• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

Atheism is not scientific

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
I did not say that. You must have misread.
If science knew it all then we would have to listen to science on every topic. Science does not know it all so that leaves the door open for faith.
The door's always open for whatever belief system you want, but science remains the gold standard. It's the gold standard because there's a method to it, involving empirical evidence and testing. What it doesn't yet know it makes no claims about.

There is none of this in faith. Faith is pure speculation and belief in the comfortable.
 

Martin

Spam, wonderful spam (bloody vikings!)
Atheism, is based on ignorance or a lack of knowledge of reality.

As I am 100% aware of the reality of a universal consciousness I seek ways of translating the explanation to the layman. However, as my intelligence is limited while in my normal state I cannot perceive a universal explanation that can reach each and every one of you.

Thank you.

Saint Dawkins would be turning in his grave (if he was actually dead). :p
 

Kooky

Freedom from Sanity
I did not say that. You must have misread.
If science knew it all then we would have to listen to science on every topic. Science does not know it all so that leaves the door open for faith.
Why can we only have faith in the unknown?
 

beenherebeforeagain

Rogue Animist
Premium Member
I did not say that. You must have misread.
If science knew it all then we would have to listen to science on every topic. Science does not know it all so that leaves the door open for faith.
Sorry that I misunderstood your earlier post. You're right, I read in stuff you certainly weren't saying. I stand abashed.:oops::oops:

I agree that science does not know all, and so that leaves an opening for faith. It is also where aesthetics, ethics, civics, etc. lie.

To me, faith--and the other areas listed above--must still take cognizance of what science does and even seems to know, and how that knowledge might affect them, and must also take care to know their own limits.
 

ecco

Veteran Member
I see the difference between A and B and I see that science does not know exactly what happened and when.

Obviously, you do not. Science accepts there were repeated local floods from many different sources. Science does not need to "know exactly what happened and when".

Howerver, science does know that 6000 years ago the entire earth was not covered in water as detailed in your scripture.

The flood story tells us what happened around Noah's area and not what happened in other places imo.
Well, your opinion is in contradiction with what is written in your scripture. My emphases...

19And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills, that were under the whole heaven, were covered.
21And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle,...22All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died.
23And And all flesh died which was upon the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and the creeping things, and the fowl of the heaven; and they were destroyed from the earth: and Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark.
24And the waters prevailed upon the earth an hundred and fifty days.​



Killed all the people in that land except for Noah and family the animals in the area that probably came to higher ground and found Noah.

That is not what your scripture explicitly states...
All the high hills, that were under the whole heaven, were covered
And all flesh died
And all flesh died

(except those on the ark)​


One world wide flood that covered the whole earth was not needed and imo is not taught in the Bible.

Again, your opinion is contradicted by your scripture.

If you want to replace scripture with your opinions, that is your prerogative.


That's one of the problems with religion. Five Christians will give fifty interpretations of the holy unchanging word of their god's scripture.
 

ecco

Veteran Member
Why couldn't the synoptic writers transcribe earlier gospel attempts and add what they knew as well?
The early church knew the real story and were familiar with the real gospels even if there were those who were making stuff up for their gnostic religions etc. The early church knew which gospels were real and used them and the apostolic fathers quoted from them.

In the above, you did a lot of speculating and, at the same time, pretended to know what people knew and believed and did 2000 years ago.

Somebody could have taken the 4 gospels and written one gospel account, joining the 4 but as it is it is the recollections of people written in 4 different accounts. It is plain they were not a collaboration and it is plain from what Luke wrote that many earlier accounts had been written to get information from.
Luke said he got his information from witnesses and those who had been there from the beginning.
Luke seems to have been written before Acts according to the internal information and Acts seems to have been written before 64 AD when Luke probably died with Paul in the Nero persecutions.

In the above, you did a lot of speculating and, at the same time, pretended to know what people knew and believed and did 2000 years ago.

There was no secular historian on the side taking notes of all these things so that you could have your evidence. The evidence is the documents in the OT and NT.

Yeah. Not one single person commented on a man feeding thousands. Not one.





Some people remembered some bits and other people remembered other bits and there was probably no reason to write something again that had already been written and was accurate. Just take from those gospels and add other bits that they could remember or be given by those people they knew.

In the above, you did a lot of speculating and, at the same time, pretended to know what people knew and believed and did 2000 years ago.

You do that a lot. It doesn't matter to you what is actually written.

Sceptical historians bring in assumptions that the accounts are false and written by people much later than the Bible indicates and by people who knew nothing of what went on.

Why do you use the term "skeptical"? By far, the majority of Biblical historians were and are believers looking for evidence to substantiate their beliefs.








It doesn't matter to you what Biblical scholars (Christian and Hebrew) have actually found from years of research. You just have your unfounded opinions and speculations.
 

Brian2

Veteran Member
The door's always open for whatever belief system you want, but science remains the gold standard. It's the gold standard because there's a method to it, involving empirical evidence and testing. What it doesn't yet know it makes no claims about.

There is none of this in faith. Faith is pure speculation and belief in the comfortable.

Christianity is not the most comfortable belief and is not speculation (even if many other religions are speculation) it is a revelation.
There is speculation in science, and because of the assumptions of science the speculations are limited only to the naturalistic ones. The claims are made therefore in a general sense already.
A corollary of modern atheism is that the naturalistic answers of science are the only answers worth having.
This sort of atheism is comfortable for people who do not want to be bothered about a God.
You can make up your own right and wrong and have an excuse to put before God if He is true. (You did not give us empirical evidence so how do you expect us to believe, it's your fault God)
Your speculation and faith is the world view that puts humanity as the pinnacle of everything.
 

Mock Turtle

Oh my, did I say that!
Premium Member
Christianity is not the most comfortable belief and is not speculation (even if many other religions are speculation) it is a revelation.
There is speculation in science, and because of the assumptions of science the speculations are limited only to the naturalistic ones. The claims are made therefore in a general sense already.
A corollary of modern atheism is that the naturalistic answers of science are the only answers worth having.
This sort of atheism is comfortable for people who do not want to be bothered about a God.
You can make up your own right and wrong and have an excuse to put before God if He is true. (You did not give us empirical evidence so how do you expect us to believe, it's your fault God)
Your speculation and faith is the world view that puts humanity as the pinnacle of everything.
Actually, this appear to be what what many religious beliefs seem to tell us (being distanced from other life), and those of us without such hindrances are more likely to see all others, all other life, and the health of this planet as being worthy of consideration - even as to our survival as a species.
 

joe1776

Well-Known Member
The door's always open for whatever belief system you want, but science remains the gold standard. It's the gold standard because there's a method to it, involving empirical evidence and testing. What it doesn't yet know it makes no claims about.

There is none of this in faith. Faith is pure speculation and belief in the comfortable.
On faith we agree. On science, we don't.

I'm skeptical of science also because the scientific method, which is unbiased, has to be done by scientists who are human and prone to biases like all humans. The peer review process just doesn't work equally well on all topics.
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
On faith we agree. On science, we don't.

I'm skeptical of science also because the scientific method, which is unbiased, has to be done by scientists who are human and prone to biases like all humans. The peer review process just doesn't work equally well on all topics.
But it's still the most likely to uncover problems, despite any difficulty in application.

True, scientists can be as biased as anyone else, but the beauty of the method is that attempting to disprove or find flaws in hypotheses is part of the system. Hypotheses are tested, and published to be criticized by other scientists. This tends to weed out errors, though, admittedly, this is less effective in certain disciplines. It's why human technology and understanding of the world exploded when the scientific method became de rigueur.
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Christianity is not the most comfortable belief and is not speculation (even if many other religions are speculation) it is a revelation.
It claims to be revealed, as do many other religions, but claims do not reality make.
As general knowledge increased, a lot of these revelations were revealed to be incorrect.
There is speculation in science, and because of the assumptions of science the speculations are limited only to the naturalistic ones. The claims are made therefore in a general sense already.
The hard sciences are pretty specific and well documented, and any general claims remain hypothetical till further evidence comes to light.
A corollary of modern atheism is that the naturalistic answers of science are the only answers worth having.
They are the best explanations we have, given current knowledge, but it's worth noting that questions of ethics, morality, meaning and purpose are not within science's purview. It leaves these to religion.
Now if only religion would leave claims of physics, chemistry, biology, &c to science....
This sort of atheism is comfortable for people who do not want to be bothered about a God.
I don't think not wanting to be bothered with god is what motivates most atheists. Most of us are atheists by default. We were born that way, so to speak. Many of us are interested in religion, and are pretty knowledgeable about it, but we see no convincing evidence supporting it.
You can make up your own right and wrong and have an excuse to put before God if He is true. (You did not give us empirical evidence so how do you expect us to believe, it's your fault God)
Now that's just silly. I suppose you blame leprechauns and pink unicorns for your lack of belief in them. :p
Your speculation and faith is the world view that puts humanity as the pinnacle of everything.
When did we arrive there?
 
Last edited:

ecco

Veteran Member
I'm skeptical of science also because the scientific method, which is unbiased, has to be done by scientists who are human and prone to biases like all humans. The peer review process just doesn't work equally well on all topics.
True, scientists can be as biased as anyone else, but the beauty of the method is that attempting to disprove or find flaws in hypotheses is part of the system. Hypotheses are tested, and published to be criticized by other scientists. This tends to weed out errors, though, admittedly, this is less effective in certain disciplines. It's why human technology and understanding of the world exploded when the scientific method became de rigueur.
An example to look at is Hoyle's Steady State vs Hubble's Expanding Universe. Hoyle fought it to the end. But the evidence for an expanding universe was overwhelming.

On the other hand, the 1980's Cold Fusion was debunked.

Ditto Germ Theory
Ditto Heliocentricity
Ditto Plate Tectonics
Ditto pretty much any new idea, good or bad. The system works.
 

joe1776

Well-Known Member
An example to look at is Hoyle's Steady State vs Hubble's Expanding Universe. Hoyle fought it to the end. But the evidence for an expanding universe was overwhelming.

On the other hand, the 1980's Cold Fusion was debunked.

Ditto Germ Theory
Ditto Heliocentricity
Ditto Plate Tectonics
Ditto pretty much any new idea, good or bad. The system works.
No fair cherry-picking the evidence!:D

Science has been in a "replication crisis" for a decade. Have we learned anything?
 

ecco

Veteran Member
You mean I cherry picked science over other areas of research.
From you link
Science has been in a "replication crisis" for a decade. Have we learned anything?
Researchers have discovered, over and over, that lots of findings in fields like psychology, sociology, medicine, and economics don’t hold up when other researchers try to replicate them.
I fail to understand why your article would be titled...
Science has been in a “replication crisis” for a decade. Have we learned anything?
... when it discusses psychology, sociology, medicine, and economics.
 

Brian2

Veteran Member
Actually, this appear to be what what many religious beliefs seem to tell us (being distanced from other life), and those of us without such hindrances are more likely to see all others, all other life, and the health of this planet as being worthy of consideration - even as to our survival as a species.

I know that false teachings about the earth and it's resources have been taught by some Christian groups and that should not be seen as the Biblical teaching.
The Bible does teach that humans are top dogs on earth (as we are) and in charge of looking after the place.
Of course God is over all and so humans are not the peak of life.
The atheist position sounds a bit self centred.
It is true that the Bible teaching does teach that things will be restored however so trusting God enables us to be at peace, sort of, even when we see the destruction of the planet by people who don't seem to care much about anything except their own wealth even though they are rich already.
Governments can tend to follow them also, wanting to be re-elected by keeping us prosperous.
 

Brian2

Veteran Member
It claims to be revealed, as do many other religions, but claims do not reality make.
As general knowledge increased, a lot of these revelations were revealed to be incorrect.

The more that are revealed to be incorrect the better for the truth to be revealed.

The hard sciences are pretty specific and well documented, and any general claims remain hypothetical till further evidence comes to light.

They are all naturalistic speculations however, so that limits them to a certain genre of speculation.

They are the best explanations we have, given current knowledge, but it's worth noting that questions of ethics, morality, meaning and purpose are not within science's purview. It leaves these to religion.
Now if only religion would leave claims of physics, chemistry, biology, &c to science....

If only ethics and morality was left to religion along with meaning and purpose.
But yes there is no meaning and purpose without God and not real right and wrong without God.
And the best explanations we have given our current knowledge seems to be a creator and life giver, but no that explanation is not accepted, it is skipped over for speculations.

I don't think not wanting to be bothered with god is what motivates most atheists. Most of us are atheists by default. We were born that way, so to speak. Many of us are interested in religion, and are pretty knowledgeable about it, but we see no convincing evidence supporting it.

As well as what you said, many atheists also push the evidence needed for a God to a place where they know it will not be shown to them that there is a God.

Now that's just silly. I suppose you blame leprechauns and pink unicorns for your lack of belief in them. :p

Yes it is a bit silly but you no doubt will be saying that to God when you see Him at the judgement. "It's your fault God for not giving us empirical evidence so that we could believe in you".

When did we arrive there?

That we are the pinnacle of life on earth to rule over it and care for it was told to us by God in Genesis. This has proven true.
The atheist can see this position of humanity and knows we are the pinnacle, the pinnacle of life that they know about, but of course they say, no creature is above any other in evolution and as one dominant species disappears another takes over.
 

joe1776

Well-Known Member
You mean I cherry picked science over other areas of research.
From you link
Science has been in a "replication crisis" for a decade. Have we learned anything?
Researchers have discovered, over and over, that lots of findings in fields like psychology, sociology, medicine, and economics don’t hold up when other researchers try to replicate them.
I fail to understand why your article would be titled...
Science has been in a “replication crisis” for a decade. Have we learned anything?
... when it discusses psychology, sociology, medicine, and economics.
I see. You confirm your bias about science being so wonderful by eliminating the fields in which it's difficult to do.
 

ecco

Veteran Member
I fail to understand why your article would be titled...
Science has been in a “replication crisis” for a decade. Have we learned anything?... when it discusses psychology, sociology, medicine, and economics.
I see. You confirm your bias about science being so wonderful by eliminating the fields in which it's difficult to do.

If you want to consider sociology a science, then you are certainly entitled to your opinion.

Your comment about "eliminating the fields in which it's difficult" is pure nonsense. Cosmology is difficult. Chemistry is difficult. Abiogenesis is difficult. Have I suggested those should be eliminated?

In any event, the title of your article was misleading. If it had asserted: Research in the fields of psychology, sociology, medicine, and economics have been in a “replication crisis” for a decade, I would not have bothered to comment.
 
Top