h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hello mahargovich and welcome to the thread.

What you are asking is a little off-topic but worth considering. The only thing is that science is not in the business of proof, it's in the business of knowledge. Proof is left to lawyers and mathematicians. Whether we can prove anything at all about the universe is a question for philosophers.

As far as science is concerned the working hypothesis is that there is no god. Just to be clear on this, because I got into trouble for suggesting something like this earlier, that's not to say that scientists are all atheists - many certainly believe in god as individuals. It's just that if we allow for 'acts of god' then experiments are not repeatable, results are not reliable and anything we discover about the nature of the universe could be changed in an instant. Science, then, assumes that all things happen according to a set of defined 'laws' which can be deduced by measurement and experiment and that these do not rely on any intelligent agent for their continued operation.

F

>As far as science is concerned the working hypothesis is that there is no
>god.... if we allow for 'acts of god' then experiments are not
>repeatable, results are not reliable and anything we discover about the
>nature of the universe could be changed in an instant. Science, then,
>assumes that all things happen according to a set of defined 'laws' which
>can be deduced by measurement and experiment and that these do not rely
>on any intelligent agent for their continued operation.

All perfectly sensible and logical points, Fathom. If science operated on the same principles as religion, we might not have computers, and, hence, no hootoo. This is not to say that religion is bad, simply that it is separate in many ways from science and logic. Logic and religion do not usually go well together.

Just to be Clear I would assume Ratzinger Is the Grand Inquisitor since the letter under discussion comes from the 'Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith' which used to be called the Inquisition.

And was instrumental in promoting the agenda that the Dead sea scrolls have nothing to do with the development of Christianity, despite the twelve 'priests' who follow the teacher of reitiousness. ect.. ect... ect....

From my brief read of the the letter, there isn't much new in it, just a reframing of what they have said for years.

I did like one phrase though: Polymorphic sexuality, that about describes me: I wonder how many other people it describes, who have been subject to the opressive qualities of 'monosexuality' (as opposed to hetrosexuality since I would not wish to give the impression that I would want to prevent people having a hetrosexual lifestyle)

My biggest criticism of the cardinals letter would be that he has the underlying assumption that the differences between people are more important than the similarities. The tone of the letter is reactionary, and totaly fails to address what I feel is the fundamental theme of the modern age. How do Men learn to define themselves in a post-feminist world. How can men be encouraged to take on those qualities which used to be valued by men in a way which empowers them to feel whole. The cardinals letter seems to assume that this will be achieved by persuading women not to compete with men. Personaly I believe that this will be partly achieved by acknowledging that men are refusing to compete with women and discovering a way to allow this to happen whilst also acknowledging the importance of 'Similar and different, but equal and together'

The cardinal's letter has to me an almost pleading quality, begging women to 'for god's sake do as they are told!' and implicit within this tone is a panic that 'liberated' women will not return to the church and that neither will their children.

It has also just this moment occured to me that the whole catholic reactionary conunndrum may well be wrapped up with it's unnatural suppression of sexuality and other drives, which is in the history of the church a relatively recent phenomena, circa the 12 century I think. I believe that the repression of these drives in priests (As distinct from Monks) leads them to be driven to repress sexuality and ambition in others, women have frequently been the target of this and it should not be a supprise that they still are.

There is a lot in the letter about return to family values, and although I might be repeating myself, I ask, Who's Family, Who's Values. Sociological research in the 60's and 70's highlighted that there were as many kinds of family as there were cultures, and as many values too.

Single Parent Familys have ben condemned, but there are many which work very well. Gay Families have been condemned but there are many which work very well Open Marriages but there are many which work very well.

The missing elements in the Families which don't work are the same no matter what, gay, Straight, Open, Closed, Mother working, Father working, The missing elements when they don't work are: consistancy, good role modelling and a capacity for emotional literacy. If these are present the family works no matter what it's structure, if they are not then the family will fail. (And probably the childrens families and unto the third and fourth generations.{Just to keep the biblical tone going, that I feel is one of the great truths of the bible, though not particularly in the context in which the OT presents it.})

What if you were a scientist studing acts of God?
What about earthquakes? They were seen as acts of God.
And what about all those diseases that were seen as punishments from God?

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That's true, I think - in the old days Cardinal Ratzinger would have been known as the Grand Inquisitor... (as in 'nobody expects...').

I imagine logic and religion is what is called 'theology'.

F

Hi M'ich. I largely agree with Fathom too. However, for a scientific approach to the question of the existence of God, go to: http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/billramey/kalam.htm
By 'scientific' I mean here an evidence-based and logically reasoned account. Actually it's broader that just 'scientific' and is more properly termed 'philosophical'.

Many here will groan that I cite this again, but surely it's better than expecting you to plough through 20k+ of backlog!

toxx

"What if you were a scientist studing acts of God?"

I'd hand back my research grant and take up flower arranging.

"What about earthquakes? They were seen as acts of God."

'Were' yes, but how long ago? Only an insurance firm would try to claim that now. Earthquakes may be unpredictable but are caused by well understood physical processes.

"And what about all those diseases that were seen as punishments from God?"

Oh, right. You were born with cystic fibrosis because of what? You were a naughty ovum? This is one of the worst aspects of religion to my mind. You got sick because god wants to punish you. Sadistic in the extreme, don't you think?

You are pulling my leg, yes? Scientists do not study 'acts of god' they look for the underlying processes that caused the event. If they believed it was truly an act of god what would be the point in trying to work out what caused it?

F

Toxx,

"Hi M'ich. I largely agree with Fathom too."







F

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Hi az! That's right, of course one could push unpleasant policies under that banner. In the context of giving value to work in the home, I think the implied reference is to an old idea in Catholic social teaching, that women looking after families should have their work recognised as with other professional work, and that their spouses should have it taken into account in their earnings. But that's only a guess.

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Hi Athena. Sometimes we listen, other times we don't. You would expect the Pope to be against abortion. But this Pope was dead against the war in Iraq, for instance, and opposes capital punishment. I suppose I'm biased, but most people would say he's not always wrong.

Fathom.

I seem to recall that Francis Galton carried out experimental studies into the efficacy of prayer. Then there is relatively recent evidence that religious faith assists the recovery of patients in hospital. OK, the 'underlying cause' in the latter case is usually interpreted to be a psychological one, and the former was inconclusive. Nevertheless ...................

toxx

I knew it wouldn't last.



And there are still scientifically conducted experiments into ESP, psychokinesis etc too.

If there was conclusive proof that the 'power of prayer' assisted with healing there would be two direct results: one, that prayer groups would be encouraged to aid the sick, two that there would be further research into the phenomenon. The point of the further research would be to uncover the basic principles that made it work. The underlying assumption for any experiments would still be that there were processes at work that could be understood. Testing whether those processes were the result of 'intelligent manipulation' - for want of a better phrase - might require some kind of 'Turing Test'.

F

On the matter of science and "God", it is impossible to scientificly study any phenomenon caused by an entity of the type called "God". The reason is simple--you "God"s are not expected to act consistantly--one day a cause may have one effect, the next it won't. If a sick you pray for gets better, it can be attributed to the aid of "God", if they don't then "God" must have a plan that would prevent the person to get better, or maybe She has some reason known only to Herself for preventing it. Science can only study repeatable phenomenon and "God" hypothesis are generally not repeatable.

"Hi Athena. Sometimes we listen, other times we don't. You would expect the Pope to be against abortion. But this Pope was dead against the war in Iraq, for instance, and opposes capital punishment. I suppose I'm biased, but most people would say he's not always wrong."

The point isn't whether the pope, or any other religious leader, is always or often wrong. The point is that they come to their ethical descisions by looking at multi-milenia old documents and trying to defend whatever position they have traditionally held. Religious leaders don't have much of a habit of trying to consider the present of the future--they care more about tradition and enforcing whatever they believe people hundreds or thousands of years ago thought was right and wrong.

As long as the pope's main source of evidence for his "ethical" opinion is his interpretation of the Bible, there is no reason to consider him a source of ethical advice. Not unless you believe that disobedient children should be stoned to death and that rape is acceptable--that can be supported by the Bible relatively easily, too.

Anyone who tries to defend their "ethical" views by picking and choosing from ancient texts should not be treated as an authority on right and wrong.

"You are pulling my leg, yes? Scientists do not study 'acts of god' they look for the underlying processes that caused the event. If they believed it was truly an act of god what would be the point in trying to work out what caused it?"

Now your starting to think about it F.

we're ment to work out what caused 'acts of God' otherwise, what is the point of it all?

Thanks Athena.
I think that's an a priori position, like mine. But we can also judge by results, although the conclusion we come to might well differ anyway. (And I'm not sure that your bit about stoning, etc., is strictly correct.)

Hi Athena,

"On the matter of science and "God", it is impossible to scientificly study any phenomenon caused by an entity of the type called "God". "

That's not strictly true. If it was discovered that such an entity did exist the next step would be to study its psychology. It is, after all, perfectly possible to study phenomena caused by the entity of type 'human' or 'mouse' or 'ant' or whatever.

The interesting thing is that simple phenomena are always repeatable - if I drop a rock I know it will fall - but complex phenomena are less so; the course of an illness, say. We know this is due to the larger number of variables making the complex phenomena harder to control but these are the very events that have been attributed to 'acts of god'. Earthquakes, disease, the weather are all in the hand of god but he never seems to intervene when I do something more easily observable like boiling the kettle.

I think your example of praying for the sick is a good one. There are so many variables in the progress of even a well understood illness that people can still believe the outcome is in the hands of god. It does puzzle me a little that people don't pray for their computer when it gets a virus - they prefer to pop in the latest version of Norton's or Symantec's virus checker.

F

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I read through it and I maintain that it is flawed reasoning. Let's get a start:

First of all, on the matter of infinity--yes, it seems to be incomprehensible in the real world--but so does the idea of a particle that is also a wave, or the idea of quantum tunnling. Frankly, if we want to ignore everytihng about the universe that is counter-intuitive, we must ignore relativeity and quantum mechanics.

On the matter of a cause for the universe:
"The problem with this is twofold. First, what does it mean to say that the cause of the universe is a natural one? Natural causes exist within the universe, not outside of it. If something preceded the universe, then by definition it is not a natural cause, because the laws of nature came into existence after whatever preceded the universe."

Personal causes exist within the universe, too. In fact, if we postulate that the universe has a cause, then we are postulating something beyond the universe that we are not aware of. This could be a pesonal creator, or a set of natural laws beyond our own. There is no more reason to think that a personal being preceeded our universe than that a set of extra-universal natural laws did.

Either way, this something is either eternal or has a beginning. If eternity has no meaning, as the arguement reasons, then the extra-universal universe/creator must have a beggining, and if a beggining requires a cause, then we have an endless cycle.


However, there is a way out of this mess. I will assume the universe has a beggining, since there seems to be scientific evidence for this, and it is simpler than argueing over that point. The universe either has an external cause or doesn't. If it has no cause, then that implies that it is self-contained--it just is. This could be a quite reasonable hypthesis--there is no reason to think that time goes back to before the Big Bang. It apparently doesn't in our universe, so the only way that anything could be "before" the beggining of our universe would be if we imagine our universe somehow being suspended in a higher universe in the form of say, a filmstrip--our time maps to super-universal time so that they exist before us. But here we are proposing a whole new universe, complete with a timeline extending beyond ours--not only are we violating Occam's razor if we don't supply a lot of evidence for it, but we then have to explain the beggining of that universe or appeal to it being infinite in time, which the kalamists claim is impossible.

The easiest solution is to see our universe as being self-contained, having no cause because nothing can exist before its begging. Rather than ask why it exists, one might as well ask why not?. I'd suggest that perhaps every possible (ie self-consistant) universe exists simply because it can--they have no cause and no meaningful before or after.

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It's a distinction between the ideas of "god" and "God". A god is simply another entity that follows natural laws but has powers we don't. Such a being would have a psychology that could be studied. However, a "God" is proposed by it's worshipers as omnipotent, omniscient, and limitless. If it follows any consistant logic that we can understand, then it is no longer omnipotent (it can't do what isn't dictated by it's psychology). Also, it's awfly hard to do any sort of controlled study when the subejct knows exactly what you're testing it for and what you're doing (if it didn't it wouldn't be omniscient).

Gods, unlike gods, are defined in such a way as to make it impossible to study their psychology--they simply can't have one. The basic premise of psychology is that thought and action depend on some sort of cause-and-effect path--Gods are defined as acting for unknowable, uncomprehendable reasons. If they have a cause-and-effect brain wiring, they are obeying natural laws, rather than writing them at will.




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Yes, but we still assume the complex phenomenon is th result of some complex set of causes, that, if all are repeated, will lead to the same results. By definition, an omnipotent/omniscient/limitless God doesn't follow natural laws and thus isn't repeatable even if you hrepeat all the causes.





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The difference is that while we can presumably eventually know all the factors controlling sickness or a god, we can't know all the factors controlling a God because if we did, it wouldn't be a God.