Quote of the Day: "The dispute between atheism and theism is at bottom a philosophical dispute, not a scientific one"

Image via Wikipedia

Continuing our look at Alex Rosenberg’s The Atheist’s Guide to Reality, we come to Rosenberg’s treatment of the question “Where did the big bang come from?”....

"[T]he dispute between atheism and theism is at bottom a philosophical dispute, not a scientific one." -- Edward Feser, in the combox of the above post, here.

"There Is No Why"

                        Image via Wikipedia

The Beatles had it all wrong when they twanged "Tell me why".

Why?

There is no why.

You're asking for a "why" when there is no "why", there is only an "is", but that leaves you as nothng particularlarly special in the universe, and that's why your ego clings to these myths. -- SDC

A really, really big bang starts everything off. Don't ask why. There is no why.

This big bang has embedded in it all the laws of mathematics, the laws of physics, the laws of logic, the laws of chemistry. Don't ask why. There is no why.

These physical laws are all exquisitely tuned, as it turns out, to support the emergence of biological life on earth, itself governed by yet more laws. Don't ask why. There is no why.

No mind behind the universe, but minds spring up out of dust. Don't ask why. There is no why.

No consciousness behind the universe, but self-consciousness emerges from dirt and water, stirred. Don't ask why. There is no why.

A dumb, purposeless process produces the exquisite emotion of love. From dirt. Don't ask why. There is no why.

A creature emerges with embedded moral sense, with strong convictions that there is good and evil, right and wrong in the midst of this senseless, mindless, purposeless swirling dirt of a universe. Don't ask why. There is no why.

A man arrives in Palestine circa 4 BC and claims to be God. His grave is empty. Don't ask why.

Evolution has given our inquiring minds the insatiable impulse to ask "why".

Why?

Don't ask.

This is the state of scientism, circa 2011.

As SDC likes to put it, there is NO EVIDENCE for a Creator.

Apart from, you know, everything that exists.

Related articles

• How could the big bang be big if there was nothing around it (wiki.answers.com)
• What is the actual defination of Big Bang (wiki.answers.com)
• [VIDEO] Power Rookies - Big Bang's Debut! (ibigbang.wordpress.com)
• CERN's 'Big Bang' recreation yields spectacular images (news.bioscholar.com)
• Animated Explained: Something from Nothing [Video] (geeksaresexy.net)
• Stephen Hawking explains the universe (scienceblogs.com)
• Existence: Why is there a universe? (newscientist.com)

Life Blooms On Mars!!!

   Image by Mads Boedker via Flickr

"You bloom quickly, you do what you need to do, and you go dormant." -- description of life on Mars, based on "the science" circa 2011

Life on Mars? Yikes, this sounds like life on earth!

The evidence for this?

To paraphrase scientist Dr. Emmett Brown, "Evidence? Where we're going, we don't need evidence".

Or, as an eminent Mars explorer once put it, "To infinity ... and beyond!

Evolution News and Views has the full story.

Related articles

• You: Scientists Find Signs Water Is Flowing on Mars (nytimes.com)
• Hints of water spark hope for life on Mars (msnbc.msn.com)
• Is there life on Mars? (theage.com.au)
• Hints of Water Spark Fresh Hope for Life on Mars (space.com)
• Life On Mars (merovee.wordpress.com)
• Why we can't get enough of The Red Planet (independent.co.uk)
• Hello, is there anybody out there? (edmortimer.wordpress.com)
• Do scientist belive there is life on mars (wiki.answers.com)
• Late Night: Is There Life on Mars? (skydancingblog.com)
• Dark streaks guide search for life on Mars (nature.com)

My Gut Tells Me This Is Wrong...

                                        Image via Wikipedia

UK Mail Online:

Scientists have created more than 150 human-animal hybrid embryos in British laboratories.
The hybrids have been produced secretively over the past three years by researchers looking into possible cures for a wide range of diseases. 

Figures seen by the Daily Mail show that 155 ‘admixed’ embryos, containing both human and animal genetic material, have been created since the introduction of the 2008 Human Fertilisation Embryology Act. 

This legalised the creation of a variety of hybrids, including an animal egg fertilised by a human sperm; ‘cybrids’, in which a human nucleus is implanted into an animal cell; and ‘chimeras’, in which human cells are mixed with animal embryos. 

Human-animal hybrids? It's crunch-time, folks. Are we crossing a line? Are we exceptional, or are we not? Are human beings merely, as darwinists and atheists like David Suzuki insist, mere animals, no better, no worse, and nothing more? And if all creation is by accident and not by design, with no externally-imposed, objective right-and-wrong, good-and-bad underlying human existence, why not?

So, here's the question. Is there, or is there not, a line here that can be crossed? I'm listening to my gut -- what does yours say? Sometimes inward intuition is a source of knowledge. Meanwhile the atheist empiricist can only protest, "where's the evidence?".

The evidence? It's in the intuitions of the human heart. What's left is for us to figure out whether these intuitions of human exceptionalism were implanted as a cruel trick of mindless evolution, or by a purposeful Creator.

Regain your full humanity. Rebel against the atheist machine.™

And that's the way the Ball bounces.

h/t Drudge.

Related articles

• 150 human-animal hybrids grown in UK labs in secret (futuredispatch.com)
• Labs grow human-animal hybrids (heraldsun.com.au)
• UK Researchers Urge Rules Governing Creation and Use of Human-Animal Hybrids By Rebecca Boyle (imullins89.wordpress.com)
• UK wants agency to monitor human-animal hybrids (futuredispatch.com)
• Regulations proposed for animal - human chimaeras (nature.com)
• Regulations Proposed for Animal-Human Chimeras (scientificamerican.com)
• The UK Would Deprive Us Our Manimals [Science] (gizmodo.com)
• Mice With Human Brain Cells? More Oversight, Please, Says U.K. Panel (news.sciencemag.org)
• Scientists warn over apeing humans (ft.com)
• Experts warn over humanising apes (independent.co.uk)
• Scientists warn of 'Planet of the Apes' scenario (telegraph.co.uk)
• Biotec.. hybrid human animals..Chimeras tomorrow.. (thefreeonline.wordpress.com)
• UK scientists want human-animal tests monitored (seattletimes.nwsource.com)

Quote of the Day: "As a scientist and a former believer, I see this as bunk"

                                  Image via Wikipedia

As a scientist and a former believer, I see this as bunk. Science and faith are fundamentally incompatible, and for precisely the same reason that irrationality and rationality are incompatible. They are different forms of inquiry, with only one, science, equipped to find real truth. And while they may have a dialogue, it’s not a constructive one. Science helps religion only by disproving its claims, while religion has nothing to add to science. -- Jerry Coyne, 2010, ardent darwinist and atheist, quoted here.

Science uses methodological naturalism, which means that it looks for natural explanations for natural phenomenon. When it looks for natural explanations for un-natural phenomenon, it is the wrong tool doing the wrong task. When it denies that supra-natural phenomenon exist, it goes beyond the bounds of legitimate scientific inquiry into unscientific metaphysical assumptions. Therefore, Coyne, in stating science as the ultimate and all-sufficient epistemological tool, presupposes that the sum total of reality is naturalistic. Problem is, this is a philosophical assumption, not a scientific one.

So, if reality consists of more than the merely material, this makes science not a search for truth, but a search for ultimately false explanations.  As someone said, "if the only tool in your toolkit is a hammer, the whole world looks like a nail".

And that is the problem with science wedded to atheism.

Scientism

Image via Wikipedia

Is science the sole or primary arbiter of what is real and true?

Several contributors to the Ball Bounces seem to think so.  There's a term for this view. It is called scientism.

Good definition of scientism here.

Under scientism, you could never be sure that your mother loved you, because love does not submit itself to scientific detection and analysis.  All we can observe are its effects.

Ultimate truth is not merely molecular; it is personal and moral.

In the beginning was the Word.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Guest Article: Does Scientism Equal Faith: Combating Misconceptions (alexblog.com)
• Against God Or Tyranny? (andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com)
• Missing the Mark (unreasonablefaith.com)
• Science, faith and limits of knowledge (openparachute.wordpress.com)