On 7/1/2014 10:22 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
On 30 Jun 2014, at 07:41, meekerdb wrote:
On 6/29/2014 10:20 PM, LizR wrote:
On 30 June 2014 17:02, meekerdb <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>
wrote:
On 6/29/2014 7:33 PM, LizR wrote:
On 30 June 2014 04:43, John Clark <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
On Fri, Jun 27, 2014 at 9:44 PM, LizR <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
> agnosticism is of course the defining principle of the scientific
method, so we really need the concept in order to understand the
status
of scientific theories.
I like what Isaac Asimov, a fellow who knew a thing or two about
science, had
to say on this subject:
"I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it. I've
been an
atheist for years and years, but somehow I felt it was intellectually
unrespectable to say one was an atheist, because it assumed knowledge
that
one didn't have. Somehow, it was better to say one was a humanist or an
agnostic. I finally decided that I'm a creature of emotion as well as of
reason. Emotionally, I am an atheist. I don't have the evidence to
prove that
God doesn't exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn't that I don't
want to
waste my time."
So he knows that he only has enough evidence to be agnostic, but he is
emotionally convinced to be an atheist nonetheless. OK, so that puts him on
a par
with religious believers who are also emotionally convinced, though not of
the
same thing.
No more so that being an aSanta-Clausist.
Well there you go then. I rest my case.
Actually I think there is enough evidence to prove (in the 'beyond
reasonable
doubt' sense) that the God of the bible does not exist. But you don't have
to
prove something doesn't exist to reasonably fail to believe that it does.
I don't
have proof that there is no teapot orbiting Jupiter, but that doesn't make
me
epitemologically irresponsible to assert I don't believe there is one.
Atheists don't just believe that the biblical god doesn't exist, they believe that
there are no supernatural forces involved in the operation of the universe.
Where is this written? Do you speak for all atheists, or just ones in NZ?
While I consider this likely, I don't consider it 100% proven, because as Arthur C
Clark said, any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic, and
it's at least conceivable that there are sufficiently advanced beings out there that
they can act outside what we call nature.
That seems to really waffle. If we knew these beings could so act wouldn't we just
readjust "what we call nature". In fact that's a general problem with saying what it
would mean for some events to be supernatural. In the past many events were thought to
be supernatural, acts of God, e.g. sickness, lightning, drought, earthquakes,...but are
now thought to be natural. So it some new phenomena is observed why wouldn't we just
assume it was natural even if we didn't have an explanation.
I agree with you. I think we can relate this to Occam. If we have a theory which
explains a lot, and fail to explain a new phenomena, we should not abandon the theory,
unless the new phenomena does violate the theory.
I think that "supernatural" has no meaning at all. No more than the incompatibilist
theory of free will which I think does not make sense (I agree with John Clark on this).
Supernatural would mean violating the laws of physics, and that makes no sense because
physics, by quasi-definition, changes itself each time she is violated.
(But comp + materialism do introduce something close to magic: primitive matter capable
of selecting consciousness, but without any role in the computations).
For example I am not 100% sure that the universe wasn't created by some intelligent
beings with sufficiently advanced technology to create big bangs (they may of course
have evolved naturally in another universe). I don't think it's likely, but that's my
emotional prejudices at work. I can't see that I can claim with certainty that it's
impossible, and since these being would fit with some definitions of god (creator of
the unvierse) then I can't say it is 100% proven that god doesn't exist.
Didn't you slip from "something or someone beyond our current explanation" to "god".
You speak for atheists, what do you have to say for religionists? Are they just
worshiping some unknown possibility. What is the god they believe in - that's the god
I don't believe in. I think you have muddled the word "god" in order make it seem
unreasonable to assert definitively that "god" doesn't exist. But in the process
you've made "god" into something quite different from the god of religion. A mere
shadow of the once powerful Yaweh, Baal, Zeus, Thor,...
Earth was thought to be a tortoise, then we learn better.
Similarly the notion of God is the notion of an all encompassing one unifying all
things. It was thought to be a sort of father in the sky, but we might learn better here
too.
Then, the God of the materialist is the physical universe. Here too, we might
learn better.
Materialism might be right, but with comp, we get a problem of how that physical
universe can select a consciousness in a stream of consciousness in arithmetic.
The materialist religion has a tendency to abstract from the existence of consciousness.
That's OK as a fertile methodological strategy, but in my opinion it misses the most
important things: persons. It fails also to explain the nature of matter and where it
comes from.
No problem, computer science and machine's computer science, and the difference between,
unravel a different theology than the materialist one, which seems promising on those
questions. To put is roughly: matter looks like the derivative of mind. Or mind is the
primitive of matter (pun included).
If you are going to narrowly define atheism as not believing in the god of the bible,
then of course I will agree with you (I will even throw in the Norse and Egyptian gods
and a few others, if you like). But that isn't what I am talking about when I say
Atheism, and I doubt it's what Asimov meant either.
You seem to be equating atheism with asserting that nothing beyond our knowledge of
nature exists. Not just failing to believe that such exists, but having 100%
confidence that it doesn't. I don't know anyone who calls himself an atheist and who
makes such a strong statement. Dawkins has explicity said he is not absolutely certain
there is no god of any kind. Vic Stenger explicitly says he cannot rule out a deist god.
Well, they still ignore machine's theology, isn't it? With the original Platonist notion
of God (the truth we search inward, about which the first thing we know is that it is
above us, ineffable, etc).
They don't ignore it. They seek 3p models to explain how the world works, but they start
with subjective observations. Stenger explicitly says that "objective" just means
"intersubjective agreement". The source of knowledge is personal, but it can still lead
to an impersonal model, like particles or arithmetic.
If atheism is the disbelief in the literal Christian god, then all taoist, jewish,
muslims, hinduists, etc. are atheists.
Taoists and Hindus are, but jews and muslims worship a theist god, a creator person who
answers prayers and judges. In fact the muslims claim it is the same god as the jews and
christians and the christians claim they worship the same god as the jews.
Why did Cantor wrote to the pope, and develop long correspondences with a bishop, to
discuss about the possible blaspheme of his naming of the higher infinities?
Because of what his parents told him, "It's blasphemous to name God."
Brent
Cantor was aware that his set theory was already a sort of theology.
The belief in God is a bit like the belief in some infinite. In math it can simplifies
the proofs, despite for many proofs, its use can be eliminated.
There are two main reasons for people to believe in God.
1) because their parents told so.
2) because they look inward and get "personal evidence" (mystical experience)
And there are many intermediates, where people believes in God because their parents
told so, and they look inward and get evidences that they interpret as confirmation of
what their parents said. Some might look inward enough to understand that what their
parents said should be interpreted less literally, for example.
But once a religion becomes a political tool, then "looking inward" is badly seen, and
the free research is banished. Logic get quickly abandoned too.
Bruno
http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ <http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/%7Emarchal/>
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