Herra1

Hello You all.
I have a question which is somehow connected to OUR cause.
How can You prove anything.
Or to put the question other way. What, or which things are PROVEN ?

Skepticologist

Do WE have a "cause"? Who are WE, and what is IT?

Pending your answer, I'll share some preliminary thoughts on your question.

My initial response is very few (things are proven). If you consider the small number of hypotheses that have graduated to the status of laws as a result of being subjected to the rigors of the scientific method, I think you'll agree. The law of gravity comes to mind. Since Newton published it all those hundreds of years ago, to my knowledge, no apple has ever fallen up. It's been proven and confirmed every day and, despite a few casa magnetica illusions, has never been called into serious question. Consequently, I'm very comfortable accepting it as proven, especially when I find myself in high places with less-than-substantial physical restraints.

On the other end of the spectrum, there are things accepted as being proven on the basis of only one, or very few, experiences. The vast majority of religious phenomena fall squarely into this category. An example: "I prayed to god for deliverance from athlete's foot and three days later I saw a Lotrimin commercial." Such happenstance, to a surprisingly large number of people, constitutes irrevocable proof that god exists. And once hooked by such nebulous circumstances, they'll even believe that whether or not they'd seen the Lotrimin commercial, god would still have answered their prayers; as if not delivering them from athlete's foot were his way of teaching them humility, or the value of spiritual vs. physical considerations, or whatever else they might imagine.

The moral of this story is "be careful what you accept as proof". Otherwise, you could find yourself dashed to bits after falling from a great height, but happy about it because your foot is no longer itching.

__________________
"I am an agnostic; I do not pretend to know what many ignorant men are sure of."

Clarence Darrow

Herra1

Well, We are, being agnostic about "proven"(???) things.
For me your answer about gravity is very convincing.
It is something we can see happening every day.

What then is scientific rigor ?
Where we base our belief/faith, when we say something is proven by scientific rigor ?

neverforever

We are being agnostic for things that cant be proven. I want u to tell me what u think we are agnostic towards that is proven. No bible verses now read my signature.

__________________
They'll know were agnostic by our brains.

Making more Christians one brainwashing at a time.

Yes i agree the bible is a history book.
Remember history books don't prove history they tell it.
So stop using the bible as proof

romansh

Never ending

Using Skepti's example of gravity ... I would go one step further in that the laws proposed by Newton are a really good expression of phenomenon we see every day. We can fly to the moon and back using them.

But are they accurate at the very small scale (atomic and sub atomic) and at the cosmic scale..... that is another matter?

By and large agnostics avoid beliefs (excluding my wife.... now her I believe).

__________________
There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened. ........... Douglas Adams

shadowind

if something is true by diffinition such as a triangle having 3 corners, then its true. i do think most things are based off of assumptions through. however some assumptions make more sense, becuse their more observeable and have less conflicting possiblilitys and less knowen senseable uncertainty.

__________________
remember "for mere impulse of appetite is slavery, while obedience to a law which we prescirbe to oursleves is liberty"-rousseau: the concept of the general will "if we can not reconcile all opions, then let us endeavour to unite all hearts."-?"to be is to be perceived"-? "‘We can be as honest as we are ignorant. If we are, when asked what is beyond the horizon of the known, we must say that we do not know’-Robert G. Ingersoll

Danlo

As we know,
There are known knowns,
There are things we know we know.
We also know
There are known unknowns.
That is to say
We know there are some things
We do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns,
The ones we don’t know we don’t know.

- Feb 2, 2002, Dept. of Defense (Rumsfeld I believe) news briefing

neverforever

Hmm can u prove that part sorry im being a

__________________
They'll know were agnostic by our brains.

Making more Christians one brainwashing at a time.

Yes i agree the bible is a history book.
Remember history books don't prove history they tell it.
So stop using the bible as proof

AB517

How about Gunther's (what ever his name is) inflation ... it is the same as religous experience.

AB517

The higgs field, that’s what they are looking for, but they are not sure. They mite find something unexpected ... didn’t know it was unknown till they find it. Science is filled with such tales.