Scientific Arguments for God

First of all Here are my reasons for belief. And keep reading in that thread for the connection to what I believe..

There is no objective evidence – certainly nothing that science would call evidence. I don’t think that is even possible. For me that would even defeat the purpose – because for me it is all about the belief in a subjective aspect to reality. Science is all about objective observation, but science is not life, and life requires subjective participation. In science what we want and believe is irrelevant, but in life what we want and believe is central – we cannot live without it.

So what you should be looking for are reasons for belief not objective evidence. Otherwise you are just indulging in self-delusion. Ultimately what God wants is faith and too great of a demand for evidence is a refusal to have faith. But I don’t think it is a blind faith which God is asking for – that which ignores the evidence. In other words, the most you can expect is an argument for this as a possibility and it is up to you to choose what you want and who you are.

The only purpose for objective evidence is a demand other agree with you. But personal belief is all about your own personal experience of life – not only what you have experienced but what you want and need. So is this really about what you believe or is this about pushing your beliefs on other people?

And I would also suggest that a good part of this is not looking for new evidence to prop up old conceptions but finding new understanding of God which better fits the objective evidence.

The thing is that our recent discoveries from what we can do with evolutionary/learning algorithms on computers is that these can surpass all human intelligence and abilities for design. This suggests to me that the search for God in intelligent design is misguided. More and more it is looking like the ultimate designer is a computer algorithm simulating mechanical evolutionary processes. Why would we look for God in something like that? So I would suggest that we go back from the largely Deist conception of God as a great watchmaker back to the traditional conception of God as shepherd. After all the first of these reduces us to little more than mechanical devices as well.

So I would say not only that we are not machines but that that design is the very difference between machines and living organisms. We are quickly progressing in the understanding and use of the machinery of life to create virus like bodies for medical purposes. But I do not think this is an example of creating life, because life is all about self-organization rather than design.

It is my belief that too much of our religious past has been obsessed with power and control, painting God in such terms because of our own misguided values and thus misrepresenting God as well. It has all been very convenient for those who would use religion as a tool of power themselves. So I believe in a God who chose love and freedom rather than power and control, for only the former would create life at all, let become a helpless human infant to grow up among us and die for us on a cross. I think it is time to remove the distortions so suited to those who would use religion as a means of power.