Is there a school of thought that states that everything can be explained without invoking the supernatural?

Question

I'm writing a paper, and I know there's some school of thought that says everything can be explained by man's powers of reasoning, if all the surrounding events are known, or something to that effect. Basically, that the so-called "Butterfly Effect" is real - that a hurricane occurs, ultimately, because a butterfly flapped its wings somewhere, and not because God/gods willed it or made it so. (Yes, I know that's a scientific simplification!) Can anyone help me with what school of thought this is, and who some of its major thinkers are? Thanks!

Answer 1

evolution. darwin introduced this.

Answer 2

>Why do people think god doesn't exist? Well, there's this gigantic lack of any substantial evidence suggesting that there are any real deities. Unless you have some evidence to present that most of us haven't encountered yet (in which case, by all means, present it to us) or some good reasoning as to why belief should be based on something other than evidence (in which case, by all means, present it to us), I think the reverse question is more pertinent. >science law states that energy cannot be created nor destroyed That's not quite true. All we really state in quantum physics is that the sum total of energy must remain the same. This doesn't stop you from making energy out of nowhere, provided you also make an equal amount of negative energy. This may sound kind of silly, but it actually has real effects in the real world, and we've built machines that can detect them. >yet science claims that the big bang suddenly created a complexly balanced universe out of nothing Whatever do you mean by a 'complexly balanced universe'? >another scientific law that says order does not come from chaos. First, I should make it clear that 'laws' in science are not necessary principles of the scientific method itself, but merely rules that have been observed to hold true. It's not as if someone came up with a giant collection of statements including that one and collectively called them 'science'. Science is just an investigation technique. That aside, I suppose you're referring to thermodynamics and entropy. I would ask, what makes you think that the original state back at the point of the Big Bang was more chaotic than the present state? Bearing in mind of course that what is meant by 'order' and 'chaos' in thermodynamic terms does not necessarily match our intuitive understanding of the words. Does it help if we use concepts like 'energy potential' instead? >also, if the universe is billions of billions years old, the law of thermodynamics is also violated in that the universe would not still have hot suns and cold dark space but it would have reached a state of equilibrium that would still be far too cold to support life anywhere. What makes you think that? Simply because 'billions and billions of years' is a long time from your perspective doesn't mean you get to make arbitrary claims about what will or won't happen to the Universe over that span of time. Have you actually done the math? >God existing fits into the law that states matter or energy cannot be created. if there is anything at all, then it must have been there already in some form. originally that was and is God. And this 'original form' just happened to be an extremely intelligent supernatural being? What are the chances of that?

Answer 3

Bohm Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics.

In a nutshell, it basically says that the Universe is deterministic and that everything can be predicted if you know the exact positions and energy levels of all matter and energy in the Universe. Uncertainty exists only because the snapshot isn't complete. Take the snapshot of all snapshots at any moment in time and you can predict exactly any other snapshot so to speak.

Applied to 'God', it allows the universe to be deterministic while maintaining the illusion of freewill. Only 'God' would be able to take the snapshot of all snapshots.

Physics isn't invoking 'God' directly in the Bohm Interpretation, but if you take that leap philosophically, it does. Physics would simply say the universe itself would be the only thing in a position to take the snapshot - whether the universe is conscious, is just another word for God, etc.,... are different questions entirely and as relevant as they may be to religion, they are not relevant from an observational/experimental point of view.

Answer 4

Are you thinking of Positivism?

wikipedia description:
Positivism is a philosophy developed by Auguste Comte (widely regarded as the first true sociologist) in the middle of the 19th century that stated that the only authentic knowledge is scientific knowledge, and that such knowledge can only come from positive affirmation of theories through strict scientific method. This view is sometimes referred to as a scientist ideology, and is often shared by technocrats who believe in the necessary progress through scientific progress, and by naturalists, who argue that any method for gaining knowledge should be limited to natural, physical, and material approaches.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positivism

Answer 5

Secular Humanism

Answer 6

It sounds like you are talking about science.

Perhaps you mean materialism

Answer 7

there is something called the Deductive-Nomological (DN) model. click on the link to see if this is what you mean.