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Today's Atheist Meme of the Day:
"We don't currently understand X" is not a good argument for why "X must be caused by God or the supernatural." Without solid, positive evidence for why X is caused by God or the supernatural, this isn't a real argument -- it's just dodging the question. Pass it on: if we say it enough times to enough people, it may get through.
Saying that anything we don't understand is therefore created by god doesn't actually answer the question of whatever it is that we don't understand. It isn't useful, it doesn't tell us anything, and it doesn't give us the information we need to make predictions about the occurrence. It's just another placeholder for "we don't know". We can't DO anything with that as an answer. And since the ultimate plan of god is supposedly unknowable, it really is just another way to say "we don't know".
And since every single time a supernatural entity was invoked as an "explanation" that science was able to investigate, every single time science has found an explanation that didn't end in "god did it".
The god-did-it answer is not an answer. It's a dead end that does nothing to further our understanding of the universe. We are where we are in society, in history, in achievement, because people did not accept that "god did it" was a suitable answer. As we've gradually uncovered more and more real reasons for things, society and the quality of life for humans and the rest of the planet, have gotten demonstrably better.
Not perfect. But better.
"We don't currently understand X" is not a good argument for why "X must be caused by God or the supernatural." Without solid, positive evidence for why X is caused by God or the supernatural, this isn't a real argument -- it's just dodging the question. Pass it on: if we say it enough times to enough people, it may get through.
Saying that anything we don't understand is therefore created by god doesn't actually answer the question of whatever it is that we don't understand. It isn't useful, it doesn't tell us anything, and it doesn't give us the information we need to make predictions about the occurrence. It's just another placeholder for "we don't know". We can't DO anything with that as an answer. And since the ultimate plan of god is supposedly unknowable, it really is just another way to say "we don't know".
And since every single time a supernatural entity was invoked as an "explanation" that science was able to investigate, every single time science has found an explanation that didn't end in "god did it".
The god-did-it answer is not an answer. It's a dead end that does nothing to further our understanding of the universe. We are where we are in society, in history, in achievement, because people did not accept that "god did it" was a suitable answer. As we've gradually uncovered more and more real reasons for things, society and the quality of life for humans and the rest of the planet, have gotten demonstrably better.
Not perfect. But better.
