Albert Einstein’s True Religious Beliefs Revealed

Or antithesis.

"Well, there is no supporting evidence that we know of so we might as well just give up researching." - Where exactly did you extract that quote? I do not remember 'giving up' to be any part of the comment to which you replied.

@cdahlkvist

Actually, research only continues on a given subject if there is supporting evidence. The evidence may just be a thought experiment, or an indication that something behaves in a certain way, but generally scientists don't investigate something that has zero evidence to support it at the time.

Black holes, quantum physics, galaxies, etc are all indirectly evidenced by things such as being able to observe the effects these things have on what we can observe.

The is no point 'researching' the question of a supernatural being, because there is zero, nil, none, nothing, zilch, nada - to support the assertion that there is one.

You can 'research' it all you want, but if you have to use some book that some guy wrote and was agreed on in a committee, you've failed.

@Metman

It's a "straw man" argument. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man

Religion simply isn't falsifiable. It is impossible to prove or disprove. That is why it is not scientific.

Oh, my dear pawn. How you have been manipulated. Let's just suppose that "God" caused the universe to exist. Now what? Everything that's happened since then can be attributed to non-mystical explanations. So why do you feel the need to worship this thing that caused the universe to come into existence. Seems a bit of a waste of time, eh?

@jezsik:
Christians and other religious sorts can't accept the fact that they're entirely made up of physical matter and the interactions thereof. They appear to think that such an existence is meaningless, without purpose.

I don't know what brought them to that conclusion, except that they had such nonsense hammered into their heads since birth.

@PawnsOfJoshua - "a creator is the best possible explanation...the laws of physics didn't spontaneously define themselves."

It amazes me how religious types are quick to proclaim that the universe is so complex that there must have been a creator. Tell me then, how complex must this creator have been to create the universe? Does not the same "too complex" argument apply to God? Please explain.

@PawnsOfJoshua, I guess my simple post really touched a nerve there. Sorry, pal. So, you don't worship a god? Fair enough, but I'm sure you can easily see how I could be drawn to that conclusion. Most theists, after all, worship a god of some sort or other. Defining the nature of the creator is indeed absurd; just as absurd as calculating the number of angels that can dance on the head of a pin or the size of the turtle upon which the universe rests. So, what, exactly, makes logical sense to you? When you observe (for lack of a better term) some phenomena which you can not explain, do you write it off as the work of "the creator" and go on about your merry way, or do you think up ideas that could explain the phenomena? If it's the later, then there's hope for you. As for knowing everything since the dawn of existence, I don't. We, as in the scientific community, have some pretty good ideas what happened and those ideas are refined and even overturned as better ideas and new evidence are uncovered. So far, there's been no need to fall back on the ol' "Jehova did it!" cop out.
As for understanding existence, whatever do you mean? Can you not observe all that is about you and can you not provide an explanation as to how these things came about? I can, indeed. There's no mysticism involved. Mystery, yes, but no mysticism. You're blown away by fact that if either gravity or electromagnetism didn't exist we wouldn't exist? Why do you find that so astonishing? So, uh, just out of curiosity, what is it that this god of yours does for you, anyway? If you think he created the universe, kicked off the big bang if you will, what then?

"How ignorant can you possibly be to assume that you even *know* everything that has happened since the dawn of existence...or why it happened. You are talking about observing an infinitely vast cosmos from a incomprehensibly limited perspective to come up with the supremely arrogant and obnoxious conclusion that mankind can explain or define existence from that perspective."

Actually, we're pretty certain we *don't* know exactly what happened at the dawn of the universe, and readily admit that the theories we've got going are supported by evidence, but that the evidence is derived.

We know that there was a big bang, and we now live in a period of universal expansion. We have no idea what caused the big bang or what's causing the expansion*.

That's not license for anyone to jump in, yelling "Magic Man Done It!", which is increasingly what it feels like. Postulating a deity for which there is no explanation to explain something which has no explanation is only ever adding an extra step.

So, science readily admits vagueness at best as to the cause of the universe. Theists claim absolute knowledge of the cause, and go on to assume that their causer is better than anyone else's causer. Who is arrogant here? Who is ignorant? I don't roll with your assertion that it's those that humbly admit information gaps, then proceed to search for the data to fill those holes.

@Fordi
"Christians and other religious sorts can't accept the fact that they're entirely made up of physical matter and the interactions thereof. They appear to think that such an existence is meaningless, without purpose.

I don't know what brought them to that conclusion, except that they had such nonsense hammered into their heads since birth."

I'm a religious sort. I'm a Buddhist. I acknowledge that I'm made of physical matter. I also acknowledge that the majority of the universe is made of dark energy and dark matter, as in, shit that we know nothing about. I say, keeping that in mind, people have a fair amount of wiggle room for their beliefs to be scientifically plausible, once we advance to a certain degree of scientific understanding. By the way, I wasn't born as a Buddhist, I converted.

Science does not claim to make any assumption about religion. Religion and science can co-exist quite well, it's all about the person interpreting them.

That, I'm afraid, depends entirely on the specific philosophy.

fyngyrz - it's just semantics. My point being that an honest seeking of objective truth is both science and philosophy, but never dogma.

Philosophy is required in order to define the word "truth" and what it means. Religion tells you what truth is (i.e. the bible/koran/etc.).