Famous Scientists Who Believed in God

Originally posted by stellspalfie
prove it.

God works in ways not foreseeable by Man. God is bound to come to you if you call out to him / her / it. And as they say in our Hindu religion God's speed is much more than humans. It is said that if you take one step towards him, he will close the distance by a hundred steps. I cannot prove to you the existence of God, certainly not by arguments over the Internet. But I do urge you to look within yourself, consider the matter calmly, and if Love, Kindness, Empathy with all living creatures, Joy in simple pleasures of Life mean anything to you, you will know that these are the manifestations of God.

Originally posted by humy
“...set aside your scientific principles for a few moments ...”

you are asking him to be stupid for a few moments.
What do you think are the chances of him doing this?

Scientific principles and Stupidity are not mutually exclusive, as you wish to suggest. Many a Scientific Principles of the past have been proved false over time. Scientists claim that it is an advantage of the scientific method that it is possible that this or that theory gets disproved over time. They say that this one of the great merits of scientific method. While I agree with that view, I suppose I can call some of the old scientific theories such as a Newtonian Mechanistic view of the Universe as a Stupidity, given that you claim that it is Stupid on someone's part to lay aside scientific principles for a few moments, as I suggested. Or are you saying that Scientific Principles are " Holy " in some way to be genuflected in front of ? Has the new God Dawkins decreed that ? Scientific principles are creations of Man and not parts of our body that we can't cast them off even for a moment.
Kindly do have a look at page 16 of Sir Arthur Eddington's book " The Philosophy of Physical Science ". The quote is too long but I will give it if you are interested.

Originally posted by RJHinds
[b]Yes He did. HalleluYah !!! 😏[/b]

didnt.

Originally posted by rvsakhadeo
God works in ways not foreseeable by Man. God is bound to come to you if you call out to him / her / it. And as they say in our Hindu religion God's speed is much more than humans. It is said that if you take one step towards him, he will close the distance by a hundred steps. I cannot prove to you the existence of God, certainly not by arguments over th ...[text shortened]... pleasures of Life mean anything to you, you will know that these are the manifestations of God.

you dont have to belief in a god to enjoy the simple things in life and feel empathy. what does your god offer me that i dont already have?

Originally posted by rvsakhadeo
... I can call some of the old scientific theories such as a Newtonian Mechanistic view of the Universe as a Stupidity, ...

Well aren't you the smart one!

I don't believe any modern scientist would have your arrogance.

Newton was a genius.

Originally posted by RJHinds
My guess is that we would never have heard of him if he had not honored God.

What an idiot I've been! There I was thinking Newton is revered today as an innovative and brilliant scientist formulating the law of gravity, amongst other laws, and the classical mechanical view of the actions of the planets and celestial bodies in the universe, whereas, in fact, we only know of him today because of his belief in God! You learn something every day.
RJH, you give out the persona of being a very strange person, a bigot and a twisted extremist fanatatic. Please tell me you are just having some rather sick fun and that you do not believe in what you say!

Originally posted by stellspalfie
you dont have to belief in a god to enjoy the simple things in life and feel empathy. what does your god offer me that i dont already have?

What you possess are the God given gifts to you. That is what I was saying, which you have not appreciated. My God is your and everybody's God too. You may curse God, call him the vilest possible names, it will not matter, so long as you build a relationship with him. It will then God's call to come to you.

Originally posted by RJHinds
I would not put too much trust in the conclusions. These people have a tendency
to do a lot of assuming.

The conclusions come from a statistical analysis of actual data. What “assumptions” are you referring to in this case that could lead to a different mathematical conclusion if false? Give just one explicit example of just such an assumption so we can scrutinise it.

Originally posted by rvsakhadeo
Scientific principles and Stupidity are not mutually exclusive, as you wish to suggest. Many a Scientific Principles of the past have been proved false over time. Scientists claim that it is an advantage of the scientific method that it is possible that this or that theory gets disproved over time. They say that this one of the great merits of scientific hy of Physical Science ". The quote is too long but I will give it if you are interested.

“...Scientific principles and Stupidity are not mutually exclusive, as you wish to suggest. Many a Scientific Principles of the past have been proved false over time....”

I took the term “ Scientific Principles” to mean “scientific method” and not to be confused with scientific theories that come from scientific method.
Scientific method has NEVER been proven false on any occasion.
Only some ( not all ) scientific theories are proven false.


“.... Scientists claim that it is an advantage of the scientific method that it is possible that this or that theory gets disproved over time. They say that this one of the great merits of scientific method. While I agree with that view, ...”

good.

“...I suppose I can call some of the old scientific theories such as a Newtonian Mechanistic view of the Universe as a Stupidity, given that you claim that it is Stupid on someone's part to lay aside scientific principles for a few moments, as I suggested. ...”


how so? are those “scientific principles” scientific theories or scientific method?
If you are referring to scientific theories then I never said nor implied that anyone that rejects a scientific theory is “stupid” merely because of that.
But, if you referring to basic scientific method ( generally that means: make observations and conclude nothing more than you can rationally deduce or extrapolate from those observations and, if make a theory from rational extrapolation, make sure it is both falsifiable and self-consistent and then think how it could be wrong and then test its predictions ) then rejecting basic scientific method IS stupid.

“....Or are you saying that Scientific Principles are " Holy " in some way to be genuflected in front of ? ...”

No, stupid.

“.. Scientific principles are creations of Man ...”

really! What a surprise! I never noticed we make principles! 😛
OK, enough of insulting my intelligence.

“....and not parts of our body that we can't cast them off even for a moment. ...”

what the hell does that mean? -What? You think that I thought that scientific principles is something that is part of our bodies that we can physically remove?

Originally posted by humy
The conclusions come from a statistical analysis of actual data. What “assumptions” are you referring to in this case that could lead to a different mathematical conclusion if false? Give just one explicit example of just such an assumption so we can scrutinise it.

The following is a quote taken directly from the article:

"Gallup based its study on the assumption that college graduates have a higher IQ than high school and grade school graduates."

They seem to have an agenda against religious belief and I think it is the
Christian belief in particular that they are concentrating on. For example,
they seem to assume that being a virgin is a bad thing when they say
virgins are more likely to have low IQs. They also must assume that if
they were to check everyone in the world that the proportion will remain
the same as their sample group.

P.S. Bill Gates never graduated from college but I would suspect he may have
a high IQ.

Originally posted by humy
“...Scientific principles and Stupidity are not mutually exclusive, as you wish to suggest. Many a Scientific Principles of the past have been proved false over time....”

I took the term “ Scientific Principles” to mean “scientific method” and not to be confused with scientific theories that come from scientific method.
Scientific method has NEVER been prov scientific principles is something that is part of our bodies that we can physically remove?

So you have now resorted to name calling ? Well, I will answer that later on, let me first deal with my request to Sonhouse and your interjection on behalf of Sonhouse. I requested to Sonhouse to lay aside his scientific principles for a few moments. I then and now meant that he lay aside all his mental baggage as a follower of Science, which while very useful in the Material world, is of no use in the pursuit of Spiritual Realization. That included the Scientific method and theories, both. Keeping aside one's mental baggage for a few moments is necessary when one is in a relearning or new learning mode. That did not or will not make him or anyone " Stupid ". You seem to indicate that only stupid people will drop their Scientific Principles--even for a few moments. This was absurd. Are we humans behaving all the time duly abiding by the Scientific Principles ? We are rational animals--it is true but we are also emotional and intuitive and do not apply scientific method every moment to everything we do. How dropping one's scientific principles for a few moments makes one " Stupid " ?? You are calling , in effect, all theists as "Stupid ". In a fit of spite, you have called me " Stupid " ! I request you to stop this name calling and get into a healthy debate.

Originally posted by rvsakhadeo
. You seem to indicate that only stupid people will drop their Scientific Principles--even for a few moments. This was absurd. Are we humans behaving all the time duly abiding by the Scientific Principles ? We are rational animals--it is true but we are also emotional and intuitive and do not apply scientific method every moment to everything we do. .

scientific principles apply to everything. if you are being emotional or intuitive you are doing so for a reason and using algorithms to make metal and physical decisions. it is impossible not to. if you need a god to make you feel warm and fuzzy thats fine, im sure it helps you make sense of the world. why dont you try not being all spiritual for 5 minutes and have a look at the wonders of science, maybe you will find you didnt need god after all.

Originally posted by stellspalfie
scientific principles apply to everything. if you are being emotional or intuitive you are doing so for a reason and using algorithms to make metal and physical decisions. it is impossible not to. if you need a god to make you feel warm and fuzzy thats fine, im sure it helps you make sense of the world. why dont you try not being all spiritual for 5 min ...[text shortened]... tes and have a look at the wonders of science, maybe you will find you didnt need god after all.

I appreciate and admire Science. We are talking to each other electronically because of that. I am a practicing structural Engineer by profession. I am 65 and will be completing 66 this August. At the same time I understand the limitations of Science. Science is a powerful tool to explore and understand the material world. However, Science is of no use in the exploration of our Spiritual Space. We need to adopt different tools for this and the first and foremost difficulty that comes in the way of any start on this path is our ego. Unless we recognise that our ego is not allowing us to absorb spiritual knowledge, we won't progress. This is not delusional understanding of the issue please note. Our ancestors, the Hindu sages who wrote the Vedas and Upanishads were not foolish or superstitious people. They were in full control of their faculties and very sharp besides. They believed in Direct Experience and yes, they had no consciousness altering drugs or other messy things to play with. Whatever they conveyed in these books, I am committed to follow, by my own choice. Thanks.

Originally posted by rvsakhadeo
I appreciate and admire Science. We are talking to each other electronically because of that. I am a practicing structural Engineer by profession. I am 65 and will be completing 66 this August. At the same time I understand the limitations of Science. Science is a powerful tool to explore and understand the material world. However, Science is of no use i ...[text shortened]... ith. Whatever they conveyed in these books, I am committed to follow, by my own choice. Thanks.

my knowledge of hinduism is pretty poor i will admit, could you give me some examples of what can be found exploring spiritual space? what is their to find?

Originally posted by rvsakhadeo
The Saints and theistic philosophers that India has produced over the ages are innumerable. Many of them are living today. Their sayings, the poetry or prose that they wrote, the advice that they gave to the troubled and the unhappy is all very well known and in many cases written down. None--- I repeat NONE-- of these persons have exhibited any anxiety earning possible. Surely, that is there in your Psychology Primer that you are chucking at me ?

Can you explain why you see the position of disbelief of the existence of God because there is no evidence of the existence of God as a product of ego? You have said that one needs to "surrender [ones] ego" and "gets one's ego out of the way", but still haven't said why you believe such a position is the product of ego. I'm truly interested. It wouldn't seem to be the case. Specifically, how is the ego involved in the construction and maintenance of that position?

Perhaps you didn't understand the following:
"If anything, the insistence of the existence of God without evidence seems to point to ego: The individual has anxiety/fear of the unknown and his ego constructs the notion of God and all that goes with it, in order to alleviate it. The individual then defends his notion of God in order to protect that which alleviates his anxiety/fear."

So there's two stages. The first provides the reason why the ego would constuct the notion of God despite the lack of evidence of God. The second provides the reason why the ego would be protective of that construct. That some have completely alleviated their anxiety/fear of the unknown via the belief in God doesn't really address the second stage. It would seem that such persons are simply resolute in their belief. In effect they are protecting that belief. It's still a product of ego.