@thysin,
Well, there are many scientific foundations that are not proving, but strongly supporting the existence of God. Not necessarily the Judeo-Christian God, but still an omnipotent, personal creator. I'll start with the anthropic principle.
To me, it seems rational, that, if I can rationally establish the principle of intelligent design, then It's entirely rational that there is a personal God. Otherwise, there essentially would be no design, if God isn't personal, why would he care how creation turned out (as a matter of fact, you could establish creation as a sufficient argument for a personal creator, but I'm going to take it a step further, because I believe design reasoning is more convincing)?
Have you ever heard of the anthropic principle?
Basically, it's a principle that states that if any of the laws of physics that govern our universe were altered, even in an infinitessimally minute increment, life would not be possible.
Take the cosmological constant for example. Now, the cosmological constant is the energy density of empty space. Even nobel-winning avowed atheist Steven Weinberg has stated that the cosmological constant is remarkably well adjusted in our favor. Now, keep in mind that according to Einstein's equation for General Relativity, the cosmological constant could have any value, positive or negative. But lets assess these varying degrees which are all potential for the cosmological constant.
- If the CC were large and positive, it would act as a repulsive force that increases with distance, a force that would prevent matter from clumping together in the early universe. This is the process that was the first step in forming galaxies, stars, planets, even people.
- If large and negative, the cosmological constant would act as an attractive force increasing with distance, a force that would almost
immediately reverse the expansion of the universe and cause it to recollapse. What the cosmological constant is in real life is unbelievably precise. It's impossible to really tell with modern science just how precise the CC is, but it's
conservatively been estimated to be at least one part in a hundred million billion billion billion billion. that's a ten followed by 53 zeros. I think we can both agree that that is INCONCEIVABLY precise.
Now, just that alone would probably be enough to convince me to subscribe to the idea of Design. But there are loads of other examples. for instance, the difference in mass between neutrons an protons. Increase the mass of the neutron by about 1/700 and nuclear fusion in stars would cease to occur. There would be no energy source for life. And if the electromagnetic force were slightly stronger or weaker, life in the universe would be impossible. When you compound the probability of all of these laws of physics being what they are by mere chance, you get one part in ten billion multiplied by itself 123 times. That's more zeros than the number of elementary particles in the ENTIRE UNIVERSE.
Now, I ask you, as a free-thinking person. If I bet you a thousand dollars that I could flip a coin and have it land on heads 50 times in a row, and then preceded to
do just that. Would you be more inclined to think it was mere chance, or that the game was rigged?
I'll give you another example. Let's say I were hiking in the mountains and came across rocks arranged in a pattern that spelled out, WELCOME TO THE MOUNTAINS MATTHEW BONVILLION. One hypothesis would be that the rocks just happened to be arranged in that configuration, maybe as a result of an earthquake or a rock slide. You can't totally rule that out. But an alternative hypothesis is that my brother, who was visiting the mountains before me, arranged the rocks that way. Now as a free-thinking rational person, which hypothesis would you be more inclined to accept? Such is the anthropic principle.
---------- Post added at 12:24 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:02 AM ----------
Brandon_Boyd;58918 wrote:Yes, I agree.
Well, what I mean by alter the environment is just change anything in general. And also, what I meant by "I cannot accept the idea of god as long as the world is the way it is," is that as long as their is pain and suffering from both human-made as well as natural causes, there won't be any evidence (for me) to prove God's existence. Not necessarily how humans behave, but how there is such chaos, not only on planet Earth, but throughout the cosmos there is such intricately uniform yet chaotic systems that make me wonder, "How could that have been purposefully created?"
Oh, and by the way, thank you Caroline. This is my second day on this forum and I'm already engaging in healthy debate, when in real life it is a rare occasion for me to debate something with an intelligent human being. Haha.
whaaaaat? think about this now. Most mainstream religion teaches that our purpose as humans is not simply to prosper, i.e. not suffer, but to know God, and through that knowledge transform your will to follow God's leading to ultimate prosperity (on earth as well as in heaven). who is to say that anyone would suffer by man's hand if we all strove to do this?
As far as natural disaster goes. While it's easy to see the damage that these disasters can cause, you have to look at the big picture. Sure, volcanoes have wiped out entire cities, desertification leaves fertile lands barren, and hurricanes have claimed the lives and livelihood of millions, but did you know that if none of these existed, life would not be possible? If volcanoes didn't help regulate our atmosphere by spewing out essential carbon and nitrogen gasses from deep inside the earth's mantle, global warming would have boiled off our oceans years ago. If desertification didn't happen, the earths' humidity would become unsustainable to life. If wind currents (which also happen to cause hurricanes and typhoons) didn't carry solar radiation around the world, our ecosystem would be destroyed. All of these features, including glaciation, are known as the earth's albedo (basically, its thermostat) that regulate Earth's temperature.
Look at earthquakes and volcanoes again. If we didn't have plate tectonics (that cause earthquakes, mountains, and other geologic formations) the mineral deposits would not be able to gather and form land, and Earth would be a complete water world, unsustainable to life (contrary to popular belief among high school science teachers and the rest of the general population). If we didn't have these natural disasters (we still call them disasters... like we don't choose to live by a volcano, or build strong enough levies, or protect our schools from earthquakes like we don't have the technology) life would not be possible overall.
While it's sometimes difficult to comprehend, and certainly doesn't answer everything, I don't think it would be wise to reject the idea that God and evil/suffering can rationally coexist. At the very least, I wouldn't accept evil/suffering as a basis for active rejection of a personal creator.
