prediction, then someone else will come up with an explanation that does, and that'll be more useful.

 

[Tristesse]

Prove is kind of a funny word to use, but if this "spiritual existence" manifests in reality, then I think science can attempt to explain it, but I haven't seen such a thing, so I don't even know what you mean by spiritual.

 

[Pegg]

He guesses God is improbable but, as a scientist who is fully knowledgeable of the limitations of Science, he "cannot know for certain". If Dawkins can't know for certain, then why does a non-scientist Austin Cline believe he can know for certain?

because any excuse will do.

I wonder if he has ever wondered why all things in our universe break down over time, yet the laws of physics do not. What keeps them so stable?

 

[lunakilo]

because any excuse will do.

I wonder if he has ever wondered why all things in our universe break down over time, yet the laws of physics do not. What keeps them so stable?

Have you ever wondered that?
Did you come to any conclusion?

 

[PolyHedral]

because any excuse will do.

I wonder if he has ever wondered why all things in our universe break down over time, yet the laws of physics do not. What keeps them so stable?

Why wouldn't they be? What would change them?

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

The existence of God cannot be proven or disproven. What we can do is say to ourselves "which is more plausible"....or...."which is more likely than not to have occurred". As a theist, all we need to do is use science to determine whether or not the universe began to exist. Once we can do that, we can leave science and go to metaphysics and determine what it means for the universe to begin, and that will led us to the Supernatural.

 

[Pegg]

Have you ever wondered that?
Did you come to any conclusion?

I thought it was strange that molecules break down over time, but not the very fabric of the universe. The universal laws remain constant.

My conclusion is obviously that these laws are unchangeable and therefore they must have been designed that way, otherwise why wouldn't they disintegrate like everything else in the universe.?

It makes me firmly convinced there is a creator who either keeps the laws stable, or designed them that way.

 

[Twilight Hue]

I thought it was strange that molecules break down over time, but not the very fabric of the universe. The universal laws remain constant.

My conclusion is obviously that these laws are unchangeable and therefore they must have been designed that way, otherwise why wouldn't they disintegrate like everything else in the universe.?

It makes me firmly convinced there is a creator who either keeps the laws stable, or designed them that way.

Catch is there is no way to know and determine if the universe's "fabric" is consistent and somehow immune to impermanence on which to make particular assumptions on which you build your conclusion upon. So far its "stable" for us certainly, but what we can see, experience, and observe is so far dynamic and fluid and flies in the face of that.

Like our the sun is stable too. So far for the moment....yet fluidity and dynamics tend to catch up soon enough.

 

[HerDotness]

This snippet from Stenger encourages reaching unwarranted conclusions about Stenger's book. His thesis is that what we know from scientific endeavors and discoveries indicates "beyond a reasonable doubt" that there is no being with the attributes typically given to God.

How does that differ from Dawkins' more specific qualifications? It doesn't. "Reasonable doubt" is not a hard and fast determiner that could not yield to evidence to the contrary uncovered at some future point. We're not talking U.S. trial law where double jeopardy prohibits the possibility of concluding in the future that God does exist.

 

[Breathe]

Some conceptions of God can be disproven, such as the shallow understanding of God that is common to literalists, the unlearned, and anti-theists (who think they know what it is that theists believe, without understanding the nuances, which is why we see things like 'sky daddy', and 'sky fairy'). Most God concepts cannot be proven or disproven, at least not in this point in time. Maybe never.

 

[Broken Smoke]

All quibbling of semantics aside, this is a prime example of Schrodinger's Cat. If you cannot open the box, how can you prove or disprove there is a cat inside? Therefore, the entire argument is invalid no matter what is said either for or against.

 

[HerDotness]

All quibbling of semantics aside, this is a prime example of Schrodinger's Cat. If you cannot open the box, how can you prove or disprove there is a cat inside? Therefore, the entire argument is invalid no matter what is said either for or against.

Huh? I don't see the commonalities of what's been said by Stenger with the Schrodinger's Cat paradigm.

Spell those out, please.

 

[McBell]

The existence of God cannot be proven or disproven. What we can do is say to ourselves "which is more plausible"....or...."which is more likely than not to have occurred". As a theist, all we need to do is use science to determine whether or not the universe began to exist. Once we can do that, we can leave science and go to metaphysics and determine what it means for the universe to begin, and that will led us to the Supernatural.

If you are going to ditch science the second you get from it what you want and ignore everything that you dislike, why bother using science at all?

 

[McBell]

I thought it was strange that molecules break down over time, but not the very fabric of the universe. The universal laws remain constant.

My conclusion is obviously that these laws are unchangeable and therefore they must have been designed that way, otherwise why wouldn't they disintegrate like everything else in the universe.?

It makes me firmly convinced there is a creator who either keeps the laws stable, or designed them that way.

So it is just like you said:

"because any excuse will do"​