Can science refute the "god hypothesis" beyond all reasonable doubt?

I don’t believe theists abandon principles of objective evidence-based thinking, or apply them differently depending on whether they’re studying the natural world or studying the spiritual world. To theists, and I suppose to everyone else too, objective evidence-based thinking isn’t the only valid kind of thinking. Even some scientists and mathematicians hail the roles of intuition and imagination in the discovery process.Even more to your point, to rational theists, faith is a type of evidence.

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Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. (Heb 11:1)

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This is obviously not the same concept of evidence held by most (all?) scientists and atheists. Are they just fanciful words? I don’t think so. Evidence of the quantum world has always existed; it has always been right before human eyes. So why was it only a century ago that the quantum world was discovered? Because only a century ago did we start to develop the “eyes” to “see” it. Is there evidence of the things not seen in the quantum realm? Are not laser beams, superconductors, and transistors evidence of things not seen?Faith is evidence for people who understand that physical reality is not the only reality. The quantum world is populated with objects that don’t have a physical reality, and yet there’s evidence of their existence. Scientists are still trying to fit them into a physical paradigm, but some realize that non-physical dimensions of reality may be necessary to account for quantum objects. I’m not a Tao Physicist. I’m pointing out how the requirement of "objective evidence based thinking" (assumed to mean "empirical evidence") alone may be insufficient for the goal of science.Edited by JungEinstein, : Added qualifier, (assumed to mean "empirical evidence"), to last sentence.Edited by JungEinstein, : Made quotations more explicit.

I'm suggesting that evidence-based and logical methods are also only aids to discovering truth. If Reality is an iceberg, science's requirement of empirical evidence does a triumphant job at explaining the reality of the tip. But by imposed constraints on what are valid means of discovery, science doesn't consider (yet?) the bigger picture. My concern is that human objectivity and the scientific method will serve to establish the reality of only the “tip of the iceberg”. That is my point. No one discovered the quantum world through faith. Faith would have required revealed knowledge of quantum physics at a time before people developed the instruments to probe it. I used quantum physics to illustrate how it’s possible to find evidence of things not seen. I didn't say faith alone is required. The Bible doesn't say faith alone is required either. And neither is faith purely subjective. Faith must be substantiated. (Rom 10:17; Jam 2:24) If you find faith that is unsubstantiated, you will hear of things like delusions and pixies. This is blind faith. Not all faith is equally evidenced. Some faith is supplemented by objective evidence. This is true faith. Let me be clear about my position on faith. As I said, faith is a type of evidence. It's only slightly equivalent to scientific evidence. If anything, faith is closer in substance to theory, but even this is a poor analogy. Faith is similar to theory in that it requires support from objective reality, but it's also similar to evidence in that it gives support to non-objective reality. Faith is required for experience and knowledge because there's an experiential and epistemological gap between the physical and spiritual domains. (This "gap" has a Scriptural explanation). Faith attempts to bridge that gap by providing a link from the physical to the non-physical. It's aim is to provide a complete picture of human reality, one that objective reality alone cannot give.Objective evidence that supports or substantiates faith includes not only natural phenomena, but the Bible as well. This, of course, leads to other questions and arguments, as does the suggestion of a "spiritual domain". But I just wanted to clarify the meaning of faith as I use the term. I don't know how people in world religions define it, or how individuals of personal religion define it. I can only speak to the meaning of faith as it's used in the Bible.

It isn’t often that someone manages to provide even the smallest hint as to God’s existence and the purpose of life in the space of a single post, without even realizing it. (Please find the allusion to one of your previous statements in jest ) This is really a discussion for another thread/forum, but I want to share here a result of much rational thought.Worship of God boils down to one thing: wanting to make your father proud of you. God doesn’t always treat people the same way you would treat your son, because there are larger issues involved, and He must provide lessons of a far greater nature than exist within your obviously loving home. Many organized religions cover over the simplicity of our relationship to God with so much extravagant ritual and unsubstantiated doctrine as to make God unrecognizable. Something happened in the ancient past that ruined the perfect “homelife” that God originally intended, something that deceived people into thinking that God was not the loving father he truly is. To the point of this thread, the father that God truly is cannot be found through scientific thought alone. If there was only one accepted concept of faith, I would agree with you. But there are several:

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A certain number of religious rationalists, as well as non-religious people, criticize implicit faith as being irrational, and see faith as ignorance of reality: a strong belief in something with no evidence.

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In the rationalist view, belief should be restricted to what is directly supportable by logic or scientific evidence.

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Michael Green includes the idea that faith is belief not based on evidence as one of the myths about Christianity. Faith is to commit oneself to act based on sufficient experience to warrant belief, but without absolute proof.

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Atheist Richard Dawkins contends that faith is merely belief without evidence.
(Wikipedia: Faith)

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This might be true if we were talking about the same concept of faith, but I don’t believe we are. I don’t seek only that evidence which supports my beliefs. I have altered my beliefs when I found they were contradictory to objective evidence and rationality. (Message 158) And in my view, there’s no such thing as objective evidence that is unnecessary or inferior to faith. My point was to address the issue of whether faith is evidence of things not seen. If the quantum world had been discovered through faith, that faith, based on a necessary source of revealed knowledge in the absence of scientific instruments, would have qualified as evidence of things not seen. I have offered a rational basis for my claim that faith is evidence. (Rom 10:17; Jam 2:24; and the description of faith in Message 110) You haven’t recognized it as rational. Faith sounds completely absurd to a mindset that recognizes only empirical or scientific evidence as valid. But in fact, no one should expect others to believe in imperceptible things without something to go on. (Mt 6:26-30; 1 Cor 15:3-8). I haven’t read any other holy books. But I have read research by others who are attempting to find agreement between other holy books and scientific evidence, just as I am with the Bible. I have opened my mind to this research, but I personally have only addressed the Bible because, 1) I cannot speak knowledgably about any other holy book, and 2) The Bible is the most commonly referenced source of revealed knowledge on these forums. I believe the answer to this question is No:

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Despite the existence of well-tested theories, science cannot claim absolute knowledge of nature or the behavior of the subject or of the field of study due to epistemological problems that are unavoidable and preclude the discovery or establishment of absolute truth.
(Wikipedia: Science)

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Why do I prefer faith over scientific reasoning alone? Because faith is possible. Faith is possible for human beings as further means to comprehend reality, and it provides a view of a bigger picture than science and empiricism alone can provide. Faith is difficult for some; it’s not science. Like science, it’s not always used correctly or legitimately. But that doesn’t make it invalid as a means of pursuing absolute truth.In my personal opinion, for some people “the god hypothesis” is a convenient way to lump all gods and faiths into a single bucket and to reject them all in one swift kick without having to address them rationally by examining each one individually to determine if any have valid claims based on substantiated evidence and revealed knowledge.I’ve begun my own examination with the Bible. My posts Message 158 and Message 160 were meant as a gauge and catalyst for a meeting of the minds, to get a feel for where the debate between science and faith is willing to go. No one that I can see has responded, except for Straggler, in a way:

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All are equally uncorroborated. But lets start a new thread or join an existing one if you want to discuss the veracity of the bible itself as that is not really the topic here.

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However, I don’t wish to discuss the veracity of the Bible alone. I wish to discuss it in the light of scientific evidence. To be honest, I’m not a “leader” personality, and I’ve been relunctant to start a new thread without a good feel for how the idea will be received.

PaulK, please read my post again. Where do I admit that the quantum world was discovered through faith? Your argument on this matter proceeds from a simple misunderstanding.

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This is obviously not the same concept of evidence held by most (all?) scientists and atheists. Are they just fanciful words? I don’t think so. Evidence of the quantum world has always existed; it has always been right before human eyes. So why was it only a century ago that the quantum world was discovered? Because only a century ago did we start to develop the “eyes” to “see” it. Is there evidence of the things not seen in the quantum realm? Are not laser beams, superconductors, and transistors evidence of things not seen?
  —JungEinstein

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This same line of reasoning can be applied to scientific evidence. Scientists believe that only scientific evidence is valid "because science says so." This is what I hope to explore with time.

Paul, you're absolutely right. My apologies. My head was surely in another place for missing your obvious point. It was your remark,

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If you could show an example of someone who discovered the quantum world through faith, before the evidence became available to our eyes you would maybe have a point.

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that followed my post that I had in mind. The simple misunderstanding was mine.And you're right, I don't know whether or not anyone discovered the quantum world through faith. I was trying to say that the only way it could have been discovered through faith is if there had been revealed knowledge about it, but I could be mistaken. I'm personally not aware of any such revelation, that's why I said no one discovered it through faith.

Hi, Bluejay No, that wasn’t my point. I'm very glad you pointed out where the confusion lies. Now that I’ve reread my previous post, I can see that I didn’t make my point very obvious.I quoted the Bible’s statement that faith is “evidence of things not seen.” (I understand completely why Straggler and others don’t accept this statement, because it isn't evidenced by science alone.)I attempted to make an analogy between the unseen quantum world and the unseen spiritual world. I believe this is where I failed, because I didn’t explicitly say that I was using the quantum world as an analogy to the spiritual world.I attempted (rather poorly) to express the thought that if evidence could exist of the unseen quantum world (lasers, superconductors, transistors, etc.), then perhaps evidence could exist of an unseen spiritual world (evidence-substantiated faith). I had hoped the analogy would be evident from the context of my post.I in no way meant to imply that lasers, etc. were identical to faith, or that the quantum world was identical to the spiritual one. I meant simply that the idea of “evidence of things not seen” is not such an irrational concept, because such evidence exists within our physical world in the case of the quantum domain. No. I agree that the universe is a more reliable witness where there is contradiction with human testimony. This is why I said earlier that there is no such thing as objective evidence that is inferior to faith. However, it seems to be the consensus among many atheists and scientists that all faith-based testimony contradicts the universe’s testimony, and so all faith is rejected outright. I wish to convey that this is not the case.If it’s the consensus among scientists that the universe hasn’t yielded testimony to the existence of an unseen spirit realm one way or the other, why the distaste for faith-based propositions (other than because of a dislike for the common concept of God)?And why is it that scientists allow themselves an appeal to the universe at large, but people of faith are dismissed for making an appeal to a creator of the universe? If scientists say it's because there is evidence that the universe actually exists, but not so for a creator, is this not an appeal to people, or scientists, who must be able to recognize that evidence? Because what is evidence? Just natural phenomena in and of itself? No, it’s a major ingredient to the scientific process. So I don't agree that "There is no appeal to science or to scientists in the process."Also, it’s interesting that you should mention a “very gross mischaracterization of scientific philosophy,” because I’ve been trying to convey that there is a very gross mischaracterization of God and faith within this thread. I suppose I will be content with my mischaracterization of science as long as scientists and atheists are content with their mischaracterization of God and faith. (Tongue in cheek ).Edited by JungEinstein, : No reason given.