Simple question?

Quote: FrGamble

Never have you written more false words.

Oh, yes I have.

For instance, everything I wrote in Yiddish and Hebrew Torah classes regarding "God." That was 100% false.

As to what I said, does the validity of a scientific theory like, say, the Big Bang, depend on how you feel about it? Can it be dismissed as "Catholic physics"?

We are not understanding each other. The results of the impartial scientific method give us facts and evidence. What we use those facts and evidence to believe is dependent on the heart.

For example the Big Bang is evidence that points to our universe having an ultimate beginning. Your heart won't allow you to go there so you posit a multiverse, an infinite regression, or simply that we cannot know or that nothing has been proven yet. How we use and come to conclusions about life and answer the big questions is taking the evidence gained by science and applying them in the real wisdom of the heart.

Quote: FrGamble

For example the Big Bang is evidence that points to our universe having an ultimate beginning.

Your heart tells you this because the evidence does not.

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Your heart won't allow you to go there so you posit a multiverse, an infinite regression, or simply that we cannot know or that nothing has been proven yet.

At some point projection simply stops being amusing.

You can't call something the ultimate beginning just because you can't see past it. Hell, you can't even see it, but actually from a short time afterwards. Your insistence that it is the absolute beginning has no foundation in the evidence available. If you could prove it, you'd win a Nobel Prize.

And this is what I mean my twisting or misinterpreting or misrepresenting the evidence.

Quote: Nareed

At some point projection simply stops being amusing.

You can't call something the ultimate beginning just because you can't see past it. Hell, you can't even see it, but actually from a short time afterwards. Your insistence that it is the absolute beginning has no foundation in the evidence available. If you could prove it, you'd win a Nobel Prize.

And this is what I mean my twisting or misinterpreting or misrepresenting the evidence.

This is what I mean about how important your heart is when discussing these things.

There is not mathematical proof that the universe had an absolute beginning, nor do I think it is possible to obtain such proof. Yet, in the case of an obvious and proven expansion of the universe you refuse to even acknowledge that one could use this evidence to support a larger claim that logically follows, namely that the universe had a beginning. You must come to grips that there are some things, like the existence of God and 'was there anything before the Big Bang', that science cannot prove. You need to take the evidence that science gives us and using both the higher functions of our mind and our heart make conclusions that are reasonable. This is what we call wisdom. It is not just a regurgitation of scientific facts, but an honest and open discussion as to where these facts could or should lead us. Your heart blocks you from looking at the evidence in any way that would lead one to support the claim for a creator. Your heart also blocks you from realizing that there is no scientific evidence at all that points in any way to the idea that there is not a God.

Quote: FrGamble

There is not mathematical proof that the universe had an absolute beginning, nor do I think it is possible to obtain such proof.

"I told Wilbur and now I'm telling you: that contraption will never fly."

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Yet, in the case of an obvious and proven expansion of the universe you refuse to even acknowledge that one could use this evidence to support a larger claim that logically follows, namely that the universe had a beginning.

If we knew nothing but that the universe is expanding, then it would make sense to trace the expansion backwards and see where and how that began. That's what Fr. Lemaitre did.

In science it's important to determine what you know, but it's much more important to determine what you don't know. The more basic the fact, the more certainty you need. In this case we DON'T KNOW the universe began with the Big Bang. I'd argue that we KNOW it didn't, simply because the energy concentrated on one point was there at the moment of the Big Bang, so at least energy predates the universe. It may be that space began with the Big Bang, and perhaps time as well (space-time being a continuum, this conclusion seems unavoidable), the expansion of the universe certainly begins then. That's all we know.

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You need to take the evidence that science gives us and using both the higher functions of our mind and our heart make conclusions that are reasonable.

The sole function of your heart is to pump blood with enough force and pressure to reach all blood-using tissues in your body (some tissues get oxygen and nutrients by other means). It's absolutely vital, but it's not a means os cognition.

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It is not just a regurgitation of scientific facts,

Science is not a collection of facts. The application of these facts is as important as the means of discovering them. If you mislike the answers, well, that's your problem.

This is merely a case of moving the goal posts. Any number of observed phenomena have been used to prove the existence of some deity, or were taken as signs of some deity. Comets, eclipses, rainbows, meteorites, and now the Big Bang.

On one side there is a long and distinguished track record of naturalistic explanations being found in due to time. On your side there is a long record of moving the goal posts. You may bet on the universe having no memory. I'll bet that science has one.

Quote: FrGamble

For example the Big Bang is evidence that points to our universe having an ultimate beginning. Your heart won't allow you to go there so you posit a multiverse, an infinite regression, or simply that we cannot know or that nothing has been proven yet.

I go as far as to allow intelligent creation a possibility among many, but hopefully that will never be confused with stating a fact.

Not sure why an intelligent creator who wanted Earth to be the center of his interest, would bother with everything else. Seems it would be simpler to create an illusion for everything outside our solar system. Certainly would be a lot less work. A lot lot lot lot lot lot lot lot less work. I can't even use enough lots.

Quote: rxwine

Not sure why an intelligent creator who wanted Earth to be the center of his interest, would bother with everything else. Seems it would be simpler to create an illusion for everything outside our solar system. Certainly would be a lot less work. A lot lot lot lot lot lot lot lot less work. I can't even use enough lots.

You run into the infinite power problem again. No matter how much effort it takes the one true god Astarte to create the universe, she may as well be sipping wine from a cup. Her power is many, many, many, many, many trillions of trillions of trillions of trillions (ad infinitum) times that which is required to exert the massive, massive, massive, etc effort to create the universe.

For all we know, Astarte creates seven hundred trillion trillion trillion universes every day before breakfast.

See, my heart tells me a deity with infinite power wouldn't be so ridiculous as to create only one universe.

Quote: FrGamble

There is not mathematical proof that the universe had an absolute beginning.

Correct. Nor is there proof it's the one and
only universe. So why would you use it in
any argument for the existence of a god.

God exists in two ways. You were taught the
concept as a child and believed it. Or, for
whatever reason, as an adult you needed
to invent a god, so you did, then you
forgot you did, and now you think he's real.

That's the extent of god, so quit trying to
prove he's real.

Quote: beachbumbabs

So the heart is not needed, either to love irrationally, or to be hardened against belief; the evidence itself stands as the fact of the matter.

The evidence does stand for itself, like a silent guard over the truth. However, the heart is needed precisely to love irrationally or to be hardened against belief. That is the meaning of the quote I gave. "For the believer no evidence is necessary, for the unbeliever no evidence is possible." The heart, and I take it for granted that we understand the "heart" metaphorically, is what brings the facts together with the will and produces action. The dead facts of science aren't meant to motivate, but only make possible the actions people use to make a philosophy or to advance our knowledge or create new things.

My point here is that Nareed and some others fail to see evidence because their heart is hardened against the possibility of belief in a God. In my case I see evidence all around me for the existence of God because my heart is wildly open to a belief in God. Science provides the evidence and based on the inclination of our hearts we ignore or interpret this evidence. I hope that makes a little more sense.

Finally, what is very interesting to me is that in the case of choosing not to believe it is based solely on the heart. It takes a strong desire to not believe in God to convince yourself of atheism. You gotta really want it. I am not saying that there are not good reasons for people to desperately not want there to be a God, but it carries no scientific evidence to support it.

Quote: FrGamble

That is the meaning of the quote I gave. "For the believer no evidence is necessary, for the unbeliever no evidence is possible."

The meaning is quite evident: You have no objective evidence, therefore you have to make belief without evidence a virtue.

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My point here is that Nareed and some others fail to see evidence because their heart is hardened against the possibility of belief in a God.

See? My point exactly.

There is no possible way to argue the matter objectively, as evidence is thrown out the window. You make this claim and, I assume, expect people will want to prove you wrong. No one likes being called "hard-hearted," or to accept an implication that they're deficient in some way.

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It takes a strong desire to not believe in God to convince yourself of atheism.

You have it exactly backwards. It took me ten years. The pressure to conform is intense.