A proposition is scientifically true, if what it says corresponds to reality. Reality is the way things actually are in the physical world. The concept of scientific truth cannot be applied to supernatural concepts because they exist outside reality.
Let’s say one claimed the proposition “God exists” is scientifically true. This would imply God exists in the physical world; therefore, we can study God’s existence with the tools of science. Scientific knowledge requires supporting empirical evidence. There is no empirical evidence supporting the idea God exists in the physical world; therefore, it is unreasonable to believe the proposition “God exists” is scientifically true.
What’s the scientific evidence that scientific evidence is the only valid source of knowledge?
by that definition you’re saying Math is not scientifically true.
I mean sure, depending on the definition you want to use that can apply, but what’s the point ?
Math works despite not being scientifically true with your definition.
>Reality is the way things actually are in the physical world.
The biggest issue with this is that you are simply assuming the physical world is all that there is – i.e. begging the question. You’re obviously going to exclude God from reality with this definition because many theists don’t claim that God exists in the physical world. As an atheist, I would still have a problem with this statement because it assumes that the mental world is reducible to the physical world – a claim that is very far from obvious AFAIAC (see “the hard problem of consciousness”). I would also point to mathematics as something that really does seem to be part of reality but it’s not obviously just a manifestation of the physical world.
“Reality is the way things actually are in the physical world”
Begs the question and is quite plausibly false, even ignoring Theism, Platonism is a live option (some 40% of philosophers affirm it). You need to rephrase this as scientifically true refers to what corresponds to testable claims about the physical world, at which point your argument will follow and be correct. Reality quite likely exceeds the physical world.
This just begs the question through your idiosyncratic definition of the word reality. A more standard definition would be the state of all things that exist. Now if it happens to be the case that only physical things exist then it would be true that reality only refers to physical things. However, theists disagree that only physical things exist. Only people who already agree with your conclusion are going to accept your definition of reality hence your begging the question. You need to provide evidence that only physical things exist for your argument to work otherwise theists have no reason to accept your definition of reality.
The only thing I object to here is your use of the word “reality” to mean the physical world. This is nonstandard and confusing. I suggest dropping this usage and rewriting your first paragraph as:
> A proposition is scientifically true, if what it says corresponds to the physical world. The concept of scientific truth cannot be applied to supernatural concepts because they exist outside the physical world.
This avoids the nonstandard usage, and supports your second paragraph just as well as before.
If your intention was for this to be an argument for atheism, then you will need to defend the further claim that the physical world is the only reality, or that scientific truth is the only truth, or something like that. If you want to make these claims, they must be argued for, not just smuggled in via nonstandard word usages.
To just that which exists is only what we can scientifically prove is itself an unproveable claim for science itself to prove, because it relies on evidence it cannot observe, and the lack of evidence one way is not proof of another. That’s a fallacy.
Personally I’m of the view that it is impossible to prove or disprove the existence of any given deity, as the scientific method only deals with the material not the spiritual. From that my view is that religious experience is simultaneously not scientifically true while not being able to be proven objectively false either. To put it another way, something can be not scientifically true while still not being false.
>A proposition is scientifically true, if what it says corresponds to reality. Reality is the way things actually are in the physical world. **The concept of scientific truth cannot be applied to supernatural concepts because they exist outside reality**.
The concept of scientific truth cannot be applied to imaginary (existing exclusively in the imagination) things because imaginary things exist only in the imagination.
Which I would argue entails that imaginary things and supernatural things are indistinguishable if not identical.
Simply put it was always a subjective claim. “God” A slippery subject that can always be redefined by a more elusive definition. Untouchable and bla bla bla.
Since you’re just assuming physicalism/materialism/naturalism from the get-go, you can simplify:
1. Non-physical things don’t exist.
2. God is a non-physical thing.
3. Therefore, God doesn’t exist.
Which is valid. The problem is obviously that nobody accepts (1) who isn’t already a physicalist/materialist/naturalist, and therefore also an atheist.
I do think it unreasonable. Because, one of the hallmarks of rationality is applying the same analytical criteria to different things. That doesn’t happen with religion. A faither will be completely rational in their disbelief of any number of things, but then apply a different and contradictory set of reasons why they believe in god.
The problem is that it’s an unfalsifiable hypothesis. There is no way to prove that there is no God or gods.
There is no such thing as scientific truth. Science does not make truth claims, it gathers observed evidence and builds models to explain phenomena. A scientific theory offers the best current explanation, not truth.
The problem here is ‘God exists’ is incoherent until ‘god’ is defined in enough detail to even be a proposition.
There has never been universal agreement or even a general consensus amongst those who believe god exists on what god IS.
Further, I’m not sure ‘scientifically true’ is the best formation, science seeks to understand known facts and discover accurate explanations for them, but there is always an acceptance it is a tentative position based on current knowledge. Scientifically true’ is verging on ‘The Truth’ territory, the strongest scientific claims seem to align more with statements such as ‘we are as certain as we can be’ or similar.
This isn’t me being pedantic, and I am open to anyone from a background in science correcting me, but I think ‘truth’ statements in such discussions are best left to theists.
Has non-existence been proven empirically by science?
Considering that God does not exist as an existence, but as the antecedent of existence, how do you propose science could prove God? Seems like a fool’s errand to me.
The fallacy here is assuming only the physical is real.
Nobody says gods existence is scientifically true, nobody’s god came to earth and lived among the natural world except Christianity and the other polytheistic religions of the world. You can’t prove or disprove god with science bc god has nothing to do with Science. God is proven and disproven by logical and philosophical arguments, idk why ppl think science is concerned with god, they are two totally different things.