God, Mathematicians, and Mathematical Logic

For professionally trained mathematicians and scientists interested in equipping Christians with the foundations of science, molecular and quantum creationism and a deeper understanding of the religious and philosophical aspects of quantum mechanics, special and general relativity and cosmology.
Eugene Shubert
Confessing Millerite Adventist
Confessing Millerite Adventist
Posts: 1597
Joined: Sat Apr 06, 2002 2:35 pm

God, Mathematicians, and Mathematical Logic

Postby Eugene Shubert » Wed Feb 04, 2009 10:50 pm

:radar: In the following sources, you can learn a few useful fundamentals in the debate between science and religion.

Georg Cantor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Cantor

Here are some important excerpts:

Cantor's theory of transfinite numbers was originally regarded as so counter-intuitive—even shocking—that it encountered resistance from mathematical contemporaries such as Leopold Kronecker and Henri Poincaré and later from Hermann Weyl and L. E. J. Brouwer, while Ludwig Wittgenstein raised philosophical objections. Some Christian theologians (particularly neo-Scholastics) saw Cantor's work as a challenge to the uniqueness of the absolute infinity in the nature of God, on one occasion equating the theory of transfinite numbers with pantheism. The objections to his work were occasionally fierce: Poincaré referred to Cantor's ideas as a "grave disease" infecting the discipline of mathematics, and Kronecker's public opposition and personal attacks included describing Cantor as a "scientific charlatan", a "renegade" and a "corrupter of youth." Writing decades after Cantor's death, Wittgenstein lamented that mathematics is "ridden through and through with the pernicious idioms of set theory," which he dismissed as "utter nonsense" that is "laughable" and "wrong".

To Cantor, his mathematical views were intrinsically linked to their philosophical and theological implications—he identified the Absolute Infinite with God, and he considered his work on transfinite numbers to have been directly communicated to him by God, who had chosen Cantor to reveal them to the world.

The harsh criticism has been matched by international accolades. In 1904, the Royal Society awarded Cantor its Sylvester Medal, the highest honor it can confer. David Hilbert defended transfinite numbers from its critics by famously declaring: "No one shall expel us from the Paradise that Cantor has created."

Millerites were the first to appreciate Cantor's revelations as being relevant in their expositions on Christ's rank in the Godhead.

The Dawkins Lennox Debate
http://www.dawkinslennoxdebate.com/

The Incorrigible Dr. Berlinski
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p ... playnext=1

This link will play a series of 22 clips from YouTube. It's starts very slow for the first 2 minutes but all the rest is very entertaining and informative.

David Hilbert's Philosophy of Physics
http://everythingimportant.org/physics/Hilbert.htm

Quantum Creationism And The Theory of Devolution
http://everythingimportant.org/quantumcreationism
http://everythingimportant.org/devolution

Eugene Shubert
Confessing Millerite Adventist
Confessing Millerite Adventist
Posts: 1597
Joined: Sat Apr 06, 2002 2:35 pm

Re: God, Mathematicians, and Mathematical Logic

Postby Eugene Shubert » Thu Feb 05, 2009 12:32 am

I was fortunate enough to have Dr. Errett Bishop as one of my professors at UCSD. He taught that set theory is "God's mathematics, which we should leave for God to do." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Set_theory

Here are a few more statements by mathematicians that I greatly enjoy:

Blaise Pascal wrote:It is the heart which perceives God and not the reason.

I'm especially delighted with the famous argument called Pascal's wager:

Blaise Pascal wrote:Let us weigh the gain and the loss in wagering that God is. Let us consider the two possibilities. If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Hesitate not, then, to wager that He is.

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) lived quite a long time ago, but his logic is impeccable. The following statements by modern mathematicians are also very enjoyable because their words also support faith and mathematical reasoning:

Bertrand Russell wrote:If a religion is defined to be a system of ideas that contains unprovable statements, then Gödel taught us that mathematics is not only a religion, it is the only religion that can prove itself to be one.

F. De Sua wrote:Suppose we loosely define a religion as any discipline whose foundations rest on an element of faith, irrespective of any element of reason which may be present. [Atheism], for example, would be a religion under this definition. But mathematics would hold the unique position of being the only branch of theology possessing a rigorous demonstration of the fact that it should be so classified. — Cited In Mathematical Circles, Boston: Prindle, Weber and Schmidt, 1969.

:infinity:


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