Can Science Find God?

[The Happy Humanist]

This question is mainly (but not exclusively!) for the scientists out there.

I have been debating a gentleman in email, who asked me what I would consider as proof of God. I thought about it, and decided that, if a few dozen stars were to suddenly rearrange themselves to spell out "Howdy, it's me! -- GOD", I might be swayed. OK, I would be seriously challenged. OK, OK, I'd be singing Hosannahs and heading for the confessional.

He replied that he doubted it, that astronomers would merely chalk it up to "coinicdence", or swamp gas, or just "unknown." That got me to thinking. I know that Science is supposedly neutral w/r/t God and the supernatural; that is, it doesn't deny they exist, it just isn't set up to study that realm, or magisterium, so it can't say anything about them.

But what about a case like this, where God (finally) shows his hand unmistakably? Am I right in saying that Science would be forced to at least acknowledge that "after significant study, the phenomenon in question seems to be attributable to an entuty called God, through mechanisms currently unknown to us, but which may involve supernatural forces"? Or is my friend right, that there still could be and would be no acknowledgement?

Basically, would Science be allowed to acknowledge God if it found him?

[The Happy Humanist]

Really? How quaint. And why again is that the “only” argument? Why is the model of God having a plan, and executing it via evolution so “impossible”

If I may jump in here for a sec...Bro Dave, you seem to be laboring under the misconception that we hold your creator theory to be impossible. Of course, if you postulate a Creator with infinite powers, anything becomes possible. Obviously we cannot argue with your game plan, the way you've set up the rules. We don't have to show that God is impossible, only that he is unnecessary, given that we have a good, solid, and scientifically unassailed theory for how things came to be, one that employs a lot less tortured logic. We simply see naturalistic explanations as more probable, at least the way things stand now. Of course that can change with furhter evidence....

So unless you think that our theory is flat out "impossible," then you must agree we are down to arguing the relative merits of the two worldviews, rather than the possibility of either.

[Bro Dave]

Really? How quaint. And why again is that the “only” argument? Why is the model of God having a plan, and executing it via evolution so “impossible”

If I may jump in here for a sec...Bro Dave, you seem to be laboring under the misconception that we hold your creator theory to be impossible. Of course, if you postulate a Creator with infinite powers, anything becomes possible. Obviously we cannot argue with your game plan, the way you've set up the rules.

My only problem is the tone that gets used when atheists talk about a Creator. There seems always a necessity to somehow condescend, and imply lack of intellect to any such understanding. I hold that atheists are nearly always more courageous, and more intellectually honest than most religionists. As you point out, if God is indeed what I have claimed He is; INFINITE, then finite minds simply look silly debating His existence. On the other hand, atheists are correct, and there is nothing there to be aware of either the universe’s condition, or to have any preference for its direction. this raises many perplexing questions.(at least for me). Clearly, there is intelligence present in the Universe. We are an example. Also, clearly, no one can claim to understand everything of which we are aware. There remains a need for some “mechanism” beyond simple survival, that brings near perfection of form and function, while avoiding retention of the benign absurdities that seem so to upset QED. Why should an animal “care” whether or not it survives? Really! Even at the single cell level, life has this “desire” to avoid destruction. Why? How can a single cell animal have sufficient awareness to recognize the consequences of NOT surviving? If you work up from the bottom, all the “happy accidents” together are highly unlikely to get sufficient cognitive powers to hold it all together long enough to move to multi-cellular animal. It would be like throwing cans of paint against a wall, and expecting the Mona Lisa eventually to appear.

We don't have to show that God is impossible, only that he is unnecessary, given that we have a good, solid, and scientifically unassailed theory for how things came to be, one that employs a lot less tortured logic.

Sorry, but your showing God to be “unnecessary”, does not prove that God did not create a system with sufficient built in tools to bring about the Universe He designed. As for “unassailable”, well, gee whiz! I thought that was what I have been doing!
All theories are “assailable”, or they would be known as “laws”.

We simply see naturalistic explanations as more probable, at least the way things stand now. Of course that can change with furhter evidence....

Since we actually know so very little, I am more than happy to allow as much wiggle room as you like!

So unless you think that our theory is flat out "impossible," then you must agree we are down to arguing the relative merits of the two worldviews, rather than the possibility of either.

No, I just think your theory is flat out incomplete! We only differ significantly in WHY the Universe is here, not so much in the mechanism of observable phenomena. And, if QED will agree that a Creator COULD have been First Cause, providing all the necessary pieces eventually to create this Universe, then this discussion will be completed.

Bro Dave

[QED]

Why should an animal “care” whether or not it survives? Really! Even at the single cell level, life has this “desire” to avoid destruction. Why? How can a single cell animal have sufficient awareness to recognize the consequences of NOT surviving?

I'd like this question to be chiselled in stone somewhere -- along with the answer because it really is a "penny-drop" moment. All the animals that didn't care if they survived are long-gone... eaten, squashed, drowned or whatever, before they had a chance to breed. Likewise the 'awareness' of the single cell comes not from within, but from its adaptation to its environment. All the poorly adapted variations are history.

If I'm not getting this very simple explanation across effectively it is entirely my own fault, it reflects my own lack of skill in communication. The explanation itself is wholly sound. Darwin knew that animals must somehow pass on some of their own characteristics to their offspring even though it took several human generations before the discovery of genes. Such predictions are powerful indicators that a theory is correct. With all the detailed findings we have at our disposal now the principle is unassailable. If anyone else is able to improve on my pathetic attempt to explain this remarkably simple concept I'd appreciate it.

But I suspect this is something like a game for Bro Dave, who can always choose to place some infinite intelligence in charge of the universe such that this simple process becomes inevitable. I just can't see how this could be so. How could the logic of evolution not be as it is? We don't see piles of stones precariously balanced on top of one another. A gravel drive tends to stay flat. Does it take a divine entity to engineer this sort of order? If it is felt that it does and that all the best smart-assed scientific answers are trumped because god deliberately made the laws of physics what they are, then I would argue that it removes god from the equation at point t=0 as everything is progressing as physics has it.

We only differ significantly in WHY the Universe is here, not so much in the mechanism of observable phenomena. And, if QED will agree that a Creator COULD have been First Cause, providing all the necessary pieces eventually to create this Universe, then this discussion will be completed.

No. I won't agree that a 'Creator' could have been the first cause for the simple reason that you are asking me to swallow that this entity was uncreated. Not only that it was uncreated, but that it is infinitely accomplished and in possession of a passion to create. That's a helluvalota stuff over and above a lowly, uncaused, universe that you yourself have acknowledged is far from perfect and is in need of constant tweaking and revision.

[Ian Parker]

Unevolvable? What makes you think that? I wrote an integer FFT in 73 RISC machine code instructions and it doesn't strike me as unevolvable in the least.

In saying unevolvable I was thinking much more about the fitness incentive An F16 pilot is fit because of FFT, he fires his missiles at an unfit enemy and lands safely, which the enemy fails to do. I am saying that there are no examples in the natural world, even though there are incentives.

You are right to say that the FFT is not particularly complex. In fact you could, in principle do FFT in an analogue CCD type system. You do though need to know about sines, cosines/complex numbers.

When we talk about "i" e^ix we are using theories worked out in the 18th century. In discussions on Bethe's irreducibility biologists are talking about "families of genes. Each stage making one marginally fitter. In terms of working out an algorithm, the knowledge of complex number, roots of unity etc. does not make you fitter, not directly. As soon as you use it to shoot someone down you are fit.

The point I made remains, Mathematics has been investigated in its pure form Mathematicians have investigated all accessible nooks and crannies. I suppose too you could be considered fit (socially) if you got a job as a Maths lecturer researching some pure field!

[The Happy Humanist]

If I may jump in here for a sec...Bro Dave, you seem to be laboring under the misconception that we hold your creator theory to be impossible. Of course, if you postulate a Creator with infinite powers, anything becomes possible. Obviously we cannot argue with your game plan, the way you've set up the rules.

As you point out, if God is indeed what I have claimed He is; INFINITE, then finite minds simply look silly debating His existence.

Quite true; however, I am reminded of the old adage "If God did not exist, Man would have to invent him." If God were an invention of ancient man, there can be no doubt that his inventor would imbue Him with the characteristic of Infinite Intelligence, in order to make the idea stick, a move that would automatically (conceptually, at least) place Him above skeptical analysis. It's a brilliant piece of Teflon coating. The upshot, however, is that it leaves us here in the modern world without any chance of discovering the deception, if that's what it is. As I said to Harvey in another thread, God could be 100% fairy tale, and we could never know it, as long as we feel constrained by the "Infinite Intellect" characteristic. It's a "Get Out Of Atheism Free" card. It's a debate-ender. Which is why I feel that it's not appropriate for this forum, since we are here to debate.

Also, clearly, no one can claim to understand everything of which we are aware.

That's right. Which is why we are currently withholding judgement on how things got started, pending more information. It is, however, conceivable that at some point mankind's knowledge and understanding will embrace the origin of the cosmos. We are, after all, within milliseconds of it right now.

Clearly, there is intelligence present in the Universe. We are an example.

Perhaps the only one. Perhaps not. The mere existence of an example of intelligence does not necessarily imply an abundance of same.

Why should an animal “care” whether or not it survives? Really! Even at the single cell level, life has this “desire” to avoid destruction. Why? How can a single cell animal have sufficient awareness to recognize the consequences of NOT surviving?

This is perhaps the best question you, or anyone else here, has raised in defense of your thesis. I am not a scientist, and can only make a vague stab at it. As far as lower life forms are concerned, I think natural selection acts in such a way as to appear to be a "desire to persist." A silly, but apt, illustration: Bubble wrap. Love to pop those bubbles. I rarely finish them off, though. Did the ones I didn't pop have an innate desire to avoid poppage? Same thing with the unicellulars - the ones that persisted, Nature simply didn't get around to popping...more correctly, some of them developed traits (not intentionally, purely through accidental mutation, which we know happens) that made them harder to pop, and consequently they resisted poppage until such time as they had reproduced themselves - with those same pop-resistant traits.

The higher life forms definitely have a survival instinct. Definitely an innate desire to avoid poppage. Where that came from, I can only mumble something about "it evolved," but how mutating genes can create such a thing is outside of my specialty. So why do I lean towards a naturalistic explanation in this regard, even in the absence of total understanding? Is it <gasp> faith?

No. It has to do with trends. If I take a step back and look at the big picture as unattachedly as possible, I can't help but notice a distinct trend towards greater and greater understanding of origins and cosmology in naturalistic terms. For centuries, we've watched God get pushed out of the gaps as we fill more and more of them with knowledge, until there are only a few gaps left. I regard it as perverse to believe that this trend will somehow be reversed with respect to the remaining gaps. Absent some extremely confounding factor, I gotta go with the trends.

And, if QED will agree that a Creator COULD have been First Cause, providing all the necessary pieces eventually to create this Universe, then this discussion will be completed.

Bro Dave, you know as well as I do that this discussion will never be completed!

[QED]

You are right to say that the FFT is not particularly complex. In fact you could, in principle do FFT in an analogue CCD type system. You do though need to know about sines, cosines/complex numbers.

Or have a set of cilia whose characteristic resonances provide an effective analogue equivalent. There is very little territory of physics that has gone unexplored by nature in pursuit of an 'edge'. I was delighted to see that the moth and other insects have evolved dielectric, open resonator antennae tuned around the IR part of the EM spectrum. These structures even resemble the Yagi Antennaes commonly found on rooftop TV aerials. But some things are a stretch too far -- like 'over the horizon radar' perhaps. It's interesting contemplating what nature has managed to evolve. But I don't think it will help science find a god anywhere.

[Bro Dave]

Why should an animal “care” whether or not it survives? Really! Even at the single cell level, life has this “desire” to avoid destruction. Why? How can a single cell animal have sufficient awareness to recognize the consequences of NOT surviving?

I'd like this question to be chiselled in stone somewhere -- along with the answer because it really is a "penny-drop" moment. All the animals that didn't care if they survived are long-gone... eaten, squashed, drowned or whatever, before they had a chance to breed. Likewise the 'awareness' of the single cell comes not from within, but from its adaptation to its environment. All the poorly adapted variations are history.

The percentage of “lucky” single cell animals that had the Happy Accident of receiving the “awarness” gene, would have to be vanishingly tiny! And, what about the “suicide” gene that is equally likely present? If you model is correct, then I conclude there must be no life on Earth! It just didn’t stand a chance.

If I'm not getting this very simple explanation across effectively it is entirely my own fault, it reflects my own lack of skill in communication. The explanation itself is wholly sound. Darwin knew that animals must somehow pass on some of their own characteristics to their offspring even though it took several human generations before the discovery of genes. Such predictions are powerful indicators that a theory is correct. With all the detailed findings we have at our disposal now the principle is unassailable. If anyone else is able to improve on my pathetic attempt to explain this remarkably simple concept I'd appreciate it.

Yes, I do. My explanation is that genetics is the drive mechanism within evolution that keeps it on course. It is the “steering wheel”, if you will. Each planet has its own history an its own genetic memory. What a wonderful design!

But I suspect this is something like a game for Bro Dave, who can always choose to place some infinite intelligence in charge of the universe such that this simple process becomes inevitable.

No, these are truly my core beliefs. I see the truth, no matter its source. What I have shared with you, is an culmination of my 65 years of that search. It has taken me from Christianity, to agnosticism to the edges of atheism, and back through Eastern Philosophies. It was a long trip, but will worth the effort!

I just can't see how this could be so. How could the logic of evolution not be as it is?

I never said evolution was “not as it is”. I only said that evolution is simply the tool used to get from planetary potential, to actualizing that potential.

We don't see piles of stones precariously balanced on top of one another. A gravel drive tends to stay flat. Does it take a divine entity to engineer this sort of order? If it is felt that it does and that all the best smart-assed scientific answers are trumped because god deliberately made the laws of physics what they are, then I would argue that it removes god from the equation at point t=0 as everything is progressing as physics has it.

You come very close to being correct! Once God released his plan to the Universe Architects, He pretty much stands back and lets them and the rest bring that plan into being. He is, however totally involved as a supportive observer.

We only differ significantly in WHY the Universe is here, not so much in the mechanism of observable phenomena. And, if QED will agree that a Creator COULD have been First Cause, providing all the necessary pieces eventually to create this Universe, then this discussion will be completed.

No. I won't agree that a 'Creator' could have been the first cause for the simple reason that you are asking me to swallow that this entity was uncreated.

Its okay. We are limited in our ability to grasp concepts outside of our experience, or at least vicariously of the experiences of others. The concept of non-time and non-space, are just now being seriously considered. Once you get your arms around those concepts, the concept of the “eternal now” makes more sense, and God residing there seems entirely reasonable. It removes the necessity of being or not being created. God simply “is”.

Not only that it was uncreated, but that it is infinitely accomplished and in possession of a passion to create. That's a helluvalota stuff over and above a lowly, uncaused, universe that you yourself have acknowledged is far from perfect and is in need of constant tweaking and revision.

Perfection is and infinite word, and is therefore only relatively defined for us. The initial plan for the Universe was not to bring a “perfect” Universe into existence. It was to provide a University, in which imperfect beings would strive to perfect both themselves, and their worlds. This effort results in attaining knowledge, and refining it into wisdom. Ultimately, all leads to the discovery of God, who was there all along, quietly supporting their efforts, and sharing in the experience of their growth.
(that is the "Cliff Notes" version, I assure you…)

Bro Dave

[The Happy Humanist]

More stuff...

Sorry, but your showing God to be “unnecessary”, does not prove that God did not create a system with sufficient built in tools to bring about the Universe He designed.

There's that "p" word again. No, it doesn't prove a thing. That's my whole point, you can't prove your theory and I can't prove mine, but we sure can argue the relative merits. If we bring in Occam, it would seem you are adding non-essential elements such as intelligence, which violates parsimony. In such cases, it's usually best to lean towards the theory with the least amount of non-essential mental gymnastics.

As for “unassailable”, well, gee whiz! I thought that was what I have been doing!
All theories are “assailable”, or they would be known as “laws”.

I know. That's why I used the term "unassailed" rather than "unassailable." Thus far your attempts at assailing have been fruitless.

[Ian Parker]

. But some things are a stretch too far -- like 'over the horizon radar' perhaps. It's interesting contemplating what nature has managed to evolve. But I don't think it will help science find a god anywhere.

The point which I originally made was that there is no engineering solution for intelligence. When strong AI is produced it will not have come from an evolable route as AI engineers will unquestionably use algorithms, such as Householder, which are not evolvable.

It is surprising in view of the fact that a lot of engineering cannot evolve that something like Intelligence has evolved by random processes, if indeed the process was completely random.

Another interesting fact. There is a paper out on irreducible complexity where it is argued that biochemical pathways evolved by means of partial solutions. This does have certain similarities with the way in which mathematicians think. Anything that mathematicians can't do must really be irreducible - at least in some sense. It is not irreducible if we cheat and look at the answer, my timeline theory.

[QED]

Why should an animal “care” whether or not it survives? Really! Even at the single cell level, life has this “desire” to avoid destruction. Why? How can a single cell animal have sufficient awareness to recognize the consequences of NOT surviving?

I'd like this question to be chiselled in stone somewhere -- along with the answer because it really is a "penny-drop" moment. All the animals that didn't care if they survived are long-gone... eaten, squashed, drowned or whatever, before they had a chance to breed. Likewise the 'awareness' of the single cell comes not from within, but from its adaptation to its environment. All the poorly adapted variations are history.

The percentage of “lucky” single cell animals that had the Happy Accident of receiving the “awarness” gene, would have to be vanishingly tiny! And, what about the “suicide” gene that is equally likely present? If you model is correct, then I conclude there must be no life on Earth! It just didn’t stand a chance.

Here you seem to accept that higher evolved creatures have their own awareness which has been transmitted up through their genetic lineage. This is easy to envisage because they have obvious sensors and motors (feelers, eyes, legs, tails etc.) to translate what's going on in their environment into an appropriate reaction for survival. But you're now balking at single-cell creatures with no apparent capacity for awareness.

In the case of these organisms they too evolve connections between stimulus and reaction but in far less obvious ways. All the action takes place at a much simpler chemical level with no mediation from a brain. The genetic coding still commands the construction and hence reaction to environmental conditions e.g. salinity, acidity, temperature and so on. Again evolved reactions result in chemical activity within the cell which produce the most appropriate reaction fro survival such as shutting-off absorbtion through membranes. Unlike higher creatures these reactions are not mediated by a brain, but it makes absolutely no difference. Even animals with brains react to danger in an autonomous way as it is often the more expedient method of surviving.

So in both cases random mutations to the construction details can result in changes to the way an organism reacts to its environment and hence determine its success or failure in that environment. Certain tiers of this process are also concerned with the degree of variability that is permitted and these too are subject to natural selection in a way that keeps the whole process on track towards the simple, autonomous 'goal' of survival. Once again, all the organisms that had not evolved such refinements met with untimely extinctions.

There are billions of 'happy accidents' in this process, just as there are billion of unhappy ones too. The trick is that the unhappy ones are soon lost to the world, while the creatures benefiting from the happy ones are the ones we see all around us. I rather think it's time you stopped referring to 'happy accidents' in the way you do. It makes no point of worthiness except to draw obvious criticism.

We are limited in our ability to grasp concepts outside of our experience, or at least vicariously of the experiences of others. The concept of non-time and non-space, are just now being seriously considered. Once you get your arms around those concepts, the concept of the “eternal now” makes more sense, and God residing there seems entirely reasonable. It removes the necessity of being or not being created. God simply “is”.

I see this as a question of "who deserves the credit" for everything. Sure the universe is a fantastic place but I think this fact tempts people into assuming something even more fantastic deserves to be given the credit for it all. Here comes the tricky bit: there are plenty of natural examples of things that look designed, that look like someone ought to be given credit for them -- like the Giants Causeway who's very name exemplifies the human instinct to give credit to the supernatural for what are in reality natural occurences. But die-hard spiritualists can always claim that supernatural forces have forged the world in such a way as for these natural things to emerge in the first place. But this only strikes me as a redundant move. Once this view is set aside fro a moment and the circular reasoning that goes with it is broken, we do indeed see that natural forces are capable of producing fantastic things. And hence that is where all the credit should go.