Researchers scared to death of the anti-science lobby?

Further notes;

Quantum Enigma: Physics Encounters Consciousness – Richard Conn Henry – Professor of Physics – John Hopkins University Excerpt: It is more than 80 years since the discovery of quantum mechanics gave us the most fundamental insight ever into our nature: the overturning of the Copernican Revolution, and the restoration of us human beings to centrality in the Universe. And yet, have you ever before read a sentence having meaning similar to that of my preceding sentence? Likely you have not, and the reason you have not is, in my opinion, that physicists are in a state of denial… https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/the-quantum-enigma-of-consciousness-and-the-identity-of-the-designer/ Quantum mind–body problem Excerpt: Parallels between quantum mechanics and mind/body dualism were first drawn by the founders of quantum mechanics including Erwin Schrödinger, Werner Heisenberg, Wolfgang Pauli, Niels Bohr, and Eugene Wigner http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mind%E2%80%93body_problem The Mental Universe – Richard Conn Henry – Professor of Physics John Hopkins University Excerpt: The only reality is mind and observations, but observations are not of things. To see the Universe as it really is, we must abandon our tendency to conceptualize observations as things.,,, Physicists shy away from the truth because the truth is so alien to everyday physics. A common way to evade the mental universe is to invoke “decoherence” – the notion that “the physical environment” is sufficient to create reality, independent of the human mind. Yet the idea that any irreversible act of amplification is necessary to collapse the wave function is known to be wrong: in “Renninger-type” experiments, the wave function is collapsed simply by your human mind seeing nothing. The universe is entirely mental,,,, The Universe is immaterial — mental and spiritual. Live, and enjoy. http://henry.pha.jhu.edu/The.mental.universe.pdf Psalm 33:13-15 The LORD looks from heaven; He sees all the sons of men. From the place of His dwelling He looks on all the inhabitants of the earth; He fashions their hearts individually; He considers all their works. Centrality of Each Individual Observer In The Universe and Christ’s Very Credible Reconciliation Of General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics https://docs.google.com/document/d/17SDgYPHPcrl1XX39EXhaQzk7M0zmANKdYIetpZ-WB5Y/edit?hl=en_US

More detailed notes are in the first part of this paper here:

Let There Be Light http://lettherebelight-77.blogspot.com/2009/10/intelligent-design-anthropic-hypothesis_19.html

Thus, as audacious as this proposition is, the proposition that God created the universe, and that we are made in the image of God, and that we therefore can rationally understand, and comprehend, the universe to a deep level, has stunning confirmation for its validity on many levels of science. Moreover, on the other hand, the counter proposition that this universe was not created by God, and that we are not made in God’s image, and that there is no particular reason why we should comprehend reality, has some very strong arguments against it. In fact these arguments are so strong that they have rendered the atheistic position completely absurd. The following references reveal the bankruptcy of the atheistic mindset as to explaining why we should comprehend reality so deeply: ,,,This following site is a easy to use, and understand, interactive website that takes the user through what is termed ‘Presuppositional apologetics’. The website clearly shows that our use of the laws of logic, mathematics, science and morality cannot be accounted for unless we believe in a God who guarantees our perceptions and reasoning are trustworthy in the first place.

Presuppositional Apologetics – easy to use interactive website http://www.proofthatgodexists.org/index.php

Further notes;

Random Chaos vs. Uniformity Of Nature – Presuppositional Apologetics – video http://www.metacafe.com/w/6853139 BRUCE GORDON: Hawking’s irrational arguments – October 2010 Excerpt: For instance, we find multiverse cosmologists debating the “Boltzmann Brain” problem: In the most “reasonable” models for a multiverse, it is immeasurably more likely that our consciousness is associated with a brain that has spontaneously fluctuated into existence in the quantum vacuum than it is that we have parents and exist in an orderly universe with a 13.7 billion-year history. This is absurd. The multiverse hypothesis is therefore falsified because it renders false what we know to be true about ourselves. Clearly, embracing the multiverse idea entails a nihilistic irrationality that destroys the very possibility of science. The Absurdity of Inflation, String Theory & The Multiverse - Dr. Bruce Gordon - video http://vimeo.com/34468027

Last power point of preceding video states:

The End Of Materialism? - Dr. Bruce Gordon * In the multiverse, anything can happen for no reason at all. * In other words, the materialist is forced to believe in random miracles as a explanatory principle. * In a Theistic universe, nothing happens without a reason. Miracles are therefore intelligently directed deviations from divinely maintained regularities, and are thus expressions of rational purpose. * Scientific materialism is (therefore) epistemically self defeating: it makes scientific rationality impossible.

Atheistic materialism simply dissolves into absurdity when pushed to extremes and certainly offers no guarantee to us for believing our perceptions and reasoning within science are trustworthy in the first place. This absurdity extends all the way into Darwin’s evolutionary theory itself:

Should You Trust the Monkey Mind? – Joe Carter Excerpt: Evolutionary naturalism assumes that our noetic equipment developed as it did because it had some survival value or reproductive advantage. Unguided evolution does not select for belief except insofar as the belief improves the chances of survival. The truth of a belief is irrelevant, as long as it produces an evolutionary advantage. This equipment could have developed at least four different kinds of belief that are compatible with evolutionary naturalism, none of which necessarily produce true and trustworthy cognitive faculties.

The following interview is sadly comical as a evolutionary psychologist realizes that neo-Darwinism can offer no guarantee that our faculties of reasoning will correspond to the truth, not even for the truth he is giving in the interview, (which begs the question of how was he able to come to that particular truthful realization, in the first place, if neo-Darwinian evolution were actually true?);

Evolutionary guru: Don't believe everything you think - October 2011 Interviewer: You could be deceiving yourself about that.(?) Evolutionary Psychologist: Absolutely.

Here a Darwinian Psychologist has a moment of honesty facing the 'hard problem' of consciousness;

Darwinian Psychologist David Barash Admits the Seeming Insolubility of Science's "Hardest Problem" Excerpt: 'But the hard problem of consciousness is so hard that I can't even imagine what kind of empirical findings would satisfactorily solve it. In fact, I don't even know what kind of discovery would get us to first base, not to mention a home run.' David Barash - Materialist/Atheist Darwinian Psychologist “Atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning...” CS Lewis – Mere Christianity "But then with me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man’s mind, which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy. Would any one trust in the convictions of a monkey’s mind, if there are any convictions in such a mind?" - Charles Darwin - Letter To William Graham - July 3, 1881 “It seems to me immensely unlikely that mind is a mere by-product of matter. For if my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brain I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true. They may be sound chemically, but that does not make them sound logically. And hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms.” J. B. S. Haldane ["When I am dead," in Possible Worlds: And Other Essays [1927], Chatto and Windus: London, 1932, reprint, p.209. "Atheists may do science, but they cannot justify what they do. When they assume the world is rational, approachable, and understandable, they plagiarize Judeo-Christian presuppositions about the nature of reality and the moral need to seek the truth. As an exercise, try generating a philosophy of science from hydrogen coming out of the big bang. It cannot be done. It’s impossible even in principle, because philosophy and science presuppose concepts that are not composed of particles and forces. They refer to ideas that must be true, universal, necessary and certain." Creation-Evolution Headlines

Moreover, even if Atheists could justify ‘doing science’, instead of plagiarizing Judeo-Christian presuppositions and claiming them as their own, the ‘predictive power’ of atheism/materialism, as a ‘scientific theory’, renders the same conclusion as the preceding analysis that atheism/materialism is false, even to the point of being a ‘pseudo-science’ along the lines of being very similar to, of all things, Tarot cards or palm reading:

Predictions of Materialism compared to Predictions of Theism within the Scientific Method: https://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AYmaSrBPNEmGZGM4ejY3d3pfNWZ3ejQyZGc5&hl=en_US

bornagain77

Here are some quotes reflecting that prevalent Judeo-Christian worldview present at the founding of modern science:

“Geometry is unique and eternal, a reflection from the mind of God. That mankind shares in it is because man is an image of God.” – Johannes Kepler To know the mighty works of God, to comprehend His wisdom and majesty and power; to appreciate, in degree, the wonderful workings of His laws, surely all this must be a pleasing and acceptable mode of worship to the Most High, to whom ignorance cannot be more grateful than knowledge. Nicolaus Copernicus "This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent Being. … This Being governs all things, not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all; and on account of his dominion he is wont to be called “Lord God” ??????????? [pantokratòr], or “Universal Ruler”… The Supreme God is a Being eternal, infinite, absolutely perfect." Sir Isaac Newton - Quoted from what many consider the greatest science masterpiece of all time, his book "Principia"

Even Albert Einstein, although he was certainly not thought of as a particularly religious person, reflects how the Judeo-Christian worldview influenced his overall view of reality in this following quote;

“I want to know God’s thoughts; the rest are details.” Albert Einstein

But a more mysterious question to this issue, is the fact that this seemingly foreign, even outrageously bold, proposition of the rational intelligibility of the universe, that could even be dared to be comprehended by mere human minds, should be so successful as a proposition of thought. For why should it be that mere human minds, human minds who happened to have the audacity to believe that their minds were, of all things, created in the image of the Being Who had created the entire universe, would be so successful as to establishing a solid foundation for modern science, unless this seemingly outlandish idea of being made in God’s image were actually true? In other words, why should science be so successful unless the seemingly outrageous propositions underlying the foundation of modern science were actually true? Dr. Meyer reflects on the success of that outrageous proposition here in this video:

Epistemology – Why Should The Human Mind Even Comprehend Reality? – Stephen Meyer – video (notes in description) http://vimeo.com/32145998

Moreover, modern science has actually revealed that this outrageous proposition, (that the universe was created by a rational Mind, and that our mind is created in the image of that rational Mind, and that therefore we can comprehend the universe to a deep level), is confirmed on many levels by science. Here Eugene Wigner reflects on the effectiveness of mathematics for understanding reality:

The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences - Eugene Wigner Excerpt: The miracle of the appropriateness of the language of mathematics for the formulation of the laws of physics is a wonderful gift which we neither understand nor deserve. We should be grateful for it and hope that it will remain valid in future research and that it will extend, for better or for worse, to our pleasure, even though perhaps also to our bafflement, to wide branches of learning. http://www.dartmouth.edu/~matc/MathDrama/reading/Wigner.html

Granville Sewell, Professor of Mathematics at the University of El Paso, reveals that mathematics actually governs reality, not just passively describes reality, here;

Finely Tuned Big Bang, Elvis In The Multiverse, and the Schroedinger Equation – Granville Sewell – audio http://www.metacafe.com/watch/4233012

At the 4:00 minute mark of the preceding audio, Dr. Sewell comments on the ‘transcendent’ and ‘constant’ Schroedinger’s Equation which governs the basic actions of the universe;

‘In chapter 2, I talk at some length on the Schroedinger Equation which is called the fundamental equation of chemistry. It’s the equation that governs the behavior of the basic atomic particles subject to the basic forces of physics. This equation is a partial differential equation with a complex valued solution. By complex valued I don’t mean complicated, I mean involving solutions that are complex numbers, a+bi, which is extraordinary that the governing equation, basic equation, of physics, of chemistry, is a partial differential equation with complex valued solutions. There is absolutely no reason why the basic particles should obey such a equation that I can think of except that it results in elements and chemical compounds with extremely rich and useful chemical properties. In fact I don’t think anyone familiar with quantum mechanics would believe that we’re ever going to find a reason why it should obey such an equation, they just do! So we have this basic, really elegant mathematical equation, partial differential equation, which is my field of expertise, that governs the most basic particles of nature and there is absolutely no reason why, anyone knows of, why it does, it just does. British physicist Sir James Jeans said “From the intrinsic evidence of His creation, the great architect of the universe begins to appear as a pure mathematician”, so God is a mathematician to’. Granville Sewell PhD.

i.e. the Materialistic Athiest is at a complete loss to explain why this should be so, whereas the Christian Theist ‘naturally’ presupposes such ‘transcendent’ control of our temporal, material, reality,,,

John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

of note; ‘the Word’ is translated from the Greek word ‘Logos’. Logos happens to be the word from which we derive our modern word ‘Logic’. In this following video, Dr. Richards and Dr. Gonzalez reveal that the universe is ‘suspiciously set up’ for scientific discovery:

Privileged Planet – Observability/Measurably Correlation – Gonzalez and Richards – video http://www.metacafe.com/watch/5424431 The very conditions that make Earth hospitable to intelligent life also make it well suited to viewing and analyzing the universe as a whole. - Jay Richards Extreme Fine Tuning of Light, and Atmosphere, for Life and Scientific Discovery - video http://www.metacafe.com/watch/7715887/

This following video is in the same line of thought as the preceding videos:

We Live At The Right Time In Cosmic History – Hugh Ross – video http://vimeo.com/31940671

But, as impressive, suspicious, and persuasive, as the preceding ‘hints’ are that the universe was created by the Mind of God and can be understood by the mind of man, since we are made in God’s image, the deepest correlation, of our mind to the Mind of God, finds its most concrete proof of correlation from looking at consciousness itself through the lens of quantum mechanics. There are many famous quotes that throw a little light on just how surprised people are when the first encounter quantum mechanics. Here are a few.

Anyone who is not shocked by quantum theory has not understood it. Neils Bohr ...the "paradox" is only a conflict between reality and your feeling of what reality "ought to be." Richard Feynman, in The Feynman Lectures on Physics, vol III “The more success the quantum theory has, the sillier it looks” Albert Einstein

And indeed, the reason why quantum theory has looked so ‘silly’, to so many top scientists, is that consciousness is found to be integral, even central, in many of the experiments of quantum mechanics. This following quote nicely sums up exactly why consciousness would throw someone, who is used to thinking of reality in materialistic terms, for a complete loop, after looking at some of the experiments of quantum mechanics:

What drives materialists crazy is that consciousness cannot be seen, tasted, smelled, touched, heard, or studied in a laboratory. But how could it be otherwise? Consciousness is the very thing that is DOING the seeing, the tasting, the smelling, etc… We define material objects by their effect upon our senses – how they feel in our hands, how they appear to our eyes. But we know consciousness simply by BEING it! - APM - UD blogger

Moreover, because of the postulated correlation of our mind to the Mind of God within Theism,,,

Genesis 2:7 And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.

,,,we can then develop a very strong argument for God from ‘consciousness’, and even provide strong empirical proof for that argument from quantum mechanics:

The argument for God from consciousness can be framed like this: 1. Consciousness either precedes all of material reality or is a ‘epi-phenomena’ of material reality. 2. If consciousness is a ‘epi-phenomena’ of material reality then consciousness will be found to have no special position within material reality. Whereas conversely, if consciousness precedes material reality then consciousness will be found to have a special position within material reality. 3. Consciousness is found to have a special, even central, position within material reality. 4. Therefore, consciousness is found to precede material reality.

Here is the empirical proof for the argument;

Dr. Quantum – Double Slit Experiment & Entanglement – video http://www.metacafe.com/watch/4096579 Wheeler’s Classic Delayed Choice Experiment: Excerpt: Now, for many billions of years the photon is in transit in region 3. Yet we can choose (many billions of years later) which experimental set up to employ – the single wide-focus, or the two narrowly focused instruments. We have chosen whether to know which side of the galaxy the photon passed by (by choosing whether to use the two-telescope set up or not, which are the instruments that would give us the information about which side of the galaxy the photon passed). We have delayed this choice until a time long after the particles “have passed by one side of the galaxy, or the other side of the galaxy, or both sides of the galaxy,” so to speak. Yet, it seems paradoxically that our later choice of whether to obtain this information determines which side of the galaxy the light passed, so to speak, billions of years ago. So it seems that time has nothing to do with effects of quantum mechanics. And, indeed, the original thought experiment was not based on any analysis of how particles evolve and behave over time – it was based on the mathematics. This is what the mathematics predicted for a result, and this is exactly the result obtained in the laboratory. “It was not possible to formulate the laws (of quantum theory) in a fully consistent way without reference to consciousness.” Eugene Wigner (1902 -1995) from his collection of essays “Symmetries and Reflections – Scientific Essays”; Eugene Wigner laid the foundation for the theory of symmetries in quantum mechanics, for which he received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1963.

Here is the key experiment that led Wigner to his Nobel Prize winning work on quantum symmetries:

Eugene Wigner Excerpt: To express this basic experience in a more direct way: the world does not have a privileged center, there is no absolute rest, preferred direction, unique origin of calendar time, even left and right seem to be rather symmetric. The interference of electrons, photons, neutrons has indicated that the state of a particle can be described by a vector possessing a certain number of components. As the observer is replaced by another observer (working elsewhere, looking at a different direction, using another clock, perhaps being left-handed), the state of the very same particle is described by another vector, obtained from the previous vector by multiplying it with a matrix. This matrix transfers from one observer to another. http://www.reak.bme.hu/Wigner_Course/WignerBio/wb1.htm

i.e. In the experiment the ‘world’ (i.e. the universe) does not have a ‘privileged center’. Yet strangely, the conscious observer does exhibit a ‘privileged center’. This is since the ‘matrix’, which determines which vector will be used to describe the particle in the experiment, is ‘observer-centric’ in its origination! Thus explaining Wigner’s dramatic statement, “It was not possible to formulate the laws (of quantum theory) in a fully consistent way without reference to consciousness.” bornagain77

I find the 'anti-science' label, that is constantly attached to people of Theistic persuasion, to be especially ironic coming from the AAAS 'science lobby', which, I believe, is one of the 'science' organizations in America that is top heavy, and overly represented, with atheists. The reason I find it deeply ironic is that the atheistic worldview cannot even provide a rational grounding for the practice of science in the first place: Notes to that effect: Why should the human mind be able to comprehend reality so deeply? Science and engineering, as foreign as it may sound to some people, was born out of a purely Judeo-Christian worldview. To be certain, other cultures, during the history of the world, have given fits and starts to science and engineering, but never did these foreign cultures bring science and engineering to a robust maturity through a sustained systematic development. It was only in the Judeo-Christian worldview, and in that worldview alone, that modern science was brought to the sustainable level of maturity that it has now reached. Several resources are available that document this seemingly mysterious, yet undeniable, fact of history. Here are a few.

Jerry Coyne on the Scientific Method and Religion – Michael Egnor – June 2011 Excerpt: The scientific method — the empirical systematic theory-based study of nature — has nothing to so with some religious inspirations — Animism, Paganism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Shintoism, Islam, and, well, atheism. The scientific method has everything to do with Christian (and Jewish) inspiration. Judeo-Christian culture is the only culture that has given rise to organized theoretical science. Many cultures (e.g. China) have produced excellent technology and engineering, but only Christian culture has given rise to a conceptual understanding of nature. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2011/06/jerry_coyne_on_the_scientific_047431.html The Origin of Science Excerpt: Modern science is not only compatible with Christianity, it in fact finds its origins in Christianity. http://www.columbia.edu/cu/augustine/a/science_origin.html Christianity Is a Science-Starter, Not a Science-Stopper By Nancy Pearcey http://www.pearceyreport.com/archives/2005/09/post_4.php Founders of Modern Science Who Believe in GOD - Tihomir Dimitrov http://www.scigod.com/index.php/sgj/article/viewFile/18/18 A Short List Of The Christian Founders Of Modern Science http://www.creationsafaris.com/wgcs_toc.htm Christianity and The Birth of Science - Michael Bumbulis, Ph.D Excerpt: Furthermore, many of these founders of science lived at a time when others publicly expressed views quite contrary to Christianity - Hume, Hobbes, Darwin, etc. When Boyle argues against Hobbe's materialism or Kelvin argues against Darwin's assumptions, you don't have a case of "closet atheists." http://ldolphin.org/bumbulis/ Christianity Gave Birth To Each Scientific Discipline - Dr. Henry Fritz Schaefer - video http://vimeo.com/16523153

Several more resources are easily available on the internet, and through Amazon, for those who would like to learn more about the Judeo-Christian founding of modern science and engineering. But the main thing I want to focus on in this article is on the particular question of ‘exactly why should it be that the Judeo-Christian worldview is so fruitful to science and engineering, whereas, in the other cultures in the history of the world, science and engineering were stillborn?’ I think Dr. Koons does an excellent job of summing up exactly why the Judeo-Christian worldview is so fruitful to modern science and engineering:

Science and Theism: Concord, not Conflict* – Robert C. Koons IV. The Dependency of Science Upon Theism (Page 21) Excerpt: Without the faith in the rational intelligibility of the world and the divine vocation of human beings to master it, modern science would never have been possible, and, even today, the continued rationality of the enterprise of science depends on convictions that can be reasonably grounded only in theistic metaphysics. http://www.robkoons.net/media/69b0dd04a9d2fc6dffff80b3ffffd524.pdf

As well, Dr. Plantinga does a very good job in summing up exactly why the Judeo-Christian worldview is so fruitful to modern science and engineering here:

Philosopher Sticks Up for God Excerpt: Theism, with its vision of an orderly universe superintended by a God who created rational-minded creatures in his own image, “is vastly more hospitable to science than naturalism,” with its random process of natural selection, he (Plantinga) writes. “Indeed, it is theism, not naturalism, that deserves to be called ‘the scientific worldview.’” http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/14/books/alvin-plantingas-new-book-on-god-and-science.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

bornagain77

Forget anti-science. I think what they're really afraid of is the general public seeing what's inside cells; the microbiology. It makes the atheist/material zealots look like complete fraud. Forget about fighting the Blind Watchmaker zealots head to head. Just put out the facts of reality and let the chips fall where they may. mike1962