How is evolution not a religion??

[Seth Uttley]

In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I think that is untrue.
No one has seen a species evolve into a whole different species, dogs can have many different types of dogs but a dog has not evolved into a whole different species..
Is there really any evidence of evolution out there? not really. Therefore Evolution must also be a belief and just faith in something that is unseen. evolution basically believes we came from dust particles that caused a 'big bang'. So the difference between evolution and creation is that evolution believes that everything came from dust, but creation believes we were created by God. Both are beliefs and a 'religion' because neither have enough convincing evidence. I personally believe in creation and I dont understand how evolution is not labelled as a religion and why it is taught at schools to kids as though it was 'known' to be true, when it is not even proven.

[jillery]

What kind of evidence would it take to convince you that evolution is
not a religion?

[Kalkidas]

On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 13:17:32 -0700 (PDT), Seth Uttley
<set...@gmail.com> wrote:

Darwinism is an ideology. So is naturalism/materialism in general.
They resemble religions in several aspects, but they are not
"religions" in the traditional sense of the term.

OTOH if by "religious" you mean any statement about God or the
supernatural, then Darwinism and materialism in general are certainly
religious positions, since they claim that God and/or the supernatural
are unnecessary hypotheses to account for the origin of nature and
life and its varieties. Indeed, that claim is an axiom of their
ideology. Since the claim is a statement about God and/or the
supernatural, it is a "religious" statement.

[John Harshman]

On 3/11/14 1:17 PM, Seth Uttley wrote:
> In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I
> think that is untrue.

You are wrong, but thanks for the opinion.

> No one has seen a species evolve into a whole different species, dogs
> can have many different types of dogs but a dog has not evolved into
> a whole different species..

We have however seen new species arise quickly, most often by what's
called allopolyploidy and mostly in plants. More importantly, we can see
evidence in current species of new species forming in the past. You can
know that something happened even if you don't see it happen, because
the past leaves traces in the present.

> Is there really any evidence of evolution out there? not really.

There's your biggest mistake. There's plenty of evidence. You, for
example, are 98.77% chimpanzee. How do you account for that?

> Therefore Evolution must also be a belief and just faith in
> something that is unseen. evolution basically believes we came from
> dust > particles that caused a 'big bang'.

Sorry, but that isn't the case. Evolution is about biological organisms,
not the whole universe.

> So the difference between evolution and creation is that evolution
> believes that everything came from dust, but creation believes we
> were created by God. Both are beliefs and a 'religion' because
> neither have enough convincing evidence. I personally believe in
> creation and I dont understand how evolution is not labelled as a
> religion and why it is taught at schools to kids as though it was
> 'known' to be true, when it is not even proven.

This is what's called reasoning from a false premise. Evolution and
creation are not equivalent. Yes, belief in creationism is based on
religion in the absence of evidence. Acceptance of evolution, on the
other hand, is based on evidence, period.

I know you're just a drive-by poster, but if you ever come back we could
explore some of that evidence.

[Roger Shrubber]

Seth Uttley wrote:
> In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I
> think that is untrue. No one has seen a species evolve into a whole
> different species, dogs can have many different types of dogs but a
> dog has not evolved into a whole different species.. Is there really
> any evidence of evolution out there? not really.

If the theory of evolution predicted that dogs would evolve into
cats while we watched, then not witnessing dogs evolving into
cats while we watched would be a problem. However, it does not
predict that this will happen so your comment seems rather pointless.

Of course the fossil record documents that species that are seen
today were not seen in the past. Intermediate fossils between
very long ago, less long ago and today are found. Species that
appear to be cousins of sorts, different species arising from
a common ancestor, show this relationship at multiple levels
including morphology, development and molecular genetics. And
they show this genetic relationship even in parts of their genomes
that are leftover nonfunctional garbage. The patterns we observe
in these historical relationships match to what we have come
to expect by following changes that we can observe in real-time.

So, in contrast to your claim, there is a tremendous wealth of
data supporting the theory evolution even if you are perhaps
not aware of it.

> Therefore Evolution
> must also be a belief and just faith in something that is unseen.
> evolution basically believes we came from dust particles that caused
> a 'big bang'.

Now you are confusing very different things. The "Big Bang" cosmology
says nothing about how life evolves. Evolution says nothing about how
the universe came into being, or how gravity works or how chemistry
works. They really are all separate scientific disciplines that all
combine forensic data, experimental data and scientific models to
explain what we observe.

> So the difference between evolution and creation is
> that evolution believes that everything came from dust, but creation
> believes we were created by God. Both are beliefs and a 'religion'
> because neither have enough convincing evidence. I personally believe
> in creation and I dont understand how evolution is not labelled as a
> religion and why it is taught at schools to kids as though it was
> 'known' to be true, when it is not even proven.

Apparently you don't even understand _what_ is taught in schools so
perhaps it makes sense that you don't understand _why_ it is taught.

If for some reason you want to criticize how science is taught,
perhaps you ought to first learn what is taught. Until then, the
best way to characterize your opinion is that it is _uninformed_.
At the same time, it seems appropriate to note that pontificating,
as you do here, without having bothered to learn something about the
subject you pontificate on is a questionable activity. Presumably
you would not try to lecture people about irregular verbs in
the Basque language unless you first learned the language. Why
would presume to lecture people about your conviction that
evolution is a religion when you know next to nothing about evolution,
not even the difference between evolution and cosmology? It is
beyond presumptuous and downright disingenuous.

>

[alias Ernest Major]

On 11/03/2014 20:17, Seth Uttley wrote:
> In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I think that is untrue.
> No one has seen a species evolve into a whole different species, dogs can have many different types of dogs but a dog has not evolved into a whole different species..

Speciation has been observed in the laboratory, under cultivation, and
in the wild. It is almost routine in agronomy.

> Is there really any evidence of evolution out there? not really. Therefore Evolution must also be a belief and just faith in something that is unseen. evolution basically believes we came from dust particles that caused a 'big bang'. So the difference between evolution and creation is that evolution believes that everything came from dust, but creation believes we were created by God. Both are beliefs and a 'religion' because neither have enough convincing evidence. I personally believe in creation and I dont understand how evolution is not labelled as a religion and why it is taught at schools to kids as though it was 'known' to be true, when it is not even proven.
>

--
alias Ernest Major

[Roger Shrubber]

The above comment is nonsense. This can be demonstrated in that
you would not see this sort of criticism of chemistry or gravity.
"Darwinism" no more claims that the supernatural intervention is
unnecessary than does chemistry or the theory of gravity. The
fact is that all science, geology, chemistry, physics, biology,
ecology, evolutionary biology, biochemistry, cosmology etc.,
exclude supernatural causation from the models they formulate
to explain observations. That is not a comment on geology or
"darwinism". It is a comment on scientific methodology.

There is a separate question as to whether or not one believes
that science can provide complete models. You may claim yes
or no, particularly you would claim no if you believe in
occasional supernatural intervention. But even those who do so
believe tend to agree that the scientific method works well
most of the time.

And it should be plain to see that the question of when and
why one claims exceptions to the functioning of science is
a question that sits outside of science itself. Ignoring
the question and disregarding potential supernatural
intervention is very distinct from a claim that such things
are impossible.

If one wants to conclude something about the success of
methods that ignore supernatural influences, that is yet
another issue entirely.

[Robert Camp]

So, then every bit of empirical investigation that has ever displaced
invocation of gods (e.g., germ theory, celestial mechanics, agricultural
science, epilepsy, etc. etc.) as an explanatory framework is religious?

I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious? Am I being religious when
I look for my keys under the couch rather than pray for them to appear?

[Kalkidas]

You do realize that you just denied, and then immediately confirmed,
my statement, don't you?

[broger...@gmail.com]

You're not actually going to discuss any of this, right? Just drop it off and move on?

[Roger Shrubber]

Actually I realize I did not confirm your statement. And I
provided further illustration that ignoring something is
distinct from making a positive claim about it. The theory
of evolution and the theory of gravity ignore your feelings
about John Bolton as a singer. They also ignore your beliefs
and lack of beliefs in various gods. They do not invoke your
feelings for John Bolton in describing data. They do not invoke
gods in describing the motion of planets or the natural history
of species. So if you pause to think, you will see that
they do not make claims about the supernatural. And you will
see that your conflation of claims about the supernatural
with ignoring the supernatural was a nonsensical thing.

[Kalkidas]

On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 14:55:48 -0700, Robert Camp
<rober...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>On 3/11/14 2:00 PM, Kalkidas wrote:
>> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 13:17:32 -0700 (PDT), Seth Uttley
>> <set...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I think that is untrue.
>>> No one has seen a species evolve into a whole different species, dogs can have many different types of dogs but a dog has not evolved into a whole different species..
>>> Is there really any evidence of evolution out there? not really. Therefore Evolution must also be a belief and just faith in something that is unseen. evolution basically believes we came from dust particles that caused a 'big bang'. So the difference between evolution and creation is that evolution believes that everything came from dust, but creation believes we were created by God. Both are beliefs and a 'religion' because neither have enough convincing evidence. I personally believe in creation and I dont understand how evolution is not labelled as a religion and why it is taught at schools to kids as though it was 'known' to be true, when it is not even proven.
>>
>> Darwinism is an ideology. So is naturalism/materialism in general.
>> They resemble religions in several aspects, but they are not
>> "religions" in the traditional sense of the term.
>>
>> OTOH if by "religious" you mean any statement about God or the
>> supernatural, then Darwinism and materialism in general are certainly
>> religious positions, since they claim that God and/or the supernatural
>> are unnecessary hypotheses to account for the origin of nature and
>> life and its varieties. Indeed, that claim is an axiom of their
>> ideology. Since the claim is a statement about God and/or the
>> supernatural, it is a "religious" statement.
>
>So, then every bit of empirical investigation that has ever displaced
>invocation of gods (e.g., germ theory, celestial mechanics, agricultural
>science, epilepsy, etc. etc.) as an explanatory framework is religious?

Any explanatory framework that explicitly denies God or the
supernatural is certainly religious in its ideology. Otherwise, why
deny them?

>I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
>I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?

Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?

>Am I being religious when
>I look for my keys under the couch rather than pray for them to appear?

If you explicitly rejected prayer, then your action was certainly
religious, otherwise, why would you even consider prayer? Why would
the idea of prayer even enter your mind?

Why would Dawkins, Dennett, Stenger, Harris, Hitchens, et al. even
bring up religion, God, or the supernatural if those items were not an
integral part of their claimed "scientific" world view?

[Dai monie]

Dawkins `brings it up' because it is his personal world view. That, and he's often explicitly invited to talk about it.

Evolution doesn't deny god. It doesn't say anything about a god. It's looking at the evidence, and seeing what happens. Not invoking a god is not the same as denying it.

[John S. Wilkins]

A religion has rituals, institutions, and objects of worship; evolution
has none of these things. A religion has sets of beliefs that believers
are required to accept; evolution has none. A religion is immune from
revision based on evidence; evolution is reviseable and indeed has been
revised as new evidence comes in. Religions have origin stories that do
not change; evolution has a few stories that have changed as we have
learned more.

Evolutionary theory has nothing to do with the big bang. Evolution is a
set of biological theories; the big bang has to do with physics and
cosmology.

Those who see the world in terms of religion first and foremost will
tend to see anything that contradicts their faith as another faith, but
that doesn't mean it is. It just means their faith has some factually
wrong beliefs.
--
John S. Wilkins, Honorary Fellow, University of Melbourne
http://evolvingthoughts.net
But al be that he was a philosophre,
Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre

[broger...@gmail.com]

On Tuesday, March 11, 2014 6:34:47 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:

> >I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
>
> >I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?
>
>
>
> Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
>
> supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?

If that's the case, the claim that leprechauns or Zeus or Sasquatch or Brahma are unnecessary for understanding physics is a religious claim. Does that mean that every statement I make about fluid mechanics which does not refer to unicorns is ipso facto a claim about unicorns?

[Kalkidas]

On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 18:25:42 -0400, Roger Shrubber

Modern science does not "ignore" supernatural claims. Modern science
explicitly denies that the supernatural has any influence on the
physical universe. The denial is explicit and overtly stated, not mere
silence. You are mistaken, and it is you who misrepresent modern
science.

[Kalkidas]

On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
wrote:

But who is making such claims, except as absurd "examples" to reply to
arguments?

Scientists do, however, make such claims about God and the
supernatural in general, not as absurd examples, but as explicit
statements of their foundational principles.

At least some scientists are willing to admit that this is done. But
the t.o. ethos seems to be to blindly deny everything said about
science by anyone accused of being a "creationist".

[Kalkidas]

I haven't said anything about "evolution". I have been talking about
Darwinism and naturalism/materialism in general.

Do you deny that naturalism/materialism is the philosophical basis of
modern science? Because the supernatural is, by definition, excluded
from naturalism.

[Roger Shrubber]

Of course I disagree and I offer the following evidence. I checked
the index of a few college text books I have lying around. They
all lacked an entry for either God or supernatural. I always read
my kids science books through their graduating high school. Never
did I see any claim denying the existence of the supernatural
or gods or that God was dead. I read scientific journals from time
to time and cannot recall a paper that claimed to have demonstrated
the lack of supernatural influence. Now of course that's just me.
And who knows, maybe I've forgotten, blocked it out.

So now all you have to do is provide some counter examples of
science textbooks that explicitly make this claim which you
say is "explicit and overtly stated". I know some people make
such claims but surely a few loudmouths do not equate to what
_science_ claims. Because if all you intended to say was that
some scientists make such claims we could refute that notion
just as easy, as some individual scientists believe in acupuncture,
in homeopathy, in astrology, in this that or the other religion.
The question is about the institutional voice, and that voice
is reflected in textbooks and journals.

[Kalkidas]

On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 20:11:33 -0400, Roger Shrubber

Now you have moved the goalposts from "denial that the supernatural
is a necessary hypothesis" to "denial that the supernatural exists".

>
>So now all you have to do is provide some counter examples of
>science textbooks that explicitly make this claim which you
>say is "explicit and overtly stated". I know some people make
>such claims but surely a few loudmouths do not equate to what
>_science_ claims. Because if all you intended to say was that
>some scientists make such claims we could refute that notion
>just as easy, as some individual scientists believe in acupuncture,
>in homeopathy, in astrology, in this that or the other religion.
>The question is about the institutional voice, and that voice
>is reflected in textbooks and journals.

I can't provide any examples of textbooks used in public schools,
since as you well know, textbooks that make explicit religious claims,
whether affirmative or negative, are not allowed in public schools.

However, I do not need to give any examples at all, since you have
moved the goalposts.

Nor is it a secret that the program of modern science is to explain
the world without reference to God or the supernatural, i.e. without
hypothesizing God or the supernatural.

If you deny this fact, then you are just being argumentative, and I
will have none of it.

[Mark Isaak]

I walked past a church yesterday without going inside. I guess that
makes me religious, by your accounting. I guess your accounting also
makes religion pretty much the most pointless, worthless thing in the
universe.

--
Mark Isaak eciton (at) curioustaxonomy (dot) net
"Keep the company of those who seek the truth; run from those who have
found it." - Vaclav Havel

[Robert Camp]

Problem is, your original claim was not about scientists, it was about
Darwinism and materialism. And in explaining your claim you called these
perspectives ideologies.

Now as far as I'm aware, Darwinism is a name for Darwin's observational
and theoretical explanation for the origins of species. Darwin did
recognize that he was actively removing supernatural influence as an
explanation for this phenomenon (at least as far as it went) but I don't
know of anything in "Darwinism" itself that explicitly denies god.
That's why I asked my questions as I did. A naturalistic explanation of
something previously understood to be of supernatural provenance is not
inherently "religious" *simply* by virtue of displacing the religious
account - that would leave the label essentially meaningless.

As for materialism, you need to be more specific. Methodological
materialism (or naturalism) is certainly not ideological, it is
operational. Hence its successful use by virtually any flavor of
ideological scientist. Of course there are those who favor some kind of
materialist or naturalist philosophy, but as that perspective is not
likely to be confused with science, it seems logical to conclude this is
not relevant to your point (not to mention that calling methodological
naturalism an ideology would be utterly uncontroversial).

To sum up, I think your original claim was flimsy, at best.

[Roger Shrubber]

If you think so, then move them back to where you claimed

>>> Modern science does not "ignore" supernatural claims. Modern science
>>> explicitly denies that the supernatural has any influence on the
>>> physical universe. The denial is explicit and overtly stated, not
>>> mere silence.

You erected those goal posts and that's what I'm asking you
to support even if in your mind I fumbled the request.

> Nor is it a secret that the program of modern science is to explain
> the world without reference to God or the supernatural, i.e. without
> hypothesizing God or the supernatural.
>
> If you deny this fact, then you are just being argumentative, and I
> will have none of it.

The words you selected, "explicit" and "overtly stated", make a
bold claim about evidence. When I ask you to support those words
you've claimed I moved the goal-posts. I'm happy to leave it
there if you are but I doubt your excuse works for anybody but you.

[Mark Isaak]

On 3/11/14 1:17 PM, Seth Uttley wrote:

> In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion..

> [snip long unformatted lines]

Seth,

Your religion obviously stirs a lot of unwarranted anger in you. As
others have pointed out, evolution is not a religion, but even if it
were, it seems it would be an altogether better religion that the one
you have.

[Öö Tiib]

On Wednesday, 12 March 2014 01:45:26 UTC+2, Kalkidas wrote:
> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
> wrote:
> >On Tuesday, March 11, 2014 6:34:47 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
> >> >I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
> >> >I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?
> >>
> >> Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
> >> supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?
> >
> >If that's the case, the claim that leprechauns or Zeus or Sasquatch or Brahma
> >are unnecessary for understanding physics is a religious claim. Does that mean
> >that every statement I make about fluid mechanics which does not refer to
> >unicorns is ipso facto a claim about unicorns?
>
> But who is making such claims, except as absurd "examples" to reply to
> arguments?
>
> Scientists do, however, make such claims about God and the
> supernatural in general, not as absurd examples, but as explicit
> statements of their foundational principles.

Do they really? You can't point at work of science that deals
with supernatural, can you? It is because all such research done
is flat out unsuccessful and there is nothing credible to publish.

> At least some scientists are willing to admit that this is done. But
> the t.o. ethos seems to be to blindly deny everything said about
> science by anyone accused of being a "creationist".

Most atheists are not scientists and all scientists are not
atheists so you mix things here up I feel. No scientist
(religious or otherwise) can demonstrate relevance of anything
supernatural to whatever field they study.

[John Stockwell]

- show quoted text -

>Darwinism is an ideology. So is naturalism/materialism in general.
>They resemble religions in several aspects, but they are not
"religions" in the traditional sense of the term.

>OTOH if by "religious" you mean any statement about God or the
supernatural, then Darwinism and materialism in >general are certainly
religious positions, since they claim that God and/or the supernatural
>are unnecessary hypotheses to account for the >origin of nature and
life and its varieties. Indeed, that claim is an >axiom of their
ideology. Since the claim is a statement about God and/or the
>supernatural, it is a "religious" statement.

People who find scientific results threatening to their scriptural literalism-based world views have invented straw man arguments to mischaracterize mainstream science as an "ideology", a "worldview", or a "religion".

Issues of the existence or nonexistence of God, or Gods in Kalkidasa's case, the subject invites moving goal posts and as such does not really get resolved. As to specific questions that can be answered scientifically, literalist histories have not fared at all well.

For people suffering from a "Nivana fallacy" (that something is either perfect or useless) this is quit a challenge.

Evolution is a scientific theory---a very successful scientific theory---of origin of species.

-John

[John Stockwell]

>Modern science does not "ignore" supernatural claims. Modern science
>explicitly denies that the supernatural has any influence on the
>physical universe. The denial is explicit and overtly stated, not mere
>silence. You are mistaken, and it is you who misrepresent modern
>science.

It's more of a provisional denial---- the same sort of put up or shut up that greets any extraordinary claim---the requirement of extraordinary evidence. So far nothing claimed to be supernatural has had the supporting evidence to tell us that we should take it seriously.

There are self-styled parapsychologists who seem to try to squeeze ever decreasingly small evidence for phenomena that seem to go away when you develop tighter experimental protocols.
What remains is a lot of confirmation bias and no science.

-john

[RAM]

Your perennial problem is your failure to understand science. You refuse to understand that it is an empirical process that defines science qua science. Philosophy doesn't inform how science is conducted it attempts to place it in a conceptual network of assumptions. Materialism, naturalism and a scientists emotional commitments to the supernatural should have no effect on doing science. And for most scientists this is true even for devout supernaturalists.

Indeed your use of the material and natural "isms" is a distortion of how science views the world. They know assumptions are made to do science and that these assumptions remain problematic because it has been found that empirical research based on different assumptions can be productive or a failure. They are not as stupid as you claim and as scientists they are constantly looking for bias and error. They do not dismiss supernaturalism (sic) out of hand. They never have. Young earth creationism and divine creation of humans are two much researched scientific efforts. When supernaturalism declares an empirical reality that can be addressed by science it is often done. In the history of science supernaturalism has lost every time. Empirical reality doesn't have a supernatural bias. But supernaturalism tries to bias empirical reality; thus ID/Creationists and other such tripe leads to an abuse of science.

Your dismissal and misunderstanding of brodgers's thoughtful responses about what science is reveals your emotional commitment to supernaturalism and a failure to understand the empirical nature of science. You clearly fail to understand that scientific empirical research strategies can be and most of the time are absolutely neutral to all "isms." Remember for science empirical means conjectured phenomena must be measurable and reliably so. This is the key to science's neutrality and it consumes much of a scientists empirical efforts. What you see digested in most texts is a summarizing of the scientific drones' empirical results and not how the phenomena were measured nor how reliable were the measurements.

Now for a prediction: you will summarily dismiss these comments as clearly biased against supernaturalism and remain as boneheaded as you have been in the past.

[eridanus]

El miércoles, 12 de marzo de 2014 00:21:52 UTC, Kalkidas escribió:
> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 20:11:33 -0400, Roger Shrubber

> >> ---------------------

The reason that some scientist had rejected the influence of
the supernatural in science was mainly due to the insistence of
some religious people that want to see the supernatural mingled
with the sciences as a rule. It is a little as asking the mechanic
that is doing a work in you car if he had taken into count any
supernatural cause. When you do not find the keys of your car
and home, you do not expect the supernatural to have anything
to do with your looking for the keys. You simple keep looking
for them. In general, anyone doing a job whatever do not
expect the supernatural to intermingle with with the task
you are doing. The person writing a novel, the person doing
some experiment of physics to prove something weird, or
so do expect the the supernatural to mingle in the experiment.
If something goes wrong, or he had not succeeded in observing
the effects he hoped to observe, he would not say "my
experiment failed because a supernatural cause mingled with
my experiment". This only happens in some novels of
Stephen King; there is a novel in which "a car is supernatural"
and has supernatural properties, and evil intentions, and a
free will, and he starts to give problems to the character of
the novel.
The "cold fusion" of Utah nobody thought "it worked because
some supernatural event", but many people think they were
mistaken at the interpretation of their data, or were trying
to deceive other people. But if other people could not
replicate the experiment of Utah, and could not watch any
production of energy, it cannot be explained by supernatural
causes interfering.
Americans do not won the War of Japan because a
supernatural event, but because the explode two powerful
atomic bombs. And that was a good argument.
US do not won the WWII because of a supernatural event,
but because they had a lot of oil, and put a lot of people to
work at making ammunition and explosives, and all sort
of machines to win the war.
In the middle ages, aristocrats and the Christian church
were not living out of thin air and supernatural causes,
but on the work of farmers that tilled the land, and tended
the herds of sheep and the cows. It was due to the work of
poor people that all those upper classes were living so happy,
and I do not thing there was involved any supernatural
miracle in this way of life. Put the poor people to work
and enjoy the fruits of their labor. This was the mechanics
of social life in the middle and not the supernatural events.

Does it mean... that I am negating the existence of
supernatural events? No. Supernatural events, had not
occurred ever in my life, that I was aware of. But super
natural events must exist in the brain of some people.
But in general, if you want your house to be painted,
you do not wait for a supernatural event, you look for
a team of painters to do the job.
If you take a plane to fly from NYC to LA, you do not
expect the plane would take you alive to LA because some
supernatural event; you want the mechanics would had
done well their work of supervising the state of the plane
and that not any terrorist would had put a bomb in the
plane. So, some people had to do their work to minimize
the possibilities of a case with a bomb will enter into
the plane you are going to fly to LA.
In general, you do not count with the supernatural
for the plane not to explode or to fall while you are
traveling on it.

Eri

[J. J. Lodder]

jillery <69jp...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 13:17:32 -0700 (PDT), Seth Uttley
> <set...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I think
> >that is untrue. No one has seen a species evolve into a whole different
> >species, dogs can have many different types of dogs but a dog has not
> >evolved into a whole different species.. Is there really any evidence of
> >evolution out there? not really. Therefore Evolution must also be a
> >belief and just faith in something that is unseen. evolution basically
> >believes we came from dust particles that caused a 'big bang'. So the
> >difference between evolution and creation is that evolution believes that
> >everything came from dust, but creation believes we were created by God.
> >Both are beliefs and a 'religion' because neither have enough convincing
> >evidence. I personally believe in creation and I dont understand how
> >evolution is not labelled as a religion and why it is taught at schools
> >to kids as though it was 'known' to be true, when it is not even proven.
> >
>

> What kind of evidence would it take to convince you that evolution is
> not a religion?

I think there is no point in arguing with it.
It is just copy-pasting some drivel it read somewhere,
and is incapable of independent thought,

Jan

[jillery]

My question is not an argument. I'm hiding my argument behind my
back.

>It is just copy-pasting some drivel it read somewhere,
>and is incapable of independent thought,

You are almost certainly correct.

[J. J. Lodder]

It will have run before you can hit it,

Jan

[Walter Bushell]

In article <iJGdncb3BunJ54LO...@giganews.com>,
John Harshman <jhar...@pacbell.net> wrote:

> There's your biggest mistake. There's plenty of evidence. You, for
> example, are 98.77% chimpanzee. How do you account for that?

Vive la difference!

--
Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greed. Me.

[jillery]

On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 11:49:44 +0100, nos...@de-ster.demon.nl (J. J.

There will be others. BWAHAHAHAAA!

[Rolf]

"Kalkidas" <e...@joes.pub> skrev i melding
news:kptuh99afd46jue3r...@4ax.com...

> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 13:17:32 -0700 (PDT), Seth Uttley
> <set...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I think
>>that is untrue.
>>No one has seen a species evolve into a whole different species, dogs can
>>have many different types of dogs but a dog has not evolved into a whole
>>different species..
>>Is there really any evidence of evolution out there? not really. Therefore
>>Evolution must also be a belief and just faith in something that is
>>unseen. evolution basically believes we came from dust particles that
>>caused a 'big bang'. So the difference between evolution and creation is
>>that evolution believes that everything came from dust, but creation
>>believes we were created by God. Both are beliefs and a 'religion' because
>>neither have enough convincing evidence. I personally believe in creation
>>and I dont understand how evolution is not labelled as a religion and why
>>it is taught at schools to kids as though it was 'known' to be true, when
>>it is not even proven.
>

> Darwinism is an ideology. So is naturalism/materialism in general.
> They resemble religions in several aspects, but they are not
> "religions" in the traditional sense of the term.
>
> OTOH if by "religious" you mean any statement about God or the
> supernatural, then Darwinism and materialism in general are certainly
> religious positions, since they claim that God and/or the supernatural
> are unnecessary hypotheses to account for the origin of nature and
> life and its varieties. Indeed, that claim is an axiom of their
> ideology. Since the claim is a statement about God and/or the
> supernatural, it is a "religious" statement.
>

I am certain Roger Shrubber can answer that much better than I can, but as
far as I can tell, science makes no claims whatsoever wrt the involvement -
or non-involvement by gods or other hypothetical supernatural entities.

In short, science doesn't concern itself with the gods and the supernatural
for the simple and obvious to most people who haven't lost their mind to
religions based on faith in non-detectable forces they call God, Intelligent
Designer and such names. But that doesn't make them real.

If I would happen to believe that there ain't no gods no matter what names
they are given, does that make my belief a religion?

It is about time you define what you mean by "religion".

To me, a religion is a collection of dogma that one is required to believe
without any evidence that they are true. Further, a religion is full of
rituals of worship of its deity, a moral code claimed to have been spoken be
the deity, liek in the Bbiel, where we find the law of Moses being to a
considerable extent a rehash of the law of Hammurabi.

You seem to be in great need of proving that science is a religion. You have
a lot more work to do before you convince anyone but yourself.

You are the same ignoramus today as you were years ago, I just don't bother
with anyhing you write since it is absolutely un-interesting and without
merit. This post is a very rare exception.

[Rolf]

"Seth Uttley" <set...@gmail.com> skrev i melding
news:7e91b00c-7b29-4ae8...@googlegroups.com...

> In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I think
> that is untrue.
> No one has seen a species evolve into a whole different species, dogs can
> have many different types of dogs but a dog has not evolved into a whole
> different species..
> Is there really any evidence of evolution out there? not really. Therefore
> Evolution must also be a belief and just faith in something that is
> unseen. evolution basically believes we came from dust particles that
> caused a 'big bang'. So the difference between evolution and creation is
> that evolution believes that everything came from dust, but creation
> believes we were created by God. Both are beliefs and a 'religion' because
> neither have enough convincing evidence. I personally believe in creation
> and I dont understand how evolution is not labelled as a religion and why
> it is taught at schools to kids as though it was 'known' to be true, when
> it is not even proven.
>

Science makes no promise about a hereafter, eternal life in heaven or hell,
meeting all your loved ones in heaven - or sulphur and eternal suffering.

What promises do science make?
What is sacred to science?

You have an awful lot to learn, you appear quite lacking in knowledge.

[Rolf]

"Kalkidas" <e...@joes.pub> skrev i melding

news:un7vh95h1gi8gnuv8...@4ax.com...

That is not true, we just reject creationist nonsense. Nonsense is all that
they have, and it seems you are one of the high priests.

Science make no claims about God or other gods because we know nothing,
absolutely nothing about them! Is that too diffiicult for you to understand?

[Kalkidas]

On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 18:19:16 -0700 (PDT), 嘱 Tiib <oot...@hot.ee>
wrote:

>supernatural to whatever field they study.:

If you ask the kind of "scientist" I'm talking about questions like:

Why are there such things as time, space, matter and energy?
What keeps the laws of physics from changing their form every instant?
What keeps the physical constants constant?

The reply will likely be "we don't ask such questions in science" or
"we don't currently know but we are sure we will eventually find
natural causes that give the answers".

The first reply reveals that science is not the comprehensive
epistemology it is claimed to be.

The second reply is a post-dated check based on faith -- the faith
that naturalism is true.

[John Harshman]

On 3/12/14 5:30 AM, Walter Bushell wrote:
> In article<iJGdncb3BunJ54LO...@giganews.com>,
> John Harshman<jhar...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>
>> There's your biggest mistake. There's plenty of evidence. You, for
>> example, are 98.77% chimpanzee. How do you account for that?
>
> Vive la difference!
>

Are you suggesting an interspecies romance?

[broger...@gmail.com]

If you ask many scientists those questions, they will answer "I don't know." That's a perfectly good answer, because it's true.

[RAM]

Find a citation from a scientist that supports this claim. I will humbly grovel if it can be found.

This is a factitious claim until you find a source.

As a scientist I have never ever seen such claims in writing. I would be upset if I did.

I have never in writing seen a scientist claim the implied comprehensive epistemology you claim.

Again provide a citation by a scientist and I will grovel some more.

In short we teach a much more limit view of what science can tackle than your ill informed view states.

>
>
>
> The second reply is a post-dated check based on faith -- the faith
>
> that naturalism is true.

This is again based on false dichotomies and "all isms" are treated by science as problematic and not truth. Your vision of science is not any thing I have ever taught or seen written by a scientist.

Again your ignorance of science is showing.

[Kalkidas]

On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 17:49:05 -0700, Robert Camp
<rober...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>On 3/11/14, 4:45 PM, Kalkidas wrote:
>> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
>> wrote:
>>
>>> On Tuesday, March 11, 2014 6:34:47 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
>>>
>>>>> I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
>>>>
>>>>> I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
>>>>
>>>> supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?
>>>
>>> If that's the case, the claim that leprechauns or Zeus or Sasquatch or Brahma are unnecessary for understanding physics is a religious claim. Does that mean that every statement I make about fluid mechanics which does not refer to unicorns is ipso facto a claim about unicorns?
>>
>> But who is making such claims, except as absurd "examples" to reply to
>> arguments?
>>
>> Scientists do, however, make such claims about God and the
>> supernatural in general, not as absurd examples, but as explicit
>> statements of their foundational principles.
>>
>> At least some scientists are willing to admit that this is done. But
>> the t.o. ethos seems to be to blindly deny everything said about
>> science by anyone accused of being a "creationist".
>
>Problem is, your original claim was not about scientists, it was about
>Darwinism and materialism. And in explaining your claim you called these
>perspectives ideologies.

Well, I've heard people on t.o. say that science is what scientists do
when they're doing science. So scientists and science are hardly
separable. And I've also heard people on t.o. defend Darwinism as
"science". So Darwinism is what Darwinists do when they're doing what
some people call "science".

As for ideology. When I called Darwinism an ideology, I intended it as
a neutral term, not an insult. Creationism and ID are also ideologies.
They are paradigms designed (sic) to explain the phenomenon, the
appearance of, varieties of species, or genera, or "kinds" of
organisms observed at present.

The difference between them is in what they will allow as "causes".
Darwinism will allow only naturalistic/materialistic "causes". ID, on
the other hand, allows for intelligent causation.

>
>Now as far as I'm aware, Darwinism is a name for Darwin's observational
>and theoretical explanation for the origins of species. Darwin did
>recognize that he was actively removing supernatural influence as an
>explanation for this phenomenon (at least as far as it went) but I don't
>know of anything in "Darwinism" itself that explicitly denies god.
>That's why I asked my questions as I did. A naturalistic explanation of
>something previously understood to be of supernatural provenance is not
>inherently "religious" *simply* by virtue of displacing the religious
>account - that would leave the label essentially meaningless.

As I said up-thread, "....if by "religious" you mean any statement
about God or the supernatural....."

So by that definition, the statement "God has nothing to do with
it..." is a religious statement, even though it makes no positive
religious claim.

>
>As for materialism, you need to be more specific. Methodological
>materialism (or naturalism) is certainly not ideological, it is
>operational. Hence its successful use by virtually any flavor of
>ideological scientist. Of course there are those who favor some kind of
>materialist or naturalist philosophy, but as that perspective is not
>likely to be confused with science, it seems logical to conclude this is
>not relevant to your point (not to mention that calling methodological
>naturalism an ideology would be utterly uncontroversial).

The temptation to conflate method with metaphysics is too tempting,
and too easy. In fact, it has produced a generation of exactly the
kind of people I cited above (Dawkins et al.) who are not merely
methodological naturalists, but angry anti-supernaturalists. Some of
them even claim that science has "disproved" the supernatural!

>To sum up, I think your original claim was flimsy, at best.

My claim is that the game of modern science is to prefer ignorance to
supernatural causation. Is that really a controversial claim?

[Kalkidas]

On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 20:59:11 -0400, Roger Shrubber

That's rich. But if you really want to go there...

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Methodological_naturalism

"Methodological naturalism is the label for the required assumption of
philosophical naturalism when working with the scientific method.
Methodological naturalists limit their scientific research to the
study of natural causes, because any attempts to define causal
relationships with the supernatural are never fruitful, and result in
the creation of scientific "dead ends" and God of the gaps-type
hypotheses. To avoid these traps scientists assume that all causes are
empirical and naturalistic; which means they can be measured,
quantified and studied methodically."

and...

"The majority of scientists do not believe it is possible to combine
methodological naturalism with theistic or supernatural philosophical
belief systems."

So the situation is exactly as I stated. The *scientific method*
includes the explicit, overt stipulation that theistic or supernatural
causes are NOT ALLOWED in science. And most scientists agree with this
stipulation.

[erik simpson]

I'll add my voice as a scientist who never encountered explicit denial of
anything 'supernatural' or 'devine'. I'm also unfamiliar with the very term
'methodological naturalism'. You seem to be clinging to some uninformed notions
about science that you've picked up from a particular school of axe-grinding.

Science deals with things that can be observed and measured. 'Evidence', in
a word. As soon as you can see and measure something, it ceases to be
'supernatural'. So the only evidence 'suppressed' or 'ignored' by science
and scientists are things that can't, or at least haven't, been seen. If
you could give ONE example contradicting this I'll join in the grovelling.

[Kalkidas]

Ahem, if you've actually read what I wrote, you'd see that I agree
with you. "Science" as currently defined by the dominant elite and
backed up by government guns and money (because they hope to get more
and better guns and money from science) is exactly as you state.

But it was not always thus. And paradigms shift. There was a time when
people were not so hot after guns and money, and "science" was
different then. I look forward to a future when the mad rush for money
and guns subsides and science reverts to what it really should be: a
search for knowledge of truth rather than a cynical quest for "what
works", i.e. guns and money.

[erik simpson]

'Guns and money'? That scientific advances have application to pretty near
all human activity has been obvious at least since Archimedes, and I'm sure
more historically informed people could provide earlier examples. That
'supernatural' and religious notions have also informed warlike and avaricious
behavior is also obvious. For your possible information, 'Darwinism' isn't a
fast track to power and wealth.

[Dai monie]

On Wednesday, 12 March 2014 17:41:42 UTC+1, Kalkidas wrote:
> 9snip)

>
> Ahem, if you've actually read what I wrote, you'd see that I agree
>
> with you. "Science" as currently defined by the dominant elite and
>
> backed up by government guns and money (because they hope to get more
>
> and better guns and money from science) is exactly as you state.

`Dominant elite' is a good start on conspiracy theorist bingo. Anyway, what dominant elite? As far as I know, the religious are a larger part of the population and most very rich people are religious as far as I know. Which, granted, isn't much because I spend most of my time on the internet.

It's still not making religious claims. <Methodological naturalists limit their scientific research to the study of natural causes>. Of course they do.
There has also never been a case where the concept of a supernatural cause was plausible. If something has a perfectly acceptable explanation, why do you need to come up with goddidit? That's not an explanation, but a reference to a concept that only raises more and more and more questions.

> But it was not always thus. And paradigms shift. There was a time when
>
> people were not so hot after guns and money, and "science" was
>
> different then. I look forward to a future when the mad rush for money
>
> and guns subsides and science reverts to what it really should be: a
>
> search for knowledge of truth rather than a cynical quest for "what
>
> works", i.e. guns and money.

Paradigms are not what you think they are.

'Hot after guns and money' - seems plausible. Scientists do often get extremely rich and guns are, of course, a necessity to defend your laser installations from cats. By `then', do you mean the ages where good science was inventing a story about some guys in the sky fighting over a pretty underage girl, the time when religious people burned anyone that asked 'why' or the time when we just threatened each other with nukes?

[Dai monie]

Don't know. Maybe god. Why is there a god?

>
> What keeps the laws of physics from changing their form every instant?

Don't know. Maybe god. What keeps god from changing his form every instant?

> What keeps the physical constants constant?

Don't know. Maybe god. What keeps god constant?

And this is why we don't invoke gods in explanations.

[Roger Shrubber]

For what little it's worth, I've met people who claim the
things Kalkidas says but, as it turns out, they were not
scientists but more like science groupies. But I'm sure
there are some such groupies who have gotten degrees and
jobs doing science. One such groupie spent a great deal
of time trying to explain how naturalism has been proven
using sophisticated mathematics that did not involve
circular reasoning via a starting axiom but that he needed
to get the details from a friend. And he insisted that
most scientists knew it. Unluckily for him, he wound up
with about six who disagreed with him and none who agreed.

How is that all relevant to what science is? Science
the methodology has no voice. As for science the institution
I guess it depends on who you listen to. From the inside,
it's easy to dismiss the groupies in the same way we tend
to dismiss advocates of crystal power or certain
conspiracy theorists. Maybe it's harder from the outside.

[Roger Shrubber]

I think this part is tripping you up. The truth is that you can't
combine them within science. As for outside of science, it should
be self-evidence you're no longer talking about methodological
naturalism. So as for actual epistemology, methodological naturalism
does not qualify, you would be speaking of philosophical naturalism
instead.

> So the situation is exactly as I stated. The *scientific method*
> includes the explicit, overt stipulation that theistic or supernatural
> causes are NOT ALLOWED in science. And most scientists agree with this
> stipulation.

Now you've moved the goal-posts. Not allowed in science is not
an epistemological claim about the universe. You still need a
separate claim that science is comprehensive and thus capable
of answering all questions. If that were the case, there would
be no point in distinguishing between methodological and
philosophical naturalism. Absolutely no point at all. So citing
methodological naturalism to defend your broader claim is
simply mind boggling.

[Kalkidas]

On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 13:30:48 -0400, Roger Shrubber

In fact, methodological naturalism was invented to disguise
metaphysical naturalism and make it appear rational and respectable.
The proof is in the very statements I cited. The use of the term
"belief systems" indicates an alleged contrast between "belief"
and...what, "certainty"? "Proof"? Yet in other places scientists will
be careful to say that there is no certainty or proof in science!

You are naive. Naturalism, whether methodological or metaphysical, is
itself a "belief system". It's just not theistic, and that is why it
is preferred by atheists.

[Bob Casanova]

On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 15:34:47 -0700, the following appeared
in talk.origins, posted by Kalkidas <e...@joes.pub>:

<snip>

>Any explanatory framework that explicitly denies God or the
>supernatural is certainly religious in its ideology.

Of course it is. Now if you could provide a cite to any
formulation of any theory in science which explicitly denies
God (or gods) rather than ignoring the possibility that such
entities exist...?

> Otherwise, why
>deny them?

Hint: "Deny" and "ignore" are not equivalent.

<snip>
--

Bob C.

"The most exciting phrase to hear in science,
the one that heralds new discoveries, is not
'Eureka!' but 'That's funny...'"

- Isaac Asimov

[David Fritzinger]

In article <5c3vh9d27fmk2j1uc...@4ax.com>,
Kalkidas <e...@joes.pub> wrote:

> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 14:55:48 -0700, Robert Camp
> <rober...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
[snip]

> >So, then every bit of empirical investigation that has ever displaced
> >invocation of gods (e.g., germ theory, celestial mechanics, agricultural
> >science, epilepsy, etc. etc.) as an explanatory framework is religious?
>

> Any explanatory framework that explicitly denies God or the

> supernatural is certainly religious in its ideology. Otherwise, why
> deny them?

Science does not deny God, Allah, Buddha or any other god that humans
worship. Science just doesn't use the existence of a supernatural being
as an answer, for anything. Science (and that includes evolution) is a
way of describing and understanding the natural world, and says nothing
whatsoever about the supernatural. Indeed, it makes no prediction of the
existence or nonexistence of the supernatural.

>
> >I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
> >I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?
>
> Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
> supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?

Did you read what Robert said? He said the supernatural is not required
for him to make a pizza. Nor is it required to drive a car, or design a
car for that matter. So, his claim is not religious. It is just a
description of what he sees.

>
> >Am I being religious when
> >I look for my keys under the couch rather than pray for them to appear?
>
> If you explicitly rejected prayer, then your action was certainly
> religious, otherwise, why would you even consider prayer? Why would
> the idea of prayer even enter your mind?

No, you are wrong. Most people I know, religious or not, don't pray that
they will find their keys. Instead, they look for them. One operation
results in finding the keys, the other most likely will not (there is a
chance that during prayer, a person may remember where their keys were.
You may call that proof of the supernatural interfering with the
natural. I call it thinking about the keys causing one to remember where
they put them).

>
> Why would Dawkins, Dennett, Stenger, Harris, Hitchens, et al. even
> bring up religion, God, or the supernatural if those items were not an
> integral part of their claimed "scientific" world view?

How so? Dawkins does specifically deny God (or gods) because he is an
atheist. On the other hand, Francis Collins does not deny God, as he is
an evangelical Christian.

Another answer to your question might be thinking about extraterrestrial
life while I drive my car. Does that mean driving is an example of me
looking for extraterrestrial life?

[David Fritzinger]

In article <un7vh95h1gi8gnuv8...@4ax.com>,

Kalkidas <e...@joes.pub> wrote:

> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
> wrote:
>
> >On Tuesday, March 11, 2014 6:34:47 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
> >

> >> >I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
> >>
> >> >I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
> >>
> >> supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?
> >

> >If that's the case, the claim that leprechauns or Zeus or Sasquatch or
> >Brahma are unnecessary for understanding physics is a religious claim. Does
> >that mean that every statement I make about fluid mechanics which does not
> >refer to unicorns is ipso facto a claim about unicorns?
>
> But who is making such claims, except as absurd "examples" to reply to
> arguments?
>
> Scientists do, however, make such claims about God and the
> supernatural in general, not as absurd examples, but as explicit
> statements of their foundational principles.

Think Francis Collins, an evangelical Christian who does not rely on God
to perform his science for him or to understand the work he and other
scientists have done.

>
> At least some scientists are willing to admit that this is done. But
> the t.o. ethos seems to be to blindly deny everything said about
> science by anyone accused of being a "creationist".

As Bob said, science says nothing about the existence or nonexistence of
a God. It just ignores it. That is why good science can be done by
atheists (such as Dawkins) and deeply religious people (Collins).
Neither rely on God as an explanation for facts they or others have
observed, because both realize that science is the study of the natural
world, and it is unable to study the supernatural world, if it indeed
exists.

[David Fritzinger]

In article <aqr0i9d3qrju8silr...@4ax.com>,

Correction: No scientist I've ever encountered (and I have spent much of
my life doing science) would describe him/herself as a Darwinist. They
are evolutionary biologists, molecular biologists, protein chemists,
etc. Where you go wrong is trying to imply that Darwin is worshipped by
a group of scientists. That is not true in any way, shape or form, but
it makes it easier for uninformed people like you to make the jump from
science to some sort of religious activity. After all, you claim, that
branch is named after Darwin, and people who study in that branch of
biology are called "Darwinists", just as in religion there are
Christians, Jews, Catholics, Mormons, Lutherans, etc.

>
> As for ideology. When I called Darwinism an ideology, I intended it as
> a neutral term, not an insult. Creationism and ID are also ideologies.
> They are paradigms designed (sic) to explain the phenomenon, the
> appearance of, varieties of species, or genera, or "kinds" of
> organisms observed at present.

Creationism and ID are indeed religious claims. Evolutionary biologists
(and most other biologists) look at the facts and design hypotheses to
explain the facts they see. When new facts come to light, new hypotheses
are devised to explain them. A hypothesis that has a great deal of
evidence to support it, and nothing that denies it, becomes a theory.
Again, theories change as new facts become known. That has happened in
biology multiple times. Has that ever happened in religion?

>
> The difference between them is in what they will allow as "causes".
> Darwinism will allow only naturalistic/materialistic "causes". ID, on
> the other hand, allows for intelligent causation.

Biologists study biology as a natural occurrence. They have no option
simply because no one has ever developed a means of studying the
supernatural. That is not denying the existence of a god, it is just
ignoring the possibility of whether s/he exists, since they have no way
of determining his/her existence. Religionists also have no way of
proving the existence of their god(s), which is why religion depends on
faith.

>
> >
> >Now as far as I'm aware, Darwinism is a name for Darwin's observational
> >and theoretical explanation for the origins of species. Darwin did
> >recognize that he was actively removing supernatural influence as an
> >explanation for this phenomenon (at least as far as it went) but I don't
> >know of anything in "Darwinism" itself that explicitly denies god.
> >That's why I asked my questions as I did. A naturalistic explanation of
> >something previously understood to be of supernatural provenance is not
> >inherently "religious" *simply* by virtue of displacing the religious
> >account - that would leave the label essentially meaningless.
>
> As I said up-thread, "....if by "religious" you mean any statement
> about God or the supernatural....."
>
> So by that definition, the statement "God has nothing to do with
> it..." is a religious statement, even though it makes no positive
> religious claim.

No it is not (besides, scientists who are not atheists do not make this
claim). They say it is impossible to determine whether a god has
anything to do with the phenomenon they are studying, so it is safe to
ignore that possibility. Science has been doing this for centuries, and
has given us many amazing technologies and an incredible understanding
of how parts of the universe work. Can religion make the same claim? No,
because religion is, by definition, dogmatic, and does not change its
claims based on new data.

>
> >
> >As for materialism, you need to be more specific. Methodological
> >materialism (or naturalism) is certainly not ideological, it is
> >operational. Hence its successful use by virtually any flavor of
> >ideological scientist. Of course there are those who favor some kind of
> >materialist or naturalist philosophy, but as that perspective is not
> >likely to be confused with science, it seems logical to conclude this is
> >not relevant to your point (not to mention that calling methodological
> >naturalism an ideology would be utterly uncontroversial).
>
> The temptation to conflate method with metaphysics is too tempting,
> and too easy. In fact, it has produced a generation of exactly the
> kind of people I cited above (Dawkins et al.) who are not merely
> methodological naturalists, but angry anti-supernaturalists. Some of
> them even claim that science has "disproved" the supernatural!
>
> >To sum up, I think your original claim was flimsy, at best.
>
> My claim is that the game of modern science is to prefer ignorance to
> supernatural causation. Is that really a controversial claim?

It is a very flimsy claim. Scientist have no way of studying
supernatural causation, and have never observed any phenomenon that
could only be explained by the supernatural. So, why should we consider
supernatural causation of anything when we have absolutely no way of
testing that hypothesis?

[eridanus]

El miércoles, 12 de marzo de 2014 18:08:32 UTC, Kalkidas escribió:
> On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 13:30:48 -0400, Roger Shrubber

> -------------

> In fact, methodological naturalism was invented to disguise
> metaphysical naturalism and make it appear rational and respectable.
> The proof is in the very statements I cited. The use of the term
> "belief systems" indicates an alleged contrast between "belief"
> and...what, "certainty"? "Proof"? Yet in other places scientists will
> be careful to say that there is no certainty or proof in science!

> You are naive. Naturalism, whether methodological or metaphysical, is
> itself a "belief system". It's just not theistic, and that is why it
> is preferred by atheists.

You are wrong. Science is not a believe, it is a philosophy.
Well, religion is also a philosophy based on the idea that some
tradition about supernatural events were real, and they were real
also and stories written on the holy books.
But in fact it is a philosophy... with the meaning of an interpretation
on the inherited traditions about past supernatural events that are
deemed real events that occurred in the past.
In this sense, a religion is both a philosophy and faith in some
written accounts about supernatural events are real events.

You can call it a faith, for most people do not understand on a
rational ground if the supernatural events really occurred or not.
Then, disregarding the different philosophies (different religions)
about supernatural events, those events are considered real, except
for some modern religions that do come here to dispute with us
about science or evolution. By example RCC do not dispute with
science but in some minor points. Some protestant churches do
not confront science either. Only the most fanatical evangelicals
are fighting with science, like you are doing.

Then, what distinguishes science is that we do not consider the
existence of "supernatural events", as a help to explain natural
phenomena. We are developing a philosophy to explain all the things
that are "natural", or considered natural.
Even if Science in practical grounds is a mater of faith, for most
ordinary people; those involved in science know that any theory
accepted today can change more or less in the future. And even
that some theories could be totally dismissed and the corresponding
facts of the former theory would be interpreted in a different manner.

To compare as equal religion and science, it would mean that a religion
would accept this conditional situation. And that perhaps tomorrow,
a Christian would not consider that Jesus was a god, or do not feel
obliged to believe that Jesus is living in heavens at the right of god-
father, etc. If religion were a natural philosophy in the near future,
it would think that some characters of the OT do not existed at all,
like King David, or King Solomon. They would accept also that
perhaps, the Jews were not slaves in Egypt, and then the story of
crossing the Red Sea was also false, etc. But they would retain some
supernatural idea, like a god created the universe at the time of the
big-bang, by example. This would be a supernatural event.

Eri

[J. J. Lodder]

Braying won't help.
They'll always run faster than you can hit them
with that argument from behind your back,

Jan

[Walter Bushell]

In article <2YmdnenTk-JQ7r3O...@giganews.com>,

John Harshman <jhar...@pacbell.net> wrote:

> On 3/12/14 5:30 AM, Walter Bushell wrote:
> > In article<iJGdncb3BunJ54LO...@giganews.com>,
> > John Harshman<jhar...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> >
> >> There's your biggest mistake. There's plenty of evidence. You, for
> >> example, are 98.77% chimpanzee. How do you account for that?
> >
> > Vive la difference!
> >
> Are you suggesting an interspecies romance?

I did not expect to be confused with Jabbers.

[John Harshman]

On 3/12/14 1:42 PM, Walter Bushell wrote:
> In article<2YmdnenTk-JQ7r3O...@giganews.com>,

> John Harshman<jhar...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>
>> On 3/12/14 5:30 AM, Walter Bushell wrote:
>>> In article<iJGdncb3BunJ54LO...@giganews.com>,
>>> John Harshman<jhar...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>> There's your biggest mistake. There's plenty of evidence. You, for
>>>> example, are 98.77% chimpanzee. How do you account for that?
>>>
>>> Vive la difference!
>>>
>> Are you suggesting an interspecies romance?
>
> I did not expect to be confused with Jabbers.
>

....not that there's anything wrong with that.

[deadrat]

I think you'd better sit down; I have some bad news for you.

There was never a golden age when people were "not so hot after guns and
money." "Science" was certainly different in the past. It has turned
in to science.

Scientists don't deny the existence of the supernatural; they say
there's no scientific evidence for the supernatural affecting what they
study. There may be galaxies beyond our time horizon, but they can't
affect us either, so science has nothing to say about them.

Consider the partition of all possible knowledge as the union of X, what
we can know through science, and Y, what we can know outside of science.
Methodological naturalism obtains X. Philosophical naturalism says
that Y is empty.

[Inez]

On Tuesday, March 11, 2014 1:17:32 PM UTC-7, Seth Uttley wrote:
> In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I think that is untrue.

<Snippers>

You, like an awful lot of people, seem to think "religion" means "something a person believes without evidence." You might give Wikipedia a look or something.

I believe without evidence that no one has taken my yogurt out of the work fridge. Is this then my religion? And as leader of this religion do I get to wear a funny hat, perhaps with a cow on it?

[Mark Isaak]

On 3/11/14 4:40 PM, Kalkidas wrote:
>> [...]

> Modern science does not "ignore" supernatural claims.

In fact, modern science pays much attention to supernatural claims, at
least to those claims that actually claim something. Many people think
science pays *too much* attention to such claims.

> Modern science
> explicitly denies that the supernatural has any influence on the
> physical universe. The denial is explicit and overtly stated, not mere
> silence. You are mistaken, and it is you who misrepresent modern
> science.

You are mistaken. Science makes no such claims. In fact, there has
been legitimate science research into claims of the supernatural. (I
have not kept up-to-date, but I know such research has been published as
recently as 2000.) You are flat-out wrong.

What science rejects is claims that can have no explanatory power, and
that goes for *any* claims, not just claims about the supernatural.
Most claims of "God did it" are in this category, because an explanation
must say not just why something is, but more importantly, why something
is *not* what it is not, and God really sucks at not being able to do
things. But the rejection of God has nothing to do with religion or the
supernatural; it is because of the *epistemological* nature of the claim.

--
Mark Isaak eciton (at) curioustaxonomy (dot) net
"Keep the company of those who seek the truth; run from those who have
found it." - Vaclav Havel

[jillery]

OTOH there is this from Wikipedia:

"Methodological naturalism is concerned not with claims about what
exists but with methods of learning what nature is. It is strictly the
idea that all scientific endeavors—all hypotheses and events—are to be
explained and tested by reference to natural causes and events. The
genesis of nature, e.g., by an act of God, is not addressed. This
second sense of naturalism seeks only to provide a framework within
which to conduct the scientific study of the laws of nature.
Methodological naturalism is a way of acquiring knowledge. It is a
distinct system of thought concerned with a cognitive approach to
reality, and is thus a philosophy of knowledge. "


Based on the above, your expressed major premises are falsified, at
least in the same way that your RationalWiki quote proves them.

[chris thompson]

On Wednesday, March 12, 2014 10:27:30 AM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 18:19:16 -0700 (PDT), 嘱 Tiib <oot...@hot.ee>
>
> wrote:
>
>
>

> >On Wednesday, 12 March 2014 01:45:26 UTC+2, Kalkidas wrote:
>
> >> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
>
> >> wrote:
>
> >> >On Tuesday, March 11, 2014 6:34:47 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
>
> >> >> >I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
>
> >> >> >I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?
>
> >> >>
>
> >> >> Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
>
> >> >> supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?
>
> >> >
>
> >> >If that's the case, the claim that leprechauns or Zeus or Sasquatch or Brahma
>
> >> >are unnecessary for understanding physics is a religious claim. Does that mean
>
> >> >that every statement I make about fluid mechanics which does not refer to
>
> >> >unicorns is ipso facto a claim about unicorns?
>
> >>
>
> >> But who is making such claims, except as absurd "examples" to reply to
>
> >> arguments?
>
> >>
>
> >> Scientists do, however, make such claims about God and the
>
> >> supernatural in general, not as absurd examples, but as explicit
>
> >> statements of their foundational principles.
>
> >
>

> >Do they really? You can't point at work of science that deals
>
> >with supernatural, can you? It is because all such research done
>
> >is flat out unsuccessful and there is nothing credible to publish.
>
> >
>

> >> At least some scientists are willing to admit that this is done. But
>
> >> the t.o. ethos seems to be to blindly deny everything said about
>
> >> science by anyone accused of being a "creationist".
>
> >
>

> >Most atheists are not scientists and all scientists are not
>
> >atheists so you mix things here up I feel. No scientist
>
> >(religious or otherwise) can demonstrate relevance of anything
>
> >supernatural to whatever field they study.:
>
>
>

> If you ask the kind of "scientist" I'm talking about questions like:
>
>
>
> Why are there such things as time, space, matter and energy?
>
> What keeps the laws of physics from changing their form every instant?
>
> What keeps the physical constants constant?

Which Darwinist scientists work on those questions?

Chris

>
>
>
> The reply will likely be "we don't ask such questions in science" or
>
> "we don't currently know but we are sure we will eventually find
>
> natural causes that give the answers".
>
>
>
> The first reply reveals that science is not the comprehensive
>
> epistemology it is claimed to be.
>
>
>

[Davej]

On Tuesday, March 11, 2014 3:17:32 PM UTC-5, Seth Uttley wrote:
> [...] I dont understand how evolution...


I don't understand why Jesus hasn't appeared in the sky. Can you explain that?

[Kalkidas]

On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 18:22:44 -0400, jillery <69jp...@gmail.com>
wrote:

Unfortunately, you cannot define "natural causes and events" without
referencing "supernatural causes and events". Therefore, those
concepts are integral to methodological naturalism. My claim stands.

[jillery]

On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 21:05:59 +0100, nos...@de-ster.demon.nl (J. J.

I dunno. You're still here.

[jillery]

In this context, "supernatural" is derived from "natural". Your claim
has no support to stand on.

[Kalkidas]

4On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 20:22:50 -0400, jillery <69jp...@gmail.com>

Go ahead, try to define "natural cause" without contrasting it to
"supernatural cause". You're going to end up in a circular definition.

[chris thompson]

Sheesh. He's been too busy showing up on saltine crackers and French toast!

Chris

[broger...@gmail.com]

On Wednesday, March 12, 2014 8:39:05 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:

>
> Go ahead, try to define "natural cause" without contrasting it to
>
> "supernatural cause". You're going to end up in a circular definition.

A "natural" cause is a cause which has a consistent nature. It is a cause which in the same circumstances reliably produces the same effect. Those are the only sorts of causes that science can deal with. Any sort of cause which, given the same circumstances, produces different, unpredictable effects cannot be studied by science. There's not the slightest need to invoke "supernatural causes" in describing the sorts of things that science can study.

Note that above "unpredictable" means, "not even statistically predictable."

[jillery]

On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 17:39:05 -0700, Kalkidas <e...@joes.pub> wrote:

>>>>OTOH there is this from Wikipedia:
>>>>
>>>>"Methodological naturalism is concerned not with claims about what
>>>>exists but with methods of learning what nature is. It is strictly the
>>>>idea that all scientific endeavors—all hypotheses and events—are to be
>>>>explained and tested by reference to natural causes and events. The
>>>>genesis of nature, e.g., by an act of God, is not addressed. This
>>>>second sense of naturalism seeks only to provide a framework within
>>>>which to conduct the scientific study of the laws of nature.
>>>>Methodological naturalism is a way of acquiring knowledge. It is a
>>>>distinct system of thought concerned with a cognitive approach to
>>>>reality, and is thus a philosophy of knowledge. "
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>Based on the above, your expressed major premises are falsified, at
>>>>least in the same way that your RationalWiki quote proves them.
>>>
>>>Unfortunately, you cannot define "natural causes and events" without
>>>referencing "supernatural causes and events". Therefore, those
>>>concepts are integral to methodological naturalism. My claim stands.
>>
>>
>>In this context, "supernatural" is derived from "natural". Your claim
>>has no support to stand on.
>
>Go ahead, try to define "natural cause" without contrasting it to
>"supernatural cause". You're going to end up in a circular definition.

I rise to your challenge. Brogers already gave a good one:

***************************

A "natural" cause is a cause which has a consistent nature. It is a
cause which in the same circumstances reliably produces the same
effect. Those are the only sorts of causes that science can deal with.
Any sort of cause which, given the same circumstances, produces
different, unpredictable effects cannot be studied by science. There's
not the slightest need to invoke "supernatural causes" in describing
the sorts of things that science can study.

Note that above "unpredictable" means, "not even statistically
predictable."

***************************

I assume you're obsessed with the adjective rather than the nouns it
modifies, that you're not debating here the existence of causes and
effects, but only their kinds.

From Wiktionary, I get:

"Natural" refers to an innate property, originating from the kind,
sort, character or quality of causes and effects.

From Oxford Online, I get:

"Natural" is of or in agreement with the character or makeup of, or
circumstances surrounding causes and effects.

As I said, "supernatural" derives from "natural". It's similar to
"artificial", in the sense that it refers to causes and effects
outside of, and apart from, the natural. "Artificial" is distinct
from "supernatural in that it refers to natural causes and effects
that have been manipulated by intelligence, while "supernatural"
refers to causes and effects above and beyond natural causes and
effects.

Now your turn. try to define "supernatural cause" without contrasting
it to "natural cause".

[Ymir]

In article <1f15cfb8-c35f-4119...@googlegroups.com>,

Mistress Inez,

As leader of the cult of don't-mess-with-my-yoghurt, you get to set
*all* the rules, including any divine vestimentary requirements that you
see fit.

Let me humbly remind you, though, that even the mightiest high-priestess
is not entirely immune to the spinal deformation and cervical problems
which a cow on your hat might pose.

With all the humility, trembling and groveling due to one of your divine
station, might I suggest a meerkat as a more practical, (not to mention
way cooler) alternative? It could act as your personal sentry at all
times.

Don't have a cow,

Your humble servant,

Andre

[Öö Tiib]

On Wednesday, 12 March 2014 16:27:30 UTC+2, Kalkidas wrote:
> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 18:19:16 -0700 (PDT), 嘱 Tiib <oot...@hot.ee>
> wrote:
> >On Wednesday, 12 March 2014 01:45:26 UTC+2, Kalkidas wrote:
> >> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com

> The reply will likely be "we don't ask such questions in science" or
> "we don't currently know but we are sure we will eventually find
> natural causes that give the answers".
>
> The first reply reveals that science is not the comprehensive
> epistemology it is claimed to be.

The first reply I have never heard or read from scientists. It is
feeling nonsense so provide citation, please.

> The second reply is a post-dated check based on faith -- the faith
> that naturalism is true.

The second part of second answer is indicating materialism. Yes,
lot of scientists are materialists and can well say that.

I happen to know some religious scientists and they may off record
give also rather non-materialistic hypotheses. They well recognize
that it is not state of art science and it can't be published since
it can't be demonstrated that it is so as they said.

Antagonism between religion and science is from religions side.
Scientists demonstrate that rainbow is well defined optical
effect. That is so and they do not mention God. They honor truth.

For religion it is bad because that implies that rainbow is not
signature of God to Noah that there won't be floods anymore ever.
So now "evil" scientist turned a claim in their book into lie.

However ... it was lie at first place, admit it. Lies can't
service no one supernatural or otherwise. They turn against liar
one day. So scientists search for truth and that is correct to
do.

If there is truly a God then it will be scientist who will first
find Him outside of wild dreams of crazy lunatics and sly speeches
of greedy politicians. If there are no God then gained knowledge
may turn ourselves close to god-like. Either way the path of
science is correct one.

[James Beck]

Sounds both lite and fit...

[jillery]

On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 18:11:46 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
wrote:

I like it. I hope you don't mind that I used your definition for my
own nefarious purposes.

[deadrat]

On 3/12/14 1:08 PM, Kalkidas wrote:

> On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 13:30:48 -0400, Roger Shrubber
> <rog.sh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Kalkidas wrote:

>>> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 20:59:11 -0400, Roger Shrubber
>>> <rog.sh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>

>>>> Kalkidas wrote:
>>>>> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 20:11:33 -0400, Roger Shrubber
>>>>> <rog.sh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>

>>>>>> Kalkidas wrote:
>>>>>>> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 18:25:42 -0400, Roger Shrubber
>>>>>>> <rog.sh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>

>>>>>>>> Kalkidas wrote:
>>>>>>>>> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 17:34:03 -0400, Roger Shrubber
>>>>>>>>> <rog.sh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>

>>>>>>>>>> Kalkidas wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 13:17:32 -0700 (PDT), Seth Uttley

>>>>>>>>>>> <set...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>> In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I think that is untrue.

>> I think this part is tripping you up. The truth is that you can't
>> combine them within science. As for outside of science, it should
>> be self-evidence you're no longer talking about methodological
>> naturalism. So as for actual epistemology, methodological naturalism
>> does not qualify, you would be speaking of philosophical naturalism
>> instead.

>>
>>> So the situation is exactly as I stated. The *scientific method*
>>> includes the explicit, overt stipulation that theistic or supernatural
>>> causes are NOT ALLOWED in science. And most scientists agree with this
>>> stipulation.
>>

>> Now you've moved the goal-posts. Not allowed in science is not
>> an epistemological claim about the universe. You still need a
>> separate claim that science is comprehensive and thus capable
>> of answering all questions. If that were the case, there would
>> be no point in distinguishing between methodological and
>> philosophical naturalism. Absolutely no point at all. So citing
>> methodological naturalism to defend your broader claim is
>> simply mind boggling.

>
> In fact, methodological naturalism was invented to disguise
> metaphysical naturalism and make it appear rational and respectable.

Could we have some evidence for this piece of foolishness?

> The proof is in the very statements I cited. The use of the term
> "belief systems" indicates an alleged contrast between "belief"
> and...what, "certainty"? "Proof"? Yet in other places scientists will
> be careful to say that there is no certainty or proof in science!
>
> You are naive. Naturalism, whether methodological or metaphysical, is
> itself a "belief system". It's just not theistic,

There are certain assumptions that scientists make -- call them beliefs
if you like -- but they are hardly controversial and likely ones you
adopt as well: that the universe is not an illusion, that its rules are
simple enough to be understood, that it's consistent enough to be
investigated by different people at different times, and so on. That
doesn't make science a religion.

> and that is why it is preferred by atheists.

And by all people who like to see things work.

[deadrat]

On 3/11/14 4:04 PM, John Harshman wrote:

> On 3/11/14 1:17 PM, Seth Uttley wrote:
>> In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I
>> think that is untrue.
>

> You are wrong, but thanks for the opinion.

>
>> No one has seen a species evolve into a whole different species, dogs
>> can have many different types of dogs but a dog has not evolved into
>> a whole different species..
>

> We have however seen new species arise quickly, most often by what's
> called allopolyploidy and mostly in plants. More importantly, we can see
> evidence in current species of new species forming in the past. You can
> know that something happened even if you don't see it happen, because
> the past leaves traces in the present.

>
> > Is there really any evidence of evolution out there? not really.
>

> There's your biggest mistake. There's plenty of evidence. You, for
> example, are 98.77% chimpanzee. How do you account for that?

Bad judgment by a couple of ancestors of chimpanzees?

[deadrat]

A natural cause is one amendable to investigation via experiment and to
description by a mathematical model.

[deadrat]

On 3/11/14 5:34 PM, Kalkidas wrote:
> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 14:55:48 -0700, Robert Camp
> <rober...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>
>> On 3/11/14 2:00 PM, Kalkidas wrote:
>>> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 13:17:32 -0700 (PDT), Seth Uttley
>>> <set...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> In the talk origins it says that evolution is not a religion.. I think that is untrue.
>>>> No one has seen a species evolve into a whole different species, dogs can have many different types of dogs but a dog has not evolved into a whole different species..
>>>> Is there really any evidence of evolution out there? not really. Therefore Evolution must also be a belief and just faith in something that is unseen. evolution basically believes we came from dust particles that caused a 'big bang'. So the difference between evolution and creation is that evolution believes that everything came from dust, but creation believes we were created by God. Both are beliefs and a 'religion' because neither have enough convincing evidence. I personally believe in creation and I dont understand how evolution is not labelled as a religion and why it is taught at schools to kids as though it was 'known' to be true, when it is not even proven.
>>>
>>> Darwinism is an ideology. So is naturalism/materialism in general.
>>> They resemble religions in several aspects, but they are not
>>> "religions" in the traditional sense of the term.
>>>
>>> OTOH if by "religious" you mean any statement about God or the
>>> supernatural, then Darwinism and materialism in general are certainly
>>> religious positions, since they claim that God and/or the supernatural
>>> are unnecessary hypotheses to account for the origin of nature and
>>> life and its varieties. Indeed, that claim is an axiom of their
>>> ideology. Since the claim is a statement about God and/or the
>>> supernatural, it is a "religious" statement.
>>

>> So, then every bit of empirical investigation that has ever displaced
>> invocation of gods (e.g., germ theory, celestial mechanics, agricultural
>> science, epilepsy, etc. etc.) as an explanatory framework is religious?
>
> Any explanatory framework that explicitly denies God or the
> supernatural is certainly religious in its ideology. Otherwise, why
> deny them?

Science doesn't "deny" gods; it just doesn't rely on them. Your claim
is like calling bald a hair color.

>
>> I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
>> I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?
>
> Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
> supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?

An empirical one, derived from making lots of pizza.

>> Am I being religious when
>> I look for my keys under the couch rather than pray for them to appear?
>
> If you explicitly rejected prayer, then your action was certainly
> religious, otherwise, why would you even consider prayer? Why would
> the idea of prayer even enter your mind?

It never enters my mind. But why are the keys always in the last place
I look?

> Why would Dawkins, Dennett, Stenger, Harris, Hitchens, et al. even
> bring up religion, God, or the supernatural if those items were not an
> integral part of their claimed "scientific" world view?

Because they wish to discuss their weltanschauung? Don't confuse that
with science.

[deadrat]

On 3/11/14 6:50 PM, Kalkidas wrote:
> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 15:46:35 -0700 (PDT), Dai monie
> <josko...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>>>> I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
>>>
>>>> I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
>>>
>>> supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?
>>>
>>>
>>>

>>>> Am I being religious when
>>>
>>>> I look for my keys under the couch rather than pray for them to appear?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> If you explicitly rejected prayer, then your action was certainly
>>>
>>> religious, otherwise, why would you even consider prayer? Why would
>>>
>>> the idea of prayer even enter your mind?
>>>
>>>
>>>

>>> Why would Dawkins, Dennett, Stenger, Harris, Hitchens, et al. even
>>>
>>> bring up religion, God, or the supernatural if those items were not an
>>>
>>> integral part of their claimed "scientific" world view?

>> Dawkins `brings it up' because it is his personal world view. That, and he's often explicitly invited to talk about it.
>>
>> Evolution doesn't deny god. It doesn't say anything about a god. It's looking at the evidence, and seeing what happens. Not invoking a god is not the same as denying it.
>
> I haven't said anything about "evolution". I have been talking about
> Darwinism and naturalism/materialism in general.
>
> Do you deny that naturalism/materialism is the philosophical basis of
> modern science? Because the supernatural is, by definition, excluded
> from naturalism.

It's the empirical basis of science. Scientific investigations aren't
equipped to investigate the supernatural.

[deadrat]

On 3/11/14 6:45 PM, Kalkidas wrote:

> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
> wrote:
>
>> On Tuesday, March 11, 2014 6:34:47 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
>>

>>>> I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
>>>
>>>> I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
>>>
>>> supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?
>>

>> If that's the case, the claim that leprechauns or Zeus or Sasquatch or Brahma are unnecessary for understanding physics is a religious claim. Does that mean that every statement I make about fluid mechanics which does not refer to unicorns is ipso facto a claim about unicorns?
>
> But who is making such claims, except as absurd "examples" to reply to
> arguments?
>
> Scientists do, however, make such claims about God and the
> supernatural in general, not as absurd examples, but as explicit
> statements of their foundational principles.

No, they don't. They may discuss them when talking about their
philosophy, but you can't say, quote a single scientific paper that
includes a section that denies the supernatural.

>
> At least some scientists are willing to admit that this is done. But
> the t.o. ethos seems to be to blindly deny everything said about
> science by anyone accused of being a "creationist".

That's because everything said by "scientific" cretinists and IDiots
about science turns out to be wrong. These are people who start every
workday by declaring that nothing they find in their "investigations"
can contradict their literal interpretation of their holy book. Why
would anyone listen to them about scientific matters?

[deadrat]

On 3/12/14 10:14 AM, Kalkidas wrote:
> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 17:49:05 -0700, Robert Camp
> <rober...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>
>> On 3/11/14, 4:45 PM, Kalkidas wrote:
>>> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Tuesday, March 11, 2014 6:34:47 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>> I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
>>>>>
>>>>>> I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
>>>>>
>>>>> supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?
>>>>
>>>> If that's the case, the claim that leprechauns or Zeus or Sasquatch or Brahma are unnecessary for understanding physics is a religious claim. Does that mean that every statement I make about fluid mechanics which does not refer to unicorns is ipso facto a claim about unicorns?
>>>
>>> But who is making such claims, except as absurd "examples" to reply to
>>> arguments?
>>>
>>> Scientists do, however, make such claims about God and the
>>> supernatural in general, not as absurd examples, but as explicit
>>> statements of their foundational principles.
>>>

>>> At least some scientists are willing to admit that this is done. But
>>> the t.o. ethos seems to be to blindly deny everything said about
>>> science by anyone accused of being a "creationist".
>>

>> Problem is, your original claim was not about scientists, it was about
>> Darwinism and materialism. And in explaining your claim you called these
>> perspectives ideologies.
>
> Well, I've heard people on t.o. say that science is what scientists do
> when they're doing science. So scientists and science are hardly
> separable. And I've also heard people on t.o. defend Darwinism as
> "science". So Darwinism is what Darwinists do when they're doing what
> some people call "science".
>
> As for ideology. When I called Darwinism an ideology, I intended it as
> a neutral term, not an insult. Creationism and ID are also ideologies.
> They are paradigms designed (sic) to explain the phenomenon, the
> appearance of, varieties of species, or genera, or "kinds" of
> organisms observed at present.
>
> The difference between them is in what they will allow as "causes".
> Darwinism will allow only naturalistic/materialistic "causes". ID, on
> the other hand, allows for intelligent causation.
>
>>
>> Now as far as I'm aware, Darwinism is a name for Darwin's observational
>> and theoretical explanation for the origins of species. Darwin did
>> recognize that he was actively removing supernatural influence as an
>> explanation for this phenomenon (at least as far as it went) but I don't
>> know of anything in "Darwinism" itself that explicitly denies god.
>> That's why I asked my questions as I did. A naturalistic explanation of
>> something previously understood to be of supernatural provenance is not
>> inherently "religious" *simply* by virtue of displacing the religious
>> account - that would leave the label essentially meaningless.
>
> As I said up-thread, "....if by "religious" you mean any statement
> about God or the supernatural....."
>
> So by that definition, the statement "God has nothing to do with
> it..." is a religious statement, even though it makes no positive
> religious claim.
>
>>
>> As for materialism, you need to be more specific. Methodological
>> materialism (or naturalism) is certainly not ideological, it is
>> operational. Hence its successful use by virtually any flavor of
>> ideological scientist. Of course there are those who favor some kind of
>> materialist or naturalist philosophy, but as that perspective is not
>> likely to be confused with science, it seems logical to conclude this is
>> not relevant to your point (not to mention that calling methodological
>> naturalism an ideology would be utterly uncontroversial).
>
> The temptation to conflate method with metaphysics is too tempting,
> and too easy. In fact, it has produced a generation of exactly the
> kind of people I cited above (Dawkins et al.) who are not merely
> methodological naturalists, but angry anti-supernaturalists. Some of
> them even claim that science has "disproved" the supernatural!
>
>> To sum up, I think your original claim was flimsy, at best.
>
> My claim is that the game of modern science is to prefer ignorance to
> supernatural causation. Is that really a controversial claim?
>
Supernatural causation *is* a (particularly virulent) form of ignorance.

[deadrat]

On 3/12/14 2:40 PM, David Fritzinger wrote:
> In article <aqr0i9d3qrju8silr...@4ax.com>,

> Correction: No scientist I've ever encountered (and I have spent much of
> my life doing science) would describe him/herself as a Darwinist.

They used to, just as some physicists used to call themselves atomists,
who thought that atoms were actual physical entities, as distinguished
from those who thought them merely convenient concepts to make
calculations. After Einstein's work in 1905, there was no need to do
that, and today there are just physicists.

> They
> are evolutionary biologists, molecular biologists, protein chemists,
> etc.

Just so. The evidence has forced non-darwinists out of science and into
religion and hucksterism. Or do I repeat myself?

<snip/>

[deadrat]

On 3/12/14 9:27 AM, Kalkidas wrote:
> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 18:19:16 -0700 (PDT), 嘱 Tiib <oot...@hot.ee>
> wrote:
>

>> On Wednesday, 12 March 2014 01:45:26 UTC+2, Kalkidas wrote:
>>> On Tue, 11 Mar 2014 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
>>> wrote:
>>>> On Tuesday, March 11, 2014 6:34:47 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
>>>>>> I claim that God and/or the supernatural are unnecessary hypotheses when
>>>>>> I make a pizza. Does that mean it's religious?
>>>>>
>>>>> Your claim is certainly religious. It's a claim about God and the
>>>>> supernatural. What else would you call such a claim?
>>>>
>>>> If that's the case, the claim that leprechauns or Zeus or Sasquatch or Brahma
>>>> are unnecessary for understanding physics is a religious claim. Does that mean
>>>> that every statement I make about fluid mechanics which does not refer to
>>>> unicorns is ipso facto a claim about unicorns?
>>>
>>> But who is making such claims, except as absurd "examples" to reply to
>>> arguments?
>>>
>>> Scientists do, however, make such claims about God and the
>>> supernatural in general, not as absurd examples, but as explicit
>>> statements of their foundational principles.
>>

>> Do they really? You can't point at work of science that deals
>> with supernatural, can you? It is because all such research done
>> is flat out unsuccessful and there is nothing credible to publish.
>>

>>> At least some scientists are willing to admit that this is done. But
>>> the t.o. ethos seems to be to blindly deny everything said about
>>> science by anyone accused of being a "creationist".
>>

>> Most atheists are not scientists and all scientists are not
>> atheists so you mix things here up I feel. No scientist
>> (religious or otherwise) can demonstrate relevance of anything
>> supernatural to whatever field they study.:
>
> If you ask the kind of "scientist" I'm talking about questions like:
>
> Why are there such things as time, space, matter and energy?
> What keeps the laws of physics from changing their form every instant?
> What keeps the physical constants constant?
>
> The reply will likely be "we don't ask such questions in science" or
> "we don't currently know but we are sure we will eventually find
> natural causes that give the answers".
>
> The first reply reveals that science is not the comprehensive
> epistemology it is claimed to be.

This is something pulled from your imagination. Or somewhere.

> The second reply is a post-dated check based on faith -- the faith
> that naturalism is true.

Those checks never seem to bounce though.

That "faith" still doesn't make science a religion.

[J. J. Lodder]

It's not my fault that you are always losing your arguments,

Jan

[jillery]

On Thu, 13 Mar 2014 11:22:38 +0100, nos...@de-ster.demon.nl (J. J.

Non sequitor. I can't lose what has never begun.

[deadrat]

She wins most of her arguments. It's her temper she's always losing.

Somehow she always manages to find it again.

[David Fritzinger]

In article <etp1i9djbbhdj9k2k...@4ax.com>,

Kalkidas <e...@joes.pub> wrote:

> On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 18:22:44 -0400, jillery <69jp...@gmail.com>
> wrote:

[snip]

> >
> >OTOH there is this from Wikipedia:
> >
> >"Methodological naturalism is concerned not with claims about what
> >exists but with methods of learning what nature is. It is strictly the
> >idea that all scientific endeavors—all hypotheses and events—are to be
> >explained and tested by reference to natural causes and events. The
> >genesis of nature, e.g., by an act of God, is not addressed. This
> >second sense of naturalism seeks only to provide a framework within
> >which to conduct the scientific study of the laws of nature.
> >Methodological naturalism is a way of acquiring knowledge. It is a
> >distinct system of thought concerned with a cognitive approach to
> >reality, and is thus a philosophy of knowledge. "
> >
> >
> >Based on the above, your expressed major premises are falsified, at
> >least in the same way that your RationalWiki quote proves them.
>
> Unfortunately, you cannot define "natural causes and events" without
> referencing "supernatural causes and events". Therefore, those
> concepts are integral to methodological naturalism. My claim stands.

Actually, you can define them without referencing the supernatural.
Scientists study the *natural* world. They rely on data from the natural
world because that is all they are able to see and study. Therefore, the
supernatural is ignored because it cannot be seen or studied.

[jillery]

Your inference remains in your imagination.

[Kalkidas]

On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 18:11:46 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
wrote:

>On Wednesday, March 12, 2014 8:39:05 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
>
>>
>> Go ahead, try to define "natural cause" without contrasting it to
>>
>> "supernatural cause". You're going to end up in a circular definition.
>

>A "natural" cause is a cause which has a consistent nature. It is a cause which in the same circumstanc, es reliably produces the same effect. Those are the only sorts of causes that science can deal with. Any sort of cause which, given the same circumstances, produces different, unpredictable effects cannot be studied by science. There's not the slightest need to invoke "supernatural causes" in describing the sorts of things that science can study.

>
>Note that above "unpredictable" means, "not even statistically predictable."
>

First, you used the term "nature" in your definition of "natural". So
either that's circular, or you must now define "nature". If a cause
has a "nature", then what is "a nature"? And what is a "natural
nature"? In fact, why are the terms "natural" and "nature" even
present? It seems they are not needed.

Second, is is quite facile to speak of "in the same circumstances",
but the problem of deciding whether two "circumstances" are really
"the same" is practically intractable, given the unspeakable
complexity of even the simplest organism, or even an gas of inorganic
molecules. This is not a trivial problem.

OK. You may call those quibbles. I know what you are really trying to
say. You're basically saying that if a mechanism cannot be found,
science cannot work. You are restricting science to the study of
mechanisms.

And a mechanism is a system in which any given fixed state
("circumstance") fully and rigidly determines the subsequent state of
the system. Or, to be more charitable, a mechanism is a black box in
which a given set of inputs always produces the same set of outputs.

I presume then that you would reject Darwinian evolution on the basis
that no organism has been sufficiently modelled to the extent that it
can be known with much certainty that it is a "mechanism", or even a
"black box" and therefore, no certain statement can be made about the
"cause(s)" of its functioning and its future evolution into different
organisms?

Or at least you would not call Darwinian evolution "science" or a
"scientific theory"? Is that right?

And how about Quantum Mechanics, where the future state of a system is
rendered unpredictable by a measurement? This is quite odd, since a
measurement seems to be a cause whose effect is unpredictable! Is an
experimental measurement not a "natural cause" then?

So is QM not science?

[Kalkidas]

On Thu, 13 Mar 2014 02:05:12 -0400, jillery <69jp...@gmail.com>
wrote:

This is incoherent and lazy. And anyway you have referenced
"supernatural".

[deadrat]

Your posting history is no imaginary.

And it's inferences all the way down, DQ.
<snip/>

[broger...@gmail.com]

On Thursday, March 13, 2014 11:41:20 AM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
> On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 18:11:46 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
>
> wrote:
>
>
>
> >On Wednesday, March 12, 2014 8:39:05 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
>
> >
>
> >>
>
> >> Go ahead, try to define "natural cause" without contrasting it to
>
> >>
>
> >> "supernatural cause". You're going to end up in a circular definition.
>
> >
>
> >A "natural" cause is a cause which has a consistent nature. It is a cause which in the same circumstanc, es reliably produces the same effect. Those are the only sorts of causes that science can deal with. Any sort of cause which, given the same circumstances, produces different, unpredictable effects cannot be studied by science. There's not the slightest need to invoke "supernatural causes" in describing the sorts of things that science can study.
>
> >
>
> >Note that above "unpredictable" means, "not even statistically predictable."
>
> >
>
>
>
> First, you used the term "nature" in your definition of "natural". So
>
> either that's circular, or you must now define "nature". If a cause
>
> has a "nature", then what is "a nature"? And what is a "natural
>
> nature"? In fact, why are the terms "natural" and "nature" even
>
> present? It seems they are not needed.

You only asked that the definition not be made in reference to the supernatural. In any case, you seem to have understood the idea just fine.

>
>
>
> Second, is is quite facile to speak of "in the same circumstances",
>
> but the problem of deciding whether two "circumstances" are really
>
> "the same" is practically intractable, given the unspeakable
>
> complexity of even the simplest organism, or even an gas of inorganic
>
> molecules. This is not a trivial problem.

You are correct that "in the same circumstances" is a vague phrase. Indeed, often cannot be specified completely. That's life. We just muddle along, hoping not to make important errors in deciding what circumstances are similar enough to count as the same circumstances for our purposes.

>
>
>
> OK. You may call those quibbles. I know what you are really trying to
>
> say. You're basically saying that if a mechanism cannot be found,
>
> science cannot work. You are restricting science to the study of
>
> mechanisms.
>
>
>
> And a mechanism is a system in which any given fixed state
>
> ("circumstance") fully and rigidly determines the subsequent state of
>
> the system. Or, to be more charitable, a mechanism is a black box in
>
> which a given set of inputs always produces the same set of outputs.
>
>
>
> I presume then that you would reject Darwinian evolution on the basis
>
> that no organism has been sufficiently modelled to the extent that it
>
> can be known with much certainty that it is a "mechanism", or even a
>
> "black box" and therefore, no certain statement can be made about the
>
> "cause(s)" of its functioning and its future evolution into different
>
> organisms?

No, of course I would not reject biology or Darwinian evolution because we cannot predict all outcomes to arbitrary precision starting from first principles. There are sufficient regularities of large scale behaviour to make useful predictions. That's good enough for science.

>
>
>
> Or at least you would not call Darwinian evolution "science" or a
>
> "scientific theory"? Is that right?

No, see above.

>
>
>
> And how about Quantum Mechanics, where the future state of a system is
>
> rendered unpredictable by a measurement? This is quite odd, since a
>
> measurement seems to be a cause whose effect is unpredictable! Is an
>
> experimental measurement not a "natural cause" then?
>
>
>
> So is QM not science?

Remember where I wrote above - Note that above "unpredictable" means, "not even statistically predictable." I included that note specifically to cover quantum mechanics, since outcomes in quantum mechanics are only statistically predictable. So, of course QM is science.

[Kalkidas]

Well, you obviously have a lot of faith in your power to "see" and
"study". But that's what it is: faith.

[Kalkidas]

On Thu, 13 Mar 2014 09:19:42 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com

wrote:

>On Thursday, March 13, 2014 11:41:20 AM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
>> On Wed, 12 Mar 2014 18:11:46 -0700 (PDT), broger...@gmail.com
>>
>> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> >On Wednesday, March 12, 2014 8:39:05 PM UTC-4, Kalkidas wrote:
>>
>> >
>>
>> >>
>>
>> >> Go ahead, try to define "natural cause" without contrasting it to
>>
>> >>
>>
>> >> "supernatural cause". You're going to end up in a circular definition.
>>
>> >
>>
>> >A "natural" cause is a cause which has a consistent nature. It is a cause which in the same circumstanc, es reliably produces the same effect. Those are the only sorts of causes that science can deal with. Any sort of cause which, given the same circumstances, produces different, unpredictable effects cannot be studied by science. There's not the slightest need to invoke "supernatural causes" in describing the sorts of things that science can study.
>>
>> >
>>
>> >Note that above "unpredictable" means, "not even statistically predictable."
>>
>> >
>>
>>
>>
>> First, you used the term "nature" in your definition of "natural". So
>>
>> either that's circular, or you must now define "nature". If a cause
>>
>> has a "nature", then what is "a nature"? And what is a "natural
>>
>> nature"? In fact, why are the terms "natural" and "nature" even
>>
>> present? It seems they are not needed.
>
>You only asked that the definition not be made in reference to the supernatural. In any case, you seem to have understood the idea just fine.

Actually I asked for a *non-circular* definition that doesn't
reference the supernatural. Your definition doesnt specify what
"nature" is, although it does talk about causes.

[Walter Bushell]

In article <1dd5ed3f-18ca-48c7...@googlegroups.com>,

Öö Tiib <oot...@hot.ee> wrote:

> However ... it was lie at first place, admit it. Lies can't
> service no one supernatural or otherwise. They turn against liar
> one day. So scientists search for truth and that is correct to
> do.

In the beginning an unjustified conjecture at most and not really a
lie until the facts were in. Now it's all dreamtime.

--
Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greed. Me.

[Kalkidas]

Who said anything about "biology"? I'm talking about a claimed
"theory" that doesn't have anything remotely resembling the rigor you
demand in your definition of "cause".

>>>
>>> Or at least you would not call Darwinian evolution "science" or a
>>>
>>> "scientific theory"? Is that right?
>>
>>No, see above.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> And how about Quantum Mechanics, where the future state of a system is
>>>
>>> rendered unpredictable by a measurement? This is quite odd, since a
>>>
>>> measurement seems to be a cause whose effect is unpredictable! Is an
>>>
>>> experimental measurement not a "natural cause" then?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> So is QM not science?
>>
>>Remember where I wrote above - Note that above "unpredictable" means, "not even statistically predictable." I included that note specifically to cover quantum mechanics, since outcomes in quantum mechanics are only statistically predictable. So, of course QM is science.

"Statistically predictable" applies to something other than 50/50
probabilities. You cannot "statistically predict" the outcome of a
fair coin toss, since the probabilities of heads and tails are equal.
Similarly, you cannot "statistically predict" the outcome of a spin
measurement on an electron, since up/down have equal probabilities.

"It will either be heads or tails" is not a "prediction".

[jillery]

On Thu, 13 Mar 2014 11:14:20 -0500, deadrat <a...@b.com> wrote:

>DQ

Asshole

[jillery]

Blatantly false and unsupported accusations don't serve your POV.

> And anyway you have referenced
>"supernatural".

I distinguished natural from supernatural, but it's not part of my
definition. You really ought to learn how to read.

So apparently you have no intention of defining "supernatural cause
and effects". No surprise there.