Originally Posted by Afzal

I'm sorry, is this the same science that was confused whether light was a particle or wave until Einstein came along?

The difference is that there was evidence for it both being a particle and a wave. Opposed to no evidence at all.

understanding of science fail?

Originally Posted by Taunton

Science helps support the idea that there is no God by providing zero evidence. In science, the leading theories are determined by evidence and the credibility of said evidence. Religion and "god" have no evidence at all to support their existence, which is a valid reason to ignore religion altogether as a valid idea or source of wisdom.

Science provides zero evidence of God because it can't, God is not testable or experimentable. Religion and "god" have no scientific EVIDENCE, otherwise every real scientist would believe in God. However, science provides no EVIDENCE for the absence of God either, otherwise no scientist would belive in God. To aetheists, science supports their disbelief in God, to theists, science supports their belief in God.

Bottom line... If you wanna talk about God or how there IS no god, I think it'd be nice to hear about it from a non-scientific perspective... or at least, not limited to your understanding of science .

man what's with all the scientific pissing contents and tldr in this thread. nonetheless! here is my take:

religion was a useful tool in the past to control the ignorant masses through fear.

however now that government does a decent job of keeping society in check and along with the separation of church and state, religion's utility has diminished.

as society becomes more sophisticated, the average person can no longer be "tricked" or "feared" into belief. going to church, praying, etc. is just too much of a hassle.

thus religion is dying a slow and painful death.

however, it still it still instills wonderful morals and is a support structure for those who can't deal with reality, but at the same time still used to manipulate people who don't know any better (suicide bombers, etc).

so in conclusion:

spam on campus is annoying

Originally Posted by drez99

However, science provides no EVIDENCE for the absence of God either, otherwise no scientist would belive in God. To aetheists, science supports their disbelief in God, to theists, science supports their belief in God.

Bottom line... If you wanna talk about God or how there IS no god, I think it'd be nice to hear about it from a non-scientific perspective... or at least, not limited to your understanding of science .

There is also no necessity for the existance of a deity to explain anything. Science or no science, why is there even the need for a deity? ..especially if there is no evidence.

frick why am I bothering with this..

Originally Posted by waddlesworth

so in conclusion:

spam on campus is annoying

Spam anywhere is annoying. Even the canned kind... same wih the spam spin-offs like "Cam." gross

Oh lord, not being able to deal with reality. Everything about that offends me.

XD

Originally Posted by temara.brown

There is also no necessity for the existance of a deity to explain anything. Science or no science, why is there even the need for a deity? ..especially if there is no evidence.

frick why am I bothering with this..

it's not about necessity... it's about reality. My "need" or lacktherof for butterflies has NOOO effect in their existence.

On that note, people who believe in God don't believe in God because they feel they NEED to, that'd just be silly.

Originally Posted by drez99

it's not about necessity... it's about reality. My "need" or lacktherof for butterflies has NOOO effect in their existence.

On that note, people who believe in God don't believe in God because they feel they NEED to, that'd just be silly.

Sorry if you weren't clear on that comment but I asked 'why you need a deity to explain life.'


oh and..

The tooth fairy isn't necessary. It's just reality?

I think it's because humans are inquisitive. For instance, special creation - the idea that every species was created independently and uniquely, put on Earth by God (unless I got that wrong). When we discovered links between species, we no longer needed special creation.

The sun was considered God by many societies because we didn't understand where that light came from or how it got so hot or how in the world that ball stayed up there.

Once we found explanations that justifiably satisfied our curiosity, we could eliminate the "link" to God.

I think presently, people "need" God to explain the unfathomable. For instance, I believe some people need to believe in God because they cannot fathom what the ultimate purpose is behind children dying.
But others may believe in God to explain less philosophical questions. Consider the Big Bang. Let's just for a moment believe that every human being believes that the Big Bang occurred and we read Stephen Hawking at breakfast, and one day the right mix of particles combined by chance to form life defying statistical odds but still conforming to the theories of statistics that...the event was probable, though...minute. Well, one person might get up and ask..."What was there before the Big Bang?"

I don't think it stops there. I personally think many individuals may have questions about who God is and where He came from even if they do believe in Him. I myself believe that every question has an answer - the human mind can't just fathom it all.

Originally Posted by waddlesworth

as society becomes more sophisticated, the average person can no longer be "tricked" or "feared" into belief. going to church, praying, etc. is just too much of a hassle.

thus religion is dying a slow and painful death.

Actually, even in North America, robust orthodox Christianity is growing, even as we are becoming 'more sophisticated'. (note: overall mainline church attendance is dropping but orthodox faith is booming)

Originally Posted by temara.brown

The difference is that there was evidence for it both being a particle and a wave. Opposed to no evidence at all.

understanding of science fail?

In 17th century, it was concluded that light was a particle, then Young came along in the 19th century and then it was accepted that light was a wave. Only with the introduction of Modern Physics, it was concluded that light has properties of both.

What I meant was: Scientific theories have constantly been changing to accommodate new phenomenons. Therefore, I do not trust it as something that can be used to prove or disprove the existence of a being that we don't know much about.

Here's something to ponder over: Why does science (or scientists rather) think that living beings might exist other than on our planet, even when there has been no evidence whatsoever that they do?

Can you use science to prove that aliens exist? If no, then is it safe to say that they don't exist? (And I know about the probability of existence of life on other planets and the math behind it, problem is: I haven't found any calculation for the probability of existence of God...not because He does or doesn't exist, because nobody knows how to exactly quantify God's existence.

Truth be told, I think it would be better if we just stopped useless research like how we came into existence and invested more on deprived people/nations to better the overall quality of life on our planet. Tell me, do you think it would've been better if LHC was not invested in, and that money was used to research about a new way of travelling around the world?.

@OP: lol

Originally Posted by Souldier

This guy probably only gets standing ovations from other Christians, big woop. All it took was for me to watch one youtube video to find out just how much of a bigot he is. He says homosexuals shouldn't enact on their homosexuality because it's unnatural and a sin.

That doesn't make him a bigot. The person who says "god hates ***s" is a bigot and has no idea what it means to love Jesus. (Note: I think I am probably a bigot towards bigots... I should probably think through that to see if it is in line with Christ or not... probably not though, dang)

A bigot is someone who "does not allow the existence, presence, practice, or act of something or someone."

Ravi is simply saying here that from his particular view of Christianity that some churches will not allow people who enact in homosexual behaviour to become members. (This doesn't mean they shouldn't be welcome in the church).

He even subtly implies that people who enact in homosexual behavior can be true Christ followers, something that he undoubtedly takes a lot of flak for from part of the Christian community.

"Tell me, do you think it would've been better if LHC was not invested in, and that money was used to research about a new way of travelling around the world?"

Really? So science is now a waste of money, but all the money that the US spent on the war is not worth mentioning?

So you're fine with science spending money on research for medication, true? But not fine with it researching evolution, or quantum physics? So who's going to judge which parts of science are 'relevant' and 'important' enough to have money allocated to research for? The government? Oh yeah, they really know how to spend money.

Originally Posted by Alchemist11

"Tell me, do you think it would've been better if LHC was not invested in, and that money was used to research about a new way of travelling around the world?"

Really? So science is now a waste of money, but all the money that the US spent on the war is not worth mentioning?

So you're fine with science spending money on research for medication, true? But not fine with it researching evolution, or quantum physics? So who's going to judge which parts of science are 'relevant' and 'important' enough to have money allocated to research for? The government? Oh yeah, they really know how to spend money.

oh yes, include war money too please.

Well as a rule of thumb, anything which will cause the standard of life of the people with the lowest standards to better is worth investing it.

The reason is, first we need to bring those people to the current standards. As you might've noticed...not all nations are so technologically advance as the first world nations. And I believe that as humans, we might as well do humanity a favor and bring everyone to the latest technology before advancing further.

But alas, we're talking about humans, selfishness is their characteristic

Originally Posted by Alchemist11

Just a note to Mowicz:
Both exons and introns are not 'nonsense' parts of DNA - while introns may have originally seemed useless some say it may serve as some sort of regulation for the type of protein or its expression.

However, exons are ... exactly what the final mRNA product contains.

What I meant by 'nonsense' DNA was, you can't just 'read it off' and predict what proteins you'll get (at least not without some higher understanding of genetics we have yet to possess)...it's my understanding that this was the goal of the human genome project, but they were met with complications for this (and perhaps among others, I'm no expert) reason.

Anyway, the point is I didn't mean to downplay the significance or anything like that...I was just trying to put it in descriptive terms.