Originally Posted by
geoff332
The key point I was making was that when you start making predictions (that is, predictions that are scientifically meaningful) from the Bible (or any other religious document), you are making claims about material reality. And material reality is not a foundation of religious belief. As I've repeatedly said, the two are not necessarily in opposition to one another, but they are very, very different things.
Of course it does: that's what sciences do. Without prediction, we don't have science. Where these predictions come from is largely irrelevant - as long as they are treated with scientific discipline to be refined and tested. The critical point is not that these predictions are correct, but that we can test them and find out if they are correct. If they are, great. If not, we think again...
As a perfect example: Thompson's inital discovery of the electron lead to the theory that the atom was that it was a "pudding"with electrons scattered through it like plums. Then Rutherford made a number of predictions about how alpha radiation would behave when passing through atoms. The resulting observations (mainly by Geiger and Marsden) were inconsistent with the plum pudding model. Rutherford's model that explained their behaviour required most of the mass to be found in a small, positively charged lump at the centre of the atom with tiny, negatively charged electrons spinning around the edge. This is, of course, the discovery of the nucleus and the birth of nuclear physics. Based on this theory, Rutherford further predicted that if you hit the nucleus hard enough with alpha particles, it would split, resulting in a change of one element to another. He achieved this, splitting hydrogen from nitrogen.
To suggest that any religion is supposed to operate like this: to make testable predictions that will confirm or falsify the truth claims of the religion is an error (and one too many people make - including a number of people who should know better). Any 'scientific predictions' made based on the Bible are in fact made on the basis of human interpretations and involve shifting the truth claim in the Bible from it's basis to a different one (from spiritual to material). That shift is messy and impossible to reverse. The Biblical claim is the inspiration, but the process of generating a testable prediction is pure science. Thus, where science "disproves" claims from the Bible, it disproves a specific interpretation and translation of that claim. This is not the same as disproving the claim itself. Similarly, scientific evidence supporting a claim from the Bible does not prove that claim to be true.
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