I think I found a hero for the first time in my life! It is strange that I have never heard about Weinberg, but I want to read everything he has written. I will even start studying physics now!
Remember we are indoctrinated more than we are educated. Society needs workers more than sophisticated individuals sitting beside the fireplace musing.
I tried to read his book on quantum field theory and found it very very hard to understand. It seemed to me (being trained as a pure mathematician) to start halfway in the middle. Can't deny his brilliance though.
I'm sorry, my mistake - it was Scalar WAVES I had once looked up. The first google hit is wiki's page, "Scalar field theory (pseudoscience." But there is ALSO another wiki page on "Scalar field theory" which I had overlooked. The second paragraph begins, "Scalar waves in these theories (as opposed to a scalar field in mainstream physics) are hypothetical waves, which differ from the conventional electromagnetic..." etc, etc The neutrality and factual accuracy of the page is in dispute.
Wow, as someone who is knee-deep in a study of Physics I have to admit I am flattered by your comment and at the same time my study has led me to a much greater appreciation for those that will study and develop pure mathematics. I've come to believe there really is no difference between the two subjects...just different facets. Once again, thanks for the comment. It makes me feel better about the collaboration that is essential to both of our further development ; )
As a physicist and atheist I find this discussion one of the most interesting and clear talks I have ever heard. The situation of humans is tragic in many ways, in most ways in fact, but as one of my professors once said "the only joy you will find is in searching not in getting the answer, because you will never get it". That is what saddens me most :(
what I see here is great respect for Weinberg from Richard. Indeed science pioneers here discussing the very fundamentals of nature and thus our existence.
Interesting what he says about Scalar fields, considering that wikipedia refers to them as pseudo science, lol. But also interesting is his take (early in this clip) about how unsatisfactory it is to just say something like, "things are as they should be" or whatever, suggesting that religious belief would somehow mean that no one would want to understand the world. John Polkinghorne, on the other hand, believes that belief in God was actually a major motivator of scientific discovery. Hmmm...
Fascinating discussion. I imagine myself sitting in the room sipping on a whiskey cocktail, smoking a cigar, and particpating in a talk with mental giants.
When Steve says the fluctuations become smooth at times, he refers to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle which would dictate that the fluctuations would, at a certain probability, lay out flat or smooth and thereby experience a moment of zero energy. The negative gravitational energy of the geometry of the "area" and the positive energy of the inflation equal zero. That's a probable event of the fluctuations and recipe of our big bang cosmos which must be relatively flat so it may continue to inflate, and must have a total zero energy. As the cosmos continues to inflate and positive inflation energy increases, the negative gravitational energy decreases. The negative gravitational energy flows into the positive inflation energy. The rest is history. As the cosmos inflates, increased space produces less gravitation being exerted in the space. Peace and love.
I don't think that the intent of your original post was semantic, but my original point stands, that Dawkins just wants to hear a plausible theory not something that can be tested at the moment. Such is his faith in the field.
Stephen Weinberg published a book called The First Three Minutes regarding the origin of the universe in 1977. Yeah, this is the right guy. Oh, I read it in that year, when I was 27.
yes but stanley miller's experiment had the wrong atmosphere. If it were accurate, we find that it actually creates a mixture of cyanide and formaldehyde, which is embalming fluid. And He used a constant stream of electricity which is highly unlikely that that much lightning was going on at that point in time.
I'm not meaning this in a condescending tone, but my question to you is why do you argue that just because it's in a book, it's not credible? Didn't you learn from books? Are the textbooks ever wrong that you learn from?
I'm making the distinction between tested and testable here. What I mean is that in the future we may find a way to test them, which means they are testable.
Couch "Where did your mass come from?" This is such a pedestrian argument, I suppose I can start with an insulting comment but I won't. To argue this point either way, two conditions must be proven. 1: An Enity Exists now 2: An entity has always existed. Argument for God 1: An Enity Exists now : ? 2: An entity has always existed ? Argument for Matter as we know today. 1: An Enity Exists now 'YES" 2: An entity has always existed ? Now, which is more likely of the two
wow you can totally see Richard Dawkins' insecurity when Steven Weinberg mentions the age of the earth within 1% of accuracy. He's totally looking for confirmation that he's doing the right thing by being an atheist. I find it funny that the word theory is used a whole lot in this interview so far.
@anon69 F=ma is not derived, it's an experimental relationship. You can build mathematical laws where F=ma^2. The laws would be mathematically consistant, but they wouldn't be correct.
Best Part: 7:24 "they can't be tested... Dawkins: "Even if you haven't Got an Observational handle, if you have a theory that's even even plausible, I'd be Grateful for that" Dawkins is awfully grateful to hear of something not observable or testable...
"Right and wrong" is whatever makes you and other people happy (up to interfering in the happiness of others). I find that very liberating personally. But also, whether you regard it as "cruel" or not, that has no bearing on the truth or falsity of it. Science doesn't "prove" God nonexistent, it just shows that there is no evidence to support a belief in God. You are erroneously equating not having absolute proof as simply asking you to "believe" in it the same way one has "faith" in a religion.
@1986bahai Why, might I ask, is faith good? Why is accepting something without good reason or evidence good? Why should "feeling and or understanding things through feeling and love" be considered a virtue? Why should anyone say that having a feeling about something should justify an idea that has no merit otherwise, and how can you distinguish it from any other god? Would you be okay if I told you I felt that the invisible pink unicorn is real? To answer your question, (Con't)
You don't understand the relation between ethics and religion. No one is claiming that human decency is and ethics were impossible before religion existed, that somehow religion is a system of rules that must be prescribed and then followed in order to produce human decency. No. When we look for an objective grounding for morality in our theorectical explanations, one which transcends our individuality, we need some transcendental basis which we call God. It doesn't mean that you need to know...
Listen again. Weinberg introduces the ideas by saying "they can't be tested." Its important to remember as well that in astronomy, things are proven by observation of phenomena because laboratory tests are infeasible. The terms "tested" and observed are largely interchangeable. (ie Einstein's relativity was proven during a solar eclipse)
The same was once said about many other things. I don't think anything is impossible, even if it is improbable. You are correct to be skeptical but I would say faith in science is based on past success. Dawkins "faith," if you can call it that, isn't blind.
No, perhaps the real tragedy, is the ignorance of making huge sweeping generalisations. Life is not only tragic. Its also blissful and strikingly beautiful. Buddha was full of it.
I dont agree. I don't how difficult those calculus courses are, but i wouldn't say physics is harder. What exact field do you find harder? Newtonian physics certainly isn't harder than advanced calculus.
You're right. Hooray for science! I guess I'll be an atheist now. Even though I've experienced God on my own without any help from a church or Bible to "steer" me in the right direction. Honestly, it makes me laugh pitifully inside, knowing that you are actually looking for something to deplete your purpose in life and for some strange reason are so passionate about it. I've met God and there is absolutely nothing that you or good ol' "science" could say to take it away from me.
i dont even have a high school diploma but i think what scientists are missing and ignoring is the power of feeling and or understanding things through feeling and love. that also can be another wat of finding him besides science. they just say, why? what else could be the reason we have feelings? to have sex,get burned or feel cold or hot?
Unless you have a rebuttal, then your claim has no basis in reality. Buddha believed in the afterlife and all kinds of supernatural ideas that buddhists are taught to believe. Its just another religion that values emotional comfort over reason afterall. Buddha, however, was right to postulate the non-existence of a seperate self- but he never quite understood what that meant.
my point is everybody is looking to someone else to tell them where the mass came from. Where did your mass come from? Why is it that Darwin's book is called origin of species and not origin of life? How did life come about?
@1986bahai ...we have feelings because they are necessary for our survival, especially as a social species. Why do other social primates have emotions very similar to ours, yet show no signs of worshiping a god?
May I ask you one of Dawkins' classic questions: Is your religion the same as your parents' or most people in your community? Almost certainly 'YES'.Have you then wondered why a person's religion should depend on nothing but an accident of birth, and how crazy it would be if scientific knowledge worked in the same way? You may then see that so many 'religions'- past and present - implies they are ALL man-made myths,unworthy of any intelligent person's belief.
@jrwilson98 Absolutely. I've always thought the greek and roman gods were far more plausible than the abrahamic God because of this. At least the greeks realised the gods were capricious and mean, that hypothesis at least matches reality.
A creator does give us meaning. What's the point of all of this if you're just gonna end up in the dust? If an engineer handed you a human eye you would hand it back because you have already been given two. Who said anything about a creator making your body perfect? It works, doesn't it? You know there are a million neurons in your eye that are connected when you are in the womb? Your eye wouldn't even work if one of those neurons didn't connect.
About science proving God non-existent, I'll quote Weinberg from 2006: "I don't argue science can disprove the existence of God, and I also wouldn't argue that science can disprove the existence of fairies at the bottom of the garden."
Matter hasn't always existed because in order for anything to be eternal, it has to have no beginning and no end. There IS an end for matter, I'm sure you know that it is inevitable. Our universe is still expanding and will not be able to contract. Which means it will eventually burn out. Because of this we can say that matter is not eternal. If it has an end, it had a beginning. Where did it come from?
It's actually somewhat simple. God says He spoke creation into existence and by His words all things are held together. Science has now discovered that new cells building DNA know how to line up based upon minute vibrations. You might be able to say how God did something, but just because it can be explained by science doesn't disprove His existence. Have you seen the ruins at Jericho? Did you know they found the original wall and it actually DID fall outwards? How do you explain this?
"we have to live with the tragedy that we will die"- Weinberg Can you tell me why dieing is a "tragedy"? I am not asking you if there are "tragedys", My question is what makes a tragedy a "tragedy," if you don't believe in God.
@bersa888 You seem like a thinking person who actually evaluted my comments, and it is good that you are thinking about these matters of supreme importance. I would only like to clarify that I don't believe Jesus taught us that "what makes life bearable is in us."
deep discussion? all he said was that Shakespeare showed that comedy and humor go great with tragedy...and did you just say Douglas Adams is on par with mindless comdedy? Have you even read anything by him?
Oh dear, Steven Weinberg completely lost me in this one. Not sure I'll ever be able to comprehend that. Not in this puny brain, I don't think. Still, it's a fascinating discussion.
We're just beginning to understand evolution? In what sense? We know pretty much how it works, and that everything living evolved. Even things that are not alive are seen to have "evolved" through natural selection, which Dawkins talks about in "The Blind Watchmaker". You can quote the bible all you like, but there is nothing you can say to show that the bible is not made up by men.
That's exactly the point - if there's evidence, science will explore it. There is no evidence, and the evidence that we have for counter-theories so strongly points to a lack of a "designer" that God is not a scientifically considered possibility. Religious nuts, however, insist on a God despite the huge amounts of evidence to the contrary.
You still didn't answer my question. Where did the mass come from? How do you get something from nothing? How am I supposed to find anything you say credible if you can't even answer a simple question like that? How do you get something from nothing? How am I supposed to believe you? Where did all of this come from? In order for atheism to be correct, you NEED an answer to this question and only this question. Where did the mass come from?
Actually, it doesn't show that at all. Your assumption that it is simple is based on your belief, which is bad science. Let me ask you this.....where did this rapidly expanding mass that was the size of a marble come from? How did we get something from nothing? (don't use the vacuum fluctuations theory, that is something from something. I wanna know how we got something from nothing.)
i find it much more beautiful that the universe , life and everything we see appeared out of probability and chance .... rather than the arrogant idea that some god made only 1 planet in the entire universe and send his son there to die for people's sins ... christianity is a direct proof at how arrogant humans can be ...we made a religion that makes us special than other beings ...thats how sick we are .... the real beauty is that life is nothing more than a complex chemical reaction
Actually we "nutcases" place Him just about anywhere, not just in mystery. We find Him most in the simple things of life AND in the complexities of it. I can hear a scientist talk about the marvel of a hummingbird and think it's pretty cool how God did that. I can look at my niece and realize that the only reason she is here is because God has been taking care of her from the minute she was conceived. Don't you think it's strange that only top minds can "understand" mindlessness?
Why do you think a creator gives us meaning? We create our meaning, and I already said that science doesn't have all of the answers but it's trying to find them. If an engineer handed me a human eye I'd give it back to him. The eye isn't even close toa human designer's standards let alone a divine beings.
Disregard the last remark. I was being sarcastic. So we are seeing 13 something billion year old radiation and we know how old the universe is so we can say this radiation came to exist when the universe was 380,000 years old. Or something like that. Interesting.
No. My stance is that there is absolutely NO way science could prove that nothing turned into something. Even to try to prove it you would have to DESIGN a test to try to prove it. I could say so much more right now but I have to go to work to pay the man. I will say this though. If science doesn't have an explanation for me for the question of origin by the time I die, it is not truth. What comes after science has all the answers? Evolution is a philosophy and atheism is a religion.
Numbers don't have units, but I'll give you a further layer of mystery anyway: the answer to life, the universe, and everything in it is 6 times 9. Hehe : )
...that God exists for you to know what is moral. But if the universe is just a storm of atoms mish-mashing about, combining to form things, then morality is just what we've been programmed to think over time through evolution. But then how can you judge a psychopath to be immoral if it is the case that a psychopath lacks what you might call your moral function? Why should your morality be "right" over his morality? Isn't that arrogant and presumptuous?You and Hitchens misunderstand thequestion.
I mean that honestly. I am a truth seeker, but my foundation has been laid. There are some things in this world that are just too far fetched to listen to, like being related to a pool of amino acids for example. Did it ever occur to you that Darwin's book is called Origin of Species and not just Origin or Origin of Life? You, nor "science", will EVER be able to prove where this all came from. The singularity came from somewhere. If not, prove it.
God is not a God of explanation. That is why God created a mind of process and thought that can lead to discovery. Which is why we have science, God gave us science to discover and explain the mysteries and wonders of being, time and the earth. Evolution is most definitely a discovery. God is a creator, but not an explanation to the creation. If that is what you are seeking you will not find the answer. God is love, seek him in this way.
u must of misunderstood me .. all im saying is life itself appeared out of chance as in it doesnt have a purpose or wasnt planned by some god ... it just appeared cus the chemical conditions for it to appear where there .... thats what "life" is ...its just a more complex form of chemical systems .... and i think this is a much better story , that the universe produced beauties like the galaxy , the complexity of the atom , life, flowers ...etc then the selfish idea of a creator.
that's weird, I got different answers for the Argument for God question.....both my answers were yes, and that leads me to the conclusion that it is more likely that God created matter.....hmmm. What exactly is it that you want from God that you would consider as proof of His existence? Are you wanting Him to come down here and eat with us and talk with us and go fishing with us? (You know He already did that, right?) The answer to this riddle is that you don't want it to be true.
@Alphonzen Everyone knows the world is very beautiful; educated people also know that it is also more tragic and unfair than blissful and equal. For instance, lions are beautiful but survive by murdering other mammals. There are 6.8 billion ppl. in the world. Around 500 children die every hour of starvation alone. Yes, flowers are pretty and so are frozen waterfalls.
"I'm an atheist with respect to the Judeo-Christian God, because there is not a shred of EVIDENCE in favor of the Judeo-Christian God." ~ Richard Dawkins ...Dawkins, that's because you have not visited my channel.
ok, but the fact that the walls have been found to have fallen outwards means that it is more likely that the story in the Bible is true. Had they fallen inwardly, you could say that the city was seized upon. This is my real point. Evolution and science cannot prove or disprove the existence of God. I happen to find Him in science because I know Him and you happen to not find Him because you can explain a few things. Being able to explain something does not take away His existence or cause.
I suspect that the big bang that created our universe is just a mere fart compared to what is really going on outside our universe. We have no concept of true size. I wish I could live forever just to be able to get closer to the explanation!!!!
I think I found a hero for the first time in my life! It is strange that I have never heard about Weinberg, but I want to read everything he has written. I will even start studying physics now!
Remember we are indoctrinated more than we are educated. Society needs workers more than sophisticated individuals sitting beside the fireplace musing.
You are exactly wrong.
We *only* have a society because there are people sitting beside the fireplace to muse.
1:59 - Most appropriate accidental occurrence of thunder ever.
I watch this discussion alot. You always discover something different from it, each time. It's fascinating, moving, uplifting and very inspiring.
I tried to read his book on quantum field theory and found it very very hard to understand. It seemed to me (being trained as a pure mathematician) to start halfway in the middle.
Can't deny his brilliance though.
Wonderful conversation.
I'm sorry, my mistake - it was Scalar WAVES I had once looked up. The first google hit is wiki's page, "Scalar field theory (pseudoscience." But there is ALSO another wiki page on "Scalar field theory" which I had overlooked.
The second paragraph begins, "Scalar waves in these theories (as opposed to a scalar field in mainstream physics) are hypothetical waves, which differ from the conventional electromagnetic..." etc, etc
The neutrality and factual accuracy of the page is in dispute.
Wow, as someone who is knee-deep in a study of Physics I have to admit I am flattered by your comment and at the same time my study has led me to a much greater appreciation for those that will study and develop pure mathematics. I've come to believe there really is no difference between the two subjects...just different facets. Once again, thanks for the comment. It makes me feel better about the collaboration that is essential to both of our further development ; )
sweet, thanks for answering my legitimate question.
As a physicist and atheist I find this discussion one of the most interesting and clear talks I have ever heard. The situation of humans is tragic in many ways, in most ways in fact, but as one of my professors once said "the only joy you will find is in searching not in getting the answer, because you will never get it". That is what saddens me most :(
what I see here is great respect for Weinberg from Richard. Indeed science pioneers here discussing the very fundamentals of nature and thus our existence.
Interesting what he says about Scalar fields, considering that wikipedia refers to them as pseudo science, lol.
But also interesting is his take (early in this clip) about how unsatisfactory it is to just say something like, "things are as they should be" or whatever, suggesting that religious belief would somehow mean that no one would want to understand the world. John Polkinghorne, on the other hand, believes that belief in God was actually a major motivator of scientific discovery. Hmmm...
Exactly!
Loving the thunder
It depends what the mass is composed of and how it is arranged, and of course if it is large enough for us to see.
we have GENIUS here...
Weinberg seems to the genius, professor Dawkins too? Dawkins is probably a genius humanitarian.
Fascinating discussion. I imagine myself sitting in the room sipping on a whiskey cocktail, smoking a cigar, and particpating in a talk with mental giants.
When Steve says the fluctuations become smooth at times, he refers to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle which would dictate that the fluctuations would, at a certain probability, lay out flat or smooth and thereby experience a moment of zero energy. The negative gravitational energy of the geometry of the "area" and the positive energy of the inflation equal zero. That's a probable event of the fluctuations and recipe of our big bang cosmos which must be relatively flat so it may continue to inflate, and must have a total zero energy. As the cosmos continues to inflate and positive inflation energy increases, the negative gravitational energy decreases. The negative gravitational energy flows into the positive inflation energy. The rest is history. As the cosmos inflates, increased space produces less gravitation being exerted in the space. Peace and love.
wonderful
I don't think that the intent of your original post was semantic, but my original point stands, that Dawkins just wants to hear a plausible theory not something that can be tested at the moment. Such is his faith in the field.
Stephen Weinberg published a book called The First Three Minutes regarding the origin of the universe in 1977. Yeah, this is the right guy. Oh, I read it in that year, when I was 27.
yes but stanley miller's experiment had the wrong atmosphere. If it were accurate, we find that it actually creates a mixture of cyanide and formaldehyde, which is embalming fluid. And He used a constant stream of electricity which is highly unlikely that that much lightning was going on at that point in time.
I'm not meaning this in a condescending tone, but my question to you is why do you argue that just because it's in a book, it's not credible? Didn't you learn from books? Are the textbooks ever wrong that you learn from?
I'm making the distinction between tested and testable here. What I mean is that in the future we may find a way to test them, which means they are testable.
Couch "Where did your mass come from?"
This is such a pedestrian argument, I suppose I can start with an insulting comment but I won't.
To argue this point either way, two conditions must be proven.
1: An Enity Exists now
2: An entity has always existed.
Argument for God
1: An Enity Exists now : ?
2: An entity has always existed ?
Argument for Matter as we know today.
1: An Enity Exists now 'YES"
2: An entity has always existed ?
Now, which is more likely of the two
As brilliant as Weinberg is, I'm more impressed with his humbleness at 0:35.
@MrAmericanzombie He just meant that the 42 joke was not the pinnacle of Adams' comedy.
i found it moving when he spoke of humans being in a tradegic position
wow you can totally see Richard Dawkins' insecurity when Steven Weinberg mentions the age of the earth within 1% of accuracy. He's totally looking for confirmation that he's doing the right thing by being an atheist. I find it funny that the word theory is used a whole lot in this interview so far.
Two great scientists and science communicators.
@anon69 F=ma is not derived, it's an experimental relationship. You can build mathematical laws where F=ma^2. The laws would be mathematically consistant, but they wouldn't be correct.
I feel I have to say something witty here, but I don't think it's worth the effort, so I'm just gonna say, GODDISSATWAT!
Best Part: 7:24
"they can't be tested...
Dawkins: "Even if you haven't Got an Observational handle, if you have a theory that's even even plausible, I'd be Grateful for that" Dawkins is awfully grateful to hear of something not observable or testable...
that will only happen when we learn everthing about everything in every univeras
42. it's actually the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything. but what is the question?
"why why why and never coming to the end" true :(
"Right and wrong" is whatever makes you and other people happy (up to interfering in the happiness of others). I find that very liberating personally. But also, whether you regard it as "cruel" or not, that has no bearing on the truth or falsity of it. Science doesn't "prove" God nonexistent, it just shows that there is no evidence to support a belief in God. You are erroneously equating not having absolute proof as simply asking you to "believe" in it the same way one has "faith" in a religion.
@1986bahai Why, might I ask, is faith good? Why is accepting something without good reason or evidence good? Why should "feeling and or understanding things through feeling and love" be considered a virtue? Why should anyone say that having a feeling about something should justify an idea that has no merit otherwise, and how can you distinguish it from any other god? Would you be okay if I told you I felt that the invisible pink unicorn is real? To answer your question, (Con't)
Should have told Weinberg the 'Puddle Argument"!
You don't understand the relation between ethics and religion. No one is claiming that human decency is and ethics were impossible before religion existed, that somehow religion is a system of rules that must be prescribed and then followed in order to produce human decency. No. When we look for an objective grounding for morality in our theorectical explanations, one which transcends our individuality, we need some transcendental basis which we call God. It doesn't mean that you need to know...
Why are you capitalizing design? Humans do design things, but that doesn't mean we were designed. If we were, we were poorly designed.
Listen again. Weinberg introduces the ideas by saying "they can't be tested." Its important to remember as well that in astronomy, things are proven by observation of phenomena because laboratory tests are infeasible. The terms "tested" and observed are largely interchangeable. (ie Einstein's relativity was proven during a solar eclipse)
@huntmatuk Precisely what I thought (being trained as a pure mathematician as well).
The same was once said about many other things. I don't think anything is impossible, even if it is improbable. You are correct to be skeptical but I would say faith in science is based on past success. Dawkins "faith," if you can call it that, isn't blind.
No, perhaps the real tragedy, is the ignorance of making huge sweeping generalisations.
Life is not only tragic. Its also blissful and strikingly beautiful.
Buddha was full of it.
Agreed!
I dont agree. I don't how difficult those calculus courses are, but i wouldn't say physics is harder. What exact field do you find harder? Newtonian physics certainly isn't harder than advanced calculus.
You're right. Hooray for science! I guess I'll be an atheist now. Even though I've experienced God on my own without any help from a church or Bible to "steer" me in the right direction. Honestly, it makes me laugh pitifully inside, knowing that you are actually looking for something to deplete your purpose in life and for some strange reason are so passionate about it. I've met God and there is absolutely nothing that you or good ol' "science" could say to take it away from me.
He didn't say anything about it not being testable.
Can't believe he hasn't read the "Hitchhiker"
What does mass look like?
i dont even have a high school diploma but i think what scientists are missing and ignoring is the power of feeling and or understanding things through feeling and love. that also can be another wat of finding him besides science. they just say, why? what else could be the reason we have feelings? to have sex,get burned or feel cold or hot?
"burping off these big bangs"
funny :)
Unless you have a rebuttal, then your claim has no basis in reality.
Buddha believed in the afterlife and all kinds of supernatural ideas that buddhists are taught to believe. Its just another religion that values emotional comfort over reason afterall.
Buddha, however, was right to postulate the non-existence of a seperate self- but he never quite understood what that meant.
my point is everybody is looking to someone else to tell them where the mass came from. Where did your mass come from? Why is it that Darwin's book is called origin of species and not origin of life? How did life come about?
Well in science the word theory means only one thing. I know people use the word differently in every day speech though.
@1986bahai ...we have feelings because they are necessary for our survival, especially as a social species. Why do other social primates have emotions very similar to ours, yet show no signs of worshiping a god?
Imagine, at the moment we die, the universe from our perspective instantaneously passes us by... Scary thought...
May I ask you one of Dawkins' classic questions: Is your religion the same as your parents' or most people in your community? Almost certainly 'YES'.Have you then wondered why a person's religion should depend on nothing but an accident of birth, and how crazy it would be if scientific knowledge worked in the same way? You may then see that so many 'religions'- past and present - implies they are ALL man-made myths,unworthy of any intelligent person's belief.
cool stuff. :)
@jrwilson98
Absolutely. I've always thought the greek and roman gods were far more plausible than the abrahamic God because of this. At least the greeks realised the gods were capricious and mean, that hypothesis at least matches reality.
A creator does give us meaning. What's the point of all of this if you're just gonna end up in the dust? If an engineer handed you a human eye you would hand it back because you have already been given two. Who said anything about a creator making your body perfect? It works, doesn't it? You know there are a million neurons in your eye that are connected when you are in the womb? Your eye wouldn't even work if one of those neurons didn't connect.
About science proving God non-existent, I'll quote Weinberg from 2006: "I don't argue science can disprove the existence of God, and I also wouldn't argue that science can disprove the existence of fairies at the bottom of the garden."
@rgrannell1 that is interesting. they're really two different problems.
And how is it that you know this?
So the universe is not 6000 years old?
Matter hasn't always existed because in order for anything to be eternal, it has to have no beginning and no end. There IS an end for matter, I'm sure you know that it is inevitable. Our universe is still expanding and will not be able to contract. Which means it will eventually burn out. Because of this we can say that matter is not eternal. If it has an end, it had a beginning. Where did it come from?
It's actually somewhat simple. God says He spoke creation into existence and by His words all things are held together. Science has now discovered that new cells building DNA know how to line up based upon minute vibrations. You might be able to say how God did something, but just because it can be explained by science doesn't disprove His existence. Have you seen the ruins at Jericho? Did you know they found the original wall and it actually DID fall outwards? How do you explain this?
R. I. P great man
Its not me you have to answer to.
"we have to live with the tragedy that we will die"- Weinberg
Can you tell me why dieing is a "tragedy"?
I am not asking you if there are "tragedys",
My question is what makes a tragedy a "tragedy," if you don't believe in God.
@bersa888 You seem like a thinking person who actually evaluted my comments, and it is good that you are thinking about these matters of supreme importance. I would only like to clarify that I don't believe Jesus taught us that "what makes life bearable is in us."
deep discussion? all he said was that Shakespeare showed that comedy and humor go great with tragedy...and did you just say Douglas Adams is on par with mindless comdedy? Have you even read anything by him?
Oh dear, Steven Weinberg completely lost me in this one. Not sure I'll ever be able to comprehend that. Not in this puny brain, I don't think. Still, it's a fascinating discussion.
"How many roads must a man walk down / Before you call him a man?"
We're just beginning to understand evolution? In what sense? We know pretty much how it works, and that everything living evolved. Even things that are not alive are seen to have "evolved" through natural selection, which Dawkins talks about in "The Blind Watchmaker". You can quote the bible all you like, but there is nothing you can say to show that the bible is not made up by men.
That's exactly the point - if there's evidence, science will explore it.
There is no evidence, and the evidence that we have for counter-theories so strongly points to a lack of a "designer" that God is not a scientifically considered possibility.
Religious nuts, however, insist on a God despite the huge amounts of evidence to the contrary.
You still didn't answer my question. Where did the mass come from? How do you get something from nothing?
How am I supposed to find anything you say credible if you can't even answer a simple question like that? How do you get something from nothing? How am I supposed to believe you? Where did all of this come from? In order for atheism to be correct, you NEED an answer to this question and only this question. Where did the mass come from?
your point beeing?
Actually, it doesn't show that at all. Your assumption that it is simple is based on your belief, which is bad science. Let me ask you this.....where did this rapidly expanding mass that was the size of a marble come from? How did we get something from nothing? (don't use the vacuum fluctuations theory, that is something from something. I wanna know how we got something from nothing.)
i find it much more beautiful that the universe , life and everything we see appeared out of probability and chance ....
rather than the arrogant idea that some god made only 1 planet in the entire universe and send his son there to die for people's sins ...
christianity is a direct proof at how arrogant humans can be ...we made a religion that makes us special than other beings ...thats how sick we are ....
the real beauty is that life is nothing more than a complex chemical reaction
Actually we "nutcases" place Him just about anywhere, not just in mystery. We find Him most in the simple things of life AND in the complexities of it. I can hear a scientist talk about the marvel of a hummingbird and think it's pretty cool how God did that. I can look at my niece and realize that the only reason she is here is because God has been taking care of her from the minute she was conceived. Don't you think it's strange that only top minds can "understand" mindlessness?
Why do you think a creator gives us meaning? We create our meaning, and I already said that science doesn't have all of the answers but it's trying to find them. If an engineer handed me a human eye I'd give it back to him. The eye isn't even close toa human designer's standards let alone a divine beings.
Disregard the last remark. I was being sarcastic.
So we are seeing 13 something billion year old radiation and we know how old the universe is so we can say this radiation came to exist when the universe was 380,000 years old. Or something like that. Interesting.
@HenrySpiritedJigsaw But then we must ask do worms have consciousness or can a computer have consciousness?
No. My stance is that there is absolutely NO way science could prove that nothing turned into something. Even to try to prove it you would have to DESIGN a test to try to prove it. I could say so much more right now but I have to go to work to pay the man. I will say this though. If science doesn't have an explanation for me for the question of origin by the time I die, it is not truth. What comes after science has all the answers? Evolution is a philosophy and atheism is a religion.
i don't think you really listened to what to what they say...
Numbers don't have units, but I'll give you a further layer of mystery anyway: the answer to life, the universe, and everything in it is 6 times 9. Hehe : )
...that God exists for you to know what is moral. But if the universe is just a storm of atoms mish-mashing about, combining to form things, then morality is just what we've been programmed to think over time through evolution. But then how can you judge a psychopath to be immoral if it is the case that a psychopath lacks what you might call your moral function? Why should your morality be "right" over his morality? Isn't that arrogant and presumptuous?You and Hitchens misunderstand thequestion.
I mean that honestly. I am a truth seeker, but my foundation has been laid. There are some things in this world that are just too far fetched to listen to, like being related to a pool of amino acids for example. Did it ever occur to you that Darwin's book is called Origin of Species and not just Origin or Origin of Life? You, nor "science", will EVER be able to prove where this all came from. The singularity came from somewhere. If not, prove it.
You're wrong there is 1 god. It's invisible, pink, and it has a horn.
God is not a God of explanation.
That is why God created a mind of process and thought that can lead to discovery.
Which is why we have science, God gave us science to discover and explain the mysteries and wonders of being, time and the earth.
Evolution is most definitely a discovery.
God is a creator, but not an explanation to the creation.
If that is what you are seeking you will not find the answer.
God is love, seek him in this way.
@huntmatuk
Another mathematician agrees with you.
u must of misunderstood me ..
all im saying is life itself appeared out of chance as in it doesnt have a purpose or wasnt planned by some god ...
it just appeared cus the chemical conditions for it to appear where there ....
thats what "life" is ...its just a more complex form of chemical systems ....
and i think this is a much better story , that the universe produced beauties like the galaxy , the complexity of the atom , life, flowers ...etc
then the selfish idea of a creator.
that's weird, I got different answers for the Argument for God question.....both my answers were yes, and that leads me to the conclusion that it is more likely that God created matter.....hmmm.
What exactly is it that you want from God that you would consider as proof of His existence? Are you wanting Him to come down here and eat with us and talk with us and go fishing with us? (You know He already did that, right?) The answer to this riddle is that you don't want it to be true.
@Alphonzen Everyone knows the world is very beautiful; educated people also know that it is also more tragic and unfair than blissful and equal.
For instance, lions are beautiful but survive by murdering other mammals.
There are 6.8 billion ppl. in the world. Around 500 children die every hour of starvation alone. Yes, flowers are pretty and so are frozen waterfalls.
"I'm an atheist with respect to the Judeo-Christian God, because there is not a shred of EVIDENCE in favor of the Judeo-Christian God."
~ Richard Dawkins
...Dawkins, that's because you have not visited my channel.
43 is the meaning of life.
Sorry Weinberg. It's 42.
Ya i guess your physics classes are randomly structured too....
ok, but the fact that the walls have been found to have fallen outwards means that it is more likely that the story in the Bible is true. Had they fallen inwardly, you could say that the city was seized upon.
This is my real point. Evolution and science cannot prove or disprove the existence of God. I happen to find Him in science because I know Him and you happen to not find Him because you can explain a few things. Being able to explain something does not take away His existence or cause.
I suspect that the big bang that created our universe is just a mere fart compared to what is really going on outside our universe.
We have no concept of true size. I wish I could live forever just to be able to get closer to the explanation!!!!