What would a perfectly rational thinker do?

[Stunster]

WHAT WOULD A PERFECTLY RATIONAL THINKER DO?

Let's say you want to create a physical world in which there are human beings. You need to select some laws of physics. Which ones do you select? Well, we *know* that the ones that obtain in the actual universe will do the job. We *don't* know that any alternative laws will do the job. Assume that you're a perfectly rational thinker with an unlimited ability to do the necessary computations. Yup, you select the laws of physics that actually obtain in our world. You reason that any other selection will defeat your purpose. But you're a perfectly rational thinker, and so you go ahead and select the right physics and
create the world and thus realize your purpose.

The physics that makes humans and the physics that drowns us is one and the same physics. Tamper with the drowning part, and we wouldn't be here to drown anyway. We are what we are (DNA); water is what it is (H2O). Given these facts, then human beings will drown in certain
circumstances. It turns out to be mathematically irrational to have undrownable human beings. If you understood the science involved, you'd see that. But you're a perfectly rational thinker, so you do
see it.

But now back up a bit. As a perfectly rational thinker, you know all this. You rationally predict that some human beings will drown, if you
create human beings. Should you go ahead and create them anyway? Since you're a perfectly rational thinker, you know that you ought to
select the better alternative. Now which alternative is better--creating human beings, or not creating them?

I think most people are, on the whole, glad they were born, even just assuming this life is all the life there is. I suspect, for instance,
that you're glad you were born and glad you're having the life you're having. Each person has to answer that question for himself or herself. But my guess is that most give a thumbs up to their having been born. Again, that's even assuming this is the only life there is for them. Even most atheists don't commit suicide, nor wish to. They're happy, on the whole, to be alive.

Ok, now you're a perfectly rational thinker, and you know all this. Let's imagine that you also know that you can share a life of immortal bliss with any human being who wishes to (though you know there can be no such life without the human becoming perfectly loving). Strikes me that you ought to go ahead and create human beings in such circumstances, if you're a perfectly rational thinker and have all this information at your disposal.

In short, the judgement the perfectly rational thinker would make is that the creation alternative is better overall than the non-creation alternative, even though the former includes some drownings.

[Az]

1. Why did the perfectly rational thinker have to start with humans

Was this some sort of imposed limitation? I don't know that we are a rational choice. Seems kind of silly to make a critter designed better for walking on all fours to walk on two legs only. And this apendix thing. Bad form man. Bad form. And teeth. Do not get me started on teeth.

So what happened. Did this perfectly rational thinker lose a bet and have to build the universe for humans?

[Stunster]

5. As far as we know

only humans are physically complex enough to have rational, moral consciousness. So, if the point was to create physical beings capable of rationality and moral consciousness, then it might well be the case that this goal would imply the creation of humans.

[Az]

8. Really?

So my dog acting guilty is not conscious? Has not concept that it has done something wrong?

There are numerous other species that show evidence of similar traits as we have. The only area which we seem to excell in is the fact that we seem to be able to store more complex instruction sets in our brains that other species.

[Crunchy Frog]

18. I think there are plenty of organisms

just as physically complex as humans. They have brains that operate on exactly the same principles and have exactly the same structures, although not as large as our own brains. I would think that any of those organisms could evolve the capacity for rational, moral conciousness in a fairly brief period of time, with the correct set of selective pressures

I think it's a very limited imagination that could only see humans, and no other concievable organism, capable of developing a rational mind. Humans have that limited imagination, along with IMO an overly inflated opinion of themselves, but I doubt that God, whatever It's nature is, shares in that limited imagination.

I don't really know if I belong in this forum, since I'm not religious, although I don't consider myself to be an atheist. I just happened on this thread because it was on the front page.

[opiate69]

2. Well, for starters....

If I possessed the omnipotence and omniscience that this "God" allegedly has, I wouldn't be constrained by the laws of physics, seeing as how I created them too.

[Stunster]

3. You misunderstand the concept of omnipotence

Omnipotence has usually been defined as being able to do whatever it is logically possible to do. Hence, not being able to do something that is logically impossible to do is perfectly compatible with being omnipotent in that definition.

In my original post, I'm suggesting that it is not logically possible to create inherently undrownable human beings, any more than it is logically possible to create humans who are inherently capable of surviving a walk in outer space without wearing protective gear. The physics involved is based on the math involved, and such things would require mathematical impossibilities.

[opiate69]

4. Omnipotence=All-Powerful.

Tell me, can God be drowned?

[Stunster]

6. Think about it

Jesus could have been. In the Jordan.

But let's leave that to one side. Omnipotence = being able to do whatever it is logically possible to do.

Is it logically possible to drown a non-physical being? I don't think so. So not being able to do that would imply no limitation on omnipotence in the sense defined.

And by the way, that is the way omnipotence has been defined in the classical theistic tradition. The only notable exception I know of is Descartes, who held that God could do even logically impossible things, like make a square circle. But most theists have not agreed with Descartes, because they conceive of God as self-subsistent Reason. What binds God is his own divine rationality.

[opiate69]

10. No.. logic is a man-made construct.

Omnipotence is being able to do anything. And I'd wager that the reason most theists disagree with Descartes is because in the face of his suggestion, their "God" becomes extraordinarily unlikely.

[Stunster]

29. Let's try it the other way round

"Atheists agree with Descartes on the proper definition of omnipotence, because on that definition God's existence is rendered less likely (given facts about natural and moral evil)."

I think this suggests that your point is really not very telling.

Oddly enough, Descartes himself was a firm theist.

[Az]

35. You'll be glad to hear

That atheists are not stressed by the notion that Descartes was a theist. :D He did a lovely bit of thinking to get to Cogito Ergo Sum. But then he went a bit off. It seems to be the same angle you are taking so you are definately in good company. But it is not the only path out there.

Cogito Ergo Spud - I think, therefore I yam.

[opiate69]

41. Hmm...

I'd say atheists agree with Descartes' definition because we actually understand language. Omni=all (not, "all except for what contradicts my belief"), potence=strength. Because, unlike the theist, the atheist really has no agenda. Every atheist I know would at the very least accept God's existence if it could be proven. (and thefore, become a theist) Yet, theological arguments are destroyed left and right, and theists just continue to stubbornly cling to the myth. Let's try this, then.. God created the universe, and everything in it, right? He therefore also created the laws of physics which determine how all things interact. If he had a blank slate to begin with, and he had the power to create all of the immensly different "things" in the universe, why could he not create the laws of physics completely differently? Also, as an aside, if God is anything less than all-powerful, why is he worthy of my, or anybody's, undying and unquestioning servitude?

[Stunster]

43. You don't understand the Latin language, that's for sure

You're just wrong about the meaning of omnipotence.

Proof? Look, you can't even prove to me that you're conscious. People that demand proof for everything are irrational to the point of insanity. Rational people accept the hypotheses that appear to them to be the most reasonable.

Theological arguments haven't been destroyed. I could as easily say that atheological arguments have been destroyed relentlessly.

Try to do the math, or come up with the physics, that would make it possible for a human being to walk in outer space without the right gear and survive. It's IM-FUCKING-POSSIBLE, as any mathematical physicist will tell you.

I could go on, but it's really not worth it.

[opiate69]

44. IM-FUCKING-POSSIBLE the way we are designed, yes..

Thus indicating a design flaw. Ergo, indicating a flawed designer. Yes, you could go on, but your argument would only get more and more ridiculous.

om·nip·o·tent ( P ) Pronunciation Key (m-np-tnt)
adj.
Having unlimited or universal power, authority, or force; all-powerful. See Usage Note at infinite.

n.
One having unlimited power or authority: the bureaucratic omnipotents.
Omnipotent God. Used with the.


omnipotent

adj : having unlimited power


omni-
pref.
All: omnidirectional.














(by the way,nice language.. I was always taught the F-word made the baby Jesus cry.)

[Stunster]

45. Here's an email to somebody else which might, or might not, assist you

Roughly, my answer to this is, as far as the physical universe goes,
that God is timeless, and in God's timeless creation of the universe,
God 'builds into' the natural laws, including vitally, quantum
mechanical laws, God's response to prayers.

Vast numbers of people have recovered from illness, and escaped from
dangerous situations. That is a result of the way that God has
configured the quantum mechanical probabilities involved.

But there is a limit to how far God can do this and still provide
enough regularity in nature to ground rational expectations and enable
such activities as science. So what we regard as miracles are in
fact *consistent* with the quantum mechanical probabilities----they're
just very low probability events.

This does not mean that God isn't omnipotent! The key to
understanding this is that 'omnipotence' means 'being able to do what
is logically possible'. It does *not* mean being able to do what is
logically impossible. Lots of things which we at first glance might
consider to be logically possible are, upon closer analysis, not
logically possible. Making a square circle is obviously so. Making
an undrownable human being, or a free-willed creature whom you ensure
never does anything wrong, turn out to impossible also, but less
obviously so. (The undrownable human being is impossible once you
understand the mathematics underlying the physics.)

What God does do, to get around this problem as it were, is remove us
from this universe and its laws, altogether. We die and we are
'resurrected'.

Why doesn't God do that automatically, without putting us through this
vale of tears? My answer is that God could, but there'd be no point
to God doing that, because it would be akin to making a happy toy.

Perhaps even humans could make a happy toy. They could make
something which was designed only to experience pleasure. But such a
thing, for Kantian reasons I've already mentioned, would not be a
rational creature, and therefore would not be something made in our
image (if we are rational creatures). The Kantian point is this: a
rational being, all of whose actions and states are causally
determined by something external to itself, is A CONTRADICTION IN
TERMS. In other words, it's a logical impossibility.

And hence not being able to make it is no violation of omnipotence if
omnipotence is defined as it should be---as the ability to do what it
is logically possible to do.

The only theist of note, as far as I'm aware, who held that omnipotence should extend to being able to do the logically impossible, was Descartes. And the odd thing is, Descartes himself
was a theist. But most theists have not followed Descartes in this
because they conceive God to be essentially self-subsistent Reason,
and hence they think that God would have to violate God's own nature
to do something logically impossible---which notion itself seems to
be, er, logically impossible--which is a good reason for thinking it's
not the case!

Happy New Year!

[opiate69]

60. What part of "Logic is a man-made concept" is beyond your

comprehension. Like I said before, All-powerful means ALLpowerful. NOT powerful within the man-made constraints of logic. If we suppose this God to be true, and we accept that he is All-powerful, he most certainly could create a square circle. We, being victims of our own logic, would not know it was a square circle, since we'd have no frame of reference, but it would exist none-the-less. Do I really need to repost the etymology of the word for you again? And I still stand by my assertion that the reason theists reject Descartes' definition is because it destroys the idea of an all powerful and perfect deity.

Gen
18:14 Is any thing too hard for the LORD? At the time appointed I will return unto thee, according to the time of life, and Sarah shall have a son. "Is anything too hard for the Lord?"
18:15 Then Sarah denied, saying, I laughed not; for she was afraid. And he said, Nay; but thou didst laugh.

Jeremiah
32:27
Behold, I am the LORD, the God of all flesh: is there any thing too hard for me?

Matthew
19:26 But Jesus beheld them, and said unto them, With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible.

Mark
10:27
And Jesus looking upon them saith, With men it is impossible, but not with God: for with God all things are possible.


Convenient how theists continually ignore the parts of their holy book which they disagree with.

[Stunster]

67. Have it your way

Define omnipotence however you want to. God may fail to satisfy your definition. But so what?

You definining 'omnipotence' your way is perfectly consistent with God satisfying the definition of omnipotence that dominates the classical theism tradition. In which case classical theism could be true. You don't disprove a theory by defining one of its key terms differently from the way its proponents define it.

To illustrate the point, let me now 'disprove' the validity of science by defining science as "the answer to every possible question, provided it's delivered to my door by midnight tonight."

[opiate69]

68. It's not "however I want to..."

It's how anybody with a working knowledge of language defines it. You claim that all theists except Descartes define it as being less than all powerful. I challenge you to back that assertion up with some sources. If you fail to do this, then I will assume you are just another desperate theist, changing definitions of words at whim when they don't agree with whichever fairy-tale you happen to believe in. Just like how many Christians now try to claim that the "days" inGenesis aren't actually, you know.. days.

"To illustrate the point, let me now 'disprove' the validity of science by defining science as "the answer to every possible question, provided it's delivered to my door by midnight tonight."

Oh,how I love the smell of burning strawmen in the afternoon. Find me ONE etymologist who claims that that is the accurate definition of science.. just ONE. Can't, can ya?

[Stunster]

69. I see

that you are too ignorant of this particular subject-matter to be worth discussing it with.

[opiate69]

71. Ha-ha-ha.. that's rich.

[Stunster]

101. Omnipotence

http://www.faithquest.com/modules.php?name=Sections&op=viewarticle&artid=87

[opiate69]

104. Great.. now he's citing apologists...

poor ones at that. The 'classical theistic tradition' of 'defining' words. Where a day doesn't equal a day, where a circle is a three dimensional object, and free will comes from an omniscient creator.

[Stunster]

106. Uh-oh, a definition-nazi.

"Ze tradition must devine ze vay I say it should othervize mein argument is krap"

:boring:

[Stunster]

46. Ok, give me your superior design

Come up with the alternative physics and its underlying math, showing how a being like us could, without mathematical irrationality, do the space-walk without the protective gear, and still survive. Ensure that the alternative physics you come up with would not cause more total harm to sentient creatures in the universe than the actual physics does.

Please submit your proposal to a refereed academic journal. I'd like to see it published, along with your detailed computations. You're obviously smarter than God if there was such a thing as God, so this should be most interesting.

[Az]

48. Why is this issue so critical to you

I may have missed it somewhere. But where is this notion coming from that the fact that humans can't survive some environments so important to you? I don't see any atheists or scientific suggestions that humans should be all impervious or something. I simply do not understand why this is an issue for you. Sorry.

Oh and lets ease up on the language up there. We are discussing some issues that can be quite emotional for some and it can easily get out of hand. I would much rather work things through that shout each other down.

[Stunster]

50. I'm just asking to be shown

Some people say it is possible for God to do X (make humans, or physical beings sufficiently complex as to enjoy rational and moral consciousness), but do so selecting a set of physical laws that would produce less harm and suffering for sentient creatures than the set that actually obtains does. After all, this is key to addressing the problem of natural suffering.

Ok. What I'd like to see is this alternative physics, complete with equations and calculations of suffering.

Let's just say I'm skeptical that it can be done. If nobody can produce this alternative physics, then how do we know that the actual physics isn't the optimal physics to minimize harm while producing rational/moral creatures? Seems to me that in the absence of the detailed alternative physics which some folk assume to be mathematically possible, we don't. In which case their argument is pretty weak.

[Az]

52. I think the notion is based on

the idea that God is described as being all powerful. The creator of laws. Thus he should be able to create any environment and conditions he chooses.

Though this is not a critical argument within atheist communities. It seems to be a slight variation of the argument concerning the existance of evil.

Consider this. God is omniscient and omnipotent as well as being the first cause. Thus when he sets the universe in motion he knows the outcome. As such there is not ending condition that he is not aware of at the initial outset of his creation. Thus he predetermines all events at the moment he sets creation in motion. Thus with the conditions of an omnipotent omniscient god setting creation in motion free will is an illusion.

From this notion we can see that all the suffering and pain were selected and chosen by god (incidently the bible even has God claiming responsibility for evil). This is not really a problem except that it is also proposed that God is all good. ie no evil. Thus a paradox.

Honestly though. This is a minor backwater argument within the atheist community. There are several attempts at refuting it (some actually quite interesting). But in the end they do nothing to posit that a god must exist sufficiently to over come the burden of proof(not talking absolute proof here, thats for math).

[Stunster]

54. Plantinga refuted the logical argument from evil years ago

Most atheistic philosophers concede this now, and hence now focus on the 'evidential' argument from evil.

But that's not really the point. God can choose the laws, sure. But God would not do so arbitrarily. God would do so in accordance with God's own rationality and purposes.

I think of the laws of physics as being various ideas expressing mathematical rationality, and mathematical rationality itself as being an aspect of divine thought eternally generated in the divine mind. The Bible calls this divine thought responsible for creating and governing the world, Wisdom.

So I'd say God is bound by God's Wisdom, which Christian theology identifies with the Logos, which is the Greek word used in the Prologue of John's Gospel. Logos has various translations, including Word, but I think the closest to what we mean would be Reason. (Think of a mental word or concept that you think, silently, in your own
mind. Aquinas et al would say that God the Son is the 'Verbum Mentale'--the 'Mental Word' eternally begotten or generated by God the Father. This perfectly rational thought includes the idea of
creating, and incarnating the Logos in, the physical world, hence it includes all the physics that would be involved.)

Is God therefore bound by something outside of God (mathematical rationality)? No, I don't think so. The conceptual difference would be over how one is to think of mathematics---is it a thing or entity existing by itself, or is it, as I believe, a portion of the thoughts that a perfectly rational thinker would have?

When we do the math correctly, I say we simply have the mathematical *thoughts*. We don't bump into mathematical objects existing outside of our thoughts. We simply grasp or comprehend part of the content of the thoughts of a perfectly rational thinker. And I think physics *derives* from those thoughts. Rather than binding thought, the physics comes from the mathematical thought. Physics doesn't bind thought. It's the thought that binds the physics. This is why mathematical physicists have been able to predict just by pure thinking, how certain aspects of the world must be, before the experiments take place. The classic example is Einstein, but there's been quite a few others, which you can read about in the history of theoretical particle physics, involving Dirac, Gell-Mann, etc. Recently, for example, they found the 'top' quark which the theorists had been saying for years must exist---it had to be there because
the mathematical models said it had to be. And so it was.

[Az]

55. Math is an abstract construct

It is a useful construct to be sure. It seems to fit the uninverse around us. But it is a construct. We seem to be on the same page with this particular issue.

Physics makes use of math to form hypothesis but it has to return to the real word and conduct tests and collect evidence to verify the theories formed in the abstract world of math.

As to the refutation of the evil argument the jury is still out on this one. Both sides currently claim victory. Lack of arguments does not indicate consession. Merely that going over the same issues repeatedly with neither side giving solves nothing and irritates both sides. And nobody likes being irritated.

There are many arguments in the atheism vs theism battle like this. Often they go silent because there is no new evidence and swords have become locked. The most famous of these issues is of course the historocity of Jesus. Since there is unlikely to be any earth shattering breakthrough on the subject nothing is to be gained from the skeptics side to continue to beat this particular horse. Thus the argument is seldom heard any longer.

As the theists are oft to quote, absense of evidence is not proof of absense. Just because you don't hear the arguments does not mean they are not still there.

[Stunster]

56. An 'unreasonably efficacious' one, to quote Eugene Wigner

I think Wigner almost had it right. It would be unreasonably efficacious if thought was the product of materialistic evolution.

[Az]

57. Arguments from increduality

Don't really carry much weight. To me the notion that a god spontaneously popped into existance is pushing the limits. Either way we go it seems someone is going to be amazed. I'm ok with being amazed. How bout you?

[Stunster]

58. I'm not aware

of any theist who conceives of God as having 'popped into existence'.

So if God did, that would amaze me.

[Az]

59. Let me rephrase

Arguably (not necissarily definitively) something has always(even this term is in question as it implies a termporal dimension) existed. God or some form of Multiverse. The jury is out on which it is. The chase is afoot. Lets find out which it is.

[opiate69]

9. Further..

Using your "logic", dolphins, fish and all other sea-life could not exist. Or at the least, could not have some of the higher functions that humans have. Why not? If we are all "just DNA and water", aren't dolphins also just DNA and water? Why is it illogical to think that an all powerful and "perect" being couldn't create us to be fully adaptable to whatever he decides to fill our world with?

[Ready4Change]

7. You're assuming intelligent design.

An alternative would be to assume an infinite number of universes. Given that, then it follows that within at least one it is possible that humans will be created under circumstances that also rule that some of them wil drown.

It is also possible that within one of them, the humans will evolve and develop the ability to live in harmony with their environment such that none of them ever drown again, nor die of anything other that sheer old age, and even that is a long, healthy, happy time. In addition they are wise enough to control their population at sustainable numbers, and protect their environment so that it is diverse and robust.

And in another universe the humans are wasters, devouring all that is in their path, careless of the weak and poor, maintaining their number through uncontrolled population growth, harnessing all production to the few who are able to rise cutthoatedly to the top and live like what they imagine to be gods.

And there are a countless other universes where the rules of physics don't allow anything to come into existance at all.

Once you remove the examination of repeatable, demonstrable, facts, you can assume anything. It's fun, but beyond fun it's rather pointless.

[Stunster]

11. The Multiverse Hypothesis

I could not disagree more. The Multiverse Hypothesis is intellectual desperation bordering on suicide, in my opinion. In order to avoid positing one intrinsically unobservable entity, the proponent of this hypothesis posits an infinity of intrinsically unobservable entities (if the other universes were observable by us, they wouldn't be other universes). Talk about a violation of Ockham's Razor! And of course, since the other universes posited are not observable, the hypothesis is not subject to the standard empirical and experimental criteria of science, so it is not itself a scientific hypothesis.

I strongly recommend a book entitled ANCIENT FAITH AND MODERN PHYSICS, by Stephen Barr. It's a careful, thoughtful, very well-written analysis of why major findings in science itself may suggest why the scientific materialist worldview may itself be inadequate.

One thing about Dawkins' Blind Watchmaker: essentially what he's saying is that the watch needn't have a consciously intelligent designer because it might have been made by a large, completely automated watchmaking factory (which is the analogue of the universe).

But if we came across a large,completely automated watchmaking factory, wouldn't that make us more, not less, inclined to believe that it got to be there not by chance, or some impersonal cosmic law, but by conscious intelligence? At least, every time I time I see a big watch-manufacturing plant, that's the inference I tend to draw. Nor do I think I'm being irrational. So even if we can explain the evolution of life in essentially Darwinian terms, we have no observable basis for extrapolating the natural selection mechanism to the universe itself. It is essentially for this reason that the Multiverse Hypothesis was proposed. And I've stated why I'm unimpressed with the proposal.

[Az]

12. Automated factories

Actually there is suggestion of just such an engine in the universe. Quantum fluxes occurr occaisionally leading to momentary creations of energy/matter from nothing. Within one theory these fluxes constitute entire universes flashing in and out of existance. In the context of our universe it is a momentary flash. Within the reality of the flux itself eternity passes. Complete with its own physics and dimensions.

[Stunster]

16. And why would that be?

You see, if what you're suggesting was found to be the case, that's the question I'd have. I'd think, "Wow, there just happens to be some law of nature that these quantum fluctuations or whatever they are happen as described." But if I found that God exists, that would make a lot more sense to me, because God would be, ex hypothesi, pre-eminently endowed with reason and value, and reason and value are the sorts of things that satisfy the mind as being ends in themselves and intrinsically understandable by rational minds.

Now, personally, I happen to have had two extraordinary experiences of God in my life. So I have much stronger grounds for believing in God than in the Multiverse; and secondly, the content or nature of my experiences of God was such that I know that anyone who discovered the existence of God would find theism to be far more explanatory, intelligible, sense-making etc than the Multiverse idea could conceivably be.

One might say, "Oh, but that's just you." However, I happen to know that it's not just me.

[Az]

19. Sense

So a universe where in void has a characteristic of creating quantum flux moments of universal extrusions makes less sense than an omnipotent omniscient being that came out of no where and made the universe for no discernable reason...... We are all entitled to our opinions I guess.

You seem to be focused on finding a reason. Intent. By implying an intent you preload the issue with the necessity of finding a conscious descision to create the universe. I will not preload the equation with any such issue. If I come across convincing evidence that it is the case then I will factor it in. I have not yet.

[Ready4Change]

30. Correction.

You only think you know it's not just you. You provide no evidence to back up your beliefs. Not that you need to, for they are just that. YOUR beliefs.

[Stunster]

32. You only think

that I only think I know... etc.

[Az]

34. But I know

that you think I know that you know I think you know.... :crazy:

[Ready4Change]

64. Precisely.

We are each in our own little cosmos, when we take things down to our sensory level. We cannot be sure that when I touch the point of a needle that the sensation I feel as "sharp" is the same as the sensation you feel as "sharp".

Hence the importance of scientific testing and review.

I may not be sure if my "hot" is the same as your "hot." But if we both heat water and find it starts boiling at 212 degrees F, we can start to deliniate a view of the world which is common to us both. Repeated testing by other individuals can increase our sureness that this view is accurate.

Likewise, drawing conclusions based on a single persons unrepeatable and untestable sensory impressions is not fully rational, no matter how convinced that one individual may be. Show me someone who can snap their fingers and turn water into wine under laboratory conditions and you'll get my attention.

I'm not saying YOU should ignore your sensory impressions. By all means follow them. However, don't expect ME to accept them.

[Ready4Change]

15. One assumption or another.

Makes no difference. And it makes no sense to make choices based on what is unobservable.

If believing in the multiverse theory is unsound because it is unverifiable, so is believing in an unobservable entity of any variety. Both concepts make assumptions which cannot be tested.

[Az]

20. Which reinforces

the necessity of being able to say "We don't know yet".

Some people don't seem to be able to abide not knowing. They try to leverage in fantastic answers that provide the sense of security they desire in an answer. Part of seeking the truth is sometimes you are disappointed in what the truth is. We don't get to choose the truth though. It above all else is imposed.

There are theories that hold potential to be answers to the questions of the universe. We cannot yet demonstrate them to be true beyond a reasonable doubt. But we cannot exclude them as yet either. This is the scientific process.

[Stunster]

27. Knowledge and reasonable belief

In the sense of 'know' that I think you're employing, there may be very little that anyone knows. (Cf. 300 years of epistemological skepticism, wondering whether we know that there are material objects existing independently of our minds, wondering how we can know that there other minds, wondering if this is really my hand, etc).

Be that as it may, it seems distinctly possible that there are many propositions and theories and hypotheses which are reasonable to believe. One can give reasons, one's beliefs can be non-arbitrary etc.

What is irrational to the point of raging insanity is to demand proof for everything. Proof is for mathematicians, and even they accept their axioms without proof, since they're, ehrr, axiomatic. But what do we do in innumerable other instances?

#1
Criminal: "You can't hold me responsible, your honor. I have no free will."

Judge: "Yes, you do--and so you are responsible."

Criminal: "Prove it!"

#2
Child: "Daddy, have you ever been to New York?"

Dad: "Yes, once, when I was about your age."

Child: "Prove it!"

If the judge and the dad don't 'prove it', are they guilty of irrationality? I don't believe so.

Given all the data available to me, theism is a reasonable hypothesis, one I find more reasonable than other, competing hypotheses.

[Az]

28. Thats my line

Science has never been about proof. As you said (stole ;) ) Proof is for math. And it is appropriate for math as it is an abstract construct. Something we created the rules for. It is fortuitous that these rules seem to fit the universe around us. But there is no direct absolute correlation. As such math is a useful tool for modeling the real world. But we have to return to the real world to verify theories and ideas developed in imaginary worlds.

We will never attain proof with science. We will obtain satisfactory evidence to accept a theory as true or we will find evidence to refute it. But proof is beyond its scope.

You are quite free to find the evidence to be in favor of theism. Likewise my reading of it is quite free to find in opposition. We are still free to compare notes and discuss ideas that we may.

[Stunster]

31. Assume, for a moment, that materialism is false

How would this be discoverable by science?

Empirical testing, experimental observation, predicted observations, etc--all the canons of scientific method would be systematically irrelevant to establishing the truth of this conclusion, would they not, because, ex hypothesi there would be something in reality which such procedures would be inherently incapable of discovering.

If, for some reason, science gave up a universal insistence on the empirical method, wouldn't that just be tantamount to saying that what we now call the scientific method isn't fully adequate to understanding reality? I mean, it wouldn't still be the same thing, science, if it did that.

Let's imagine, for a moment, that Saint Paul had a profound encounter with the Risen Christ on the road to Damascus, such that nothing else would be as convincing to him as that experience. Then, St Paul would have a way of knowing, or reasonably believing, that materialism (if he knew what that was) was false. But no scientific procedure would be able to establish this. Yet someone (St Paul) would know that it was indeed false.

The difficulty I'm having with your reliance on science is that we have no really solid a priori or other reason for thinking that, as science progresses, it will be able, in principle, to uncover the truth about these matters, as long as the above-described scenario seems logically possible (which it strikes me we have every reason to suppose it will always appear to us to be). But what if, it won't be able, even in principle to uncover the truth about these matters, and yet St Paul is right, and as justified as he could possibly be in thinking that he met the Risen Christ and that materialism is false.

It seems to me, in other words, that the rational thing to do is to be open to the possibility that science might not be the only way of knowing things, or even the best way, and that science itself may well be incapable of discovering this, and that there may be other ways of discovering it, which a rational person may have access to, or even have had access to in the past.

[Az]

33. And yet

If Jesus/God exists they must operate in some way. They must be something. Maybe not materialism as we know it. But they must be. And that is what the scientific method would move on to study.

You are caught in the nexus of the solipsistic trap. You cannot move on because you cannot determine that what is before you is all of reality. Science does not presume this is all there is. It just examines what it can when it can. If Jesus showed up that is something to study. If God makes an electron zing when we expected it to zang. That is something to study.

The scientific method is nothing more than a checking system. It is not wed to the materialistic ideals. It works well with them. But it can be adapted to anything.

You seem to be concerned that science is stressed as the only way to know things. This is untrue. We know a great many things from our experiences and intuition. We may not be able to explain them. We may not understand them. But we know them to be true (whether they are or not).

Consider victims of false recovered memory. These individuals are treated by doctors who place their own preconceptions in the patients memory. They do this by means of reinforcement and suggestion. Eventually the patient becomes convinced that their memories have been recovered. They know absolutely these things happened. They have direct memories of them. But they never happened.

Our minds are easily mislead. This does not mean they are always mislead. But it does imply that on their own they are perhaps not the best source for ripping the truth out of the cosmos. Thus we develop tools and methods for sifting the wheat from the chaffe. Like a sculptor we develop a way to carve away that which is false, leaving behind an increasingly accurate image of the truth.

There is an excellent movie called the Messenger. It is about Joan of Arc. There is a scene in it where Dusten Hoffman plays a mysterious robed figure. As she goes over the reasons she believes she was chosen by God to be the Messenger this robed figure asks her why she chose the conclusion she did. He then presents a miriad of possible (some implausible but possible none the less) explanations for the circumstances.

Yes. Knowledge can come via other methods. It always does. But our ability to verify and understand them is dependent on comparing them to what we currently know of the universe. Thus Thomas asked to touch Jesus' wounds to verify that what he was seeing was real. We seek evidence to verify our observations. Its simple and it seems to work.

[Stunster]

37. I'd more or less accept this

But I think the conceptual revision involved would be so great that we'd probably hesitate to call what we were then doing (studying how God did things, how Jesus appeared to his disciples, etc) 'science'. I'd just call it rational inquiry. But I agree that if those things occur, there has to be a way for them to occur.

St Ignatius of Loyola, it may or may not interest you to know, had what he called an 'intellectual vision' near the river Cardoner in northern Spain. In it, he was shown, inter alia, how God made the universe. But it was so lofty a vision that he could not find words or concepts to communicate the interesting details. I suppose it would be like an average 5-year-old trying to explain the General Theory of Relativity after s/he had intuited the whole theory in one brief moment, and then went back to his/her normal conceptual framework.

See also, 2 Corinthians, 12: 1-4. I know of two other people at least who have described something apparently similar to what St Paul is writing about there.

[Stunster]

13. I have a bunch of posts over on the

"Theists: Tell us about atheists" thread which are relevant to this theme.

It would be repetitious to post them all again here, but they're there if you want to read them.

[Crunchy Frog]

14. You could always make your humans aquatic.

Then there wouldn't be any need to worry about drowning.

As for myself, I'm not actually particularly glad that I was born, and not happy with the life that I've got, but that's another story.

[Ready4Change]

17. Then they'd be getting stranded on dry land.

Individual life, at least as we witness it here on our planet, is constantly at risk. It is only as species, and beyond that environments, that life has any resiliance.

[Stunster]

21. Two questions

Q1: Do you believe it is possible to make a human being in such a way that if s/he went for a walk in outer space, but without wearing a space-helmet (or other protective gear), no harm would result?

It strikes me that from a rational, scientific point of view, this
would simply be impossible. The existence of a human being implies
the existence of natural laws like the ones that obtain in our universe, and this would seem to suggest that nothing that was a human
being could survive a walk in space without the necessary protective
clothing. In a cartoon world, this would perhaps be possible. But
that's precisely the point---it would be a cartoon world.

The conclusion one should draw, I think, is that it is logically,
metaphysically, rationally and conceptually impossible to create human
beings--or even any being possessing life as we know it in any form--who, no matter what they did or what else happened naturally,
would never suffer any physical harm. Physical suffering and harm
seems to be implied in the existence of life as we know it.

Now, physical harm in this world has limits. One *can* go for a
space-walk if you wear the right gear. One can survive a tsunami if
one moves to higher ground as a result of being given a timely warning. The human body, in fact, can survive a great deal. But
obviously there are, and must be, limits to what it can endure.

The definitive limit, of course, is represented by death. If harm is
too great or too serious, humans will die, and as far as we can tell,
this releases them from any further physical suffering. Nor is our
life expectancy infinite. We can't keep on suffering in this world
for ever. At most, all our suffering will be all over in about a
century, or less. So, it's not as if the world is such that a human
will have to bear, say, severe chronic pain for a thousand years.
Death itself limits our suffering.

There seems, then, to be no way to have human beings exist without
some physical suffering being possible, and indeed being likely to occur--unless you believe in cartoons. But it is limited, and human intelligence can limit it further. And of course a great deal of suffering is due to human choices, especially immoral choices, rather than from natural causes. But as far as suffering and harm from natural causes are concerned, we have no reason to believe that the amount of it that occurs due purely natural physical factors is any greater than it needs to be, given our own existence and nature as human beings.

Now Q2: given these apparent facts, which is a better state of affairs
overall: that human beings exist, or that they don't?

[Az]

22. Why the obsession with human beings?

You are presuming the universe was made for us. We are the result, not the cause. The universe came before us and we resulted from it.

I can well imagine a number of ways life could exist in space. There is even an existing theory that the moment of abiogenesis on earth was seeded from space. We find complex molecules (including sugars) all over the place in space. Plenty of opportunity for selfreplicating molecules to take hold out there.

[Stunster]

25. What about the anthropic cosmological principle?

Unless you go with the Multiverse, it does seem as if the universe itself is obsessed with human beings.

The idea has been around for some time that the happiest anything can be is this: a rational being knowing and loving to the fullest possible extent. Ignorance, or a lack of love, are inconsistent with
the highest possible happiness for rational creatures. Now, of course, one question is whether a rational being *by its very nature* has to be also a material or physical being. From Plato to Kant to Chalmers and McGinn, this question has exercized the best minds.
Or brains. But even among those of a materialist persuasion, there are plenty who think that knowledge and love are incommensurably high values.

So, let me try to simplify the question. On the whole, taking everything into consideration, do you think that it's better that you exist compared to you not existing? Now, suppose you answer 'Better that I exist', then there's a strong argument which says that this implies that it's better that the actual laws of the physical universe obtain than that they don't. You can't consistently will your own existence and not will the conditions of your own existence. But if you will that the laws of physics obtain, then you will that tsunamis occur.

Now, let's stick with tsunamis. Had people shared tsunami-warning technologies with the brown-skinned folks living around the Indian Ocean, the chances are that the death toll would have been much less
on this occasion. There was an article in the other day's LA Times suggesting that the technology is actually fairly simple and cheap. Now, for God to have made us share the technology, God would have to control human wills. But if God controls human wills so that nothing bad ever happens, then that's just tantamount to God abolishing the human will. Because with even just one human will allowed to operate without being controlled, it's quite possible for
something bad to happen. A free-willed person could stick a baby in the washing machine, or shoot dead 2000 people a day, or say something
hurtful, etc. If God always made us do whatever God wants us to do, we'd essentially be machines, or toys.

So when the atheist says, I refuse to bend my will to some supernatural being, what is the atheist saying? That he's not a machine or toy and doesn't want to be, and that s/he is proud of the
fact that he possesses an autonomous will? Ok, and if s/he's not a machine or toy, and happily possesses an autonomous will, then s/he can't consistently hold that if God existed, God would be morally
required to abolish the autonomy of his will.

And there is a Kantian argument that if one wills one's own autonomy, then morally one must will the autonomy of all rational beings---morality consists, roughly, in consistently willing for others what one wills for oneself.

So, first, if you will your own existence, then you will the conditions of your existence, and hence you will the laws of physics of your universe. Second, if you will the autonomy of your own will, then morally you ought to will the autonomy of other rational agents' wills. And all the natural and moral evil of the world flows from the laws of physics plus the autonomous wills of rational individuals.

Makes sense to me, and I will my own existence, and will the autonomy of my will. I think the rest follows.

[Az]

26. Better than love?

Fustiodios. This is an sense of being experienced by a species from a far distant planet. It is far greater in experience than the sense of well being and love that we sometimes experience. This emotion was evolved in order to facilitate an end to the constant conflict species underwent on the planet during the early stages of development. It allowed the species to feel a connectiveness to the entirety of life on the planet.

Love is certainly a powerful emotion for us. But it is an evolved construct. It can be simulated by drugs and chocolate. Mind you I wouldn't trade the love I feel for my mate for anything. But this does not change the fact that it is a measurable and definable effect within the brain.

Our understanding and definition of love come from our biological/neurological experience of love. It is not something we invented. It is something we experience.

As to will. I don't have a choice in the laws of physics. I am a result. A happy result. But so to are all the tradgedies that come with it. Desire to control tradgedies does not create a being that is capable of control. But not something we set in motion. We are the motion it set in action.

[Stunster]

36. This might work if you could solve the mind-body problem

...scientifically.

And we differ as to whether you'd ever be able to do that.

What matters for evolution is reproduction, which is essentially about behavior. All the right behavior could go on happily enough, in my opinion, in the complete absence of consciousness. The brain would just need to get the right body-parts to move at the right time in the right way, which I think could happen just the way it does now, but without any conscious experiences going on. It is odd, to say the least, that bodily behavior would need something like conscious experience to make it happen.

As to fustidi.. whatever you call it. We have no reason to posit its existence. But we have a reason to posit love. Love enters into explanations of why certain events take place, like two people getting married, and so forth. Love requires consciousness, which itself presents materialism with a hard problem. Fustidi...whatever you call it would also require consciousness, which itself presents materialism with a hard problem.

Though we differ as to how hard it is. If I could see a reasonable prospect for a materialist explanation of the phenomenal properties of consciousness....

Chalmers, who is not a theist, thinks that consciousness is an irreducible, fundamental ontological category. So he is a non-materialist naturalist. I'd be satisfied with that, but for the conscious phenomena associated with reason and value, such as the phenomena I'm experiencing now in the process of thinking out this post in my own mind. Because it seems to me that reason and value are just as irreducible, maybe more so, as Chalmers thinks consciousness in general is. When I think as well as I can about those phenomena, I just see no way to be a even a non-materialist naturalist in his sense, because to me they imply personhood as being even more irreducible ontologically than consciousness. If personhood looms this large over my ontology, then the theistic hypothesis seems to be the one I should abductively infer.

[Az]

38. Chaos

The conscious mind seems to arise from an orderly system that is beyond our current means to measure. Chaos. We are able to affect and change the conscious mind through real physical alterations. We are able to detect sentience in other species. It is not unique to humans. What is unique or at least special in humans is the capacity of storage for instructions.

In computing there was a revolution in CPU technology some time ago. Prior to this event chips were manufactured with complete instruction codes enbedded in their circuits. It was a fixed approach to design. But then someone came up with the idea of placing the instructions sets in memory instead of in the circuits. RISK chips were the result. They were far more flexible. There was an initial cost in that they had to learn their instruction sets before they became fully operational. But this allowed their instruction sets to be much more flexible. Able to adapt to specific tasks and environments.

The same shift seems to have occurred in the development of the brain. We shifted from more encoded and fixed wiring to a system that allowed us to load new instructions. With this shift it became a race to see which branch could develop larger storage for these instructions quicker. HomoSapiens won.

With this increased functionality a new form of evolution began. Social evolution was enabled. As our minds were dependent on learning behaviour and this relied on replication, the environment was set for a nonorganic form of evolution. This method moves much more rapidly than organic evolution.

This is part of the current understanding of our minds. We are able to trace such abstract concepts as love in the wiring of our brain. We are able to force experiences that never occurred. We are able to remove experiences from memory that did occurr. We do not understand the entirety of the mind yet. But it is easily arguable that the mind is a creation of our brains and not some free formed association with the brain attached for the ride. The mind and the brain seem to be one.

[Stunster]

39. I've read a million things like this

How does larger storage produce phenomenal experience? And regardless of how it produces, why go to the bother? Why not rest content with larger storage capacity? I mean, I suppose there are computer systems that have a larger storage capacity than our brains do. But are they experiencing phenomena as a result?

I agree that the mind is not free-formed in us. It goes along with brains. I think it was designed to.

[Az]

40. Sentience precedes increase in storage

It is the sentience that allows for adaptable approach to environment. Increase in storage capacity forced reliance on increased cognitive functions. There is a critical size limitation to the cranium due to biology. Thus a fork was hit (often called a genetic bottleneck) where the increases in storage capacity forced out instinctual prewiring which was less efficient any way.

[Az]

24. What does it matter?

I am missing your point about humans not being impervious to any harm. Evolution does not lead to ideal forms. It leads to functional forms. Sometimes barely functional.

I don't really see where you are going with this angle. Sorry :shrug:

[opiate69]

42. An answer...

"Q1: Do you believe it is possible to make a human being in such a way that if s/he went for a walk in outer space, but without wearing a space-helmet (or other protective gear), no harm would result?"

Yes. If you create the human without adding the uneccesary need to breathe oxygen. And if you created him in such a manner that radiation, extreme temperatures and extreme pressure would not harm him. Or, maybe I'd take the easy way out, and not create all of these dangers in the first place. Are these requirements beyond God's capacity?

[Stunster]

47. Here's $250 for any bright atheist

....if you can give me a superior design of nature.

Come up with the alternative physics and its underlying math, showing
how a being like us could, without mathematical irrationality, do the
space-walk without the protective gear/take a tsunami/jump from the
Empire State Building, etc, and still survive. Ensure that the
alternative physics you come up with would not cause more total harm
to sentient creatures in the universe than the physics of the actual
universe does.

Please submit your proposal to a refereed academic journal. I'd like
to see it published, along with your detailed computations. You're
obviously smarter than God if there was such a thing as God, so this
should be most interesting.

[Az]

49. Um, $250 .....

Speechless. I am really concerned about your focus on this issue. It has nothing to do with the claims we are making. It really seems to be a strawman you have a lot of experience beating the tar out of.

For the record. We are not stating that we understand all of creation. We are not stating that we could do better. Even the notion of creating something superior is entirely subjective. Who do you think is superior a human or a slug. If you are living in a slug's environment its far superior to be a slug. So superior is a silly standard and completely dependent on your point of view.

[Stunster]

51. I guess I'm speechless

that anyone who can't come up with the alternative, superior physics that would make the world a better place would take the amount of natural suffering in the actual world as a sufficient reason to reject theism----because it strikes me as such an irrational, even emotional move on their part.

[Az]

53. Belief is about emotions

It goes to the nature of our minds. We store our experiences with the emotional relevance we feel towards them. Our brain balances the emotional relevance of these accumulated experiences and rejects those that are countered by stronger emotions. This is belief. It is how our brains work.

Even logic and reason are learned in this way. They are tools that we develop in order to sort out near balances between opposing ideas. When our emotional brain cannot sort out positions on their own we turn to these tools to try to break the tie.

Reason and logic can be part of how we form our beliefs but for the most part they are messy emotional reactions. Even atheists and their lack of belief in god is an emotional irrational thing in origin. Some may over time explore their beliefs and form arguments defending their position. But the core gut level belief is all emotional and messy.

[muriel_volestrangler]

63. It is the physics, or the biology that worry you?

If it's the physical laws - well, all this means is that none of us can predict how a universe will turn out after 14 billion years if we alter some laws. If your argument is "I can't design a universe, so therefore someone else must have", then it's limp and unworthy of further discussion. I don't think I've ever heard of anyone trying to refute the idea of an entity that did the initial creation of the universe by pointing to human suffering. The suffering argument is just used to refute the idea of caring, involved gods - eg the Christian one.

If, however, you just want a suggestion on how our biology could be better, so that there is a net increase in human happiness, then I'd suggest an immunity to malaria.

[Stunster]

70. It's not an obviously good argument, though

The suffering argument is just used to refute the idea of caring, involved gods - eg the Christian one.

So if a mother causes her child to suffer by weaning it, that means the mother is not caring, or involved?

Or if a surgeon amputates a soldier's leg, thus damaging the soldier's body, that means the surgeon is not caring, or involved?

Or if a nurse gives vaccination injections to small children, who scream with terror at the thought that they are going to have needles stuck into them, that means the nurse is not caring, or involved?

Or if a man lets his brother die, rather than use extraordinary means of life-support to keep him alive, that means the man is not caring, or involved?

Humans frequently cause pain and injury, and even let people die, in ways that are quite compatible with, or even required by, moral goodness. So the mere fact of God being in some way responsible for pain and injury, or letting people die, doesn't by itself prove that God is not morally good.

Perhaps it's the amount and degree of suffering involved that is objected to. But how do we know that it's not the minimum amount of pain consistent with the physics necessary for human life to exist in the first place?

To return to the weaned child, suppose it's a baby boy. And suppose it grows up to be a man, and falls in love with a beautiful woman, and marries her, and goes on a blissfully happy honeymoon with her. Is his honeymoon spoiled by the suffering caused by his weaning as a child?

Suppose now that human suffering in this life is as proportionate to the joy of a heavenly afterlife as the suffering of being weaned as a baby is to the joy of a blissfully happy adult honeymoon. In that case, it would not be obvious that a Christian God cannot be loving and caring and involved, given the amount of suffering there is in this life.

[muriel_volestrangler]

75. The idea of an afterlife makes this a completely different argument

So far, you've been talking about harm and suffering of sentient beings. Now you're bringing in a completely different existence, for which there is no evidence at all. If we're allowed to invent things, and then claim they make up for our existence in the real world, then we can both argue anything we like.

If you're claiming that the suffering of millions improves us as a species, then I think you need to make it clear in what way - your parallels of weaning etc. all have a purpose which we know - eventually, if not at the time. What has all the suffering in human history really done for us as a whole? About the only lesson the suffering of people from hundreds or thousands of years ago that I get is "shit happens" - and that it can happen to you even if you care for your fellow humans.

[Stunster]

76. I think there is

Now you're bringing in a completely different existence, for which there is no evidence at all.

It depends on how you're defining evidence.

Here's something I would consider as evidence. In October 2004, a young woman I know got married. Her father had died in May of 2003. Just before she got ready to walk down the aisle with her mother and sister, she spent a short time alone in the bridal room, during which the young woman had an experience in which she saw her father in risen glory. The young woman was completely overjoyed by this experience.

Now, it's not conclusive evidence. It might have another explanation. But I don't know what it would mean to say that it doesn't even count as evidence. Suppose you had such an experience---you wouldn't take it as evidence that there was an afterlife, no matter how utterly convincing an overwhelmingly real it appeared to you? Really?

Incidentally, I know personally of one other encounter like this, and I've read about more. I have had a couple of extraordinary, life-changing spiritual experiences myself, though not involving encounters with any deceased human beings. Only with God.

Doesn't prove to you that there's a God, or an afterlife, of course. But I don't understand what it would mean to say that my experiences didn't even constitute prima facie evidence for me that there's a God. In fact, the nature of the experiences was such that it was not so much that they constituted evidence for me that God exists, but simply that I was aware of God's existence, and in a much more direct, powerful and convincing way than I'm aware of, say, your existence.

An excellent book by a leading philosopher that discusses religious experiences is PERCEIVING GOD, by William P. Alston.

[muriel_volestrangler]

77. If something that seemed overwhelmingly real happened to me

I might take it as evidence of something supernatural - especially if it had some confirming detail that I could later find out to be true. Nothing like that has ever happened to me, or, as far as I know, to my family or friends, concerning a god or an afterlife. And the less I know someone, the less I can trust their telling of their memory to be accurate. The nearest I know of something like this is a dream a relation had, which might have been just a coincidence, or might have really given her vague knowledge of an event which you would not expect her to dream.

Until something like a vision happens to me personally, I wouldn't call it evidence at all - and I wouldn't expect other people to call what I tell them I experienced evidence, either.

[opiate69]

78. So....

It seems more reasonable to you to assume that the "vision" this woman had was actually real, and therefore is evidence of some God* as opposed to it simply being a hallucinatoin brought on by the stress and emotions of her pending nuptuals. Sheesh.


*(although, you'd still have to prove it is the God you worship, not one of the other 30,000 that humans have worshipped throughuot history)

[Stunster]

79. The question is....

not what seems more reasonable to me, but more reasonable to her.

[opiate69]

80. Short-term memory problems?

Stunster:"not what seems more reasonable to me, but more reasonable to her."


Stunster:"It depends on how you're defining evidence. Here's something I would consider as evidence."

[Stunster]

81. Yes, I consider it evidence

for her.

[Az]

82. Semantic differences

It seems we are caught in the difference between empirical evidence and personal or emotionally relevant evidence. What may serve as compelling evidence to someone experience may not qualify as evidence.

[Stunster]

84. Yes, it's

a semantic difference.

But it does strike me that for her, or anyone in her position, such an experience is still pretty darn good evidence, as evidence goes.

And since we can't get inside another person's consciousness to experience what data they are experiencing, but have to take their word for it, even 'empirical' evidence is always in a sense 'personal'.

[Az]

86. The mind is a tricky thing

We have limits due to it. And it is not the best data collection device around. Did you know that what we experience is slightly delayed from reality. It seems it takes a moment or two for the information that reaches our senses to travel our neuro systems and reach our brain. Once there they have to be translated and transfered to various locations in our brain. Its not a great length of time but it is measurable.

What we experience is not reality. It is our senses reporting about reality as it was a moment ago to the best of their ability to descipher it. There is further interference due to our brains translation of this input. Consider a crowded room with numerous people talking. Our brains are able to sift out the conversation we are focused on and discard the rest of the babble. This is not an accurate portrayl of reality. It is filtered to our needs.

Sometime the brain misfires. Sometimes we force ourself into a state where it behaves differently than normal. These shifts and changes create experiences that to our brain are indistinguishible from reality. There are even studies that show that in prayer and meditation we can disconnect our own sense of self from our brain. The brain continues to function but the thoughts and ideas running through it are not tagged as originating from self. Instead the brain attaches whatever learned identity would be able to project thoughts or voices into our head.

Minds are tricky things. What is convincing to another is merely the brain recording the emotional significance of the event and basing its validity on that alone. An mental experience that is outside our normal day to day experience is going to bring with it a very large emotional impact. There is no way a person could not be affected by it. They may be able to overwhelm it by understanding the nature of the experience. But left to their own with just the experience they are like a ship without a rudder.

[opiate69]

83. Then by the same token...

Dumbya thinks God talks to him. He probably thinks he's seen God. His God tells him that homosexuals shouldn't have equal rights, and that it's ok to slaughter thousands of Iraqi citizens for no valid reason. Does that qualify as evidence for him? Or, how about the people suffering from schizophrenia, who have visualand aural hallucinations? Shall we all bow before them, since their "evidence" is real to them?

[Stunster]

87. Did you ever see the movie, "A Beautiful Mind"?

If so, would you say that the hallucinations that the main character experienced didn't even constitute evidence for him that he was having contact with US intelligence?

By the way, the following argument is logically invalid:

"Some people have strange sorts of experiences, which I regard as invalid. Therefore all strange experiences that people have are invalid."

[Az]

88. Experience vs Explanation of events

A man having a hallucination has a real experience. His explation of the event may bear no relevance to the truth of the event. A man that thinks he is a chicken will not lay eggs despite the very real sense of being a chicken he has.

[Stunster]

96. I posted this on another thread, but it's relevant here too

Scientism says, "science is the only way of obtaining true knowledge of reality." This statement, however, cannot itself be verified by the methods of science. So the first problem is scientism's self-referential incoherence. The statement of scientism is not itself a scientific statement. Its claim that the only way to arrive at true knowledge is through empirically verifiable procedures involvign sensory perception cannot itself be verified through empirical verifiable procedures involving sensory perception.

The next problem is that scientism commits the logical fallacy of petitio principii, commonly known as 'begging the question'. It is like a blind man who claims that only through hearing, touching, tasting, and smelling can one know anything for certain about the world. Using only his four senses, though, he obviously cannot prove that there is no fifth sense--the sense of sight. Well, suppose there is a way of knowing reality, or some aspect of it, which is non-sensory or not amenable to the methods of the natural sciences, perhaps because it involves a non-physical reality. One couldn't establish that there wasn't such a non-sensory way of knowing by showing that it could not be detected by the senses. That would be like a mathematician who claimed there was no number greater than 100 because his calculator only went up to 100.

The next problem is that scientism has too narrow a conception of experience for which it then fails to provide adequate warrant. Sensory experience is far from being the only kind of experience we have. We also commonly have moral experience, aesthetic experience, and the experience of rational thinking. Scientism epistemologically privileges sensory experience. But that privileging is not itself justified by anything we sense. Just from having sensory experiences one couldn't prove that sensory experience ought to be given epistemological privileges over other types of experience.

It might be objected that it is justified, because sensory experiences we have had before tend to be repeated under appropriately controlled conditions. This, of course, is inductive reasoning. But notoriously, Hume showed that there is no way to justify inductive reasoning on the basis of past sense-perception without circularity. Just because the chicken has always been fed at 9am every day up till now, doesn't justify the chicken in thinking that today, the farmer won't ring its neck. Analogously, just because inductive reasoning has served us well in the past doesn't prove that it's going to serve us well in future---unless you are already assuming the validity of inductive reasoning. The problem of induction is a large topic in philosophy of science, and scientism just naively ignores it, or assumes the problem away. (Hume's account itself, however, is not without problems of circularity, since he uses causation to explain induction, and induction to explain causation).

But perhaps the biggest challenge to scientism now is the New Mysterian position recently developed in the philosophy of mind. That's another huge topic in philosophy of mind. The New Mysterians say that science, and human cognition more generally, is intrinsically and forever incapable of solving what Chalmers has called 'the Hard Problem of Consciousness. But rather than give up on materialism, they say that even though consciousness can't be fitted into a materialistic worldview, we should just have faith that materialism is true anyway. Naturally, theists find such a position amusingly ironic.

[Az]

97. And I responded to it the first time as well

Science makes no such claim. Only is exclusionary beyond any reasonable scope. There are a number of ways of obtaining knowledge. But not all knowledge is truth and science just happens to be a very good method of determining if a thing is true or not. So if truth is of any importance (it need not be important) then science may be of interest to you.

As to the notion of the mind, yes there is an explosion going on within some communities connecting quantum theories to the brain. But it seems to me they fail on a majority of theories. The brain is a macro object. The ebb and flow of it occurrs entirely on the macro scale. We can watch and trace activity and determine its impact. We can modify parts of the brain and directly elecit changes.

The reason for so many trying to force the mind into a quantum state may derive from the fact that there are dueling philosophies at play. The majority of individuals(in western society anyway) continue take a dualistic stance regarding the nature of mind and identity. Thus a continued effort to establish identity detached from body persists. This despite evidence demonstrating that the mind is the brain.

The mind is the brain in activity. It is an exceedingly complex process. So much so that it still continues to present a Chaotic front to us. But just because we cannot yet pierce it does not mean we have to call into play explanations that we predefine as unexplainable. We can continue to say we don't know yet.

[opiate69]

89. Haven't seen the movie. I hate Russel Crowe.

Now.. onto the meat...

"Some people have strange sorts of experiences, which I regard as invalid. Therefore all strange experiences that people have are invalid."

That's not the argument I'm making. It'd be more like:

"Hallucinations have been empirically determined to be a symptom of mental illness. Visions of "God" have been claimed thoughout the ages, but none have been empirically proven. Thus, until a 'holy vision' is verified, it is reasonable to conclude that hallucinations (including seeing/hearing God) are merely a symptom of mental illness."

[Az]

90. Minor issue

I take issue with the term mental illness. Alteration of mental states is perfectly within the realm of normal experience. Runners high, meditation, sex, and any number of things can lead to a state of shift in mental condition. The experiences do not accurately convey the reality to the individual experiencing them. But they are not necissarily an illness.

[opiate69]

91. Point taken..

I should have been more specific and cited chronic hallucinations... (I think I've taken too many psych classes for my own good, or perhaps, not enough?) :)


On edit: Although, I do whole-heartedly believe that religiousity/fundamentalsim is, at the very least a personality disorder, and better psychologists than myself could probably make the case for diagnosing it as a chronic cognitive disorder.

[Az]

92. I would strongly disagree

It may be problematic for a diverse society but fundamentalism functions perfectly within a homogenous social structure. That is in fact where it evolved. In the past travel and communications were nothing as compared to today. Nations were isolated by distance. Societies were homogenous unless invaded.

In these conditions an absolute religious order will naturally take root. It provides for social control that would otherwise be difficult to come by. It also provides strength to the community.

It was inevitible that such overreaching structures would fall as societies expanded. They lost their hold on control of the society but they continued to exist as religious institutions. Thus the same framework that existed during more monolithic times continue to exist in our modern multicultural society.

These institutions are dedicated to propogating the same rhetoric they had when they ruled. Most have adapted to modern culture and find their niche within. But some continue to run on the notion that they (by proxy from God) alone define the morals of the society.

Religious fundamentalism is not a disorder. It is the brain internalising a teaching just as it was designed to. Nothing out of speck. Biologically anyway. Socially... well thats a different issue.

[opiate69]

93. Ah, but there's the rub, no?

As our societies evolve, shouldn't our tools for functioning in that society also? After all, what makes a personality disorder a disorder and not just a personality type? The disorder limits one's ability to function "normally" within a society.... (Now I'm really wishing my fiancee would have gotten me the DSM4 for Xmas/Solstice)


on edit: I think this would be a great topic for the atheism forum.. maybe I'll start a thread there when I have the time.

[Az]

95. Progress is not contiguous

All portions of society do not advance at the same rate. Further more there are competing idealogies at play. And the current social standard that we seem to hold to the highest value (in liberal circles anyway) does not actively seek to promote itself. Thus those systems which are actively promoting themself can rise up and overwhelm the newer systems that knocked it from its former place.

[Stunster]

94. Sadly, that one's invalid too

It commits the logical fallacy of petitio principii, by assuming the key issue at stake, namely whether the only possible valid evidence for a belief is that which is subject to public empirical testing.

And so is this:

"A firm belief in invisible realities has been empirically determined to be a symptom of mental illness. An inner sense of having 'free will' and of being 'under a moral obligation' has been claimed throughout the ages, but the inner sense of these invisible things has never been empirically proven to be valid. Thus until the sense of having 'free will' and 'being under a moral obligation' is verified, it is reasonable to conclude that a belief in the reality of free will and of moral obligations, is merely a symptom of mental illness."

[opiate69]

98. A few points.

I was under the impression that "petitio principii" is just a pretentious prat's way of saying "circular reasoning". Is that correct?

And if so, how does "assuming the key issue at stake, namely whether the only possible valid evidence for a belief is that which is subject to public empirical testing" qualify as circular reasoning?

When in actuality, what you're arguing is that just because it is intagible and cannot be measured or tested then there's nothing to say that they aren't visions and not hallucinations. A load of crap.

Schizophrenics have anatomical abnormalities in their brains which are obvious. Hallucinations can be seen to take place using fMRI's and regional blow flow monitors. The hallucinations will occur when the brain activity is centered around places such as the occipital lobe for visual hallucinations which the occipital lobe is the primary vision cortex, which forms the images we "see".

[Stunster]

99. Hahaha, you've done it again

Given a question-begging argument. :eyes:

You should stick to insisting that theists define omnipotence the way you want it defined. That was even more amusing.

But now.... it's time for a :beer: and a :smoke:. Then maybe I'll call Alison, and let her know you've proved she's a schizo.

Is there an address she can send the thank-you note to?

[opiate69]

100. I haven't proved she's "a schizo"

But you certainly haven't proved she had a verifiable "holy vision". My suiggestion, take her to the nearest University Medical center and have her talk to a psychologist. And while you're there, enroll yourself in some remedial science classes. And, for what it's worth, doesn't smoking and drinking make the baby Jesus cry? Prat.

[Stunster]

108. Enroll yourself in some remedial logic classes

Please name ANY human experience that does not involve some brain event/process or other. There are none? Fine!

Would you then infer that that every human experience was therefore illusory, or non-veridical?

Many years ago, hominid brains evolved in such a way as to enable humans to experience watching a bird fly in the sky, the taste of ice cream, the sound of music, the sound of words, the emotion of fear in the face of wild animals seeking to eat us, etc. That fact says PRECISELY NOTHING about the veridicality of those experiences. Why should a qualitatively similar fact concerning brain processes say any more than PRECISELY NOTHING about the veridicality of religious experiences?

Hence this type of argument---all religious experiences are caused by brain-states, therefore all religious experiences must be non-veridical---is, not to put too fine a point on it, utterly IDIOTIC.

It also has a name. It is called the Genetic Fallacy. See, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_fallacy

[Az]

109. Its not that it is the only explanation

Its just that it is more reasonable than fashioning an infinitely powerful being to embed such images in ones mind. Furthermore similar experiences have been created in clinical conditions. We also know that such visions occurr in many different communities with wildly varying beliefs. And yet the descriptions do not match. Mayan spirit walkers are not seeing visions of Mary.

Thus the evidence suggests that the visions are a creation of the mind alone and not placed there by an external source.

[Stunster]

110. All your evidence shows is that they are in the mind

and not representative of something existing in the world of physical objects.

But that does not show that they all are solely created by the mind and are non-veridical. That inference is simply invalid.

Let's say that only 0.0003% of the human population is capable of having and understanding a specific and very difficult mathematical thought, and that everybody else, when they try to, make mistakes or simply get confused. Does this prove that the thought in question is not valid or true or veridical?

There's a good story told in one of his books by Roger Penrose, the famous Cambridge mathematician, about how he once 'saw' a 4-dimensional geometrical object. As far as we know, he's the only person to have had this kind of experience. Does this mean it's more reasonable to suppose that Penrose had some brain malfunction than that he's an extraordinarily gifted mathematician?

[Az]

111. Why do you continue to try to read things into others statements

I did not say these visions could only happen by internal processes. I said specifically that it seemed (note the word seemed) to be the most (note the word most) likely (note the word likely) route. The claim that there is a god or being sending these visions to people is unsupported (note this does not mean absolute impossible).

You really present the image of someone that does not seem to understand the scientific method. This may or may not be true. But this is the impression I get. You seem to be very excited by glimpses of other's work that support your theories. But then you fail to verify the methodology of them. Their word is good enough for you. Thats not science.

A theory is offered up for consideration. Evidence is provided to try to demonstrate the veracity of the theory. A method of falsifying the theory is created as well. If at any time this means of falsifying occurs the theory must be discarded or reworked to take into account the new evidence. The process is always open and never concludes. A long standing theory can be toppled at the arrival of new evidence any time.

No scientist worth their diploma will ever insist that a position is conclusive. They will not insist that there is no god. They will not proclaim religion absolutely invalid. These are phantoms of your creation.

[Stunster]

112. You are so

:boring:

[Az]

113. Nice

Hope you are proud of yourself. I tried to talk and you turn childish. We are done.

[Stunster]

114. What's childish

is to beg the question SO systematically about whether scientific method is the only available way of knowing or having rational beliefs about something, and then claim that you're open-minded about the ways in which we might come to know something or have rational beliefs about it---and not see the logical incoherence of what you're doing (begging the question systematically) with what you're claiming (that you're open-minded).

---"Fine show me the evidence that there's another way of knowing or having rational beliefs about something"

"Here's some...."

---"Oh, I'm not going to count that as evidence"

"Why not?"

---"Well, it's not, um, scientific."

"But isn't that begging the question at issue?"

---"No, I'm open to other forms of evidence---as long as they conform to my a priori, not scientifically derived, commitment to scientific method as the only respectable yielder of evidence."

"But what about consciousness, and all the phenomena associated with reason and value"

----"No, that doesn't count, because I believe that science might one day be able to explain those things in materialist terms."

"And if it doesn't?"

----"We'll never know if it will or not. But in the meantime, I'm determined to believe that it will, regardless of all rational philosophical arguments to the contrary. Not that this is faith on my part. It's scientific open-mindedness."

"But I get the impression that regardless of how unsuccessful a scientific research program is into the nature of consciousness, reason and value, you will always say, ah, but it might be successful in future. Surely that's just a statement of faith on your part?"

----"No, I'm just being open-minded. And to show that I'm open-minded, I reject on a priori grounds the a priori arguments of philosophers who argue that science will never succeed in solving these problems."

"Hmmmmm. Well, what about all these indications from cosmology and physics and biology that the universe and life is extremely unlikely to have come about from chance, and exhibits to a marvellous degree mathematical intelligibility and order? You're saying that provides no evidential support for the theistic hypothesis?"

----"No, that's not scientific evidence either. You see, it's simpler to presume that there's an infinity of unobservable universes, than to posit the theistic hypothesis."

"An infinity of unobservables is a simpler---and scientific---hypothesis?"

----"Yes, because that's more conformable to naturalism."

"But isn't that begging the question again? Aren't we trying to decide if naturalism is true or not, or more rational believe?"

----"Yes, we are, and I'm completely open-minded about that. Just show me the evidence."

"But you won't count anything as evidence if it's not naturalistic evidence, so you're begging the question!"

----"No, I'm prepared to consider the possibility of there being other forms of evidence. Just as long as it has all the features of naturalistic evidence. If it doesn't have all those features, then that shows it's not good evidence at all."

"But you're begging the question again! The question is whether the concept of evidence is logically broader than the concept of evidence as defined by the naturalistic research program."

----"But we have good evidence in favor of the superiority of the naturalistic research program."

"What evidence is that?

----"It's the evidence we get when we do natural science---that kind of evidence is good evidence for the validity of natural science."

"But how does that show that that's the only kind of good evidence there is?"

---"Oh, there might be other kinds of good evidence. And I'd be prepared to accept that. Provided this can be shown by the methods of natural science, of course."

"I give up! This is so :boring:! But here's the issue you're being childish about..."


The naturalist tradition is staunchly committed to follow science wherever it leads, thus placing naturalism itself beyond the reach of scientific refutation. At the same time, the naturalist tradition is committed to the idea that all substantive philosophical doctrines – naturalism included – stand at the mercy of science.

This internal conflict reveals itself in both the metaphysical and epistemological varieties of naturalism. Metaphysical naturalism is supposedly the view that the sciences paint a complete and accurate ontological picture of the world; there are quarks, molecules and organisms, but not ghosts and gods. If naturalism is to follow science wherever it leads, however, it cannot rule out specific kinds of entities before science is complete. More generally, the problem is whether the science providing ontological guidance is current science or ideal science. If it is current science, then naturalism is probably false. If it is ideal science, then naturalism is metaphysically vacuous. Epistemological naturalism fares no better. If it is at the mercy of future developments in science, it cannot follow science wherever it leads. But if it is immune to empirical results, then it is self-refuting, because it is just the sort of hypothesis that epistemic naturalism insists must be grounded on scientific investigation rather than armchair theorizing.

Hence....charity suggests that we treat naturalism not as a doctrine to profess, but as a method to practice, a research program, i.e., a complete set of dispositions to treat certain types of sources as basic evidence. Because evidence is only recognized as such from within a research program, research programs themselves are not adopted on the basis of evidence, but are instead something we bring to the table of inquiry. What naturalists bring to the table is the disposition to treat all and only the methods of science as evidentially basic. At present, these methods include perception, memory, testimony, standard criteria for theory choice, as well as the appearance of mathematical, logical, and conceptual necessity. Excluded are rational intuition and religious experience.

Naturalism thus construed is coherent, because one may be disposed to follow science wherever it leads and also hold that justified philosophical beliefs are at the mercy of science. But it is also defanged, because research programs cannot be argued for or adopted on the basis of evidence. They are rather the frameworks within which rational arguments take place, and within which it is decided what counts as evidence.

[opiate69]

61. Offer the $250 to your god.. and answer my question, please...

"Are these requirements beyond God's capability???"

[Jim__]

65. Well, gee, what about the Garden of Eden?

Are you telling us that god could not have created the Garden of Eden as it is described in Genesis? Are you telling us that this biblical story is just an impossible fantasy? Who perpetrated this lie on all the people who actually believe it?

[Stunster]

66. You're obviously a Biblical scholar

Hence you know that Genesis is not a science book.

[Jim__]

72. So, could god create the Garden of Eden?

And further, was man condemned to live in misery whether or not Adam and Eve sinned? Is the misery in this world due to the fall of man? Or, is it due to the ultimate impotence of god?

[Stunster]

73. Well, first

Define 'Garden of Eden'. Then specify the physics it would involve.

Then, if the physics you specify is logically possible, my answer would be: Yes, God could create it.

As for misery, I think the world would be a much less miserable place if nobody ever sinned. Don't you?

[Az]

85. It would be very quiet

Particularly since we are all born in sin (according to some rule books) we would have to stop having sex to get rid of sin.

Incidently the world would be a much less miserable place if we also started following the Tao Te Ching, the Eight Fold Path, the Rig Veda, and the Bill of Rights. There are numerous codes created by societies. Some by religious constructs and some by reason.

[Crunchy Frog]

23. Then you could make the planet entirely aquatic.

I'm not sure what my point is, as I agree that any scenario, at least in a Darwinian world, is going to have individual lives vulnerable and at constant risk. That's after all, what drives change, and increases in complexity that lead to the development of rational minds in the first place.

Of course, if you were a God of a non-Darwinian world, you might set that world up in much the same way that we might set up an aquarium, with the creatures maintained in a safe, secure environment in which all their needs are provided for.

Again, I'm not sure exactly what my point is, just throwing out some alternate scenarios, and causing trouble.:)

[Jim__]

62. Of course, Doctor Pangloss, this is the best of all possible worlds.

Why just think about it, the creator even gave us a nose to hold up to hold up our spectacles.

[Stunster]

74. Voltaire may have written some plays and stuff

But Leibniz invented calculus.

[enki23]

102. now there's a serious imagination

but would the humans drown if they were made of dilithum and fairy dust? what if, instead of humans, all that existed were very appreciative rocks. rocks which were so happy to exist that they did nothing at all, except bask in the goodness of existence. needing nothing, wanting for nothing, their perfect existence led them in lives of utter happiness forever. or perhaps just one rock, which would contain all the happiness in the universe. why not a single point, the highest possible concentration of gratitude-for-existing? a dimensionless universe made up of no matter, no energy, just "gosh i'm sure glad i existed, rather than the alternative." and "if i hadn't existed, i'm quite sure i would have regretted it."

[Stunster]

103. Rocks, even happy ones, don't cut it.

As a preliminary, make the plausible Kantian assumption that a rational being, all of whose actions and states are determined by causes external to itself, is a contradiction in terms.

Well, the idea has been around for some time that the happiest anything can be, and the realization of the highest form of value, is this: a rational being knowing and loving to the fullest possible extent.

Ignorance, or a lack of love, are inconsistent with the highest possible happiness for rational beings. And the valuable states of rational beings have generally been taken to be incommensurably more valuable than any other valuable states.

Now, of course, one question is whether a rational being *by its very nature* has to be also a material or physical being. From Plato and Kant to Chalmers and McGinn, this question has exercized the best minds. Or brains. But even among those of a materialist persuasion, there are plenty who think that knowledge and love are incommensurably high values.

[enki23]

105. then, i suppose i should thank god that there is no such thing...

as a rational being.

[Stunster]

107. I can see why an atheist would suppose that (n/t)