Pope says god was behind Big Bang, world awaits proof.

God must be tiny, hiding among those gaps.

Theres no mention of the big bang in that article by the pope wtf? Anyone got any quotes on the pope accepting evolution or is that more tabloid nonsense?

jhegarty wrote: »

rehabilitated(Verb)
1. Restore (someone) to health or normal life by training and therapy after imprisonment, addiction, or illness.
2. Restore (someone) to former privileges or reputation after a period of critical or official disfavor.

Wow absolvement from "official disfavour" is strong enough to deserve the
word "rehabilitate" I thought that was only reserved for being sick or
when you actually did something wrong.

If you use the word that way it still doesn't make sense, they only
issued this apology as a means to gain their own "rehabilitation" in
the eyes of society seeing as they were the ones who transgressed,
& conceding that the term applies for them to bestow in this situation is to
concede that they took away reputation & privileges when in
the long run they were the ones who ultimately lost both,
hence the issuing of "rehabilitation" orders 300 years later as nothing
more than a face-saving tactic.

recedite wrote: »

Less important news; that cheeky pup Hawking disagrees;
"God did not create the universe and the Big Bang"

Pope versus Hawking... fight!

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Hey guys,
I'm fine with the pope doing this and attributing things to god. at least he is accepting reality even if he is attributing it to his god. I wish more religious people would accept scientific ideas, like the earth being older than 6000 years, even if they are going to attribute them to their god, its an improvement. Accepting reality and saying 'my god done it' is better then not accepting the reality.

That's not really accepting reality though is it?
I suppose it is partially accepting reality.... a step in the right direction I guess.

rccaulfield wrote: »

I'm just after links, why are you asking an unrelated question?


No but i have 2 words for you zillah! Christ ya can't make conversation in a forum these days without a smartarse jumpin on ya. Some horrible characters in this forum!

In fairness Zillah was being nice to you. He could just have done this. And, given that Zillah is usually sharp and blunt, I'd defo say you got the nice end of his stick.

I'm a horrible character.


Anyway my attitude was due to the rather obnoxious implication that a matter of public record (Catholic Church and evolution) was "tabloid nonsense". Especially when the person in question could have disabused themselves of this misconception rather easily rather than blustering around in here.

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Again I agree, it is god of the gaps, but moving god to the cause of the cause is much better than denying the effect in the real world. Two scientists could work together and agree on their findings and one of them attribute the findings to his god and the other to pixies. I dont mind that so long as their method is sound I dont care what they attribute it to. Like Ken Miller for example. Its not ideal but so long as they are honest in their science I dont care what they attribute it to.

But attributing it to something that can by no means even remotely be proven isn't honest science. We may not (at this time) be able to show exactly how some particular belief is wrong (eg life on earth came from aliens putting it here), but if they cant show, even in general, how their particular belief could be right (no evidence of said aliens, no evidence that life couldn't have arosen naturally on life), then their particular belief is scientifically useless (and being a stopgap for their ignorance doesn't count). This is doubly true in the case of god, who is scientifically untestable.

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

My point could be boiled down to this, its much better to have people examine the real world and look honestly for the hows, rather than stand in the way of actual progress. If they all behaved like that there could be the creation Myth, and the Fact of evolution taught side by side in religion books. Instead of just the myth taught as fact

But attributing these things when there is no evidence is standing in the way of actual progress. Why bother checking how the big bang arose, if we can just say it was god? If we have no scientific reason to say god did it, then bother saying god it at all? What purpose does it serve. God is untestable, in scientific terms, so can we scientifically hold to the assertion that god did something? You end up with a lot of contradictions, the only way to avoid them is to not make baseless assumptions and hold to them as if they any weight.

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

In answer to your last question I agree with the statement but my point is thatim talking about people you could work together with all week genuinely trying to figure things out and do different things sunday morning. Which im ok with.

I see what you are saying, and I do agree that one isn't necessarily as bad as the other, but they are both from the same fallacy, the fallacy that "insert thing I like the sound of" has to be true because I like it.

If you think about it, though, in some ways the people who go for the gap of the gaps argument are more disingenous than those who dont. Those who do, do so because they recognise that you cant ignore strong evidence to suit your own beliefs, (a distinctly scientific outlook, objective evidence>personal experience), but they will then look for places with no strong evidence for anything and start making baseless untestable assumptions, something which scientifically you cant do. They accept science only when it suits them and that is unscientific and to hold to that way of thinking would ultimately retard scientific progress.

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Ah yes I think I see the misunderstanding here. Im not talking about using god to explain anything or mention god in journals. At the point where I, and most of the posters here, 'would say x seems to be a natural law', the religious person too could say 'x seems to be a natural law' and when they go home they can be satisfied that they have figured out the natural law their god uses. I am not ok with using god to explain anything without evidence, or in spite of evidence.
Just saying it is an improvement. Not the ideal

But they are, in that case, using god to explain something. They are assuming that natural laws have some intelligence behind them, something not supported by scientific reasoining. These people are still, essentially, attributing lightning to thor, just with a bit of a better understanding of the workings of the lightning itself.

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

yes they are both forms of the same fallicy. One is very obstructionist the other Could be completely unobstructionist (if thats a real word) if its done in line with scientific method. I think ken miller is a good example of what im talking about.

If you hold completely to the scientific method, you simply wont do it. And of course its obstructionist, what happens when we get more understanding of the universe and start challenging these unscientifically arrived at beliefs? Do you think people will just drop them in favour of a difficult reality? History would say otherwise.

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Just for contrast I mean finding real world effects and finding real world causes for them. I am not talking about the cause being god and trying to find evidence for an effect, like in the case of 'creation science' Christ I hate using that phrase.
If a guy is doing good science I dont care if he figures out how something actually works and says “so thats how god does it”.
So long as they are not inserting god as an explanation for the effect.

But by saying "so thats how god does it" you are inserting god as an explanation for why it happens. You figure out how something happens and then you attribute the why to god, its fallacious logic and not in any way scienctific.

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

There is a massive difference between saying gravity works because god just makes it work, and saying gravity = ((m1xm2)/D squared) because thats the natural law god uses. You dont have to be religious to use it.

What? they are the same thing: god makes it work by making gravity = ((m1xm2)/D squared).

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Just so you know I dont like the idea of religious attribution of causes. I am however saying that im glad they are saying god did the big bang because thats what the evidence suggests rather than god did 6 day creation. Im sure we are in agreement on that.

!!WHAT!! The evidence suggests nothing of the sort. What evidence do you think suggest such nonsense?

Soulja boy wrote: »

No, you obviously wouldn't have that power.

Prove that i dont have the power :P

CDfm wrote: »

There is no reason for anyone to suggest that the Catholic Church has ever had a problem with the Big Bang, its originator, George LaMaitre , a Catholic Friar was honoured by the Catholic Church. A Monsignor is like a Bishop without a diosese.

So I presume, there is a reason for it, are their some Laws of Natural Science that the Catholic Church rejects.

It was actually Alexander Friedmann who came up with it, after finding out that it was a consequence of General Relativity. LaMaitre argued for it, but it didn't originate with him.

Mark Hamill wrote: »

But they are, in that case, using god to explain something. They are assuming that natural laws have some intelligence behind them, something not supported by scientific reasoining. These people are still, essentially, attributing lightning to thor, just with a bit of a better understanding of the workings of the lightning itself.


If you hold completely to the scientific method, you simply wont do it. And of course its obstructionist, what happens when we get more understanding of the universe and start challenging these unscientifically arrived at beliefs? Do you think people will just drop them in favour of a difficult reality? History would say otherwise.


But by saying "so thats how god does it" you are inserting god as an explanation for why it happens. You figure out how something happens and then you attribute the why to god, its fallacious logic and not in any way scienctific.


What? they are the same thing: god makes it work by making gravity = ((m1xm2)/D squared).


!!WHAT!! The evidence suggests nothing of the sort. What evidence do you think suggest such nonsense?

Yeah I am assuming that the theist believes 2 things and uses them as underlying assumptions
1 god exists
2 god is responsible for the universe and everything in it.

I dont like those beliefs and I dont think they are backed by evidence but im not a theist. I suggest you argue those points with a theist.
So when evidence suggests a big bang the theist will assume god did it by that means. I am saying that the theist who is interested in the how questions is someone who can use scientific method even if he believes his god is ultimately responsible for what he finds.

I agree that its not even nearly ideal and to be honest I dont see where we disagree.

You can work more easily with the theist who uses the formula for gravity than the theist who is not interested in the how and just asserts angels pull things towards the earth with random force. I really dont think im saying anything controversial here