Like phlogiston. Obviously the existence of an incorrect idea about a physical aspect of reality indicates that all ideas about physical aspects of reality are incorrect.
Ohh, wait a second, the same group that said they were the ultimate authority figures on God also said they were the ultimate authority figures on cosmology and science! Ohh, wait a second, does this mean they might have been incorrect on various assumptions they made about God as well as the incorrect assumptions they made about cosmology and science? No, couldn't be.
Let me put on my thinking cap... hrmm, obviously since they were wrong about certain ideas they are logically correct about everything else they say. It's not their method of thought that led to these conclusions, it's just science sciencing their science holes, which makes them wrong about science, but absolutely right about everything they say about God.
Now, let's think about this for just a little bit. The same people who deny scientific aspects of reality also say things about God. They say these things because the "science" comes from their interpretation of a book. Now. I'm going to go way the fuck out on a limb here and guess that.. well, maybe, just maybe, the book that contains a bit of inaccurate cosmological and mathematical claims might just have a few pieces of misinformation about God as well.
In fact, I'm going to go to an older book, the Bhagavad Gita, and paraphrase something contained within: one does not know God through scriptures (holy books), one gets to know God by knowing God.
Science isn't concerned with authorities; when people who claim to be doing science instead defer to authority, the conclusions they reach are often wrong, and are never scientific. (Of course, the same is true of people who don't claim to be doing science).
The phlogiston model is inaccurate, but workable; phlogiston is the absence of oxygen. Obviously it is cumbersome and pointless to use the absence of a thing in an equation, rather than the thing itself; and accurate determination of the masses present before and after something burns - taking account of the mass of gasses present as well as that of solids and liquids - show that what was postulated as a material (phlogiston) is in fact the absence of another material (oxygen).
The phlogiston hypothesis is wrong, but not very wrong; it describes many combustion events fairly well, but doesn't describe others very well at all, and doesn't lead to many useful insights in non-combustion chemistry; while the oxygen hypothesis describes almost all combustion events very well, and does lead to other useful insights in chemistry.
Your error here is in assuming that science - specifically in this case, chemistry - relies on authoritative statements written in books, that people are expected to accept without question. Chemistry does not work like this (ETA - although sadly it is often taught like this in schools); instead, it consists of statements written in books which are considered authoritative if
and only if they have been, and continue to be, subjected to intense criticism, and widespread testing; and if (and only if) the statements survive this criticism, and cannot be shown by testing to be incorrect or inadequate, do they remain - which is why the oxygen hypothesis remains, and phlogiston does not.
Science is not really about what is known to be true; it is about what is known to be false. Phlogiston doesn't make the cut; so far, oxygen does - but if it is shown to be wrong, the oxygen hypothesis will be dropped just as the phlogiston hypothesis was. The history of science is full of stuff that is now known to be false; Doubtless some of the stuff currently believed to be 'probably true' will go the same way. Nothing in science is certain - although in many cases, testing has shown that the uncertainty is so small as to be negligible. So much has now been demonstrated to be false, that most of what remains is very likely to be true. All of what remains is more likely to be true than any of what has been disproved.
There is nothing authoritative about the rejection of God by science; like phlogiston, God is simply not up to the job of providing a better explanation for any observation than can be provided by other, more useful, hypotheses. God is not needed to explain anything; everything with a known explanation - and that is now most things - has an explanation that does not involve and gods. Anything with no known explanation is unknown - you could say 'it might be God'; but you could, with the exact same level of certainty and justification say 'it might be phlogiston'. If 'God' simply means 'unknown', then God is not worthy of worship, nor of love; and the idea of doing the will of the unknown is meaningless.
Scientists do not authoritatively assert the existence of things, but they do authoritatively assert their non-existence. Both God and phlogiston fall into this category. Of course, phlogiston might still be real, if the definition of the word 'phlogiston' is changed such that it has nothing to do with combustion; but to assert that phlogiston is real because you have changed your definitions is just weasely underhanded nonsense.
Trying to maintain that the phlogiston hypothesis has not, in fact, been falsified, requires first that you either agree that the definition of 'phlogiston' that is in common use is the one that you will also use; Or that you first provide a complete and clear statement of the properties that you claim phlogiston to have.
Trying to maintain that the God hypothesis has not, in fact, been falsified, requires first that you either agree that the definition of 'God' that is in common use is the one that you will also use; Or that you first provide a complete and clear statement of the properties that you claim God to have.
If you talk about phlogiston, but are not using the word in the common way, and have not provided any clear definition of your own, then people are never going to comprehend you.
If you talk about God, but are not using the word in the common way, and have not provided any clear definition of your own, then people are never going to comprehend you.
If you care about being understood, you need to provide a clear and complete statement of the important characteristics of God, as you define the word. If your definition of God is not (as the common use has it) omnipotent - able to do anything - then you need to define what you consider the limits to Gods power are; If God is not the creator of all things, you need to define what, if anything, he created. If God is not all knowing, you need to tell us what the limits of Gods knowledge are. If you don't do this, then you are not communicating at all.
If I say 'There is a car in the kitchen', then you cannot be blamed for failing to understand that it is the sort of car that has legs instead of wheels, and is a few inches long, and squeaks rather than going 'Vroom, vroom!', and eats cheese rather than using petrol. In fact, when I say 'car', I have something very definite in mind - but if that word brings to your mind something very definite, but very different from what I am talking about, it is me who has failed to communicate. If you say 'What kind of seats does the car have?', and I reply 'Seats? LOL! If you knew anything about cars, you would know they don't have seats!', then we will get nowhere.
I can, of course, eliminate the confusion, by saying, "By 'car', I mean what you might call a 'mouse'". If I fail to do so, then it isn't your fault that you don't have a clue what I am on about.
In other words; Define exactly what YOU mean when you say 'God', or just stop posting about God, because nobody else can possibly understand what you are saying in the absence of a definition.
