Scientists asks skeptics to investigate God

[TriSec]

Scientist encourages skeptics to investigate God

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. --He opened the session by improvising on hymns at the piano and concluded it by accompanying a sing-along on the guitar. In between, he delivered a compelling account of his unlikely conversion from atheism to evangelical Christianity.

The lanky, amiable platform personality wasn't some traveling revivalist but one of the world's leading biologists.

Francis S. Collins led the international Human Genome Project that mapped the 3.1 billion chemical base pairs in humanity's DNA. He now directs the U.S. government program on applying that information to medical treatments.

He's also emerged as a surprise advocate for faith and for its compatibility with science.

The 56-year-old Collins addressed the clash of science and religion last weekend during a conference at Williams College sponsored by the C.S. Lewis Foundation -- appropriately so, since the writings of the English literature scholar were instrumental in Collins' conversion.

[LiberalVoice]

1. How does one investigate something for which no proof is possible? nt

[xchrom]

3. you know -- i have no idea -- and i'm a believer.

nor do i think it's the point.

i don't know WHY people can't leave each other alone -- so he found god!?!? good, now shut up and get back to work -- or something.

[Exiled in America]

14. Hear hear! I feel the same way.

God I swear, so what if the guy found god?? Some of you folks act like its some personal betrayal or something. Let people explore their lives as they see fit, and interpret their experiences through whatever language brings them joy and happiness!

Until he starts telling you you're not free to live your life in the way you see fit what difference does it make?

[ironbark]

11. Perhaps by looking to a scale of 'probability'

rather than 'proof'.

Much of what we believe and do is based on a calculation of 'the odds'
rather than a foundation of proof or certainty.

[LiberalVoice]

12. Ok, how do I measure the "probablitly" that a being...

working outside of the laws of science created the universe? :P

[Zhade]

13. Probability does not equal evidence of existence.

NT!

[Jeroen]

16. Look at the surface and study the ripples. Science does it all the time

"..huh...there must be something moving under the surface, George!"

[Random_Australian]

17. Right, and what are these ripples?

What's that? There is no set of information that God HAS to do, therefore no set is evidence? Thought so.

Or, you could change by mind with some good examples... but be warned, I have taken care to look wherever I can for evidence of anything, God included.

[Jeroen]

18. The question should be: what is causing the ripples?

You cannot answer that question and I cannot tell you what the ripples are.

We both don't know where this Universe comes from (beyond the Big Bang)
This Universe could be a beautiful, but meaningless accident, it could be a beautiful design.
I find the idea of 'a beautiful design' no more insane that the idea of 'a beautiful accident'.

There is no point in proving the existence of God. I agree on that.
But there is also no point in proving the non-existence of God.

I guess we are trapped in a boolean mindset - 'to be or not to be'.
What is we are both wrong? What if 'to be' and 'not to be' are just two variations of n-possibilities?
Once we believed that the earth was flat. We should keep that in mind.



On edit: I am Dutch, makes it hard sometimes to formulate my thoughts in English.

[Random_Australian]

20. The english thing is no problem, after these Americans.

:) (kidding, Americans!)

1) We both don't know...... yet. Actually, that is precisely what I hope to specialise in. :D (I am a university student)

2) My atheism does not rely on disproving God.

3) Booloean mindset? Actually, I prefer a preaxiomic concept of God. (One in which Not-God can equal God, but that also means that God is not God - though I shall not go into it further, I am trying to unstick myself from the boolean mindset :) - it is going ok but it is tough work)

[Demit]

2. Apparently they're supposed to go hiking in the Cascades.

So his odyssey of looking for evidence that God exists includes reading C.S. Lewis, struggling & studying for two years, then going hiking. Okay. That's nice. It really has nothing to do with science though. And faith never had to be incompatible with science to begin with. That's religionists who insist on that, not scientists. Apparently this guy is on a little mini-crusade because the 40% of his fellow scientists who are religious aren't noisy enough about it. Feh.

[acmejack]

5. I see.

[charlie]

4. If he's saying

Try God, You'll Like Him, I say go for it. None of my business anyway. But if he's calling for investigation in their capacity as scientists, that's fatuous nonsense. I think it's the former, but I'm not sure from reading the article.

[varkam]

6. Oy.

That's all we need - evangelical scientists.

[no_hypocrisy]

7. I would believe as a scientist and a theologian, Collins has the burden

of proof to demonstrate evidence of a supernatural being in terms of physical science.

[Exiled in America]

15. of course, that presumes Collins believes in a clasical theism's god...

...which is not a given.

I for instance, couldn't look for proof of a "supernatural being" for several reasons. First, if its "super-natural" then its not going to be provable naturally. Second, I don't believe god is "supernatural." Third, I don't believe god is a "being."

So every time people say the same thing over and over "there's no proof of a supernatural being" I continually go... "that's because its probable that no 'supernatural being' exists. That has no connection to my belief in that which is worthy of being called "god" since god is, in my opinion, not appropriately called "super-natural" (thus outside of nature) or a "being" (as though he is one being along side other beings.

I'm just sayin' :)

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

8. I think if this happens

both the religious and the non religious concepts of God will change.

Because what we're talking about here are concepts.

[Finder]

9. You catch more flies with honey....

and if this guy can cause the fundies to study a bit of science then kudos to him. As we all know, fundy types are more about the messenger than the message. They will see him as "one of theirs."

[charlie]

10. Maybe

Did you catch the bit about the "frosty" reception he got from a meeting of Christian doctors when he told them the evidence for evolution was overwhelming? He might have a tough road with Fundies, his specialty is genetic mapping and engineering, which is the Devil's Science. In any case, I don't have much hope that Fundies can regard science as anything more than another realm to conquer and bend to their whims. Look at Dembski, he's practically a member of the Lie and Distortion of the Week Club.

[SPKrazy]

19. Sounds Like An Interesting Man

although, what happens when a) science does or doesn't prove God exists?
b) Science does or doesn't prove something else is responsible?

I think the odds of either happening are relatively small since you can't prove something that you can't measure, and you can't measure something that you can't prove.

I for one was happy when the experiment failed where they had people praying for people.
Can you imagine if it had succeeded? We'd have people being hired to pray, pray over the phone, pray in large prayer sweathouses in 3rd world countries for low wages, I don't know, it just sounds like something I'd rather not have any more commercialized than it already has been.

I mean I'm thinking we need another Martin Luther today (not King, although we could use one or a thousand of him too!) to nail some treatises on the door of the fundies as they are basically charging people for access to God (or perceived access) when Jesus said the Kingdom of Heaven is now.

anyway, back to the OP, he sounds like an interesting, although misled, person.