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Can science prove or disprove the existence of God?

People who believe in God generally believe that a purely analytical and scientific method of forming knowledge is constrained to a subset of reality that cannot encompass God. Atheists on the other hand, typically say that God is merely one of numerous theories that lack coherence and supporting evidence, and that these shortcomings already constitutes sufficient proof of God's non existence.

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Experts and Influencers

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Agree
Experts In Science


Paul Z. Myers    Biology Professor
Agree
What should a scientist expect from an idea? That it be a reasonable advance in knowledge; that it be built on a foundation of evidence; that it be testable; that it should lead to new and useful questions and ideas. If we look at religion from that perspective, it doesn't help. At best, the hypothesis [...] is vague, unfounded, and inapplicable in any practical fashion [...] At worst, religion is confused, internally contradictory, and in conflict with evidence from the physical [...] world.
29 Jun 2006    Source


Eliezer Yudkowsky    Artificial Intelligence Researcher
Agree
The vast majority of religions in human history - excepting only those invented extremely recently - tell stories of events that would constitute completely unmistakable evidence if they'd actually happened. The orthogonality of religion and factual questions is a recent and strictly Western concept. The people who wrote the original scriptures didn't even know the difference. ... The idea that religion is a separate magisterium which cannot be proven or disproven is a Big Lie...
04 Aug 2007    Source


Experts In Philosophy


Austin Cline    Philosopher
Agree
A popular objection to atheists' arguments and critiques of theism is to insist that one's preferred god cannot be disproven — indeed, that science itself is unable to prove that God does not exist. This position depends upon a mistaken understanding of the nature of science and how science operates. In a very real and important sense, it is possible to say that, scientifically, God does not exist — just as science is able to discount the existence of a myriad of other alleged beings.
20 Dec 2009    Source


Disagree
Experts In Science


Kenneth Miller    Biology Professor, Christian
Disagree
No, it can’t. The existence of a supreme being simply is not a scientific question. A supreme being stands outside of nature. Science is a naturalistic process and can only answer questions about what is inside nature. Beyond that it’s a matter of personal belief.
01 Jan 2004    Source


Experts In Religion


The Catholic Church    Largest Christian Church
Disagree
Scientific proofs [...] are valid only for things perceptible to the senses, since it is only on such things that scientific instruments of investigation can be used. To desire a scientific proof of God would be equivalent to lowering God to the level of the beings of our world, and we would therefore be mistaken methodologically in regard to what God is. Science must recognize its limits and its inability to reach the existence of God. It can neither affirm nor deny his existence.
10 Jul 1985    Source


Experts In Christianity


Andrew Sullivan    Journalist, Author
Disagree
Science cannot disprove true faith; because true faith rests on the truth; and science cannot be in ultimate conflict with the truth.
17 Jan 2007    Source


Miscellaneous Experts


David Quinn    Journalist
Disagree
The question of whether God exists or not cannot be answered fully by science either and a common mistake that people can believe is the scientist who speaks about evolution with all the authority of science can also speak about the existence of God with all the authority of science and of course he can’t. The scientist speaking about the existence of God is actually engaging in philosophy or theology but he certainly isn’t bringing to it the authority of science per se.
09 Oct 2006    Source



Comments

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1 Point      Adam Atlas      05 Apr 2010      Stance on Question: Agree
I'd avoid using the words "prove" and "disprove", because, outside the domain of mathematics, they tend to promote (or indicate) a misunderstanding of how rational evidence works. That said, I do think it is perfectly appropriate to say that God is scientifically unsupported (in the manner of the Teapot, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, the Invisible Pink Unicorn, the dragon in your garage, etc.), and that you must not have a fully rational worldview if you can permit yourself to believe in God.

If, under any given person's definition of God, they can think of some way the world would be empirically different if there were no God, and that actually does turn out to be the case, then that is scientific evidence against God. If they -can't- think of any way the world would be different if their God were not real — or if they refuse to think about or say what the differences would be — or if they claim that some observation would be evidence for God, but refuse to allow that its absence would be evidence against God — then they are delusional.


1 Point      Packbat      17 Mar 2010      Stance on Question: Agree
It is odd to say that science can investigate the existence of an individual thing, as odd as it would be to say that science could search for the best spouse for an individual person - but that is because it is usually not bothered with in such cases. Science - the principle that ideas should be tested by experiment - can be applied in any situation, and has been convincingly more powerful than almost all other methods of epistemology ever since its invention. The existence of anything which is in any way causally connected with us has implications about what will occur to us, and therefore can be tested by creating situations where the output would be different if the causal connection were absent.


1 Point      Benja      17 Mar 2010      Stance on Question: Agree
What you say is undeniable: "the existence of anything which is in any way causally connected with us has implications about what will occur to us, and therefore can be tested by creating situations where the output would be different if the causal connection were absent."

The point is really so obvious, that the interesting question becomes what concoction of cognitive and social biases lead us to think this is not true. Eliezer Yudkowsky gives a partial explanation of that.



0 Points      Stephen MacNally      03 Feb 2010      Stance on Question: Agree
Can science prove or disprove the existence of the Flying Spaghetti Monster?

There are so many "gods" with so many man made attributes that are entirely contradictory that the overwhelming evidence is against the existence of a single unifying god.

Gravity may only be a theory, but it gets us to the moon and other planets.

Fantastic claims require fantastic proofs.


-1 Point      Matarael      09 Jan 2010      Stance on Question: Disagree
Logic can be used to disprove certain depictions of God, however the scientific method is by definition agnostic.

To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry must be based on gathering observable, empirical and measurable evidence subject to specific principles of reasoning. A scientific method consists of the collection of data through observation and experimentation, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses.

God is often seen as being, by definition, unobservable, unmeasurable, and above the rules of science as the very creator of those rules.

How can the scientific method operate when it has nothing to work with?

I can understand people saying that they cannot agree with the concept of God logically, but the scientific method has nothing to work with.


1 Point      Packbat      09 Jan 2010      Stance on Question: Agree
The questions which science is incapable of proving and disproving fall into two categories: isolated incidents (who stole the cookie from the cookie jar?) and unphysical counterfactuals (could Batman beat Superman?). Regarding the possible persistent presence of a causally active intelligent being, science should be as effective at judging the existence of God as the existence of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (to give an example of a real person) or Peter Parker (to give an example of a fictional one).