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

But, ICANT, I have never seen any difference in anyone who has ever said they are a believer. Including anyone on these message boards. Including the Pope. Including Mother Theresa. For any and all people who claim to be believers, there are just as many good and decent and honest folk who do not claim to be believers.Does this mean there are no belivers anywhere on the planet?Or are my methods of finding a 'difference' not valid for some reason?What sort of difference should we actually find in a believer? Actually, at this point I'm referring to any sort of difference at all. Answered prayer... an easier life... perhaps even just smiling slightly more often than others. Anything at all, really. I've never seen any significant difference from anyone claiming to be a believer. What is it that a believer can have that a non-believer cannot? I have yet to see any valid answer for that question.

That's exactly my point. What's the difference between these gloves being God's credit, and these gloves being from some nice people making a donation? How do we tell the difference? What if no one prayed at all and the gloves still come? Is that just from nice people then? Or is that from God still too? Very true. That's why tests are always repeated, whenever anyone makes a claim. Anyone can claim, anyone can test. We are all eagerly awaiting any 'true' tests for God, however. I am not against such a conclusion, I am merely pointing out that it hasn't happened yet. Hasn't happened yet with all of humanity searching for it to happen over the course of human history.But sure, it certainly could happen still, I'm just not holding my breath, that's all. No. It's evidence that what you tested for isn't true.If I think I have keys in my pocket, and I look for those keys in my pocket and there is nothing there... this is evidence that there are no keys in my pocket. Of course it is evidence that you do not exist, it's just not very much or very good evidence, and can certainly be overturned by some positive evidence that you actually do exist.* However, if this person continues to look for you everywhere you're supposed to be (as people have done with God) and you're no where to be found. Say you never are at home, never at work, never with your wife, friends have never seen you, you never answer phone messages, you don't really have a driver's license or social security number, you have never posted on any internet message board, you don't even have a Facebook page ... then yes, that's certainly some good evidence that you don't exist.I agree that negative results when testing for prayer do not show God does not exist. But it is evidence towards that end. As we do more tests for everything else God is supposed to do... and they all come up with negative results... this is more and more evidence that God does not exist. When no one, anywhere, is ever able to come up with any positive evidence for God existing at all... in the history of the world... then that certainly is some good evidence that God does not exist. Certainly enough to show beyond all reasonable doubt.Edited by Stile, : *Added some clarity to this sentence

Agreed, very much so. Likely. I have no argument agaist this. I'd just be wary to put forth such a definitive statement about something that happened so long ago. I think that many beliefs in the supernatural came about through a variety of different means. But that's simply what I think, and I certainly think the one you've offered here was one of those ways (perhaps the majority, even?).

Hi Stile, Eternal life. God Bless,

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"John 5:39 (KJS) Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me."

Thanks. But you'll have to forgive me for not believing you. You offer no reason for me to take your word for this claim of reality. I don't think you, or whatever God you claim to support, have the ability to offer me this.If there is a just God that offers such a gift, He will make Himself known to me. If He does not make Himself known to me, then perhaps I am unable to receive His gift as my search has yet to yield any results.Nothing you have offered makes any sense for implying that such a God actually exists. I have met many false prophets in my time (many of them preaching from the same Bible you propose), and you have not offered anything to identify yourself as different from them.Perhaps it is my path of seeking truth in this reality that actually makes me a believer, and perhaps it is I who already has eternal life, if such a thing is even available at all. I do not know, and by what you have shown so far, neither do you. Unless you are hiding some way of showing that what you say is actually true?

I agree with you, as an atheist, but, if I was a person who had belief in a higher power, without any religious affiliation, I would disagree with you. The advantage would be "life" and the ability for it to adapt, evolve and continue...nothing else would be required. I think religion has ruined what could have been a good philosophical God concept with their self-centered arrogance. Agreed. And I think this has been the ultimate failure of religions, to make claims about reality and attribute certain phenomena to God. If God hadn't been arrogantly sequestered by the world religions, who knows where the "God Hypothesis" would be now.It could have been just a philosophical ideology that made no hard claims about reality. I wouldn't say reasoning, I would say evidence.Reasoning implies that all people of faith know the facts about the Earth, planets, universe, etc, and reject it. Many people throughout the world know absolutly nothing about science so reasonably God is a good answer. It would still lack evidence though. To me yes, to someone from a tribe in the middle of the rainforest, not so much.

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"All great truths begin as blasphemies""I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky

In response to the OP, for me to believe in a phenomena it must have repeatable, testable evidence. The stronger the evidence of the existence of the phenomena, the less skeptical I become.That's pretty much it.

I don't understand what you're getting at here. This sentence confuses me. We're talking about the difference between followers of God (religious people) and non-religious people. This 'advantage' you've provided is something that (generally) non-religious people accept and religious people tend to reject.Or are you thinking about some sort of ID-like religion where they believe God is behind evolution/adaptation/everything?I just don't really understand the point you're trying to make here.I totally understand that a person with a belief in a higher power may certainly disagree with me when I say their higher power provides no advantage over anyone else.I'm not really concerned with what anyone thinks though. It is a fact that we can show that belief in a higher power does not add any significant "goodness" to one's life. High's and low's are equally attainable from theists and atheists alike. There is no feeling or attribute that is only attainable by "those who believe". We can show this to be fact, regardless as to who thinks it's actually real or not, they're just simply wrong.Remember, I'm not trying to convert anyone, or convince anyone.Reasonable doubt. That's all. And I think you are conflating the term "reasonable doubt". What's meant here is what we can show to be true, not what some people may think is "reasonable". Probably where it is with most Rational Theists right now. They understand that their faith is not rational or reasonable in the sense that it can be shown to be a part of reality. They understand that their faith rests on their personal conviction. With this understanding they do not allow their faith to interfere with other people's life-decisions. They also do not attempt to "prove" or "show" their faith, since they understand that such an act is unnecessary and even counter-productive to what faith actually is. Sort of. Rational Theists do make hard claims about reality... those claims are just kept private and personal. They do not make hard claims about reality to other people. That's the difference. For that, they understand that they require the ability to show how it is so in reality. And they understand that their faith is beyond such a restriction. But we must remember and respect that their personal philosophical ideology (or "faith") most certainly is a hard claim about reality to them.In exactly the same way that I do not accept anything but what can be shown to be true in reality, they are able to accept some things that are not yet shown to be true in reality. Although this isn't possible for me, the personal conviction at the end of the day is exactly the same. My choice to only accept what can be shown is exactly the same as someone elses choice to sometimes accept what is-not-yet-shown. They are equal life-guiding choices. One is not better or worse than the other apart from our personal subjective feelings about them. Rational Theists do not quietly understand that their faith is actually "just an idea". They certainly do make hard claims about reality. They just have the rational ability to understand that these yet-to-be-shown ideas need to remain personal. You are correct, my mistake. I knew I didn't like the wording of that line. However, the context of this word "reasoning" is not the same as the context for the word "reasonable" in the phrase "reasonable doubt". It does not matter who personally accepts an argument for "reasonable doubt". The point is to show, within the confines of reality, that what you say is actually true.If I claim there are no keys in my pocket, and we turn my pocket inside out on the table and there are no keys there, then we have shown "beyond all reasonable doubt" that there are no keys in my pocket. I'm sure there are plenty of people (perhaps tribes in the middle of the rainforest, perhaps crazy people on the street) that may believe that I do still have keys in my pocket even though they do not see them in front of their eyes. Their refusal to accept reality does not change the fact that there are no keys in my pocket "beyond all reasonable doubt".In the same way, if we look for God in all the places God is supposed to be (which people are constantly doing) and there is no God there and has never been any God there throughout the history of humanity... then it is shown "beyond all reasonable doubt" that God does not exist.People can decide not to accept this conclusion all they like, it doesn't matter. Reality doesn't care what other people think, it only cares what we can show.It doesn't matter if this is a valid argument to someone from a tribe in the middle of the rainforest.
It doesn't matter if this is a valid argument to onifre.
What matters is that this is a valid argument. That's all, period.And it will remain a valid argument until such time that anyone is able to produce some sort of valid evidence from reality that contradicts this "reasonable doubt".

No you can't.You can show that you cannot detect any addition, but that doesn't show that the addition isn't there.How do you know that you method of detection is not flawed? But science doesn't even have a possible method for detecting God. You're argument that science's inability to detect something non-phyiscal, based on the lack of physical evidence, shows that the non-physical thing doesn't exist is most circular. Plenty of people have seen God here and there. The claim that there is not and has never been any God anywhere is just fallacious. We don't know that.Sure science has never detected God, but that doesn't mean anything. Do you love your mother?How do you show that to be true in reality?

You are correct. I do not know that the method of detection is not flawed. I also agree that I cannot tell the difference between "no detection" and "unable to detect".That's why I'm only saying it's shown "beyond all reasonable doubt". If we use every means available to us, and we come up with nothing, then it's shown "beyond all reasonable doubt". It's not shown "100% true that this must be how reality is", but it most certainly is shown "beyond all reasonable doubt". It is possible that science doesn't have a method for detecting God. It's also possible that they do, and they've tried it, and God does not exist.
You cannot say "science doesn't even have a possible method for detecting God", how could you possibly know such a thing?We are only limited to the methods known to us. How can we use a method of detection that we are unaware of?Beyond all reasonable doubt.Not 100%, not "this must be true about reality".Lets look at the keys in my pocket again. I turn my pocket inside out and we both do not see any keys there.
This shows "beyond all reasonable doubt" that no keys exist in my pocket.
It does not show 100%, it does not show with absolute certainty that there are no keys in my pocket.
Perhaps there is some unknown phenomenon deflecting light away from the keys so that we cannot see them.
Perhaps we are both affected by some toxin that prevents us from visuallizing metal for some reason.
Or, as you say, perhaps our "method of detection" for the keys is flawed.However, regardless, we have used all methods known to us, and therefore it is shown "beyond all reasonable doubt".If we were to look everywhere that people said keys existed: vehicles... all people's pockets... houses... mailboxes... safes... locksmiths... Wal-Mart... and we NEVER, EVER found any real evidence of keys. If we used all methods of detection known to man to search for keys and we're unable to find keys anywhere on the planet... then this is some very good evidence that keys do not exist. If this were possible then it would be shown "beyond all reasonable doubt" that keys do not exist.It's the same thing for God.Sure our detection method may be flawed.
Sure we may not understand the detection method required to find God.
It's also quite likely (since we take many precautions) that the detection method is not flawed.We have used all detection methods we know about.
We have attempted to detect everywhere people say we should look.
We have NEVER, EVER found any real evidence of God. Therefore, the "God hypothesis" is refuted beyond all reasonable doubt.Exactly like when I say "there are no keys in my pocket", I am really only saying "I've checked my pocket in the most reliable way I know how and have not found any keys... they may still be there, but I have no way to identify how this could possibly be different from them not being there".That's what "beyond all reasonable doubt" means.-We've checked everywhere God is said to be in the most reliable ways we know how
-We've checked multiple times, by many different people, in many different ways
-We have NEVER, EVER found any real evidence supporting the position that God may exist
-We are unable to identify a difference between "God existing and is undetectable" and "God doesn't exist".
-We are unable to identify a difference between "God" and "imagination".Therefore, we have shown that God does not exist beyond all reasonable doubt. It most certainly is not fallacious. It's shown "beyond a reasonable doubt". It is true that science never detecting God doesn't mean anything. What does mean something is that there is never any real evidence that God exists.People claim things all the time. That's what "doesn't mean anything". Yes, I love my mother.I show this to be true in reality "beyond all reasonable doubt" because I use every method available and known to me to show that love.We are all limited by the methods known to us. You seem to be suggesting that all the methods we know about are useless compared to all the methods we don't know about.That's like saying if someone attacks us with a bow and arrow, we shouldn't hide behind a brick wall because it's possible that there's something we don't know about the brick wall that may lead it to not block arrows.It's not as if I'm saying we shouldn't bother looking for God at all and that shows He doesn't exist.I'm saying we've looked for God EVERYWHERE He's supposed to be, using ANY AND ALL methods of detection we know about, for the ENTIRE HISTORY of mankind, and we haven't come up with any real evidence for His existence.This shows that God does not exist "beyond all reasonable doubt".If it doesn't, then nothing is ever shown "beyond all reasonable doubt". And that's just plain silly.

Wait, what?You not knowing if your method is flawed and you not being able to tell the difference between "no detection" and "unable to detect" are both reasonable doubts.If you took a ring to a jeweler and they said that they've shown that it is not gold beyond a reasonable doubt but they don't know if they ran the right test and they're not sure if they failed to detect gold or if there actually was no gold there in the first place, then you'd claim that your ring is not gold? Not in my opinion.and if it does, then "beyond a reasonable doubt" is a worthless qualifier.Before we invented a detection method, you'd claim that there was no reason to doubt that your fork didn't have bacteria on it. That says nothing about whether or not there actually is any bacteria on it. Because of the nature of philosphical naturalism versus the nature of god.A god that is both intelligent and supernatural is outside the scope of science. No, its not the same thing for god.Looking and feeling around is a great way to find keys, but you're not going to find an intelligent supernatural being that way. Its a false analogy. What is so unreasonable about those doubts? For detecting a freakin' GOD!? Seriously? This is circular reasoning. You're defining "real evidence" as that from the methods we know about and then saying that since we have nothing from the methods that we know about then we don't have any real evidence and therefor it reasonably doesn't exist.

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Let me take the other approach to this.... No way. How have you shown it?We could take your same argument against god and apply it here.-We've checked everywhere love is said to be in the most reliable ways we know how
-We've checked multiple times, by many different people, in many different ways
-We have NEVER, EVER found any real evidence supporting the position that love may exist
-We are unable to identify a difference between "love existing and is undetectable" and "love doesn't exist".
-We are unable to identify a difference between "love" and "imagination".Therefore, it is shown beyond a reasonable doubt that you do not love your mother.

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Actually, I thought of one more aproach.You're basically arguing Positivism here. But what about the social sciences?

quote:

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Among most social scientists and historians, orthodox positivism has long fallen out of favor. While in agreement on the important role of the scientific method, social scientists realize that one cannot identify laws that would hold true in all cases when human behavior is concerned, and that while the behaviour of groups may at times be predicted in terms of probability, it is much harder to explain the behaviour of each individual or events. Today, practitioners of both the social sciences and physical sciences recognize the role of the observer can unintentionally bias or distort the observed event.

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source

quote:

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Antipositivists then add that positivism is restricted to phenomena that can be constrained within an analytical and verifiable fragment of the reality, i.e., that it is impossible to study freedom, irrationality and various unpredictable actions that are common in individual human behaviour.

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sourceAre many of the findings of the social sciences false beyond all reasonable doubt as well?

Hi, Stile.I liked this post quite a lot. There is one thing I don't understand, though.In Message 278, to Onifre, you wanted "reasonable doubt" to be applied universally, not individually or subjectively: But, to Catholic Scientist, you said this: When you define "reasonable doubt" in terms of what we know and where we've been told to look, don't you mandate that "reasonable doubt" can only be assessed in terms of a particular audience?If so, doesn't your argument ("only what's available to us") take the same logical form as Oni's primitive-rainforest-tribe analogy? In other words, aren't you, in effect, only saying, "it's a valid argument to me," just like Oni's tribe?Aren't you basically lending validation to any argument simply because it is adequate to convince somebody somewhere?Edited by Bluejay, : extra yellowing

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-BluejayDarwin loves you.

No, they are not reasonable doubts.In your gold ring analogy they are not running all the tests we know about. In fact, they may not be running any tests at all.With God, we're running EVERY test we know about, using ANY method we can possibly develop. We continually use any NEW method anyone is capable of thinking up, ALL of these methods come up with nothing.If you think "not doing anything" is equivalent to "doing everything we can"... you're not understanding me. This very nicely shows the difference between "reasonable doubt" and "100% certainty".What rational person would claim there's bacteria on a fork before we even knew what bacteria was? How could they claim such a thing?
At this point, it most certainly is "beyond all reasonable doubt" to say bacteria does not exist.
No one ever said we shouldn't look for bacteria. And we eventually found it.What rational person can claim God exists before we even know what God is?
No one ever said we shouldn't be looking for God. However, we still have yet to find Him. Therefore we are still "beyond all reasonable doubt" that God does not exist.What rational person would claim their imagination is real before showing it to be so?
No one ever said we shouldn't be looking for things in our imagination. How else would we discover new things? However, until we actually find something to indicate that it exists we are still "beyond all reasonable doubt" that things in our imagination do not exist.This line of reasoning is exactly what I'm doing. How can we claim something is a part of reality before we can show it to be so? What is it that let us know that bacteria actually exists? We showed that it does exist by looking where it is supposed to be and finding real evidence for it.We still can't even say with "100% certainty" that bacteria exists. It's possible that something exists that merely is detected by us as bacteria. However, we certinaly can say that bacteria exsts "beyond all reasonable doubt".We would have been right in the realm of bacteria.
We would be wrong in the realm of Zeus.
We would be wrong in the realm of fairies.
We would be wrong in the infinite realm of human imagination.There are an infinite number of imaginary things we'll be wrong about.
There are only a limited number of "types of things" that actually exist.That is why we need to show things before we claim they are a part of reality. It is likely we are mistaken. Says who? You? Who cares what you say?
What if an intelligent God wants to be found?
What if science can detect an intelligent, supernatural God and they just don't because one doesn't exist? No, it's not.If the only thing we are left with is a God who is undetectable from non-existence, then that alone shows "beyond a reasonable doubt" that God does not exist.Nothing is ever shown to not exist further than being undetectable from non-existence. Not a single thing in our imagination. This is as far as our tests can take us, ever.How can we ever possibly tell the difference between "non-existence" and "looks like non-existence but isn't"? We are never, ever able to do this, with anything. That's why we use the phrase "beyond reasonable doubt", for exactly this situation. Therefore, it is still shown beyond a reasonable doubt that I love my mother. I am real, my love is real simply because people can love, and I am a person. In order to show my love actually exists, all we need to do is show that I actually exist and promote some sort of action to imply that love.It's not like we have something from God that we could be unsure about.It's that we have NOTHING from God.There is a big difference. Notice, of course, that there's still "an event". Sure, that event may be distorted, or misinterpreted when intelligent beings are involved in the observations or as the subject. The problem is that with God, there are no observations at all. We don't have an observation that may be mis-interpreted.Go ahead, name an observation of God that we may have misinterpreted.
Likely, you'll only name an observation that has a perfectly acceptable mundane explanation for it, unless you know something I don't?
If you're going to complain that our mundane interpretations may be faulty, you have a lot of work ahead of you showing how that may be.I'm not saying we checked once and didn't find God. That certainly would fall into the possibility that we're "missing" an intelligent being.I'm saying we're checking constantly, and have been for all history. And as long as we still find nothing at all, we are showing "beyond a reasonable doubt" that God does not exist. Of course not. They are intended to show that certain findings on intelligent beings may have different results since intelligent beings do not behave the same way all the time.The point with God is that there are no findings in the first place. We can't place a wrong interpretation on results when those results don't exist. It's the non-existence of those results that shows God does not exist beyond all reasonable doubt.

Yes, this is true. The entire point of "reasonable doubt" is not to be "100% certain" because such a goal is unattainable (by any known method, anyway).But you need to be careful. Onifre's "what we know" was "a tribe in the rainforest", and Onifre's "where we've been told to look" was "where a tribe in the rainforest might try to look.Now, with my example "what we know" is what all of humanity knows. And "where we've been told to look" includes all possible places we can know of to look in.That's a big difference. Yes and no. The same kind of form, but certainly not just "to me".The same kind of form, but "to everyone" with "everything that we know to date".How can we (human race 'we') reasonably claim anything beyond what which we know?That's the whole point of "reasonable doubt". It absolutely is not "100% certain", but just correct-as-far-as-we-are-able-to-tell.

We are talking about followers of God, yes, but, there need not be any religious affiliation to follow God. I believe evolution is widely accepted by religious people, it's just that the fanatical lunatics are louder and get more attention. But there in lies the rub. Reasonable doubt by whos standards...?You use the scientific method and limit our capability as a society to just that method because you feel it provides the most accurate data, and I as an atheist agree with you. To us, it provides reasonable doubt.A person of faith, lets go with a moderate who accepts evolution, also applies the scientific method, BUT, includes as well their own subjective experience. They value this subjective ability and place faith on it. To them this faith and subjectiveness provide an equal doubt that our atheistic method is not good enough.The question of who is right is irrelevant, both the moderate and the atiest provide themselves with reasonable doubt to satisfy what each individual feels is important. The atheist feels science and only science is important. Where as the moderate feels that not just science but also our subjective interpretations are improtant too. So, reasonable doubt is not judged equally. Each individual has their own level of reaonable doubt and their own method by which to get there. I think people like Catholic Sci or Bluejay would disagree with the not rational or reasonable part. I wouldn't say convictions, sounds like they are being stubborn. I would say they place faith on their subjective experiences. As should be the case with all subjective experiences; they are yours and yours alone.As a side note: I personally think that faith started off this way long ago, when man first started to interprete their subjective experinces and express them to others. It manifested into organized religion with rules and laws to govern and control. Of course no one listen to the laws if man said it so they said God said it to strike fear. But, one need not follow this type of religion. Nor is religion required to follow God. I was thinkiing more along the lines of Einsteins God. Where it is not really an "IT" but more of a law of phisics type ideology. The claims that would be made would fit within the knowlegde of the applied sciences. Remembering of course that even theoretical physicist make claims that can't yet be objectively verified. Agreed. I will point you to Bluejays post #282 for the reply to this. What if we are on the phone with each other. To you in your apartment looking in your pocket, there is reasonable doubt. To me half way across town on the phone with you, there isn't enough reasonable doubt. Even though the keys may actually not be in your pocket. Reasonable doubt, like time, is relative to the observor, lol. What I'm say is that reasonable doubt is judge differently by people. Some include the objective and only the objective. Some include the object AND the subjective. Both cast doubt on each others methods, equally, so neither side wins. This will sound corney but, what about the people that look within themselves and claim to find God? Is that not proof that God exists for them? Is objectivity the only correct method for reasoning? I don't think I would like to live in a world where that was the case. I am an atheist, but I don't feel that my method of determining that is the only proper method. For all we know God is ONLY experienced subjectively and we are the one's who are wrong. Maybe both atheists AND religion is wrong. Maybe it's somewhere in the middle, like a combo of both, like Einstiens concept of God. I don't know. But, I don't think we should be closed minded to ONLY the objective. This will take us into a philosophical argument. Who determines what reality is...? We are one species in a pretty big universe, we may not know shit yet. Don't think our ability to experience reality shows us the ONLY reality there is to experience. Evolution shows us a gradual change in the level of awareness that species experience. The reality we experience maybe only one of the ways to experience the universe. To you...?If it doesn't matter if it's a valid argument to the rainforest people, or to me, or I guess to anyone else, to include you, then we can reasonable determine that it doesn't matter if it's a valid argument, period. It doesn't matter because it's only a valid argument to those who feel it's a valid argument. Yes to both you and I it is a valid argument, and it does place reasonable to doubt by my standards. Edited by onifre, : No reason given.

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"All great truths begin as blasphemies""I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky