Balancing Faith and Science

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I do, no evidence, no proof. God does not exist.

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Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.It is more accurate and rational to say that you don't know.

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So it's more rational to say that invisible beings exist?

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No.We aren't comparing belief in the unseen to what you believe.The fact is that you cannot get away from the logic; absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.It is reasonable and rational to conclude that there is no evidence for unseen beings, so they probably do not exist.You are not all-knowing, however, so you cannot make a positive statement about something's non-existence.

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So because we don't have a motive or a murder weapon we should convict Mr. Brown? Just because we don't have evidence does not mean he's not guilty.

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Uh.What?

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Its these things that exist that are out of the reach of science that have lead me to believe that science cannot detect everything. So, because something has not been detected by science is no reason to assume that it doesn't exist. The existance of the things that cannot be detected by science are some of the reasons why I have made a rational decision to believe in god.

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No, that's not rational.What would be rational would be to say "We do not currently understand X" and leave it at that.To fill in the gap in knowledge with what essentioally works out to be magic is not rational.

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So you require evidence there is no bigfoot, ufos or orgonians?

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It is impossible to prove a negative.There is currently no reliable evidence for any of the phenomena you listed, except the UFO's (we do, indeed, have evidence for unidentified flying objects, just not that they are alien spacehips or whatever).The scientific conclusion we must reach is that there is no evidence for such things, not that they do not exist.Since we are not omnicient, we cannot know if they do not exist.We just don't know.

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I filled in the gap in knowledge with my own personal subjective feelings and interpretations of those feelings to make a rational decision about the world we live in. That decision includes the existance of a god.

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Subjective feelings are not rational, so one cannot make a rational descision on what to believe based uupon feelings.

So, explain how you prove a negative, then.

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Using these definitions, I don't see how that because something is subjective it cannot be rational.

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If something proceeds from, or takes place in, my mind while I am of sound mind, or have the ability to reason, then, according to these definitions, said thing (ie a belief in god) could be both subjective and rational.

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I'll remind you that part of the definition of "subjective" you provided was "Existing only in the mind; illusory".I'll also mention that a key part of rational descisions is the use of logic, and your God of the Gaps logic is poor logical reasoning.

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Sure it is, ever hear of not guilty verdicts.

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Notice how they are called not guilty verdicts rather than innocent verdicts.So, please walk us through the logical proof of a negative, please.

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So then is it impossible to prove a positive?

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No.

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A legal verdict is a finding of fact.

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No, it isn't.There is a lot of squishy language in the law like "preponderance of evidence", and "reasonable doubt", etc.For example, the OJ Simpson criminal trial returned a verdict of not guilty. Does that mean we can all be 100% sure that he didn't kill Nicole Brown?

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one can never be sure there are no ghosts under the bed.

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Exactly.We are not onmicient, we do not have all knowledge, so we cannot know that there are no ghosts under the bed.We do not have any evidence for there being ghosts under the bed, but that could be just because we cannot ever detect them, or perhaps have not developed the technology to detect them yet.