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Most annoying/frustrating atheist arguments?
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Fair enough, if you don't think you are doing that. But I and others think you are so we can't really continue with your analogy any further.mangaroosh wrote: »No, it has been asserted that I am confusing two meanings of the word "real". If any valid points are put forward, I will respond to them.
It is like saying "Star Wars never happened, it is a made up story, but people claim to have 'seen' it. How can people claim to have seen something that never happened, think about that for a minute! Blow your mind!"
The issue here isn't the concepts of what is real or not real but purely a miss use of English.
If you can't see this I really can't discuss the analogy of countries and "real" things any further.mangaroosh wrote: »Not quite so, it is actually the other way around. One does not have a clue what they are explaining, without the experience.
Not sure how you can say that. I've never experienced an atomic blast 5 metres from my face but I can explain to you what happens.
On the other hand if you grab a man from Egypt ten thousand years ago and set off an atomic blast in front of him he wouldn't have a freaking clue what was happening to him, even if he had time to actually properly observe himself being vaporised.
The experience on its own is pretty much useless in terms of knowledge gathering. You only start "knowing" what was happening when you start on the explanation, even if it is as simple as saying that painful thud in my face was someone hitting me with a 2 by 4
Yeah of course, the only way something can be verified is if someone actually verifies it, but that isn't relevant to the point. You still need the model. The experience of opening up someone's head is not going to tell you anything on its own.mangaroosh wrote: »Knowledge of a model of reality, is not knowledge of reality. The only way the accuracy of a model can be verified is through personal experience.
I may learn all the information there is about brain surgery, and I can meet all the top brain surgeons in the world, who tell me the information I have is correct, but I cannot know if it is true until I put it into practice, until I have direct personal experience.mangaroosh wrote: »Again, as agreed, the explanation is not the experience. Further, the knowledge is not the explanation. The explanation may of course be correct or incorrect, however that may be dependent on a persons ability to express themseles, the knowledge however remains objective.
No it doesn't, because raw sensory data is not knowledge. Feeling sharp pain in your face is not knowledge. I just got hit in the face by a plank of wood is knowledge and that is also the explanation for the experience. And it is also subjective, you may not have just got hit in the face with a plank of wood, you may have felt that for some other reason.mangaroosh wrote: »So the explanation may indeed be correct or incorrect (this of course is an entirely subjective judgement), but ability to explain something has no bearing on knowledge. It may impact how one transfers the knowledge to someone else, but again that is immaterial, and does not affect a persons ability to know something.
He is explaining it to someone, he is explaining it to himself. He is not going merely on experience, his experience is simply raw data. From his experiences he has constructed an explanation for what has happened when he played with the clutch, why what happened did happen.
His ability or lack of ability to explain it to someone else has nothing to do with that fact. That is a question of lingustics and verbal expression. He may not have the words to communicate his model to someone else. But he knows it. It is his model in his own head.
He could not have done any of that without forming a model in his head of how the clutch works. This is the explanation for his experiences with the clutch.mangaroosh wrote: »There appears to be an incorrect assumption as to how science operates, that there is an individual scientist who may discover something and that there are other scientists who are free from the same biases as the original scientist. It also appears to be assumed that something does not become true until it is verified by other scientists, this of course is not correct.
"Becoming true" is irrelevant since humans never know if something they believe about the world (I just saw a cup) is true or not. Science recognises this and does not deal with true or false, simply with accurate or not accurate.
They would never say it is true.mangaroosh wrote: »A scientist may make a claim. This claim is either true or it isn't, regardless of whether or not it is verified, or regardless of what the original scientist maintains. They may say it is true, but it may be false.
They would say it accurately predicts observed phenomena, or it doesn't accurately predict observed phenomena. The case for whether or not it accurately predicts observed phenomena is strengthened if other scientists can repeat the experiment using the same theory and get the same result as the first scientist.
In science (or anything else for that matter) you never know is anything true or not, only degrees of how well it predicts phenomena.
And you can never know is something is true.mangaroosh wrote: »The truth is independent of who knows it.
A good example is Newton's laws of motion. They accurately predicted observed phenomena up to a point. But they were inaccurate in some regards. Along came General Relativity. This more accurately predicted phenomena, so scientists could say that this was closer to what is actually happening than Newton (closer to the truth)
But scientist don't know is some more accurate theory will come along tomorrow, and as such cannot say if General Relativity is true or not. It might be, it might be 100% accurate and require no further refinements, it might be as true an explanation as possible. But no scientists can determine this.
Scientists watch the universe and build models of what they think is happening based on what they observe
A classic analogy is playing chess. You watch two people play chess and try and determine the rules from what they are doing. You see that one player moves his pawn two places, and you record that. The other player does that as well. You go "Ok, I have a model now of what a pawn can do, it can move two places"
Then you see the player move is pawn one place. You go "Ah ha! My model was incurrate. A pawn can also move one place" You adjust your model
After a while you notice that pawns only move two places on their first go. You add this to your model.
After a while you have build up quite a good model of what can happen is chess. Is this model "true" (ie 100% accurate). You have no idea. You have no idea if the next move will show that your model is some what inaccurate in some way, just like what happened after the pawn moved only one place.
That is the nature of human learning of the world around us, something science recognises. You never prove anything in science, you never know if your model is 100% accurate. You never know if you understand properly what just happened.mangaroosh wrote: »There is an assumption that one can't, however, the question is, have you tried, and what is your understanding of the issue/topic?
No that isn't the question.
The question is how do you know you are not making up the explanation. How do you know your mind is not playing a trick on you? How do you determine this on your own
This highlights the flaw in relying purely on your own judgement. The idea that you would know if your brain was tricking you is silly.
What do you mean by "the truth" How does someone know that the first time they heard "the truth" it wasn't a lie?mangaroosh wrote: »If one knows the truth, then one cannot be lied to, it is impossible.mangaroosh wrote: »As for the supposition that God could lie, that is based on a subjective interpretation of what God is and sounds as though it is conditioned by the idea that God could speak using words.
As we know however, words are subjective and not part of reality.
That is a completely non-answer. God could lie by representing something that is not true. The subjective nature of words is utterly irrelevant to his.mangaroosh wrote: »Knoweldge of that depends on ones knowledge of God and indeed reality. If one knows reality, then one knows the truth, if one knows the truth, then one could tell the difference.
And as we have already established you cannot know that you know the truth. And as such you could always be being lied to.mangaroosh wrote: »seeing a bed is a subjective perception of reality. A bed exists at the sub-atomic level and quite possibly at the sub-string level. If one sees a bed, then what they are seeing is not reality.
Also, talk of God turning into a bed is based on a subjective interpretation of what God is.
Another non-answer.
It's ok to say you don't know the answer to these questions Mangaroosh, people have been wrestling with this issues for thousands of years.0 -
The definition explicity refers to knowledge defined by personal characteristics of the mind or by particular states of mind. Scientific theories do not depend on personal characteristics of the mind. They are impersonal, as they rely on the collective experiences and experiments of the scientific community.
There are a number of qualifiers in the above explanations, I have emboldened and underlined them.
Just to point out that what a collectie experience actually is, is a group of personal experiences. Without the individual personal experiences, there is no collective.
Also, words, symbols and numbers are typical of the mind and are therefore a characteristic of the mind. Seeing as how the mind is a personal thing i.e. everyone personally has their own. It follows that scientific theories being based on words, symbols, numbers etc. are defined by personal characteristics of the mind.
They are therefore subjective.Well I agree that personal experience is essential for obtaining knowledge (and by knowledge I mean coherent descriptions of the universe with efficacy). But I would also say that personal experience, although essential, is not enough. I would compare my experiences to those of others, and see if my knowledge is reputable, in the hope of obtaining an impersonal description of phenomena.
Knowledge of "coherent descriptions of the universe" is different from knowledge of the universe. One can have knowledge of these coherent descriptions, but one cannot know if they are true or not, without some form of direct experience, to confirm the description.
Being able to describe something coherently is not a characteristic of knowledge. It may be an indicator of knowledge, but it is not knowledge itself. I have knowledge of driving, yet I may not be able to describe that knowledge in a manner that is coherent. This however, does not detract from my knowledge of driving, rather my ability to teach somebody else. Regardless, my knowledge of driving is unaffected.
Experience on its own can be enough for knowledge. Knoweldge of information about something i.e. a description is not sufficient without experience, as one cannot know if the information is accurate or indeed correct. They may believe it is correct, and have good reason to believe it is correct, but without the personal experience to verify the information, they cannot know.
A woman will acquire a certain type of knowledge by going through childbirth - whether some like it or not, this is called tacit knowledge. This knowledge can be acquired without knowledge of the information surrouding childbirth.
However, if a woman only knows the information surrounding childbirth, then she will not have the same knowledge as the woman who has gone through childbirth.0 -
mangaroosh wrote: »There are a number of qualifiers in the above explanations, I have emboldened and underlined them.
Just to point out that what a collectie experience actually is, is a group of personal experiences. Without the individual personal experiences, there is no collective.
Also, words, symbols and numbers are typical of the mind and are therefore a characteristic of the mind. Seeing as how the mind is a personal thing i.e. everyone personally has their own. It follows that scientific theories being based on words, symbols, numbers etc. are defined by personal characteristics of the mind.
They are therefore subjective.
Words, charactersm symbols, and numbers, are not dependent on personal characteristics of the mind, even if minds are needed to construct them. There are also not dependent on particular states. They are therefore not subjective, as they instead depend on the collective experience and experiments of the scientific community.Knowledge of "coherent descriptions of the universe" is different from knowledge of the universe. One can have knowledge of these coherent descriptions, but one cannot know if they are true or not, without some form of direct experience, to confirm the description.
Being able to describe something coherently is not a characteristic of knowledge. It may be an indicator of knowledge, but it is not knowledge itself. I have knowledge of driving, yet I may not be able to describe that knowledge in a manner that is coherent. This however, does not detract from my knowledge of driving, rather my ability to teach somebody else. Regardless, my knowledge of driving is unaffected.
Experience on its own can be enough for knowledge. Knoweldge of information about something i.e. a description is not sufficient without experience, as one cannot know if the information is accurate or indeed correct. They may believe it is correct, and have good reason to believe it is correct, but without the personal experience to verify the information, they cannot know.
A woman will acquire a certain type of knowledge by going through childbirth - whether some like it or not, this is called tacit knowledge. This knowledge can be acquired without knowledge of the information surrouding childbirth.
However, if a woman only knows the information surrounding childbirth, then she will not have the same knowledge as the woman who has gone through childbirth
Well yes, it is different. But if I am unable to formulate knowledge then I won't be able to compare my experiences to the experiences of others. If a woman tenders an incoherent theory of childbirth, then other women will not be able to see if her theory also describes and predicts their experience of childbirth.
And how would direct experience give us any knowledge of a mind-independent reality? Coherent instrumental descriptions of experiences with predictive power is the best we've done so far.0 -
In addition to my previous post. Here are some examples of the common use of the word objective we are adopting.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/objectiv/#H1IEP Essay on Objectivity wrote:“Objective judgment or belief” refers to a judgment or belief based on objectively strong supporting evidence, the sort of evidence that would be compelling for any rational being. A subjective judgment would then seem to be a judgment or belief supported by evidence that is compelling for some rational beings (subjects) but not compelling for others. It could also refer to a judgment based on evidence that is of necessity available only to some subjects.It is vitally important for science that the information about the surrounding world and the objects of study be as accurate and as reliable as possible. For the sake of this, measurements which are the source of this information must be as objective as possible. Before the invention of measuring tools (like weights, meter sticks, clocks, etc) the only source of information available to humans were their senses (vision, hearing, taste, tactile, sense of heat, sense of gravity, etc.). Because human senses differ from person to person (due to wide variations in personal chemistry, deficiencies, inherited flaws, etc) there were no objective measurements before the invention of these tools. The consequence of this was the lack of a rigorous science.In philosophy, an objective fact means a truth that remains true everywhere, independently of human thought or feelings. For instance, it is true always and everywhere that 'in base 10, 2 plus 2 equals 4'. A subjective fact is one that is only true under certain conditions, at certain times, in certain places, or for certain people.One common use of the notions of objectivity and subjectivity is to demarcate kinds of judgement (or thought or belief). On such a usage, prototypically objective judgements concern matters of empirical and mathematical fact such as the moon has no atmosphere and two and two are four. In contrast, prototypically subjective judgements concern matters of value and preference such as Mozart is better than Bach and vanilla ice cream with ketchup is disgusting. I offer these examples not to take sides on whether such judgements actually are objective or subjective, but only to call attention to a typical way of using "objective" and "subjective".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objectivity_(science)To be properly considered objective, the results of measurement must be communicated from person to person, and then demonstrated for third parties, as an advance in understanding of the objective world. Such demonstrable knowledge would ordinarily confer demonstrable powers of prediction or technological construction.
Some of these examples are indeed from wikipedia, but they are all well supported by references. And important examples are not from wikipedia, so I pre-emptively disagree with any objection to using such sources. It is evident that your definition of objective is very different to the one used by the majority of people here, and I would wager that, if a single definition was adopted for this discussion, the conversation would progress much more rapidly.0 -
And just for ****s and giggles (although this will stray us far off topic): I put it to you that, (accepting your definition of objective and subjective) it is impossible to determine any objective properties of the universe.0
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http://www.google.ie/search?hl=en&safe=off&defl=en&q=define:subjective&ei=FTM0S9ihFIf00gSZpowZ&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title&ved=0CAcQkAE
Pertaining to subjects as opposed to objects (A subject is one who perceives or is aware; an object is the thing perceived or the thing that the subject is aware of. ...
You have incorrectly taken the extremely strict view that subjective applies only to things that exist solely in the mind.
OK, here I have been accused of the above. Let me just point out that there are in fact 14 defintions on the link that you provided and 12 of them are the same definition that I have been using, or at least are dependent on "things" which are completely dependent on the mind for existene e.g. opinions, beliefs, desires, feelings, perspective, etc. etc.
There are 2 defintions on the page that could possibly be interpreted in the context that has so far been argued, one of those is the one stated above.
Let us examine those further.Pertaining to subjects as opposed to objects (A subject is one who perceives or is aware; an object is the thing perceived or the thing that the subject is aware of. ...
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/subjective
A subject is defined as "one who perceives or is aware". Who or what is it that perceives or is aware? I would argue that it is the mind, as perception is dependent on the mind. Awareness on the other hand is a little more vague, and indeed would require a discussion on the nature of mind and awareness in order to see how things would qualify as subjective.
So the above description could perhaps pass on the basis of the vagueness of the term "awareness", although a very strong case could be made against this.
However, upon furhter examination we find:Subjectivity refers to a person's perspective or opinion, particularly feelings, beliefs, and desires. It is often used casually to refer to unsubstantiated personal opinions, in contrast to knowledge and fact-based beliefs. In philosophy, the term is often contrasted with objectivity.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subjectivity
Here we have a second entry from a similar source, although I'm not sure how separate wikipedia and wiktionary are from each other. In this, the emboldened words are all dependent on the mind for existence, so it ties in with the OED defintion.
The bit in italics even makes the distinction between knowledge and subjectivity. The fact-based belief is however somewhat of a contradiction as it goes against what was already mentioned in bold. This could be argued on the basis of ambiguity at best, but would equally be classed as "clutching at straws" (apologies for poisoning the well).
The other entry that would support the contention with regard to the meaning of subjectivity is the well reknowned authority on the english langauge:access.autistics.org website wrote:Individual and internal. Having to do with one's own experience and interpretation of that experience. See also: objective.
access.autistics.org/resources/glossary/main.html
Here the part that matches the contention is "having to do with one's own experience", however it must of course be both individual and internal. An arguement could of course be made against both those qualifiers.
The latter part of the description matches the OED description.
I'm not sure if it is a scientific principle or not, but surely checking one's sources for reliability should be a pretty basic requirement of the scientific method. When it comes to the english language, then the OED is the most reliable source.
So just to be clear, in case there is any temptation to argue the point, any attempt to take an extremely strict view of what the word subjective means, to try and fit it to the argument, is not something that I have done at all. In fact, 12 of the 14 sources you cited, use a very similar description as the OED namely, that subjective applies only to things that exist solely in the mind.
Even if an object or an event is objective, that does not mean that your experience of it is objective. That even fits into your narrow definition: your experience of an objective event is dependent on your mind for existence. All experience is subjective because all experience is dependent on the mind for existence. You are confusing an objective event with an objective experience. The latter does not existThat's actually evolution in action. That "knowledge" is built into your genes.
I would question if it is built into the genes, as babies do not seem to have the same ability to use the knowledge. Regardless of where it is located however, it is still retained within me and other indiviudals, and does not depend on the mind for existence.
Thank you evolution nonetheless!Non sequitur
If this is a dream then we could be the dream of John Smith from Tallaght. Anything can happen in a dream and you don't have to be omnipotent to have one.
We can examine whether or not it is a non-sequitur or not, using the John Smith example.
The contention was that if this is indeed John Smith's dream, then John Smith (the dreamer) is the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent being that is referred to as God.
If this is his dream, then everything in this dream takes place inside his head, the entire universe, including the language we use to describe things. If the entire universe is his dream, then his act of dreaming the universe into existence was the act of creation, he created the universe.
If this is all taking place inside his head, then he is everywhere, he is omnipresent. The fact that he can dream anything to happen in this universe, makes him, according to our definition, omnipotent. Seeing as how everything takes place within his dream, he knows everything there is to know, and is therefore omniscient.
If this is somebody's dream, then whoever is dreaming the dream, is what is referred to as God, according to the language they have dreamed up.Except that religion claims to deal with reality and it fails miserably every time where science succeeds to the point of putting men on the moon and explaining neurologically many of the things that religion claims have supernatural origins
According to science however the moon is not reality, the moon is basically sub-atomic particles that we perceive as the moon, and neurological explanations fall by the same sword.
There may indeed be many erroneus claims made within religions, but to paraphrase, God doesn't really care, as God is independent of religious claims. There are of course some notable contradictions within the realm of science. Most notable the incompatability of the two main theories of physics - general relativity and quantum theory, where both cannot be simultaneously true.
Unless of course the, as of yet unsubstantiated, hypothesis of string theory proves to be true.
Other claims notable by the lack of evidence to substantiate their validity would be such things as black holes (unobservable by definition), dark energy and dark matter, which together make up over 95% of the [un]observable universe.In fact no scientific experiments lead to "truth", the best they lead to is an improved understanding.
If they don't lead to truth, then one must ask, what exactly is it that one will better understand?But that is because the standard of "truth" proclaimed by philosophy and religion does not exist in the real world. The word "truth" will always remain in quotes until it can be externally verified and it can never be externally verified
It is not so much that the standard of truth does not exist in the real world, it does, by definition exist. Reality exists, there is some form of objective reality. The error appears to be in the understanding of what is meant by the terms objective and subjective. When these are correctly understood, then it becomes clear that an objective reality is open to experience.
I do take your point however, that if this is a dream, then perhaps the "objective reality" is beyond our ability to experience. However, as explained, if this is the case, then what is referred to by the word God, within the realm of this dream, is the dreamer of the dream.
God can exist, even if we cannot experience objective reality. If we can experience objective reality, then we can experience God, and personal experience is the only means available to do this.Yes, of course they do, what is your point? That does not mean that every single person who experiences something will interpret it in exactly the same way and 100% correctly. If that were the case there would be no such thing as opinion and we would all be identical.
Again, just to re-iterate, a persons interpretation of an experience is not the same as the experience. Two people who share an experience will share a common knowledge. They may interpret the knowledge differently, as good or bad, as pleasureable or not, but independent of this interpretation will be a shared knowledge.
Two women who give birth to a child will have a similar experience, there may be differences but an integral part of the experience will be the same. They may intepret it differently, and even explain it differently, but they will not be able to rationalise it completely as a rationalisation takes place in the mind, whereas the expereince does not. They may have different explanations (for various reasons), but there will be a knowledge that is shared among them, and other women who have given birth.
Similar goes for men who have been kicked in the balls, or even the top of the knob. This is what is meant by "knowing what someone is talking about", as opposed to believing you understand what they are talking about.It is not only possible but extremely common for people to be 100% sure of things that are 100% wrong
I don't dispute that, but this is not the only scenario. It is not uncommon for people to be 100% sure of something and for them to be right either. For example, a person can be 100% sure they are coming down with a cold.I left this to the end because I honestly don't know how to respond to this other than to say: What the **** are you talking about? But I'll give it a shot:
For the purposes of this discussion I will grant you the completely incorrect assumption that every part of an experience is objective except the conscious part but even if we make that assumption; so what?
Hopefully it has been sufficiently explained, even using the sources that you cited yourself, that every part of an experience is objective, becuase it does not depend on the mind for existence.
It is the interpretation/rationalisation/explanation/etc. that is subjective. However all of the aforementioned are not the experience themselves, and they are not the knowledge acquired by the experience.Even if on some level in our mind the event is recorded correctly, every time we try to recollect it or use this "knowledge" in some way, it will be subject to the same interpretational errors.
Knowledge does not have to be recollected. "Interpretational errors"may occur from time to time, but this is usually done by the subjective mind. Once the mind has cleared, then the knowledge can be accessed without subjective interpretation. This is often what is referred to as "being in the zone", where a person does not need to consciously recall information, but rather acts based on their acquired knowledge.In all honesty, it sounds to me like you're confusing your evolved instincts and your unconscious biases with some kind of deeper knowledge. What you're saying actually goes a long way to explaining the origins of religion: thousands of years ago people just like you confused evolved instincts and unconscious biases for deeper knowledge and they wrote their subjective experiences and subjective opinions on things like morality down in holy books as if they were objective and declared that they were god's will. Sure how could they not be? How could they be wrong? They had experienced these things so they "knew" them :rolleyes:
Nice theory, but the confusion does not appear to be on my part, with regard to what has been discussed thus far.
Another theory of how religion started, and feel free to dismiss this, as it is just my own personal one, but seeing as we're doing the personal theory thing:
There have existed certain people down through the ages who have become enlightened, or perhaps just had insights (don't worry I don't include myself in all of this), for example Lao Tzu, Siddartha Gautama, Jesus, allegedly Thomas Acquinas, and several realised buddhist masters. These people, upon their enlightenment, sought to tell people what they had experienced, and sought to show the people how to have the experience for themselves.
When trying to explain their experiences, they, naturally enough, used the language that they had learned and tried to present the information in a way that the people might understand, using words and phrases that they were familiar with.
Unfortunately, because the people had not had the same experience, they had trouble interpreting the "teachings" correctly. They may have interpreted certain words or phrases according to their own slightly incorrect understanding, they may have taken some things too literally, and other not literally enough. Perhaps it was like a woman trying to explain childbirth to a man, where the man understood what was being said, but could not meaningfully interpret the knowledge, because of an absence of a shared experience.
There would of course have been people who would have seen the potential to exploit these teachings for their own gain, while others would have sought earnestly to organise the teachings in such a manner as to bring them to a wider audience. This attempted organisation may have required the appeasing of a wide variety of demands from different people, which would have affected the organisation.
These teachings would then have been passed down through the generations, where people who did not fully grasp the meaning of them would have been passing them to others who did not fully understand them. What would have ensued would have been a chinese whisper style passing of the message, to the extent that the message would have been distorted along the way, almost beyond recognition, but at the core the message would still be the same.
All these "enlightened beings" may have realised the same thing, but expressed it in a different way according to their culture, their langugage, the age they lived in and the history that had gone before them.
For some, elaborate stories may have sprung up around them, the thing of folklore, in accordance with the folk tales passed down through the agesthe Simpsons wrote:Went by the name of Homer. Seven feet tall he was, with arms like tree trunks. His eyes were like steel: cold, hard. Had a shock of hair, red, like the fires of Hell
There may have been talk of virgin births, cruxifictions and resurrections, because the folk tales all told of these things. There may have been other stories, meant as teaching aids that existed in the culture that were adopted into the body of literature.
The original message of these enlightened beings may have been adorned with a lot of excess baggage, but the core of the message may still be there for those who wish to hear it.
But again, that is just my own personal theory.0 -
A very important point. If I think I have experienced something I might make a mistake where someone else might not make the same mistake. Have 1000 people look at something and you're extremely likely to pick up any mistakes that humans are capable of picking up. That's why repeatability is so important. One guy's unverifiable description of something is all but useless in determining "truth" (as far as humans are capable of determining "truth")
I think we might still be talking about slightly different things here, which is understandable, given the nature of what we are talking about. I could be wrong but bear with me.
Firstly, just to point out that the discussion thus far has not been about, "God exists because I have had a personal experience of God", it has instead been about the nature of knowledge and the role personal experience plays, in the acquisition of knowledge.
Even if the conclusion is that, yes, personal experience is objective and is the only manner in which knowledge can be acquired, it does not mean that God exists for that reason - to suggest that God exists for that reason would be a non-sequitur. It also doesn't mean that anyone who claims to have had a personal experience of God, has necessarily had a personal experience of God. It would simply mean that this would be applicable to the issue of the existence of God.
I think the difference in what we are talking to boils down to:
1) the experience
2) the knowledge gained from the experience
3) the interpretation of the experience
4) the description of the experience
5) the description/rationalisation of the knowledge to an outside party.
These are all separate things, despite being closely related.
If we focus on two of the above, namely the knowledge gained from an experience and the rationalisation of that knowledge.
The knowledge gained from an experience, because of its nature, will not necessarily be translatable into langugage, images, symbols, numbers, etc. It is for this reason too that analogies are necessary, so that a point that cannot necessarily be described in words can draw on one's own personal experience, for the purpose of illustration.
This is why shared experiences are useful.
If we take the [hopefully common] experience of cycling a bike. For anyone who knows how to cycle, they may very well be able to explain how it is done to another person. The description of the knowledge from the cyclist, to the other person, will not be the same as the knowledge that the person has about how to ride a bike. That knowledge is stored in such a way that it cannot easily be described.
Indeed, the non-cyclist may hear this information about how to cycle a bike and they can know this information inside out, but that does not mean that they know how to cycle a bike, because they have not acquired the knowledge of this skill yet.
In fact, it is only through the personal experience of learning to cycle, that they can confirm that what the cyclist told them was true or not.
If we apply this to the 1000 people.
We have the example above, where one cyclist tells a non-cyclist how to cycle. The non-cyclist does not know if the cyclist is telling the truth. Then the non-cyclist tries it out for themselves. They then acquire the knowledge of how to cycle for themselves and can verify the claim. They may find that the original cyclist has not explained it very well and they may develop the explanation for the next cyclist, to ensure that it is more accurate.
However, this does not mean that the original cyclist does not know how to cycle. The second cyclist may indeed doubt whether or not the original cyclist can cycle or not. This of course is immaterial to the second cyclist, because they have acquired the knowledge of the skill that is referred to as cycling, through their own personal experience.
This chain can continue all the way through the 1000 people, with each perhaps doubting their mentor, but still acquiring the knowledge of the skill through their own personal experience, and altering the explanation so as to improve it down along the line, so that the 9,999th person may pass on the most accurate description to the 1000th person, but the 1000th person still has to acquire the knowledge throught their own personal experience in order to verify the explanation.
Here we can see that each cyclist acquires the knowledge through their own personal experience, but has difficulty in passing that knowledge on to the next person, with the explanation improving the more people that are involved, but still the only means available for verifying the accuracy is through the personal experience of each individual.
Also, it is only the individual who has had direct personal experience who actually has the knowledge. The person who hears the explanation but does not verify it for themselves, will only have the explanation, which they can choose to believe or not. If more people confirm the explanation that they have, then they may have more reason to believe it, but they still do not posess the knowledge, and so cannot know if the explanation is true or not.0 -
The important difference between science and an argument ad populum though is that it also tags on "but if you don't want to take our word for it you can go and verify it for yourself and here's exactly how you do it". That's the bit that religion is missing.
In a sense you are right, religion is missing that part to an extent, or at least the likes of Christianity, Judaism and Islam appear to be missing it. It is still there at the core of the religions though, even though it has become somewhat obscured.
Religion does detail a "path" that can be followed in order to "verify it for yourself", the issue is,that it doesn't so much say "if you don't want to take our word for it", as opposed to "you better take our word for it, or else". But again, this is not so much a fault of the message at the core of religion, rather perhaps a fault with those that pass on the message.
Buddhism is one religion that basically says "don't take our word for it, verify it yourself", and there is no belief in the concept of God in Buddhism, although the nature of God is not denied.
That again is probably a major problem with some who follow a religion, is that there is a belief in concepts, which themselves are divorced from reality.0 -
mangaroosh wrote: »OK, here I have been accused of the above. Let me just point out that there are in fact 14 defintions on the link that you provided and 12 of them are the same definition that I have been using, or at least are dependent on "things" which are completely dependent on the mind for existene e.g. opinions, beliefs, desires, feelings, perspective, etc. etc.
There are 2 defintions on the page that could possibly be interpreted in the context that has so far been argued, one of those is the one stated above.
The thing is that I don't really care if your definition of the word technically matches what it says in most dictionaries (but not all). The fact remains that your understanding of the word is not the same as mine or indeed the same as anyone on the forum and since we do not accept your understanding of the words subjective and objective (among many others such as "experience", "know", "tacit knowledge" etc), we are not going to accept any opinion you have based on your understanding of those words. This is an argument over semantics, much like our previous discussion where you defined the word supernatural to include anything that humans do not yet understand, as opposed to beyond the laws of nature which is my understanding of the word.
So there really is no point continuing the conversation. I'm sure all of your opinions make perfect sense to you but I don't have the same understanding of those words as you do so they make no sense to me and they never will because I am not going to change my understanding of the words. And another reason not to continue it is that you have again written a massive chunk of text that I simply cannot summon the will to read. Honestly mangaroosh, if you want to have online discussions you need to get the hang of brevity, or click here:http://en.wordpress.com/signup/0 -
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Wait, are we talking about philosophy here or science?*
* Philosophy of science is about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds.- attrib Richard Feynman
It's impossible to deal with the question of whether or not God exists using science alone, precisely because it is a philosophical question to begin with. That's what I would have thought anyway.0 -
It's impossible to deal with the question of whether or not God exists using science alone, precisely because it is a philosophical question to begin with. That's what I would have thought anyway.
Philosophy is a science, in fact some call it the mother of all science. It is supposed to be a logical and rational endeavour. You can't just put God outside human cross-examination based on semantics. You don't get it that easy!0 -
It's impossible to deal with the question of whether or not God exists using science alone, precisely because it is a philosophical question to begin with. That's what I would have thought anyway.
The thing is that if your god actually existed I don't think that would be the case. For example if god was actually intervening in the world it would be obvious for all to see. If your god actually existed I think the evidence for his existence would be objectively convincing and people who denied his existence would be thought of the same way we might think of people who denied the existence of France.0 -
Funny how everything else can be evaluated by science yet gods somehow get a pass. It's only a philosophical question because the religious god concept doesn't stand up to scrutiny in a real field of enquiry.It's impossible to deal with the question of whether or not God exists using science alone, precisely because it is a philosophical question to begin with.0 -
It's impossible to deal with the question of whether or not God exists using science alone, precisely because it is a philosophical question to begin with. That's what I would have thought anyway.
Depends on what you mean by "science alone"
Religious people keep going on about these wonderful ways they can determine fact from fiction when it comes to the reality around us that don't some how require scientific methodologies. These methods some how go beyond the shackles of scientific standards.
Yet when pressed to explain how these ways work there is a big fat silence, one assumes because these methods do not go beyond science, they merely abandon the scientific standards to come up with easy, yet unverifiable, answers.
It is relatively easy to answer the question of whether God exists if you don't care if your answers is accurate or not, only that it is pleasing and makes sense to your own personal view of how the universe should work.0 -
It's impossible to deal with the question of whether or not God exists using science alone, precisely because it is a philosophical question to begin with. That's what I would have thought anyway.
What do you think, though, of science dealing with Christ's resuerrection? I mean if science shows that reviving someone from the dead is possible then Christ's feat becomes rather shallow. God depends on being supernatural and outside science, because if he wasn't He wouldn't be God; he would be human.0 -
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On that note I've always liked this passage from Douglas AdamsWhat do you think, though, of science dealing with Christ's resuerrection? I mean if science shows that reviving someone from the dead is possible then Christ's feat becomes rather shallow. God depends on being supernatural and outside science, because if he wasn't He wouldn't be God; he would be human.
"[SIZE=-1]The Babel fish is small, yellow and leech-like, and probably the oddest thing in the Universe. It feeds on brainwave energy received not from its own carrier but from those around it. It absorbs all unconscious mental frequencies from this brainwave energy to nourish itself with. It then excretes into the mind of its carrier a telepathic matrix formed by combining the conscious thought frequencies with the nerve signals picked up from the speech centres of the brain which has supplied them. The practical upshot of all this is that if you stick a Babel fish in your ear you can instantly understand anything said to you in any form of language. The speech patterns you actually hear decode the brainwave matrix which has been fed into your mind by your Babel fish.
Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mindbogglingly useful could have evolved purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen it to see it as a final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God.
The argument goes something like this: "I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."
"But," says Man, "the Babel fish is a dead giveaway isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED."
"Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.
"Oh, that was easy," says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets killed on the next zebra crossing."[/SIZE]0 -
What do you think, though, of science dealing with Christ's resuerrection? I mean if science shows that reviving someone from the dead is possible then Christ's feat becomes rather shallow. God depends on being supernatural and outside science, because if he wasn't He wouldn't be God; he would be human.
Science deals with natural claims, not supernatural claims.
If it was claimed that Christ's Resurrection were natural, of course that would be absolutely absurd. I'd find your post agreeable.
Likewise if one comes to the argument with the assumption that:
1) Everything is material.
2) There is no ultimate reason for our existence.
Of course it's going to be illogical because you've set up the parameters in your mind for it to be illogical.0 -
Science deals with natural claims, not supernatural claims.
If it was claimed that Christ's Resurrection were natural, of course that would be absolutely absurd. I'd find your post agreeable.
Likewise if one comes to the argument with the assumption that:
1) Everything is material.
2) There is no ultimate reason for our existence.
Of course it's going to be illogical because you've set up the parameters in your mind for it to be illogical.
But if one comes to the argument with the opposite assumptions then you have no more reason to believe the claims of christianity over those of Islam or Buddhism or Sathya Sai Baba. This is a guy who right now has legions of followers who all attest to his supernatural powers and claim he regularly performs miracles. He recently had a birthday and a million people showed up but to quote Sam Harris, this guy doesn't warrant an hour on the evening news. But When you put claims like this in a 2000 year old completely unverifiable old book suddenly half the world are willing to shape their lives around its teachings.
Sorry mate, even if you are 100% convinced that there is some kind of god, believing in christianity over all other religions is still illogical0 -
Fair enough, if you don't think you are doing that. But I and others think you are so we can't really continue with your analogy any further.
fair enough if you and others think that, but unfortunately my mind reading capabilities may not be on par with everyone elses, so if you, and others, can express those thoughts through the medium of language, and perhaps clarify what is that has lead ye to this perception, then we can explore if it is an accurate perception, or just a misperception.
A good place to start may be to explain, what the "two meanings of the word real" are, and how they are [apparently] being confused.
Ye may indeed be correct, but if ye are, then ye should be able to explain why.It is like saying "Star Wars never happened, it is a made up story, but people claim to have 'seen' it. How can people claim to have seen something that never happened, think about that for a minute! Blow your mind!"
The issue being discussed is "externally viable evidence", and someone claiming to have seen something does not count as "externally viable evidence", so the comparison doesn't work.The issue here isn't the concepts of what is real or not real but purely a miss use of English.
Again, if you can elaborate on that assertion and clarify where the misuse is, then we may come to agreement. As it stands what we have is an assertion that the english is being misused, with no clarification of where and how.If you can't see this I really can't discuss the analogy of countries and "real" things any further.
If you can see it, then point out where and how, otherwise it is just an empty assertion.Not sure how you can say that. I've never experienced an atomic blast 5 metres from my face but I can explain to you what happens.
How do you know the information you have is correct?On the other hand if you grab a man from Egypt ten thousand years ago and set off an atomic blast in front of him he wouldn't have a freaking clue what was happening to him, even if he had time to actually properly observe himself being vaporised.
Again, there is a difference between knowldege and information. You may be able to explain in great detail, everything about childbirth, but a woman who has experienced childbirth will have knowledge about it that you have no access to.
With regard to the explanation about what happens to a person during an atomic blast, was this information made up out of thin air, or how did it come about?The experience on its own is pretty much useless in terms of knowledge gathering. You only start "knowing" what was happening when you start on the explanation, even if it is as simple as saying that painful thud in my face was someone hitting me with a 2 by 4
What is there to explain without experience?
How does one verify that an explanation is accurate?
An explanation of something is not knowledge of that thing, it is knowledge of information about a thing, which may or may not be true. In order to verify the explanation one must have experience, otherwise one either chooses to believe an explanation or not.Yeah of course, the only way something can be verified is if someone actually verifies it, but that isn't relevant to the point.
verification is the act of confirming if something is true. In order to say if something is true or not, one must have knowledge of the truth. If verification has to be done by a person themselves, in order to gain knowledge of the truth, then personal experience is the only way in which the truth can be verified.
Otherwise, one chooses to either believe the information, or not.
Therefore personal experience is the only way in which the truth can be verified, bearing in mind that someone else cannot verify something for another person. They can verify it for themselves and tell the other person what they have found, but unless the other person verifies it for themselves, then they choose to either believe or not.You still need the model. The experience of opening up someone's head is not going to tell you anything on its own.
In order to confirn the model is true, then personal experience is required, as outlined above.No it doesn't, because raw sensory data is not knowledge. Feeling sharp pain in your face is not knowledge. I just got hit in the face by a plank of wood is knowledge and that is also the explanation for the experience.
If someone gets hit in the face with a plank, would they have knowledge of what happens when a person gets hit in the face with a plank? Or if someone knows the explanation/information "I just got hit in the face by a plank of wood", would they know what it is to get hit in the face with a plank? Without the experience the information "I just got hit in the face by a plank of wood" is meaningless.
If someone knows the information about how to drie a car, everything from the explanation of putting the car into gear, to increasing the speed and how to turn the steering wheel, right down to what actually happens in the engine when a person presses on the accelearator. If a person knows all this information, does that mean they have the knowledge of driving?And it is also subjective, you may not have just got hit in the face with a plank of wood, you may have felt that for some other reason.
the explanation is subjective, the rationalisation that the feeling is sore, is subjective, and interpretation of the "raw sensory data" in the mind is subjective, but again, the mind and brain are not necessarily the same. Indeed, what many people understand as the minds is not necessarily what the mind is also, and investigating the "true nature of mind" can often prove beneficial.He is explaining it to someone, he is explaining it to himself. He is not going merely on experience, his experience is simply raw data. From his experiences he has constructed an explanation for what has happened when he played with the clutch, why what happened did happen.
Again, the explanation is subjective, but a person does not necessarily need to explain an experience, one can just allow the experience to happen and allow it to fall away again without rationalising it in the conscious mind.
Again, I don't have a rational explanation for how to measure the right force to use when throwing a stone to hit something, but through experience I can make accurate predictions on how to do it. In fact, it is usually when I try to think about it consciously that the accuracy of my "predictions" decrease.His ability or lack of ability to explain it to someone else has nothing to do with that fact. That is a question of lingustics and verbal expression. He may not have the words to communicate his model to someone else. But he knows it. It is his model in his own head.
He could not have done any of that without forming a model in his head of how the clutch works. This is the explanation for his experiences with the clutch.
How does he develop this model?
Does he just formulate it in his head first day without ever seeing a car?
How does he confirm that his model is correct i.e. how does he compare his model to what is true?"Becoming true" is irrelevant since humans never know if something they believe about the world (I just saw a cup) is true or not. Science recognises this and does not deal with true or false, simply with accurate or not accurate.
Accuract is defined by what is true and what is not. The accuracy of something is determined by its proximity to the truth. If the truth cannot be known, then accuracy is meaningless.
What is the reason that humans never know if something they believe is true or not?They would never say it is true.
They would say it accurately predicts observed phenomena, or it doesn't accurately predict observed phenomena. The case for whether or not it accurately predicts observed phenomena is strengthened if other scientists can repeat the experiment using the same theory and get the same result as the first scientist.
In science (or anything else for that matter) you never know is anything true or not, only degrees of how well it predicts phenomena.
Ok, but when talking about the existence of an entity/being, then one is dealing with truth and reality. Observed phenomena, as science will attest to, is not necessarily an accurate "model" of reality.And you can never know is something is true.
why not?A good example is Newton's laws of motion. They accurately predicted observed phenomena up to a point. But they were inaccurate in some regards. Along came General Relativity. This more accurately predicted phenomena, so scientists could say that this was closer to what is actually happening than Newton (closer to the truth)
But scientist don't know is some more accurate theory will come along tomorrow, and as such cannot say if General Relativity is true or not. It might be, it might be 100% accurate and require no further refinements, it might be as true an explanation as possible. But no scientists can determine this.
OK, but the above deals more with the predictions of how gravity will operate, as opposed to its existence.
How do they verify the accuracy of the predictions?
According to scientific principles, is the force of Gravity true? Not necessarily the prediction made according to the model, but does that which is referred to as "gravity" exist in reality?
The act of "watching the universe" is personal experienceScientists watch the universe and build models of what they think is happening based on what they observeA classic analogy is playing chess. You watch two people play chess and try and determine the rules from what they are doing. You see that one player moves his pawn two places, and you record that. The other player does that as well. You go "Ok, I have a model now of what a pawn can do, it can move two places"
Then you see the player move is pawn one place. You go "Ah ha! My model was incurrate. A pawn can also move one place" You adjust your model
After a while you notice that pawns only move two places on their first go. You add this to your model.
After a while you have build up quite a good model of what can happen is chess. Is this model "true" (ie 100% accurate). You have no idea. You have no idea if the next move will show that your model is some what inaccurate in some way, just like what happened after the pawn moved only one place.
Indeed, but the model only develops as knew knowledge is acquired through direct personal experience. In fact, the initial modl follows from personal experience i.e. a person observes the move of the pawn, and then creates an [incomplete] model based on that.
Of course someone may present you with a model, before you ever start "observing" chess, but the only way you can confirm its accuracy is though personal experience, such as observing other players.That is the nature of human learning of the world around us, something science recognises. You never prove anything in science, you never know if your model is 100% accurate. You never know if you understand properly what just happened.
One of the main issues with modelling, and often the reason for their [eventual] inaccuracy, is that they are based on assumptions that are not usually questioned, until such point as evidence is so strongly mounted against the model, that a questioning of the assumption is almost forced.
However, the assumptions upon which a model is based can, and indeed should be, questioned from the outset. This is often an issue with human interpretation of experiences, the interpretation is often based on a primary assumption.
Ideally, nothing should be assumed, but once something arises, it should be investigated. The problem is that we are often indocrinated with a wide number of assumptions about the world around us, that never go unquestioned. For some there are assumptions about the nature and existence of God, but for nearly all of us there are assumptions about who we are, and other assumptions about the nature of reality.
While sciene does indeed seek to question many of these assumptions, there are some assumptions which even scientists may be unaware, because they are ingrained in the human psyche. Some [maybe not all] spiriutal practice, deals with questioning other deeply held assumptions, that affect nearly everyone on an individual level, including the most eminent scientists. These assumptions will then be borne out in scientific (and other) models, until such point as they are questioned.
For example, with the model of chess play above, there may be an assumption that both players actually know how to play chess, when this may not be the case. They could perhaps be making illegal moves, which will then be borne out in our own personal model. This assumption could of course be investigated, ever before observing the two play chess.No that isn't the question.
The question is how do you know you are not making up the explanation. How do you know your mind is not playing a trick on you? How do you determine this on your own
This highlights the flaw in relying purely on your own judgement. The idea that you would know if your brain was tricking you is silly.That is a completely non-answer. God could lie by representing something that is not true. The subjective nature of words is utterly irrelevant to his.
The answer to the second quote above, followed from the first quote
Again, there is the issue that the brain and the mind are not necessarily the same thing. There are spiritual models on the nature of mind, and the difference between the "ordinary mind" and the "true nature of the mind". The predictions of these spiritual models can be tested, but seeing as how one can only experience their own mind, personal experience is the only avenue open to explore them.
Some of these spiritual models deal with questioning the very nature of who we are, or more to the point, who we think we are. This act of questioning the most fundamental assumption, held by the majority of people, can foster a tendency of questioning other fundamental assumptions about the nature of reality, which can lead to some interesting insights.
One can determing when one's mind is playing a trick on them by "questioning" their assumptions about what their mind has "told" them. Perhaps a better description would be, that one can tell when their mind is playing tricks on them, by developing a deeper understanding of the nature of their mind, and understanding better what part of the mind plays tricks. By doing this one can recognise this more readily and realise the illusory nature of the "ordinary mind".
For exmple, if one is looking to tell the difference between a bed and God disguised as a bed, one can realise that any perception of something as a bed, is not necessarily reality, as the bed is the composition of sub-atomic (and possibly sub-string) particles. Then the question of telling the difference between a bed and God disguised as a bed, is no longer a meaningful question.What do you mean by "the truth" How does someone know that the first time they heard "the truth" it wasn't a lie?
One cannot hear the truth, becaues words etc. are only ever attempts to describe the truth, they are not the truth itself. How does one know that they can drive a car? How does one know that they can cycle a bike?And as we have already established you cannot know that you know the truth. And as such you could always be being lied to.
This, as of yet has not been established, rather asserted and refuted.Another non-answer.
It's ok to say you don't know the answer to these questions Mangaroosh, people have been wrestling with this issues for thousands of years.
I will say that I don't know the answer to the questions, because knowledge of information is ultimately not really knowledge, seeing as how information exists in the mind as thoughts and thoughts are not reality, and anything that is not reality does not exist.0 -
One can gauge how useful religious inquiry is in reaching a conclusion, by noting how many religious leaders and religious people are in permanent and full agreement with each other.Religious people keep going on about these wonderful ways they can determine fact from fiction when it comes to the reality around us that don't some how require scientific methodologies. These methods some how go beyond the shackles of scientific standards.0 -
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I would not fully agree with this. One of the fundamental issues in philosophy is whether rationality serves any purpose. I thinking of that problem of induction. We might know that any selected theory is broadly consistent with everything we've observed thus far, but that's no guarantee that all future events will also behave consistently. It all really rests on an assumption we make that things behave in rational, logical and consistent ways.Philosophy is a science, in fact some call it the mother of all science. It is supposed to be a logical and rational endeavour.
That's a fair point, IMHO. But the ultimate proof of everything - be it a religion or any other proposition - is individual experience.You can't just put God outside human cross-examination based on semantics.
Wherein lies the problem. You cannot directly transfer your individual experience to me.0 -
I'm going to throw a sorta curve ball here at Mangaroosh.
Suppose:
Person A experiences a blip occuring only at slot A, whereas Person B experiences the blip occuring only at slot B. Both of them know exactly what they experienced but who is actually experiencing the objective reality, that you claim our personal experiences allow us to. So my question is, do you think it is possible for humans to experience an objective reality? If so, how?
Also, slightly offtopic, but does anyknow how to get Firefox to spellcheck boards posts. Mine seems to have malfunctioned..:(0 -
If we open our eyes and carefully study the workings of nature, we see regularity and order in all things – the rising and the setting of the sun, the waxing and the waning of the moon, the changing of the seasons, and so on. We see the same regularity in the birth, growth and decay of living creatures.
In short we can very clearly observe that everything in nature follows a carefully-crafted and delicately-balanced order. This naturally requires a well-coordinated plan behind it. As such, if there is a plan, mustn’t there be a planner? If we live in a world of cause and effect, there must be an original uncaused cause.
Our reason and our experience teach us that a plan can come only out of intelligence. When we look at the grand design and perfect balance of the universe, the unerring order and pattern in nature, how can we call this mere coincidence? In a world of random events, the sun could suddenly go out of its orbit and fly off at a tangent; the seas can become boiling acids, etc. There will be no law; no order.
But ours is a universe of order, it is a cosmos and not a chaos. There is a reliable order, or a predictability and stability (instead of randomness) of laws governing the workings of the universe. Hence, scientists are able to do experiments and discover what they call the laws of nature or the laws of science.
The foregoing considerations lead us to the inevitable conclusion that behind the operations of this universe there is a grand design or plan which must have a posteriori come out of an intelligence and vision which transcends and comprehends all the spheres of our knowledge, understanding, and experience. Furthermore, we find that the unity and the uniformity of the laws of nature unerringly point to the Unity of the Power behind the universe too.
God is above the heavens, and above His creation. This, however, does not mean that He is contained by any sort of physical dimensions. God is close, very close, to those who believe in Him and He answers their every call. God knows all of our secrets, dreams, and wishes, as nothing is hidden from Him. God is with His creation by His knowledge and power. God is the Creator and the Sustainer. Nothing comes into existence except by His will.
to atheis pple out there just ask urselves abt how everything was maded and why is there planets and why r they coordinated?why is the body functioned to do many things,nutrients are absorbed/removed by many organs?
these qs have been asked by me and many of my friends to atheis pple in school and they dont answer them,even the atheis teacher couldnt answer our qs to him.we go into a depth argument and then u come to think of it evoultion laws came from atheis scienctist.WHY?0 -
The thing is that I don't really care if your definition of the word technically matches what it says in most dictionaries (but not all).
Just to clarify, it is not my definition that technically matches the dictionary, I am using the dictionary definition.
Also, the statement that it "technically matches what it says in most dictionaries (but not all)". The definition of the word matched 12 of the 14 sources cited by yourself. The two instances where it differed, it was only part of the definition and even then it was highly debatable. One of the sources actually had another defintion that was more aligned with the OED and other definitons.
The other "dictionary" that falls into the category of "not all" was a website called, something like, access.autistics.org. While I don't wish to cast any aspersions on the organisation or the content of the website, I must question the legitimacy of the site as a lexicon on the english langauge, especially when compared to the OED.The fact remains that your understanding of the word is not the same as mine or indeed the same as anyone on the forum and since we do not accept your understanding of the words subjective and objective (among many others such as "experience", "know", "tacit knowledge" etc), we are not going to accept any opinion you have based on your understanding of those words.
Again, just to be clear, that the understanding you have yourself, of the words, is not necessarily what they mean. Indeed, if there is any dispute, then it is the dictionary that is the "objective" source.
For example, I may make the statement that "if I am at the bottom of a hill and I want to reach the top, then I must remain where I am". This statement is incorrect, as, in order to get to the top of a hill from the bottom, "remaining still" is not how this is achieved.
If however, I maintain that what I understand as "remaining still", is actually what is described by the word "walking", then my statement is still incorrect, and it is I who needs to correct my understanding of the words I am using - as the words have predefined meanings.
Of coure I don't have to change my understanding, I can continue to use the words erroneously, however, it will mean that there is a greater likelihood that what I say will be incorrect.
You may decide yourself, not to accet my opinion, as expressed through the medium of english, on the basis that your understanding of the words I use are different to how you understand them, but the validity of my statements can be checked.
If we actually work on your understanding of the word subjective and objective (as outlined throughout the discussion), then your understanding of the word is subjective while the dictionary definition is objective.This is an argument over semantics, much like our previous discussion where you defined the word supernatural to include anything that humans do not yet understand, as opposed to beyond the laws of nature which is my understanding of the word.
Again, just to be clear, it is only an argument over semantics because it is yourself that is arguing over the meaning of the words. The words already have a meaning, as outlined in the dictionary.
The same applies with the word supernatural.
A further example. I may have an understanding of what the word "happy", and I may describe it as feeling or showing displeasure or discontentment. If this was the case then my understanding of the word would be incorrect, and any statements I made based on my assumption of the word would also [more than likely] be incorrect.So there really is no point continuing the conversation. I'm sure all of your opinions make perfect sense to you but I don't have the same understanding of those words as you do so they make no sense to me and they never will because I am not going to change my understanding of the words.
That's no problem, but if that is the case then be prepared to be wrong, a lot!And another reason not to continue it is that you have again written a massive chunk of text that I simply cannot summon the will to read. Honestly mangaroosh, if you want to have online discussions you need to get the hang of brevity, or click here:http://en.wordpress.com/signup/
This is the third time I think you have said this, and [obviously] you are entitled not to read whatever you do not feel capable of reading, but honestly Sam, if you are struggling to follow a few longer than average posts, then perhaps you should question your understanding of a great number of things, not least your understanding of God.0 -
I would not fully agree with this. One of the fundamental issues in philosophy is whether rationality serves any purpose. I thinking of that problem of induction. We might know that any selected theory is broadly consistent with everything we've observed thus far, but that's no guarantee that all future events will also behave consistently. It all really rests on an assumption we make that things behave in rational, logical and consistent ways.That's a fair point, IMHO. But the ultimate proof of everything - be it a religion or any other proposition - is individual experience.
Wherein lies the problem. You cannot directly transfer your individual experience to me.
I would agree on both points. I was rather lax in my wording but I suppose you could keep taking away assumptions until you are left with nothing. Here lies the path to madness!
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to atheis pple out there just ask urselves abt how everything was maded and why is there planets and why r they coordinated?why is the body functioned to do many things,nutrients are absorbed/removed by many organs?
these qs have been asked by me and many of my friends to atheis pple in school and they dont answer them,even the atheis teacher couldnt answer our qs to him.we go into a depth argument and then u come to think of it evoultion laws came from atheis scienctist.WHY?
Your english degraded rapidly at the end of your post there. You wouldn't be plagarising would you?
You say the Universe is predictable, reliable and stable. If it follows such rules as gravity and evolution what need is there for a divine hand?0 -
Also, slightly offtopic, but does anyknow how to get Firefox to spellcheck boards posts. Mine seems to have malfunctioned..:(
Without knowing what has gone wrong with it, I guess you could check the settings.
Tools -> Options -> Advanced -> "Check my spelling as I type" checkbox should be marked.
Also, you can right click in the text box you are typing in and turn spelling off and on I think. Depends on your version though.0 -
If we open our eyes and carefully study the workings of nature, we see regularity and order in all things – the rising and the setting of the sun, the waxing and the waning of the moon, the changing of the seasons, and so on. We see the same regularity in the birth, growth and decay of living creatures.
In short we can very clearly observe that everything in nature follows a carefully-crafted and delicately-balanced order. This naturally requires a well-coordinated plan behind it. As such, if there is a plan, mustn’t there be a planner? If we live in a world of cause and effect, there must be an original uncaused cause.
Our reason and our experience teach us that a plan can come only out of intelligence. When we look at the grand design and perfect balance of the universe, the unerring order and pattern in nature, how can we call this mere coincidence? In a world of random events, the sun could suddenly go out of its orbit and fly off at a tangent; the seas can become boiling acids, etc. There will be no law; no order.
But ours is a universe of order, it is a cosmos and not a chaos. There is a reliable order, or a predictability and stability (instead of randomness) of laws governing the workings of the universe. Hence, scientists are able to do experiments and discover what they call the laws of nature or the laws of science.
The foregoing considerations lead us to the inevitable conclusion that behind the operations of this universe there is a grand design or plan which must have a posteriori come out of an intelligence and vision which transcends and comprehends all the spheres of our knowledge, understanding, and experience. Furthermore, we find that the unity and the uniformity of the laws of nature unerringly point to the Unity of the Power behind the universe too.
God is above the heavens, and above His creation. This, however, does not mean that He is contained by any sort of physical dimensions. God is close, very close, to those who believe in Him and He answers their every call. God knows all of our secrets, dreams, and wishes, as nothing is hidden from Him. God is with His creation by His knowledge and power. God is the Creator and the Sustainer. Nothing comes into existence except by His will.
to atheis pple out there just ask urselves abt how everything was maded and why is there planets and why r they coordinated?why is the body functioned to do many things,nutrients are absorbed/removed by many organs?
these qs have been asked by me and many of my friends to atheis pple in school and they dont answer them,even the atheis teacher couldnt answer our qs to him.we go into a depth argument and then u come to think of it evoultion laws came from atheis scienctist.WHY?
I'm sorry Poe's law has struck again. Are you being serious, do you really want me to answer your question?0 -
Our reason and our experience teach us that a plan can come only out of intelligence. When we look at the grand design and perfect balance of the universe, the unerring order and pattern in nature, how can we call this mere coincidence?
That's what's called the teleological argument and it fails on many levels.
If you want to go on believing in the "unerring order and pattern in nature", do not look at the attached picture and do not watch this video from which the picture is taken
WARNING: DO NOT CLICK THIS IF YOU ARE EASILY OFFENDED0 -
mangaroosh wrote: »Again, just to be clear, it is only an argument over semantics because it is yourself that is arguing over the meaning of the words. The words already have a meaning, as outlined in the dictionary.
It's an argument over semantics because you use the words "supernatural", "know", "tacit knowledge", "subjective" and "objective" in a way that I have never seen them used. An experience cannot be objective because the only thing that can have an experience is a living being, ie a subject. A subject can only have a subjective experience even if the thing being experienced is objective. An experience exists only in the mind0 -
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Words, charactersm symbols, and numbers, are not dependent on personal characteristics of the mind, even if minds are needed to construct them. There are also not dependent on particular states I][B]of mind[/B][/I. They are therefore not subjective, as they instead depend on the collective experience and experiments of the scientific community.
Again, the qualifying part of the explanation ("of the mind") has been emboldened and put in italics above, and added in parentheses where it was left out, as it is essential to the explanation.
To illustrate the importance of the qualifier we can look at the following statements:
The following example is to be taken in the context of measurement at one standard atmosphere.
"0 degrees celcius is the freezing point"
this statement is incorrect (or incomplete), as there are different freezing points for different liquids.
However, we can add a number of different qualifiers to the statement:
"0 degrees celcius is the freezing point of mercury"here the qualifier ""of mercury" has been added to the statement. The statement, however, remains incorrect, as 0 degrees celcious is not the freezing point of mercury.
If we add a different qualifier:
"0 degrees celcius is the freezing point of H2O"
here the qualifier "of H2O" has been added. With this qualifier, the statement become true.
There may be conditions under which the statements below are deemed false, however, the addition of these conditions are themselves further qualifiers.Well yes, it is different. But if I am unable to formulate knowledge then I won't be able to compare my experiences to the experiences of others. If a woman tenders an incoherent theory of childbirth, then other women will not be able to see if her theory also describes and predicts their experience of childbirth.
Whether or not you are able to compare your experience to others has no bearing on your knowledge of something. If the above woman cannot formulate a coherent explanation of her experience of childbirth, it does not mean that she is no longer in possession of the knowledge. It may mean that other women cannot determine whether or not she has actually experienced childbirth, but that still does not affect the original womans knowledge.
It may mean that the other women won't believe here claim, but it is immaterial, as knowledge of the claim and belief in it, is not sufficient for the other women to have knowledge of childbirth. In order to gain this knowledge, they must experience it for themselves, and it is ultimately immaterial how it is described.
Of course, this is working off the assumption that a coherent explanation won't be possible. It may be a case that the experience itself is not completely describable in words (as is actually the case with all experiences), but that a "half decent" description is possible. Again, however, knowledge of the description does not substitute for actual knowledge gained through experience.
This may lead to difficulty in identifying who to believe and who not to, but personal investigation can help in this process.And how would direct experience give us any knowledge of a mind-independent reality?
It isn't important how it would do this, just as it isn't necessarily important to know exactly how the engine of a car works in order to drive it.Coherent instrumental descriptions of experiences with predictive power is the best we've done so far.
How are these descriptions and predictions verified?0 -
mangaroosh wrote: »This is the third time I think you have said this, and [obviously] you are entitled not to read whatever you do not feel capable of reading, but honestly Sam, if you are struggling to follow a few longer than average posts, then perhaps you should question your understanding of a great number of things, not least your understanding of God.
It's not so much that I'm incapable of reading it, it's that I've had a few discussions with yourself before and I just don't see it going anywhere. Your view of the world is massively different to mine to the point that you ascribe very different meanings to words and it's very difficult to talk to someone when you're pretty sure that anything you say is going to be misinterpreted because of this. If you wrote shorter replies I might be willing to respond but I don't particularly want to spend about half an hour a time saying "that's not what that word means" and "no that's not what I meant", especially since it will all be lost in the noise of a 1000 word reply
Pretty much your whole point is predicated on your understanding of the words subjective and objective. By your understanding of those words certain things can be argued but I do not share your understanding of those words and neither does anyone on the forum so the whole thing becomes a massive debate on the meanings of words.0 -
I'm sure others have put this much better than me, but, no, simply calling that 'order' a plan does not require a planner. At least, not a 'planner' in the sense of a god known to any religion.if there is a plan, mustn’t there be a planner?
All you can say of this 'planner' is that it was a sufficient cause of the universe that we know. There is no basis for assuming this 'planner' to be an omnipotent, caring god.
Of course, its still possible for someone to assert a belief that their personal experience suggests to them that such a god is guiding and aiding them. But that's quite a different matter.
I don't know, but would the existence of an uncaused cause not disprove the notion of cause and effect? If one thing can be uncaused, why cannot many (or all) things be uncaused?If we live in a world of cause and effect, there must be an original uncaused cause.0 -
In addition to my previous post. Here are some examples of the common use of the word objective we are adopting.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/objectiv/#H1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objectivity_(science)
Some of these examples are indeed from wikipedia, but they are all well supported by references. And important examples are not from wikipedia, so I pre-emptively disagree with any objection to using such sources. It is evident that your definition of objective is very different to the one used by the majority of people here, and I would wager that, if a single definition was adopted for this discussion, the conversation would progress much more rapidly.
I haven't had a chance to read the essay yet, but I will make some pre-emptive points of my own. Firstly however, I will say that we are in agreement on one thing, a single definition is not only necessary, but it pretty much all that is possible. If people work on different definitions, based on what they think a word should mean, then communication through the medium of language is effectively useless.
I propose the dictionary definition of the word, as I believe it is the most reliable source.
I will also say that, if the essay proposes a definition of the word that is not as described in the dictionary (it appears that most are in agreement anyway), then it is incorrect. If one wishes to look up the meaning of a word it is the dictionary that is used, or at least that should be, as it is the dictionary that is most reliable. Actually it is farcical to suggest that anything other than the dictionary should be used as a lexicon.
As for the pre-emptive disagreement against a challenge of the sources, on the basis that they are all well supported with references, I ask only, are the references themselves reliable sources, and has the dictionary been consulted.
I once read a 12 page paper on the meaning of the word supernatural, and not once in the paper was the dictionary referenced, rather the discussion was based on a discussion of what other people thought the word meant.
Just to be clear. If one wishes to get the official meaning of a word, look it up in a dictionary. With regard to the english langauge, the OED is [arguably] the most reliable source.0 -
mangaroosh wrote: »How are these descriptions and predictions verified?
You keep asking this question as if it proves something. The predictions are verified by scientists doing experiments. Yes they "personally experience" the experiments. All that shows is that verifying something for yourself is better than taking someone's word for it in some cases.
However it does not mean that personal experience is inherently better than externally verifiable evidence. A million people can think they have experienced something and they can still be wrong. A process of peer review involving years of repeatable experiments and thousands of scientists trying to disprove something is and will always remain a far superior way of determining "truth" than one guy's opinion about how great he is at interpreting his senses0 -
Goduznt Xzst wrote: »Quickly, give me your first impression, someone walks up to you and says they are setting up a camcorder to record the gnomes coming alive in their garden at night. How intelligent do you imagine this person is?
I'm not saying it's true, intelligent people are religious, but it's natural to quickly come to this conclusion when faced with individuals who claim belief in the fantastical. I'm sure there where some Mensans at Knock staring at the Sun hoping to see Mary. Intelligence is really only a vehicle for how quickly you can digest information. If you don't digest the right information, all the intelligence in the world won't help you.
The most annoying atheist argument is that kind of one.
You simply do not understand where others are coming from.
I hate the argument that science has proven there is no God. It has not. There are theories on subjects such as evolution and the creation of the universe, and historical evidence and records that contradict parts of various holy books.
That is still not proof that there is no God. What we do know for certain, is that there is much in life and the universe, and about life and the universe, that we do not know.
All we can be sure of is that we do not know everything.
Various religions offer answers/explanations of these unknown. To be fair, science has not offered a definitive rebuttal to "God created the heaven and the earth". There is no scientific theory I have heard where one could not ask, "and what came before that".0 -
That's one of the most annoying theist arguments there. No one ever said that science has proven there is no god. When people talk about science and evidence in general, they're talking about whether or not it is reasonable to believe in a god. There might well be gnomes coming alive at night, in order to disprove that science would have to be recording every square inch of the planet at all times just in case a gnome popped out of the ground and started dancing but even though science cannot disprove dancing gnomes we still don't believe in them because doing so would not be reasonable.Stabshauptmann wrote: »The most annoying atheist argument is that kind of one.
You simply do not understand where others are coming from.
I hate the argument that science has proven there is no God. It has not.
When people say science can't disprove god this is essentially the argument being presented:
Stabshauptmann wrote: »To be fair, science has not offered a definitive rebuttal to "God created the heaven and the earth". There is no scientific theory I have heard where one could not ask, "and what came before that".
What came before god? If everything has to be created surely god has to be created and if god can just "always exist" why can't matter just "always exist"?0 -
mangaroosh wrote: »Again, the qualifying part of the explanation ("of the mind") has been emboldened and put in italics above, and added in parentheses where it was left out, as it is essential to the explanation.
To illustrate the importance of the qualifier we can look at the following statements:
The following example is to be taken in the context of measurement at one standard atmosphere.
"0 degrees celcius is the freezing point"
this statement is incorrect (or incomplete), as there are different freezing points for different liquids.
However, we can add a number of different qualifiers to the statement:
"0 degrees celcius is the freezing point of mercury"here the qualifier ""of mercury" has been added to the statement. The statement, however, remains incorrect, as 0 degrees celcious is not the freezing point of mercury.
If we add a different qualifier:
"0 degrees celcius is the freezing point of H2O"
here the qualifier "of H2O" has been added. With this qualifier, the statement become true.
There may be conditions under which the statements below are deemed false, however, the addition of these conditions are themselves further qualifiers.
We both accept "of the mind". You, however, are ignoring "personal characteristics" and "particular states". According to the dictionary definition, a statement is subjective if it depends on a particular state of mind/personal characteristics. Scientific theories do not depend on a particular states of mind, or a personal characteristic.Whether or not you are able to compare your experience to others has no bearing on your knowledge of something. If the above woman cannot formulate a coherent explanation of her experience of childbirth, it does not mean that she is no longer in possession of the knowledge. It may mean that other women cannot determine whether or not she has actually experienced childbirth, but that still does not affect the original womans knowledge.
It may mean that the other women won't believe here claim, but it is immaterial, as knowledge of the claim and belief in it, is not sufficient for the other women to have knowledge of childbirth. In order to gain this knowledge, they must experience it for themselves, and it is ultimately immaterial how it is described.
Of course, this is working off the assumption that a coherent explanation won't be possible. It may be a case that the experience itself is not completely describable in words (as is actually the case with all experiences), but that a "half decent" description is possible. Again, however, knowledge of the description does not substitute for actual knowledge gained through experience.
And the fact that this knowledge cannot be communicated means we cannot determine whether or not the knowledge depends on a particular state of mind or a personal characteristic, which is the point we have been making. Nobody has been arguing that experiences aren't indicative of objectivity. We are saying personal experiences aren't enough to determine whether or not they are indicative of objectivity.It isn't important how it would do this, just as it isn't necessarily important to know exactly how the engine of a car works in order to drive it.
Then we cannot say our experiences are necessarily true. Scientists accept this, so they settle for impartiality.How are these descriptions and predictions verified?
Repeatable experimentation, carried out by multiple people. The repeatability of experiments help to filter out facets of observations which stem from a personal characteristic or a particular state of mind.haven't had a chance to read the essay yet, but I will make some pre-emptive points of my own. Firstly however, I will say that we are in agreement on one thing, a single definition is not only necessary, but it pretty much all that is possible. If people work on different definitions, based on what they think a word should mean, then communication through the medium of language is effectively useless.
I propose the dictionary definition of the word, as I believe it is the most reliable source.
I will also say that, if the essay proposes a definition of the word that is not as described in the dictionary (it appears that most are in agreement anyway), then it is incorrect. If one wishes to look up the meaning of a word it is the dictionary that is used, or at least that should be, as it is the dictionary that is most reliable. Actually it is farcical to suggest that anything other than the dictionary should be used as a lexicon.
As for the pre-emptive disagreement against a challenge of the sources, on the basis that they are all well supported with references, I ask only, are the references themselves reliable sources, and has the dictionary been consulted.
I once read a 12 page paper on the meaning of the word supernatural, and not once in the paper was the dictionary referenced, rather the discussion was based on a discussion of what other people thought the word meant.
Just to be clear. If one wishes to get the official meaning of a word, look it up in a dictionary. With regard to the english langauge, the OED is [arguably] the most reliable source.
I have been arguing that I am indeed using a dictionary definition, and have referenced a dictionary. The definition also conforms to the OED definition:"based on or influenced by personal feelings, tastes, or opinions.". I have now given multiple sources where the word is used in a manner similar to the way it is used here.
Remember that I am not arguing that your definition is wrong, but rather that there are multiple definitions, and the one we are using is a common one. The Philosophy essay, for example, talks about the multiple meanings of objective and subjective.0 -
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Remember that I am not arguing that your definition is wrong, but rather that there are multiple definitions, and the one we are using is a common one. The Philosophy essay, for example, talks about the multiple meanings of objective and subjective.
Exactly. Both meanings of the word are valid. But as I keep saying, even if we use mangaroosh's narrow definition of the word this statement is wrong:mangaroosh wrote: »1) [Personal] experience does not take place solely in the mind i.e.it is not completely imaginary, and therefore by definition is not subjective, but rather objective - because this is what the words objective and subjective actually refer to.
Personal experience most certainly does take place solely in the mind. Even if you are experiencing something that is objective, your experience of it is still entirely dependent on your mind. The "experience" is nothing more than a series of electrical signals stored chemically in your brain. Kill your brain and the experience no longer exists.
If experience was objective, things like this would not happen but they happen all the time.0 -
Your english degraded rapidly at the end of your post there. You wouldn't be plagarising would you?
You say the Universe is predictable, reliable and stable. If it follows such rules as gravity and evolution what need is there for a divine hand?
yea i did copy the post but at the end i added my qs to what was said by a scholar,its true when u think abt it there is something behind all of the working of nature,universe,body etc.if evolution existed were did the very first thing come from and gravity was maded by someone,soo there is a planner and I DONT BELIEVE THAT EVOLUTION EXISTED AND THERE IS A GOD AND HE WAS THE CREATER OF ALL THINGS!0 -
yea i did copy the post but at the end i added my qs to what was said by a scholar,its true when u think abt it there is something behind all of the working of nature,universe,body etc.if evolution existed were did the very first thing come from and gravity was maded by someone,soo there is a planner and I DONT BELIEVE THAT EVOLUTION EXISTED AND THERE IS A GOD AND HE WAS THE CREATER OF ALL THINGS!
Simple question :
If we needed a created, then why didn't God?0 -
yea i did copy the post but at the end i added my qs to what was said by a scholar,its true when u think abt it there is something behind all of the working of nature,universe,body etc.if evolution existed were did the very first thing come from and gravity was maded by someone,soo there is a planner and I DONT BELIEVE THAT EVOLUTION EXISTED AND THERE IS A GOD AND HE WAS THE CREATER OF ALL THINGS!
Firstly, please use your full keyboard. Now, not believing that evolution existed in 2010 is about as consistent with reality as not believing that gravity exists. Evolution is as fully supported an idea as any in science. But evolution does not pretend to explain the origins of the universe, only the diversity and complexity of life, contrary to what many creationists say. You can "believe" in evolution and still believe in god. But as Malty_T says, if you can't imagine something as complex as the universe "just existing", why do you have no problem with the concept of god "just existing", presumably a being that is infinitely more complex?0 -
Simple question :
If we needed a created, then why didn't God?
We always end up back here.
Who created us = god made us and the universe.
Why are we here = god made us and the universe to appease his ego.
Who created god = no one, he is all powerful, nothing is more powerful. He just is as always was.
Could something else have created us = no one could, he is all powerful, nothing is more powerful. He just is as always was.
Nothing can be created from nothing. = what about god then ........hhhmmmmm
Round and round the argument goes.
How do we know about god? = the bible tells us about god
How do we know about the bible? = the bible is the word of god
How do we know its real? = god told us it was real
(i think dades has a nice circular picture chart to highlight this)
The only truthfull evidence for the bible, is that it is only a collection of different stories over a 1600 year period, with 80% missing or destroyed by catholics.
The 1st gospel does not appear until 70-90 AD. There is also a huge issue with translations and arguments that still rage on about a virgin or young woman.
There is no evidence there was a jesus yet it still doesn't stop anyone believing.
Supernatural claims are fantasyScience deals with natural claims, not supernatural claims.0 -
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That's one of the most annoying theist arguments there. No one ever said that science has proven there is no god. When people talk about science and evidence in general, they're talking about whether or not it is reasonable to believe in a god.
There might well be gnomes coming alive at night, in order to disprove that science would have to be recording every square inch of the planet at all times just in case a gnome popped out of the ground and started dancing but even though science cannot disprove dancing gnomes we still don't believe in them because doing so would not be reasonable.
When people say science can't disprove god this is essentially the argument being presented:
[image]
What came before god? If everything has to be created surely god has to be created and if god can just "always exist" why can't matter just "always exist"?
Ok perhaps I didnt spell this out enough for you.
You are using strawmen arguments.
You make superficial analogies and demolish them rather than actually deconstructing your opponents actual position.
It is your flawed understanding of what your opponents think God is that is preventing you from seeing why your analogy is flawed.
A better analogy is that god is the creator of a movie (scrip writer, casting director, props etc).
So take the POV of the film viewer, or an actor during production who doesn’t have the full script in front of him.
The choices a character made can be seen to affect another character or event and so on. Combinations of lighting and sound give one effect or another to the end product. Innocuous background elements play pivotal roles. You get the picture.
(Imagine for a moment that we dont know it is a film) As the actor / viewer you can feel that it was all causality, chance and the will of the protagonists that brought about the end result. And that makes perfect sense based on the evidence available.
But another actor / viewer beside you might feel that something so perfect didnt just happen together. That there was some guiding hand pushing it along and making sure things worked out. That this force knew from the beginning what was going to happen, because to this force it has already happened.
Its not about a super man type character flying through the sky smoting bad guys and diverting natural disasters. Thats the type of thing I think you think God is when you talk about dancing gnomes.
And its not that Im asking you to disprove God. Though your cartoon does fit into the straw man category. If you want to use baseballs, then it would be if you and I were in a park that happened to be beside a baseball stadium. I find a ball and say I believe it was hit out of the stadium by some famous player one time. You say its more logical that it belongs to some kids who were playing in the park.
To be fair, neither of us knows where it came from. You can make very reasonable, logical arguments about why it probably is as you say. but you cant prove it, and you cant disprove my theory.0 -
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Stabshauptmann wrote: »Ok perhaps I didnt spell this out enough for you.
You are using strawmen arguments.
You make superficial analogies and demolish them rather than actually deconstructing your opponents actual position.
It is your flawed understanding of what your opponents think God is that is preventing you from seeing why your analogy is flawed.
A better analogy is that god is the creator of a movie (scrip writer, casting director, props etc).
So take the POV of the film viewer, or an actor during production who doesn’t have the full script in front of him.
The choices a character made can be seen to affect another character or event and so on. Combinations of lighting and sound give one effect or another to the end product. Innocuous background elements play pivotal roles. You get the picture.
(Imagine for a moment that we dont know it is a film) As the actor / viewer you can feel that it was all causality, chance and the will of the protagonists that brought about the end result. And that makes perfect sense based on the evidence available.
But another actor / viewer beside you might feel that something so perfect didnt just happen together. That there was some guiding hand pushing it along and making sure things worked out. That this force knew from the beginning what was going to happen, because to this force it has already happened.
Its not about a super man type character flying through the sky smoting bad guys and diverting natural disasters. Thats the type of thing I think you think God is when you talk about dancing gnomes.
And its not that Im asking you to disprove God. Though your cartoon does fit into the straw man category. If you want to use baseballs, then it would be if you and I were in a park that happened to be beside a baseball stadium. I find a ball and say I believe it was hit out of the stadium by some famous player one time. You say its more logical that it belongs to some kids who were playing in the park.
To be fair, neither of us knows where it came from. You can make very reasonable, logical arguments about why it probably is as you say. but you cant prove it, and you cant disprove my theory.
Your theory is MAD0 -
What you have there is called hyperactive agency detection. Human beings are wired to see purpose in everything, whether there is actually purpose or not. It's a very useful evolutionary device that allowed us to see a crocodile where a less well adapted animal saw a rock and promptly died but it can quite often misfire. We used to ascribe things like lightning to gods but now we know better. And if you believe that the world is "so perfect that there must be some guiding hand pushing it along and making sure things work out", you must never have seen this picture:Stabshauptmann wrote: »Ok perhaps I didnt spell this out enough for you.
You are using strawmen arguments.
You make superficial analogies and demolish them rather than actually deconstructing your opponents actual position.
It is your flawed understanding of what your opponents think God is that is preventing you from seeing why your analogy is flawed.
A better analogy is that god is the creator of a movie (scrip writer, casting director, props etc).
So take the POV of the film viewer, or an actor during production who doesn’t have the full script in front of him.
The choices a character made can be seen to affect another character or event and so on. Combinations of lighting and sound give one effect or another to the end product. Innocuous background elements play pivotal roles. You get the picture.
(Imagine for a moment that we dont know it is a film) As the actor / viewer you can feel that it was all causality, chance and the will of the protagonists that brought about the end result. And that makes perfect sense based on the evidence available.
But another actor / viewer beside you might feel that something so perfect didnt just happen together. That there was some guiding hand pushing it along and making sure things worked out. That this force knew from the beginning what was going to happen, because to this force it has already happened.
http://boards.ie/vbulletin/attachment.php?attachmentid=100194&stc=1&d=1262104632
WARNING: DO NOT CLICK IF YOU ARE EASILY OFFENDED
and you must not have seen this video from which the picture is taken:
The world only looks like there's a "guiding hand pushing it along making sure everything works out", if you ignore the vast number of things that do not work out. If there is a guiding hand it is either pathetically weak or malevolent.
You should also watch this excellent video. It goes a long way to explaining the origins of religious belief at a neurological level, including hyperactive agency detection:
Stabshauptmann wrote: »Its not about a super man type character flying through the sky smoting bad guys and diverting natural disasters. Thats the type of thing I think you think God is when you talk about dancing gnomes.
And its not that Im asking you to disprove God. Though your cartoon does fit into the straw man category. If you want to use baseballs, then it would be if you and I were in a park that happened to be beside a baseball stadium. I find a ball and say I believe it was hit out of the stadium by some famous player one time. You say its more logical that it belongs to some kids who were playing in the park.
To be fair, neither of us knows where it came from. You can make very reasonable, logical arguments about why it probably is as you say. but you cant prove it, and you cant disprove my theory.
You say "its not that Im asking you to disprove God", then you end with "you cant disprove my theory", essentially challenging me to disprove it. But the point being made is that it doesn't matter that we can't prove either way that god doesn't exist because there are an infinite number of things whose non-existence cannot be proven but we don't believe in them anyway because it's not reasonable to do so. Saying "you cant disprove my theory" is a bad argument for exactly the same reason as it's a bad argument to say you can't prove I don't have a baseball. You are the one making a claim so you have to justify it.
And besides all that, even if I was to totally accept that there was an intelligence guiding the universe, that's a far cry from accepting that a Jewish guy raised from the dead 2000 years ago.0 -
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