Re: If god exists, what created god?
Gil Hardwick (gil@landmark.iinet.net.au)
Thu, 04 May 1995 03:57:15 GMT
In article <3o5hr8$n5b@unogate.unocal.com>, Richard Ottolini (stgprao@sugarland.unocal.COM) writes:
>In article <558@landmark.iinet.net.au>,
>Gil Hardwick <gil@landmark.iinet.net.au> wrote:
>>Note that the claim is not that God exists, only that God IS (L. Deus
>>est) . . . whatever. Like astronomers claim that space (or whatever)
>>IS . . . whatever.
>
>These are fundamentally different ways of explaining things
>and your analogy of astronomical space is incorrect.
>And astronomer would ASSUME some theory of space for explaining
>or predicting observations. The theory could change if new data
>came along. A theory that survives many tests can operationally
>be thought to be essentially "true", but could proven false at some time.
No it is not incorrect at all Richard. As you state here yourself
space is merely an assumption, an entity supposed merely to BE rather
than to actually EXIST, only because it helps to explain aspects of
human observation and experience.
Further, I am obliged sadly to add, the theory most frequently does
not in fact change as new data comes in. It is brandished as a weapon
against the religious of the world until they begin to take up arms
in their own defence. Already we have seen it taken to court, with
extremely bitter divisions and recriminations forthcoming for years
subsequently.
>Most concepts of God I know about are not testable or disprovable
>in this fashion, so beyond the discourse of science.
>there may or may not be ways of knowing about things outside of science,
>but would not be meaningful to science. And this knowledge could be
>congruent to what science learns, but doesn't have to be.
Yes, the matter is beyond the capacity of scientific method. No, it
cannot be "congruent to what science learns" because science cannot
possibly learn anything.
"Science" is nothing more than a disciplined method of enquiry into
the nature of things in which us humans engage. People who may also
happen to be religious.
Let's all just get off these reified abstractions finally, shall we,
and take into the account the empirical evidence on how all these
intellectual domains and and abstracted entities are constructed. I
don't care if people find it boring. To them anthropology may well be
boring, but that being the case surely they are quite as free to go off
and study physics instead.
They might just as well get off our conference too, yes?
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He who refuses to qualify data is doomed to rant.
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