If you go back and read my post before last you will find my reasoning clearly laid out. If you find a fault with it then point it out, so we can discuss. I can't really see any point repeating myself.

And note, I am not here claiming that god either exists or doesn't exist. I am only concerned with finding out why you think your reasoning should be applied differently in the cases of believers and non-believers being affected by God and the absence of God repsectively.

And also please note that what I have said has absolutely nothing to do with demonstrating a lack of existence of anything.

Please consider the following very closely.

1. Sometime in the 1900's electromagnetism was discovered. The next question was the medium in which EM waves propagated. Scientists hypothesized the existence of a substance they called ether.

Sometime in human history human beings hypothesized the existence of god based off of the observations they made (order, design, etc).

2. For ether scientists attempted to detect the effects of ether on instruments. They found none. Therefore, as per scientists, the ether didn't exist. However, had they detected the ether they would've concluded that the ether did exist.

As concerns the god question we can very easily see the effects of god on people. Therefore god does exist.

This is nonsense because by the same argument people who thought the ether existed would have been affected by the existence of the ether, and so you should then conclude that the ether existed, at that time at the very least. Or alternatively if no one believed in God anymore and therefore no one was being affected by the existence of God, would you conclude that God had never existed, or at the very least had ceased to exist, as you do with the ether. If not, why not?

Scientists used instruments to detect physical evidence of the ether. Had they found any, they would've affirmed the existence of ether.

There's plenty of physical evidence for god - temples, prayers, rituals, beliefs.

Temples, prayers, rituals and beliefs are evidence for belief in God, not for the existence of God.

Temples, prayers, rituals and beliefs are evidence for belief in God, not for the existence of God — John

Then you should agree that...

Mass, volume, charge, velocity, etc. are evidence for the mere belief of electrons, protons, neutrons, in fact the whole of science is nothing more than a belief.

Mass, volume, charge, velocity, etc. are evidence for the mere belief of electrons, protons, neutrons, in fact the whole of science is nothing more than a belief. — TheMadFool

If you want evidence that a photon hit a plate, then you can find the mark on the plate where the photon hit it. You can also find evidence of the speed and angle at which things hit other things and infer from that, angular momentum, mass, and all manner of other measurements which physicists are adept at making.

If you want 'evidence for God', what are you even going to look for? There were, some years ago, some attempt to measure the effect of prayers on healing of the faithful. From memory, none of those studies were ever conclusive, or ever showed anything beyond chance.

Now, as it happens, I think there is actually quite solid evidence of miraculous healings, namely that preserved in the Vatican archives, concerning the supposed deeds of saints. But that is very specific - there, you're looking at actual pathology reports, medical opinions and judgements, and a lot of documentation about very specific cases.

But the idea that simply because a large number of people believe something, therefore it must be true, doesn't even amount to an argument. If you want to believe it, then by all means do, but there's no point trying to rationalise your belief in terms of weak arguments which are really nothing like 'scientific evidence' at all.

If you want 'evidence for God', what are you even going to look for? — Wayfarer

Measurable effects of God:

1. How many people pray?

2. How many times do people pray?

3. How many people avoid a certain kind of food item?

4. How many people undergo circumcision?

Etc.

It's useless to debate with those who don't understand the meaning of basic terminology, such as 'measurable' and 'scientific'.

do you agree with me that science is not entirely correct in its methods and principles. — TheMadFool

Indeed I do

Then you should agree that...

Mass, volume, charge, velocity, etc. are evidence for the mere belief of electrons, protons, neutrons, in fact the whole of science is nothing more than a belief. — TheMadFool

If you want to talk about electrons, protons, and any of those elementary particles, you should probably study them a little before you make such an awfully wrong statement. Mass, charge, spin are properties of electrons, not evidence for electrons. They were measured to characterize electrons, not to find electrons. Also, a velocity of electrons changes with the applied electric field. Its direction of path can also be manipulated to a degree with applied magnetic field due to intrinsic spin that the particle has. It means there is no intrinsic velocity to an electron. Also, electron is known to work well in quantum electrodynamics, a highly sucessful field of quantum physics, when treated as point particle. This means that the electron itself as a particle do not have any volume. (People mistake electron probability density as electron volume but this, under definition, is wrong.) We can also directly measure most of these particles. Checking wikipedia can still give you basic qualitative background. I wonder why you haven't done it.

That tells me that you understand nothing of science nor scientific method. I wonder why you even thought of trying to apply something you don't understand to something irrelevant.

Measurable effects of God:

1. How many people pray?

2. How many times do people pray?

3. How many people avoid a certain kind of food item?

4. How many people undergo circumcision?

Etc. — TheMadFool

Logical fallacy, like me and everyone else mentioned so many times.. Those are measurable effects of our concept of God, not the existence of God itself.

Mass, charge, spin are properties of electrons, not evidence for electrons — FLUX23

You're right BUT...

One has to measure these, you say, properties. The only way you can do that is by observing effects of these properties on instruments. In the case these properties are undetectable and unmeasurable it must be that given object doesn't exist. I'm still on the right track here.

It's useless to debate with those who don't understand the meaning of basic terminology, such as 'measurable' and 'scientific'. — Wayfarer

''Measurable'' simply requires a unit of measurement and we can count how many people pray, how many times we pray, etc.

''Scientific'' means one must have measurable evidence. Kindly refer to the paragraph above.

I'm still on the right track here. — TheMadFool

You're not, because in saying that God has measurable effects you're assuming that God exists, so the argument begs the question. Others have pointed this out.

That's one of the worst arguments I've seen in a long time. You'd need another argument to show that this is God and not merely imagination, feeling, or something else.

To clarify this a little more let me take the example of the ether hypothesis of science. Its existence was suspected/hypothesized just as god's existence was. — TheMadFool

And both have been discredited. In the latter case, many times, but unlike the former case, it has persisted through revision or otherwise, which is due in no small part to faith, willful ignorance, fanaticism, wishful thinking, and that sort of thing.

As it happens, as a bit of an aside, I was reading just the other day that while it took several decades following the discovery in 1929 of our expanding universe for the notion of a Big Bang to achieve independent empirical confirmation, Pope Pius XII heralded it in 1951 as evidence for Genesis. Given that the Big Bang theory was proposed by a priest, one might have thought that Lemaître would have been thrilled with this papal validation, but he had already dispensed in his own mind with the notion that this scientific theory had theological consequences. He later voiced his objection, saying “As far as I can see, such a theory remains entirely outside of any metaphysical or religious question.” And the pope never again brought up the topic in public.

You're not, because in saying that God has measurable effects you're assume that God exists, so the argument begs the question. Others have pointed this out. — jamalrob

Let me clear up the matter. My reasoning, in complete agreement with the scientific method, is as follows...

If god exists there should be observable, measurable effects.

There ARE observable, measurable effects

Therefore, god exists

Of course this is a fallacy - affirming the consequent. However I don't see how one can be justified in ignoring it for science but not in the case of god.

Please read my reply to jamalrob

Let me clear up the matter. My reasoning, in complete agreement with the scientific method, is as follows...

If god exists there should be observable, measurable effects.

There ARE observable, measurable effects

Therefore, god exists

Of course this is a fallacy - affirming the consequent. However I don't see how one can be justified in ignoring it for science but not in the case of god. — TheMadFool

You yourself admit that it's a fallacy, so that spells the end for your argument, irrespective of what you or I think about science.

However I don't see how one can be justified in ignoring it for science but not in the case of god.

However I don't see how one can be justified in ignoring it for science but not in the case of god. — TheMadFool

I think the difference is that affirming the consequent is an error in deductive reasoning, but science doesn't claim to use deductive reasoning. Instead it justifies its inferences using Bayesian probability theory (according to this) which (apparently) shows that in certain cases affirming the consequent is permissible.

So your argument fails if you claim it to be deductive or if probability theory doesn't justify the (non-deductive) inference.

However I don't see how one can be justified in ignoring it for science but not in the case of god. — TheMadFool

Formal fallacies, such as affirming the consequent, only have relevance to deductive arguments, in which the conclusion necessarily follows. Science isn't deductive, it's inductive.

You sonofabitch, how dare you beat me to the punch?! And by less than a minute!

I think the difference is that the objects of science are described or defined entirely in terms of their measurable properties, via their effects. But to say that the cause of religious practices is the supreme being and creator of the universe, etc., is to go far beyond the evidence, i.e., beyond the effects.

Not only did I beat you to the punch, but I have references, which makes it the objectively better reply.

>:o

So your argument fails if you claim it to be deductive or if probability theory doesn't justify the (non-deductive) inference — Michael

Thank you. No, the certainty in my proof is at par with the certainty of science. Not more and also, not less.

Thank you. No, the certainty in my proof is at par with the certainty of science. Not more and also, not less. — TheMadFool

Then you should further clarify your claim. What are you claiming, more precisely? That an existing God is a more likely cause of all of these effects than any other possible cause? Where's your evidence for that, then? Good luck... you'll need it.

I think the difference is that the objects of science are described or defined entirely in terms of their measurable properties, via their effects. But to say that the cause of religious practices is the supreme being and creator of the universe, etc., is to go far beyond the evidence, i.e., beyond the effects — jamalrob

But I've only applied scientific principles. Does this mean science too is flawed?

But I've only applied scientific principles. Does this mean science too is flawed? — TheMadFool

Compared to a sound deductive argument, yes, of course it is. I don't think any reasonable person would claim that the scientific method is without flaws.

Then you should further clarify your claim. What are you claiming? That an existing God is a more likely cause of all of these effects than any other possible cause? Where's your evidence for that, then? Good luck... you'll need it. — Sapientia

What other cause do you have in mind? Also please read my reply to jamalrob.