The Einstein Status...Again!

So, I'm sure most people who read this will have had the misfortune the come across this ahistorical, scientifically  and philosophically illiterate and generally facepalm-inducing status on your newfeed before. 

It is the kind of overt display of idiocy that forces one into the dilemma of whether to engage in what will likely be a very frustrating debate (usually with a complete stranger) through that most excellent medium of reasoned academic discourse -  facebook comments (and maybe even messages if it gets really serious). 

It reads like this:

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"Professor : You are a Christian, aren’t you, son ?

Student : Yes, sir.

Professor: So, you believe in GOD ?

Student : Absolutely, sir.

Professor : Is GOD good ?

Student : Sure.

Professor: Is GOD all powerful ?

Student : Yes.

Professor: My brother died of cancer even though he prayed to GOD to heal him. Most of us would attempt to help others who are ill. But GOD didn’t. How is this GOD good then? Hmm?

(Student was silent.)

Professor: You can’t answer, can you ? Let’s start again, young fella. Is GOD good?

Student : Yes.

Professor: Is satan good ?

Student : No.

Professor: Where does satan come from ?

Student : From … GOD …

Professor: That’s right. Tell me son, is there evil in this world?

Student : Yes.

Professor: Evil is everywhere, isn’t it ? And GOD did make everything. Correct?

Student : Yes.

Professor: So who created evil ?

(Student did not answer.)

Professor: Is there sickness? Immorality? Hatred? Ugliness? All these terrible things exist in the world, don’t they?

Student : Yes, sir.

Professor: So, who created them ?

(Student had no answer.)

Professor: Science says you have 5 Senses you use to identify and observe the world around you. Tell me, son, have you ever seen GOD?

Student : No, sir.

Professor: Tell us if you have ever heard your GOD?

Student : No , sir.

Professor: Have you ever felt your GOD, tasted your GOD, smelt your GOD? Have you ever had any sensory perception of GOD for that matter?

Student : No, sir. I’m afraid I haven’t.

Professor: Yet you still believe in Him?

Student : Yes.

Professor : According to Empirical, Testable, Demonstrable Protocol, Science says your GOD doesn’t exist. What do you say to that, son?

Student : Nothing. I only have my faith.

Professor: Yes, faith. And that is the problem Science has.

Student : Professor, is there such a thing as heat?

Professor: Yes.

Student : And is there such a thing as cold?

Professor: Yes.

Student : No, sir. There isn’t.

(The lecture theater became very quiet with this turn of events.)

Student : Sir, you can have lots of heat, even more heat, superheat, mega heat, white heat, a little heat or no heat. But we don’t have anything called cold. We can hit 458 degrees below zero which is no heat, but we can’t go any further after that. There is no such thing as cold. Cold is only a word we use to describe the absence of heat. We cannot measure cold. Heat is energy. Cold is not the opposite of heat, sir, just the absence of it.

(There was pin-drop silence in the lecture theater.)

Student : What about darkness, Professor? Is there such a thing as darkness?

Professor: Yes. What is night if there isn’t darkness?

Student : You’re wrong again, sir. Darkness is the absence of something. You can have low light, normal light, bright light, flashing light. But if you have no light constantly, you have nothing and its called darkness, isn’t it? In reality, darkness isn’t. If it is, well you would be able to make darkness darker, wouldn’t you?

Professor: So what is the point you are making, young man ?

Student : Sir, my point is your philosophical premise is flawed.

Professor: Flawed ? Can you explain how?

Student : Sir, you are working on the premise of duality. You argue there is life and then there is death, a good GOD and a bad GOD. You are viewing the concept of GOD as something finite, something we can measure. Sir, Science can’t even explain a thought. It uses electricity and magnetism, but has never seen, much less fully understood either one. To view death as the opposite of life is to be ignorant of the fact that death cannot exist as a substantive thing.

Death is not the opposite of life: just the absence of it. Now tell me, Professor, do you teach your students that they evolved from a monkey?

Professor: If you are referring to the natural evolutionary process, yes, of course, I do.

Student : Have you ever observed evolution with your own eyes, sir?

(The Professor shook his head with a smile, beginning to realize where the argument was going.)

Student : Since no one has ever observed the process of evolution at work and cannot even prove that this process is an on-going endeavor. Are you not teaching your opinion, sir? Are you not a scientist but a preacher?

(The class was in uproar.)

Student : Is there anyone in the class who has ever seen the Professor’s brain?

(The class broke out into laughter. )

Student : Is there anyone here who has ever heard the Professor’s brain, felt it, touched or smelt it? No one appears to have done so. So, according to the established Rules of Empirical, Stable, Demonstrable Protocol, Science says that you have no brain, sir. With all due respect, sir, how do we then trust your lectures, sir?

(The room was silent. The Professor stared at the student, his face unfathomable.)

Professor: I guess you’ll have to take them on faith, son.

Student : That is it sir … Exactly ! The link between man & GOD is FAITH. That is all that keeps things alive and moving.

P.S.

I believe you have enjoyed the conversation. And if so, you’ll probably want your friends / colleagues to enjoy the same, won’t you?

Forward this to increase their knowledge … or FAITH.

By the way, that student was EINSTEIN."

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So, getting the easy part out of the way first - this is ahistorical, i.e. it never happened and in fact misrepresents Einstein's religious beliefs - he was an agnostic and/or a pantheist (depending on which quotes you prefer to use) and certainly would not have demeaned and misrepresented science so crudely (more on that later). 

The main premise of this steaming pile of intellectual laziness is that faith is required to accept science, so what's so bad about using it to believe in a deity? This is absurd and the "professor" character is a ridiculous strawman - any academic stunned into silence by such a misguided student would be deserving of immediate firing. 

The strawman is this - science is about what your 5 senses can tell you and thus belief in evolution, electromagnetism and so on is a leap of faith. 
But science is not just about what an individual can observe with their senses: we can't "see" ultraviolet light but we can observe its effects, we can measure it, create it etc. With evolution the case is also clear - we have a wealth of evidence which includes observation of mutation and adaptation of a species within the lab. The brain example is just asinine - we observe the effects of the professor's brain (though it appears to be quite feeble if the response to our young "Einstein" is anything to go by) in his speech, muscle movements and  ability to teach a lecture.

On the question of "faith" we tumble further down the rabbit hole - is the author's implication that faith in God is just as justified as scientific "faith" (and in the same way), because if so that suggests we have some serious physical evidence for god if he manifests as clearly as electricity or electromagnetism. Maybe they mean that since we all have faith we might as well believe in the Christian god, in which case I would suggest the reader take out all uses of the word God and replace at will with other concepts (flying spaghetti monster, invisible pink unicorn, Odin, Thor) - that should give an idea of how much value comes from arguing on faith.

I've probably bored anyone reading this to death but I felt this needed to be refuted (if I missed anything let me know), at least now when this is posted you can link here so you don't have to endure the tedium of writing out a response to this childish nonsense.