[Ganeshas Rat]

It's like saying a scientist can't really believe in the big bang without directly experiencing the big bang. You believe in the big bang in either case.

No, it's like saying a scientist can't really believe in the big bang if he directly experienced the big bang. By the way, if scientist believes in something, the big bang or God or particles, he isn't a scientist.

[mikema63]

Science is not a sure thing fact, all you can do is show an increase in probability that something is true. All of science is underplayed by the induction fallacy. Just because light has seemed to be an unalterable constant throughout all time and all our observations show that does not prove that it must always be so. Science also can never solve solipsism. We cannot know that anything science said is actually true, we just have a pretty good idea what is or is not true.

Belief is not some mystical thing only religious people can have, everything we know, we merely believe with varying degrees of justification for believing it.

[Rancid]

By the way, if scientist believes in something, the big bang or God or particles, he isn't a scientist.

If there were true, why bother with anything then?

[Godstud]

By the way, if scientist believes in something, the big bang or God or particles, he isn't a scientist.

No. Many scientists "believe" in theories but they only believe in so far as the evidence and information supports that. If you think believing that the evolution theory is FAITH, then you are sadly misinformed about what scientific method is all about.

Scientific belief and religious belief are not one and the same. Most scientists believe that there are rational, and scientific, explanations for everything. They do not believe in things that don't have science to back them up.

Then again, a scientist can believe in god and this can still not disrupt his science. Many scientist are religious, but the science is separate from their religious convictions. Believing god made the earth doesn't mean it can't also be explained scientifically. eg. God made the earth, and man need not question that, when he's still trying to figure out the owner's manual.

[mikema63]

still trying to figure out the owner's manual.

Very unfortunate that god turned out to be the type to not just put it in the glove box.

[Godstud]

I guess the "Apple of Knowledge" on the tree, that Adam ate, was just enough to cause trouble, but not answer any real questions. Damn Satan's shrewd!

[distinct]

I think a big factor in my atheism was my lack of admiration for my highly religious parents. I saw them as flawed individuals with flawed religious thinking, which led me to quest for my own religion. Nothing satisfied me, so here I sit a skeptical agnostic.