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Can Science explain everything in the universe without a God?


Henry McLeod

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No offense, but I have always been against religion. I know most of the bible and some of it is just plain horrible. I'm going to give you a few of these quotes; Psalms 137:9, 1 Kings 20:35-36, Genesis 19:5-8, Deuteronomy 22:28-29, and Numbers 15:32-36. I got more than that and if you don't believe me read them for yourself.

 

I was always told as a kid that "the universe can't come from nothing" and this proves God exists. It wasn't until I watched a science video until I learned the truth. The basic idea is that the universe started at a heated and condensed state. Energy (not nothing) had transferred into particles of matter. These particles later combined because of the heat and made atoms, which later combined and made planets and stars. Then the universe cooled down and expanded. This took place over billions of years...

 

It's seems like everything can be explained by science and not religion. In the bible; bats are birds, unicorns exist, pi is three, and plants were created before the sun. We all know this is not true. A religious person asked me why the sky was blue the other day and how this proves God exists. I told him that the particles in the atmosphere reflect the color based on the distance from the sun. In your opinion, can Science explain everything without a God. What do you think?

Edited by Henry McLeod
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No offense, but I have always been against religion. I know most of the bible and some of it is just plain horrible. I'm going to give you a few of these quotes; Psalms 137:9, 1 Kings 20:35-36, Genesis 19:5-8, Deuteronomy 22:28-29, and Numbers 15:32-36. I got more than that and if you don't believe me read them for yourself.

 

I was always told as a kid that "the universe can't come from nothing" and this proves God exists. It wasn't until I watched a science video until I learned the truth. The basic idea is that the universe started at a heated and condensed state. Energy (not nothing) had transferred into particles of matter. These particles later combined because of the heat and made atoms, which later combined and made planets and stars. Then the universe cooled down and expanded. This took place over billions of years...

 

It's seems like everything can be explained by science and not religion. In the bible; bats are birds, unicorns exist, pi is three, and plants were created before the sun. We all know this is not true. A religious person asked me why the sky was blue the other day and how this proves God exists. I told him that the particles in the atmosphere reflect the color based on the distance from the sun. In your opinion, can Science explain everything without a God. What do you think?

 

 

God explains nothing, it is a place holder until more information becomes available, the sky is blue btw because blue light is scattered more than other visible wave lengths

 

http://spaceplace.nasa.gov/blue-sky/en/

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The gaps in our scientific knowledge continue to close as we learn to apply rigorous methodology to discover the best, most evidenced explanations for various phenomena. God(s) still live in the gaps for many people, and secular education is the best investment overall as a cure for ignorance.

 

Knowledge replaces fear in addition to inspiring us. It allows us to focus our rational minds where reasoned thinking is the best response, and subsequently teaches us how to best apply an emotional response as well. Knowledge and experience helps us build our morality. The more we know, the less we need to guess or hope that something is correct. Science doesn't ask for your faith; it wants to earn your trust by being thorough, reality-based, and worthy.

 

Everything we understand through science is based on the natural world. Anything we can't yet explain we assume to have a natural explanation rather than a supernatural one. If it's outside of nature, science isn't the tool to use. Nothing is outside of the nature of reality, it seems, as we have no evidence to support supernatural explanations. In the end, using the supernatural in your belief system adds an unnecessarily nebulous, malleable, and powerful emotional perspective that's completely at odds with good science.

 

God(s) can never be used in scientific explanations until they all agree to become observable and predictable.

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Just because we may not know some detail of nature right now does not imply that we will not know it or that we cannot know it in the future.

To just plug in a magical entity to fill in that gap is not worthy of consideration.

And to pick a particular human created god from one particular culture from a long time ago as an answer to anything screams laziness to me.

We have been told that we cannot explain existence without this magician but we are not permitted to question this magician or ask where it came from either.

If we cannot explain existence without the use of a god, then explain that god without the use of the our existence.

Why do we exist or why does this god exist? What is your purpose? What is this god's purpose?

I will always put my money on how my highly evolved brain interprets the evidence I see, not in what some particular culture decided to tell itself.

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Henry -"Science explain everything without a God. What do you think?

 

What I think is that this is nonsense. With or without God science explains very little. Metaphysics is where the action is at for the big questions, and this explains the most when it does not appeal to God but merely to logic and the data. If metaphysics is not enough then experience must be consulted, and science is certainly not a bold exploration of experience.

 

I believe that we make a terible mistake thinking we can justify or falsify God in the sciences. The two areas of knoweldge have to be connected up via metaphysics for any translation between them.

 

What we can say, for definitional reasons, is that science has nothing to say about God or indeed any metaphysical question. Which is not to say that scientists don't have their opinions and conjectures.

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I was always told as a kid that "the universe can't come from nothing" and this proves God exists. It wasn't until I watched a science video until I learned the truth. The basic idea is that the universe started at a heated and condensed state. Energy (not nothing) had transferred into particles of matter. These particles later combined because of the heat and made atoms, which later combined and made planets and stars.

 

I find it interesting that you ignore the law of thermal dynamics and created " energy" from nothing. where did the energy come from, what caused the condensed and heated state of the Universe? The Law of Thermal dynamics states that matter can neither be created nor destroyed, but is converted from one state to the other. The answer is actually not science, you can not recreate nor observe the creation of the Universe, the best theory in science only happens when you supply the initial energy or mass, so science does not have the answer, you are practicing faith in the religion of science.

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If something cannot come from nothing then this is not a proof of God. It is a proof that the world is stranger than we tend to think. It is an ancient and venerable metaphysical problem with significant implications. It leads physicist Paul Davies to wonder if there is some truth in mysticism - he is not led to wonder about theism because it doesn't help. . .

Edited by PeterJ
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If something cannot come from nothing then this is not a proof of God. It is a proof that the world is stranger than we tend to think.

 

I don't know how you can look at Universe, the World, and life, and not see a creator, our bodies have numerous systems functioning in harmony, which without intelligent design have no reason to work together, if you believe in evolution, what inspired it to develop from single cell organism to higher life forms. why would the ability to move, then in turn give feedback to design appendages, this would be inherent intelligence, being led by an intuitive force. Humans and animals have digestive, Respiratory, Nervous, Reproductive, visual Systems, how does advanced life forms know to develop veins and arteries to reach cells throughout the body? To supply oxogen and nutrients to cells, and these cells work together to move the body, move blood, carry oxogen, carry signals, react to stimuli, and thats not even looking inside the cell, where you have cell division occurring, RNA reproducing DNA, Chromosomes aligning themselves after being duplicated to split the cell to create a new cell, the body repairing itself or growing, then Reproduction, where did the intelligence to reproduce?, the system to reproduce?, and pairing of donor Chromosomes? there is no evidence of evolution, a link has never been found to join two species. there are many scientists, Biologists, Chemists, Astronomers, ect who believe in a creator or in intelligent design.

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I don't know how you can look at Universe, the World, and life, and not see a creator, our bodies have numerous systems functioning in harmony, which without intelligent design have no reason to work together,

 

Much of it comes down to efficiency within a system. Life is the most efficient way to use available energy, so it's actually a lot more probable than you might think.

 

You're looking at the total marvelous end result and thinking, "Whoa, no way that could have happened without a designer", and ignoring the part where all these numerous systems started out much fewer and simpler, and got more complex over time. It doesn't always work that way with evolution, but in this case it did. These systems function in harmony, not because they were designed that way, but because each system had to be built on available resources, and improvements tended to be passed along to offspring.

 

Eyes started out as little light-sensitive patches that gave an advantage. Millions of years of refinement gives us the eyes we humans think are a marvel, and they are, but if you think they're some god-like design, you should study how flawed our eyes are. The photocells point backwards, away from the light (and the wires connecting them point forwards, and have to be fed back, and how the blood vessels that feed receptors sit on top of the retina, blocking light. That's the source for retinopathy, something that affects half the people over 40.

 

Evolution can be considered a trial and error process. Think of it in terms of the evolution of iron in human technology. No human started out saying, "I'm going to design the perfect metal for making things that need to be hard and maybe sharp". Early humans forged iron, and used it for many things before they tried scraping the slag off the top to remove impurities. Further trial and error led them to allowing some carbon to remain in the iron, and thus steel was created. Not designed, but discovered, over a long time, through experiment and testing.

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!

Moderator Note

This is not going to devolve into a creationism vs evolution debate. Take that party somewhere else (i.e. other than SFN).

 

The subject of this discussion is whether science can explain everything without a deity. Stick to that topic.

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there is no evidence of evolution, a link has never been found to join two species.

 

If you understood that evolution and life are constant, ongoing processes, you'd realize that this link you're unable to find doesn't exist. There's no need to link a single, ongoing event that's never been completely disrupted in hundreds of millions of years. You creationists are always looking for "transitional fossils" without realizing that every fossil is transitional, just as every living thing is in transition. Evolution is a gradual change in allele frequency within a population over time, yet you demand science produce some kind of missing link.

 

Are you familiar with the concept of emergence? Some things aren't physical, they're more like events. Fire is an emergent event rather than a thing. Fire always happens when the conditions for it are right, enough heat, oxygen and fuel will always result in a fire event. Same thing with lightning, same thing with life. These are complicated events that emerge when a bunch of much less complex requirements are met. They weren't designed that way, they work because it emerged that way.

 

You haven't bothered to understand evolution to the point where you could figure out what you're asking for completely misses the mark. It makes sense to you, but that's because you're ignorant of the mechanisms you're criticizing. I mean no offense, ignorance is curable with knowledge and reason. This is not a good place to apply your supernatural belief system. Science explains life to a much greater depth than religion ever could.

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Hi Phi for All

 

I agree with everything you just said right up to the final sentence.

 

"Science explains life to a much greater depth than religion ever could."

 

This is a very bold claim and to me it seems to be demonstrably untrue. I think what you mean is 'religion as I know it'.

Edited by PeterJ
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You haven't bothered to understand evolution to the point where you could figure out what you're asking for completely misses the mark. It makes sense to you, but that's because you're ignorant of the mechanisms you're criticizing. I mean no offense, ignorance is curable with knowledge and reason. This is not a good place to apply your supernatural belief system. Science explains life to a much greater depth than religion ever could.

 

I don't have a degree in Biology, I did take 3 college level biology courses, but that was over 35 years back, and I don't work in that field, but I am not completely ignorant of the subject, and my Prof believed in a creator. You believe that science has the answers to questions that are no more than theories, which makes it religion, In science you must be able to observe and or recreate the hypothesis to prove it, and science has not proven evolution.

when you say how the eye was developed you are making a hypothesis founded on: no evidence.

Moderator> This is on topic, can science explain everything without a creator.

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I don't have a degree in Biology, I did take 3 college level biology courses, but that was over 35 years back, and I don't work in that field, but I am not completely ignorant of the subject, and my Prof believed in a creator. You believe that science has the answers to questions that are no more than theories, which makes it religion, In science you must be able to observe and or recreate the hypothesis to prove it, and science has not proven evolution.

when you say how the eye was developed you are making a hypothesis founded on: no evidence.

Moderator> This is on topic, can science explain everything without a creator.

You should ask for your money back.

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so you have no defense, just quips, smug dude

If you think that your half remembered poorly taught biology course means you understand evolution, there's nothing more to say. You're going to be immune to reason.

 

Then again, prove me wrong. Write as plainly as you can what scientists mean when they talk about the theory of evolution. Not what your preacher said, what the scientists say. What actually is the theory of evolution?

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so you have no defense, just quips, smug dude

 

 

All you seem to have is an argument from ignorance, if you don't understand then it must be wrong... god of the gaps solves nothing. You have no idea what theory means in science and from what you said so far your understanding of science in general is sorely lacking. BTW evolution is a fact, the only questions that remain are the finer points of the driving forces of evolution. Go to talkorigins.org and brush up on your understanding of evolution....

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Theory in Science, means something backed by mountains of evidence. Dogma is for Religions. You are supposed to continue to question scientific theories. Can't move forward if everyone accepts things on faith.

 

In general there may well be parts of the Universe unassailable by the Scientific method, reliant as it is upon evidence. Have only been able to see so far backwards, speculate so far forwards. Can't see across the event horizons.

 

I'm hoping there is some more oddball stuff out there. Unusual oddities of the Universe are how we've been advancing lately. Good cause to think that this will continue to be the case.

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Theory in Science, means something backed by mountains of evidence. Dogma is for Religions. You are supposed to continue to question scientific theories. Can't move forward if everyone accepts things on faith.

 

In general there may well be parts of the Universe unassailable by the Scientific method, reliant as it is upon evidence. Have only been able to see so far backwards, speculate so far forwards. Can't see across the event horizons.

 

I'm hoping there is some more oddball stuff out there. Unusual oddities of the Universe are how we've been advancing lately. Good cause to think that this will continue to be the case.

 

1. Can you please share with us the "mountains of evidence" backing up string theory?

 

2a. Can you please tell us what "The Scientific Method" is?

 

2b. If I find someone who offers a different characterization of TSM from your own (assuming you offer one), can we safely assume that he/she is just plain wrong?

Edited by Reg Prescott
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What actually is the theory of evolution?

 

Thank you: theory of evolution.... it has not been proven, I will bring evidence of the mechanics of the cell organelle which work in harmony but how or why is yet to be answered. example what guides centrioles to align Chromosomes and separate the cell?

Edited by John316
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  1. Mean more in the sense of: Theory of Evolution, Theory of Relativity.
  2. The crux of the Scientific Method consists of observations and/or experimentation. Make your hypothesis and see if it checks out or continues to check out with the world at large. If it does you keep it, if it doesn't you toss it out with the bathwater. Repeat.
  3. I would say it depends.

 

Thank you: theory of evolution.... it has not been proven, I will bring evidence of the mechanics of the cell organelle which work in harmony but how or why is yet to be answered. example what guides centrioles to align Chromosomes and separate the cell?

 

Unquestioned proof is not the point of Science. We want people to keep looking into a Theory and making it stronger as a result of their investigations or even give us cause to scrap it altogether.

 

the Great Ultan pops down tomorrow and shows documentary evidence of how He created Everything and we will chuck Evolution on out the window(keeping in mind we'd only be adopting the Theory of Ultan instead). Until then we keep going with the best we have.

Edited by Endy0816
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Thank you: theory of evolution.... it has not been proven, I will bring evidence of the mechanics of the cell organelle which work in harmony but how or why is yet to be answered. example what guides centrioles to align Chromosomes and separate the cell?

You could have at least tried. Insteas, you doubled down on ignorance of even the most basic concepts of science and philosophy of science.

 

Shame, really. Then again, it's what I expected.

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