Are skepticism and Belief in God mutually exclusive?

williamgrogan · 10-01-2004 8:47pm

I don't recall saying anything about the intellectual inventiveness of religious people

They invented the god that you don't know exists or not. My point is obvious here.

Come on.... don't you feel a tiny bit embarrassed that your god was invented by primitive man and embellished and expanded by some of the greatest mass murders in history?

PS

Paisley would probably be a Catholic except that King Henry fired blanks when it came to boys.

williamgrogan · 10-01-2004 8:50pm

I'm examining a very very abstract idea which isn't dependent upon groups of people or what they choose to do.

I don’t think the belief in God is abstract, the philosophers/theologians did, I don’t. It’s a very straightforward superstition.

Are you distancing yourself from the religious?

ecksor · 10-01-2004 9:00pm

Originally posted by williamgrogan
They invented the god that you don't know exists or not. My point is obvious here.

It seems almost certain that that is where the idea originated, sure, but I still haven't said anything about the inventiveness of that idea.

Come on.... don't you feel a tiny bit embarrassed that your god was invented by primitive man and embellished and expanded by some of the greatest mass murders in history?

Not really, the concept of the natural number has primitive origins and I think it's a wonderful concept. Also, I'm sure that many fine ideas have been held by people I find distasteful.

I don’t think the belief in God is abstract, the philosophers/theologians did, I don’t. It’s a very straightforward superstition.

Well, abstract ideas can have concrete manifestations and people have believed in all sorts of concrete manifestations that we could examine individually, but I'm very much talking about the abstract idea and whether or not there might be a concrete manifestation of some description.

You say that we can't check all of these possible ideas (I'm not sure about that, I think it may be possible eventually to reject them all or confirm one of them if we can agree on a definition even if just between ourselves), but that just leads me to conclude that we still can't answer the question of whether a sceptic can consistently believe in god because we don't know if an accurate theory does or can exist somewhere.

I don't see how I'm distancing myself from the religious, or how I was ever particularly close to their viewpoint.

sextusempiricus · 10-01-2004 10:37pm

Originally posted by williamgrogan
Is this true?

Is there not a finite amount of knowledge? (I ignore data such as the position of every particle in the universe and mean knowledge as in laws, proofs etc..)

You regard knowledge as a searchlight illuminating the vast but finite blackness of ignorance, it's beam becoming ever broader as new knowledge is gained. I argue that the darkness gets broader too. why? Simply because the solution to one problem raises numerous other problems to be sorted out, problems that we hadn't even guessed about originally. For example prime numbers are the unexpected result of our invention of an infinite sequence of natural numbers. Many of the problems of number theory have their origin in prime numbers. You are thus quite wrong to think that as time progresses there is less to discover not more. In addition our knowledge is conjectural. Newton's law of gravitation has great explanatory power for the movements of the planets but its still wrong.

Originally posted by williamgrogan

I think this is an illogical suggestion.

Not really. The difficulty is linking up the first person experiences of sensations like feeling pain or seeing red with third person investigations into neuronal processes. Thomas Nagel has some interesting points here and I'll try and find the references.

originally posted by williamgrogan
It only might be true if there is a god. If there isn’t a god then the mind is something real and concrete and exists in a real non magical universe that obeys laws.

God has nothing to do with this. Good God I'm an atheist not unsympathetic to your point of view!

originally posted by williamgrogan

There is a puzzle about consciousness but that could be resolved within a few decades, never mind millennia.

I don't share your confidence on that point. Indeed I'm fairly sure that the point above and made by Nagel is unsurmountable.

sextusempiricus · 10-01-2004 11:29pm

Originally posted by ecksor
Do you also think it is unacceptable to hold that position for an educated, clear thinking and intelligent person?

No, of course not. But agnosticism is sitting on the fence and I'd prefer the stronger claim that there is no God, full stop! I was also trying to make an epistomological point that if God is an explanation for everything and is inconsistent with nothing then He cannot be scientifically investigated. A further thought is that if a God made our world then is He not outside that world beyond our theories, beyond definitions.
Lets get on with investigating what we can investigate.

[/i]Which points out the problems with previous definitions of god, but any theory must seek to explain new information if it is shown to be inadequate in light of old information. The line of reasoning is interesting if you can reduce all possible ideas about god to an absurd or unmaintainable position, but regarding a finite number of cases won't accomplish that.

I'm not too interested in definitions but if you want a God that agnostics and atheists can all agree on why not equate Him with Nature as Spinoza (who loved specious definitions) and Einstein both did. Glory be to Nature! Unfortunately most religious people wouldn't agree with this definition. Why do we need an extra word for Nature anyway?

[/i]It's an interesting argument to think about though. In my life I have swayed from one extreme to the other and back into the middle ground as WG calls it, and I can't see a line of reasoning that will take me out of my middle ground or give me any sort of certainty at all.

Don't torment yourself with uncertainty. The important thing is to be happy with our limited knowledge. Its interesting that original sceptics like Sextus Empiricus thought that their outlook would bring them peace of mind. I'd like to think that they could then concentrate on the important things in life. When we discuss what I have labelled 'down-to-earth issues' theists, atheists and agnostics may often find themselves in close agreement. I suspect a lot more ink (or typing on this thread) will be used but to little avail. I have already commented about the pointless search for a Unified Field Theory ( at least for the present )and that is an empirical problem that with future technology might be solved.

[/i]I am not confident in it at all. I think that the incompleteness theorem leads to the conclusion that science will always have open questions, no?

I agree 100% with you.

ecksor · 11-01-2004 12:18am

Originally posted by sextusempiricus
I was also trying to make an epistomological point that if God is an explanation for everything and is inconsistent with nothing then He cannot be scientifically investigated.

Agreed, but that appears to be the major source of conflict on this thread.

Lets get on with investigating what we can investigate.

Agreed.

Don't torment yourself with uncertainty.

Uncertainty doesn't really torment me. I'd be more tormented by an inconsistency in my basic assumptions, or axioms if you like (and being human, such problems are very likely to arise occasionally). I suppose that those assumptions would describe the basis my 'belief system' ? Perhaps this is what williamgrogan sees as my personal religion.

It is that topic of consistency that has occupied me most for the last couple of pages I suppose.

I suspect a lot more ink (or typing on this thread) will be used but to little avail.

I think that it has generated some interesting posts as well as some rather exasperating ones.

sextusempiricus · 11-01-2004 1:08am

Originally posted by sextusempiricus

The difficulty is linking up the first person experiences of sensations like feeling pain or seeing red with third person investigations into neuronal processes. Thomas Nagel has some interesting points here and I'll try and find the references.

References as promised.
1) 'What Does It All Mean ?', Thomas Nagel, Oxford (1987), p 8-37.
2) 'What is it like to be a Bat?' in 'Mortal questions' Thomas Nagel, Cambridge Canto edition (1991), p165-180

williamgrogan · 12-01-2004 8:04pm

There is a new channel starting tonight on Sky 289 called FX and at 10:30 pm is Penn & Tellers BULL**** program.

Tonight they (hopefully) debunk Psychics.

I hear about this series and know that P&T are Skeptics.

williamgrogan · 12-01-2004 8:29pm

Is there such a thing as superstition? If so does the belief in god not qualify? If so does the belief that God may exist not qualify? Where does the superstition become a subject for philosophy?

When Philosophers started studying god they believed in him. If some how or another we evolved so quickly that we never invented god but invented science first. Would we believe in god or even be discussing him? I repeat, god is a left over superstition from the past. It is obviously so. Dressing the discussion of god up in philosophical verbiage doesn’t change that.

I don’t think that inventing numbers and that a god created the world/universe are remotely similar. All the theories that primitive man had regarding what things were made of, how things worked, where they came from, the laws of nature etc were all wrong, hopelessly wrong, out by a mile. So how come they managed to invent god? Is it not more reasonable to believe that they didn’t invent god and were right about this invention but invented god and they were wrong like everything else and people today who either believe in god or believe he may exist are not terribly different from each other and are superstitious?

You regard knowledge as a searchlight illuminating the vast but finite blackness of ignorance, it's beam becoming ever broader as new knowledge is gained.

I don’t actually. I regard knowledge as mainly gathering together rules and information.

Do you believe that there is a finite amount of knowledge or not? The entire universe is probably similar to here for starters.

At any given time when research opens up a new area it may be true to say that one discovery leads to another but that cannot always apply. Surly there is only so much you can say about the “orbit of planets”?

“Seeing red” is almost a cliché. Seeing red is a particular firing of specialised cells and a processing of changing that data into information, nothing much else. This smells of the one hand clapping waffle.

At the very least do you not agree that the gathering of knowledge will tend towards a limit?

ecksor · 12-01-2004 10:57pm

It is obviously so.

Since this appears to be the best you can come up with after 12 pages of some of the sharpest analysis of an argument I've ever seen on these boards, I don't think it's worth pursuing the god question further.

Originally posted by williamgrogan
I don’t actually. I regard knowledge as mainly gathering together rules and information.

You mentioned proofs originally in your definition of knowledge. The incompleteness theorem shows that for any finite set of axioms, there will always be true statements which will be unprovable within that set of axioms.

The criteria for proof of 'laws', as based on evidence, in the physical world is obviously different but it would still seems quite possible that there will always be observable phenomena that are unexplainable by the current theories of the day. It would seem that once we get each new theory (newtonian mechanics, then relativity, then quantum mechanics, etc etc) that proves successful in previously problematic areas we start to test it against new areas until we run into a gap. What you are saying is that we eventually close all the gaps (in fact, you explicitly said that very early on in this thread if my memory serves), but I don't actually believe that, and if you do believe it I'd like to see your reasoning for it.

williamgrogan · 12-01-2004 11:22pm

newtonian mechanics, then relativity, then quantum mechanics, etc etc) that proves successful in previously problematic areas we start to test it against new areas until we run into a gap. What you are saying is that we eventually close all the gaps

It’s the etc etc bit above I have the problem with.

The first of your two etc’s might be replaced with String Theory and the 2nd maybe the final theory? Newtonian M. only falls down at 99.9999999% of the speed of light, Relativity & QM in black holes so whatever theories are left are only need in extreme places. 99% of the universe is neither that fast nor that dense. You could argue that we have very roughly the laws that apply to 99% of the universe.

At the very least do you not agree that the gathering of knowledge will tend towards a limit?

As for the gaps, if you can fully describe a system, even if limited by the laws of quantum mechanics then that’s it. I think there will come a point where Science can say no more about the orbit of planets, then the nature of stars, the structure of the vacuum, and so on through the “systems” that make up the universe. It is finite after all. Then the origin of the universe may be only one last step away and then we fill in the remaining gaps. Gaps don’t bother me too much. QM has no gaps. There are not infinite steps between things.

I agree that you would need an unlimited amount of data to describe everything but what I am talking about is the “understanding” bit.

I would say that Water Diving, Homeopathy, Acupuncture, etc.. are obviously wrong, what’s wrong with saying that about religion?

sextusempiricus · 13-01-2004 12:08am

Originally posted by williamgrogan
Is there such a thing as superstition? If so does the belief in god not qualify? If so does the belief that God may exist not qualify? Where does the superstition become a subject for philosophy?

David Hume (1711-1776) describes superstition well. I'm going to quote him at length as he is one of my favourite writers and Im holding my own 1764 copy of his 'Essays and Treatises' Vol 1. Hope you enjoy it.

[/B][/QUOTE]

The mind of man is subject to certain unaccountable terrors and apprehensions, proceeding either from the unhappy situation of private or public affairs, from ill health, from a gloomy and meloncholy disposition, or from the concurrence of all these circumstances. In such a state of mind, infinite unknown evils are dreaded from unknown agents; and where real objects of terror are wanting, the soul, active to its own prejudice, and fostering its predominant inclination, finds imaginary ones, to whose power and malevolence it sets no limits. As these enemies are entirely invisible and unknown, the methods taken to appease them are equally unaccountable, and consist in ceremonies, observances, mortifications, sacrifices, presents, or in any practice, however absurd or frivolous, which either folly or knavery recommends to a blind and terrified credulity. Weakness, fear, melancholy, together with ignorance, are, therefore, the true sources of SUPERSTITION

When theists talk of God their belief is not arising neccessarily from any of these sources of superstition although the appeasement of malevolent agents can often be found in religions and fear has often be used by religion's proselytes. Edmund Burke, who believed in a God and who was a near comtemporary of Hume, could write in his 'Reflections on the Revolution in France' (1789) that

Superstition is the religion of feeble minds.

Philosophy, if it needs an excuse for its justification, looks at our many assumptions that don't come under the aegis of science. You seem to think just about everything
can be scientifically explained. God, and I repeat I am not a believer, does make the universe intelligible to many people and as an assumption it can be examined philosophically. The arguments don't to my mind hold up. I agree with you there.

Do I agree that there is a finite amount of knowledge? I believe in problems and that knowledge is our attempted solutions to those problems. Perhaps there is a limit to how much you can say about the orbits of the planets but technology is now allowing us to explore new problems such as life on Mars. I see science as presenting more and more problems for us to investigate. That is the exciting and fascinating thing about science. Knowledge is often provisional, Newton overturned by Einstein for example. Your humdrum conception of science as gathering "rules and information" is wrong for it fails to emphasize the importance of that leap of the imagination when a solution to a problem is proffered and then its subjection to severe testing that is the whole basis of the growth of knowledge.

On the 'mind-body' problem perhaps a new thread but read Nagel too. Can we make a robot that feels love like us, smells a rose and wants to write poetry about it (although I'd admit that with a computer and a suitable program a new Mozart symphony might be 'composed') , has hopes and aspirations and makes arguments about what makes life interesting. I doubt this.

ecksor · 13-01-2004 12:11am

Originally posted by williamgrogan
You could argue that we have very roughly the laws that apply to 99% of the universe.

Where do you pull these figures out of?

Anyway even if what you say is correct, a mostly accurate theory leaves a lot of questions. It in no ways supports the idea that we'll achieve complete accuracy, even at the sort of percentage that you mention.

At the very least do you not agree that the gathering of knowledge will tend towards a limit?

You'll have to qualify that question very precisely. Knowledge in the sense of how much we can describe in a 'percentage of the universe' or 'observable phenomena' sense has possibly already come very close to a 'limit', but that's very different to saying that we'll have a complete understanding in the sense that we'll have fewer and fewer questions to answer.

As for the gaps, if you can fully describe a system, even if limited by the laws of quantum mechanics then that’s it.

Did you phrase that correctly? If you require a full description of a system to explain it, then the explanation doesn't seem that useful as a scientific theory. It's predictive usefulness would be equivilent to just waiting to see what happens.

I agree that you would need an unlimited amount of data to describe everything but what I am talking about is the “understanding” bit.

Here's a poser for you: If you ever suspect you have achieved this state of ultimate understanding, how do you go about scientifically testing that you actually have achieved that state?

I would say that Water Diving, Homeopathy, Acupuncture, etc.. are obviously wrong, what’s wrong with saying that about religion?

I didn't mention religion and neither did you in the post I replied to.

GuanYin · 13-01-2004 2:04am

Originally posted by williamgrogan
You could argue that we have very roughly the laws that apply to 99% of the universe.

Erm, we don't have 99% of the mechanisms that govern the biology of our body, I find it hard to believe we have 99% of the laws of the universe. Especially seeing as we probably haven't explored 1% of it.

Of what we have explored, we have done well, granted. However our current knowledge of science can't explain how the human eye picks up and communicates perspective to the brain. It doesn't know how the trillion neural connections of the brain our formed. It only just elucidated the pathway of ion transport through which some sensory signals are transmitted (sodium channels, which earned a Nobel Prize).

Its laughable that anyone would think that we know 99% of the laws of the universe. At the very best we know some of the laws that govern the small part of the universe that we have encountered, nothing more.

[edit] Edited so that sober people can understand what I was saying[/edit]

williamgrogan · 13-01-2004 11:24am

Erm, we don't have 99% of the mechanisms that govern the biology of our body, I find it hard to believe we have 99% of the laws of the universe. Especially seeing as we probably haven't explored 1% of it.

The point being made here is that there are a finite number of laws and mechanisms and that we will know them all eventually.

the laws that apply to 99% of the universe.

Not 99% of the laws but the laws that apply to 99% of the universe.

The universe is likely to be similar everywhere, e.g. if we fully understood the laws of our own galaxy we would probably understand the laws of all other galaxies so I don’t accept the 1% bit. If the same laws apply everywhere then we don’t have to explore all of it just a representative sample.

In adding up the known laws I do not equate the different chemicals reactions in the body as counting as the same as say QM. They are just repetitions with slight differences of the same mechanisms.

Anyway I cannot and we could not agree a figure on this so I withdraw the 99%.

However, I still assert that there is a finite number of mechanisms at work in the body and they will be understood and relatively soon. As it is we do know a great deal about the body and there is not an infinite amount of knowledge left to be gained.

I think people are susceptible to believing in things based on clichés. “Science cannot know everything”, “Discovering one thing leads to even more puzzles”, “Humans cannot know (or understand) everything”, etc. Many of these are left over ideas from the age of religion. If someone asserts them, I can as a skeptic attack them.

PS

Do we not know say 95% of how the eye works?

We know approximately how & why it evolved, we know its components, we know the optics, we know about the stuff it reacts to – the light and its properties, we know the way the cells are differentiated into b/w and colour, we know where they are and how big they are, how many of them there are, we know a good deal about the chemistry of the individual cells making it up and the liquid in it and its properties, we know a lot about its many diseases & cures, then there’s optometry, we know about the components in the cells, we know about the molecules making up the cells, we know about the atoms making the molecules, we know about the quarks making the components of the atoms and many of the laws relating to how they behave, we even know about other animals eyes.

ecksor · 13-01-2004 5:49pm

Originally posted by williamgrogan
I think people are susceptible to believing in things based on clichés.

You're fond of saying something like this if someone doesn't agree with you. I am inclined to doubt your idea about a finite set of laws because of what I know so far about science.

Have you thought about either my question about the nature that showing such an understanding has taken place (consistent finite set of theories that are also consistent with the universe and a finite set of laws arising from those theories) and how you'd go about proving that such a state has been reached?

williamgrogan · 13-01-2004 11:25pm

You're fond of saying something like this if someone doesn't agree with you.

Does that make it wrong?

I have ideas about how people think that may differ from others posting on this thread. People do carry around a bag of clichés (sort of like memes?) that influence them. Many of these assumptions are completely wrong because people have never questioned them.

Have you thought about either my question about the nature that showing such an understanding has taken place (consistent finite set of theories that are also consistent with the universe and a finite set of laws arising from those theories) and how you'd go about proving that such a state has been reached?

I suppose that proof would be part of the totality of proofs, a bit like the indices in a library and the index of the indices.

There have been many similar points made on this thread that have very little bearing on the positions in question except in an esoteric or linguistic or philosophical sense. If you spend a lot of time dissecting the exact meaning of sentences, quoting Godel’s theorem and generally getting bogged down in serious nit picking I think you can miss the bigger picture as Dr Connell did when he produced his PhD on Guardian Angels. When Philosophers originally asked, “Why are we here”, they probably though there was an amazing answer to it, if any, but its turning out to be pretty mundane. Take a soup of chemicals, add external energy, shake mix and wait …….. up pops some nifty replicating molecules which then evolves into us. Quite straightforward really.

You rarely have to be completely accurate except when the game is accuracy itself. As I said before we got to the moon using Newton’s Laws and not Einstein’s. Saying Newton’s Laws are inaccurate is not relevant if the goal is a moon journey.

It may be true mathematically that you can never know all laws 100% but is that important, if we know them to very close to 100% then most objectives are achieved.

As I said the human brain is real. It functions because of physical process and not magic. It will be completely understood and reasonably soon. To say it cannot be completely understood is to attribute magic to it. I don’t believe in magic.

If you follow many of the arguments put forward to support the Agnostic position and use them to defend say Homeopathy, Miracles at Lourdes, Faith Healing, Acupuncture etc you end up in the same cycle which is why any Skeptic is leaving himself open to a charge of hypocrisy if trying to argue against all the new age nonsense.

ecksor · 13-01-2004 11:38pm

Originally posted by williamgrogan
Does that make it wrong?

No, but when people are putting forward arguments for their point of view on this thread (which you are failing to answer), it doesn't suggest that they have blindly accepted a cliché.

There have been many similar points made on this thread that have very little bearing on the positions in question except in an esoteric or linguistic or philosophical sense. If you spend a lot of time dissecting the exact meaning of sentences, quoting Godel’s theorem [..]

Save us from the distractions of logic and nitpicking I suppose.

I give up. I don't think you're capable of constructing a coherent argument for your POV.

One final question, how many of the philosophers quoted on this thread have you studied?

dangerman · 14-01-2004 2:20am

This was an interesting thread. As is possibly inevitable, it's moving a bit more towards mud-slinging as people become more passionate...

As for WG's comments on the proof of no existance of god, i think his arguement has been destroyed by everyone elses arguements and his own meandering. As everyone used the 'more' scientific method of breaking down his comments and sorting through them, taking each as it came and rebuking it... the guy supposedly argueing the scientific side became more and more inconsistent.

It's kind of hard though when a thread goes on and on like this, people pick away at eachothers individual statements, and the original thrust of people's arguements gets mixed up in semantics.

Oh well, you made some nice points at the start, WG, particularly on the inherited religous beliefs point - thats a very interesting one.

As stated by others, argueing about the existance of god really does offend people. I remember making an exchange student cry in secondary school when a group of us systematically took apart some bible stories and ridiculed them.

Everyone should question their own beliefs all the time. What upsets me is when others walk up to you and try and force you into believing what they believe. In a train station in Poprad, Slovakia, an American student studying at a bible camp there tried to convert me on the spot. I let loose with my usual 'are you sure you're right to answer such questions' but only because she started it. [playground rules of course]

Discussions like this one are great. It's the perfect place to hammer them out. (And even more fun when there's no possible end.)

If you ever suspect you have achieved this state of ultimate understanding, how do you go about scientifically testing that you actually have achieved that state?

I like that.

Having the belief that when you die your resurrected by humans 5000 years from now/go to heaven is entirely compatible with being skeptical about realistic, every day things such as horoscopes, alternative medacine...whatever.

Thanks for a good read.

williamgrogan · 14-01-2004 11:53am

One final question, how many of the philosophers quoted on this thread have you studied?

I decided in my teens after reading some books on philosophy that it wasn’t of much use. So why would I study it? Few of us study things we have no interest in or believe will not enlighten us. I have already said that I think Philosophy is Bull****. I read a great deal and have read much of what has been quoted here before and it didn’t impress me then and still doesn’t. I think that many people attacking my position on this thread have studied philosophy and it is natural that they would feel insulted by me ridiculing a subject they have studied.

The Catholic Church used the position of Philosophers to imprison Galileo and much of Theology is wrapped up in Philosophical waffle.

In my school, CBC in Cork, in about 1969 I gave up Latin for similar reasons in 2nd year. I was the first student to refuse to do Latin since the school was founded in 1888. Many reasons were put forward to convince me to continue with it but I refused. Now very few people study Latin and far fewer people as a % of students study Philosophy now than did in the past.

I’m not saying that Philosophy contributes nothing, I didn’t think Latin contributed nothing either but they are dead subjects with very little substance or relevance.

Everyone on this thread appears to be “scientifically inclined” but to oppose me on the subject of religion and Agnosticism they quote philosophers not scientists. Funny that!

Let me summarise:-

The belief in God or the belief that there may be a god is incompatible with rational thought.

There isn’t a shred of evidence that there is or ever was a god or gods.

Religion has caused enormous harm and unfortunately continues to do so; Islamic terrorism, wholesale fraud, child abuse, censorship, the denial of the rights of women, the effect on the law of notions such as evil as opposed to modern notions such as social deprivation etc.

Religion began in pre-historic man and virtually all of his superstitious beliefs about the big questions were wrong

There are millions of religions and definitions of god and they all contradict each other. This in itself is proof that the vast majority of them must be their own definitions be wrong.

Agnosticism is not any more valid than religion because it is based on religious inventions and beliefs and is a quasi form of religion

Religion as practised by the vast majority of the people of Earth was handed down to them by their parents, teachers and the society they live in; it is not based on “faith”, reason or logic.

Philosophy cannot contribute much to the understanding of reality because it is not science.

“Hard” Science has answered or is in the process of answering all the “big” questions that preoccupied religion AND philosophy and I have no doubt will do so in the not to distant future. These answers are and will be comprehensive and certain. Science has blown religion and Philosophy out of the water.

Morality is nothing to do with philosophy. It can be explained by evolution and by studying such things as Game Theory. Why we are here and where did we come from is an answer for biologists, chemists and physicists. When religion and philosophy studied morality they gave us wholesale war, burnings at the stake, the death penalty, torture, fascism, communism, mind control, brutality, slavery etc.

The notion & well known cliché that we cannot understand everything is a straightforward religious position. There is no god & no magic therefore our brains and the universe are understandable and linguistic conundrums cannot change that.

The fact that one cannot disprove something that’s defined in a way that it cannot be disproved doesn’t mean that you accept it as a possibility as many of you argue.

There is little or no difference between believing in Homeopathy, Acupuncture, spoon bending and God of any definition.

Why people get offended by opposing their religious beliefs is a question for Psychiatrists and those that study the human brain. Perhaps people are in real fear that you may undermine their entire belief system and that might traumatise them.

For further amusing reading see a recent thread on irishhealth.ie

http://www.irishhealth.com/index.html?level=4&id=4015

PS This is an important subject. I think religious belief makes it easier for people to be defrauded by quacks and makes it more difficult to enact legislation to stop these criminals.

ecksor · 14-01-2004 1:31pm

Originally posted by williamgrogan
I think that many people attacking my position on this thread have studied philosophy and it is natural that they would feel insulted by me ridiculing a subject they have studied.

[..]

Everyone on this thread appears to be “scientifically inclined” but to oppose me on the subject of religion and Agnosticism they quote philosophers not scientists. Funny that!

Some scientists were qouted to you very early on and you decided that it wasn't relevant. To be fair, I don't think that science has much of relevance to tell us on this subject.

I haven't studied philosophy apart from some small pieces by some mathematicians. I don't think I have quoted any philosophers on this thread. At one point you seemed to be admitting that a philosopher had contributed one of science's guiding principles though.

The reason I asked the question is that (a) if you hadn't studied philosophy in any depth, then you are obviously unqualified to call it bull**** and (b) if you had studied philosophy in any depth then you should be able to offer a better argument for your position than to call it bull****.

When arguments have been presented to you you have either ignored them or asserted that they are irrelevant or simply repeated your assertions (sometimes preceded by "you all seem to be missing my point") or reasoned that we're all brainwashed by conditioning to hold the positions we do or told us yet another anecdote from your past where you were right and everyone else was wrong, (which presumably is supposed to make us conclude that you're right again in this case).

I admit that there may be a compelling argument to back up your POV, which is why I've stuck with this thread until now, but you're not offering it. Guilt by association isn't any sort of logic. It is reasonable to get a shallow impression of an idea by examining the people who agree with it and those who do not, but ultimately an idea must stand or fall on its own merits.

I'm not exactly a fan of organised religions, but I'm sure that for any worthy idea it is possible to find an organised group of people who use that idea to justify nasty things. That doesn't say much to me about the idea itself.

There isn’t a shred of evidence that there is or ever was a god or gods.

I agree with this (with the qualification that there's no evidence that I know of). However, as I noted in one of my first posts on this thread, different people have different criteria for what they consider evidence.

Philosophy cannot contribute much to the understanding of reality because it is not science.

The english language contributes a lot to my understanding of reality because it helps me to formulate and answer questions, but it isn't science.

“Hard” Science has answered or is in the process of answering all the “big” questions that preoccupied religion AND philosophy and I have no doubt will do so in the not to distant future. These answers are and will be comprehensive and certain.

I honestly thought this attitude to science had been debunked about 50 years ago. Maybe it is possible that you could draw up a list of big questions that might look plausibly solvable in (say) the next few hundred years, but I don't understand how you can have no doubt of this. It seems like religion to me. The word 'scientism' mentioned earlier lead me to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientism which looks like food for thought.

Incidentally, that links to an essay by Dawkins that contains a lot of passages that look startlingly similar to a lot of the points you've used on this thread.

More linguistic gymnastics for you: http://www.objectivethought.com/articles/scientism.html

Morality is nothing to do with philosophy. It can be explained by evolution and by studying such things as Game Theory.

Game theory will model a situation where someone does something purely to maximise the chances of a desirable outcome for themselves. That doesn't seem like morality to me. Perhaps some crossed definitions again.

The fact that one cannot disprove something that’s defined in a way that it cannot be disproved doesn’t mean that you accept it as a possibility as many of you argue.

I actually do accept this as a reasonable point wrt god, but I would also say that I would have to be shown exactly why it is undecidable. I have a sneaking suspicion that it would be philosophy rather than science that answers that question (even if the methods of deciding were rooted firmly in the sciences, which I believe they would have to be).

cazeone · 14-01-2004 11:55pm

Originally posted by ecksor
Game theory will model a situation where someone does something purely to maximise the chances of a desirable outcome for themselves. That doesn't seem like morality to me. Perhaps some crossed definitions again.

Morality is a set of emotions and belief systems which have evolved in humans as a means of most efficiently balancing the needs of individual genes and protecting the genetic totality of humanity (a set of evolutionary stable strategies). Much simpler forms of this have been studied extensively - examining prey-predator relationships and the interaction between dominant and submissive members of animal societies are two examples; morality is simply a more complex form of this applied to creatures with more complex goals and social structures than Lions or Gazelles.

You say that Game Theory models situations where someone is involved, this is not how it applies to Morality because the actors involved are the gene complexes and not the individuals themselves; obviously people don’t spend hours wondering whether a single descision was right or wrong (at least not day to day) or whether a particular course of action is most likely to lead to a evolutionary advantagous outcome, these innate decisions are based on the biases instilled in us by our genes.

..

GuanYin · 15-01-2004 12:03am

Originally posted by cazeone
Morality is a set of emotions and belief systems which have evolved in humans as a means of most efficiently balancing the needs of individual genes and protecting the genetic totality of humanity (a set of evolutionary stable strategies). Much simpler forms of this have been studied extensively - examining prey-predator relationships and the interaction between dominant and submissive members of animal societies are two examples; morality is simply a more complex form of this applied to creatures with more complex goals and social structures than Lions or Gazelles.

You say that Game Theory models situations where someone is involved, this is not how it applies to Morality because the actors involved are the gene complexes and not the individuals themselves; obviously people don’t spend hours wondering whether a single descision was right or wrong (at least not day to day) or whether a particular course of action is most likely to lead to a evolutionary advantagous outcome, these innate decisions are based on the biases instilled in us by our genes.

..

Genetics doesn't even begin to work in the way your posting implies. Lets get this straight. The role of genetics as the all powerful blueprint that makes us what we are is vastly overplayed by journalism.

Genetics simply doesn't work that way. It doesn't code for behaviour in any way what so ever. It may make pushes or influences towars certain reacions on a basis of stimuli that we don't yet understand but then again these may be a result of a so far unknown component of what makes us what we are, but none of them would have a role in anything as complex as what has been described here, or generally implied by WG.

Many journalists, both scientific and otherwise have simplified genetics and I do understand people having this misconception, but to see people taking such "expert" stances in arguements with shakey and misconstrued facts really has disappointed and shaken my opinion of soceities such as the Irish Skeptics.

cazeone · 15-01-2004 12:25am

I don’t see genetics as an “all powerful blueprint” for anything - and certainly not the incredibly complicated cognitive processes that underpin morality, religion, art etc. - but it isn't a requirement for it to be so to explain the emergence of these properties in evolutionary terms. It merely needs to be the starting point in a process that is modulated by the local genetic environment of particular genes, the developmental process, sensory tuning of neural networks, learning and finally culture.

The fact is that these human traits have been shown to be universal and to a large degree heritable, if this is indeed the case and one doesn’t believe in a anthropomorphic god then the only framework we have which can explain these things with any degree of satisfaction is one which is firmly couched in science and evolution – not metaphysics.

DadaKopf · 15-01-2004 1:18am

Morality is nothing to do with philosophy. It can be explained by evolution and by studying such things as Game Theory.

Game theory will model a situation where someone does something purely to maximise the chances of a desirable outcome for themselves. That doesn't seem like morality to me. Perhaps some crossed definitions again.

Game theory isn't a morality, it's a strand of economic theory. If it relates to any sort of moral stance, that stance would have to be utilitarianism. Utilitarianism is a nineteenth century attempt to objectify human values and morals scientifically by embedding morality in the pleasure principle. Desire is one of the first principles of economics.

Williamgrogan has on many occasions throughout this thread expressed how much he disagrees with any attempts by pseudosciences and quasi-philosophies like economics to deal with such sources of morality and human motivation. And I'm inclined to agree.

In fact, utilitarianism as a moral principle has be almost thoroughly debunked - except for a coterie of economists who continue to attempt to reduce human behaviour to an inhuman architectre of inputs and outputs. The problem of economics and such scientistic approaches to deal human/social phenomena such as morality and meaning is the whole difficulty of scientising the social world. At least to the extent that williamgrogan has.

Which is why, throughout this thread, I've been advocating an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the world.

I find it amusing, to say the least, that williamgrogan would attempt to bolster his position by referring to a way of thinking that contradict everything he has so far said. OUTRAGEOUS! Especially since Game Theory is a theory that has more to do with the 'philosophy' of Jeremy Bentham and 'positivist economic philosophy' of John Stuart Mill.

Myksyk · 15-01-2004 1:22am

Originally posted by syke
...but to see people taking such "expert" stances in arguements with shakey and misconstrued facts really has disappointed and shaken my opinion of soceities such as the Irish Skeptics.

Hmmm ...

If people are, in your opinion, making weak arguments I can undestand your disappointment. Why on earth would this shake your opinion of societies like the Irish Skeptics?

Are we to believe that no such disappointment would be experienced in a Science Society, or a Evolutionary Biology Society, or a Philosophy Society or a Genetics Society ............

Fact is that individuals in any context will make all sorts of arguments ... strong and weak ... informed and ill-informed ... biased and fair ... etc etc. This says nothing at all about the merits or demerits of the society or organisation which creates or moderates the forum for these discussions. The goals of the society remain valid and worthy regardless of this forum.

If you are aware of the perfect Boards forum where no-one makes ill-informed claims or steps beyond their knowledge base or misrepresents an area of study or fails to seamlessly integrate all intellectual disciplines, perhaps you would be gracious enough to point us in its direction.

In case you were under some other impression people in this forum are talking on their own behalf.

cazeone · 15-01-2004 1:53am

Originally posted by DadaKopf
Game theory isn't a morality, it's a strand of economic theory. If it relates to any sort of moral stance, that stance would have to be utilitarianism. Utilitarianism is a nineteenth century attempt to objectify human values and morals scientifically by embedding morality in the pleasure principle. Desire is one of the first principles of economics.

umm... No one has tried to put forward the view that game theory can explain morality, or is a morality (which doesn't mean anything, how can a branch of mathematics be a moral standpoint?), you will notice if you go back to WG's post that he referred to 'such things as game theory' - indicating there are 'other things' which are also needed.

What it can do is help explain how certain aspects of morality may have come about within an evolutionary framework.

At the end of the day this whole area is very speculative and will probably never have enough evidence to verify it conclusively, but it seems to me the most elegant and self-contained theory that has been put forward to date.

Hobart · 15-01-2004 2:00am

What Myksyk said and (just to continue in the vain of this thread) a bit of "nit picking"

Originally posted by syke
Genetics doesn't even begin to work in the way your posting implies. Lets get this straight. The role of genetics as the all powerful blueprint that makes us what we are is vastly overplayed by journalism.

Firstly you make a statement here that not only bears absoloutely no relevance to what you quoted but also brings "journalism" into the equation for some unknown reason.

Genetics simply doesn't work that way. It doesn't code for behaviour in any way what so ever.

As a race that is just in the begining of begining to understand what genetics is I am amazed that you can come out with such a statement. Maybe you can tell me where you gleen this amazing fact from in relation to genetics?

It may make pushes or influences towars certain reacions on a basis of stimuli that we don't yet understand

and then you follow with that. What absoloute ignorance. I mean really. How can you "try" to totally debunk a theory on genetics, which simply does not exist, and then try to 'backup' your thesis with a statement like that? And then the so called cherry on the genetic cake

but then again these may be a result of a so far unknown component of what makes us what we are, but none of them would have a role in anything as complex as what has been described here

Priceless, based on the previous assertion.

Many journalists, both scientific and otherwise have simplified genetics and I do understand people having this misconception,

indeed.

but to see people taking such "expert" stances in arguements with shakey and misconstrued facts really has disappointed and shaken my opinion of soceities such as the Irish Skeptics.

See first line of this post.

cazeone · 15-01-2004 2:52am

syke's comments remind me of the feud between Dawkins and Gould, the latter's camp attempting to argue against Dawkins' determinist reductionism using the following example:

(Reductionists) argue that the properties of a human society are... no more than the sums of the individual behaviours and tendencies of the individual humans of which that society is composed. Societies are ‘aggressive’ because the individuals who compose them are ‘aggressive’, for instance.

Dawkins response was:

As I am described in the book as "the most reductionist of sociobiologists", I can speak with authority here. I believe that Bach was a musical man. Therefore of course, being a good reductionist, I must obviously believe that Bach’s brain was made of musical atoms! Do Rose et al sincerely think that anybody could be that silly? Presumably not, yet my Bach -- example is a precise analogy to "Societies are ‘aggressive’ because the individuals who compose them are ‘aggressive"’.

Taken from Dawkins review of "Not in Our Genes: Biology, Ideology and Human Nature by Steven Rose, Leon J. Kamin and R.C.Lewontin:
http://www.world-of-dawkins.com/Dawkins/Work/Reviews/1985-01-24notinourgenes.htm

It would appear that the straw man is alive and well!

btw I'm not falling for the same mistake here, i'm not equating the views of Rose and friends with syke, just pointing out the same faulty reasoning.

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GuanYin · 15-01-2004 9:12am

Originally posted by cazeone
I don’t see genetics as an “all powerful blueprint” for anything - and certainly not the incredibly complicated cognitive processes that underpin morality, religion, art etc. - but it isn't a requirement for it to be so to explain the emergence of these properties in evolutionary terms. It merely needs to be the starting point in a process that is modulated by the local genetic environment of particular genes, the developmental process, sensory tuning of neural networks, learning and finally culture.

Actually no, one theory on the emergence of human intelligence, that has gained alot of support of late is based on a non genetic driven evolution. I've alluded to it many times already but you guys don't seem to be picking up on any possability other than what the general skeptic consensus is. Have a read of the work be Elaine Morgan and read the Aquatic Ape. It is quite possible, in fact it is as good a theory as any (and in some ways better as it explains an awful lot of other traits about humans), that human intelligence evolved not through chance mutation of genes at all.

Are skepticism and Belief in God mutually exclusive?

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