Allow me to focus your first question a bit more precisely:
Alex: Why do suppose a website of techies, nearly all of whom abhor spam, would give a forum to one of the most notorious spammers of the late 1990s; an individual who once defended his relentless spamming of not only his own personal website, but also his bulk e-mailing on behalf of others, with the assertion that "I'm an environmentalist."
I only hope his answer is as thought-provoking as the question.
Why must science be with out a God? What if there is one? Shouldn't real science then reflect this? Just think about this even if you don't believe in a God, consider it for a moment. What if there was a God and you would refuse any scientific report that claims this, would you then be scientific?
The notion of an omnipotent entity that actively interacts with the world on a whim is fundamentally inconsistent with the scientific method.
Attributing the possibility of observable effects to "the work of God" is an unacceptable scientific conclusion because the results of not reproducible. Our common conception of God posits that He acts-- or refrains from acting-- on His own free will. (C.f. "nature"). Accordingly, it is impossible to design a reproducible experiment that would allow us to test a hypothesis that God is the cause of an observable effect. (Particularly when God is invariably a fickle creature who refuses to definitively manifest himself or permit incontrovertible evidence of his existence to exist.)
Science is all about reproducibility. If other scientists cannot reproduce your results by reproducing your experimental methods, we are left with a "well, it works for me" situation. (Or even worse, "it works for me sometimes.") If the results of an experiment are dependent upon "God wanting it to come out that way," you've introduced a variable into the experiment that cannot be controlled for.
That being said, there has been some efforts to apply the scientific method towards discerning the existence of God. For example, there are studies (cites upon request) that compare the recovery rates of sick and injured people, some of whom are surreptitiously prayed for, and some of whom are not. The results showed that praying for someone to recover had no demonstrable effect on their recovery time.
Let's assume, for a moment, that a reproducible effect was established by such an experiment. A scientist might then formulate experiments to test whether prayer is effective in other contexts. If those demonstrate a similar effect, the scientist might then devise other hypothesies and experiments to determine the existence of God. If valid experiements, scrupulously conducted and peer reviewed by other scientists, showed there to be reasonable evidence to believe in the existence of God, any reasonable scientist would have to accept the possibility that He exists.
Belief in the scientific method does not necessarily negate belief in God-- it is possible to believe that God establishes the physical laws of the universe, or that He puts into motion the chain of events leading to the creation of the universe or the existence of life. But science only works with a complacent God who doesn't change the rules in the middle of the game or interfere with earthly events on a whim.
Slashdot Mirror
Allow me to focus your first question a bit more precisely:
Alex: Why do suppose a website of techies, nearly all of whom abhor spam, would give a forum to one of the most notorious spammers of the late 1990s; an individual who once defended his relentless spamming of not only his own personal website, but also his bulk e-mailing on behalf of others, with the assertion that "I'm an environmentalist."
I only hope his answer is as thought-provoking as the question.
The notion of an omnipotent entity that actively interacts with the world on a whim is fundamentally inconsistent with the scientific method.
Attributing the possibility of observable effects to "the work of God" is an unacceptable scientific conclusion because the results of not reproducible. Our common conception of God posits that He acts-- or refrains from acting-- on His own free will. (C.f. "nature"). Accordingly, it is impossible to design a reproducible experiment that would allow us to test a hypothesis that God is the cause of an observable effect. (Particularly when God is invariably a fickle creature who refuses to definitively manifest himself or permit incontrovertible evidence of his existence to exist.)
Science is all about reproducibility. If other scientists cannot reproduce your results by reproducing your experimental methods, we are left with a "well, it works for me" situation. (Or even worse, "it works for me sometimes.") If the results of an experiment are dependent upon "God wanting it to come out that way," you've introduced a variable into the experiment that cannot be controlled for.
That being said, there has been some efforts to apply the scientific method towards discerning the existence of God. For example, there are studies (cites upon request) that compare the recovery rates of sick and injured people, some of whom are surreptitiously prayed for, and some of whom are not. The results showed that praying for someone to recover had no demonstrable effect on their recovery time.
Let's assume, for a moment, that a reproducible effect was established by such an experiment. A scientist might then formulate experiments to test whether prayer is effective in other contexts. If those demonstrate a similar effect, the scientist might then devise other hypothesies and experiments to determine the existence of God. If valid experiements, scrupulously conducted and peer reviewed by other scientists, showed there to be reasonable evidence to believe in the existence of God, any reasonable scientist would have to accept the possibility that He exists.
Belief in the scientific method does not necessarily negate belief in God-- it is possible to believe that God establishes the physical laws of the universe, or that He puts into motion the chain of events leading to the creation of the universe or the existence of life. But science only works with a complacent God who doesn't change the rules in the middle of the game or interfere with earthly events on a whim.