concept of GOD in science

[cyruseternity]

The thing which stuck out for me the most which I believe is the pivotal point between believers in God and atheists, was that Atheists could never give a satisfying answer as to why the planet Earth was in the right place, at the right time, and in this state for millions of years to support the different forms of life. When this was asked, theyd simply reply that we are only experiencing life: if it wouldnt exist in that way, we wouldnt observe it. This is known as the contra-antropic-principle. But that seems like a fancy way for saying, It is like that because if it werent like that then it wouldnt be like that. Well yeah, obviously, but that still doesnt make it any less miraculously that it is like that, and not any other of the million less favourable ways..[NO OFFENCE ]

[david345]

This is known as the contra-antropic-principle. But that seems like a fancy way for saying, It is like that because if it werent like that then it wouldnt be like that. Well yeah, obviously, but that still doesnt make it any less miraculously that it is like that, and not any other of the million less favourable ways..[NO OFFENCE ]

You explain this by saying it was created by an even more miraculous super hero in the sky. You have no proof that the earth must have been created. You act as though things must be created. This is highly unlikely.

[cyruseternity]

Anyways guys lets agree to disagree here.....

THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR PRECIOUS TIME

[david345]

Thanks and good night.

[Strange]

Thats wat im trying to say...just like no one can prove 100% whether QM is true or false....if a new theory comes in which is more suitable surely the QM will be discarded....similarly no one can prove that god doesn't exist...it is just our faith...

 

It is true that science never 100% proves anything there is still a big difference. There is overwhelming evidence for quantum theory and it is used in technology such as the computer you are using. There is also no evidence that shows it to be wrong (yet). So accepting quantum theory is NOT an act of faith.

 

However, there is zero evidence for (or against) gods or unicorns so if you believe in them then that is 100% an act of faith. I have no problem with that, as long as you don't try and equate your evidence-free faith with science.

[Phi for All]

Similarly for an atheist to say there is no God, he should at least know the concept of God

 

Then shouldn't you know the concept of quantum mechanics? You're saying it's a belief like a religion, but it's clear you don't understand it or you wouldn't EVER say that. QM works, and we have lots of evidence to back that up.

 

The thing which stuck out for me the most which I believe is the pivotal point between believers in God and atheists, was that Atheists could never give a satisfying answer as to why the planet Earth was in the right place, at the right time, and in this state for millions of years to support the different forms of life. When this was asked, theyd simply reply that we are only experiencing life: if it wouldnt exist in that way, we wouldnt observe it. This is known as the contra-antropic-principle. But that seems like a fancy way for saying, It is like that because if it werent like that then it wouldnt be like that. Well yeah, obviously, but that still doesnt make it any less miraculously that it is like that, and not any other of the million less favourable ways..[NO OFFENCE ]

 

“This is rather as if you imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in — an interesting hole I find myself in — fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!' This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, frantically hanging on to the notion that everything's going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise. I think this may be something we need to be on the watch out for.”

 

― Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt

Science doesn't concern itself with "why". That's for philosophy. So you're criticizing science for not doing what it wasn't designed to do.

[iNow]

What does science say about the existence of God...

Nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

This is not entirely true, at least not if one considers psychology and sociology to be branches of science.

Brother the whole quantum mechanics is based on assumptions.

As has been pointed out, this is a false equivalence. QM and the God concept do not rest on the same empirical (nor even logical) footing. QM is part of a much larger empirical framework and evidence of its validity is available to each of us every single day (for example, it underlies that computer you are using right now).

[imatfaal]

I have almost had it with the repetition by defenders of existence of a Deity of "the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence" - this is basically just an argument from ignorance. I claim that this argument is logically and morally bankrupt.

 

Morally - You claim the existence of a supreme being, a creator of the universe, a prime mover yet cannot provide any positive evidence to support this that does not require a pre-existing acceptance of the fact which is begging the question on a supreme scale

 

Logically - If there is a torrential rain storm outside my office then the street and pavement get wet - the street and pavement are not wet therefore there has not been a torrential rainstorm. Sure there will be patches of dry where a van parked - but I, as a semi-intelligent observer, can make judgement calls on this. If there is a supreme being who takes an active role in humanity then the street and pavement will get wet (sorry mixed logical assertions there) then disinterested individuals will be able to notice and remark upon events that could only have been caused by said supreme being - there are NO events that a disinterested observer can remark upon that could only have been caused by said supreme being therefore it has not rained said supreme being does not exist in the terms that many religions assure me that It does.

[Fuzzwood]

The thing which stuck out for me the most which I believe is the pivotal point between believers in God and atheists, was that Atheists could never give a satisfying answer as to why the planet Earth was in the right place, at the right time, and in this state for millions of years to support the different forms of life. When this was asked, theyd simply reply that we are only experiencing life: if it wouldnt exist in that way, we wouldnt observe it. This is known as the contra-antropic-principle. But that seems like a fancy way for saying, It is like that because if it werent like that then it wouldnt be like that. Well yeah, obviously, but that still doesnt make it any less miraculously that it is like that, and not any other of the million less favourable ways..[NO OFFENCE ]

There is no answer to 'why', it just happened. Mankind isn't all that special, you know. It just likes to pretend it is. There are millions of less favourable situations for us. That doesn't mean that other conditions aren't suitable for other life forms. Take black smokers for instance.

Edited December 18, 2014 by Fuzzwood

[swansont]

The thing which stuck out for me the most which I believe is the pivotal point between believers in God and atheists, was that Atheists could never give a satisfying answer as to why the planet Earth was in the right place, at the right time, and in this state for millions of years to support the different forms of life. When this was asked, theyd simply reply that we are only experiencing life: if it wouldnt exist in that way, we wouldnt observe it. This is known as the contra-antropic-principle. But that seems like a fancy way for saying, It is like that because if it werent like that then it wouldnt be like that. Well yeah, obviously, but that still doesnt make it any less miraculously that it is like that, and not any other of the million less favourable ways..[NO OFFENCE ]

 

 

The person that wins the lottery might think that they have been "chosen", to have gotten the right number set out of some large range of possibilities. 1 in 60 million, or whatever. But in the larger picture, somebody is going to win the lottery. There's nothing special about that at all. There is no "why" required.

 

It only seems odds-defying when you're the one, but nobody predicted the winner would be the one before it happened; the notion that they defied the odds is a common error. The probability of that person winning the lottery, after the drawing has occurred, is one. What's the probability that the earth would have the right conditions and support life? It's also one.

[MigL]

It is not that God can be proven or disproven by science.

The 'realm' of God or deities in general, lies outside where one can reasonably apply science.

 

It is more like the ( classical, pre-Einstein ) aether. Current science simply doesn't require it. In effect, there is no difference whether it actually exists or not. We simply apply Occam's razor and 'cut away' all that's not necessary.

 

Similarly with God. The deity concept in not needed for our understanding of the workings of the universe. So science simply cuts Him out and has nothing to say about it.

 

I, personally have no need for the aether concept ( neither does anyone else ), nor for the concept of a God ( and, in a few hundred yrs, neither might anyone else ). But, by all means, if God and your religion give you personal comfort, science should have nothing to say about that either .

[DevilSolution]

Most people dont like to believe in god because it implies belief in some relious branch, which is swamped in fairy tales (parables) which usually acively contradict science, this ovourse "usually" seperates them from any sort of spiritual belelief that can come from believing in god without having to pin your badge to any particular religion.

 

Is there any science that isnt logical?

It is not that God can be proven or disproven by science.

The 'realm' of God or deities in general, lies outside where one can reasonably apply science.

 

It is more like the ( classical, pre-Einstein ) aether. Current science simply doesn't require it. In effect, there is no difference whether it actually exists or not. We simply apply Occam's razor and 'cut away' all that's not necessary.

 

Similarly with God. The deity concept in not needed for our understanding of the workings of the universe. So science simply cuts Him out and has nothing to say about it.

 

I, personally have no need for the aether concept ( neither does anyone else ), nor for the concept of a God ( and, in a few hundred yrs, neither might anyone else ). But, by all means, if God and your religion give you personal comfort, science should have nothing to say about that either .

 

Thi seems to be a very simlar statement to my first post....

[Delta1212]

This is not entirely true, at least not if one considers psychology and sociology to be branches of science..

That was supposed to be a clever response to both major questions in the OP.

 

That said, I'd still say science doesn't say much if anything about the existence of God. It does say a few things about the human belief in the existence of God, though.

[iNow]

It is not that God can be proven or disproven by science.

God cannot even be reasonably and falsifiably defined by theists in such a way that consensus can be found, so there's that, too. God is usually whatever each individual believer wants it to be, and generally in their own image and with their own preferences and biases.

 

EDIT: http://www.pnas.org/content/106/51/21533.full

 

That said, I'd still say science doesn't say much if anything about the existence of God. It does say a few things about the human belief in the existence of God, though.

Agreed. Edited December 19, 2014 by iNow

[overtone]

 

Yes indeed you are willing to reject the possibility of God being there, simply because u dont want to open your mind to that possibility.

Nobody's rejecting the possibility, in abstract, of some kind of a God existing. We're rejecting the defensibility of the particular kinds of belief in the particular modes of existence of the particular kinds of Gods you advocate. These beliefs are poorly defended, don't make good sense, and lead to trouble.

[Ten oz]

The thing which stuck out for me the most which I believe is the pivotal point between believers in God and atheists, was that Atheists could never give a satisfying answer as to why the planet Earth was in the right place, at the right time, and in this state for millions of years to support the different forms of life. When this was asked, theyd simply reply that we are only experiencing life: if it wouldnt exist in that way, we wouldnt observe it. This is known as the contra-antropic-principle. But that seems like a fancy way for saying, It is like that because if it werent like that then it wouldnt be like that. Well yeah, obviously, but that still doesnt make it any less miraculously that it is like that, and not any other of the million less favourable ways..[NO OFFENCE ]

I am an athiest because I do not know of a single good reason to believe in a god(s). Does that mean I have proof that there isn't a god, of course not. However lack of proof against something is not in of itself proof of anything. As for the whole right place and right time thing I see it as a fallacy. Life will always be best suited for the enviroment where it is born and involved. It defies logic to imagine otherwise. So it is not mind blowing that life on earth is best suited for earth. It is a given. As for why earth is its size, in its orbit, and etc those are all meaningless qualities. They only seem special because you (we) evolved here. Also with trillions of planets in the universe it is not difficult to imagine the earth's current circumstance being amongst them. There are planets of all sizes, ages, and orbits out there.

[iNow]

“This is rather as if you imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in — an interesting hole I find myself in — fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!' ”

 

― Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt

[MigL]

The odds against are probably even higher because advanced civilizations may only last for a comparative 'instant' compared to the age of the universe. The universe is large in extent and time.

 

The mistake you're making, however, is that you only consider life as WE know it.

[recursion]

 

Who knows. Maybe it wasn't created, it has always existed. Or maybe it wasn't created by anyone/anything it just came to be.

 

 

Absolutely nothing. Although science does disprove some of the claims made bythose who believe in God (such as young Earth creationsts).

 

 

Science does absolutely nothing to disprove that. There is strong evidence of dozens of prior completed developments of a species ("completed development" meaning evolved to a level at which they understand truth at a fundamental level and have a mastery of physics). The rate at which evolution occurs is extremely fast – from a fairly basic development of life (lizards and frogs, simple but not very simple creatures – still highly complex) it appears evolution takes no more than 4 million years or so, with 2-3 million looking to be the time required. Thus, scientifically, there is a strong possibility of changing history. Science only explains that with the observations we have accounted, we see there is a strong trend towards a certain cause being the reason.

Modern science is still highly underdeveloped. Not only do we a species have hardly a mastery at all of physical or biological systems, we do not understand sentience, either, and no sentient machine (aside from a child perhaps) has ever been produced by a human. We have a fair ways to go before science will get a strong grasp on our understanding of truth and finally become totally coherent (although science seeks to be coherent, there is a lot of logical ambiguity in our ways of seeking the truth).

Yes, science is concerned with the truth about God, as well as the truth regarding what defines a sentient being and more importantly, what exactly the truth really is. Science is far too undeveloped as of today to provide anything remotely close to an explanation of reality. It's egoism that is lying to people and exaggerating the proficiency of modern science, as a collective entity.

When science can better understand the nature of truth, then it will be able to progress more easily. Currently it leaves a gaping hole about the size of Jupiter at the creation or initiation of both the entirety of manifest reality and specifically the universe, too.

The odds against are probably even higher because advanced civilizations may only last for a comparative 'instant' compared to the age of the universe. The universe is large in extent and time.

 

The mistake you're making, however, is that you only consider life as WE know it.

 

This is ambiguous and misleading. You're suggesting advanced civilizations die, with all evidence being contrary, yet you provide no rational discourse. Who are "WE?" I've heard the "robots see things differently" argument before -- it's a popular notion among movie-goers. I would like to provide a counter-argument to that notion. Sentience is a deeply understood phenomenon and it connects any sentient being to a common understanding of truthfulness, of self-identify, and of free-will. Thus, there is no other perspective. We are the perspective through which all life sees existence, at least once we have found what is actually true.

I am an athiest because I do not know of a single good reason to believe in a god(s). Does that mean I have proof that there isn't a god, of course not. However lack of proof against something is not in of itself proof of anything. As for the whole right place and right time thing I see it as a fallacy. Life will always be best suited for the enviroment where it is born and involved. It defies logic to imagine otherwise. So it is not mind blowing that life on earth is best suited for earth. It is a given. As for why earth is its size, in its orbit, and etc those are all meaningless qualities. They only seem special because you (we) evolved here. Also with trillions of planets in the universe it is not difficult to imagine the earth's current circumstance being amongst them. There are planets of all sizes, ages, and orbits out there.

 

An environment which supports life is an environment which supports life. Your perspective is based on a memory-less understanding (to remove oneself from what exists by attributing everything to memory), which is self-defeating as you're utilizing memory to make your argument. It's also self-defeating in that it also makes the assumption that truth is based on environment. While predictable phenomena are based on repeated observations of the environment, truthiness in and of itself is not. To ignore the fact that there is perfect logic while claiming something defies logic is confusing and hypocritical. Logic is not environmentally based; it is inherent in existence.

Is your statement an absolute proven fact? Once again you are playing the unfalsifiable game. Yes it is possible that quantum mechanics is wrong. You are using the unfalsifiable "anything is possible" argument.

 

And you are providing a moot argument as you are using fallacious logic. Drawing a disconnected interpretation of the method of confirmation through rejection of the null hypothesis (which is exactly the "unfalsifiable" argument) is weakening the discussion. Also remember there are no proven facts except the way to deduce the validity of something -- it is a process common but often not discussed. Everything else is the best we have been able to identify, but allowing counter-argument (otherwise science would have become stifled and frozen a long time ago).

Faith fails far more often then evidence. Many have lost their entire life savings because of faith in a unproven scam. I would bet my money on that which is testable and has been tested. I'm not going to waste my life on a wild goose chase.

 

Faith is the trust in something. If you misplaced your faith, then you were too careless, definitively. Your argument has nothing to do with religion -- just don't trust the wrong person. It's a decent argument if it's removed from the discussion of religion and treated as just practical advice.

 

It is true that science never 100% proves anything there is still a big difference. There is overwhelming evidence for quantum theory and it is used in technology such as the computer you are using. There is also no evidence that shows it to be wrong (yet). So accepting quantum theory is NOT an act of faith.

 

However, there is zero evidence for (or against) gods or unicorns so if you believe in them then that is 100% an act of faith. I have no problem with that, as long as you don't try and equate your evidence-free faith with science.

 

Quantum theory is simply a category of extension of (subatomic) physics. It's not a hypothesis in and of itself and it's not a theory either. There is no possibility to attribute faith to quantum theory.

A creator isn't needed, and no evidence exists that there was one. Do you have a reason to invent one?

 

 

Whose god? All of them have an equal lack of evidence for their existence, so how do you choose which one you're wishing to be the creator of the universe?

 

The gods we've heard of all have some sort of caveat against being directly observable. This means science has no methodology to apply to an explanation of those gods, so they're considered supernatural, outside the normal parameters of our reality. And since science only deals with natural phenomena, science isn't the right tool to use when discussing the existence of gods.

 

You observe sentience but you still cannot describe it. Some things are done through rejecting what is not true, and some things are noted as predictable phenomenon. Nothing is truly objectively observed, so to become entirely of observable reality would be to become fake -- a skewed perception of what exists (which is what science has always been).

 

Science leaves a gigantic whole at the possibility of existence itself, and this is where you are fooled along. While strict science will never make a conclusion that cannot be either 1) logically deduced with no fallacy or 2) proven repeatedly and predictably, your science is an expression of emotion rather than pure logic. Thus, it severely clouds the argument. Rejection of the null hypothesis is a perfectly valid way to gather data. We also understand sentience is not a random phenomenon and appears to occur only under certain conditions. Without understanding sentience, science will never be able to comprehend a supremely intelligent being, if he/she/it exists, as science cannot understand the process of reflective thought and self-awareness. The height of computing and machine intelligence is merely a squashing of many statistical functions together, hardly considerable as sentience.

Edited January 4, 2015 by recursion

[MigL]

'We' have been able to communicate extraterrestrially, in the form of transmitted EM radiation for about 100 yrs.

The universe has existed for over 13000000000 yrs.

That's a very small window.

 

I wonder how many times we came close to ending our civilization during the cold war.

I wonder when the next asteroid will hit to end our civilization, like it did the dinosaurs. It is a cyclic phenomenon.

Civilizations rise and fall. Sometimes we don't even know why. What happened to the Greeks between 1200B.C. and 600B.C. ?

 

You can spout all that abstract stuff about sentience, truth, understanding, self-identity and free will, but the fact is that the element carbon makes the most compounds of any other element. That is a likely reason life evolved using carbon compounds.

I believe Sulfur makes the second most compounds. Who is to say that at higher temperatures, sulfur based life could not develop ?

 

But this has probably nothing to do with the concept of God in Science anyway.

Edited January 4, 2015 by MigL

[recursion]

 

'We' have been able to communicate extraterrestrially, in the form of transmitted EM radiation for about 100 yrs.

The universe has existed for over 13000000000 yrs.

That's a very small window.

I wonder how many times we came close to ending our civilization during the cold war.

I wonder when the next asteroid will hit to end our civilization, like it did the dinosaurs. It is a cyclic phenomenon.

Civilizations rise and fall. Sometimes we don't even know why. What happened to the Greeks between 1200B.C. and 600B.C. ?

 

Some of these are very poignant to people. Suffering is almost entirely caused by other people, although you can consider other beings a shared cause as well (such as diseases and hurricanes). The problem is disagreement or false agreement (which leads to halting progress as well as violence). If we were all to realize that the truth is the only commonly agreed upon knowledge, then our wars would subside. Attempts to falsify the truth or hinder thinking are thus attempts at sustaining the existence of war and violent disagreement (not saying that's what you're doing, just I've noticed there is a significant looseness to some of the arguments I've been seeing).

 

 

 

You can spout all that abstract stuff about sentience, truth, understanding, self-identity and free will, but the fact is that the element carbon makes the most compounds of any other element. That is a likely reason life evolved using carbon compounds.

I believe Sulfur makes the second most compounds. Who is to say that at higher temperatures, sulfur based life could not develop ?

But this has probably nothing to do with the concept of God in Science anyway.

 

Please be scientific. I understand this is the religion section, but that in no way means the rigors of perfect logic are reduced. The nature of God, sentience, truth, and existence are very pertinent to science today so please try to be helpful to those who would like the world to truly understand truthful discourse without error in logic.

 

Sentience, truth, self-identity, the nature of understanding, and free-will are all very specific, objective topics and freely shooting off opinions and erratically steering the discussion are not helpful (it's reminiscent of dirty politics). I hope the others are not stirred emotionally by what is indicatively attempting to delay the solving of some of the world's greatest problems (if we bring emotion into our scientific discussion or diversion or personal opinion, we will never finish the discussion, and as responsible, reasonable people on a science forum, we should seek to avoid that -- in addition if we don't solve the world's problems, one of the large ones being "what exactly is the objective truth," then people will continue to suffer, so there is definitely a very serious side to this as well). I say this with reference to referring to objective topics as "abstract," which is reminiscent of diversion (whether intentional or not).

 

Bringing the discussion to what materials are required to facilitate the coalescent systems which evoke sentience and self-awareness as well as self-maintainability and independence, we can probably conclude that there is more of a specific logical structure with certain variability than there is a real necessity for any elements. Furthermore, the elements are simply higher-order constructions of matter-energy, which we don't fully understand, so yes, you're right, there are likely other materials that could form the systems from which sentience emerges.

Edited January 4, 2015 by recursion

[Strange]

Science does absolutely nothing to disprove that.

 

Of course science disproves young-earth creationism. There is a ton of evidence that the Earth is more than 6000 years old.

 

 

There is strong evidence of dozens of prior completed developments of a species ("completed development" meaning evolved to a level at which they understand truth at a fundamental level and have a mastery of physics).

 

I have no idea what you are talking about, so: citation needed.

 

 

Yes, science is concerned with the truth about God

 

Science has little to do with truth and nothing to do with God. If you claim otherwise, please provide some evidence.

 

Quantum theory is simply a category of extension of (subatomic) physics. It's not a hypothesis in and of itself and it's not a theory either.

 

Of course it is a theory: it is a complete mathematical model that makes testable predictions that match experimental evidence.

 

There is no possibility to attribute faith to quantum theory.

 

Because it is a scientific theory.

 

 

Science leaves a gigantic whole at the possibility of existence itself

 

That sounds like a problem for philosophy, not science.

 

 

your science is an expression of emotion

 

The whole point of science is to get away from psychological biases like that by focussing on quantitative predictions and objective measurements.

 

You have a very weird idea of what science is.

The nature of God, sentience, truth, and existence are very pertinent to science today

 

Why?

 

 

Sentience, truth, self-identity, the nature of understanding, and free-will are all very specific, objective topics

 

If they are objective, why did you previously say that sentience, for example, cannot be defined? Why are all these still subject to endless philosophical debate? How would you objectively measure any of these to make them amenable to the scientific method?

[recursion]

 

 

Of course science disproves young-earth creationism. There is a ton of evidence that the Earth is more than 6000 years old.

 

Let's be 100% accurate. Science sees a connected story that suggests, with what we have observed, various things about the world. But, as you must understand, if you accept that as ultimate fact, you are the fool. In a hundred to a thousand years, we could very well leave the planet and change the apparent history and no monkey would be able to differentiate as we will have gone through that process already. So while science suggests something, we must always understand later evidence may revoke that suggestion.

 

 

 

I have no idea what you are talking about, so: citation needed.

 

It's been some time. I'll have to find the evolutionary rate and diversity through time charts. You're free to look them up and predict the rate of evolution. I think you'll find that it occurs much more quickly than the popular scientific consensus.

 

 

 

 

Science has little to do with truth and nothing to do with God. If you claim otherwise, please provide some evidence.

 

If God created the universe and science seeks to understand everything about manifest reality, then yes, God is an important topic that science desperately sees to either explain or find an alternative to, of which it has not really done anything (it's literally, unavoidably, and inarguably a logical paradox that something comes from nothing, and I think scientists should refrain from making the assumption that they've found it, regardless of how many noble prizes they'd like to imagine they'd win).

 

 

 

That sounds like a problem for philosophy, not science.

 

Perhaps I misunderstood, but you just stated that understanding the possibility of existence itself is not a concern of science, which seeks to explain all manifest existence as well as psychological existence.

 

I think I've already answered why "The nature of God, sentience, truth, and existence are very pertinent to science today," previously in this post (as a response to your question, "Why?").

 

 

 

 

If they are objective, why did you previously say that sentience, for example, cannot be defined? Why are all these still subject to endless philosophical debate? How would you objectively measure any of these to make them amenable to the scientific method?

 

Science has taken a bit of a diversion from its fundamental basis, which is the objective and error-free search for truth. It's turn into almost robotically measuring things (at least in the eyes of much of the public, who often misunderstand science). Science is greater than just measuring things and running statistics on that data. It is really a search for truth of all existence, material (such as through physics) and ideological (such as through psychology). Science itself stems from the realization that there is only truth when the statement is always true and as such we get the scientific method, which is an elaboration and specification of the actual fundamental of all intelligent/knowledgeable thought, logic. Also, philosophy is conjecture, logic is fact, so while I see where one might get mixed up, I do not consider logical discourse to be philosophical, at least not with a movement towards the perfection of logic. In addition, the existence of everything is well within the realm of science. It seems you are seeking to avoid answering some of the more important questions regarding existence, which is the focus of science (as well as the focus of many things, like philosophy, which uses ambiguity to generally understand various notions and is being replaced by a split combination of psychology and materials science, and history as a separate facet of it). "Philosophy" is merely "the love of knowledge," once ambiguous, but today the search for what's true is becoming more defined, with rigor and precision.

 

I say sentience cannot be described, not that it cannot be defined. It's not necessarily a fundamental truth or fact, it's just a truth that concerns our modern society -- that no one can properly define sentience (and by sentience, I mean, the entire culmination of independent-thought, self-identity, self-awareness, and the corollaries thereof). It does not mean it's undefinable, it's just our technical understanding is very unsophisticated (and rudimentary).

[John Cuthber]

OK,let's start with "Let's be 100% accurate. Science sees a connected story that suggests, with what we have observed, various things about the world. But, as you must understand, if you accept that as ultimate fact, you are the fool. In a hundred to a thousand years, we could very well leave the planet and change the apparent history and no monkey would be able to differentiate as we will have gone through that process already. So while science suggests something, we must always understand later evidence may revoke that suggestion."

 

 

Imagine that some scientist somewhere had said that the earth is 6000 years old.

Some other scientist would say that, if that were true, the record of tree rings couldn't go back further than 6000 years.

But it does, so the assertion is clearly false.

As you say, the evidence has revoked that suggestion.

 

"It's been some time. I'll have to find the evolutionary rate and diversity through time charts. You're free to look them up and predict the rate of evolution. I think you'll find that it occurs much more quickly than the popular scientific consensus. "

No, because, unlike religious mumbo jumbo, the scientific consensus will be based on evidence.

So, if we look at the evidence, it will agree pretty well with that consensus.

However, if you want to prove me wrong- show me the data.

 

"If God created the universe and science seeks to understand everything about manifest reality, then yes, God is an important topic that science desperately sees to either explain or find an alternative to"

Not really.Even if God exists then He is a liar; that's what the fossils prove.

There's not much point trying to study a being whose always out to mislead you.

 

if I want to know what the weather is like, I can ask God- who may lie to me- or I can look out of the window.

Which is the better course of action if I wish to know whether to take an umbrella or not?

[Strange]

Let's be 100% accurate. Science sees a connected story that suggests, with what we have observed, various things about the world.

 

While that is true, your vague claims do nothing to change the very clear evidence that the Earth is more than 6,000 years old. It may be that new evidence will emerge that will change, slightly, our understanding of the history of the Earth. This might add or subtract a few million years here or there but it will not change the overall picture.

 

 

If God created the universe and science seeks to understand everything about manifest reality, then yes, God is an important topic that science desperately sees to either explain or find an alternative to

 

[i hope you will excuse me cutting some of your rambling, near incoherent sentences down a bit, to focus on the main point.]

 

IF god exists. But, from a scientific (objective, measurable evidence) point ot of view, there is no reason to consider such a possibility.

 

 

Perhaps I misunderstood, but you just stated that understanding the possibility of existence itself is not a concern of science, which seeks to explain all manifest existence as well as psychological existence.

 

Correct.

 

 

Science has taken a bit of a diversion from its fundamental basis, which is the objective and error-free search for truth.

 

That is not what science is about (and hasn't been for a long time). You might wish science had different goals but ... well ... <shrug> ... tough.

 

 

Also, philosophy is conjecture, logic is fact

 

You have some very weird ideas. Philosophy is not conjecture, it is about the rigorous analysis of questions. Logic is part of philosophy (with formal logic becoming part of mathematics). Logic is NOT fact.

 

 

I say sentience cannot be described, not that it cannot be defined.

 

So it is not really objective, is it.