The phenomena are not themselves new: merely newly discovered.
Antti: Yes, you right most natural laws, material, etc. existed before humans started the exploration. However, for the mankind many issues and phenomena are new.
Science does not “specify” natural laws: it documents and analyses them.
Antti: I agree, however, in standard language discovered issues are called “new”, which means new for the science.
Earlier proven issues and methods are always used as the primary evidence for new ones, because effects cannot exist without causes. If we have the courage to pursue this chain of evidence to the very end and meet the original cause then we will always end up with God, i.e. we will find the primary reason, which has no cause.
Why do you claim this?
Antti: Because science evaluates newly discovered phenomena using the earlier proven issues. Our world and universe is amazing because the science can zoom into infinite small wonders like molecules, atoms, neutrons, photons, etc. And on the other hand zoom out into infinite large issues like suns, galaxies, universe, Big Bang, etc. It seems that the primary reason is all the time moving forward when the science makes progress. When one secret has been solved we usually get two new ones to explore. However, we can count that the final primary reason will be the God.
Why do you think that the big bang is a kind of reason, instead of the earliest state of affairs? Indeed, what kind of a thing do you think that reason is such that it can exist without life?
Antti: I do not believe on “Big Bang”, the original assumptions of Big Bang theory do not stand on the solid basis. In any case, the life in the universe must have a very long history.
All matter, energy, life and spirit was compressed into a space smaller than a pinhead 14 billion years ago, according to the current official scientific conception.
I have never heard of any scientist who claimed that life existed fourteen billion years ago. And what scientific evidence do you think that there is in favour of the existence of “the spirit” (whatever you mean by that), let alone evidence that it existed at the time of the big bang?
Antti: If the Big Bang believers think that all started 14 billion years ago then also the raw materials, recipies and formulas of life must have existed at that time already.
The facts do not change: what people believe in relation to them might.
Antti: I have seen that proven scientific facts changes in medicine, chemistry, biology, etc. within the last 50 years. Ofcourse the existing natural laws do not change but our conseption changes.
Science changes and improves our understanding of the universe all the time, however, we will always find God at the final end of every scientific footpath, now and forever.
Upon what reasoning do you base that bizarre claim?
Antti: Just because the science has not been able to find any more convincing primary reason. Do you have any better idea ?
Beauty, wisdom, justice, love and faith cannot be measured with a gauge nor with any physical or chemical instrument.
Neither can the fact of abstraction, the laws of mathematics nor whether or not there is such a thing as equivalence; that does not mean, however, that they are incapable of reasoned analysis, nor that any such thing as a deity is entailed by them.
Antti: Science do not give the answer to the guestion: what is right and what is wrong, this is very important issue for me. Human soul, spirit and religion are able to discuss and evaluate these kind of issues.
What is the basis of your claim that there is such a thing as a “human spirit”, and what, precisely, do you contend that one is?
Antti: I have observed that I have the “human spirit”; when I discuss with the other people I have observed that they have also such a spirit which still exist when all the physical items, body and clothes has been removed. The “human spirit” is all what remains when the material has been removed from the human.
How is that a consequence of the previous proposition?
Antti: You may see the connection one day if you stop fighting back with your God’s Adjuster in your soul.
What, precisely, do you think that “the voice of the material is”? What is “the material”, do you contend, such as it is meaningful to conceive of it having a voice?
Antti: The “voice of the human soul” means opinions, justice, love, caring, concern, etc. The material do not react with this kind of issues.
Why do you think that there is such a thing as the human spirit in the first place?
Antti: Because I have the “human spirit”, I can feel it. You can also feel your spirit if you try hard.
What do you think that right and wrong are such that their nature is incapable of empirical analysis?
Antti: You may carry out empirical analysis on the “right and wrong” but independed research groups in different countries will reach to very different conclusions. The only way to reach the same conclusions is the idea of one God which makes us brothers and sisters with equal human rights.
Different religions purport to answer those questions (in different, conflicting, ways); but there is no reason to believe that any of those answers are correct.
Antti: The main problem is that many religious groups believe that their God is the only one and the best. However, gradually they will understand that only the name of the God is different but the God is the same. Some religious answers must have been correct because we still live on this wonderful planet.
Real science bravely finds out which material issues are true and which are false. Using science, we may improve the welfare of our bodies. Real religion finds out the spiritual issues which are true and which make our soul happy. These positive effects may be used to identify true science and true religion from the false and the fake.
That all assumes that there is such a thing as a soul that can have issues and be made happy. What evidence is there to support such a contention?
Antti: I have observed lot of love, justice, forgiveness and mercy in this world. Many human beings forgot his or her own physical, economical or emotional preferences and take into account also the needs of the other ones. This is the evidence of the soul.
Why do you claim that? Many people believe false things despite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, including precisely the belief that there is a deity.
Antti: According to the empirical scientific observations this world where we live is simply amazing with full of splendid, gorgeous and overwhelming architecture, engineering and design. We may ask “why some people have to suffer” or “why the primary creator do not give clear instructions how to live”. I feel that the most logical reason is that our creator needs souls and spirits who can make their own wise decisions in the dynamic and changing world. We have much more difficult task than being blind robots which obey orders.
Mercy, justice, love, the flowers in the meadow, the atom or the whole universe are all valid evidence of God for the Hindu or
Catholic but the atheist may look at the world from a different perspective.
In what sense are any of those things evidence for the existence of an entity with all the characteristics of a deity?
Antti: I or you have not created these marvellous evidences. We simply live here, we do not know where we come and where we go. We may ask who has created this all? I feel that the most logical answer is the God who is the primary reason for all the natural laws and evolution.
How does the proposition that any particular person exists by itself entail, as you claim, that there exists a deity?
Antti: As I sed, I cannot scientifically prove that God exist but you cannot prove that God do not exist. I see evidences of the God all over the nature, because I know in my soul that God is my primary father and mother. However, if you do not have such a feeling then you cannot see the evidences.
Why do you think that? And, in any event, even if that was true, how does it follow from that that the mere fact of rigorous empirical analysis (science) entails blind faith in anything?
Antti: I cannot understand how some people can be so sure that God do not exist because there is so much things and issues in this world which we cannot see and feel. Empirical scientific work finds every year new physical and chemical phenomena which have not observed earlier.
A Lutheran, Orthodox, Moslem or Jew can be absolutely sure of God, because they do not base their faith on scientific evidence but instead on the God’s Adjuster which lives in our minds.
That is circular: it assumes that “God’s Adjuster” (whatever that is) is a conclusive reason to believe in the existence of a deity, yet merely assumes that there are valid reasons to believe in the “Adjuster” in the first place, which there are not.
Antti: Are you looking for a God who tells clearly that I am the Boss and you are the slave ? I feel that our God is more sophisticated, on the basis what I have seen in my life on the earth. The world must be just like this what we have now, if the God is looking for the humans who voluntary and using free will select his way.
What evidence is there for that?
Antti: There must be something in our soul and spirit because religion is an universal phenomena all over the world and many basic ideas are the same. However, if you really require scientific evidences before you can believe on anything then you cannot survive.
The truth depends soeley on the correspondence between the proposition in question and that state of affairs with which it purports to correspond.
Antti: I do not believe on this.
Why does that follow?
Antti: This world would be a terrible and horrible place without our conscience, mercy and justice. I cannot see any other practical purpose of use for our own sense and conscience.
We may find a lot of truth, for example, from the Koran, Bible and also from the Urantia Book, which gives a logical explanation of why we are here, where we come from and where we are going.
Why do you claim that the accounts are logical? Do you claim that they are true ? If so, what is the basis for that contention?
Antti: The logical explanations are in agreement with the experimental observations. The logical sources do not change the principles case by case.
Upon what basis do you contend that that is merely an assumption, rather than a conclusion validly drawn from evidence?
Antti: Purely scientific philosophy is also based on assumptions, it may, for example, assume that we live only some 80 years and that’s it. In science it is important to be able to test also some other assumptions than the traditional ones.
And what, in turn, evidence is there to support that proposition?
Antti: You desire for the evidences, but you will not find them. The only way to the eternal survival is the faith.
Why not? And what exactly do you mean by “meet fear and disappointments” anyway? In what sense are fear and disappointments the kinds of things that can be met?
Antti: Can you really imagine the taste of electric shock if you are not able to test ? Can you imagine the feeling of fear if you have not the possibility to test it ? In this world we have possibility to test the feeling of real fear and disappointments.
Without pain and suffering we could not strive for pleasure and joy.
What evidence is there for this? And, even if this was the case, how does this entail that people live for ever?
Antti: You cannot find evidences, but you can be sure that if we would have the rock solid scientific evidences of the eternal life and God then the free selection between the faith and atheism would not be possible anymore.
What do you mean by “face” here, exactly? And, again, how would this entail immortality even if it were true?
Antti: When we live our life on the earth we face social inequality and injustice in the society, business, streets, etc. We have the free selection to accept it or try to remove it.
How so? And, as with all of these propositions, what is the connexion with the immortality that you postulate?
Antti: The connection is to the world where we live and why is made just like this. The imortality is an different issue.
And the same applies to these, too.
Antti: The same comments as earlier, too.
Whyever do you claim that?
Antti: I believe that there must be a logical explanation why our world is just like this. I feel that these issues are the most important primary reasons.
Would failure to reach those targets, though, not be an error that would render the universe imperfect?
Antti: The failure is one of the most common ways to reach the target in the nature. It gradually removes the unsuitable material, we are the childrens of million years of evolution. The God is responsible of the frameworks.
Why do you claim that? And what of philosophy about whether or not there is a deity? And what exactly do you mean by “without” here?
Antti: I mean that the philosophical considerations and reasoning will lead to the very different conclusions if we assume that we live only some 80 years or if we assume that we will live forever.
Why do you claim that? In any event, philosophy does not aim to provide relief: it aims to provide true understanding.
