Yukimura

Addiction, to me, refers to a physiological condition that someone is born with or without, though it can also be created through heavy drug use. It doesn't really have anything to do with self control. Someone who looks at an addict and thinks the addict lacks their self control is like someone with a fever of 99.5 looking at someone with a fever of 104 and saying, "I've got a fever too. It's not so bad. Get off your butt and get back to work." There are several firm scientific grounds for the disease theory on addiction that I'm not educated enough to repeat to you right now, but I'm sure if you look it up you won't have much trouble finding information on it. I know a few important things though. For one, "addicts" are true responders. The euphoria they feel on any substance is greater than the effects another would feel. Another is that their bodies acclimate to the substances faster than other people would. Finally, there is a chemical in their brain that seeks to metabolize euphoria inducing substances, and when they aren't found, the mind will forcefully seek out more. It's much more chemical than I had thought before I heard all the science mumbo-jumbo.

In the words of Mitch Hedberg, "It's funny. Alcoholism is a disease, but it's the only disease you get yelled at for having. 'Damn it Bob, you're an alcoholic!' 'Damn it Bob, you have lupus!' One of those doesn't sound right."

As for the sudden rise of atheism, atheism isn't a novel concept. It's not like it just recently came into existence. However, that doesn't mean the media isn't beginning to focus on it more. Personally, I don't see much of an "atheist bandwagon" out there, except in the high-school goth crowd where kids just want to feel a little more grown up by choosing a 'grown up' religion. Other than that, I don't see many people declaring themselves to be atheist because it's 'the cool thing to do'.

I thought this was relevant, but didn't think of a way to work it in: in a recent survey, 2% of the population reported their religion to be atheism, meaning the belief in no God, as opposed to agnostic, "I believe in God, just not sure about much else."

I would argue that atheism is a religion. It's a person's set of beliefs about the nature of the universe. Lack of religion may not be entirely accurate.

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Willravel

Science can't explain what isn't. That which science cannot focus it's analytical lens simply isn't. That said, just because we don't know all of the facts yet doesn't mean that there are no facts. There are facts yet to be discovered, and they are as much a part of science as that which we've already discovered.

The Heisenberg uncertainty principle represents surrender. It basically reads "we can't measure it now, so it cannot be measured". What about 15 years from now when we are projected to start developing working quantum computers? I'm not a physicist, but saying a physical phenomenon cannot be explained ever seems shortsighted.

filtherton

So are you agreeing with me that science can't explain everything? If not, do you have some sort of rebuttal to what i said?

I'm not a physicist either, but i'm not really sure that it is prudent to argue from an ostensibly pro-science position that what seems like a general consensus among quantum physicists is wrong because it offends your sense of the way things ought to be. Interestingly enough, you are agreeing with einstein when he said, "I cannot believe that god would choose to play dice with the universe." This might be an odd position in which to find yourself in.

Willravel

Atheism isn't a fundamental belief, it's an evolving understanding. It's neither uniform nor unchanging. The term atheism is actually not dissimilar from terms like "pagan" or "gentile" wherein it refers to a person for what they are not instead of for what they are. An atheist disbelieves in a supreme being. That's hardly a doctrine or "set of beliefs", and we have no necessary actions to accompany our understanding.

BTW, you only used description #2. Here is all of them:
If when you say "everything" you're not only referring to what is but also fiction and what isn't, then yes I agree that science cannot explain everything. If, however, you mean everything as in that which is in the universe that is real and not fictitious, then I disagree. I needed clarification before presenting a rebuttal.
My understanding of the uncertainty principle not a sense, it's an observation based on tons of precedence. I'm also not aware of a general consensus on Heisenberg, either. As I understand it, many physicists agree that it's something we cannot solve today, but that hardly means it's something we can't solve tomorrow.

pig

quick note on uncertainty principle, taken straight from the most accurate source on the web wiki wiki

the important thing is that the uncertainty principle isn't a product of imperfect measuring devices, but as we currently understand it, is an intrinsic limitation on the ability to make certain measurements of very small, very fast systems. we may, of course, reformulate physics and find that, voila!, no more uncertainty...but for now, it's what it is.

of course, this could get around to the question of whether science can ever 'know' anything, or whether or not it only describes things so that we can reproducibly predict outcomes with statistically reasonable bounds. if you accept the 2nd statement (i will say now that i do), then i have to ask myself what knowledge, in that context, means, and whether or not other types of knowledge are available. i think they are.

as they say, god is in the details.

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Yukimura

[EDIT: Sorry, I had a computer glitch here yesterday apparently.]

I did not post all of the definitions as a space saver, not because they do not support my argument. Let's go through them.

1. applies to atheism

2. applies to atheism

3. applies to atheism

4. applies to atheism

5. This one may not. One might argue that a practice like education or work would qualify, but let's say it doesn't. I concede this definition.

6. applies to atheism

7. I don't fully understand this definition. Let's say I concede it too.

8. applies to atheism

9.
a.applies to atheism
b.applies to atheism

So two of these wordings don't apply to atheism, but seven do. I'd say this is good initial evidence to support that atheism is a religion, but let's continue to explore the topic.

Neither is religion. My religion is not unchanging or uniform. Many people express it in their own ways, but they all take on a common name. Mine changes with me on a daily basis, because I change on a daily basis. It is my own evolving understanding.

The difference between the term atheist and the terms pagan or gentile is that the latter two were invented by people who belong to a certain religion to describe those outside it. I hear many atheists describe themselves as being atheist. It is a word for a certain belief, not a lack of one. Of course, that entire argument is simply a matter of perspective.

Let's define doctrine too. I'll use all the definitions this time.

Your statement is self-contradictory. You claim that atheists have no doctrine, though many share the same one. The doctrine of science. I'll immediately concede that this is not a bullet-proof argument, but I know one doctrine that all atheists agree on without exception, for it is the very definition of being atheist, as you said. "There is no God." As you put it, "An atheist disbelieves in a supreme being." Not only is this a central belief to all atheists, but many are quite vocal about it and want to convert others to their religious beliefs.

That about wraps it up for me I guess. *whew* If I had said that out loud, I'd need to catch my breath.

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roachboy

yukimura: i dont find that argument to be compelling.

it seems to me that the only folk who claim atheism is a religion are themselves religious one way or another and so seem to be motivated by an inability to imagine the world as ordered differently from themselves. from this follows a compulsion to assimilate a category like atheism into itself, as a mirror image of itself, a religion without this god character.

well, it isnt.
there's no movement.
there's no organization.
there's no ritual. no liturgy.
no shared committments to anything.
there is no community.
there are just people who use the word to situate themselves in certain types of conversations, which unfold within particular contexts (like this.)

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

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Willravel

You're describing spirituality.
Actually, the term atheism was not developed by atheists (don't bother with wiki, some asshole bigot erased the page).
You claim that there's no atheist doctrine? How about science? That may not be fair, I'm not sure. It's more an actual question. If that one's not enough, how about the simple doctrine that I'm more sure of, "There is no god."[/QUOTE]
Not all atheists are rationalists. Some people don't believe in god because they feel like it and it has no roots in rationalism whatsoever. I do not represent all atheists, of course.
Atheism isn't a religion any more than gentile is a race.

Yukimura

I'm describing religion. Religion can work this way. I'm sure you don't believe that, but it's true.

Nonetheless, it is used by atheists. I wouldn't call myself a gentile.

Nonetheless, the central doctrine of "There is no God," does apply, regardless of how they came to the conclusion.

Is too. :-P

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roachboy

atheism is a noun.
that's all.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Willravel

Religion is not "an expression of the spirit within", it's a set of doctrines. I'm always surprised by how many theists confuse the two terms.
But you could. It really doesn't matter what you call yourself, and it matters even less where the words originated. The word Jew describes what you are and gentile describes what you are not. Likewise, theist or "religious" describes what you are, and atheist describes what you are not.
Not believing in something isn't a doctrine.


BTW, why do atheists have to know so much about theism? It's a goofy, and horribly ironic reality that is terribly frustrating.

Ustwo

I don't believe in smurfs, either, does that make not-believing in smurfs a religion?

Asmurfic?

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Leto

Hmmm... so, we should take sicence as far as we can, and reap the benefits as we go. There will come a point, though, where the limits have been reached. This is where we have to ask, "And So?"

Willravel

Will there? I'm not so sure. Between the fact that humanity could become extinct and the fact that we've really only begun to develop some sciences, it's hard to say if there will be one day where a scientist goes, "Okay, I'm done. Science is over", without saying it as a joke on the internet, sarcastically.

Leto

I was refering to (what I thought was the current post on) the Heisenberg principal.

But, to answer your question, following the premise of said principal, I think that there will come that point where the scientific method fails us. Science may not be over, but the pushing of the boundaries may come to an end.

Prior to the beginning of the universe, what was there? what began the big bang (if big bang is current science)?

pig

i highly doubt that scientific inquiry will ever come to an end...if i recall correctly, in the period after newtonian physics and prior to that of relativity / quantum etc - the feeling was that the universe was just a big set of billiard balls. all the basic fundamental relationships were known, and the rest was just fleshing it out....then whoops!: there's all this other stuff to consider. if scientific inquiry can give us increasingly sophisticated concepts to explain how the universe operates, it seems to have very little to say about what the universe fundamentally is or why it is here. i do not think those types of inquiries are purely in the realm of 'science.' furthermore, all the 'hows' of our scientific explanations don't really tell us 'how it works...,' they only give us a consistent set of relationships that allow us to categorize and predict future events....that doesn't mean any of it is 'true'. at least, that's how it seems to me.

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Willravel

This assumes there was a beginning to the universe. If you mean the big bang, occurrences may very well have preceded the big bang. We don't know. Yet. One popular theory says that there have always been big bangs following big crunches following big bangs and so on. A sort of chicken/egg conundrum on a mass scale.
There's a lot of speculation, but we probably won't be getting any decently backable answers until we have more data.
You're correct.

BTW, "why" the universe is here is a philosophical question, not a scientific one. Science gives us the how, not the why. Well psychology can provide the why, but that's another thread.

Ustwo

Oh that should be good, please do.

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Willravel

Some of the why, not all it. Why does he compulsively gamble? Psychology to the rescue. Why are we here? Nope, that's philosophy.

Ustwo

Ah I thought you were talking the whole 'why are we here'.

Damn, that would have been amusing.

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filtherton

When i say everything i mean everything that actually is.

All natural laws, like the second law of thermodynamics, or newton's law of gravitation, are merely observations based on tons of precedence. You're right that science has definitely proven itself wrong before. Despite that being the case, you aren't being a very good steward of science by claiming that it is okay to deny the validity of well supported theories because you don't agree with their implications. That's the kind of thing intelligent design proponents do.

Willravel

Heisenberg is just like Shrodinger; it's a principle about what we don't understand yet. It's saying "We don't know yet because...", and then it presents evidence to show why we don't know. I call it a cop out only because it's not the end of the story, and people are acting like it is. We're still studying quantum physics and learning more every day.

filtherton

Let me edit that in a way that i hope is illustrative.

No idea is self contained- every theory has elements of the unknown in it. That doesn't make a theory inaccurate or invalid. And, i'm sorry will, but i don't think that you're in a position to comment on the impending abandonment of heisenberg.

So tell me what your evidence is for your belief that science can explain everything that's real.

Willravel

You read my post wrong. The theories themselves, Schrodinger and Heisenberg, are demonstrations of what we don't know. They aren't things we think we do know or think we know, but are things that we don't know. I'll simplify:
Heisenberg - Holy shit, when we tried to measure that outcome it wasn't deterministic. *measures again* See? That's crazy. I wonder if it might be impossible to explain that. I can't explain it right now.... but I'll get right on explaining that.

Infinite_Loser

I've asked that question many times before, yet no one has been able to give me an answer. If you ask "Why?" enough times, you'll eventually come to a point where science says I don't know).

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Willravel

Apparently you missed my dozen answers, including the one to the question you quoted.

filtherton

All science is an implicit demonstration of what we don't know. Is there anything in the constitutive equation for gravitation that explains the mechanism by which gravity works? No.

f = ma - no explanation there,

These are both descriptions of observed phenomena and neither claims, or even needs to claim, any sort of explanation or underlying mechanism.

Whether one is found or not will remain to be seen.

From what i understand, you're advocating some sort of "hidden variable" which is an idea that has been explored and discredited in the context of heisenberg.

Here is what is going on here will, you disagree with a specific, experimentally supported, scientific theory and instead of bending your perspective to match what science tells you, you are insisting, in spite of a complete lack of evidence, on the existence of some completely unsubstantiated mechanism to explain why a bunch of quantum physicists don't know what they're talking about. You are doing exactly what you argue against when it comes to theists.

Willravel

Science is not a demonstration of what we don't know. Science is about figuring out what we do know. It's about facts and truths and how they work. I see no implication in it at all about what we don't know. I see what we don't know as the problem and science as the solution.
As I said above, science is about what we know, not about what we don't know. The reason you're citing Heisenberg is because it's about what we don't know, in a manner of speaking, but it's not that simple. Heisenberg is a demonstration of what isn't the answer. It's saying, "We've applied what we know to test this, but it's not panning out. Stand by." That standing by, or the moment in which we don't have a solution, is the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. I can't say if it will be solved or not, but the interpretation that Heisenberg suggests there is no solution is a misunderstanding.
Whoa, wait just a second... who said the Heisenberg uncertainty principle was a theory? You know that a principle is very different from a theory, right? If it were a theory or law, this would be a completely different conversation. It's neither. It's a principle.

ubertuber

As long as you guys are picking at nits, I don't think the Heisenberg principle is as general as is being indicated. It's actually something very specific that illustrates the boundaries of scientific knowledge. I'm not ruling out the possibility (likelihood) that you guys know more about this than I do, but since I'm studying this tonight, I can't resist giving in to synchronicity and chiming in. If you know better than I, please speak up - preferably before my exam, which is next week.

I have no idea what this has to do with atheism, other than it is certainly true that science doesn't provide the explanation to everything. On the other hand, it's more likely that science will provide answers to things like the unified theory, the big bang, and the weak nuclear force than religion or philosophy are. So it's not perfect, but I know where I'm placing my bets.

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Ustwo

Laugh I was about to post the same thing.

I was beginning to wonder why the location of an electron or the potential deterministic nature of particle motion had to do with the existence or non-existence of a superior all knowing being who created everything.

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filtherton

Well, it actually has nothing to do with atheism. It has to do with what i see as a gross over estimation of the capabilities, a deification if you will, of science on the part of will. When it comes to the existence of god, i think that will and i are in complete agreement.

ubertuber

If I have to prove or disprove the existence of God on my chem exam, it better be multiple choice.

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Willravel

I thought god was covered in geology (6k year old earth) and biology (we evolved from the 6th day or something)....

I think the point of the discussion was that filtherton was challenging my assertion that science can explain everything by naming a principle that suggests we have a problem without a current answer. If filtherton is a fraction as exhausted as I am, then we'll agree to disagree for the night and have a Dos Equis. Cheers, bud.

Ustwo

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filtherton

Will, this is actually a pleasant diversion from what i should be doing.

Edit: maybe we should take the night off

Infinite_Loser

Okay. I admit I didn't read all the way down, so I didn't see your response.

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Willravel

No worries.

Leto

Precisely. Yet, when the end of the "and-so-ons" are reached, regardless of how many, what is there? What precipitated the first iteration? going with the assumption that there was a beginning.

Ustwo

But God can not answer that question, because in so doing it creates a bigger question.

When I was a good little Catholic I was told that God made his own mold and threw it away.

Even as a young child that struck me as stupid, and you can imagine how I felt when my mother tried to teach me Papal Infallibility when I was about 9.

But I digress, anyways, nothing -> something, seems just a concept outside of our experiences and knowledge. Nothing just appears without something leading to it, but.... nothing -> omnipotent being -> everything, makes nothing -> something seem pretty straight forward.

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Willravel

There is no necessary limit. We as humans live finite existences so we feel the need to compare everything to that. There's really no evidence to suggest there was a beginning.

Let me put it in a theistic framework: when you die, I suspect you expect to go to heaven. If you're a member of the Abrahamic religions, Judaism/Christianity/Islam, you'll expect to be there for eternity. So you must grasp the concept as it's a part of your faith and religion. You never cease to be, and continue on forever; to infinity. Well, imagine the inverse of that. Imagine that there is not only an eternity in front of you, but also behind you. Going back continues on forever, without end.