Can you admit that belief in God is not completely irrational or illogical?

Question

*PLEASE READ DETAILS BEFORE YOU ANSWER*

Consider Science. Science is method of obtaining knowledge about the natural world and an effort to explain various natural phenomena. So when presented with a question like, "How did humans get here?" Science uses natural evidence. It examines the human speices and other speices, fossils, etc etc. It uses various tools and various laws of nature to give us a natural answer to the question.

Science is dependent on this mechanism we call nature. Science is based on a premise that everything can be explained through natural means. Nature is orderly and nature has laws. So, my question is, how did this mechanism of Nature get here?

Three possibilities:
1. "I don't know."
2. Beyond our known nature: Mutiple Universes
3. Beyond our known nature: A supernatural
entity or force

I am not advocating the Christian God here, but rather that it is not COMPLETELY irrational or illogical to believe in a supernatural entity.

This question is not a Scientific question because Scientificallly, it is irrational because we are talking about something BEYOND nature. Rather this is a philosophical question.

Answer 1

I believe there is a fourth possibility, that nature is merely a consequence of existence. For something to exist, it must exist as something and that something will have certain qualities.

It is a bit like asking why water is wet. You say that God makes water wet, but I argue that water could exist no other way.

Still, I agree that belief in God is not totally irrational.

Answer 2

"Nature is orderly and nature has laws. So, my question is, how did this mechanism of Nature get here?"

You're coming at this from a very strange direction: you perceive 'laws' and 'order' and assume that they are imposed on - what? - chaos?

But the universe we inhabit is as it is because of the properties of the basic fabric of reality. What you see as 'laws' are really just descriptions of the way things behave. Water doesn't flow downhill because of an imposed tendency; it does so because the effects of gravity cause it to.

The REAL laws you're probably driving at are the handful of universal constants that were probably given their values during the first infinitesimal instants after the Big Bang: the velocity of light, the charge on an electron and similar constants.

But these constants pretty much had to have SOME value. It's pretty clear that the values they wound up with are responsible for the universe not being a big vacuum, or a hot plasma.

If you want to put God in there you may do so, but it's a stretch. The Anthropic Principle may also be useful: if the values were different, we wouldn't be here to marvel at it. It looks, however, as though universes are forming constantly, so there may well be zillions with different values for the fundamental constants.

Nor should you assume that any other values would prevent life: all you need is a replicator, and although biochemistry is a way to create one, it might be possible to have one made entirely of hot plasma - who knows?

Whatever your opinion of the origin of our universe, bringing in an intelligent agency is nothing less than giving up on an explanation. It's like saying 'the fairies did it'. We're a long way from having to give up on sensible explanations and adduce supernatural ones.

CD

Answer 3

Science and religion offer different answers to the question of "where did we come from?", although the scientific answer is tentative, whereas that of Religion is final and absolute. And you're correct in saying that everything can be explained through natural laws, but the point is the whole truth will be discovered tomorrow, if not today. Religion - on the other hand - has an answer NOW for everything, based on ridiculous superstitions. As science continues its findings, Religion is forced to revise its absurd dogmas. But if you live long enough - who knows? - maybe the full light of the scientific approach may shine on you.

Answer 4

1) This is not an answer.

2) The key word here is KNOWN. The planets used to be beyond our known nature. Lightning used to be beyond our known nature. All of science at some point was beyond out known nature.

3) And where did that supernatural entity come from?



When you get down to it either a natural thing or a supernatural thing must have either always existed, or spontaneously come into existence to go on to cause our universe.

So which is more logical?
A relatively simple, but not homogeneous non-sentient natural thing?

Or
A incredibly complex sentient thing?

As Christians like to point out, we do not find watches lying on the beach. We do find relatively simple non-homogeneous rocks though.

Matter has been seen popping into and out of existence, at a quantum level.

There has been no documentation of deities doing the same thing.

Answer 5

Although I believe in God who is not a material thing I thought specie evolution was random but watched a lecture given by two Nobel prize winners in Biology on the Internet given at the Congress National Library. The lecture between the two of them. Part of the lecture was about the RNA and how it scans any protein sequence to determine if it fits the specie DNA if there is no match it rejects it other wise the body accepts. It is very, very complex process.After that I said it is impossible to leave this process to random act of nature. Now I believe that science of biology proves so much so that God and super intelligence is behind all marvelous life.

Answer 6

Deism cannot really be argued against,except by the application of Occam's razor.This concept of god is simply "force"or "nature"This god need not be sentient.This is a far cry from the traditional sense of the word "god"
You are correct though,science only measures nature,science is correct,that IS how things work.Science also doesn't negate the existence of "higher dimensions"nor does any science disprove oe even offer any evidence against the existence of higher dimensions.Science deals with the 3D world,and in that context is valid.It does not state there is no higher dimension.Much as an imaginary 2D person could measure and Analise everything 2d,and be correct,yet only be able to fathom the existence of 3d through thought,never measure it,nor disprove it

Answer 7

A theistic deity has as a necessary consequence the existence of free will.

Free will provably does not exist (split brain studies, stroke studies, partial brain anasthesia studies, etc).

As such, a theistic deity is proven to not exist.

However, I yield this proof does NOT rule out deism.

A deistic deity would be logical, but requires an unnecessary a priori so is safely discarded by occam's razor, as deism and atheism are consequentially identical.

Answer 8

I dont believe in the big bang theory or Darwin. I believe SOME higher being put us, the animals, land,etc. here for us. Too many dif cultures have a version of a creator (Like all the Native American tribes believed in a creator. most called him "wakan takan" *(SPELLING?) So yes, I do believe in God and I dont think he is white, black, Indian,etc. but just a beautiful color of alll the races he created.

Also, in science, you come up with a hypothesis , then try to prove it and as far as I know, no one has never proved that God / Higher Power didnt create everything.

Interesting ? , be interesting to here all answers.

Answer 9

Belief in God, like irrational behaviour, is far more widespread and "normal" than is generally supposed.

Rationality is defined thus:

"Rational thinking leads to the conclusion that is most likely to be correct, given the knowledge one has... a rational action is the one that, given the person's knowledge, is most likely to achieve his end."

The co-inventor of the anthropic principle, Frank Tipler, is likened to Voltaire's character from "Candide", Doctor Pangloss, who insisted that all was for the best in the best of all possible worlds. A difficulty arises for Tipler's more recent proposal that, at the end of the Universe, we will all be recreated in some kind of super-virtual reality which will include our memories. Without delving into the mind-boggling physics of all this, we can see a problem in respect of the memories, which psychologists would say are constructed, and hence interpreted, from stored experiential data.

"The individual rehearses the memory and in the process changes it a bit, depending on emotions, previous memories, subsequent events and memories and so on. This process recurs thousands of times over the years... If Omega/God resurrects me with all of my memories, which memories will they be? The memories I had at a particular point in my lifetime? Then, that won't be all of me. All the memories I had at every point in my life? That won't be me either."

On the last page of the book, Shermer issues a challenge:

"If there were only one thing skeptics, scientists, philosophers, and humanists could do to address the overall problem of belief in weird things, constructing a meaningful and satisfying system of morality and meaning would be a good place to start."

Answer 10

It is irrational to believe in a personal god. It is rational to try to understand the universe using science and logic.