God: No magic required

[Angrboda]

Are you going to believe in Santa Claus come next December on the theory that it will make you good?

[Mudhammam]

"(1) There are objective "this life" personal advantages associated with theism, as opposed to atheism, in terms of mental and physical well-being, including longevity.

(2) Therefore, it is not irrational for a present day non-theist to determine if it's possible for he/she to morph into a theist."

It seems like your conflating "personal advantages" with rational behavior. For a quick, on-the-spot (and therefore, perhaps somewhat inadequate) example, there may be personal advantages to running red lights when I don't see anyone else around but common sense dictates that there are many factors that I cannot account for, and thus it would indeed be an irrational act if I value my life or my driving record. Likewise, that religion or theism might make us feel better emotionally or even lead to a healthier lifestyle does not mean it is rational--there are negative consequences we might not immediately be aware of or even personally endure but certainly it is irrational to adopt running the risk.

"(3) Theism is perfectly compatible with state of the art knowledge and theory, relating to physical cosmology, without the need to invoke mysticism or magic."

Unfortunately, once you attempt to articulate "God," it doesn't stand up to rational scrutiny or coherency; many ignore the task of defining God at all, thinking it saves face when in actuality it just dismisses their own claims.

[max-greece]

With respect to the "technology" of prayer, I simply used MRI and EEG as examples. I personally think that it's highly plausible that these and other non-invasive monitoring technologies, combined with ever-more-sophisticated computer algorithms, will allow future interrogators to eschew waterboarding, as it will one day be possible to literally read minds. Neutrinos (trillions of them) permeate every cubic millimeter of our bodies, including our brains. We can barely detect neutrinos and we can't detect dark energy (i.e. most of the energy in our universe). We are hardly in a position to assert the impossibility that such energy may be organized in such a fashion as to possess sentience and to be fully capable of monitoring, in real time, the thoughts of every other sentient being in the universe.

Possible that we will be able to read thought processes externally? I suppose it is - lets hope not, however, as privacy has taken too much of a hit already. As for the Neutrino thing - sounds like crap to me. Neutrinos appear to pass through all mass in the universe without interacting in any way - its one of the reasons they were so hard to prove in the first place.

As for our inability to assert that energy and sentience are unrelated this is an argument from ignorance. We are equally unable to assert that this energy and farting are unrelated.

Why would such a dark energy sentience (let's call it "God," for convenience) be at all interested in monitoring us and hearing our thoughts? Why is the NSA interested in monitoring everything it can about everything it can? Do you have a cat or dog or goldfish? Would you have any curiosity about what it was thinking? If it was thinking that it wanted to be petted, would you pet it? Did you ever own a terrarium? They are very interesting little microcosms. Why do scientists run millions of computer simulations? What if the earth is simply one of a hundred billion "simulations" in our universe or one of an infinite number of "simulations" in the multiverse? So "God" provides some sort of kick start to life and then monitors how it evolves and what happens to each planet over infinite periods of time. What else is God going to do? Just sit around and contemplate his navel? I'd say that God would have a lot of reasons for wanting to be engaged (i.e. to be theistic, as opposed to deistic).

Comparing your God to the NSA ought to be sending shivers up your spine - it does mine. What does a cat, dog, goldfish think? Well probably not alot (hungry, horny, tired, WALK etc.) and certainly nothing that would hold your interest for long. Surely that is the point. A universe creating deity would have less in common with us than does an ant.

What's God doing if he's (!) not following us? OK - logical problem here - God is infinite. God existed for an infinite amount of time before he "invented" the universe. What was he doing then? Or, the universe is 13.72 billion years old - we are 200,000 years old. What was he doing for the 13.72 billion years prior to our arrival?

With respect to atheism being "theism-1," well...no. Who in the world said anything about "one true religion," in the present conversation? I personally look at religion like I look at language. Languages are simply mechanisms for communication between people. Religions are mechanisms for communication with God. I think that virtually all human societies, since the beginning of humanity, have had religions and that most (obviously not all) of these religions have been of positive value for the lives of the people in those societies. Religion has passed the test of time; that's why it endures. Talks of the death of religion are premature. At one time, the Soviet Union was almost entirely atheistic. Atheism is popular now in Europe and, increasingly so, in the USA. Yet, a declaration of victory would be just more in the way of certitude. But I digress.

So all religions are versions of the truth but atheism isn't? Non-belief is probably as old as humanity itself as much as belief is. Works too.

And why, if all religions contribute something, do all religions go out of their way to tell you all other religions are wrong?

No religion isn't dead, yet. Sadly neither is astrology, palm reading, phrenology, the belief in the power of crystals.....

A couple of people have said that there is no evidence that prayer works. That's certainly not true. I've already stated that I don't necessarily believe that God stops wars, brings rain, or cures cancer. I don't know for sure that he's never done any of those things. but I don't think that there's any real evidence that God ever did any of those things. But prayer certainly provides comfort, courage, perseverance, escape from substance abuse, improved performance with regard to personal responsibility and morality, and so on. Whether this is owing to divine intervention or is "placebo effect" is quite beside the point. Prayer works. Unambiguously works. It's worked for billions of people in the history of the world. It has certainly worked for me. It's why I keep doing it.

When we say prayer doesn't appear to work its on the basis of peer reviewed research - not the feel good factor. With your argument a rabbit's foot for luck probably works too. You mentioned the heart patient study in another post, acknowledging that praying for someone when they know it actually appears to make the situation worse. What you did not acknowledge is that praying for someone when they don't know appears to have ZERO effect.

Here's a challenge, which I'm sure that everyone will reject, a priori (but maybe not forever; just keep it at the back of your mind for possible future use).

This really isn't about me, personally, but I can use myself as an example. I was a pretty hard core secular agnostic most of my life. But I'm a cancer doctor and a health nut (haven't eaten red meat for 40 years; work out; etc.etc.). I was impressed by the studies indicating a longevity advantage to religion/spirituality with the population equivalent to curing all forms of cancer. I also developed a personal morality problem which was refractory to self-help.

I made the decision to proceed with a "clinical trial." Was it possible for me to develop belief in God, and could I find a religion which would foster said belief, and, if so, would this make a positive difference in my life?

What I did was to pick out three different religions. For the better part of a year, I attended services in each of the three religions. While in each service, I suspended belief, in the same fashion as if I were attending a stage play in which there were audience participation. I did everything that the other people did. When they stood, I stood. When they sang, I sang. When they prayed, I prayed (though not initially sure that anyone was listening). I kept my heart open to everything; I rejected nothing.

At a certain point, I got to feeling that someone out there was listening to me and, later on, that someone out there was engaging in a conversation with me. Why would God do that? Again, for the same sort of reason that I might talk to a cat, if said cat could talk to me. Lots of perfectly logical reasons.

What is the challenge? I didn't understand it. Is it to try religion for a while and see if we get it? Remember most atheists start as theists.

Conversely - try atheism - imagine there is no God - then try to understand what freedom that brings to the mind.

One final thing - in one of your other posts you mentioned belief in atheism. That's belief in non-belief. Its not how it works. Atheism is a lack of belief in a God. It is categorically not the same as Catholicism. I don't "not believe" in Judaism more than I don't "not believe" in Catholicism, Buddhism or the tooth fairy.

[lweisenthal]

I like having discussions like this with people in different time zones. The conversations tend to be more slow motion and thoughtful, which is not how they are when they are real time/back and forth, where there is too much in the way of emotional reaction. I do thank the several of you who are continuing this discussion with me.

Firstly, let's dispense with the straw men.

I don't believe in Santa Claus, because he doesn't meet the test of plausibility. We have Google Earth images of the North Pole. No sign of human or reindeer habitation there. There is no evidence that mammals have ever had the ability to levitate and fly. And so on.

I also don't believe in physical miracles, including such things as faith healing of cancer. I don't reject the possibility completely; I'm an open-minded scientist (medical and research oncologist). I'm always open to reading the sorts of anecdotes which are used to support the canonization of Popes and what not. To date, I am not persuaded, but perhaps one day I shall be.

On the other hand, it is beyond challenge that prayers for beneficial alteration of sentient consciousness are routinely answered, for literally billions of people: courage, solace, liberation from substance abuse, companionship (yes, it's decidedly possible for a lonely person to experience a sense of companionship with a higher order of consciousness), perseverance, determination, improved ethics and morality, and so forth.

Now, I know that you'll bring up placebo effect, but that's a very high class problem to have. A believer experiences the myriad benefits of prayer, which are completely real to said believer (e.g. yours truly), but the precise mechanism of these benefits is elusive, from the standpoint of "proof."

The reason that you guys can't convince believers to disbelieve, on the basis of the sorts of arguments you throw out, is that their (our) own personal experience trumps the arguments which you find to be so logical.

Max gives me the courtesy of seriously considering my answer to the question of what interest God would have in us dull, uninteresting humans and states the following:

"What does a cat, dog, goldfish think? Well probably not alot (hungry, horny, tired, WALK etc.) and certainly nothing that would hold your interest for long. Surely that is the point. A universe creating deity would have less in common with us than does an ant.

"What's God doing if he's (!) not following us? OK - logical problem here - God is infinite. God existed for an infinite amount of time before he "invented" the universe. What was he doing then? Or, the universe is 13.72 billion years old - we are 200,000 years old. What was he doing for the 13.72 billion years prior to our arrival?"

My answer:

Well, firstly, this is another straw man. I don't know that God is infinite or that God existed for an infinite amount of time. For example, current theories from cosmological physics postulate the existence of an infinite number of universes in an infinite multiverse. Within our own universe, 95% of the physical reality is dark energy and dark matter. Human consciousness is simply organized biolectrical energy. Common matter is organized into very complex, sophisticated structures. We know that organized patterns of wired energy can produce sentience. None of you guys can begin to prove that organized patterns of wireless dark energy can't also produce sentience -- on an incalculable scale. Which is, parenthetically, why atheism is a "belief," while agnosticism is rational skepticism.

Getting back to the current straw man:

The higher order sentience, existing in the dark energy/matter/higher dimensions of our universe would not necessarily have existed for an infinite amount of time. Our universe is postulated to have existed for less than 15 billion years. Therefore the "God" of our universe could have arisen from the coalescence of dark energy, in the same way that the stars originated from the coalescence of ordinary matter. The God whom I believe answers my own prayers may, therefore, be a product of spontaneous evolution of dark energy, who/which may or may not be a creator in his/its own right.

Or perhaps God arose from the exotic energy in another universe in our multiverse.

What did God do to occupy his time before the emergence of homo sapiens 200,000 years ago? There are 500 billion galaxies, each with hundreds of billions of stars and doubtless trillions of planets. That's only in our universe, one of possibly an infinite number of universes in the multiverse.

You don't care to believe in this; that's fine. But you can't begin to offer the beginning of any proof at all that it's not plausible, much less offer proof that it's not true. An agnostic would have the intellectual honesty to say that it's plausible, but doesn't rise to the level of believability, at the level of said agnostic. But an atheist has to assert that it's not only implausible, but actually impossible. As I said originally, certitude is poison. I believe that God exists and that God answers prayers, but I'm open to the possibility that I'm wrong and that it's all placebo effect, albeit a powerful and very beneficial placebo. You guys have the certitude to believe that you have sufficient understanding of the nature of the multiverse to reject all possibility of God.

There was certainly a time when your ancestors would have felt they had sufficient understanding of the nature of the planet earth to reject all possibility of Skype.

- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA

[Angrboda]

You can choose plausibility, in which case belief is unjustified, or you can choose pragmatism, the "I believe because it benefits me to do so." You can't waffle back and forth to suit the temporary need of your argument. That's the sin of equivocation, and it means the things you've written aren't worth shit.

On top of everything, I'm relatively confident that those studies refer to people who believe because they truly believe, not just because studies demonstrate that believers live longer. Since you belong to the latter category, or are advocating people join that category, none of the studies you've referenced even apply because they refer to a different category of religious believer. So, no, your words and argument are crap, and your studies don't apply in the way you need them to apply, so they're crap too.

Do you have anything that isn't crap? Oh wait. I forgot. You made a point of explaining how you seek out groups that are diametrically opposed to you for the experience of heated discussion. Since most folk here are, obviously, atheist, that paints you as self-consciously theist, despite your horse shit about "passing as an atheist." I wonder how this God whom you believe in for the health benefit feels about you being a lying sack of shit. And are there any health benefits to being a lying sack of shit? Well, I guess you'd know the answer to that (yes, I've perused some of your professional representations). It probably doesn't benefit your patients for you to peddle quack cancer treatments to them, but I'm sure it helps you jet set in style.

Have I overlooked any of your other lies and boneheaded bullshit? I'm sure I'll get back to it if I have.

[lweisenthal]

Hi Rasetsu,

It was pragmatism that caused me to consider and explore plausibility, as I explained briefly in one of my introductory posts, and which is described in greater detail on the web site I'm not permitted to link.

Once I'd become convinced of both potential advantages (pragmatism) and plausibility, I then proceeded to do a clinical trial, as described earlier. For one year, I regularly attended three different types of religious services, at which I suspended disbelief, as in participatory theater. I opened my heart. I fully participated. At a certain point, I began to believe -- not in all the doctrinal details, but in the basics: God exists, hears my prayers, and answers my prayers. I believe this, because of personal experience, but I would be foolish to assert that there is no possibility that what seems like truthful reality to me is not a product of some sort of placebo effect. There is no "crime," God-wise, in having a sense of doubtfulness. Mother Theresa, for goodness sake, had strong doubts, and so have many of the most prominent proponents of various religions.

I constantly challenge my beliefs -- in part through reading and considering books such as "The Divinity of Doubt" and in part through discussions with people who aren't believers, from family members to anonymous people on Internet discussion boards, such as this. But I do believe in God and I believe that God knows that I believe in God and I believe that God most definitely answers the sorts of prayers which are of greatest importance to me.

So the progression is as follows:

pragmatism --> search for plausibility --> plausibility --> search for faith --> faith

With regard to "quack cancer treatments," that's entirely libelous, coming from someone who scribbles Internet graffiti anonymously, on a web site which won't even allow me to post links to defend myself against said libel.

Unlike you, Rasetsu, I'm a real person, with a real name, a real family, and a real reputation. You are a coward who hides behind a pseudonym and who appears to be incapable of understanding the concept of the honest difference of opinion and to be incapable of discussing said difference of opinion without resorting to the classic ad hominem attack of the classic anonymous Internet graffiti scribbler.

- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA

You can choose plausibility, in which case belief is unjustified, or you can choose pragmatism, the "I believe because it benefits me to do so." You can't waffle back and forth to suit the temporary need of your argument. That's the sin of equivocation, and it means the things you've written aren't worth shit.

On top of everything, I'm relatively confident that those studies refer to people who believe because they truly believe, not just because studies demonstrate that believers live longer. Since you belong to the latter category, or are advocating people join that category, none of the studies you've referenced even apply because they refer to a different category of religious believer. So, no, your words and argument are crap, and your studies don't apply in the way you need them to apply, so they're crap too.

Do you have anything that isn't crap? Oh wait. I forgot. You made a point of explaining how you seek out groups that are diametrically opposed to you for the experience of heated discussion. Since most folk here are, obviously, atheist, that paints you as self-consciously theist, despite your horse shit about "passing as an atheist." I wonder how this God whom you believe in for the health benefit feels about you being a lying sack of shit. And are there any health benefits to being a lying sack of shit? Well, I guess you'd know the answer to that (yes, I've perused some of your professional representations). It probably doesn't benefit your patients for you to peddle quack cancer treatments to them, but I'm sure it helps you jet set in style.

Have I overlooked any of your other lies and boneheaded bullshit? I'm sure I'll get back to it if I have.

[Neo-Scholastic]

...that's entirely libelous, coming from someone who scribbles Internet graffiti anonymously...Unlike you, Rasetsu, I'm a real person, with a real name, a real family, and a real reputation. You are a coward who hides behind a pseudonym ....

To my knowledge you and I are the only members that use our real names. Like you, I stand behind my opinions. At the same time I recognize that some people have legitimate reasons to preserve their privacy. Some just want to act clever and that's okay too. Raetsu's username used to be Apophenia. (We can only speculate about why she felt she needed to change her name.)For some reason, she believes that anyone who disagrees with her must be a liar and intellectually dishonest. That's what happens to immature little cunts who suck Dennett's cock to find out what they think.

So as you can see vulgarity, ridicule and insult are common on this forum, so you might as well get used to it. You'll learn with whom it is worth talking and who belongs on your ignore list.

[lweisenthal]

Thanks, Chad. I don't have a problem with people (particularly women) wishing to remain anonymous. But I think that people who choose to use pseudonyms should try to comment responsibly when they feel tempted to make personally derogatory statements at the expense of people who sign their own names -- particularly when said real name commentators have themselves been courteous and are "guilty" of nothing more than having a different point of view.

- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA

...that's entirely libelous, coming from someone who scribbles Internet graffiti anonymously...Unlike you, Rasetsu, I'm a real person, with a real name, a real family, and a real reputation. You are a coward who hides behind a pseudonym ....

To my knowledge you and I are the only members that use our real names. Like you, I stand behind my opinions. At the same time I recognize that some people have legitimate reasons to preserve their privacy. Some just want to act clever and that's okay too. Raetsu's username used to be Apophenia. (We can only speculate about why she felt she needed to change her name.)For some reason, she believes that anyone who disagrees with her must be a liar and intellectually dishonest. That's what happens to immature little cunts who suck Dennett's cock to find out what they think.

So as you can see vulgarity, ridicule and insult are common on this forum, so you might as well get used to it. You'll learn with whom it is worth talking and who belongs on your ignore list.

[max-greece]

I like having discussions like this with people in different time zones. The conversations tend to be more slow motion and thoughtful, which is not how they are when they are real time/back and forth, where there is too much in the way of emotional reaction. I do thank the several of you who are continuing this discussion with me.

Firstly, let's dispense with the straw men.

I don't believe in Santa Claus, because he doesn't meet the test of plausibility. We have Google Earth images of the North Pole. No sign of human or reindeer habitation there. There is no evidence that mammals have ever had the ability to levitate and fly. And so on.

Right - but Santa lives in Lapland - you can even go there on holiday and meet him, see the elves and the reindeer - although obviously they won't be flying if it isn't Xmas eve and you can't go there on Xmas eve because Santa is busy that evening(!)

Now if that isn't enough to convince you I don't know what is - its far more proof of existence than anything you have for your Dark Matter God.

I also don't believe in physical miracles, including such things as faith healing of cancer. I don't reject the possibility completely; I'm an open-minded scientist (medical and research oncologist). I'm always open to reading the sorts of anecdotes which are used to support the canonization of Popes and what not. To date, I am not persuaded, but perhaps one day I shall be.

It appears that this is something you are looking forward to - I wonder why?

On the other hand, it is beyond challenge that prayers for beneficial alteration of sentient consciousness are routinely answered, for literally billions of people: courage, solace, liberation from substance abuse, companionship (yes, it's decidedly possible for a lonely person to experience a sense of companionship with a higher order of consciousness), perseverance, determination, improved ethics and morality, and so forth.

Actually nothing should be beyond challenge. All of the above benefits are not the sole preserve of religion, nor even one particular religion. Many people get much of the above, if not all of it, from astrology - does that mean we have to take that on board as a possibility as well? How about phrenology, palm reading....?

Now, I know that you'll bring up placebo effect, but that's a very high class problem to have. A believer experiences the myriad benefits of prayer, which are completely real to said believer (e.g. yours truly), but the precise mechanism of these benefits is elusive, from the standpoint of "proof."

I don't know why you claim the placebo effect is a high class problem to have. You are a Doctor, apparently. Surely you are aware that your most pressing instruction is simply to do no harm? Surely, for a general physician at least, you are aware that 90% of afflictions are self limiting so that as long as you are doing no harm you should achieve that success rate at least?

"...completely real to said believer..." Consider how important this statement is. Consider also that the basis of clinical trials in your own profession are exclusively designed to separate what actually works from what appears to work. Where there is no proof available, in medicine is the default position to assume it works or to assume it doesn't? Why should things be any different for matters of faith?

The reason that you guys can't convince believers to disbelieve, on the basis of the sorts of arguments you throw out, is that their (our) own personal experience trumps the arguments which you find to be so logical.

Yes, this is true and its a problem often shared with schizophrenics. Now is it more reasonable to argue that a proportion of the human race have, lets call them spiritual, experiences that are real whilst the rest do not, or, that delusion caused by mild mental issues are more common that we think?

Max gives me the courtesy of seriously considering my answer to the question of what interest God would have in us dull, uninteresting humans and states the following:

"What does a cat, dog, goldfish think? Well probably not alot (hungry, horny, tired, WALK etc.) and certainly nothing that would hold your interest for long. Surely that is the point. A universe creating deity would have less in common with us than does an ant.

"What's God doing if he's (!) not following us? OK - logical problem here - God is infinite. God existed for an infinite amount of time before he "invented" the universe. What was he doing then? Or, the universe is 13.72 billion years old - we are 200,000 years old. What was he doing for the 13.72 billion years prior to our arrival?"

My answer:

Well, firstly, this is another straw man. I don't know that God is infinite or that God existed for an infinite amount of time. For example, current theories from cosmological physics postulate the existence of an infinite number of universes in an infinite multiverse. Within our own universe, 95% of the physical reality is dark energy and dark matter. Human consciousness is simply organized biolectrical energy. Common matter is organized into very complex, sophisticated structures. We know that organized patterns of wired energy can produce sentience. None of you guys can begin to prove that organized patterns of wireless dark energy can't also produce sentience -- on an incalculable scale. Which is, parenthetically, why atheism is a "belief," while agnosticism is rational skepticism.

Not actually a strawman - merely an assumption that you have a more standard definition of God, rather than a unique position.

As it happens my figures for the combination of dark energy and dark matter are nearer 99% than 95 but it makes no odds.

"We know that organized patterns of wired energy can produce sentience. " True - but we also know that in the vast majority of cases it doesn't to any interesting degree (ants, dinosaurs, Pandas, republicans etc.)

You still haven't understood the burden of proof or what atheism is. Atheism is not the outright rejection of the possibility - it is the absence of belief due to the lack of proof.

Getting back to the current straw man:

The higher order sentience, existing in the dark energy/matter/higher dimensions of our universe would not necessarily have existed for an infinite amount of time. Our universe is postulated to have existed for less than 15 billion years. Therefore the "God" of our universe could have arisen from the coalescence of dark energy, in the same way that the stars originated from the coalescence of ordinary matter. The God whom I believe answers my own prayers may, therefore, be a product of spontaneous evolution of dark energy, who/which may or may not be a creator in his/its own right.

Or perhaps God arose from the exotic energy in another universe in our multiverse.

OK - forgive me for not guessing that your God isn't the standard, run of the mill, creator God. I'd drop the God that inhabits the multiverse bit altogether - unless you have specific explanations as to how he (?) leaps from one to another.

What did God do to occupy his time before the emergence of homo sapiens 200,000 years ago? There are 500 billion galaxies, each with hundreds of billions of stars and doubtless trillions of planets. That's only in our universe, one of possibly an infinite number of universes in the multiverse.

All of which really emphasises my original question of what possibly interest we might hold for such an entity with so much choice to entertain them. Actually it does go a bit further than that. What makes you think this intelligent Dark Matter God is even aware we exist? We are a thousand times harder to find than a needle in a haystack in terms of both space and time.

You don't care to believe in this; that's fine. But you can't begin to offer the beginning of any proof at all that it's not plausible, much less offer proof that it's not true. An agnostic would have the intellectual honesty to say that it's plausible, but doesn't rise to the level of believability, at the level of said agnostic. But an atheist has to assert that it's not only implausible, but actually impossible.

Like I said - you haven't understood what an atheist is. It might help to look at the Dawkins scale to get a better grip on things. That is a bit over-simplified but covers the basics (which are beyond your current understanding).

As I said originally, certitude is poison. I believe that God exists and that God answers prayers, but I'm open to the possibility that I'm wrong and that it's all placebo effect, albeit a powerful and very beneficial placebo. You guys have the certitude to believe that you have sufficient understanding of the nature of the multiverse to reject all possibility of God.

See above.

There was certainly a time when your ancestors would have felt they had sufficient understanding of the nature of the planet earth to reject all possibility of Skype.

- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA

My atheist ancestors or my theist ancestors?

[lweisenthal]

Hi Max, Thank you indeed for the thoughtful comments. I don't want this to devolve to a tit for tat, point by point, series of rejoinders and counter rejoinders. I don't feel the need to challenge most of what you wrote; I stand by what I wrote previously, but I do understand your different points of view. Also, I do find your clarification of atheism (absence of proof, as opposed to absence of possibility) to be helpful.

I have a couple of specific replies, relating to the physics part of it. I think that we can have a useful dialog, if we treat this as a thought experiment, as opposed to an argument over core values.

You raise the issue of communication between different universes within the multiverse (this is relevant to my suggestion for two possibilities for the location of the higher level of consciousness which I refer to as God: to wit, within the dark energy/dark matter of our own universe -- 95% according to my sources and up to 99% according to yours -- versus an even more exotic form of organized energy in a different universe within the multiverse).

We now have some direct physical evidence suggesting physical "communication" with least one other universe -- the Planck project measuring background radiation, showing a "cold" area, putatively caused by the gravitational pull on our universe by another universe, mediated by the inter-universe equivalent of gravitrons, or whatever. Here's a great video by a University of North Carolina physicist, explaining it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAL1-vzMvmA

Now, the point is that is it possible for there to be communication between one universe and another, within the multiverse. I understand that you have a skeptical approach to such things; you are the type of scientist I'd refer to as an investigator, as opposed to a discover. Investigators are conservative and seldom make mistakes but never make breakthroughs. Discovers are enthusiasts and often make mistakes, but, when they are right, they create entirely new paradigms. The world of science needs both investigators and discoverers... but I digress.

Now, what's even more interesting is that I'm not only one who's considered the possibility that "free floating" energy in the universe could undergo spontaneous organization into sentient consciousness.

Google "Boltzmann Brains," or start with this popular culture explanation:

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/05/...reloaded=1

Perhaps we'll continue this conversation (I'm willing; you may find it tiresome and wish to move on). Perhaps not. I'm sure that I won't convince you that God exists; as I wrote, in my case, it's because I was impressed by clinical research data showing objective health and longevity advantages associated with theism and I had some behavioral issues refractory to conventional management. I first needed to establish plausibility (as opposed to proof, which is your higher bar prerequisite). Once I had plausibility, I then did a "Phase II Clinical Trial" (as opposed to a prospective, randomized, controlled Phase III clinical trial) to determine if it were possible to convert myself from an agnostic to a theist, as explained earlier. I did so. The trial was positive. And I have benefited unambiguously, in several ways.

So what, precisely, from your point of view is the problem that I did this and that I recommend consideration of what I did to others? Of course, religion can be misused. So can alcohol, automobiles, and the Internet. But the fact that religion has passed the test of time shows that it does meet a basic human need in many people and enriches (and perhaps prolongs) many lives.

What I don't like are gratuitous comparisons of religion to Santa Claus and astrology and palm reading and a seeming need to denigrate people who enjoy the personal benefits of religion in their lives. The health benefits of training for and competing in marathon runs remain controversial and unproven; yet for the many marathon runners, the rewards are obvious in real time. There are many such things in life.

If your problem with religion is that it is an intrusive influence on secular society (perhaps you don't like having "In God We Trust" on US currency; I'd agree with you, but I'd point out that there are far greater problems in public governance than such bland religious intrusion -- so called "legislative prayer" being another such intrusion).

It's hardly worth the fuss, and, in any event, one can be a fierce defender of separation of church and state and yet not feel compelled to attack the church which is important to so many. Likewise, religious people should grant atheists their right to disbelieve in the absence of the sort of physical proof they seem to require, as a prerequisite for being open to the possibility of faith.

- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA

I like having discussions like this with people in different time zones. The conversations tend to be more slow motion and thoughtful, which is not how they are when they are real time/back and forth, where there is too much in the way of emotional reaction. I do thank the several of you who are continuing this discussion with me.

Firstly, let's dispense with the straw men.

I don't believe in Santa Claus, because he doesn't meet the test of plausibility. We have Google Earth images of the North Pole. No sign of human or reindeer habitation there. There is no evidence that mammals have ever had the ability to levitate and fly. And so on.

Right - but Santa lives in Lapland - you can even go there on holiday and meet him, see the elves and the reindeer - although obviously they won't be flying if it isn't Xmas eve and you can't go there on Xmas eve because Santa is busy that evening(!)

Now if that isn't enough to convince you I don't know what is - its far more proof of existence than anything you have for your Dark Matter God.

I also don't believe in physical miracles, including such things as faith healing of cancer. I don't reject the possibility completely; I'm an open-minded scientist (medical and research oncologist). I'm always open to reading the sorts of anecdotes which are used to support the canonization of Popes and what not. To date, I am not persuaded, but perhaps one day I shall be.

It appears that this is something you are looking forward to - I wonder why?

On the other hand, it is beyond challenge that prayers for beneficial alteration of sentient consciousness are routinely answered, for literally billions of people: courage, solace, liberation from substance abuse, companionship (yes, it's decidedly possible for a lonely person to experience a sense of companionship with a higher order of consciousness), perseverance, determination, improved ethics and morality, and so forth.

Actually nothing should be beyond challenge. All of the above benefits are not the sole preserve of religion, nor even one particular religion. Many people get much of the above, if not all of it, from astrology - does that mean we have to take that on board as a possibility as well? How about phrenology, palm reading....?

Now, I know that you'll bring up placebo effect, but that's a very high class problem to have. A believer experiences the myriad benefits of prayer, which are completely real to said believer (e.g. yours truly), but the precise mechanism of these benefits is elusive, from the standpoint of "proof."

I don't know why you claim the placebo effect is a high class problem to have. You are a Doctor, apparently. Surely you are aware that your most pressing instruction is simply to do no harm? Surely, for a general physician at least, you are aware that 90% of afflictions are self limiting so that as long as you are doing no harm you should achieve that success rate at least?

"...completely real to said believer..." Consider how important this statement is. Consider also that the basis of clinical trials in your own profession are exclusively designed to separate what actually works from what appears to work. Where there is no proof available, in medicine is the default position to assume it works or to assume it doesn't? Why should things be any different for matters of faith?

The reason that you guys can't convince believers to disbelieve, on the basis of the sorts of arguments you throw out, is that their (our) own personal experience trumps the arguments which you find to be so logical.

Yes, this is true and its a problem often shared with schizophrenics. Now is it more reasonable to argue that a proportion of the human race have, lets call them spiritual, experiences that are real whilst the rest do not, or, that delusion caused by mild mental issues are more common that we think?

Max gives me the courtesy of seriously considering my answer to the question of what interest God would have in us dull, uninteresting humans and states the following:

"What does a cat, dog, goldfish think? Well probably not alot (hungry, horny, tired, WALK etc.) and certainly nothing that would hold your interest for long. Surely that is the point. A universe creating deity would have less in common with us than does an ant.

"What's God doing if he's (!) not following us? OK - logical problem here - God is infinite. God existed for an infinite amount of time before he "invented" the universe. What was he doing then? Or, the universe is 13.72 billion years old - we are 200,000 years old. What was he doing for the 13.72 billion years prior to our arrival?"

My answer:

Well, firstly, this is another straw man. I don't know that God is infinite or that God existed for an infinite amount of time. For example, current theories from cosmological physics postulate the existence of an infinite number of universes in an infinite multiverse. Within our own universe, 95% of the physical reality is dark energy and dark matter. Human consciousness is simply organized biolectrical energy. Common matter is organized into very complex, sophisticated structures. We know that organized patterns of wired energy can produce sentience. None of you guys can begin to prove that organized patterns of wireless dark energy can't also produce sentience -- on an incalculable scale. Which is, parenthetically, why atheism is a "belief," while agnosticism is rational skepticism.

Not actually a strawman - merely an assumption that you have a more standard definition of God, rather than a unique position.

As it happens my figures for the combination of dark energy and dark matter are nearer 99% than 95 but it makes no odds.

"We know that organized patterns of wired energy can produce sentience. " True - but we also know that in the vast majority of cases it doesn't to any interesting degree (ants, dinosaurs, Pandas, republicans etc.)

You still haven't understood the burden of proof or what atheism is. Atheism is not the outright rejection of the possibility - it is the absence of belief due to the lack of proof.

Getting back to the current straw man:

The higher order sentience, existing in the dark energy/matter/higher dimensions of our universe would not necessarily have existed for an infinite amount of time. Our universe is postulated to have existed for less than 15 billion years. Therefore the "God" of our universe could have arisen from the coalescence of dark energy, in the same way that the stars originated from the coalescence of ordinary matter. The God whom I believe answers my own prayers may, therefore, be a product of spontaneous evolution of dark energy, who/which may or may not be a creator in his/its own right.

Or perhaps God arose from the exotic energy in another universe in our multiverse.

OK - forgive me for not guessing that your God isn't the standard, run of the mill, creator God. I'd drop the God that inhabits the multiverse bit altogether - unless you have specific explanations as to how he (?) leaps from one to another.

What did God do to occupy his time before the emergence of homo sapiens 200,000 years ago? There are 500 billion galaxies, each with hundreds of billions of stars and doubtless trillions of planets. That's only in our universe, one of possibly an infinite number of universes in the multiverse.

All of which really emphasises my original question of what possibly interest we might hold for such an entity with so much choice to entertain them. Actually it does go a bit further than that. What makes you think this intelligent Dark Matter God is even aware we exist? We are a thousand times harder to find than a needle in a haystack in terms of both space and time.

You don't care to believe in this; that's fine. But you can't begin to offer the beginning of any proof at all that it's not plausible, much less offer proof that it's not true. An agnostic would have the intellectual honesty to say that it's plausible, but doesn't rise to the level of believability, at the level of said agnostic. But an atheist has to assert that it's not only implausible, but actually impossible.

Like I said - you haven't understood what an atheist is. It might help to look at the Dawkins scale to get a better grip on things. That is a bit over-simplified but covers the basics (which are beyond your current understanding).

As I said originally, certitude is poison. I believe that God exists and that God answers prayers, but I'm open to the possibility that I'm wrong and that it's all placebo effect, albeit a powerful and very beneficial placebo. You guys have the certitude to believe that you have sufficient understanding of the nature of the multiverse to reject all possibility of God.

See above.

There was certainly a time when your ancestors would have felt they had sufficient understanding of the nature of the planet earth to reject all possibility of Skype.

- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA

My atheist ancestors or my theist ancestors?