The best scientific method (Bayesian form of H-D)

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Evolution addresses the very meaning of human life

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It does?Since when does any science address any kind of philosophical "meaning"?People may take scientific findings and ascribe their own philosophical "meaning" to them, but that is not science nor is it scientific to do so.Science doesn't make value judgements.

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Evolutionists who ignore well established scientific methods, which validate God's claims commit this sort of injustice.

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So, please elaborate upon which well-established scientific methods have validated any supernatural anything.

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Of course they wail that there is "no evidence" (like, right, they have examined all available evidence!).

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So, are you saying that because we have not examined all evidence we cannot use the evidence we do have to reach tentative conclusions?We do not have perfect knowledge, and never will, so we can never know anything at all?

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If they open their eyes to the evidence that is out there, they find a stack of bills to pay.

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Please present your scientific evidence of God.[This message has been edited by schrafinator, 01-05-2004]

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But look at Bible Code Digest.com - Home Page [Bible Code Digest] and search on Moby Dick. Or search at Doron Witztum's website, reading the review of Harold Gans of the criticism. It's worth the study. The popularizers are right about one thing. This study changes everything about our culture and science.

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Hey, instead of looking at biblecodedigest.com, a site obviously biased in favor of the Bible Code business being true (rather than biased in favor of the evidence), why not look at the following site:Bible Codes debunked in Statistical ScienceIt is a link to an actual peer-reviewed (biblecodediges' studies were not peer reiviewed as far as I can tell) article from Statistical Science which contradicts the findings of the Bible Code.Incidentally, Statistical Science is the same journal which published the original article which made the Bible Code claims.

So, basically you are saying that the descision of the professional Journal "Statistical Science" to publish the bible code paper was correct, but the descision to publish the contradictory article was a complete mistake?Are you saying that peer review is an unreliable method for evaluating scientific findings, or do you consider it unreliable only when it disagrees with your preferred worldview?I suppose biblecodedigest to be biased because biblecode digest is an entire site dedicated to the uncritical promotion of the idea that the biblecodes are real. It is a cheerleder, "true-believer" site, never mentioning any problems or limitations, other than saying that every single critic is wrong.They say "our own researchers have uncovered this or that", but have these fidings been evaluated by others? That's what peer-review is for; to help you not fool yourself.The thing is, the researchers writing a real scientific paper typically bend over backwards to show the ways in which the findings might be wrong, or other ways the findings could be explained, and then go on to make their case for what they think the findings mean, as supported by evidence from theor own, and others', research.I don't see that happening at biblecodedigest.

According to what I know, the only assumption of methodological naturalism is that naturalistic explanations can be found for natural events.To emphasize, it is a methodological assumption; that is, in science, we act as if it is true without asserting that it is definitely true.

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Here's my rant. Most "scientists" are just using science as a hidey-hole from having to deal with God, and will block any effort to do or report such a study.

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How arrogant of you....and wrong.Science doesn't deal with God because it isn't set up to deal with anything supernatural.Science does not deny or confim the supernatural; science ignores the supernatural.Science deals with naturalistic explanations for naturalistic phenomena.Your implication that most scientists are "hiding" from anything is arrogant, insulting, and actually serves to illuminate your own insecurity and discomfort with people not believing exactly as you do.

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They are the ones who don't care how much the afflicted suffer.

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More completely unfounded, bigoted ignorance. [quote] It really scares you that people don't believe as you do, doesn't it? Otherwise, why would you express such vitriol/

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"Evolution is a 'theory', just like gravity. If you don't like it, go jump off a bridge."

Can you please tell me how my definition of what science is and isn't is incorrect?Can you please back up your assertion that scientists don't care for ill people and that they are afraid to do studies on god or retract them immediately?

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You are an accident of matter, that purposesly obeys certain physical and chemical laws, such that accidental reproductive entities occurred and whenever the accidents produced more reproductive units, they increased, until here you are. (Theory of Evolution)?

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Yep.Random mutations ("accidental", to use your word), plus natural selection (non-accidental) over a very long time has resulted in me.I find this a much more likely scenario than the idea that an unseen, completely-undetected-by-everyone-except-those-who-already-believe-
in-him, all-powerful middle eastern nomadic shepherd tribe god directed my existence.

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"Evolution is a 'theory', just like gravity. If you don't like it, go jump off a bridge."

OK, I thought I'd give you another chance to actually respond to what I wrote.If you would like to take back your insults and untruths about scientists, please do, or defend your own statements.I'm afraid that pretending you didn't say them isn't an option.

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Here's my rant. Most "scientists" are just using science as a hidey-hole from having to deal with God, and will block any effort to do or report such a study.

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How arrogant of you....and wrong.Science doesn't deal with God because it isn't set up to deal with anything supernatural.Science does not deny or confim the supernatural; science ignores the supernatural.Science deals with naturalistic explanations for naturalistic phenomena.Your implication that most scientists are "hiding" from anything is arrogant, insulting, and actually serves to illuminate your own insecurity and discomfort with people not believing exactly as you do.

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They are the ones who don't care how much the afflicted suffer.

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More completely unfounded, bigoted ignorance.It really scares you that people don't believe as you do, doesn't it? Otherwise, why would you express such vitriol?

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"Evolution is a 'theory', just like gravity. If you don't like it, go jump off a bridge."

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H-D science has no limitations regarding spiritual matters, and is often applied to deal with them. God, meaning the God, Jehovah, clearly states of Himself that He can be proved scientifically. "prove Me now in this." If He is out there, science can deal with Him. If He is not, the test He provides will "prove" or test the point. So, this statement is wrong.

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I just have one question for you.What evidence could disprove the existence of God?

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The Journal of Scientific Exploration is full of scientific articles pertaining to the supernatural.

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I went to the website of this journal and read a number of the abstracts.Very few of them deal with anything supernatural; they discuss anaomalies in nature, not God.Most were simply reports of incidents and case studies rather than tests of theories.It actually reminded me a lot of a slightly better quality Fortean Journal.For instance, there is a paper about "posession" which recounts an incidence of a woman in India dying and then being revived. Upon revival this woman claimed to have "been" another woman in a neighboring town.The paper is merely a case study, because there is no "Theory of Posession" described or defined with positive predictions and possible falsifications.So, case studies are a good starting point for real, detailed investigation, but they are hardly evidence for anything because they haven't defined or tested anything. They have just told a story.

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Schrafinator: Science deals with naturalistic explanations for naturalistic phenomena.

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True, but it also deals with what cannot be explained, such as quantum mechanics.

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...except that quantum mechanics meets all the requirements to be a scientific theory; it is supported by positive evidence which can be observed by anyone, it's observations are replicable by anyone, and it is falsifiable.If all you are saying is that there are fundamental properties of the Univerese which are not explainable by other fundamental properties, that doesn't mean that any fundamental properties are supernatural. It just means that they are unexplainable.Of course, that's not all you are saying, is it? You are somehow expecting acceptance of an enormous leap from "we don't understand this" to "Jehova and demons of the Christian Bible exist".

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About scientists who care nothing for human suffering, only their own egos:

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Consider the scientists 150 years ago who ignored the women dying of childbirth fever, so they could keep their professional smell acquired doing autopsies and wouldn't have to wash away the germs they were carrying.

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First of all, those were doctors, not scientists, who weren't washing their hands.Second, the Germ Theory of Disease was not widely accepted at that time so doctors didn't wash their hands out of ignorance, not malice.Third, it was the scientists who eventually figured out that doctors should wash their hands.http://www.mansfield.ohio-state.edu/~sabedon/biol2007.htm

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They did not concern themselves with human suffering. Today, we have better evidence for the effectiveness of prayer than Semmelweis was able to provide for handwashing. And, like handwashing, it is such an easy thing to pray, to do prayer experiments, and prayer has such a potentially powerful cure for so much human suffering. But scientists today, like the ones who ignored Semmelweis' early studies on hand washing, don't care that they might be able to lower the damage that potential demons are doing to people.

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If prayer works, how is this evidence for demons or your God?It only means that prayer works.Some other God could be answering your prayers, or demons could be answering the prayers, or space aliens could be answering the prayers.Besides, you haven't demonstrated that prayer heals people. If it really did, insurance companies would pay for it in a heartbeat.

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They don't want to pray, think it will make them ridiculous before their peers, and don't care who might be helped by prayer.

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You really do hate it that people don't believe as you do; so much so that you vilify all non-beliving scientists as cold, uncaring people.Yep, those cold, uncaring cancer researchers who save lives every day; they sure do waste their time trying to understand how cancer grows and begins. If they would all just stop trying to understand stuff and just pray a whole bunch, we wouldn't have any cancer, right?Stupid, uncaring scientists.

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Instead, they concern themselves for their opinions and self-righeousness, do all they can to pick holes in the efforts of others to show that prayer can do some, maybe a lot, of good, and do their best to stay ignorant of ways that prayer has been shown to help.

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Um, isn't it the job of all scientists everywhere to critically analyse ("pick holes in the efforts of others", as you call it) the relevant work in their respective fields?I mean, that's how science remains a very accurate, powerful, and most importantly, self-correcting method of inquiry.You think that prayer proves the existence of your God and demons?Fine.What is your theory of the existence of your God and what is your theory of the existence of demons? Please define your terms, provide positive evidence observable by anyone and replicable by anyone, for each, and potential falsifications for each.To me, those prayer studies disprove the existence of Jehova, and here's why:Jehova is all-powerful, correct?If Jehova is all-powerful, I would have predicted that the people not being prayed for would show no change in healing, while the people being prayed for should have shown a 100% cure rate.If this wasn't the outcome, then Jehova could not have been the cause of the improvement in healing.[This message has been edited by schrafinator, 02-07-2004]

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Arrogance is thinking you know more and better than Yeshua or Jesus.

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Nice sermon.Too bad it's not a relevant answer.

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It is looking over the human race, 80-90% of which believes in God,

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Irrelevant.Just because lots of people believe something doesn't mean it's true.Not long ago, close to 100% of people believed in a flat Earth, but belief doesn't make something true.But hold on, do you claim that 80%-90% of all people believe in your particular version of God?

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that demons exist,

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Please define "demon".Furthermore, please provide some documentation to support your claim that 80%-90% of the world's population believes in the existence of demons as you define them.

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that prayer is essential to life,

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Define "prayer".Please provide some documentation to support your claim that 80%-90% of the world's population considers prayer essential to life, as you define it.

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and ignoring the scientific evidence that confirms these beliefs,

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I don't ignore the evidence; I disagree with your wild extrapolations of the evidence.

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deciding that you know better, that what makes sense to you is more likely to be right, and doing what you think is right in your own mind is better. That's arrogance.

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You still haven't responded to my post, Steve. I'll keep reposting it untill you defend or retract your insulting, unfounded statements.

Replies to posts #219 and #220, please Stephen.

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Well, remembering that science never disproves or proves anything,

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Of course.

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it is clear from Scripture that, if a study of tithing, done according to the rules given in the scripture for tithing,

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Who's interpretation of scripture are you going to use? [quote]which did not produce some well-defined "openings of the windows of heaven" and "rebuking the devourer."[quote] Please provide precise definitions of "openings of the windows of heaven" and "rebuking the devourer."

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this would "disprove" God. Opening the windows of heaven is elsewhere in scripture defined as increased rainfall, so, for example, if the governor of Kansas called for a test in some drought ridden counties, but not others, of tithing, called for, say, 1% of the population of the test counties to volunteer to tithe properly, and asked residents of control counties to abstain from tithing for one month. And then rainfall changes between the two counties could be compared.

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Of course, you would have to control for all other reasons that the weather would be a certain way. You would also have to control for all other types of rituals or sacrifices that anyone might do to other gods.Even if you could do all of that, you still have no idea if the tithing is working for your particular God, because tithing is not exclusive to Christianity.

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In H-D science, evidence is used in two ways, to confirm predictions and to form prior estimates of plausibility. Evidence "for" an idea is evidence that does not contradict it, and makes it ever-so-slightly more plausible.

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So, The fact that Children believe in Santa Claus makes the existence of Santa Claus "ever-so-slightly more plausible"?

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Now, weird or anomolous evidence, that suggests the existence of "spiritual" beings, such as souls, demons, gods, and the God, Jehovah, is "for" the plausibility of these things, not "against."

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...except that this "evidence" only suggests the existence of the supernatural in those who are already biased to interpret it in this way through cultural and personal bias.

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Understand that my goal here is to make sure as many as possible understand a particular scientific proceedure, and to suggest that that proceedure be applied to the evolution/creation controversy. Since the creation hypothesis postulates the reality of a Creator, as well as demons, human souls, etc, as all being relevant to the understanding of "the Origin of Species." it's of value to evaluate the evidential plausibility of the idea that such creating spiritual beings exist.

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...except that you are not, as far as I can tell, using H-D science properly, in that it is supposed to be based upon real evidence, not heavily-interpreted and biased "plausibilities."

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If all the "creatures" in our biological world were produced by artificial selection, for Jehovah, Satan, or us, we need to know this, and which "creatures" were created by which spiritual being, or by us. (Although, most think that we are spiritual beings as well.)

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Please provide your evidence for such creatures that anyone can observe, regardless of religion.

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This is true now, but it wasn't when they first began gathering evidence to test its predictions. Remember, Einstein never did buy it.

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Doesn't matter if he believed, it only matters if it works.Your problem is that you only want to stay in the rareified dreaming stage; you haven't even tried to define your terms yet.

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Someday, perhaps, demons will be as well studied.

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Define "demon".

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But, the process has to begin, and be encouraged. Perhaps a difference between us, is that I consider the initial phases of the scientific validation of an idea, while you are focusing on its final stages, after years of testing.

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No, I am focusing on what makes reliable, productive science.

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"might be out there" not "exist." Followed by a "so, let's study the idea further hypothetico-deductively, and see for sure."

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But invisible pink unicorns "might be out there", too. How do you propose we test this using H-D science?Do you concede that the journal you cite as dealing with spiritual matters 1)deals with anomolous natural events, not supernatural, and 2)is a collection of case studies and does not test theories?

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Actually, (I'll dig around and find the article, if you want) several scientists being interviewed about the studies confirming and validating prayer, though unbelievers, admitted that they prayed over their research, just in case it might help.

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Irrelevant if there were no controls.The issue at hand is your implication that, for example, cancer researchers are cold and unmoved by human suffering because they refuse to follow your religion's rituals. Furthermore, you have been shown several times that your prayer claims are not supported.

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But, I really do hate those who hate God, so much that they won't talk to and with Him.

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Um, I can't hate what I have no evidence for the existence of.

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We're here to do good, to make a difference, and when we neglect that duty, everyone else suffers.

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I'm all for doing good, but I'd much rather have the cancer researchers working to understand the origin and spread of cancer rather than simply pray for a cure.We have lots of evidence that the difficult work of real scientific research can and does lead to the alleviation of suffering.

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Successful prayer makes the reality of the God prayed to more plausible.

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Why? You keep repeating this claim, but it is a HUGE, GARGANTUAN leap of conclusion to claim this.Successful prayer means that the prayer was successful, nothing more.You have absolutely no way of verifying what caused the prayer to be successful, and you are simply deciding, with nothing more than your personal bias, that it HAD to be your personally-preferred God.What if all prayers are answered by the Great Spirit, or Vishnu, or the Great Galactic Goat regardless of which God or gods anybody prays to?You have no reason at all to conclude that YOUR god is doing anything.

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If that God works by delivering from demons, then it makes demons more plausible.

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You have not esablished in the least that your God has anything to do with anything.

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If possible, express the theory in mathematical terms, a model, so that differences of opinion about predictions can be settled.

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Actually, math is nice but not neccessary.

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I do not expect 100% healing from prayer, because in the description of "right" prayer in the scriptures, there are lots of factors that can "fall short of the glory of God."

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Well, then it would seem that, in your definition, your god is not all-powerful.

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And examples of people not praying "successfully."

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So, any positive outcome is attributed to Yeshua, but any negative outcome is attributed to "falling short of the glory of god" or because people didn't "pray correctly"?Sounds like an unbeatable system to me, kind of like astrology.

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If Yeshua were the one praying, I would expect 100% success.

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Go prays to himself?

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My own rate has increased over the 25 years I have trained in the matter, to nearly 85%.

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Really, you have been keeping detailed records, including accounting for confirmation bias by recording negative evidence, for 25 years?

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The estimates of prior plausibility come from some sort of average of collective intuition. For you to ignore your fellow human's opinions, or to discount them severly, is to put yourself above them, arrogance.

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So, by this logic, Saddam Hussein ordered the attacks on the World Trade Center, because the majority of Americans believe this to be true.Just because someone, or many someones, believe something is true does not make it true.

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Map-makers today, for all practical purposes, often "believe" in a flat earth.

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Yes, but does this mean that most people "believe" in God?Or do they believe (no parenthesese) in God?

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Which is to say, that the flat earth people were not far wrong.

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Come on, Steve, stop being silly. the people who believe in a flat earth don't "believe" for practical purposes so they can make maps. They believe that they will fall of the edge of the earth!

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Re demons, those who see a red-suited guy with a pointy tail and a pitchfork, would be flat-earthers. Not a bad approximation, but of course the real thing will be different. But not that different.

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A spiritual pathogen, where spiritual is understood to be the historic term for a part of the universe similar to, or equivalent with, "dark matter/dark energy."

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Is this aspect of demons a consensus view?

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Demons are understood to have all known spiritual human characteristics: personality, free will, intelligence, power to use dark or spiritual energy and dark or spiritual matter, to influence electro-magnetic material.They can make themselves visible or invisible to humans at their discretion. Demons normally work by deception or lying. "The most successful lie of Satan, is that he doesn't exist." ((The Usual Suspects). But, they are able to put thoughts, desires, fears, in a mind, and to force certain choices (compulsions, addictions).

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How do you know this? What is your evidence? Please provide a link.

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Conversation, often one-way, with God.

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Which God or gods?What kind of conversation, exactly?

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We're talking prior plausibilities, not posterior ones. When lot's of folks believe something is true, it's arrogant to not take their hypothesis under advisement, as having a prior plausibility worth evaluating. It's "true" only when the accumulating confirmed tests of predictions raise the posterior plausibility to near one.

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Lots of folks believe that Astrology is true; does that mean that the plausibility of Astrology being true is greater? Most Americans believe that violent crime and child abductions are on the increase; does that make more plausible that they are right? A majority of Americans believe that antibiotics kill both viruses and bacteria, so does this increase the plausibility of viruses being killed by antibiotics? Almost half of Americans believe that early man and dinosaurs coexisted on earth; does their belief make it more plausible that it is true?I would answer that the facts and evidence tell us most accurately the nature of the universe, because people "believe" many, many things for lots and lots of different reasons.

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Some view atheism as courageous honesty, but most, in my opinion and experience, view it as cowardly retreat from the struggle to believe.

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Well, in your case, I would say your stripe of religious belief is a pathetic and arrogant attempt to bolster your feeling of self-importance which has destroyed any rational bone in your body, but it's a good thing that opinions about religious belief are irrelevant.

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So many believe, that it is foolish to not try to find the true part of that belief.

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I think the "true part of that belief" is that people are terrified of not knowing what happens after death, and a belief in God helps people deal with events and circumstances they feel powerless to influence.You know, like how humans used to believe we should sacrifice virgins to the volcano god so that he wouldn't send the lava and ash to burn us.

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If demons have done their job, there will be no consensus view.

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Is it a consensus view that there will be no consensus view if demons have done their job?

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The link below is rather scholarly.
Page not found - Apologetics Press

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Steve, your link provides no evidence of demons at all, just a bunch of bible quotes, anecdotes where people simply claim that "demonsdunit" which are taken completely at face falue with no attempt at investigation, and misrepresentations of skeptics.In particular, the following lines misrepresent skeptics completely:

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The skeptic, and even those religionists who have been influenced by the rationalistic mode of thought, repudiate anything that is not consistent with current human experience.

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The nature of demons is spelled out explicitly in the New Testament. They were spirit beings. This, of course, creates a problem for the skeptic, who denies that there is anything beyond the material.

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The skeptic neither "repudiates anything that is not consistent with current human experience", nor "denies that there is anything beyond the material."The skeptic simply wants you to show them the evidence.I grow very weary of you, Steve. You don't ever answer any straight questions. You are a bullshit artist of the highest degree.

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S: Who's interpretation of scripture are you going to use?

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God's. He says that's the only one that works. You ask Him what it means, and He tells you.

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Stop avoiding my direct questions, Steve, it's starting to piss me off and it is counter to forum guidelines.So, am I to understand that each person is supposed to have a conversation with god and each person's version of what God's interpretation of the scripture is what will be used for each indivildual's method of tithing?Your study is dead in the water right from the start, then.

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Well, yes, in the prior plausibility estimate, although done properly, the accumulation of prior plausibility estimates from more authoritative sources would lower the value considerably. As things now stand in my experience, the prior plausibility of Santa Clause is so low as to make the study of the hypothesis a waste of time.

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Show me the calculations, please.

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S: ...except that this "evidence" only suggests the existence of the supernatural in those who are already biased to interpret it in this way through cultural and personal bias.

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And they would say that the evidence suggests the existence of the supernatural in anyone not biased to interpret it in some, any, other way. But, diligent application of H-D science will tell who is biased.

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Unresponsive. I explained why and how the religious bias occurs. You basically said "Nuh-uh! YER biased AGAINST Jehovuh cuz you don't believe just cuz I SAY SO!"Because you cannot explain to me how the evidence found in nature that anyone, regardless of religious belief can examine, shows reason for me to interpret it to mean that the Christian god or demons exists, this is great evidence that you are suffering from extreme religious bias.I'm done with you, Steve. You do not argue in good faith, and I think you might actually be mentally ill. Enjoy your self-image as the "brilliant, misunderstood champion of science and Truth".You are a self-deluded crank.{edited by AdminTL to fix coding}[This message has been edited by AdminTL, 02-24-2004]

Hambre, I completely believe that Steve had a conversation with "the most authoritative philosopher of science I could find on the KU campus.".Steve was talking to himself in the mirror.