Life From Dirt?

[Polymath257]

I don't say that people can prove God. I'm the one who says faith is OK and stepping to a belief beyond what we have proof of is OK.

And I disagree. It is a dereliction of the duty to think and hold that we don't know in many situations. if we don't know, it is dishonest to say that we do.

I wonder how atheists/skeptics can say that science has shown that God is not needed or that certain ideas in science have been shown to be true, when they have not.

Well, God isn't necessary for quantum mechanics. Nowhere in any standard quantum mechanics text will a deity even be considered. And yet, quantum mechanics demonstrably works in the real world. The computer you are communicating with proves that. So, while it may not be 'true' in a strict philosophical sense, it is much closer to being true than anything that religion offers. We can use the principles of science to actually build things that work. We can find out new things about the world and use that new knowledge to explore further or make even better things.

So, no, God is not necessary for understanding the universe around us. That has been amply demonstrated by example. And the science works. It allows us to do things we couldn't even imagine when religion was running the world.

Is our scientific knowledge perfect? Of course not, it is a human endeavor and humans make mistakes. But, unlike religious beliefs, science is self-correcting. Because it *tests* things over and over again, eventually the mistakes are revealed and new ideas are brought to bear if necessary.

But you do not seem to want to address that.
So anyway it seems that some atheists/skeptics say they shun faith but in reality embrace it when it comes to scientific ideas that have not been proven.

On the contrary, we shun faith. We hold to ideas supported by objective evidence and reasoning. We maintain skepticism, even of the most cherished ideas, demanding that they be tested in as many varying situations as possible.

I find it ironic when you claim science uses faith when, if religion kept even a fraction of the skepticism of science, nobody would believe in any deities.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Yes, and real is in your mind as it has no objective referent like a cat.
So "real" and real are not real, but the cat is real, because of reasons.

My friend is allergic to cats.
But only to real cats. Not cats that only exist as a concept inside someone's brain.
When he thinks of a cat, oddly he doesn't start sneezing.

 

[Polymath257]

So there are in the physical world, fundamental phenomena which are immaterial?

That depends on what you mean by the word 'material'. Is light material? If not, then it is a fundamental phenomenon that is immaterial. Are neutrinos material? if not, then they are fundamental particles that are immaterial. Are atoms material? If not, then there are fundamental things in the physical world that are immaterial.

 

[Polymath257]

By theistic scientist I meant a scientist who believes in God.
Do you think that a scientist who believes in God can scientifically test that God?

No.

Maybe believing scientist tests the truth of their God subjectively in their lives.

So it is an emotional response, not a reasoned one.

But if I say there is no test that could refute the existence of God that does not mean that there is no evidence, as you seem to admit.

So what *is* the evidence?

I have known theistic scientists. They are honest enough to admit tha their beliefs are personal tastes and not something supported by the actual evidence. They are also honest in admitting that the universe is billions, not thousands of years old, that evolution (change in species over time) is a scientific fact, and that the Bible is a book of myths and stories and not a guide to truth about the universe.

 

[Polymath257]

So are beauty, love and consciousness physical things or non-existent?

Beauty is an emotional response that we have to certain stimuli. Love is an emotion we have to help us bond with others. Consciousness is a process in our brains.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

No, the account states that the Creator, an eternal Self-existent Being, spoke life into existence.

Did he say "abracadabra"?

 

[Polymath257]

Science defines the magic spark of life as an emergent property of matter and that is a way to eliminate the magic in it. But neither of us know scientifically if it is an emergent property of matter.
So why do you sound as if you do know?

Science does no such thing. If you study biochemistry, you realize that the 'life force' is simply a chemical gradient from oxygen reacting with organic compounds. There is no 'spark' other than the spark of chemistry and the interaction of molecules. We know that through hard work exploring exactly how life actually works.

And, in the past, there were hypotheses of a life force, an elan vitale, but those hypotheses went nowhere. They were vague, and did not help to understand what actually happens in life.

True.

If the body of man evolved then that would be just another animal without God's involvement and turning it into a man, made in the image of God.

So? That does not mean that it is false. It just means you don't like the conclusions.

The gospels support the belief in Jesus but only if believed.

Any idea you need to belive *first* before you can get evidence, is one that should be discarded without further comment. That it the route to self-delusion.

The gospels are the *claim*, not the evidence.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Look, lets be honest with your viewpoint. You believe your great-great-++ lots more grandpap was a fish. Have a good one.

Not a belief. Instead, a genetic fact.

Your argument from incredulity, notwithstanding

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

OK. I'm going to stick to my point as well, that chimps do not and have never written religious texts... I like your comment though. ALTHOUGH I will say that the things written in the Bible about the Law that God gave Moses for the Israelites (which, by the way, they agreed to follow) is very detailed.

All religions are rather detailed.

Entire books exist describing the Greek Pantheon, and there are many others just like it.
All of which you don't believe either.

 

[Polymath257]

Your cat has biological life force as do humans.

Yes, cats are alive. There is no life force other than chemistry, though.

Humans have spirit from God which makes us more than animals imo.

Prove it.

We can see that humans are more than cats, but of course I have not met your cat.

We are different than cats. We have much more complex brains, which allows for language and social memories.

Spirit is something that is not testable by tests for material things, but as I said we can see the huge difference between humans and animals.

If it is not testable, there is no good reason to believe in it. The difference between humans and cats is one of magnitude, not of kind.

 

[Polymath257]

And a symphony is a formal arrangement of harmonised sounds created by an orchestra. But the music is not the instrument that produces it.

No, it is our interaction and intepretation of the sound waves that reach our ears.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

So are beauty, love and consciousness physical things or non-existent?

All have physical underpinnings in a material living brain

 

[Audie]

It's hard to understand what exactly what you said.
It is true that science cannot shown that God is not needed but ateist and skeptics claim this a lot.
I also hear them claim that science has shown that abiogenesis, without the need for God, is true and that evolution without the need for God is true.

You've heard these things from idiots.
If you didn't make it up which I think you did.

 

[Audie]

By theistic scientist I meant a scientist who believes in God.
Do you think that a scientist who believes in God can scientifically test that God?
Maybe believing scientist tests the truth of their God subjectively in their lives.
But if I say there is no test that could refute the existence of God that does not mean that there is no evidence, as you seem to admit.

Anyone can test for God.
Or Batboy.

They will never prove they don't exist.

So what? That's evidence that Batboy
is real? Or God?

It's so trivial it's not remotely worth mentioning.

 

[blü 2]

What has Ananus got to do with Jesus apart from the fact that you want to use the story to show Mark was written after 70 AD. But Ananus was a Jewish prophet who was filled with the Holy Spirit at Pentecost and prophesied and was put on trial and beaten for no reason. This also shows what Jerusalem had done to the prophets before that. You also ignore the true prophecy Ananus gave from God.

As I said, no relevance other than that Josephus' account of Jesus son of Ananus' trial was not available till 75 CE and was used by the author of Mark in his writing of the trial of Jesus.

Paul certainly would not have become a Christian if he knew that Jesus had not even existed.

The point is that assuming he existed, he exists in oral versions that at the least led to five incompatible versions in the NT alone (though Matthew's Jesus is fairly similar to Luke's).

Jesus pre existed and created the universe and became a human.

No, only the Jesuses of Paul and of John did that. Mark's Jesus was an ordinary Jew till adopted by God, and there's no hint in Matthew or Luke that their Jesuses had existed in any other form than that resulting from divine insemination on that particular occasion. And certainly none of Mark's, Matthew's or Luke's Jesuses created the material universe ─ the idea of pre-existing in heaven and of being the demiurge, the creator of the material universe, is from gnosicism and not found in the synoptics.

But the mother was a virgin'

The mother of Matthew's Jesus and the mother of Luke's Jesus were each virgins. It's an unignorable claim, so when it's not found in Paul, Mark or John, it's because no such claim is made there. As well, you shoot yourself in the foot if you also wish to claim Jesus was descended from David ─ as I said, those claims in Matthew and Luke clearly demonstrate the absurdity. And of course the mother of Mark's Jesus was an ordinary Jewess just as Mark's Jesus was an ordinary Jew till his adoption by God on the model of David.

and so no zygote was killed so that Jesus could become a human.

As I also said, my best guess is that there was an ordinary conception by a Jewish couple and Paul's and John's Jesuses became incarnated by slipping in spirit into the resulting zygote. It's a best guess because neither Paul nor John discusses how their Jesus entered the world.

Mark starts at the baptism of Jesus but Jesus is still the Son of God in Mark also.

Mark's Jesus becomes the son of God when he's baptized and God adopts him right at the start of Mark's story ─ Mark 1:9-11. Goodness, don't you read your own book? Do you know no more about what it says than what other people have told you it says?

Jesus is also Son of David in Mark (eg Mark 10:47)

A stranger calls him 'Son of David' in Mark 10:47. He denies he's descended from David in Mark 12:35-37.

Both Genealogies make it plain that Joseph is not the father of Jesus and Lukes is logically the genealogy of Mary whose father is also called the father of Joseph in those days.

No, the genealogies in Matthew and Luke don't make it plain that Joseph is not the father of Jesus ─ those gospels make it plain elsewhere. On the contrary, each is expressly a genealogy of Joseph ─ Matthew's genealogy ends, Matthew 2:16 and Jacob the father of Joseph the husband of Mary. Luke's genealogy (written in reverse order) says Luke 3:23 Jesus [...] being the son (as was supposed) of Joseph,

Each gospel writer has his own agenda and information to convey and they add to each other and not contradict.

No, in the places I keep pointing out to you they dang sure contradict each other.

The each have Jesus as the Son of God, and end up showing clearly that He is the divine Son of God, someone the Jews wanted to kill because He made Himself equal to God.

If you were a Jew in those days, that may have sounded quite a reasonable idea. But Jesus was God's envoy, and no more God than the US Ambassador to Germany is Joe Biden.

When on trial His claim to being Son of God was what got them in the end even though the OT clearly tells us that the Messiah would be the Son of God.

That he had the title 'Son of God' is not what we're discussing.

Certainly the letters of Paul were circulating and quoted by Church Fathers before Marcion.

That's interesting. Where can I read more about that?

 

[RestlessSoul]

No, it is our interaction and intepretation of the sound waves that reach our ears.

There's a little more to it than that, L think. The physics of sound doesn't account for the experience of listening to Mozart or Miles Davis. Nor does the wavelength of visible light account for the experience of seeing the colour red.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

So there are in the physical world, fundamental phenomena which are immaterial?

We need to be careful with language. Some use the words material and physical interchangeably. Matter is one manifestation of physical reality. Ideas are immaterial, but remain physical, like energy and force. Immaterial doesn't mean not physical.

I wonder how atheists/skeptics can say that science has shown that God is not needed

I haven't seen that written by any skeptic, although I imagine some have. Gods haven't been ruled out, but what is a god needed for? What would its job be that unconscious nature couldn't accomplish without a god? Do you think that a god is necessary for there to be life, consciousness, moral intuitions, or a universe "finely tuned" to support them? Probably, but if so, why? Why should a god exist?

it seems that some atheists/skeptics say they shun faith but in reality embrace it when it comes to scientific ideas that have not been proven.

You're conflating justified belief with unjustified belief. Belief based in experience properly understood is justified. Belief based in the will to believe is not. A man turns the key in his car and it starts just like the last several hundred times he tested it. He holds the belief that it will probably start this time, too, and that belief is justified. He also believes that guardian angels watch over him as he drives, and that belief is by "supported" by faith, not experience.

Science defines the magic spark of life as an emergent property of matter and that is a way to eliminate the magic in it. But neither of us know scientifically if it is an emergent property of matter. So why do you sound as if you do know?

I have no reason to believe that when the proper elements are arranged the proper way that they will not come to life unless some unseen substance is injected into it, just as I have no reason to believe that if I set a dry leaf on fire using the sun and a magnifying glass that it will not burst into flame unless another substance enters the leaf to make the flame.

The main difference in our thinking is that the scientific narrative contains no unnecessary elements. You want to find a job for a god. No scientific law or theory benefits in terms of explanatory or predictive power by inserting a god into it, so we don't. You're like the boss trying to find a job for his son-in-law in a company that works well without him. Sure, you can put him on the floor, but to do what that isn't already being done without him?

If the body of man evolved then that would be just another animal without God's involvement and turning it into a man, made in the image of God.

Agreed. And this is why I question whether Darwin's theory and Christianity are compatible. In Christianity, man was created in the image of his creator as a soul encased in flesh for a purpose. None of that is negotiable, right? None of that can be changed without it no longer being Christianity, right? Yet none of it is compatible with the theory of biological evolution.

The gospels support the belief in Jesus but only if believed.

That's not what's meant by support as in justified belief. Belief by faith is unsupported belief, and no demonstrably correct ideas can be derived from such beliefs. If your foundational belief is faith-based, your system cannot generate useful ideas. Look at astrology, which purports to predict life trajectories and personality traits based in a false belief about stars and their power over those lives. It's no surprise that it doesn't work.

 

[Aupmanyav]

And a symphony is a formal arrangement of harmonised sounds created by an orchestra. But the music is not the instrument that produces it.

Behind the music is something physical, brain. Of course, Mikkel has a different view.

 

[RestlessSoul]

Behind the music is something physical, brain. Of course, Mikkel has a different view.

Yes, there is a correlation between the physical and the mental. To infer from this that the one is entirely reducible to the other, requires an inductive leap which does not logically follow from the observation.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

No, it is our interaction and intepretation of the sound waves that reach our ears.

I want those 2 bold words in purely strictly psychical science terms. I don't your subjective words. That is not useful. I want the pure science or that you learn that you are doing philosophy in the end. One or the other.