Enslaved By Science

[Freedom]

You keep jumping around and changing topics. I am unable to keep up. Sorry.

I have not changed the topic at all. You are the one who made the claim against the scientific community and against science in general, I am just asking you to follow up on your own topic. What evidence do you have of a conspiracy and what methodology to you propose to learn if not by the scientific method.

[happy]

I have not changed the topic at all. You are the one who made the claim against the scientific community and against science in general, I am just asking you to follow up on your own topic. What evidence do you have of a conspiracy and what methodology to you propose to learn if not by the scientific method.

A conspiracy? I say so many things apparently.

[Verum]

Also:

This is an assumption. You are demanding that our scientific knowledge allows us to observe things directly created by God rather than simply a product of the natural system. That's very likely false.

Again, like "thesometimesaint" avoids at all costs, any belief in God eventually abandons natural law. The mere idea that a being can do anything claimed by the Bible or Book of Mormon will never be testable. That is where faith comes in. A single entity parted the Red Sea. This same entity ascended from Heaven without aid of jet packs and wings.

If I came to you today and said some guy just floated down from the sky and changed the weather, you'd call me nuts. You'd say "that's impossible".

Ask the Mythbusters. They already proved humans could not walk unaided on water. These concepts defy science. So to believe in them already admits that science has huge limitations it will never likely resolve.

You very much misunderstand the scientific method.

Let's take an example. God tells you that your town is going to flood tomorrow. Fast forward to tomorrow when you then personally observe the town flooding. Assuming you survived, you now make claim to two phenomena: A. your town flooded, and B. God foretold the event to you personally. I do not live in your town, so I must use some method to validate your claim.

Is your claim testable? A. most certainly is, so I use the scientific method to test your claims. I can look for evidences or traces of a flood, test samples of material, soil, look for observable water damage, interview witnesses, etc. Basically I collect all data possible that is testable, measurable, observable, etc. Let's say I find absolutely nothing that substantiates your claim other than your eyewitness account. What can I then conclude, using the scientific method? That no physical evidence of a flood occurring in your town is present as witnessed by you. Does that mean that the flood did not occur? Not necessarily. Does that mean you didn't witness a flood? No. Did God cause the flood and decided to be a boy scout and leave without a trace? It's possible. If God can use his power to spontaneously create a flood, he can just as easy take away its evidence. Did God just give you the apparition of a flood in place of an actual flood for some reason? Maybe. You could infer your own conclusions, but that is not what the scientific method is doing. If you conclude that there was a flood, then you personally are drawing inference based on your own observable data in spite of the physical data. The scientific method; however, let's reality and the evidence speak for itself, supporting a theory when a theory's predictions are confirmed and challenging a theory when its predictions prove false. The problem is in the inference, not necessarily the scientific method itself. To what degree of accuracy can your inference be correct? How reliable is your eyewitness account to you? This can be debatable, but even your own eyewitness account can be tested by you, and in my opinion, most people's egos (and religious ideology) allows individuals to perhaps put a high degree of accuracy on conclusions inferred from personal witness.

In this example, you had an experience where there appeared to be a flood (whether it happened or not, you had an experience where it appeared to be real). Should you infer from that you had more from that experience in spite of the physical evidence as wells as evidence showing that personal witness accounts are very often flawed? You certainly can, but would it be damning to someone to not make that kind of inference? Is making that kind of inference a virtue? In the absence of any physical or observable evidence where all you have is your own personal experience to draw on, I can see the argument where that can perhaps be a virtue, but it may not be if later counter-evidence is presented and you resist re-evaluating your conclusions.

I think Alma 32 says something very similar. Alma says that once you feel the swelling of a seed planted in your heart, you can infer the following: verse 34: "And now, behold, is your knowledge perfect? Yea, your knowledge is perfect in that thing, and your faith is dormant, and this because you know[...] that the word hath swelled your souls [...] sprouted up [...] begin to be enlightened" etc. In other words, I feel the seed grow, what knowledge can I infer from this? Alms says our knowledge is perfect, in what? "that thing" What thing? --the "swelling", "sprouting", "enlightening". That is the only thing you have perfect knowledge of, you don't have perfect knowledge of the truth itself, just on your personal experience. Why would be damning for someone not infer anything more than the experience?

There you have it...scientific method + Alma 32 = philosophies of men mingled with scripture.

Edited August 21, 2012 by Verum

[Verum]

duplicate

Edited August 21, 2012 by Verum

[mfbukowski]

I always look for opportunities but I am not smart enough!

That's a good one!

[The Nehor]

I had a girl blind me with science but she never tried to enslave me. I might have taken her up on it. She was cute.

[ERayR]

"And sometimes replacing them with new and improved false conclusions."

Yes, of course, science is a rigorous vehicle in which false claims are debunked by the discovery of new data, improved data collection models, new discoveries, etc. In that manner, science is continually self-correcting in an attempt to properly describe the world around us.

For me, this is preferable to the religious vehicle, which when faced with claims of irrationality, suspension of logic or flat out impossibilities (such as the Noah's Ark story), clings to the standard that these things are completely logical, rational and "real" because it says so in the Bible, or they have prayed about it and received a "confirmation", etc.

You understand that no matter the data you are putting your faith in the one interpreting the data. This interpretation may be accurate or inaccurate. The acceptance of which is an acceptance by faith, very much a religious concept(experience). The Noah's ark story can very well be true whether or not a global flood is or not. As for a global flood there is evidence that can be and is interpreted against the probability of a global flood. There is on the other side men of science that find evidence that supports the concept of a global flood. Which evidence and interpretation one chooses to believe is determined by where he/she place their faith. You can choose either one just don't claim to have irrefutable evidence for either side, Just state that for you the evidence is more compelling for ....

Edited August 22, 2012 by ERayR

[ERayR]

But that's what humans do- try to organize matter unorganized!

And what results is what we call "rationality" because it is all neat and tidy! It is more like "rationalizing" than anything

It is definitely rational until somebody comes along and pokes it full of holes.

[ANACO]

"And sometimes replacing them with new and improved false conclusions."

Yes, of course, science is a rigorous vehicle in which false claims are debunked by the discovery of new data, improved data collection models, new discoveries, etc. In that manner, science is continually self-correcting in an attempt to properly describe the world around us.

For me, this is preferable to the religious vehicle, which when faced with claims of irrationality, suspension of logic or flat out impossibilities (such as the Noah's Ark story), clings to the standard that these things are completely logical, rational and "real" because it says so in the Bible, or they have prayed about it and received a "confirmation", etc.

You would have to admit that science has confirmed religious beliefs.

For example, the Word of Wisdom pertaining to health, the discovery of extrasolar planets, continental drift.

[Calm]

CFR that continental drift was a religious belief prior to it being a scientific idea. This is a serious question---not a challenge---as I am interested in the timing of the origin of the religious claim.

Edited August 22, 2012 by calmoriah

[ERayR]

And we have seen all the results of "progress" from progressives, haven't we?

Is that progress I see going down the progressive rabbit hole in the middle of the garden.

[ERayR]

How come nobody wants to talk to me anymore?

Because it doesn't take you long to get over my head on some topics.

[ANACO]

CFR that continental drift was a religious belief prior to it being a scientific idea. This is a serious question---not a challenge---as I am interested in the timing of the origin of the religious claim.

Peleg. The idea of the land being divided. Science thought of the continents of being static.

Don't go off that this was some societal event. I've read discussions about it.

Edited August 22, 2012 by ANACO

[Jeff Walsh]

I think Freedom nailed it with this one, "What science rids us of is false conclusions that are, by and large, passed down to us from the dark ages. Just because something has been in our beliefs for centuries does not mean that it is true."

Science is consistently ridding us of the false conclusions that have been passed down to us from the dark ages, and is now commonly referred to as "religion." Science has ridded us of the false conclusion that the earth is 6000 years old. Science has ridded us of the false conclusion that the earth is the center of the universe (as taught by dark/middle age Catholicism). Science is ridding us of the fanciful "creation" myth, handed down for centuries as part of a belief system, in place of an evolutionary model in which the evidence for facts, such as the case with natural selection, is overwhelminingly proven by actual, empirical data.

Going back to the original question, I am not sure why believers feel the need to explain "miracles" through scientific means, but I would suggest it has something to do with the fact that science is quickly debunking the "false conclusions that are, by and large, passed down to us from the dark ages," and that there is a need by the religious to attempt to fight fire with fire.

Waldren are you saying then that science has all the answers and the Bible is just a Myth, are you also taking God out of creation and saying that this is a scientifically proven fact.?

You do say that Creation by God is a fanciful myth based on a belief system, if you are then let me ask you a few questions, and see if in fact science has been factually proved and those of us who accept creation by God have to accept this by faith.

Does science say that the earth came into being by a "big bang" by chance, did life begin on this earth by the chance coming together of the myriad of sub microscopic particles of dead matter and become that first cell, several billion years ago, how did these dead bits of substance suddenly aquire some sort of life force

If then as you say evolution through natural selection purely by chance took place without any outside help over myriads of time, came through all the so called links and finish up with mankind as we know today. Are all these proven facts, where is your evidence do you have a science "bible" which is verifiable?

Where are all the millions of missing links? Can you tell me how an eye can evolve, can you tell me how a whale evolved ? can you tell me where the dinosaures came from and how they suddenly became extinct? Can science produce life from dead material. How do you account for the spirit, or do you not believe in such a myth.

The only conclusion I can come up with is that science does not have all the facts and that darwinian evolution is a faith system and quite frankly takes more faith to belive in than it takes to believe in God. And by the way to believe that mans' intelligence came from man himself is the height of arrogance.

Surely what we all should be seeking for is TRUTH, and to my mind all TRUTH comes from God who shares this with science. Looking forward to being enlightened. Jeff Walsh

[Freedom]

A conspiracy? I say so many things apparently.

You do say many things, perhaps you do not realize you are saying it. I suggest, however, that when you are shown where you have said something, just admit it and rephrase it. I have to do this all the time. Arguing the point with multiple posters confirm your statements is pointless. If you did not mean what you said, just restate it, For example, you stated the following:

In effect, it does. By publishing ideas in mostly high end scientific terms and through controlled experiments observed by small groups of people, there can be an authoritative control over the civilian population through "call to authority".

If you are not suggesting a conspiracy by scientists to control information, what exactly are you trying to say? You would do well to realize that these `small groups of people`are very diverse in their opinions and clash quite frequently through their publications and in open forum. I suggest you attend a scientific conference to see just how little authoritative control there is in academia. There are many widely held beliefs that do slow down progress, but these are hashed out until sufficient evidence is presented to set them aside.

[Freedom]

Waldren are you saying then that science has all the answers and the Bible is just a Myth, are you also taking God out of creation and saying that this is a scientifically proven fact.?

This is not the point at all. It is not that the bible is just a myth, but rather that many long held interpretations of the bible are myth. For example, it was long believed that Moses was literally in the wilderness for 40 years. Because our understanding of ancient hebrew has advanced over the past 20 years, we now understand that the repeated use of the measurement `40 years` is not to be taken literally but rather as a very common figure of speech. Likewise, access to the manuscripts that most likely produced the King James version of the bible reveals that the world was created in 7 periods of time rather than the mistranslated 7 days. This knowledge comes to us via the scientific method.

There are many mysteries in the scriptures that as yet cannot be explained by science, but there are many misconceptions of the scriptures that have been set aside through science. Evolutionary theory suggest complete randomness however it cannot be proven so I can accept the evidence of evolution but set aside the un-provable theory of randomness. I accept the restrictions apparently set upon the observable universe of the speed of light, but because I read the source material, I have come to realize that this rule is anything but absolute. Every paper I read on it concedes there are contradictions to this rule that have yet to be worked out. There are even papers that propose alternatives to this rule as ways to explain the contradictions. If you read the social media accounts of what science is saying, you will hear what the editors what you to hear. If you read the actual research, the picture is much less clear.

[volgadon]

Peleg. The idea of the land being divided. Science thought of the continents of being static.

Don't go off that this was some societal event. I've read discussions about it.

Can you reasonably show from the text that continental drift is even intended?

[mfbukowski]

Because it doesn't take you long to get over my head on some topics.

Well who knows- maybe that's because I am floating away into la la land...

[mfbukowski]

Peleg. The idea of the land being divided. Science thought of the continents of being static.

Don't go off that this was some societal event. I've read discussions about it.

Pretty tricky when that was written before there were maps which showed South America "fitting" into Africa, etc.

It was about divisions of people- unless you can explain how the writer of Genesis got a birds-eye view of continents.

[ANACO]

Can you reasonably show from the text that continental drift is even intended?

No. When the earth was divided, it didn't drift. It jumped and did a somersault

This is confirmed in D&C 133.

[ANACO]

Pretty tricky when that was written before there were maps which showed South America "fitting" into Africa, etc.

It was about divisions of people- unless you can explain how the writer of Genesis got a birds-eye view of continents.

The writer had a satellite with a digital camera and downloaded it through googleEarth.

The same way the Nephites knew they lived in a narrow-neck of land without ever having left its 500 x 200 miles.

Is D&C 133 now suspect? You tell me.

[volgadon]

No. When the earth was divided, it didn't drift. It jumped and did a somersault

This is confirmed in D&C 133.

In other words, you can answer neither my question, nor Calmoriah's.

[ERayR]

Pretty tricky when that was written before there were maps which showed South America "fitting" into Africa, etc.

It was about divisions of people- unless you can explain how the writer of Genesis got a birds-eye view of continents.

Maybe an original of the Piri Reis map.

[Calm]

Peleg. The idea of the land being divided. Science thought of the continents of being static.

Don't go off that this was some societal event. I've read discussions about it.

But when did the interpretation turn it into a continental drift event? All the early commentaries I've seen speak of it as a social one. So if you've read discussions about it being a continental drift, then you should be able to place a rough date of when these discussions are taking place.

[mfbukowski]

Maybe an original of the Piri Reis map.

I think Genesis was a tad earlier considering that draws from Columbus and is dated what- 1513?