The following article appeared in the March 17, 2012 "God issue" of New Scientist.
The party line among scientists -- believers and nonbelievers alike -- is that science and religion are what Stephen Jay Gould called "non-overlapping magisteria." In 1998 the US National Academy of Sciences issued a statement asserting "Science can say nothing about the supernatural. Whether God exists or not is a question about which science is neutral."
Yet according to a survey the same year, 93 percent of the members of the academy do not believe in a personal god.
Since about the same percentage of all US citizens say they do believe in a personal god, it makes one wonder what, if not their science, leads the elite of US scientists to differ so dramatically from the general population.
A majority of scientists at all levels do not believe in any god. Yet most are unwilling to challenge the religious beliefs of others. I am a physicist who, along with others dubbed the New Atheists, is willing to challenge religious belief. The gods worshipped by billions either exist or they do not. And those gods, if they exist, must have observable consequences. Thus, the question of their existence is a legitimate scientific issue that has profound import to humanity.
We can consider the existence of god to be a scientific hypothesis and look for the empirical evidence that would follow. Many of the attributes associated with the Judaic-Christian-Islamic God have specific consequences that can be tested empirically. Such a God is supposed to play a central role in the operation of the universe and the lives of humans. As a result, evidence for him should be readily detectable by scientific means.
If a properly controlled experiment were to come up with an observation that cannot be explained by natural means, then science would have to take seriously the possibility of a world beyond matter.
In fact scientists have empirically tested the efficacy of intercessory prayer -- prayers said on behalf of others. These studies, in principle, could have shown scientifically that some god exists. Had they found conclusively, in a double-blind placebo-controlled trial, that intercessory prayers heal the sick, it would have been difficult to find a natural explanation. They did not.
Similar tests have been done on near-death experiences (NDEs). Some people having an NDE during surgery have reported floating above the operating table and watching everything going on below. Whether this is a real experience or a hallucination can be tested easily by placing a secret message on a high shelf out of sight of the patient and the hospital staff. This has been tried, and no one reporting an NDE has yet to read the message.
Just as science can design experiments to test the existence of God, it can also seek evidence against a god's existence in the world around us. Here we must be clear that we are not talking about evidence against any and all conceivable gods. For example, a deist god that creates the universe and then just leaves it alone would be very hard to falsify. But no one worships a god who does nothing.
If God is the intelligent designer of life on Earth, then we should find evidence for intelligence in observations of the structure of life. We do not. The Intelligent Design movement failed in its effort to prove that the complexity found in some biological systems is irreducible and cannot be explained within Darwinian evolution. Life on Earth looks just as it should look if it arose by natural selection.
Most religions claim that humans possess immaterial souls that control much of our mental processing. If that were true, we should be able to observe mentally induced phenomena that are independent of brain chemistry. We do not.
If God is the source of morality, then we should find evidence for a supernatural origin in human behavior. We do not. People of faith behave on average no better, and in some cases behave worse, than people of no faith. History shows that the moral and ethical guides that most of us live by did not originate with the monotheistic religions, as proponents of those religions would have us believe. Instead, moral behavior appears to have evolved socially.
Again, if God answers prayers, we should see miraculous effects of prayer. With millions of prayers having been said every day for thousands of years, we would expect some to have been answered by now in a verifiable way. They have not.
If God has revealed truths to humanity, then these truths should be testable. Over the millennia many people have reported religious or mystical experiences in which they have communicated with one god or another. By now, we should have seen some confirming evidence for this, such as a verifiable fact that could not have been in the person's head unless it was revealed to them. We have not.
If God is the creator of the universe, then we should find evidence for that in astronomy and physics. We do not. The origin of our universe required no miracles. Furthermore, modern cosmology suggests an eternal "multiverse" in which many other universes come and go.
If humans are a special creation of God, then the universe should be congenial to human life. It is not. Theists claim that the parameters of the universe are fine-tuned for human life. They are not. The universe is not fine-tuned for us. We are fine-tuned to the universe.
After evaluating all the evidence, we can conclude that the universe and life look exactly as they would be expected to look if there were no God.
Finally, I would like to comment on the folly of faith. When faith rules over facts, magical thinking becomes deeply ingrained and warps all areas of life. It produces a frame of mind in which concepts are formulated with deep passion but without the slightest attention paid to the evidence. Nowhere is this more evident than in the US today, where Christians who seek to convert the nation into a theocracy dominate the Republican party. Blind faith is no way to run a world.
I agree with the qabove statement; I also remain a (poly-) theist, despite my
'classically.intolerant.catholic.childhood’ experience.
Some questions...
…Could a Deity / Deities be arranged in such a way that they could exist but still hide / obscure themselves from scientific testing / discovery?
Why would / why wouldn’t a Deity / Deities decide to do so?
Of course, this is one of those questions like…
‘Can a Deity / Deities create something so large that S/He/It couldn't move it?’
No matter the outcome of these investigations, (fascinating as they are...), they serve to reinforce the rule: Keep your religion off Me / US unless I/We specifically demand otherwise!!
That part I agree with. I have no problem with someone having belief in some deity. But with regard to the origin of the universe, the planet, life on the planet...my only contentions is that (even if any gods actually exist) they aren't necessary for any of it. All evidence so far points pretty clearly that the universe, planet, and all life on Earth (or even the universe) can occur without the need for a higher power, superior intelligence, or supernatural energy or entity of any kind.
I'm not saying it's proof they/it don't exist, just that they/it are not essential.
Jurors are warned by judges in trials to carefully evaluate evidence and to base their decision only on the evidence.
Patients rely on their doctors to carefully evaluate evidence and to base their treatment advice only on well established facts.
Passengers in cars, jets, elevators and space shuttles rely on designers to carefully analyse the facts and to design these devices in accordance with facts.
Sensible people try hard to base important decisions on facts and logic.
But when it comes to religion and religiously-based politics, many people believe in the most astonishingly silly and counterfactual things.
Oil and Water.
No. It isn't "designed". Get over your need to anthropomorphize everything and you may be able to think about these things more clearly and rationally.
"There is no standard moral compass at all, just what each of us wants to do, and all else be dammed?"
Society imposes consequences for unacceptable behavior in a community.
"Every time I hear an atheist I laugh myself to the point of running to the bathroom because of how ridiculous the no God mentality is. "
Yes, clearly. As opposed to the idea that an all powerful magical superbeing that created the entire universe so you would have something to stand on while it showered it's boundless love on you sacrificed it's own son to itself so that it could forgive you for IT not creating you perfect and then let you live forever in a paradise where it for some reason couldn't have just put you in the first place.
Obviously it's the atheists that are providing the comedy value here.
Craig Ferguson
The old way was to have the Virgin Mary appear to 4-7 year olds on a cowpath someplace. Why not appear in New York's Time Square at high noon? Better yet, halftime at the Superbowl. If that feat ever did happen, the churches would be overfilled to capacity.
Science has finally prevailed over medieval ignorance. It will just take time for each generation to accept reality.
Asking scientists to pronounce on the grand questions of life is like asking Hollywood celebrities to pronounce matters of economics, politics and foreign policy.
An all inclusive, all pervastive consciousness, the sum of all things. It is the energy consciousness
that forms material reality for subatomic particles, that for the atoms and molecules of our reality. If you want to find God, you have to go were God exist. Jesus new were God existed, In the gospel of Thomas, he said the kingdom of God was within.
Be it an anthropomorphized being, a diffuse spirit or even just a supernatural energy. It really comes down to the same question (in terms of the article), if it's there, someone can produce the evidence.
Christians can be absolutely sure about God and His creation of the universe and the wonderful order by which He has set all things.
Modern science is doing a nice job of discovering and explaining how the Universe works...and it doesn't require a supernatural being of any sort. What's known, so far, is explainable within the laws of physics. Explaining the unknown by the known is logical...explaining the known by the unknown is absurd...(sigh)
Wrong, they say absolutely that there are no absolutes.
"We don't think there's a god...because there's no evidence that there is."
The evidence is everywhere you just choose not to accept it as evidence because of your belief system.
"Myth and superstition has been around a long time."
It sure has, but I don't see how that is relevant to the discussion at hand.
"Perhaps you've noticed that the dead and resurrected god motif has been around at least since about 3,000 years before Christ...."
Yes, I do see how all other religions have aped Chrisitanity, but why throw out the baby with the bath water?
"Modern science is doing a nice job of discovering and explaining how the Universe works...and it doesn't require a supernatural being of any sort."
Yes it does, when it treads in the Christian worldview and of course it requires a supernatural being or you would not have logic or be able to have predictability.
"Explaining the unknown by the known is logical...explaining the known by the unknown is absurd...(sigh) "
I totally agree. So I'll ask again, why does naturalism continue to state that nothing can be known absolutely and then claim to explain the known with the unknown. Your right, it is absurd! A system of belief that is at odds with itself.
If we showed a helicopter to a person 2,000 years ago and asked them to explain it they would have limited words coming from a limited cultural story to be able to factually describe it; much is the same about God. We have ancient stories that had limited words, ideas, concepts to describe the divine. We are evolving as people, as a culture (world wide) our story and therefore our concept of God is changing. To find God, start by looking within. God is all, it is that simple and that complex.