Higgs Boson – are scientific advances squeezing religion out of existence?

[naomi24]

A number of ABers have asked for a simple explanation and this is about the simplest I’ve found.

http://www.thesun.co....story-of-science.html

[Old_Geezer]

The best explanation is from Your Soaraway Sun ?!?!? :-D

In answer to your question, no. Science clarifies and indicates where religion, as well as science, didn't have things 100% accurate in the past. New information will have its affect and the new information will need to be accommodated, but nothing more.

[naomi24]

OG //The best explanation is from Your Soaraway Sun ?!?!? :-D //

I said the simplest - not the best - although actually I think the simplest explanations are the best. There's nothing to be gained from blinding people with scientific jargon they don't understand. ;o)

[RATTER15]

>>Are Scientific Advances Squeezing Religion Out Of Existence?<<

I doubt it, im sure the theists will provide some biblical quote to prove the existence of Higgs Boson. but atheist wont understand it because we dont understand what is written in the Bible.

[naomi24]

Ratter, //atheist wont understand it because we dont understand what is written in the Bible. //

Perhaps you should qualify that by saying atheists don't understand what is written in the bible as religionists understand it. I think most atheists understand all too well what is written in the bible - which is why they are atheists. ;o)

[jomifl]

Following on from Ratter's insight, it won't be long before a muslim scholar(or even keyplus) says that the Higgs boson was mentioned in the koran.

[argorstran]

No - scientific advances are not squeezing religion out of existence . Read the article - the theory is that the Higgs particles "condensed" after the Big Bang .

Who or what caused the big bang ?

[jake-the-peg]

Sorry argorstran it doesn't work like that.

Time was created at the big bang - by definition it cannot have a cause

You'll get the same argument from theists about God not having a cause

But we have evidence

[argorstran]

So the big bang caused itself , Jake ?

[jake-the-peg]

The word cause implies a before

there was no before

Time "started" at that point

If you're used to time being the way you experience it day to day that seems like nonsense I know.

but your everyday experience is in a very limted set of conditions and things like time don't work the way you're used to when things get extreme.

The gravity in a black hole is so strong that time stops

The big bang was basically a black hole in reverse

[vetuste_ennemi]

Dr. Cox will be relieved to know that in one way at least he floats Naomi's boat.
The answer, questioner, is of course "Yes": we no longer need supernatural explanations of the world. To quote Khandro's mate Nietzsche "God is dead". The intellectual argument is won. What remains is to overcome the inertia of thousands of years of social and religious conditioning and to wrest the moral domain away from the priests and idolaters where it has been so poorly served. I was optimistic when I was younger that these difficult tasks were achievable. Now, considering the triumph of Christianity in the Roman Empire and its stultifying effects on human progress for the next thousand years and the recent rise of the most ignorant and morally stunted kinds of Islamic fundamentalism, I am far more gloomy.
Re "what caused the big bang?" I've recently read Krauss's fascinating Universe from Nothing with the mixture of awe, astonishment and incomprehension I have whenever I get within a parsec of Schrodinger, Heisenberg etc. It will appeal to the more scientifically orientated.

[naomi24]

VE, //Dr. Cox will be relieved to know that in one way at least he floats Naomi's boat.//

Despite my opinion of Brian Cox’s physical failings, I would be honoured to invite him to my dinner table. It is not unknown for me to have fallen in love with a brain or three . ;o)

The rest of your post is music to my eyes.

[birdie1971]

I loved the caption to one of the photographs in The Sun which was, “... scientists in Geneva find teeny particle...”

As if there there were lots of other beach-ball sized particles that no one had ever noticed before...

[naomi24]

^^ Haaa! Good, eh? :o)

[ludwig]

// I loved the caption to one of the photographs in The Sun which was, “... scientists in Geneva find teeny particle...” //

That caption could only have been improved if it referred to them as 'boffins', as it does elsewhere.

[chakka35]

"I think that the simplest explanations are the best". Er...naomi, what was that about Occam?

Just teasing.

[bazwillrun]

"The gravity in a black hole is so strong that time stops "

Really ?!, I suggest you do some more resarch then

[bazwillrun]

@JTP

If you now intend masquerading as an expert on Astrophhysics/Cosmolgy then at least try and get your facts right

[jake-the-peg]

My my you're cross!

Yes I'm using some sweeping terms as this isn't a hugely technical forum.

Are you disputing Gravitational time dilation, the fact that time is a feature of space that was created at the big bang or that a black hole is like a big bang in reverse?

Or perhaps you want to pick hairs on the difference between a black hole and a singularity?

PS your best bet is probably to say that we don't know what happens in a singularity because the laws of physics clearlly dont work at that point and I'm infering beyond where we have data for.

In any case just getting abusive and saying "you're wrong" in colourful terms doesn't progress us very far

[ludwig]

// The gravity in a black hole is so strong that time stops //

This is true, and I've noticed a similar effect when I go clothes shopping with my wife. I think Jake is a bona fide boffin, and not masquerading.

[naomi24]

Chakka, //Er...naomi, what was that about Occam?//

Slightly askew there. Occam best guesses – always – but Brian Cox in the link I provided, explains, in simple terms, a proven answer. Big difference. ;o)