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My argument with you and Beany is simply an argument of values, that's what you two don't seem to understand.
Anytime we're having an intellectual conversation, we're assigning values to different ideas, and trying to make the other person see the value in those ideas as well.
You and Beany are putting value into Science and Secular Morality, but in order to do so you, you're only appealing to prior values that not everybody holds.
For example, Sam Harris in his book, The Moral Landscape, argues that "The worst suffering possible for all life" (paraphrasing) is the worst case scenario for the Universe. He calls the worst suffering for everybody "philosophical bedrock", basically implying that this value of disliking suffering is intrinsic, and that philosophically, you can't regress any further than that.
The fundamental problem with his argument, is that while he may not realize it, he's simply appealing to another value, which is human compassion. Human compassion is a natural value that most humans have (because of our instincts), but it is not uniform. Different people have different levels of it, and according to you Beany, some humans have no compassion at all (you called them the outliers). Human compassion as a value is not universally agreed upon intellectually, even if it is in some of our natures to value it. Human compassion has some intrinsic value naturally, but intellectually, it has no intrinsic value. As I mentioned in my last post, something can not have intrinsic value unless every person understands and agrees that it has value.
In a materialistic, subjective world view, nothing has intrinsic value intellectually. By this I mean, every value is simply an appeal to another value, on and on ad infinitum. Any appeal to value turns into an infinite regress, because there is no universally agreed-upon value that we can all share. You can't force people to have a certain value, Secular Morality is simply appealing to a person's natural values (values giving by nature) and hoping that it works. Clearly we've seen that it doesn't always work.
You, realizing in your minds that the Universe is materialistic, and that there is no objective purpose, have no problem with all values being subjective. You've chosen values that you think are important. Of course to illustrate their importance, you're simply appealing to other values that not everybody agrees upon, so your argument becomes rather moot.
You can say, "Science is the best way of gathering evidence". I can say, "Human testimony is the best way of gathering evidence". And according to your world view, neither of us are wrong. To prove me wrong, you're simply appealing to more values. And if I were to try to prove you wrong, I'd simply be appealing to more values. By simply having different values than you guys, using your own world view, I can come to a completely different conclusion than you do. I can come to the conclusion that "Genocide is fine", and there would be no argument you could make against me that would have any intellectual value.
Stalin, Pol Pot, and Mao, can come to the conclusion that in the absence of intrinsic moral values, it doesn't matter whether human beings live or die. That is the same conclusion I would come to as well. You guys come to a different conclusion using the same world view, but it doesn't have any more value intellectually than the mass murderers' conclusion.
So, in closing, I'm happy you can come to the conclusion that life still has meaning in a Materialistic Universe, but don't expect everybody to (expect the opposite often).
However, Ironically, using your world view, this is exactly what you're forced to do.'ll preface this with the fact that science does not assume that what has the most evidence is true or is the default position, that's just not true (and I don't know where that came from). And a lot of people believing something doesn't constitute evidence. Anyway.
If I say: "I don't value Science", the only answer you could give me is "But lots of people value Science."
If I say "Majority testimony is evidence", you can't make an argument against me, because your values are no more important than mine.
Finally, I think I probably oversimplified Science a little bit. What I should have said is, "In Science, when something gain enough evidence for it, it becomes the default position". For example, in the 20th Century, there were two major theories about the origin of the Universe: Steady State Theory, and the Big Bang Theory. Both Theories had some evidence for them, but neither had enough evidence to become the default position. Eventually, enough evidence was found to make the Big Bang Theory the default position, and the burden of proof is now on the naysayers to prove otherwise.
This is how I view existence. I put value into the idea that existence (of humans and the Universe) is the Scientific Theory that we have the MOST evidence for (everything else branches out from there), so it becomes the default position. Anybody seeking to disprove it must present evidence otherwise.
I disagree with you, and I disagree with you by pointing out that most atheists are still very spiritual people, they just don't believe in god. According to this study, atheists often have even stronger beliefs and convictions than do theists. You don't have to believe in god or religion to be spiritual, only that human life has some intrinsic value. And I think, whether you agree or not, that most atheists do believe this.Point? People can live just fine without a belief in the spiritual or ethereal or whatever. We don't need things larger than ourselves to keep ourselves from just recklessly murdering everyone around us.
Once again, it's not evidence you would accept, but that doesn't mean it's not evidence. You're simply putting value into different evidence than I am. The only thing you can appeal to, using your world view, is that "lots of people put their value into Science". That's the exact same value I'm appealing to when positing Spirituality. We are on equal ground here, you just don't realize it.I don't dismiss religion because I hate it, I dismiss it because it doesn't hold any truth - it has no evidence - it's not an understanding of reality. I don't dismiss god because I hate him, I dismiss god because I've never seen the guy.
I believe that there's a fundamental knowledge using Spirituality, that all life has value. That has nothing to do with magic.If you believe that humans or any other thing have intrinsic value that makes them of more worth than other things, then you must believe in some form of irrational magic. Magic.
We make choices that contradict our environment all the time. You're basically saying that your environment and your genes completely controls all your decisions. This is where I disagree. I think people who come from bad environments often break out of those environments and become successful, and people who come from good environments often make bad choices and become criminals etc. You say there's a Natural explanation for all of these things; I disagree. That's what we're arguing about. You're assuming the argument is already won, which is begging the question.It is blatantly obvious that this sort of freedom does not exist in the world. We do not choose to be conceived, by whom, or in what country, or on what planet. We do not choose what will happen to us in our lives. We do not choose when we will die. We do not choose if other people will let us be successful. Essentially every important part of our existence is dictated by the chain of events which is outside of our control. Why then would the little things, like what clothes you should wear today, be any different?
That's fine, you can refuse it if you like.Once again, I refuse to accept the idea that there might be some magical part of me that exists for some reason that lets me make uninfluenced choices.
You can also refuse the Spiritual experiences you've had, where you've known things that are impossible to know in the current Scientific understanding of a Naturalistic World. I won't be rejecting those, because I don't reject evidence simply because it doesn't fit into my world view. Experiences like yours are extremely common. Science rejects them because they can't be repeated in a lab. I don't find that to be intellectually honest. Many aspects of the human experience can't be repeated in a lab, but that doesn't mean they don't exist.
Well that's nice, but I was raised by two parents who were horrible parents, and often treated me like sh*t. By 12, I was already suicidal, I had to call the cops on my own mother for beating me. By 17, I was already in the mental hospital because I had an overwhelming urge to kill myself. By 19, I was in the mental hospital again with the same urges.It would be dishonest for me to believe this, and cruel. The reason I am a loving and intelligent person is because I was raised by two devoted parents, who paid much of their earnings to give me a good education. They created me, so to speak. If I were to claim that there is some supernatural part of me that makes choices,
However, I rejected Christianity and became in-tune with a very Spiritual part of myself, and since then I have become one of the kindest and most loving people I know. So who do I thank for this? What explanation do I give for it?
I'm not convinced that Nature can fully explain my situation. I'm glad you are convinced that it can, but it hasn't convinced me.
I never claimed that the subjective influences of nature and the environment don't have a HUGE impact on our actions and morality (in fact I've said that they do many times). I just believe that we also have an objective value, accessible by all of us, that can influence our decisions if we let it. It's interesting that you use the example of the boy that was beaten and grew up in a life of murder and violence, because there's plenty examples of people who escape this life. How would you explain that?If I were to claim that there is some supernatural part of me that makes choices, then I would have to say that I am better than a poor immigrant boy who had no parents, was beaten, and grew up to live a hateful life of murder and gang violence. Why did he do those things? He had a magic will which gave him the ability to say no. I must just be better than he is. I vehemently deny this. The ONLY reason that I am a better person than anyone else is because I was gifted with an environment saturated perfectly to grow me into who I am.
You call the claim of Spirituality arrogant, but I've said this entire world view is just my opinion. I think you and Beany are being arrogant, because you seem to be claiming, with ABSOLUTE KNOWLEDGE, that the entire Universe is Materialistic (and callling people who believe otherwise superstitious and cruel). That makes you much more arrogant than me, who just has a very fragile theory.The acceptance of the idea of "free choice" relies on believing in superstitious magic, and ultimately arrogantly claims that some humans are better than others because of their own actions. It denies the beautiful truth that our fates are fully interrelated.
Morality based on Science is just an appeal to values, just like every moral system is an appeal to values based on your world views. You say it's a betterment of self and society; I disagree with you using your own world view - the argument ends because we're simply applying to different values.Morality is the science of determining what human behaviors lead to the betterment of self and society.
You're making the assumption that everybody likes total prosperity and perpetual states of joy etc. However, you can't prove this using your own Naturalistic Explanation of the Universe. Some people don't enjoy prosperity and we've seen this, some people like to hurt others and kill people by the billions. Your assumption here has no intellectual value, because not everybody has agreed to it.Let's say that we decide on the absolute best society you could have. Everyone lives in total prosperity and lives in a perpetual state of joy, etc. We give this a 100 rating.
Now if I were to make the claim that everybody wants to live in total prosperity and a perpetual state of joy because of the knowledge of Spirituality, I would have an argument. I'm not claiming this however.
Okay, then explain the beginning of the Universe. What caused The Big Bang? What caused space and time to begin? If the natural Universe, according to you, is simply an amalgamation of cause and effects, then by definition, a supernatural even must have occurred to create nature. Space and time can't have caused itself, because something had to cause the cause, on and on ad infinitum. This is a fundamental problem with your theory of the Materialistic Universe.I do believe that we live in a Determined universe. Cause and effect has dictated everything that will happen, just like dominos.
Finally Apostate, I don't think you fully understand my position, and it's something I'd like to talk to you more about over Private Messaging. It seems that you think that belief in Spirituality, or that we can change our "destinies" by an inner, guiding force is an insult to humanity and to people who have been raised in a good environment. You also think it's an insult to the people who were raised in a terrible environment, as it's a way of putting blame on them for the life that they were born with. You're completely oversimplifying my position, but my reasons for why are not relevant to this argument. Suffice it to say that human Spirituality only gives hope to the people who were not raised in a good environment, it does not hold people responsible or pin blame on those who fail to use it. You're thinking of religion, which makes verbal claims of right and wrong.
My final question to Beany is this: You say that Evolution can completely explain human behavior. I've given examples before of good things that humans do like donating blood, or jumping on a grenade to save a squad, and you say this can be explained naturally (I don't agree but whatever).
However, what about "terrible" things human beings do? How do you explain serial killers or people who genocide entire races? In nature, animals don't kill for fun, they kill to survive. I haven't heard of a single documented cause of an animal killing other animals just for fun. Give a Naturalistic explanation for this phenomenon.
Originally Posted by senzation54
I'm in agreement about most of what Apostate said - especially on the part about free will, just going to comment on one thing.
I like this definition, because it almost offers science as a viable alternative to religion - there's some good and bad to viewing science as a religion, but I think it's cool at the very least. As for determining our values scientifically, due to the is-ought problem, we can only determine these values when we have assumed the premise that "we want to be moral", which is fine, but I don't want to neglect the many different ways you can be moral. I think most definitions will reach the same conclusions on most things, but if we focus entirely too much on happiness, and neglect health, liberty, and advancing knowledge, we could potentially end up in a Brave New World environment where everyone is popping anti depressants and no one is doing anything. Brings up the interesting moral dilemma of psychiatric drugs too.Much of this discussion can be completely discarded if we accept a modern definition of what morality is. Morality is not an agreement on what is right and what is wrong. Morality is the science of determining what human behaviors lead to the betterment of self and society. It's like math. Our moral preferences have until now been determined by evolution, just like our skin tone, the amount of hair on our bodies, and so on. It just so happens that humans benefit more when they love and share with one another. Some other animals have evolved this moral sense, like wolves, many apes, dolphins, and so on. It provides a fantastic advantage. However, humans have such advanced brains that we can be moral in ways that extend beyond our biological urges. We can figure out things that benefit us more. Everyone does this, even if many people get it wrong and end up doing things which actually harm their happiness, not advance it.
It was just a premise - Sam Harris, nor anyone else, has been able to get around the is-ought problem.For example, Sam Harris in his book, The Moral Landscape, argues that "The worst suffering possible for all life" (paraphrasing) is the worst case scenario for the Universe. He calls the worst suffering for everybody "philosophical bedrock", basically implying that this value of disliking suffering is intrinsic, and that philosophically, you can't regress any further than that.
Until we start to get to the foundation and appeal to epistemic beliefs. There isn't a one who would deny evidence out there - to do so would be to deny the whole of their human experience. And there isn't a one who would deny reason - to do so would be nonsensical. For the sake of argument someone might pretend not to hold these views, but that's like pretending not to value your life but still jumping out of the way of oncoming traffic - your actions will betray your words. People use evidence and people use logic. In a moral discussion, if all parties involved have accepted the premise 'they should be moral', then the rest follows. If they haven't, they likely have to unless they wish to reject their empathy and fairness (which can have dire mental consequences). I've illustrated how this is done, but I'll do so again here.In a materialistic, subjective world view, nothing has intrinsic value intellectually. By this I mean, every value is simply an appeal to another value, on and on ad infinitum. Any appeal to value turns into an infinite regress, because there is no universally agreed-upon value that we can all share. You can't force people to have a certain value, Secular Morality is simply appealing to a person's natural values (values giving by nature) and hoping that it works. Clearly we've seen that it doesn't always work.
As for intrinsic value, we're not arguing for it.
I'd say, let's look at the evidence, then. Evidence clearly supports science and not testimony - you might say that you defined evidence only as testimony, but this means quite a bit. This means you can't trust any of your senses, so you could never parse any testimony because to do so would be through your human senses. This is going to get into a lot of philosophical jargon that I'd rather avoid, but feel free to look it up - I'll just jump to the conclusion that if you define evidence in any usable way, science is going to win out because of the overwhelming superior quality evidence in favor of it. Better quality evidence is more reliable evidence based on more reliable reasoning.You can say, "Science is the best way of gathering evidence". I can say, "Human testimony is the best way of gathering evidence". And according to your world view, neither of us are wrong. To prove me wrong, you're simply appealing to more values. And if I were to try to prove you wrong, I'd simply be appealing to more values. By simply having different values than you guys, using your own world view, I can come to a completely different conclusion than you do. I can come to the conclusion that "Genocide is fine", and there would be no argument you could make against me that would have any intellectual value.
The problem with your argument is that people just aren't that different. We all use evidence and reason, that's as close to intrinsic as you will get outside of the severely deluded and insane. Some people just arrive at false conclusions using less reliable methods. I'm not sure I really want to argue this entire point out, so I'll just conclude with: No - people will hold at least some views in common and with the minimum amount of premises in common the end goal will follow. For everyone else who doesn't fit, we have laws and mental institutions.
Nope, you still value reason and evidence and both of these would conflict with your idea of appealing to the majority is not fallacious. I need not even mention my beliefs, your own values will deconstruct this idea. We can show your beliefs to be inconsistent.If I say "Majority testimony is evidence", you can't make an argument against me, because your values are no more important than mine.
Finally, I think I probably oversimplified Science a little bit. What I should have said is, "In Science, when something gain enough evidence for it, it becomes the default position". For example, in the 20th Century, there were two major theories about the origin of the Universe: Steady State Theory, and the Big Bang Theory. Both Theories had some evidence for them, but neither had enough evidence to become the default position. Eventually, enough evidence was found to make the Big Bang Theory the default position, and the burden of proof is now on the naysayers to prove otherwise.
Also, what you're describing is not the default position, just a shift in the burden of proof - if the big bang was to be disproved, the current model would return to the default position (which is no model). As far as I know, science has nothing to say on whether or not this universe is real. You still can't get around the assumption that we exist.
An appeal to the majority is bad logic - It's unreliable evidence. The majority of people could say anything, but that doesn't make it true - in fact, the majority of people might some day agree with me. The majority of people have also, at some point, disagreed with every scientific belief you now hold. It's an unreliable path to knowledge. You have reached your conclusion through fallacious means.
I don't need to claim anything about the universe to attack your claim of spirituality. I can simply show that it is inconsistent with your epistemic values of reason and evidence. While I do find this superstitious, what I find cruel is your outlook on free will.I think you and Beany are being arrogant, because you seem to be claiming, with ABSOLUTE KNOWLEDGE, that the entire Universe is Materialistic (and callling people who believe otherwise superstitious and cruel). That makes you much more arrogant than me, who just has a very fragile theory.
Sure, animals will kill for other reasons that food or survival. They'll kill over territorial disputes, political disputes, or because another animal pissed that animal off. Here is a cat that might be psychotic. These monkeys have a sense of fairness and show outrage at inequity, here's a TED talk on animal morality. Here are cases of rape documented in animals explained by evolutionary theory. Humans are not special, we're just animals. Again, I wouldn't use a knowledge gap as proof for your argument, that's just an argument from ignorance. Different behavior will be cataloged in time. As for actions that allows us to dehumanize and kill large groups of people - that might be exclusively a human rationalization. It can be explained psychologically, so I don't see a need to invoke the supernatural.However, what about "terrible" things human beings do? How do you explain serial killers or people who genocide entire races? In nature, animals don't kill for fun, they kill to survive. I haven't heard of a single documented cause of an animal killing other animals just for fun. Give a Naturalistic explanation for this phenomenon.
However, like I said, even if morals were not the result of evolution, this doesn't help your case.
One final note: This study that you linked is not very good. Like, this is undergrad quality if not worse.
One of the many things that stuck out to me:He doesn't account for other variables (which I'm sure were mentioned in the original study), such as you're more likely to be paroled if you claim to have a religion. He frequently lets his bias slip through in his inability to account for errors in his own representation of reality (confirmation bias). He presents no research of his own and doesn't seem to have a degree in anything (not an expert). I looked into the journal where it was posted and it was sociology-compass, which doesn't seem to be a real academic journal, as it basically allows anyone to post an essay, even if it has nothing new to offer. Further, what this paper doesn't show is anything to do with atheists and spiritualism.people (Benson 1992; Gorsuch
1995; Hood et al. 1996; Stark and Bainbridge 1996). But when it comes to more serious
or violent crimes, such as murder, there is simply no evidence suggesting that
atheist and secular people are more likely to commit such crimes than religious people.
After all, America’s bulging prisons are not full of atheists; according to Golumbaski
(1997), only 0.2 percent of prisoners in the USA are atheists – a major underrepresentation.
I love this topic. By far the most interesting topic within philosophy, because it ultimately proves that life is ultimately meaningless, and our central focus should be solely to bring ourselves as much pleasure as possible, or immediately commit suicide.
The sad thing about relativism is that it can only logically lead to nihilism. Anyone who disagrees with this point is simply fooling themselves to not face the facts.
Relativism means there is no objective truth. If there is no truth there is no God. If there is no God there are no morals.
If there are no morals, then everything is permitted. There is no difference between a Mother Theresa or an Adolf Hitler.
Because the universe will eventually suffer heat-death (as the universe expands all matter will eventually be a near-infinite distance away from all other matter, and the temperature will drop to nothing, killing any and every living being), whatever we do in life is ultimately meaningless.
It doesn't matter if you go to school. It doesn't matter if you are a doctor who saves lives on a daily basis. It doesn't matter if your parents aren't proud of you. It doesn't matter if you rape and kill. It doesn't matter if you steal from a church to support your drug addiction.
One might argue that a person's life DOES indeed matter, because they influenced history, or made an impact upon others. This argument is terribly short-sighted, as in the end we are all simply heatless dust, and it does not matter what we do in life as it will all eventually come to nothing.
Utilitarians are also terribly short-sighted, for thinking that what's best for humanity makes any difference at all. Does it matter if we survive for a hundred, thousand, million, or trillion more years, if we all ultimately perish in the eventual heat death? What is the point of ANYTHING at all?
Relativism faces these facts knowingly, and says that the best thing we can do is INVENT meaning in our lives. We must CHOOSE what is important to us and stand by it, in order to avoid the fact that nothing actually matters.
**************************
Personally, I don't buy that philosophy, although I used to. I believe in a higher power. If there is no God, then the universe did not come into existence, it has always been. Matter and energy can not spontaneously pop into existence. It either has always been, or it was created by something that HAS always been. I choose the latter because of science. Since our universe has been proven to have a beginning, it must have been created by something. Matter can not spontaneously come into being. Obviously we can not fathom the complexity (or simplicity) of such a being/matter/energy/whatever, however it simply must exist, because we inexplicably exist.
To sum it up:
No morals ---> no truth ---> no objective meaning ---> nihilism ----> live for pleasure/commit suicide
morals ---> truth ---> objective meaning ---> theism ---> live for eternal life
And I swear if someone points at me and says "closed minded Christian/Jew/Muslim", then it will only be proven that you were conceived anally.
Last edited by IstabbedZach; 04-18-2012 at 06:29 PM.
That would make sense if we believed things on how they make us feel rather than truth. Your entire rant about how relativism leads to nihilism was undermined by this:
To which I say... NO ****. That's life. That there's no predestined purpose to life, only what we make of it is one of life's challenges but it's the only way life can have any actual meaning. We matter not because of anything that has to do with history, but because our time here is finite. An infinite afterlife makes this life devoid of meaning in contrast with the empty and unverified promise that there is a life after this one. This leads to true nihilism and death cultism.Relativism faces these facts knowingly, and says that the best thing we can do is INVENT meaning in our lives. We must CHOOSE what is important to us and stand by it
I won't get into the afterlife discussion with you, as I'll gladly admit there's no scientific basis for believing that.
However, if there is no objective meaning to life, then what's wrong with raping and murdering?
Objectively, nothing. Subjectively, I'd like to live, so I'd prefer you not murder. I guess that sounds like a weak position, but like I said - it's in a society's best interest to do what is best for a society much like it is in an organism's best interest to live - if it weren't, they'd die off and be naturally selected against. So societies will outlaw murder and immoral behavior. So, objectively, what will be wrong with rape and murder is that there will be consequences for it - and your actions will be stopped by force. Also, it will be objectively harmful to the human race (not a compelling argument if you aren't concerned with humans, I know). Also, odds are you won't murder and rape because of millions of years of biological conditioning. We naturally have empathy and moral values so it's hard to resist those without utilitarian arguments or psychological techniques such as dehumanization.
If you can't live with having to decide for yourself what you will live for then I'm sorry for that.
Excellent points, Beanybag.
I've already discussed my views on life and I will not do so again, although I do have a belief system that incorporates a reason to be.
To be honest, I agree with everything you're saying. We are on the same side of the fence.
What I am saying is, if there's no objective meaning to life, then the only meaning there can be is subjective, and we CREATE this for ourselves.
Actually subatomic particles are routinely seen coming into and out of existence in particle accelerators. Some physicists such as Stephen Hawking and Lawrence Krauss believe the universe came into existence spontaneously.Even if it were true that subjective morality makes everything pointless this still says nothing as to whether it is correct or not. I don't think that subjective morality makes everything pointless anyway, at least not for myself and almost everyone I know.
Last edited by ProfessorOak; 04-18-2012 at 07:59 PM.
[Map
Beany, you still don't understand the fundamental point that I've been trying to articulate in probably the last 10,000 words.
Your defense of Science, and presentation of it as "the best method for finding evidence and truth" is simply a subjective appeal to value.
If I ask you why Science is the best method of finding evidence, you simply have to appeal to another subjective value to answer.
Why is Science the best method for finding evidence?
Because Scientific proofs can be repeated by anybody.
By why is that valuable?
Because it means the discoveries are reliable.
But why should I care about reliability?
Because it's an important part of finding truth.
I don't agree that reliability is useful in finding the truth.
Well lots of people do.
-----
That's an example of how you'll eventually hit an infinite regress of values when arguing why Science is the best method for finding evidence.
Because you don't have an objective standard by which to measure value, value simply becomes a matter of opinion. Zach is absolutely right, the conclusion you're intellectually forced to make is Nihilistic.
Your defense of Science as a means of finding truth holds no more intellectual value than my defense of Spirituality as a means of finding truth using your own world view.
I think Zach's logic is sound here. A naturalistic Universe had to be created by something supernatural (first cause). I'm not saying that cause is god, in fact I have no idea what that cause is at all. The point I'm making is that I think it's intellectually dishonest to conclude that the Universe is materialistic, if for no other reason than the fact that intellectual conversation after that point is beyond irrelevant.Personally, I don't buy that philosophy, although I used to. I believe in a higher power. If there is no God, then the universe did not come into existence, it has always been. Matter and energy can not spontaneously pop into existence. It either has always been, or it was created by something that HAS always been. I choose the latter because of science. Since our universe has been proven to have a beginning, it must have been created by something. Matter can not spontaneously come into being. Obviously we can not fathom the complexity (or simplicity) of such a being/matter/energy/whatever, however it simply must exist, because we inexplicably exist.
To sum it up:
No morals ---> no truth ---> no objective meaning ---> nihilism ----> live for pleasure/commit suicide
morals ---> truth ---> objective meaning ---> theism ---> live for eternal life
And I swear if someone points at me and says "closed minded Christian/Jew/Muslim", then it will only be proven that you were conceived anally.
A simplified version of what happens when two people in a completely subjective Universe have a conversation is this: You take a 2 liter bottle of Mountain Dew, you shake it up really good, then you put it on the table. Now you take a 2 liter bottle of Coke Zero, shake it up real good, and put it on the table. Now you take the two lids off and voila, you have two chemical reactions that are influencing one another.
Neither of them has a choice with how they react, and the conclusions of their reactions are completely arbitrary.
That is exactly what having a conversation would be like in a materialistic Universe, you and Apostate just can't come to grips with that.
Last edited by Hat_Truck; 04-18-2012 at 08:15 PM.
I do strongly believe in a certain type of spiritual existence and experience. To not believe in spirituality would be to deny much of what I've gone through. However, It is my proposition that spirituality as it exists in the world is not "supernatural" in the sense that it breaks or defies the laws of the universe. I believe that humans just haven't figured out everything yet, and this is one of those areas. I have various theories and I'd love to carry that specific conversation into PMs with you later. I'll type up some stuff to share later today.
If I can summarize, it sounds like what you are saying is this:
I agree with this. I think that almost everyone, even the insane, have the same basic presuppositions. They suppose that they exist. They suppose that their well being and to some extent happiness is important. Do people exist who do not have these presuppositions? Yes. And conversation with such people IS irrational. How could you talk to someone at all who didn't believe in his own existence? See, I don't see a problem with the fact that only 99% of the world assumes that it is important for standard of living to be better in some way. The fact that 1% holds to some bizarre assumption about their experience which is vastly different from mine does not void discussions I have with other people.Unless everyone has the same basic philosophical presuppositions, all conversation is irrational.
I wanted to point out to you that your argument is essentially stolen from the Christians. Yours is a more secular version of the fairly common presuppositional argument, which is as follows:
- There are a number of features of human understanding, such as logic, consciousness, science, morality, meaning, and so on, which the atheist uses, and which we can designate as X.
- The atheist position cannot account for its use of X, because…
- Materialism fundamentally cannot account for X, because of the properties of matter.
- Materialism fundamentally cannot account for X, because of the properties of biological evolution.
- Materialism cannot account for the existence of scientific laws, which require omniscience to be known, but are necessary for X.
- Only theism (with a god as Creator) can justify our use of X. The atheist implicitly presupposes theism when he uses X.
This argument is almost exactly the same as yours, except that we are inserting the vague term "Spirituality" instead of God or theism. This argument is thoroughly refuted here.
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From the look of things this has somehow devolved from a discussion of morality to a discussion of faith based arguments vs reason based arguments ...
Okay, now we're getting somewhere at least.I agree with this. I think that almost everyone, even the insane, have the same basic presuppositions. They suppose that they exist. They suppose that their well being and to some extent happiness is important. Do people exist who do not have these presuppositions? Yes. And conversation with such people IS irrational. How could you talk to someone at all who didn't believe in his own existence? See, I don't see a problem with the fact that only 99% of the world assumes that it is important for standard of living to be better in some way. The fact that 1% holds to some bizarre assumption about their experience which is vastly different from mine does not void discussions I have with other people.
I wanted to point out to you that your argument is essentially stolen from the Christians. Yours is a more secular version of the fairly common presuppositional argument, which is as follows:
However, the presuppisition I keep mentioning is not listed in that Christian argument or any of the examples you gave.
"There are a number of features of human understanding, such as logic, consciousness, science, morality, meaning, and so on, which the atheist uses, and which we can designate as X."
This isn't the argument I'm using. I'm not saying that logic, consciousness, science, and morality can't exist in a subjective Universe, I'm saying its existence is not worth discussing.
Refer to the Mountain Dew and Coke Zero demonstration I gave in my last post. If all human behavior is simply the result of complex chemical reactions, then discussion is pointless. The event of those two bottles of pop are overflowing and spilling all over the table is no more meaningful or important than this discussion. We had no choice but to have it, and the conclusions have no value.
At the end of the conversation, all that happened is that some atoms are now arranged in a different order than other atoms in our brains. It wasn't our choice to have it in the first place, it was just a coincidence based on a variety of factors including our genetics, our environment, and our access to a computer with internet.
Neither you or Beany have given me a reason why intellectual conversation has any value in a subjective Universe. It has about as much value as throwing two different colors of paint against the wall. The same goes for human life. What value does it have in a subjective Universe? A human being has no more or less value than a rock.
The only thing you and Beany can do in order to make other people see things the way you do, is appeal to value. But you've already admitted that all value is completely subjective, and there's no inherent reason they should accept your values, other than the fact that you think they're important (which wasn't your choice btw).
Conversation in this context is completely meaningless. If you argue that the Universe is completely subjective, you also argue that the value of life and morality is completely subjective. If everything is completely subjective, then anybody can draw any conclusion, and no conclusion is better than any other conclusion. If I draw the conclusion that killing people by the billions is good, all you can do is appeal to another subjective value in order to argue with me. If I reject that subjective value, the conversation is over.
The fact that conversation is basically pointless in a completely subjective Universe doesn't give any more evidence for or against it, it just shows that having discussions under that assumption is a very fruitless and arbitrary endeavour. Intellectually, if I reject your values, the conversation is OVER.
I find this extremely interesting. You accept spirituality and things that Science can't fully explain in a Materialistic Universe, yet you still believe absolutely that the Universe is Deterministic. To me, these two beliefs are in conflict with one another. If you admit that there are still parts of reality that Science knows almost nothing about, then it's not intellectually dishonest to come to the conclusion that there could be things about the Universe we still don't understand.I do strongly believe in a certain type of spiritual existence and experience. To not believe in spirituality would be to deny much of what I've gone through. However, It is my proposition that spirituality as it exists in the world is not "supernatural" in the sense that it breaks or defies the laws of the universe. I believe that humans just haven't figured out everything yet, and this is one of those areas.
When I use the term "supernatural" when referring to Spirituality, I simply mean that there is not a natural explanation for this concept yet. I mean it exists outside of our current Scientific understanding of the Universe. When we understand it (if we ever understand it), then it will possibly become part of the "natural" world. Many things in Science that were once considered supernatural, now have natural explanations.
My beef with your argument is that you are assuming that the entire Universe has to operate under the laws of cause and effect. This is in direct conflict with the fact that the Universe's beginning (the beginning of time and space) couldn't have had a natural cause, because time and space can't have created itself.
Beany admits that there could be aspects of the natural world that don't have a cause (which would argue in favor of me), but denies the possibility of a Spiritual "dimension".
Now if Apostate could admit that there are possibly parts of the natural Universe that don't have a cause, and Beany could admit that Spirituality (a realm of the Universe that operates outside of cause and effect) possibly exists, then we would all be on the same playing field.
Yes, I'd love to hear that.I have various theories and I'd love to carry that specific conversation into PMs with you later. I'll type up some stuff to share later today.
Yeah, I don't think I'm going to respond to the argument after this post.
This argues as much in favor of your argument as it does against it (if not more against it). Only the unimaginative mind thinks what is unexplained helps explain their idea. It's nothing more than an argument from ignorance, a spirituality of the gaps. Hearing the old creationist apologetics argument based on causality over and over is really just painful at this point.Beany admits that there could be aspects of the natural world that don't have a cause (which would argue in favor of me), but denies the possibility of a Spiritual "dimension".
I still don't think you understand it, but to make it more clear, I'll get you involved in the process.
You say it's stupid or foolish of me to accept personal observation or majority testimony as evidence, so I ask you:
What makes Science the best evidence?
Give me an answer that isn't based on a subjective appeal to value.
Uhh, ok... Science is the only method that has proven itself, over time, to come up with seemingly correct results for it's inquiries and it can back up it's findings through recreatable experiments, thus demonstrating the accuracy of it's findings to those who would doubt them. It doesn't claim it's findings to be infallible truths, but merely maintains them until they are disproven.
So are you going to ask why I "value" the ability to back up one's findings now?
I don't know if there is anything but a pragmatic solution to the problem of induction.
Uniformity of nature helps - there might be gradual change in the laws of nature, I can't say, but the laws of logic hold strong. We can reason that, for instance, the law of noncontradiction will remain, because if there was no law of noncontradiction, there would still be the law of noncontradiction (see?). In this way, I kinda support Decartes and the ability to reason about the universe, but only to a point.
Also, the power of the scientific method is easily shown empirically. If you value evidence, you value science.
This is circular reasoning Beany. All of the "evidence" that Science produces, only has value under the presupposition that Scientific Evidence if valuable. However, there is no objective reason to accept that presupposition in the first place.Also, the power of the scientific method is easily shown empirically. If you value evidence, you value science.
I can think of at least a thousand reasons to possibly reject the presupposition that Science makes - an example that we're all living the Matrix so the boundaries of our "Natural Universe" are simply fabricated.
Beany you scorn the idea of personal or eyewitness testimony as completely unreliable, but in order to do so, you're chopping off your legs. Personal or majority testimony is used ALL THE TIME in areas outside of Science, in the absence of repeatable experiments or physical proof. Most of what we know about history is only "known" by the writings and testimonies of people. According to you, should we throw all of this out because we can't Scientifically prove it happened? Court cases are another example where eyewitness testimony is one of the most valuable forms of testimony available in the absence of the ability to repeat the event.
You can't just reject personal testimony because it's not Science Beany, it doesn't work that way. The presupposition that you can trust other people's testimony is no less valuable than the presupposition that the Scientific Method is the best way of finding truth.
Forget about Causality, I don't need that to win the argument. I just wish you would either understand or accept the fact that your presupposition that Science has value is baseless. The only argument you have going for you is that lots of people accept the Scientific Method, and that's not an argument at all, according to you.
If the fact that lots of people accept Science is your argument, then according to you we're on equal grounds, which is all I've been saying from the beginning.
Last edited by Hat_Truck; 04-20-2012 at 07:49 PM.
If you value evidence, you value science. I said nothing about 'scientific evidence', I am referring to all forms of evidence. It is evidence through evidence that the scientific method accounts for the uncertainty and unreliability of evidence better than any other known method.
And no, eye witness testimony is not one of the most valuable forms of testimony in court, but one of the weakest forms of evidence. Physical evidence or evidence from an honest observer (such as a camera or recording) are much preferred. If eye witness testimony ever conflicts with physical evidence, we believe the physical evidence over the testimony. Why? Because evidence shows that human memory is unreliable. You can misremember, forget, or even entirely fabricate memories, all unknowingly. And that doesn't get into people who lie intentionally. Eye witnesses are so biased and unreliable and their accounts conflict so often. They're only really worthwhile when you get someone to admit something against their bias or can persuade a jury through an emotional testimony.
So. I'll lay it out again. If you value evidence, you value science and devalue testimony. We are not on equal ground.
Last edited by Beanybag; 04-20-2012 at 08:13 PM.
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