Of course it's philosophy - that's the closest common ancestor of religion and science. Where else was the discussion supposed to be centred?
Richard dawkins
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Of course it's philosophy - that's the closest common ancestor of religion and science. Where else was the discussion supposed to be centred?
Quite possibly, even science itself at one point thought they had actually proved God.
The universal constent was thought to be to perfect for it not have been created, and maybe science was wrong to try and create diverging theories to try and make a answer that fitted. Some even think were just a computer simulation.
In some respects if you imply a human notion of a person or being onto something then its creates huge problems of creation of God and what came before. It is quite possibly an answer so profound we will never ever be able to conprehend it from our simple existences.
However, one thing we can take from it, is that if there existed such a being, I doubt he would want us to be killing each other or starving ourself for 30days in his name etc etc.
Im struggling to get my head round this now, but theres a problem with you assumption. Your starting with a God, you've created one where there is no need for one to exist. You've created a concept to fulfill your understanding of something because you do not have the necessary evidence, so its a man made creation.
How about we go backwards to explain what I'm thinking.
How humans came to be (dont jump to straight to God)
Humans > evidence for evolution all the way back to single cell life (workable model) > chemicals etc > atoms > *
Where does it ever imply the need for a god, not even when we get to the end which we don't understand do we need to imply a god (it just in our nature to want to)
Most religious people will get to the * and say god, I say that the * just means unknown and one day will be known, but then the religious people will just push one more level further and say well God must have done that too. God is a human need to fill a void to achieve some sort of attonment
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Well science if anything as the purpose of thread was to acknowledge a scientist! It's just everyone started preaching about the philosophy he's been involved in as this seems to stir more interest than science.
It is the anthropomorphising of a universal concept, we cannot help it. We create an explanation and a name for everything, it is our nature.
God will always exist in some form, no matter how much you explain or name or discover, because you are you and I am me. In that specific difference between each of us is God.
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More arrogant the better, ever have a conversation with a Creationist? Their right, your wrong, and nothing you say or do will change that.
I personal like his speaches and opinions
Can he not convince people of his argument without the need of arrogance?
That would make his case stronger, not weaker as it does. The more arrogant he has become the more dismissive those he targets become. That helps no-one and is frankly worrying in someone of Dawkin's obvious logic based intellect.
So, you don't like arrogance, yet it's okay for some one to be arrogant when they're of the same opinion as yourself?
Hypocrite comes to mind.
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People mistake his intellect for arrogance like being smart and having answer and opinion on everything is a bad thing. People actually miss the humour in a lot of his stuff! Watch him speak to father coyne on yt - such a reasonable man!
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That sadly applies for anything these days. If a person 'has an answer for everything' then he's presumed to be a ******.
I don't mind Dawkin's arrogance but it's very evident that he has a massive chip on his shoulder when it comes to accepting the ignorant people (at least as he sees them) in the world.
That said, I would call him a genius in his field and like most, he's a bit nuts.
In all honesty, I can get just as angry and fed up with religion and fundamentalists as he does but as others have said, when you do that, you can very easily become or appear to be the very thing you are frustrated with.
That said, I appreciate his message and whilst he maybe does ram it down people's throats, I personally was heading down the atheist/agnostic route before Dawkins starting becoming massive. All his words did, was give me reason to be more sceptical and fulfill my own destiny (faith wise.)
That said, I would call him a genius in his field and like most, he's a bit nuts.
In all honesty, I can get just as angry and fed up with religion and fundamentalists as he does but as others have said, when you do that, you can very easily become or appear to be the very thing you are frustrated with.
That said, I appreciate his message and whilst he maybe does ram it down people's throats, I personally was heading down the atheist/agnostic route before Dawkins starting becoming massive. All his words did, was give me reason to be more sceptical and fulfill my own destiny (faith wise.)
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Indeed, but isnt that the arguement we are having, that science does what we have both described better than religion. Isnt Dawkins himself just trying to get people to come to the same conclusion. To not believe in a single truth i.e God, but an unknown, that results in NNN occuring.
If NNN is a result and MMM is the technique that every time brings that conclusion, then its better to believe in that, then LLL causing NNN when that technique does not bring that conclusion, regardless if MMM is a "truth"
Man this is hurting my head
Whenever I've heard Dawkins proselytising it seems to be with the goal of getting people to leave their beliefs, depending on your standpoint that may or may not be a good thing. I tend to take the view that there may well be no such thing as absolute truth so if people want to believe in a god or gods then provided they're not harming others with their beliefs then that's fine by me. If for instance people want to tell me that god created the Earth then sure, I'll shrug and say "maybe", aside from an intellectual curiosity it doesn't matter to me in the least how the Earth came to be or indeed if there is a why behind it.
As for the question it depends on what you want, if you want predictively useful then go with the model that will show the correct results on a regular and repeatable basis. A model that may be strictly "correct" in terms of being how things actually occur but is not regularly repeatable with accuracy (e.g. suppose a force has intervened to create the same result every time in action but it's not repeatable in a laboratory with artificial constructs replacing the natural ones) is useless for the purposes of science but if you want to know how things have come to be then it's the model you should believe in.
Are you really an ignostic? Although it'd certainly be better if people could agree on what we're meant to be discussing.
I don't have any objection to him having an answer to everything except that it's an impossible ask of any person, the most intellectually honest answers for most questions relating to god are simply "I don't know" or "I can't prove it" along with perhaps "it's an irrelevance" yet too often Prof. Dawkins presents it as if he holds the correct position on the topic. It's possible that he does but asserting that he is right is arrogant, that's not me mistaking intellect for arrogance - it's almost by definition arrogant to hold your beliefs above others.
any other garbage you write after saying this is irrelevant
Sorry, I've misrepresented myself, as it appears I'm invoking a God of the gaps, when I'm really not. My faith in God is not there as a means of solving the significant problem of abiogenesis, it is merely a happy coincidence that it does. However, either way you're still left with something from nothing, be it life itself of God himself. At that point you pretty much have to apply some sort of anthropic principle and accept that one way or another we came to be here, but we don't entirely understand how or why.
yes how dare a highly intelligent Englishman speak his mind. May he be shot down by other Englishmen including those on the ocuk forum
An appeal to intellect is a fallacy, his intellect has no bearing on whether he is correct or not...
While not wanting to defend his somewhat militant atheism I can certainly understand how he got to be the way he is. When your life's work is constantly being called lies, fraud and fairytales by people you believe are telling lies, being frauds and acting on fairytales you are going to get somewhat bitter about it.
In short, I quite like Dawkins, even though I do not agree with him and can easily see why he gets annoyed at creationists and the like.
In short, I quite like Dawkins, even though I do not agree with him and can easily see why he gets annoyed at creationists and the like.
I can see that too, however the problem is he is exactly like those he vilifies when it comes to philosophy, and that's what all his work around religions and faith is. His brilliance within the scientific context is utterly irrelevant when discussing philosophy, but he is so 'sure' of his faith in the scientific method as being realist (as opposed to instrumentalist) that he has become that which he hates.
I don't dislike Dawkins for his actual views, but for the way he presents them and uses them to attack anyone who disagrees with him. In other words, I dislike him for the same reasons I dislike other fundamentalists.
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Science and Religion are nothing of the same. Religion has no place in explaining where we come from other than fairy tales. There is zero evidence. Oh but evidence is a 'science thing', no evidence is just that: evidence. They can't be compared because theres nothing to compare. People having 'faith' in a 2000 year old book written by man has no place in anything other than fairy tales and telling other people they will burn in hell for not believing.
Yes I do have a chip on my shoulder of Christianity. There are far too many believers believing something with zero evidence. This affects many of our laws and world tensions whether you like it or not.
He is not like them. They base their presumptions on nothing, nada, thin air. Dawkins pressumes on countless theories from countless years of science.