Originally Posted By utahjosh They mix. However, when it comes to issues of faith, you cannot use the scientific method to proved your faith.
Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder It can certainly be used to prove a faith-inspired position wrong. THAT would be critical thinking.
Originally Posted By TomSawyer But what about the point that critical thinking exposes a flaw in what the faith teaches? We know that it took longer than 6 days for the world to come in to being. There is no evidence that the Jews were ever in Egypt. We know that the stars are not fixed in the firmament and that there was no global flood since the continents appeared. Critical thinking can't be jettisoned when it conflicts with faith.
Originally Posted By Yookeroo "They mix. However, when it comes to issues of faith, you cannot use the scientific method to proved your faith." They mix....until they don't.
Originally Posted By Labuda *sigh* I still say that I respect people who can have faith int he face of all that goes on in this world. I don't think I ever had faith, despite the fact that I was a Catholic long enough to get confirmed and continue going for a few years after that.
Originally Posted By Labuda I just saw this: But what about the point that critical thinking exposes a flaw in what the faith teaches? We know that it took longer than 6 days for the world to come in to being. AND OMG, Tom... you nailed it for me. I remember being a little girl (maybe 6?) and questioning the 6-day thing in CCD. I don't recall the answer, but I didn't buy it. I also questioned where Abel's wife came from.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 "*sigh* I still say that I respect people who can have faith int he face of all that goes on in this world. " I hear you on one level, Labuda. Sometimes I envy the certainty that some people have. So much easier than all the messy uncertainty, and can be comforting. Then I think about it a little bit, and I'm not envious anymore.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>It can certainly be used to prove a faith-inspired position wrong. THAT would be critical thinking.<< This. Religion and critical thinking can go hand in hand, but Josh, I don't think that's what you're doing. You seem to have built a wall between the two, in the wrong place. Any religious belief that can't stand up to reality is wrong. Period. Regardless of what book it comes out of, or what organization of graybeards declares it to be so. Religion, at its heart, should be a coping mechanism for reality, not a substitute for it. Most of the louder religious people nowadays, and I do include you in this, Josh, definitely use it as a substitute. Don't like reality? Pretend it doesn't exist and insert religion to cover the blanks. That's stupidity. (It's also Fox News, but I digress.)
Originally Posted By TomSawyer "I also questioned where Abel's wife came from." Digression, but think about the Native American myths that tell how their tribe was created. They don't talk about where the other tribes came from, just where their people came from. Then look at the first several books of the Bible in the same context. "There are no other Gods before me?" Really? Not just "There is no other God?"
Originally Posted By ecdc I heartily endorse post 148. And the other general sentiments here are excellent. I've said it before: Science exists to test the observable and falsifiable. If something (say, the existence of God) falls outside of that, then it falls beyond science. But science does invalidate a lot of the stuff Josh posts here about homosexuality and gay marriage. Science can never say anything with 100% certainty, but sometimes it can come close. Anthropology tells us that what anti-gay marriage opponents call "traditional marriage" isn't traditional at all. That's just one example. Yup, as mawnck says, in this case, religion is being used to cover up or substitute reality.
Originally Posted By TomSawyer "Does it mean, if you don’t understand something, and the community of physicists don’t understand it, that means God did it? Is that how you want to play this game? Because if it is, here’s a list of things in the past that the physicists at the time didn’t understand [and now we do understand] [...]. If that’s how you want to invoke your evidence for God, then God is an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance that’s getting smaller and smaller and smaller as time moves on - so just be ready for that to happen, if that’s how you want to come at the problem. " --Neil Degrasse Tyson
Originally Posted By utahjosh What have I said about homosexuality and gay marriage that goes against SCIENCE?
Originally Posted By mawnck >>Does it mean, if you don’t understand something, and the community of physicists don’t understand it, that means God did it?<< No. Next?
Originally Posted By ecdc >>What have I said about homosexuality and gay marriage that goes against SCIENCE?<< You can correct me if I'm wrong, but I suspect you're defining science incorrectly here. Most people think of "science" as "science class" - geology, how old is the earth, etc. But science is a process of observing hypotheses and then falsifying. Historical science tells us that polygamy was once the most important thing to Mormons, and that as a people and a leadership, including their prophets, they believed it would never, ever be changed. Your repeated pronouncements about polygamy and the law of chastity go against science.
Originally Posted By TomSawyer I think that one of the hardest things for some people of faith to understand about science is that it isn't a philosophy but a method of testing and measuring the observable universe in a way that is repeatable by other people.
Originally Posted By ecdc >>No. Next?<< Well in fairness, the argument from ignorance is the bread and butter of many a pro-theist argument.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>Well in fairness, the argument from ignorance is the bread and butter of many a pro-theist argument.<< Perhaps, but TomSawyer does seem to have a particular affinity for starting his anti-theist arguments with an obvious straw-man.
Originally Posted By Mr X ***If that’s how you want to invoke your evidence for God, then God is an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance that’s getting smaller and smaller and smaller as time moves on*** I never really got into Tyson as much as I did Carl Sagan for this kind of stuff (and Sagan is still, undisputed, the Jedi Master for teaching us idiots what's what in a very kindly way), but the more quotes I see from the guy, particularly the off-the-cuff stuff like this, the more impressed I become. Sadly, I never met Sagan. But I hope I can meet Tyson one day and ask him a few things.
Originally Posted By TomSawyer Not my argument - I thought the quote applied to the conversation, and it isn't even a straw man since Tyson says God is a receding pocket of scientific ignorance IF you think that he exists in those places where critical thinking and reason can't reach. That's a big "if" and it's essential to understanding what Tyson was saying.
