Christians and scientific evidence

Hahaha.

So according to this (warped) logic, since it takes more faith to believe in science and faith is a virtue, then the most virtuous people on the planet are atheist evolutionary scientists?

First off, you’re switching terminology– but this is a common tactic. I don’t know many “Christians”, even of the Fundamental variety, that disapprove of doctors, medicine, or scientific reasonings as far as what’s going on in the testable environment of today.

The problem is when science starts wearing the hat of historian claiming that it not only knows what’s testable, but then proceeds to declare as fact that which is not.

Science is not able to detect the supernatural, and yet there are supernatural things that happen every day. So, by definition, science is at least agnostic to God.

Second, science is constantly being revised. First it’s this number of years, then this number. First we have uniformitarianism, then catastrophe theory. Tomorrow it’s going to be sunny, but then it snows. And don’t even go into the concept of how the universe (or life for that matter) began– science can’t agree, and there’s many different theories.

So, it actually takes more faith to believe in science than it does in the Bible. The Bible really hasn’t changed since the time it was originally written, and yet the number of theories about how the world came about are as innumerable as the grains of sand on the sea.

How anyone can be dogmatic about a unfalsifiable theory that keeps changing with new data really is beyond me. How you can trust that people that can’t even tell you reliably what the temperature will be tomorrow or where a hurricane will end up to tell you what happened not 1000 years ago, but supposedly millenia ago– that’s quite amusing.

I think what bothers Christians are the claims that are made by some, to be the truth, that just don’t line up with the bible. A Christian believes the bible, over anything else.

True scientific knowledge will prove God, not the other way around.

Not everthing that claims to be truth, is in fact, truth.

Therein lies the difference.

So minthegap you judge all science based on predicting meteorology. Wow. considering it’s not the same in other science. I could judge the whole Bible and say that the creation accounts aren’t true based on much evidence to the contrary and say the whole Bible is trash.

That old 2000 year old book of faith called God’s word/The bible contains all the answers, bottom line - it’s up to each person to accept or reject it’s message…Hope this helps !!

Some of the same people who will claim faith is virtuous, will turn right around and say things like “it takes more faith not to believe than to believe”, indicating that deep down they realize faith is nonsense.

minthegap “So, it actually takes more faith to believe in science than it does in the Bible.” lol. you just drove many christians crazy with that one.

and where are you coming from that it takes MORE faith to believe in what is proven than what is not?

Well egg, I agree with you as I so often do. I don’t like to see any group stereotyped like this. It makes it that much harder to appeal to the more reasonable members.

like I told minthegap… “you just drove many christians crazy with that one”

too funny signed, a virtuous atheist evolutionary scientist

“True scientific knowledge will prove God, not the other way around. Not everthing that claims to be truth, is in fact, truth”

Sigh.

You are claiming that “true” scientific knowledge will prove god, yet no science has ever done anything of the sort. I guess all our knowledge to date is not the truth, yet it seems to work really well.

Your assumption is that god is real and scientific endeavours will prove this to be true. However, science is not lead by prior assumptions - it is lead by the evidence. To date there is absolutely no evidence of a divine creator, let alone any one deity in-particular. Seems you have your work cut out for you.

Science proves god isn’t real…case closed

I think sometimes we as Christians forget that though the bible is the divinly inspired work of God, it was written and translated many times by men. Men make mistakes and some things are lost in the translation. There are certain things in science we detest, but I believe on the whole most christians respect science and some of us learn it as well as our bibles. I cannot say this for myself, other than the basic knowledge learned in highschool and below.

As to why we all hate it… Well we don’t all dislike it. Some are more knowledgable than others. I personally don’t hate science, I just don’t understand it as well as others.

I dont get why people follow the bible when there are hard facts that prove many of the things in it wrong. see, they believe the bible first, and when others tell them its wrong, they fall back on the excuse that science is ‘challenging their faith’ I think they are challenging MY faith in the logic and reasoning humans are supposed to have evolved to.

True Toadaly, but the majority of most religions have not shone the light of reason, logic, or decent standards of evidence to their own beliefs. Many are quick to point out the ridiculous beliefs of other faiths or cults, but fail to see the same flaws in their own. This sort of hypocrisy is unforgivable as well as being one of the root causes of bigotry and violence in this world.

Well, I can’t speak for any Christians except myself, but I have no problem with people using science to support anything. Science can be used to support a christian point of view also, and most of the time, non believers do not like that because they cannot refute science and christian belief together, usually working to discredit both of them. Check out this site: www.faithreason.org

oh semi1900, you do make me giggle. thanks for the good answer. I am amazed also.

“Be careful with generalizations. The vocal fundamentalist Christians overrepresented online are not representative of Christians in the general population, as far as I can tell.

On this particular site, there is one individual Christian I can think of (but won’t name) who has expressed disdain for both reason in general, as well as the scientific approach.” good one toadaly. I bet I know who you are talking about. lol.

Not all believers are against science. Like I said in other advice the most brilliant physicist and computer scientist I ever met was a devout Christian.

It is only a certain type of believer who feels threatened by science and reason.

I remember on a long road trip where for part of the drive the only station I could pick up was a fundamentalist AM station. The topic was science and religion. They denounced evolution because they said it went against the Bible stories. He explained, “when studying science, believers must only accept that which agrees with the Bible.” That is the filter they use. For them the Bible defines truth and when evidence goes against their definitive volume it is the evidence that is wrong rather than their Bible.

Be careful with generalizations. The vocal fundamentalist Christians overrepresented online are not representative of Christians in the general population, as far as I can tell.

On this particular site, there is one individual Christian I can think of (but won’t name) who has expressed disdain for both reason in general, as well as the scientific approach.

“That old 2000 year old book of faith called God’s word/The bible contains all the answers, bottom line - it’s up to each person to accept or reject it’s message…Hope this helps !!”

I know it sounds anal of me, and I know it’s a little off topic, but the Bible isn’t 2000 years old, that’s just when Jesus is said to have lived. Your translation of the Bible is probably no more than 400 years old, more likely around 100. The original Bible was compiled about 1600 years ago. And some parts of the Torah were put into written form around 2900 years ago.

Once again, it never ceases to amaze me how little some Christians know about their own holy book.

That’s a great question. I wish I understood the mentality of all those Christians. Someday, they may understand that scientific evidence is much more feasible than a book that has been edited, rewritten, copied, and is 2000 years old. Science has come so far, that it proves many Christian beliefs wrong, but I think they are too scared to admit it. People just need to open their eyes and see that blind faith doesn’t cancel out hard facts.

I enjoyed this one. Thanks! :D

Great question.

I think deep down they know that their beliefs do not make any sense, not have any evidence supporting them. Once someone truly believes that living without god is a sure fire ticket to hell, no amount of evidence or reason can shift them from the fear of punishment from their “all loving” deity.

Sad really.

Yes, that’s right. Fundies have proven that atheists are more virtuous than themselves.

amblessed, how does the story of Jephthah sacrificing his daughter answer the question?

Remember that next time you call out to Him.