Does science function to supress knowledge of God and God's work?

Seemingly, the fundamentalist creationist view is that the various sciences have a long history of conspirering to deny God and the works of God.Do the creationist here truly believe that mainstream biology, geology, etc. beliefs are not a result of solid, valid work?Are all these scientists guilty of putting together a vast, complicated story, to replace the obvious and simple story of God and God's creation?Or is the story truly vast and complicated?Moose------------------
Old Earth evolution - Yes
Godly creation - Maybe

"Seemingly, the fundamentalist creationist view is that the various sciences have a long history of conspirering to deny God and the works of God."Science has never 'conspired' to deny God and the works of God, science never has and never will be able to refute God. With the advancement of the sciences, theories will be refuted, evolutionary and creationary. I love science and it is a friend to Creation."Do the creationist here truly believe that mainstream biology, geology, etc. beliefs are not a result of solid, valid work?"I think using the word 'belief' is not quite correct, 'interperetations' would be a more correct word for the subject of the question. Creationists believe that mainstream biology, geology, and other various profession 'uniformitarian interperetations' are and are not the result of 'solid', valid scientific work. now take out the word 'uniformitarian' and you will have valid scientific work. Science cannot 'prove' that uniformitarian evolution has ever happend or happens. A 'proof' requires there to be no space available for an 'interperetation' Something such as addition, we can 'prove' that 1+3=4 by taking 1 object and 3 objects and making them add up together to 4. But evolution seriously requires for it to be a 'proof' that you MUST be able to observe it happening. You can't take small changes and 'theorize' that if you take many of these small changes and add them up to one big change, this is no proof, the evidence can be 'interpereted' different ways logicly."Are all these scientists guilty of putting together a vast, complicated story, to replace the obvious and simple story of God and God's creation?"Technically God is really not 'obvious'. I believe that there is a God and that that God is the Biblical God. Why? Because when I look at the evidence, I can see my interperetation of that evidence and see that it is the most logical and reasonable choice based on what we can observe. Are scientists guilty? Sure, but thats what they believe because of their interperetation of the evidence. But I can look at their interperetation and can say that many of them are touching the borderline of science and pure fantasy, rather than science and theory. To try and 'replace' their theories with a God puts them in so much danger. To dismiss the supernatural is to put the whole idea of evolution in jeopardy."Or is the story truly vast and complicated?"The story of evolution is truly 'vague', and because of how vague it is it is quite complicated when you look at the whole picture.

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Originally posted by minnemooseus:
Seemingly, the fundamentalist creationist view is that the various sciences have a long history of conspirering to deny God and the works of God.

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Interestingly Issac Newton in his OPTICKS, has an interesting even if somewhat cryptic sentence where he states he prefers chemical bond science to conspiring motions which leaves the reader with a circle of fire at the end of stick and yet the modern Harvard read on Newton's PRINCIPIA puts off the idea that in the end, in the General Sholium Newton had as if any intentions to read back the SPIRIT into his system. This much modern science seems to deny to the experimental philosophy experience and so does in Laplace preeminenced deny God and the Works of God. Good works in grace do however sit in good behavior on the stations of the earth where science is practiced. Sounds like a contardiction in terms but words are true.

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Do the creationist here truly believe that mainstream biology, geology, etc. beliefs are not a result of solid, valid work?

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There is solid faith and works in the current probabilistic atmosphere of science, works of creationists that is. That or this credibility has been won. Thank you creationists before me. It would be nice if this new learning style transferered to new works that contribute to scinece change as a whole and beyond "imprinting" the entropy concept.

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Are all these scientists guilty of putting together a vast, complicated story, to replace the obvious and simple story of God and God's creation?

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Maybe not they simply communicate more by a math that is not engaging the caterory that approaches the unconditioned unconditionally.

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Or is the story truly vast and complicated?

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Moose

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Indeed it is Moose, indeed it is. We can but all learn to see the complex as simple. We can never think God's thoughts but we can think them after HIM by GOD.

schrafinator had a nice message, that I thought worthy of further exposure. I also thought it might jump-start this topic.From http://EvC Forum: Noah's Flood Came Down. It's Goin Back Up!! -->EvC Forum: Noah's Flood Came Down. It's Goin Back Up!! I quote:

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Ned posted a great reply, but I would just like to add that nearly ALL "naturalists" 180 years ago were members of the clergy or religiously-trained, because that's the kind of educational system that existed for the best and the brightest (men only, of course).

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This was prior to science, as we know it today, becoming completely formalized and professionalized.

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At that time, wealthy religious "gentlemen naturalists" went on expeditions to document and study nature and then reported their findings back to their societies. Not that their findings weren't scientific; Darwin was a great scientist in that he constantly questioned himself, and his premise of common descent with modification and proposed mechanism of natural selection have certainly held up to the most intense tests and scrutiny for nearly 200 years.

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So, Buzsaw, there were nearly 100% Christian Creationists in all of western science back then.

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There are very, very few accredited scientists who give Creation 'science' the time of day, and that's only in the US:

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"According to Newsweek in 1987, "By one count there are some 700 scientists with respectable academic credentials (out of a total of 480,000 U.S. earth and life scientists) who give credence to creation-science..." That would make the support for creation science among those branches of science who deal with the earth and its life forms at about 0.14%"

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Less that one percent, Buz. Of course, I could be wrong, as this data is from the late 80's.

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I suppose you could just dismiss this statistic by saying all the scientists are brainwashed and that's why they don't use the Bible as a science book and invoke miracles in their work.

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LOL!!

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Anyway, it's becoming clear that you aren't interested in learning anything; not even the basic science you have rejected without understanding it.

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Moose

I'll use this to give one of my old "never went anywhere" topics a bump.At http://EvC Forum: The best scientific method (Bayesian form of H-D) -->EvC Forum: The best scientific method (Bayesian form of H-D)Stephan is quoted as saying:

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But, evolutionary biologists do not seem to be interested, as they ought to be, in the objective, Bayesian, plausibility of the God as creator idea. They thus neglect all three of the standards I was taught made one a true scientist.

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To which Edge replied:

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Did it ever occur to you that perhaps they considered the plausible alternative and then rejected it long ago for lack of evidence? It seems to me that you are committing an error common to YECs in that they think history began with them.

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Since my formal training is in geology, I'll focus in on geology, although the situation is the same in the other sciences.In the past 200 years or so, the earth's geology has been intensely studied. Ideas of how things came to be have come from this study. Some ideas hold up under further study, some do not.The bottom line, is that a "big picture" of vast complexity has been developed, made up of countless tiny details. Details that require certain conditions and time to happen. These details are fit together in a manner that makes sense.Now, most creationists (and the population in general) don't have a clue of how complex the earth's geology really is (I barely claim to have that clue myself). But it seems that many of the creationist movement think they understand the earth's geology. They seem to think that the long chain of geologic study, that indicates an old earth, has somehow been blotched, and that the geologists are doing a grand cover-up, just to deny the truth of a young earth creation.Enough for now,Moose

Are you surmising that the creationists are saying that the sciences may be driven by a conspiracy-theory? Namely, that part of the training a budding scientist recieves is to learn to consiously interpret the world in such a way that God & religion are left out of the equation? Or are we to believe, as I do that some creationists would like to see changes in the scientific-method to include things like testing the "God hypothesis"? And how on earth does one test ephemeral stuff like that anyway? Or do the creationists want to rid the scientific-method of error-bars, statistical analysis, Occam's razor, and lower the standards of what constitutes acceptable evidence by scientific peer-review? Believe me when I write that when I was a former fundee-creationist that people in my former church and in the 'circle' of creationist thinkers I belonged to, talked about this 'conspiracy of scientists' and how they (the creationists) wanted to rework the scientific-method to their advantage.[This message has been edited by Prozacman, 12-30-2003]

I think it is, just barely, on topic to ask what this "rework" would involve? It seems to me that throwing it out is what they really want to do and go with "what I say" as the answer to everything.

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Science has never 'conspired' to deny God and the works of God, science never has and never will be able to refute God. With the advancement of the sciences, theories will be refuted, evolutionary and creationary. I love science and it is a friend to Creation.

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I agree. Science will never be able to deny God. Only man tries to deny God.Scientific theories do come and go, but some theories, like Evolution are built upon and become more concrete as time passes. Science has been the death knell for the Creationist Christian interpretation. Despite it's "sophistication", Creationism is only growing where it is introduced into areas of the world with low levels of education (third world countries and dare I say it, southern states of the US, y'all) Make one Creationist claim of fact on this board, and see how friendly science is to it. Read mainstream sciences literature and see how friendly it is to it.Quote

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Something such as addition, we can 'prove' that 1+3=4 by taking 1 object and 3 objects and making them add up together to 4. But evolution seriously requires for it to be a 'proof' that you MUST be able to observe it happening. You can't take small changes and 'theorize' that if you take many of these small changes and add them up to one big change, this is no proof, the evidence can be 'interpereted' different ways logicly.

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The validity of interpretive sciences (and there are many of them) has been articulated in this forum and extensively on Talkorigins. An associate of mine is a Creationist and also a lawyer. He also questions the validity of interpretive sciences (stating the creationist cry of "Were you there?" in relation to the age of the earth). Of course, in law he deals with circumstantial evidence on a daily basis, and he has no answer to this hypocracy in his reasoning.Quote

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Technically God is really not 'obvious'. I believe that there is a God and that that God is the Biblical God. Why? Because when I look at the evidence, I can see my interperetation of that evidence and see that it is the most logical and reasonable choice based on what we can observe. Are scientists guilty? Sure, but thats what they believe because of their interperetation of the evidence. But I can look at their interperetation and can say that many of them are touching the borderline of science and pure fantasy, rather than science and theory. To try and 'replace' their theories with a God puts them in so much danger. To dismiss the supernatural is to put the whole idea of evolution in jeopardy.

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God is not really obvious, but even though I am a Christian, I disagree with your following sentiments. I attempted an evidentiary path to God and failed. The history of Bible development, Bible interpretation, the history of the Christian church, most Christian apologetics and the modern day beliefs and practices of many modern Christianity (Bible Numerics, Bible Codes, Pyrimadology, British Isralite theories, Creationism and other Christian "sciences") destroy such a path. The path that many Christians and I took to God was purely emotive and subjective. Having been there myself, I understand why my scientific friends cannot find a path to God through the material world and rationale thought. God calls our hearts.[This message has been edited by Light, 12-30-2003]

The law of any land will never change my academic reading of Hume's use of spirit"" in pure math for else there is no way beyond his mite teleologically to the supernatural metaphysically if one is stuck or doubting in amazement in science of the maze socitey affords else Pascal was scientifically wrong as well about the void or vaccuum. I still think Newton is to be upheld and I still take time to go to Church.

I must point out that you are replying to the TrueCreation of 2 years ago. Many of TC's positions have changed considerably since then.Moose

I am still Creationist, so the answer is NO.
When I ask to see evidence here, I have been shown evidence AND therefore science. I can even see that the 'belief' can be based on evidence. I think you've hit it there. Bingo.. I think science is not a fabrication when it shows you the reason for why it thinks a certain way. I am still Creo but to deny the evidence of "reality" is silly. So obviously you are correct, the scientific peoples's motives are just, well.....scientific.

Well said, Mike! I'm filing this response under the "honorable opponents" category. Now, if you could just convince certain other posters on this board of the fundamental truth of your last sentence there...

Well, thanks for the 'honor vote'. But convincing people is a very hard thing to do,Lol. As you know, I have been quite irrational in the past, I'm still categorised as 'Creo' but to deny scientific finds and evidence (I've came to this clarity) is like saying, "reality is not real'. So I can understand the frustration of the "scientific people's" belief in well...facts,For example if I ignored that and denied Neanderthals skull is shaped differently, I would be denying reality.... irrational 'creo' thought. I'd rather think: "I admitt this FACT despite my belief in Creation, simply because the skull is THERE" - therefore rendering a possibility of evolution in the wiz box. But I will NOT deny a vast array of scientific work throughout the centuries just because I am Creationist, I urge all Creationist to NOT deny reality if you see it.Hope that helped.[This message has been edited by mike the wiz, 12-31-2003]

That post made me laugh. Very true though.

My college logic professor warned us students to look out for 'arguments from authority'. It seems that creationists could gain the political clout to get into our public schools, as they have done in some backward conservative states, and persuade the teachers & kids(future scientists) to throw out the scientific-method, or at least water it down quite a bit. Dr. Sagan wrote about this sort of influence in our educational & political systems in his book; "The Demon Haunted World", where he argues for very high standards of evidence when scientists do their work. I presume you have read his books. It seems to me that one example of this "reworking" involves lowering standards of evidence in the minds of young future scientists. I can just hear the thoughts of some creationists as they say to themselves, "If we could infiltrate the schools, and get the kids to believe that hard evidence doesn't matter all that much when inquiring about Nature, then we can easily persuade the kids to believe God does it all." That is how I & my former creationist friends thought. As to the notion that trained/degree'd scientists are all out there attempting to consiously disuade everybody that God has nothing to do with anything, I think is quite against the spirit of scientific inquiry. Why? Because I still remember Mr. Komark, my 7th grade physical science teacher say, "...scientists must be open to evidence & new ideas." That is distinctly opposed to the 'set in stone', absolutist statements of creationists who would like all the rest of us to believe the crap that science conspires against belief in God.[This message has been edited by Prozacman, 12-31-2003]