Originally Posted By ecdc >>If interested, read this:<< Great. Cause my Goodreads list isn't long enough. Added. I do know that humans have evolved to NOT be rational. That's the default. We are hard-wired for patternicity, cognitive bias, inumerancy, fallacies, etc. Cognitive dissonance has been observed in chimpanzees. Whether this is what makes belief in the supernatural or higher powers the default, or something else, I don't know. Perhaps this book will enlighten me.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>Perhaps this book will enlighten me.<< Let's just say it will give you much food for thought. And it's very well-written as well. A juicy book about a dry subject.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>May I suggest spending some time with Bertrand Russell?<< Especially if you're a Ray Bolger fan. The guy's got more strawmen than you can shake a stick at. ;-)
Originally Posted By ecdc >>it will give you much food for thought.<< Well screw that. Do you have anything that might just validate what I already believe? I'm thinking Glenn Beck....
Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder You mentioned Goodreads. They're getting sold. <a href="http://www.laobserved.com/archive/2013/03/goodreads_acquired_by_ama.php" target="_blank">http://www.laobserved.com/arch..._ama.php</a>
Originally Posted By TomSawyer I think that it was Neil DeGrasse Tyson who pointed out that never in the history of our time on earth was the supernatural explanation for an event the correct one.
Originally Posted By TomSawyer Hopemax, it isn't that humans were wrong every time, it's that they were looking at it like children until just a few hundred years ago. It wasn't until the Enlightenment that scientific method was really figured out and put in to practice. Humans that said that the universe was created in six days or that it had some other supernatual origin were wrong because they lacked the tools, technology, method and mathematical skill to measure the world. It's only been in the last 150 years that the fields of geology, astronomy, chemistry, and biology have all independently converged on the Big Bang model of the beginning of the Universe. And every experiment and this hypothesis rests on is repeatable by any other human, and the scientist who can demonstrate that the model itself is incorrect would be the next Newton or Einstein. We know what has happened since just after the Big Bang. There is not a single shred of scientific evidence that refutes it. Evert thing we see, everything we measure, every oberservable, measurable, and testable thing in the universe points to the current model of the origin of the universe.
Originally Posted By TomSawyer Tyson, again: "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? [...]. 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."
Originally Posted By ecdc Imagine being in an early agrarian society ten thousand years ago. You are totally dependent on rainfall for your survival. But too much and floods wipe out your crops. Too little and drought. Snow destroys fragile early crops. Heat scorches them. Perhaps an earthquake hits. Lightning strikes and causes a fire, wiping out a field. You have absolutely no model to base this on. There's no concept of atmosphere, tectonic plates, storm systems, etc. It's little wonder ancient cultures believed in gods.
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?<< Do you have ANY arguments that don't start with a strawman?
Originally Posted By TomSawyer What argument? It's just a quote that I thought addressed some of the points brought up here.
Originally Posted By ecdc And let's not pretend like the argument from ignorance (that's what Tyson's basically addressing) isn't frequently trotted out in defense of religion.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>And let's not pretend like the argument from ignorance (that's what Tyson's basically addressing) isn't frequently trotted out in defense of religion.<< Some Athiests have this stereotype of Christians that's based on the obnoxious attention-seeking branch of the religion. But it's no more accurate than, say, Pat Robertson's stereotype of homosexuals (which is based on the obnoxious, attention-seeking branch of, well yeah).
Originally Posted By Dr Hans Reinhardt "Some Athiests have this stereotype of Christians that's based on the obnoxious attention-seeking branch of the religion." Some do, but I'd wager that most strict non-believers in America became atheists after questioning the beliefs they were taught. Moving away from Christianity was not an easy thing for me to do that's for sure; it was a struggle that took a couple of years to overcome. In short, I don't believe that atheists have drawn their conclusions about God and the Bible by being lazy thinkers.
Originally Posted By ecdc >>Some Athiests have this stereotype of Christians that's based on the obnoxious attention-seeking branch of the religion.<< Sure, except Tom's quotes from Neil DeGrasse Tyson didn't do that. It responded directly to statements made here that invoke the argument from ignorance. The thinking goes: Science can't explain everything, there's lots of mysteries, ergo, God! Why, there's so many mysteries I don't know how someone CAN'T believe in God! Those arguments were made, in so many and not so many words. Tom responded with a quote, which is not a strawman and not guilty (nor am I) of what you've said about Atheist assumptions.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>It responded directly to statements made here that invoke the argument from ignorance.<< Ah ... found them, back on pages 5 and 6. ;-) I withdraw the complaint, then, but nevertheless reinforce that I certainly never said that, and nobody (with a clue) at any church I've been a member of has ever said it either.
Originally Posted By RoadTrip I don't care what anyone says, I'm sticking with the Magic Pig Wizard. His progeny have given us Bacon, and what greater gift is there than that?
Originally Posted By Dabob2 Apparently, according to a program I watched yesterday while salivating like crazy, wild boar bacon. It seems it puts domesticated pig bacon to shame. Must. have.
