On Mon, Dec 5, 2016 at 3:38 AM, Brent Meeker <[email protected]> wrote: > > > On 12/4/2016 10:45 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote: >> >> On Sat, Dec 3, 2016 at 6:03 PM, Brent Meeker <[email protected]> wrote: >>> >>> >>> On 12/3/2016 12:03 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote: >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> Physicists confuse physics and metaphysics, by not seeing that >>>> Aristotelianism is incompatible with Mechanism, and by confusing >>>> mechanism >>>> and materialism. Yes, that happens often for fundamental researcher >>>> often >>>> after retirement, except for philosophers, which confuses theology with >>>> Aristotelian theology. René Thom explained well that physicists confuse >>>> the >>>> notion of explanation and prediction. Physicists are good in prediction, >>>> but >>>> naive about explanation. >>> >>> >>> How do you know an explanation is a good one unless it provides good >>> predictions? >>> >>>> Physicalism *is¨a form of creationism. They take the statement that >>>> "there >>>> is a physical universe" as an explanation of why there is a physical >>>> universe. They replace "God made it", by "it exists", but that is not >>>> better. >>> >>> >>> Sure it is. It is better not to add imaginary beings to your explanation >>> for several reasons. First, it implies you know something for which you >>> have no evidence. >>> Second, brings in a lot of baggage about God: He's a >>> powerful person. He demands we enforce certain laws. He hates the same >>> people we dislike. He rewards worship.... >> >> You are implying specific definitions of God (I would guess >> Judaic-Christian). >> >> I just invented a new religion. Here's the sacred text: >> God is the explanation for matter existing and behaving the way it >> does. It is not possible to know God. >> >> Does your argument hold for my religion? > > > Your religion, like Bruno's, misuses the word "god" which has always meant a > person;
Brent, sorry, this is just not true. There have been many different conceptions of god throughout history. > and by doing so you drag in a lot of baggage. There was a group of > atheists in the Dallas area which for a time formed a church and claimed to > be a religion for tax purposes. They defined "God" to be whatever was good > in the world. The IRS disallowed their claim. I assume that evoking the American IRS as a a scholarly authority on such a matter is a joke, right? Telmo. > > > Brent > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
