"Everything cannot be proved", he replied as emphatically as her
"What are you guys debating about?", I asked
"I am religious and I believe there is God but she says prove it to me", he explained
"Yes, I will only believe when there is a scientific explanation", she emphasised
I was about to join the debate but realised I had more pressing things to worry about, however there was a fundamental flaw in her argument
In 1831 electricity became viable for use in technology when Michael Faraday created the electric dynamo and later Thomas Edison and Joseph Swam discovered incandescent filament light bulb. If we had questioned someone in 1830, on existence of electricity, what would have been their answer?
Radio was invented in 1895. If we had questioned someone in 1894 on the existence of radio waves, what would have been their answer?
It was in the 19th century, that the Atomic Theory was discovered, where it was stated that matter is composed of discrete units called Atoms. If we had questioned someone in the 18th century on the existence of Atoms, what would have been their answer?
Would not knowing the existence of something, make it a non-reality? Would not having the means to confirm something, make it non-existant?
This debate is long drawn however the premise to claim one would believe only once 'scientifically' proven begs for want of imagination. Science has proved and with the same vigour scientists have disproven. At school we studied, in 1930 Pluto was discovered and christened as the smallest and the ninth planet in our solar system. In 2003, an astronomer saw an object (Eris) which was larger and beyond Pluto. This caused the astronomers to re-think on what is a planet and downgraded Pluto from a Planet to a Plutoid. Probably when we have better telescopes, astronomers may downgrade others too!
As homo sapiens there are many things that we know; and a lot many that we don't
Science = Data;
Science != always reality
Every discovery & every invention stems from an imagination. To limit one's imagination over existing facts is curtailing the very spirit of knowledge
Krishna, there is another dimension to this problem. Logic-based proof is what your friend was asking. Logic is a human creation to explain and reason about facts we perceive in this physical world. Logic itself was proved to be incomplete - in the sense it cannot answer all questions or deduce all proofs by Godel. You may know some of paradoxes that cannot be resolved with logic. Now to reason about existence of God, there are two issues. Logic about the physical world does not cut it for metaphysical reasoning like God, emotions, etc. Second reasoning about metaphysical entities requires competence and preparation and maturity of mind, just like reasoning about physical entities. It is amusing at best, that such arguments occur, even then pre-requisites to have the argument are not met. Also, if one ascribes to believing is seeing, which is what you seem to be alluding, there is hope of eventually experiencing Godliness.
ReplyDeleteEven if you did not have pressing things to worry about you'd have been better off to be removed from such arguments :)