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Author Topic:   How Do Scientists Believe in God and Evolution?
Perdition
Member (Idle past 3237 days)
Posts: 1593
From: Wisconsin
Joined: 05-15-2003


Message 35 of 145 (467969)
05-26-2008 12:30 AM
Reply to: Message 31 by Wumpini
05-25-2008 10:21 PM


Re: Scientists and Belief in God
First of all, Planck time is 5.39121x10[sup]-44[/sup] seconds. Or the amount of time it takes a photon to travel a Planck length. So saying they don't know what's going on during that first Planck time, while everything is in a singularity, which means a point at which our physics breaks down, doesn't mean a lot. After a Planck time, things start to make mathematical sense again, so saying they know what's going on a thousandth of a second (which is many, many Planck times), again, isn't unsurprising.
As for Dark Matter and Dark Energy, those are fairly simple Physics equations. Essentially, it boils down to how much gravity we see is needed to keep galaxies from flying apart due to their speed of rotation. Once we know that, we look at the visible matter and calculate how much gravity that much mass would create. There is a huge difference in these numbers, so there must be something else causing that gravity...that "something else" is what we call Dark Matter. Dark Energy is much the same. Based on gravity, the Universe should be slowing down its expansion. Instead, we find it accelerating. Again, it's easy to calculate the energy needed to overcome gravity and accelerate the expansion at the rate we find. That energy is called Dark Energy. The fact that we don't know precisely what those are yet, is the hallmark of science. If we knew what everything was, there would be no need for science any more.

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Perdition
Member (Idle past 3237 days)
Posts: 1593
From: Wisconsin
Joined: 05-15-2003


Message 49 of 145 (468058)
05-26-2008 7:15 PM
Reply to: Message 47 by Wumpini
05-26-2008 5:51 PM


Re: Scientists and Belief in God
If a person could be totally objective, and this may not be possible, then they may ask some questions of them self. An example of some of these questions may be as follows:
If God did exist, and He had played a part in this process, then would I interpret this evidence differently?
If the interpretation of this evidence would have an effect upon my prestige as a scientist, or my acceptance by my peers, then would I interpret this evidence differently?
If the interpretation of this evidence would have an effect on my ability to obtain a job, or to obtain a government grant, or to obtain any financial benefit, then would I interpret this evidence differently?
If the interpretation of this evidence would have an effect upon my personal relationships, then would I interpret this evidence differently?
I think you can see where this is going. There are many ways that a person’s judgment can be compromised without outright forgery of the evidence.
I agree, it may be difficult, if not impossible to be completely objective when looking at evidence. But I'm pretty sure that most good scientists do a very good job of it. The ones who can overturn an established theory and account for all the evidence we have, plus make predictions about any new evidence would be automatically catapulted to the upper echelons of science, we would know their name as a household word, and they would win a Nobel Prize.
Newton is a name we all recognize because he was able to formulate his theory of gravitation, one that was so different from the established idea that he was ridiculed at first. Einstein came along and revolutionized even that theory, I'm sure you've heard of him. The scientists who first noticed the increasing complexity of the fossils in the geologic column and began to notice morphological similarities were almost all Christian. They came at the evidence with a definite Christian bent, and the science at the time was dominated by Christians, where it would have been safer and easier to ascribe their evidence to god, but it was obvious to them that what they had read and learned from the Bible could not be literally true based on the evidence. They weren't willing to accept a god who would trick and deceive them, and I guess that would be their biggest bias, so they had to follow where the evidence took them. They were not trying to overthrow religion or make god unnecessary, they were just seeing the evidence and realizing what it was saying, rather than what they wanted it to say.

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Perdition
Member (Idle past 3237 days)
Posts: 1593
From: Wisconsin
Joined: 05-15-2003


Message 52 of 145 (468069)
05-26-2008 8:14 PM
Reply to: Message 51 by Wumpini
05-26-2008 8:04 PM


Re: Prediction
What are the physical predictions that have been made that would falsify the Theory of Evolution? Is there a list of these predictions?
There are quite a few things that could completely rewrite the theory of evolution. There are less things that would make us toss it out completely.
Finding a Mastodon skeleton in Precambrian rock would be a good find that would at the very least completely revolutionize the study of evolution.
If they found a fossil that is half human and half fish (a mermaid or merman) would completely revolutionize the study as well.
A fully formed complex creature that doesn't use DNA without any precursor fossils using that same molecular engine would be another blow to the ToE.

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