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Atheism/Existence of God Debates (Please Read OP)

PDN

This new 'catch-all' thread will operate similar to the Creationism and Protestant/Catholic Debate threads.

Too many threads are spoilt and dragged off topic when a non-Christian poster demands, "What evidence do you have for God?" While some may enjoy such discussion, it is frequently off-topic and derails discussion of other subjects (the very discussion that is the reason for this Forum's existence).

So, in order to protect the Forum and facilitate on topic discussions, all that stuff now belongs here. Anyone who keeps trying to derail other discussions by demanding evidence for God's existence will be warned, and if those warnings are ignored then swift infractions and bans will ensue.

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Fanny Cradock

If people are interested in listening to a strong proponent of scientism (which is not to be confused with science) then they should look no further than Peter Atkins.

The problem with the claim that science can explain everything is that the claim fails its own standard. When Bertrand Russell said, "I conclude that, while it is true that science cannot decide questions of values, that is because they cannot be intellectually decided at all, and lie outside the realm of truth and falsehood. Whatever knowledge is attainable, must be attained by scientific methods; and what science cannot discover, mankind cannot know." he was making a scientistic claim that was self-refuting. In short, this isn't a scientific calm and should be disregarded if we are to take the claim to heart, but then why should we?

pauldla

Fanny Cradock wrote: »

If people are interested in listening to a strong proponent of scientism (which is not to be confused with science) then they should look no further than Peter Atkins.

The problem with the claim that science can explain everything is that the claim fails its own standard. When Bertrand Russell said, "I conclude that, while it is true that science cannot decide questions of values, that is because they cannot be intellectually decided at all, and lie outside the realm of truth and falsehood. Whatever knowledge is attainable, must be attained by scientific methods; and what science cannot discover, mankind cannot know." he was making a scientistic claim that was self-refuting. In short, this isn't a scientific calm and should be disregarded if we are to take the claim to heart, but then why should we?

Atkins gets a mention in GD, having a go at Richard Swinburne.

Isn't scientism the idea that the Scientific Method can be applied to all fields, including social science, the arts and humanities, etc?

Tim Robbins

Fanny Cradock wrote: »

If people are interested in listening to a strong proponent of scientism (which is not to be confused with science) then they should look no further than Peter Atkins.

The problem with the claim that science can explain everything is that the claim fails its own standard. When Bertrand Russell said, "I conclude that, while it is true that science cannot decide questions of values, that is because they cannot be intellectually decided at all, and lie outside the realm of truth and falsehood. Whatever knowledge is attainable, must be attained by scientific methods; and what science cannot discover, mankind cannot know." he was making a scientistic claim that was self-refuting. In short, this isn't a scientific calm and should be disregarded if we are to take the claim to heart, but then why should we?

That is very impressive quoting Bertrand Russell. You'd swear you were trying to get into my good books or something.

[Deleted User]

Fanny Cradock wrote: »

If people are interested in listening to a strong proponent of scientism (which is not to be confused with science) then they should look no further than Peter Atkins.

The problem with the claim that science can explain everything is that the claim fails its own standard. When Bertrand Russell said, "I conclude that, while it is true that science cannot decide questions of values, that is because they cannot be intellectually decided at all, and lie outside the realm of truth and falsehood. Whatever knowledge is attainable, must be attained by scientific methods; and what science cannot discover, mankind cannot know." he was making a scientistic claim that was self-refuting. In short, this isn't a scientific calm and should be disregarded if we are to take the claim to heart, but then why should we?

That reminds me of Protagoras' claim which Socrates refuted, namely "Man is the measure of all things." If each man experiences his own truth, then why should others believe Protagoras' pronouncement?

I don't subscribe to scientism. I'm not sure what my final opinion will be — if I'll ever even have one — on the whole empiricism/rationalism divide, but I do believe it's foolish to believe that the scientific method can discover all things, not necessarily due to a flaw in the method, but due to our own intellectual and cognitive limitations.

Fanny Cradock

Tim Robbins wrote: »

That is very impressive quoting Bertrand Russell. You'd swear you were trying to get into my good books or something.

Heaven forbid!

indioblack

gvn wrote: »

Do you really think that? I'm not so sure, being honest. You can spend all of your time trying to teach a dog algebra, but it's just something it'll never understand, and, more importantly, the dog will never comprehend its inability to understand; our human intellect is limited, so it follows that there's a limit to our understanding and our ability to understand. Perhaps that limit is below what's required to fully understand the universe.

Perhaps.
It may be that we cannot/ will not understand all things through science.
Equally, we cannot state that there are things we will never comprehend - to prove that requires sufficient knowledge of the very thing we claim can never be explained.

[Deleted User]

indioblack wrote: »

Perhaps.
It may be that we cannot/ will not understand all things through science.
Equally, we cannot state that there are things we will never comprehend - to prove that requires sufficient knowledge of the very thing we claim can never be explained.

That's right. But I do think the most reasonable position is to be sceptical of the claim, because believing the claim seems a little ... unfounded and, perhaps, arrogant. Scepticism is the more honest position on the matter, I feel. (Though, like everything else, I'm open to having my opinion changed.)

indioblack

gvn wrote: »

That's right. But I do think the most reasonable position is to be sceptical of the claim, because believing the claim seems a little ... unfounded and, perhaps, arrogant. Scepticism is the more honest position on the matter, I feel. (Though, like everything else, I'm open to having my opinion changed.)

I agree.
I have a relative who watches "Most Haunted" every night, (can't stop her!).
At the end of each program there is a person who attempts to filter out the explainable from the improbable. My sister becomes very vocal at this point and there is much talk of "science doesn't know everything" and "there are things we cannot explain".
I usually answer that the man is playing devils advocate in order to give credibility to the show.
She is quite capable of understanding this - I think she needs the idea of mystery.
Perhaps we all do, to an extent. Mystery that we do not yet understand.
As with so many things - maybe it's the journey rather than the destination.

nagirrac

King Mob wrote: »

Then how could you possibly say that there's been no progress in QM since Einstein's time?

Here's my exact sentence that you reference.. "For all of the effort nobody has made much headway since Einstein understanding the apparent paradox of quantum theory. The questions are just as perplexing today as they were in 1930".

If you had bothered to try and comprehend the sentence I am obviously talking about the EPR paradox regarding the impossibility of knowing the position and momentum of a quantum particle. The implication that one particle can communicate with another (entanglement) across space is mind boggling but apparently true. We have no current science to explain this and all the hypotheses developed since like string theory and M-theory are wholly lacking in any experimental proofs.
One of the problems with science today imo is it has become very establishment controlled. Anything that does not conform to accepted science is ridiculed as "pseudoscience". All the great leaps in scientific breakthrough were made by people going completely against establishment thought (Galileo, Darwin, Einstein). A good example today is Sheldrake who admittedly is a bit of a nutter but at least is challenging establishment thinking. He is asking the right questions in my view. How is it that once knowledge of something is gained it becomes easier for others to use the same knowledge with no contact with the original, how is knowledge passed on from one generation to another as it clearly is (I have chickens that I raised from day old, at night they know to roost in high branches to escape predators, how did they gain this knowledge as they had no older chickens to teach them? instinct? what is instinct, is it carried in genes? is there a tree roosting gene for chickens?), why is it that when a substance crystallises for the first time in one laboratory it then happens easily and regularly in distant laboratories, why does my dog sit and woof at the door 5 minutes before the piano teacher arrives in her car? There are multiple examples of communication and knowledge transfer that are not well understood but any attempt to explain them is laughed at. Our best hope imo is another Einstein shows up soon and blows open the doors of establishment thinking once again.

[Deleted User]

gvn wrote: »

Do you really think that? I'm not so sure, being honest. You can spend all of your time trying to teach a dog algebra, but it's just something it'll never understand, and, more importantly, the dog will never comprehend its inability to understand; our human intellect is limited, so it follows that there's a limit to our understanding and our ability to understand. Perhaps that limit is below what's required to fully understand the universe.

It's possible, but I've yet to see any good reasoning to show there could be something we would never understand.
The closest things that are presented are stuff that does not interact with anything we can observe in the universe which makes them indistinguishable from something that does not exist.

If something has a detectable effect on the universe that effect can be analysed, theorised about and eventually predicted.
If it does not have a detectable effect, then we couldn't do those things but then also that thing looks exactly like it does not exist.

[Deleted User]

nagirrac wrote: »

Here's my exact sentence that you reference.. "For all of the effort nobody has made much headway since Einstein understanding the apparent paradox of quantum theory. The questions are just as perplexing today as they were in 1930".

If you had bothered to try and comprehend the sentence I am obviously talking about the EPR paradox regarding the impossibility of knowing the position and momentum of a quantum particle. The implication that one particle can communicate with another (entanglement) across space is mind boggling but apparently true. We have no current science to explain this and all the hypotheses developed since like string theory and M-theory are wholly lacking in any experimental proofs.

Well again, that's not true. There's tons of papers on the subject.
But let's pretend there aren't. So what?
What about all of the other areas of quantum mechanics that have been advanced?

nagirrac wrote: »

One of the problems with science today imo is it has become very establishment controlled. Anything that does not conform to accepted science is ridiculed as "pseudoscience". All the great leaps in scientific breakthrough were made by people going completely against establishment thought (Galileo, Darwin, Einstein).

No, stuff that sounds like science but isn't scientific is pseudo-science. The proponents of which like to pretend that they are being suppressed by a giant conspiracy to explain away the inadequacies of their particular nonsense.
The scientists you listed weren't going against the established scientific thought, Galileo and Darwin were going against established though from religion.
All of them used based their work on the current theories and tied them together, such as Einstein using Lorentz's work.
The main difference between these theories and pseudo-science is that these can all be shown to be true in good experiments.

nagirrac wrote: »

A good example today is Sheldrake who admittedly is a bit of a nutter but at least is challenging establishment thinking. He is asking the right questions in my view.

But he fails to follow up those "right questions" with good experiment as he is more concerned with his theory being right more than whether it's actually true.

nagirrac wrote: »

why does my dog sit and woof at the door 5 minutes before the piano teacher arrives in her car?

I'm not sure about the other examples, but this one is easy to explain. Dogs are just simply better at understanding body language and such signals than people give them credit for.
Add that to a liberal helping of confirmation bias, poor controls and statistical analysis and there's no need to invoke quantum entanglement.
http://barenormality.wordpress.com/2011/04/22/rupert-sheldrake-and-the-psychic-dog/
I'd wager that the other examples you've provided all fail simple controls.

nagirrac wrote: »

There are multiple examples of communication and knowledge transfer that are not well understood but any attempt to explain them is laughed at. Our best hope imo is another Einstein shows up soon and blows open the doors of establishment thinking once again.

Except that the idea of that happening in the first place is a total myth.
Einstein's work was not immediately accepted at the time simply because it was good, or because it was revolutionary, it was because of the same reason string theory is yet to be accepted. But when it all started to be verified and predictions where starting to , it started to be accepted.

Pseudo-science does not do that. It's nothing to do with "establishments". It's very thing to do with good experiments and objective testing.
Cranks like Sheldrake do not do that and need to invent conspiracy theories to explain why no one is taking him seriously.
No one is laughing at his theories because the are revolutionary (they're not) or because they are different and outlandish.
It's because he's a terrible shill of a scientist.

lmaopml

muppeteer wrote: »

I only say that it holds people back from understanding the world as it exists in reality. Science informs both sides but the conclusions reached by one side are not consistent with our current best scientific understanding. Having a different conclusion from the same evidence is annoying but only human. What actually annoys me is the hypocrisy of accepting some naturalistic conclusions while rejecting ones that conflict with a religion, even though the conclusions are supported by the same reasoning and methods.

Yeah that can be annoying, but not when you understand that Science is nothing more than a tool - and you only derive a 'philosophy' or value system from it soley - whereas others treat it as a tool, and derive their philosophy from not only 'new' understanding but also the lessons outside of naturalism...Christianity is a 'living' philosophy, it's both old and new. It's vital imo.

No argument here. Progressive is just a buzz word. We try our best to make ethics better by our self assigned standards but where it's going we don't know. You seem to be one of the few here to actually understand that atheism says nothing about ethics.

Well, no I'm not really. I 'do' know the meanderings of Atheism/Agnosticism, I was one - however I also know the 'people' too and also what 'progressive' means to some as opposed to others that fall under the same banner - Progressive doesn't necessarily mean the same thing to somebody looking through the lens of Atheism and trying to ground an ethical value. It means that their ethics and morals are changeable, informed by human knowledge and also subject to it alone -

Perhaps this is the reason why Atheists and Agnostics have such a really hard time explaining that they are 'only' this, or 'only' that, so many words to describe themselves - but they have a common expression....as regards how that translates to interaction with others.

They are 'only' human beings with something to say and people to meet and places to go and books to read and truth to seek just like me. I don't claim to be 'superior' I claim to have understood more fully Christianity, and to see the 'Cross' for what it is and others saw it as, and not through the eyes of those that are shy to look at it or understand it. However, that was my choice to seek it..

If you can look at the Cross, and even try to understand why people knew it was vital way back then - than it's just the beginning. We have to be able to look at it first though - most people don't turn to Christ until they wonder about peoples nature and are let down by it, or sometimes don't know what it is to have 'pride' in anything at all they are so poor, and they look at the cross and comprehend that pride is possibly the very best and very worst thing depending on where one decides they should place it.

nagirrac

King Mob wrote: »

I'm not sure about the other examples, but this one is easy to explain. Dogs are just simply better at understanding body language and such signals than people give them credit for.
Add that to a liberal helping of confirmation bias, poor controls and statistical analysis and there's no need to invoke quantum entanglement.
http://barenormality.wordpress.com/2011/04/22/rupert-sheldrake-and-the-psychic-dog/
I'd wager that the other examples you've provided all fail simple controls.

Except that the idea of that happening in the first place is a total myth.
Einstein's work was not immediately accepted at the time simply because it was good, or because it was revolutionary, it was because of the same reason string theory is yet to be accepted. But when it all started to be verified and predictions where starting to , it started to be accepted.

Pseudo-science does not do that. It's nothing to do with "establishments". It's very thing to do with good experiments and objective testing.
Cranks like Sheldrake do not do that and need to invent conspiracy theories to explain why no one is taking him seriously.
No one is laughing at his theories because the are revolutionary (they're not) or because they are different and outlandish.
It's because he's a terrible shill of a scientist.

Sheldrake is a "crank" and a "shill" but you post a completely discredited paper by the former magician Richard Wiseman to make your point?? If you had any interest in truth you would point out that Wiseman finally admitted in 2007 (7 years after he published his debunking paper) that his experimental results were identical to Sheldrakes. Wiseman has contributed nothing to science, unlike Sheldrake who has done a mountain of work. For those interested in Sheldrake's work and his utter repudiation of Wiseman they can visit www.sheldrake.org and make their own minds up. Just as an aside, my reference to a dog's behavior had nothing to do with Sheldrake and is simply my experience with my dog.. and it has nothing to do with "understanding body language" as it happens whether I am in the house or outside.

Materialistic scientists generally are the equivalent of flatearthers. Their minds are completely closed by their scepticism. The quote from Max Plank comes to mind: "A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die off". Although I am sure it is not your intention you could just as easily be speaking about Sheldrake with your commentary on Einstein. Sheldrake's Hypotheses of Formative Causation is very compelling to those with an open mind but of course will not be generally accepted until it is verified, guess what, just like Einstein's work.

[Deleted User]

nagirrac wrote: »

Sheldrake is a "crank" and a "shill" but you post a completely discredited paper by the former magician Richard Wiseman to make your point?? If you had any interest in truth you would point out that Wiseman finally admitted in 2007 (7 years after he published his debunking paper) that his experimental results were identical to Sheldrakes. Wiseman has contributed nothing to science, unlike Sheldrake who has done a mountain of work. For those interested in Sheldrake's work and his utter repudiation of Wiseman they can visit www.sheldrake.org and make their own minds up.

Why is it important that Wiseman was a former magician? What about the fact that he's a current researcher at a university?
What about the other issues with Sheldrake's theories that were raised in the article I posted that shows that the experimental results that they both got don't actually show what Sheldrake says they do?
Why do you take issue with me calling him a crank when you yourself called him a nutter?

nagirrac wrote: »

Just as an aside, my reference to a dog's behavior had nothing to do with Sheldrake and is simply my experience with my dog.. and it has nothing to do with "understanding body language" as it happens whether I am in the house or outside.

Dogs understanding body language is just one factor I suggested. I also pointed to confirmation bias: that you would be more likely to remember the times he exhibited the behaviour than the times he did not and therefore it would appear as if the behaviour was consistent.
And there's a hundred and one other factors and explanations you need to consider and exclude before you can present your anecdote as evidence of psychic dogs. And there's a lot more you'd need to present to show that psychic digs have anything to do with quantum mechanics.

And then there's the models that are needed to explain how this behaviour happens or by what mechanism it works.

Neither you nor Sheldrake can provide those things, instead opting to cry about how mean science is.

nagirrac wrote: »

Materialistic scientists generally are the equivalent of flatearthers. Their minds are completely closed by their scepticism. The quote from Max Plank comes to mind: "A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die off". Although I am sure it is not your intention you could just as easily be speaking about Sheldrake with your commentary on Einstein. Sheldrake's Hypotheses of Formative Causation is very compelling to those with an open mind but of course will not be generally accepted until it is verified, guess what, just like Einstein's work.

And here you seem to be using "open mind" to mean "stop using critical thinking."
If Sheldrakes work was anything other than the psuedo-scientific schlock that it was, there'd be not issue with providing the evidence to support it. If the evidence is good it would satisfy any skeptics.
However both Sheldrake and yourself don't provide this evidence when asked. Instead you write waffle about how all of science is wrong and how all these other scientists are just like you (despite that not being actually true.)

So can you say that you are open minded? Have you considered the possibility that Sheldrake's theories are in fact pseudo-scientific crap?
What reasoning or evidence would convince you that they are?

nagirrac

King Mob wrote: »

So can you say that you are open minded? Have you considered the possibility that Sheldrake's theories are in fact pseudo-scientific crap?
What reasoning or evidence would convince you that they are?

So I assume to reach your conclusions on Sheldrake you have read all 80 of his Scientific Papers and all 10 of his published books, or do you take your opinion from Robert Wiseman and other skeptics? If you don't mind personally I will go with the guy with the PhD in BioChemistry from Cambridge, with a lifetime of work in Biology over the ex magician with the PhD in Psychology from Edinburgh.
A lot of "accepted science" has been later proven to be crap. I am sceptical myself but not to the extent of materialistic skeptics who refuse to consider anything that does not fit with their worldview.
As for the dog, where did I say she was equipped with psi? I am merely reporting what I see. I have eliminated confirmation bias as she has done it consistently once a week every week for 3 years. I have no idea how she does it, maybe she can hear a specific car that is a mile away, who knows.
BTW your comparison of String Theory with Einstein's work is laughable. I recommend you read "The Trouble with Physics" by Lee Smolin which illuminates String theory for what it is, a conjecture. Unlike Sheldrake's work which is a hypothetis (and not a theory as you stated).

marienbad

nagirrac wrote: »

So I assume to reach your conclusions on Sheldrake you have read all 80 of his Scientific Papers and all 10 of his published books, or do you take your opinion from Robert Wiseman and other skeptics? If you don't mind personally I will go with the guy with the PhD in BioChemistry from Cambridge, with a lifetime of work in Biology over the ex magician with the PhD in Psychology from Edinburgh.
A lot of "accepted science" has been later proven to be crap. I am sceptical myself but not to the extent of materialistic skeptics who refuse to consider anything that does not fit with their worldview.
As for the dog, where did I say she was equipped with psi? I am merely reporting what I see. I have eliminated confirmation bias as she has done it consistently once a week every week for 3 years. I have no idea how she does it, maybe she can hear a specific car that is a mile away, who knows.
BTW your comparison of String Theory with Einstein's work is laughable. I recommend you read "The Trouble with Physics" by Lee Smolin which illuminates String theory for what it is, a conjecture. Unlike Sheldrake's work which is a hypothetis (and not a theory as you stated).

nagirrac - I have been following this exchange but at this stage I am at a loss as to what is your point exactly ?

As you say a lot of ''accepted science has proven to be crap '', but so what ? It has been shown to be such by the same scientists or their decendants . That is how we progress.

Are you saying that scientists in general have a world view and anything that does not conform is given a hard time ?

nagirrac

marienbad wrote: »

nagirrac - I have been following this exchange but at this stage I am at a loss as to what is your point exactly ?

As you say a lot of ''accepted science has proven to be crap '', but so what ? It has been shown to be such by the same scientists or their decendants . That is how we progress.

Are you saying that scientists in general have a world view and anything that does not conform is given a hard time ?

I am saying that materialistic scientists in particular like Dawkins and his fellow travellers have a world view that is close minded. They have contributed nothing new to science other than "explaining" what is already known. Any scientist who goes against their materialistic worldview is ridiculed, such as Sheldrake. People should read Sheldrake's work and make up their own minds.

marienbad

nagirrac wrote: »

I am saying that materialistic scientists in particular like Dawkins and his fellow travellers have a world view that is close minded. They have contributed nothing new to science other than "explaining" what is already known. Any scientist who goes against their materialistic worldview is ridiculed, such as Sheldrake. People should read Sheldrake's work and make up their own minds.

Why the obsession with Dawkins ? He is only one and as far as he is concerned he sees it as his vocation to counter organisations that are according to him totally close minded . To some that is a noble calling if only for the education value alone.

As for Sheldrake - I read him years ago when he first broke away and to be honest after an initial attraction he just turned out to be another false prophet , a bit like Colin Wilson in the late 60's
shaking up the literary establishment . Needless to say the establishment won and rightfully so. I think the same is true of Rupert and I don't intend reading all his books and papers.

Life is too short to read every maverick- it is an impossibility.

nagirrac

marienbad wrote: »

Why the obsession with Dawkins ? He is only one and as far as he is concerned he sees it as his vocation to counter organisations that are according to him totally close minded . To some that is a noble calling if only for the education value alone.

As for Sheldrake - I read him years ago when he first broke away and to be honest after an initial attraction he just turned out to be another false prophet , a bit like Colin Wilson in the late 60's
shaking up the literary establishment . Needless to say the establishment won and rightfully so. I think the same is true of Rupert and I don't intend reading all his books and papers.

Life is too short to read every maverick- it is an impossibility.

Well, the thread is about Atheism/Existance of God and as Dawkins is the poster child of the New Atheists I think he deserves a bit of attention. I have spoken to many who regard themselves as atheist and they all cite Dawkins so I believe he is highly influential. I agree he adds enormously to the debate, I just happen to disagree with a lot of his conclusions.

[Deleted User]

nagirrac wrote: »

So I assume to reach your conclusions on Sheldrake you have read all 80 of his Scientific Papers and all 10 of his published books, or do you take your opinion from Robert Wiseman and other skeptics?

I reached my conclusion based on the horrible science he uses in his "papers" on supernatural nonsense and his behaviour in the face of criticism.

What exactly are you basing your opinion of Richard Wiseman on?
The comments made by Sheldrake?

nagirrac wrote: »

If you don't mind personally I will go with the guy with the PhD in BioChemistry from Cambridge, with a lifetime of work in Biology over the ex magician with the PhD in Psychology from Edinburgh.

And I would go for the guy who uses actual science and good points rather than relying on an argument from authority. Or at least the guy who doesn't believe in magic dogs.

There's plenty of people with degrees from Cambridge and other institutions that are more prestigious than Edinburgh who all agree that Sheldrake is a crank. So how come you don't trust them?

And again, why do you keep referring to Wiseman as an ex-magician?
Does that somehow make him untrustworthy?
If you're going to engage in personal attacks, maybe you should pick something a little more damning?

nagirrac wrote: »

A lot of "accepted science" has been later proven to be crap.

...Proven to be crap by science :rolleyes:

Unless you can show me one piece of accepted science that was disproved by other means?

nagirrac wrote: »

I am sceptical myself but not to the extent of materialistic skeptics who refuse to consider anything that does not fit with their worldview.

So then can you please answer the question I presented to you in the last post:
So can you say that you are open minded? Have you considered the possibility that Sheldrake's theories are in fact pseudo-scientific crap?
What reasoning or evidence would convince you that they are?

nagirrac wrote: »

As for the dog, where did I say she was equipped with psi? I am merely reporting what I see.

What does equipped with psi mean? What is psi?

nagirrac wrote: »

I have eliminated confirmation bias as she has done it consistently once a week every week for 3 years. I have no idea how she does it, maybe she can hear a specific car that is a mile away, who knows.

So you have other explanations for the behaviour: routine and being able to hear really well.
Yet you still pretend that this is somehow indicative of psychic powers? Or of weird Quantum effects? Or that science doesn't work somehow?

nagirrac wrote: »

BTW your comparison of String Theory with Einstein's work is laughable. I recommend you read "The Trouble with Physics" by Lee Smolin which illuminates String theory for what it is, a conjecture.

I did not compare Einstein's work with string theory.
No one claims that string theory is more than hypothetical.

nagirrac wrote: »

Unlike Sheldrake's work which is a hypothetis (and not a theory as you stated).

No Sheldrake's work is not even a hypothesis. It's nonsense supported by bad science and poor reasoning (both of with you've illustrated excellently).

Tim Robbins

nagirrac wrote: »

Well, the thread is about Atheism/Existance of God and as Dawkins is the poster child of the New Atheists I think he deserves a bit of attention. I have spoken to many who regard themselves as atheist and they all cite Dawkins so I believe he is highly influential. I agree he adds enormously to the debate, I just happen to disagree with a lot of his conclusions.

Do you ever think you make generalisations?

nagirrac

King Mob wrote: »

I reached my conclusion based on the horrible science he uses in his "papers" on supernatural nonsense and his behaviour in the face of criticism.

What exactly are you basing your opinion of Richard Wiseman on?
The comments made by Sheldrake?

And I would go for the guy who uses actual science and good points rather than relying on an argument from authority. Or at least the guy who doesn't believe in magic dogs.

There's plenty of people with degrees from Cambridge and other institutions that are more prestigious than Edinburgh who all agree that Sheldrake is a crank. So how come you don't trust them?

And again, why do you keep referring to Wiseman as an ex-magician?
Does that somehow make him untrustworthy?
If you're going to engage in personal attacks, maybe you should pick something a little more damning?

...Proven to be crap by science :rolleyes:

Unless you can show me one piece of accepted science that was disproved by other means?

So then can you please answer the question I presented to you in the last post:
So can you say that you are open minded? Have you considered the possibility that Sheldrake's theories are in fact pseudo-scientific crap?
What reasoning or evidence would convince you that they are?

What does equipped with psi mean? What is psi?

So you have other explanations for the behaviour: routine and being able to hear really well.
Yet you still pretend that this is somehow indicative of psychic powers? Or of weird Quantum effects? Or that science doesn't work somehow?

I did not compare Einstein's work with string theory.
No one claims that string theory is more than hypothetical.

No Sheldrake's work is not even a hypothesis. It's nonsense supported by bad science and poor reasoning (both of with you've illustrated excellently).

I find it interesting that you continue to mock "bad science" and lack of good experimental data in one field, yet if one is being honest string theory is the greatest offender in this regard as it has abandoned the principle of experimental confirmation completely. As Lee Smolin points out there were 5 great unanswered questions in physics 30 years ago when string theory became the dominant idea in theorietcical physics and none of them have been solved in the past 30 years. It is just as easy for me to refer to string theory as pseudo-science as it is not based on experimental data that can be confirmed and frankly has made no significant progress in our understanding of the universe (where are the Nobel prizes for string theorists?). The problem I see currently is that establishment science (academic and private) has accepted string theory, to work in theoretical physics one must accept string theory, and there are huge resources being spent on something that may be a dead end and never provable.

Of course I am open minded enough to consider that Sheldrake may be completely wrong just as string theory may be completely wrong. There is no point discussing Sheldrake further as obviously you think he is a charlatan and I don't so lets just leave it there. Leaving aside the dog and staring paranormal studies, his hypothesis of morphic fields is based on decades of work in biological science where he was a pioneer.

If we can broaden the discussion a little and more relevant to the original thread, to my mind the most significant question on the God/lack of God question is how is the universe equipped with the exact set of natural laws that allowed life to emerge, with the odds of that happening being so huge.
1. Was it completely random. Given the probabilities involved this is extremely unlikely.
2. There are a large number of universes and we experience the one that supports life (suggested by string / M-theory).
3. There is a God outside our space time universe that designed the universe.
4. There are forces/effects/energies within our universe that we currently are unaware of and have not been able to measure.

Essentially all of modern theoretical physics is working on 2. I would call that bad science as it is putting all the eggs in one basket and is likely to turn out to be the greatest dead end science ever went down.

psi is a common term for physic ability, you would know that if you had read anything regarding paranormal effects. I never said my dog had psychic abilities by the way, I said she exhibits behavior I do not understand. There are countless examples of paranormal effects that have no explanation regardless of how much scorn skeptics like Wiseman and Randi heap on them. I find a great hypocricy from those that mock experiments that fail when they are being observed and yet have no problem with science accepting that subatomic particles behave differently while being observed. I personally question why so little scientific effort is expended in the paranormal area but enormous resources are potentially being wasted on a theory that has no experimental confirmation. The difference between string theory and Einstein's woek is that Einstein developed experimental data (light bending around stars) which took him 10 years to confirm, no experimental data exists for string theory and none may never exist.
That is my biggest problem with science as it stands today. Enormous resources being spent on a theory that has had no experimental confirmation in 30 years.

[Deleted User]

nagirrac wrote: »

I find it interesting that you continue to mock "bad science" and lack of good experimental data in one field, yet if one is being honest string theory is the greatest offender in this regard as it has abandoned the principle of experimental confirmation completely.

Again you are putting works in my mouth.
Yes string theory has yet to make and testable claims. However unlike hacks like sheldrake string theorists do not claim that they have done experiments that prove string theory. Further they haven't used bad science and dishonest tactics to defend themselves when criticised.

nagirrac wrote: »

Of course I am open minded enough to consider that Sheldrake may be completely wrong just as string theory may be completely wrong.

So again, what evidence or reasoning would you accept that would convince you he is wrong? If you really are a skeptic and open minded you should have no problem answering that question. Yet this the the third time asking.

nagirrac wrote: »

There is no point discussing Sheldrake further as obviously you think he is a charlatan and I don't so lets just leave it there. Leaving aside the dog and staring paranormal studies, his hypothesis of morphic fields is based on decades of work in biological science where he was a pioneer.

Lol pioneer is not a word I'd use.
His hypothesis is a joke. It's never once been shown to happen experimentally. It doesn't make a lick of sense in physics or biology. There's no plausible mechanism by which it can work.
And you say he's been at that for decades? Yet you hate string theory for not producing results for 30 years?

nagirrac wrote: »

Essentially all of modern theoretical physics is working on 2. I would call that bad science as it is putting all the eggs in one basket and is likely to turn out to be the greatest dead end science ever went down.

That's a lie. There are other competing theories that are proposed by other scientists who use actual science, such as loop quantum gravity.

nagirrac wrote: »

I never said my dog had psychic abilities by the way, I said she exhibits behavior I do not understand.

So why the hell did you bring it up in the first place?

nagirrac wrote: »

There are countless examples of paranormal effects that have no explanation regardless of how much scorn skeptics like Wiseman and Randi heap on them.

No there's not.
There is not one single paranormal effect that is observable in conditions that exclude the possibility of cheating, psychological effects or other confounding factors.

nagirrac wrote: »

I find a great hypocricy from those that mock experiments that fail when they are being observed and yet have no problem with science accepting that subatomic particles behave differently while being observed.

You do not seem to understand what the observer effect is because it would not apply to an experiment like Sheldrake's or other paranormal effects.

We mock experiments that fail only when the pseudo-scientists still cling on to them and make silly chlidish excuses rather than do what an actual scientist would do.

nagirrac wrote: »

I personally question why so little scientific effort is expended in the paranormal area but enormous resources are potentially being wasted on a theory that has no experimental confirmation.

Because every single well controlled experiment conducted on the paranormal fails to show an effect.
While string theory is yet to produce experimental tests, the models are very mathematically sound, just as Einstein's theories where before they were experimentally observed.

nagirrac wrote: »

That is my biggest problem with science as it stands today. Enormous resources being spent on a theory that has had no experimental confirmation in 30 years.

How much resources are being spend on it exactly?
And how much should we instead spend on spoon bending and psychic dogs?

[Deleted User]

nagirrac wrote: »

I am saying that materialistic scientists in particular like Dawkins and his fellow travellers have a world view that is close minded. They have contributed nothing new to science other than "explaining" what is already known. Any scientist who goes against their materialistic worldview is ridiculed, such as Sheldrake. People should read Sheldrake's work and make up their own minds.

Given that the scientific method is only applicable to the materialistic world (i.e. to matter), would it not be an oxymoron for a scientist to study the immaterial? Aren't scientists by necessity confined to the materialistic? I'm not sure what your point is.

P.S. Dawkins has contributed to biology; he isn't merely an expositor or populariser.

nagirrac

gvn wrote: »

Given that the scientific method is only applicable to the materialistic world (i.e. to matter), would it not be an oxymoron for a scientist to study the immaterial? Aren't scientists by necessity confined to the materialistic? I'm not sure what your point is.

P.S. Dawkins has contributed to biology; he isn't merely an expositor or populariser.

Actually the reality is almost the opposite to your statement. Ordinary matter (our material world that we can measure) represents roughly 5% of the Universe acording to modern Cosmology. The remaining 95% is 70% dark energy and 25% dark matter. We have a very limited understanding of dark energy and dark matter, so 95% of the universe consists of energy and matter that we can see the effects of on a macro level but have no specific understanding of as yet. The nature of dark energy and dark matter is one of the 5 great unsolved issues in physics.
List one scientific discovery Dawkins has made other than writing popular books explaining (very well) the work of others.

[Deleted User]

nagirrac wrote: »

Actually the reality is almost the opposite to your statement. Ordinary matter (our material world that we can measure) represents roughly 5% of the Universe acording to modern Cosmology. The remaining 95% is 70% dark energy and 25% dark matter. We have a very limited understanding of dark energy and dark matter, so 95% of the universe consists of energy and matter that we can see the effects of on a macro level but have no specific understanding of as yet. The nature of dark energy and dark matter is one of the 5 great unsolved issues in physics.

The hint is in the name: dark energy and dark matter. The affects of both hypotheses on the universe can be studied with the scientific method; they're not immaterial in the sense that they're outside the remit of science. My original point still stands: it's an oxymoron to suggest that scientists should study that which is immaterial. Scientists are empiricists, as such they study that which can be observed; after all, science is the study of the natural world (and not the supernatural world).

List one scientific discovery Dawkins has made other than writing popular books explaining (very well) the work of others.

Memetics, for one.

He has published dozens of scientific papers, too. He's not just a populariser: he's also a scientist who has contributed to his field.

philologos

Memetics isn't a great example. It's been commonly criticised as pseudoscience. It's not much more than a philosophy.

[Deleted User]

philologos wrote: »

Memetics isn't a great example. It's been commonly criticised as pseudoscience. It's not much more than a philosophy.

That's beside the point, though. nagirrac is claiming that Dawkins is nothing more than an expositor or populariser of science — he is these things, but not only these things — when, in fact, he has contributed, or at the very least attempted to contribute, to his field of evolutionary biology. I'm not Dawkins' biggest fan, but I can at least recognise this fact.

[Deleted User]

nagirrac wrote: »

Actually the reality is almost the opposite to your statement. Ordinary matter (our material world that we can measure) represents roughly 5% of the Universe acording to modern Cosmology. The remaining 95% is 70% dark energy and 25% dark matter. We have a very limited understanding of dark energy and dark matter, so 95% of the universe consists of energy and matter that we can see the effects of on a macro level but have no specific understanding of as yet. The nature of dark energy and dark matter is one of the 5 great unsolved issues in physics.

Yet the only reason we know that there is dark matter out there is because of modern science.
And we can measure both dark matter and dark energy, we are just not yet able to tell what it is made out of.

We aren't going to be able to figure out what it is by suddenly deciding that all science is useless.
We will however figure it out using the scientific method.

nagirrac wrote: »

List one scientific discovery Dawkins has made other than writing popular books explaining (very well) the work of others.

Name one discovery that Sheldrake has ever shown to be true in well controlled experiments.

nagirrac

King Mob wrote: »

And how much should we instead spend on spoon bending and psychic dogs?

The fact you highlight spoon bending reveals who you truly are, a fanatical sceptic similar to Wiseman and Randi. As for spoon bending, there are scoundrels in every walk of life, including science. Experiments leading to the desired effect are all too common in science unfortunately and there are all too many example of "good" science being later exposed as "bad" science.

I assume you have heard of quantum entanglement. When first proposed in the famous EPR paper in 1935 it was met with huge skepticism and understandably so. If there was ever a proposal that sounded like paranormal babble here it was. The idea that particles could influence each other over vast distances instantaneously was scorned. Even Einstein himself refused to accept it and referred to it as "spooky action at a distance". However in time quantum entanglement was experimentally proven to exist, and experiments have proven since that effects due to entanglement travel at speeds of at least thousands of times faster than the speed of light (H. Xbindin et. al. 2001). Weird eh! Sounds a bit like pseudoscience to me but I have to accept it exists as it has been experimentally proven and confirmed by multiple researchers. If you accept quantum entanglement then I simply don't know how you can just dismiss out of hand other strange effects in nature.

Compared to quantum entanglement Sheldrake's hypothesis is much more rational sounding, essentially that there is a memory effect carried by a field (the morphic field) influencing transfer of knowledge between organic entities. It is a complementary hypothesis to natural selkection and not opposed to it. His work was positively received by the New Scientist and Biologist among others but it was the review by John Maddox in Nature that set off all the anti Sheldrake hysteria. A direct quote form Maddox in a later BBC documentary sums up the fanatical sceptic position well "Sheldrake is putting forward magic instead of science, and that can be condemned, in the same language that the Pope condemned Galileo, and for the same reasons, it is heresy". If that does not sound depressingly familiar I don't know what is. It was Leibniz that described Newton's work on universal gravitation as "trying to smuggle the occult into science". Scientific history is littered with mavericks who in their time were scorned and later proven correct. The establishment in Gallileo's time was the Church, there was no higher authority in science.
To make the comments that you have on paranormal effects shows your absolute ignorance on the subject. Have you read Dean Radin's "The Conscious Universe"? You seem happy just to accept debunkers such as Randi and Wiseman who themselves have been completely dishonest in their fanatical zeal to debunk paranormal effects. Everything you need to know about Wiseman is revealed in his attempts to debunk Sheldrake's dog and staring experiments. Regardless of whether you belief or disbelieve Sheldrake's work, Wiseman is completely untrustworthy. On the dog experiment he got identical results and then misrepresnted his own findings, claiming to refute what he had actually verified. On the staring experiment after coming up with similar results as Sheldrake he dismissed his student volunteers and replaced them by himself and then got negative results. How convenient, confirmation bias indeed.

Sheldrake may indeed be wrong in some of his conclusions on morphogenetic fields. It is a fascinating area of biologoical study, first proposed by Paul Weiss in the 1920s. Regardless, he is hardly deserving of the hostile criticism he has received from the "science sceptics" that you are repeating here. To criticise Sheldrake, you have to open your mind up enough to acquire even a basic understanding of his work which I suspect you have not.