I can't post links yet, but PBS did an interview with Steve Hawking on faith and reason. My take on him is that he's a) a radical empiricist and b) a biodeterminist. Hence, he's not likely to submit to the idea God exists without direct observational evidence of an embodiment of God.
Glad to see you back Ludwik! My take? . . . . .scientists are oriented toward the "natural" , or physical . . . . . theism is oriented toward the "supernatural". or metaphysical. When these two orientations converge is when we get entanglements. When they coincide, all of these arguments will be moot!
Ludwik: Also . . . would appreciate ypur commenting on "The EEMU Hypothesis" (new thread) . . . . EEMU webpage (new) is: https://sites.google.com/site/eemuhypothesis/ Thanks . . . wlminex
Multi-universes have no proof, so why is this acceptable? What tends to happen are th religious use this as a way to point to God. The conversation turns to dumping on God and the lack of proof is ignored. Where is the proof of multi-universes? God not playing dice with the universe meant, that Einstein did not believe in the approach that assumes a random universe governed by gambling math. Gambling math, would become like a gamblers system that he uses to win the jack pots of science. You can win this way, but you will lose more than you win, since the house always wins in the end. The sober man relies on reason and cause and effect and will not be found frequenting science casinos.
No, Einstein's quote means that he did not accept QM. The problem is that if quantum affects were not taken into account then the computer you are tapping away on would not work. Einstein was wrong on QM. I think we can forgive him considering his contributions though.Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
This is a bad argument. Not only is it a circular argument, but it presupposes (begs the question) that an infinite number of universes exist aside from our own. One would think that with such imagination run rampant, Ockham's Razor would kick in and the simplest explanation is to go with what we know only for a fact: that our universe is the only one known to exist; that it seems to have been fine-tuned from the start to produce life; and that the simplest explanation for fine-tuning the universe is that it was fine-tuned by an Intelligent Designer majority of people are pleased to call God.
There is a simpler explanation - the universe is not fined tuned. We exist because we 'fit in' to the way the universe happens to be.
This would be evolution fine-tuning us to the Earth, although it seems not to be a sure thing, such as when thought that our population was down to just a few thousand during Marine Isotope Stage 6.
When I said us, I meant life in general. I don't think that the universe was fine tuned for life. The fact that life exists does not mean the universe was set up so that could occur. The overhelming majority of planets we have found cannot support life. The universe is a rather inhospitaple place for life and one well placed asteroid could end the only place where we know life exists
Following are from some psots, with my comments indented. And, a sincere scientist will not simply deny things he has no ground to disprove.Scientists do not deny ideas with no supporting evidence. They typically ignore such notions, but will sometimes voice an opinion against outrageous ideas. IOW at the very best the "no god" camp is purely speculation.That is laughable. It would be better to say the god camp is speculating in the absence of evidence . Actually he said no God is _required_ to create the universe, which is quite different Until I saw this, I wondered if Hawking had ever expressed an opinion on the subject. While I would expect him to be an atheist, I was unaware of his expressing an opinion one way or the other. I know several billion people who would agree to disagree good sir. Above from a theist. I might point out that if billions of people believe in a foolish idea, it is still a foolish idea. We exist because we 'fit in' to the way the universe happens to be.Thanx for that post: A far more reasonable view than the concept that the universe is fine tuned for our benefit. My take? . . . . .scientists are oriented toward the "natural" , or physical . . . . . theism is oriented toward the "supernatural". or metaphysical. When these two orientations converge is when we get entanglements. When they coincide, all of these arguments will be moot! When implies a belief that the two views will converge. I do not expect the two views to converge. I also expect the theist view to be come a minority opinion compared to the atheist view.As for any notion: An extraordinary claim requires extraordinary evidence. BTW: From my POV, the concept of multiple universes is speculation, which is unjustified on the basis of the currently available evidence. The best that can be said for it is that it is not inconsistent with existing knowledge & evidence. Every time I see a suggestion of the proof by design, it reinforces my POV that theists usually embarrass themselves when they attempt to use logic to support their notions. Their strength is blind faith, not logic or even cogent arguments. I wonder why they do not recognize the implications. Namely, the problem of who designed the designer of the universe? The human designer of a watch is obviously more complex than the watch. The designer of the universe is similarly expected to be more complex than the universe & requires a designer. Repeat this argument ad infinitum.
Stephen Hawking is irrelevant, and has been for decades. He has a huge ego, so he went for some 'hot button' issue like the existence of God to try to get people to pay attention to him again and garner a few headlines.
[citation required] http://www.globalmontreal.com/montr...rges for online threats/6442466983/story.html
Early astronomy projected gods and goddess into stars and planets. We still use this system to name constellations. Although the stars and planets were not gods and goddess, using their unorthodox system still had practical value, with the ancients able to plot and predict many things such as movement, eclipses, asteroids, etc. Where Dawkins loses touch with reality is he can not seem to see the connection between the ancient empirical theory and their practical results, and but seems to assume if the gods and goddess did not exist then even the stars are not there. He is more of an entertainer than a thinker. Someone with more brain power that him would be afraid to learn about Orion since from that god assocation we can learn a star grouping this is still valid today. Not all atheism is rational. Dawkins learned how to cater to the irrational atheist. If you plot the rise of atheism in America and the drop of church attendence you will noticve that social costs have risen. This atheist empirical is less efficient in terms of the practical results. This is what Dawkins calls progress. He needs to get out more and look around at reality.
Oooh, so that's what you meant. I thought you were referring to my question in this post. What a coincidence. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Really, you think it's him?
I suggest that you read the book, as I did before commenting on it. It did not say God does not exist, but that a God was not necessary in his theory.
I don't buy into the multi-verse idea myself. It, just like the intelligent designer hypothesis, doesn't really answer any questions. But the universe is not "fine tuned" for life. Rise just 20 miles above the surface of the Earth and you'd find the universe to be very inhospitable.
Actually, that is true. Summer starts circa December 22 every year; and every year the earth is closest to the sun just a few days later, circa January 5. http://earthsky.org/tonight/earth-comes-closest-to-sun-every-year-in-early-january http://www.weatherzone.com.au/news/summer-solstice-for-the-southern-hemisphere/19699 But of course, the seasons are because of Earth's tilt, making Southern hemisphere summers warmer than northern hemisphere ones because Earth is closer to the sun during southern summers.
"Summer starts circa December 22 every year; and every year the earth is closest to the sun just a few days later, circa January 5." Don't you mean WINTER?
