Winner and Losers of 2005

[vista]

I'm not saying that Chico's belief is not valid

Fungus

I am.

Belief is required when no rational proof is available ergo Jesus is as proven as Santa, the tooth fairy and the easter bunny.

Now don't get me wrong, if a bunch of people want an excuse to do good works, help other people, get comfort and feel good about themselves along the way then I'm all for it and think it should be encouraged, theres enough bad in the world already (criminals, murderers, rapists, child molestors, child killers, necrophilicas and politicians etc.) but I think if you truly, truly believe in a supreme being then you are at best a little bit mad if not stark raving bonkers - but in a good way rather than a stabby, shooty sort of way.

Wow! Mention religion and all the nutters come out to play.

[Jabberwocky]

Science is not based on proof, only a very narrow part of it is - pure mathematics - and that has very little bearing on the real world. Sure the pure punk will tell you it does, but they are looking for their next grant check.
Science is itself a belief system.

Science is based on axiom, experiment and politics - increasingly on politics. Bit like religion really, the axioms are in the bible, the experiments are on the human mind, and the politics, well, just join your local church.

People who ask for a proof of God display their ignorance and narrow-mindedness. It is a meaningless question - it like asking a pure mathematician to prove their axioms.

[sasguru]

Science is not based on proof, only a very narrow part of it is - pure mathematics - and that has very little bearing on the real world. ...

Really? - have you ever been on a plane, car or train, used a computer, switched on a light, watched TV, taken medicinal drugs?

What do you think gave the West its power if not a certain empirical way of thinking which the rest of the world did not entertain. It amuses me that the Chicos and Jabbers of this world partake of of the fruit of the Enlightenment while denying its existence.

Of course this does not add to our spiritual growth - but the invention of a non-existent God is not the best way to solve that problem.

[EternalOptimist]

The problem Vista, is that not everyone who believes in Jesus wants to do good things. Chico is an example (in my opinion) of someone who believes in Jesus who wants to do horrible things.
I just dont understand why all beliefs have to be given equal weight.

I havnt yet heard anything from the fundamentalist wing of the Easter-bunny-istas but the moment they want to bomb all countries that teach the children that it all comes from Wily Wonka, then that is belief gone dangerous.

[cojak]

Hmmm...

So they've given up on setting out a hypothesis then going out to disprove it then?

Or are you referring to the South Korean branch of science Jabbers?

[Chico]

And what horrible things do I want to do? For the avoidance of doubt I will state what my mission statement is.

Matthew 28

18Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."

That for uninitiated is called the Great Commission - the duty of every Christian.Tell the world about Jesus yes and that includes IT contractors in the UK.

[Jabberwocky]

Hmmm...

So they've given up on setting out a hypothesis then going out to disprove it then?

Or are you referring to the South Korean branch of science Jabbers?

There is a difference between gathering evidence and proof. Proof in a mathematical sense is irrefutable barring errors in logic. When someone says can I prove that God exists, I might as well answer can a scientist prove Newton's laws of motion ? He/she cannot do so because they are empirical laws supported by experiment. And they are not correct on the large or the small scale.

This is by far the most common way "science" is done. The proof of Fermat's last theorem has had very little impact on peoples' lives. The same cannot be said of a belief in a God.

[Chico]

The Professor Teaches About Evil and Christianity

[OwlHoot]

The proof of Fermat's last theorem has had very little impact on peoples' lives.

Give it time, Jabber. The theory of elliptic functions over finite fields, which was developed as a spin-off of attempts to prove Fermat's last theorem, is now used extensively in encryption and code breaking, for example in relation to factoring large integers into primes.

Also, with reference to my post above in this thread, once they can untangle the links between the Langlands duality (also derived from number theory relating to Fermat's last theorem) and Witten's S-duality in string theory, the underlying principles brought to light may open a vast new vista into subtle physical laws never guessed at so far.

(Everyone slags off string theorists these days, even some of the theorists themselves, because their work has so far seemed no more than abstract vaporizing with no firm grasp on reality and no testable results to show for their efforts; but FWIW I reckon their work will pay off big time before too long.)

I must say, that survey paper is one of the most hellishly complicated I've ever seen, and I'd be the first to admit only understanding a tiny fraction. It's very much at the coal face of modern maths, at the bottom of the deepest mine.

[EternalOptimist]

what horrible things ??

have you got dementia as well as delusions ??

how about, war bomb kill maim, war bomb kill maim, hate hate hate, war bomb kill maim


etc