Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
1Z wrote: Tom Caylor wrote: One thing Schaeffer did was remind us that the assumptions of nature and cause were foundational to modern science. More prevalent on the Christian Right is the Dominionist idea, shared by Reconstructionists, that Christians alone are Biblically mandated to occupy all secular institutions until Christ returns -- and there is no consensus on when that might be. Dominionist thinking precludes coalitions between believers and unbelievers, which is why many Christian rightists will have a hard time compromising with some of the very same Republicans they recently helped elect. The idea of taking dominion over secular society gained widespread currency with the 1981 publication of evangelical philosopher Francis Schaeffer's book -- A Christian Manifesto. *that* Schaeffer..? I'm not going to defend the whole life of Francis Schaeffer, because that's not needed in order to discuss his thoughts related to this List. But it's my opinion that people have taken some of his writings (mainly the more application oriented writings such as A Christian Manifesto) and used them for their own corrupt purposes (such as Dominionism IMO!), as can happen with anyone's writings. In fact, Dominionism goes against the true spirituality that Schaeffer taught, IMO, in that it puts man at the center (of course Dominionists would disagree...!). In a way, this is similar to Bruno's warnings that grabbing for power over others totally invalidates your world view. I want to assure people here that I don't agree with the Dominionist idea, and that's certainly not my purpose here. Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom Caylor wrote: One thing Schaeffer did was remind us that the assumptions of nature and cause were foundational to modern science. More prevalent on the Christian Right is the Dominionist idea, shared by Reconstructionists, that Christians alone are Biblically mandated to occupy all secular institutions until Christ returns -- and there is no consensus on when that might be. Dominionist thinking precludes coalitions between believers and unbelievers, which is why many Christian rightists will have a hard time compromising with some of the very same Republicans they recently helped elect. The idea of taking dominion over secular society gained widespread currency with the 1981 publication of evangelical philosopher Francis Schaeffer's book -- A Christian Manifesto. *that* Schaeffer..? --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Tom, The question I am interested in is not whether it would be a *good thing* for a personal God to exist, but whether it is *the case* that a personal God exists. There are all sorts of things that people would like to be true, but that does not make them true. Stathis Papaioannou Stathis, You asked a similar question before: Tom Caylor writes: But as somewhat of an idealist, I strive to make everything whole, integrate beliefs and works, and live in integrity (same root as integer). So I understand that tension between idealism and real life limitations, whether it be simple finiteness or even evil. But I get my comfort in the thought that the ideal is a real Person who reached across infinity and darkness to love me. You have made this point several times. Do you actually think that there is some empirical reality to your belief, or do you simply think that it is something that is useful regardless of whether it is the case, like the hope that the future will ultimately be better than the past? That is, we don't actually have any evidence that the future *won't* be better than the past, so we may as well believe that it will, because it makes us feel better. Stathis Papaioannou I have said before that my criteria, like yours, for believing something is whether it is true or not. The big question is: How do we know that something is true? What does it mean for something to be true? This is the area of epistemology. I will post my thoughts on epistemology, but it is going to take multiple posts, and I don't have the time right now to develop my thoughts for the first full post, unfortunately. But I am very interested in this. These thoughts on epistemology will be in response to Bruno's latest response to me, since he seems to be hitting closest to the critical differences between an personal and impersonal core. Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 04-déc.-06, à 08:34, Tom Caylor wrote : The existence of a personal God who is not silent answers the questions in a way that an impersonal god or reality does not... I certainly have a methodological problem with such an idea. This is due to my motivation in the subject. I am searching an explanation of what is a person, so assuming the existence of a person (any person, godlike or not) seems to me to beg the question... In my view, your motivation is not large enough. I am also motivated by a problem: the problem of evil. I don't think the real problem of evil is solved or even really addressed with comp. This is because comp cannot define evil correctly. I will try to explain this more. Note also that the major critics by the neoplatonists on Aristotle, besides their diverging opinions on the nature of matter, is the non-person character of the big unnameable, but then for Plotinus the second God (the second primary hypostase is personal), and indeed G* has a personal aspect from the point of view of the machine. I agree (comp agree) with Plotinus that the big first cannot be a person. The second one can. To be sure Plotinus is not always completely clear on that point (especially on his chapter on free-will). None of Plotinus' hypostases are both personal and free from evil (as well as infinite, which we agree is needed (but not sufficient, I maintain!) for the problem of meaning). ... An impersonal origin results in everything finally being equal. Why? This reminds me Smullyan describing two possible reactions of a human in front of the comp hyp: 1) The human does not trust himself and believes that machine are stupid at the start. His reaction about comp is: I am machine thus I am as stupid as a machine. 2) The human trust himself: his reaction with the comp hyp is Cute, it means machine can be as nice as me. Where you can really see that numbers are impersonal is in the fact that they don't solve the problem of evil. Yes, Man is finite and cf Sartre, Plato etc. is not a sufficient integration point within himself for meaning. But man, as a person, is also noble and cruel in his relationship with himself and other persons. With an impersonal core, the universe/multiverse is totally silent in this area. With an impersonal core, Man's alienation with himself and other persons is only because of chance. With an impersonal core, man is simply statistically out of line with the rest of the universe. With an impersonal core, the only possible definition of right vs. wrong is statistical (e.g. the average), and ultimately there is no difference between cruelty and non-cruelty. As Marquis de Sade said, What is, is right. If we were all tied to a computer which takes the average and spits it out as the current definition of right, then after a while, if it weren't for meaningless random fluctuations, it would filter into a constant and we would all end up flat-lining. ... Impersonal+complexity does not produce personal. I would like to see a proof of that statement. The comp first person seems to me to be a counterexample, unless you assume at the start the negation of comp (and weaker-comp). See above paragraph. Impersonal+complexity produces something with evil intrinsically in the mix, and no real solution can exist. See below for more on this. This is the problem Plato had. He knew that you need absolutes in order to have meaning. Plato's gods weren't big enough to be the point of reference needed to define a person. The gods and fates were continuously fighting one another. You are right, but Plato did not know about Church thesis, or incompleteness. I know you get some nice relative forms, G*/G and all that. But in the end it is all meaningless. You are quite quick here. Why would machine's beliefs and hopes be meaningless? You are talking about relative meaning, meaning relative to the machine. This is why I said *in the end* it is all meaningless. Meaning has to address evil and nobility. See below. As Satre pointed out, no finite point has any meaning without an infinite reference point. I totally agree with Sartre's point here. Church thesis is exactly what gives an absolute infinite reference point. OK, even saying for the sake of argument Church's Thesis gives an absolute infinite reference point. This is not sufficient for solving the problem of evil. When you change the language or reference frame from one machine to the other, suddenly evil (in one machine's perspective) gets redefined. This is the problem that happens for example in marriage. The two person's see each other as a machine in an impersonal universe, and the cycle of I'm withholding love or respect until I get love or respect from you starts and doesn't end... until at least one person makes the choice to tap into (and hold onto) the ultimate Person who provides the infinite source of
RE: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom, The question I am interested in is not whether it would be a *good thing* for a personal God to exist, but whether it is *the case* that a personal God exists. There are all sorts of things that people would like to be true, but that does not make them true. Stathis Papaioannou From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Subject: Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief) Date: Sat, 9 Dec 2006 15:33:10 -0800 Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 04-déc.-06, à 08:34, Tom Caylor wrote : The existence of a personal God who is not silent answers the questions in a way that an impersonal god or reality does not... I certainly have a methodological problem with such an idea. This is due to my motivation in the subject. I am searching an explanation of what is a person, so assuming the existence of a person (any person, godlike or not) seems to me to beg the question... In my view, your motivation is not large enough. I am also motivated by a problem: the problem of evil. I don't think the real problem of evil is solved or even really addressed with comp. This is because comp cannot define evil correctly. I will try to explain this more. Note also that the major critics by the neoplatonists on Aristotle, besides their diverging opinions on the nature of matter, is the non-person character of the big unnameable, but then for Plotinus the second God (the second primary hypostase is personal), and indeed G* has a personal aspect from the point of view of the machine. I agree (comp agree) with Plotinus that the big first cannot be a person. The second one can. To be sure Plotinus is not always completely clear on that point (especially on his chapter on free-will). None of Plotinus' hypostases are both personal and free from evil (as well as infinite, which we agree is needed (but not sufficient, I maintain!) for the problem of meaning). ... An impersonal origin results in everything finally being equal. Why? This reminds me Smullyan describing two possible reactions of a human in front of the comp hyp: 1) The human does not trust himself and believes that machine are stupid at the start. His reaction about comp is: I am machine thus I am as stupid as a machine. 2) The human trust himself: his reaction with the comp hyp is Cute, it means machine can be as nice as me. Where you can really see that numbers are impersonal is in the fact that they don't solve the problem of evil. Yes, Man is finite and cf Sartre, Plato etc. is not a sufficient integration point within himself for meaning. But man, as a person, is also noble and cruel in his relationship with himself and other persons. With an impersonal core, the universe/multiverse is totally silent in this area. With an impersonal core, Man's alienation with himself and other persons is only because of chance. With an impersonal core, man is simply statistically out of line with the rest of the universe. With an impersonal core, the only possible definition of right vs. wrong is statistical (e.g. the average), and ultimately there is no difference between cruelty and non-cruelty. As Marquis de Sade said, What is, is right. If we were all tied to a computer which takes the average and spits it out as the current definition of right, then after a while, if it weren't for meaningless random fluctuations, it would filter into a constant and we would all end up flat-lining. ... Impersonal+complexity does not produce personal. I would like to see a proof of that statement. The comp first person seems to me to be a counterexample, unless you assume at the start the negation of comp (and weaker-comp). See above paragraph. Impersonal+complexity produces something with evil intrinsically in the mix, and no real solution can exist. See below for more on this. This is the problem Plato had. He knew that you need absolutes in order to have meaning. Plato's gods weren't big enough to be the point of reference needed to define a person. The gods and fates were continuously fighting one another. You are right, but Plato did not know about Church thesis, or incompleteness. I know you get some nice relative forms, G*/G and all that. But in the end it is all meaningless. You are quite quick here. Why would machine's beliefs and hopes be meaningless? You are talking about relative meaning, meaning relative to the machine. This is why I said *in the end* it is all meaningless. Meaning has to address evil and nobility. See below. As Satre pointed out, no finite point has any meaning without an infinite reference point. I totally agree with Sartre's point here. Church thesis is exactly what gives an absolute infinite reference point. OK, even saying for the sake of argument Church's Thesis gives an absolute
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Tom, The question I am interested in is not whether it would be a *good thing* for a personal God to exist, but whether it is *the case* that a personal God exists. There are all sorts of things that people would like to be true, but that does not make them true. Stathis Papaioannou In fact the problem of evil is that things people don't like, such as cancer, AIDS, tsunamis,..., exist in spite of the supposed existence of a loving, personal God. If the world is impersonal, then there is no reason to suppose that it is all good or all evil, but a mixture - which is the way it seems to be. Brent Meeker From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Subject: Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief) Date: Sat, 9 Dec 2006 15:33:10 -0800 Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 04-déc.-06, à 08:34, Tom Caylor wrote : The existence of a personal God who is not silent answers the questions in a way that an impersonal god or reality does not... I certainly have a methodological problem with such an idea. This is due to my motivation in the subject. I am searching an explanation of what is a person, so assuming the existence of a person (any person, godlike or not) seems to me to beg the question... In my view, your motivation is not large enough. I am also motivated by a problem: the problem of evil. I don't think the real problem of evil is solved or even really addressed with comp. This is because comp cannot define evil correctly. I will try to explain this more. Note also that the major critics by the neoplatonists on Aristotle, besides their diverging opinions on the nature of matter, is the non-person character of the big unnameable, but then for Plotinus the second God (the second primary hypostase is personal), and indeed G* has a personal aspect from the point of view of the machine. I agree (comp agree) with Plotinus that the big first cannot be a person. The second one can. To be sure Plotinus is not always completely clear on that point (especially on his chapter on free-will). None of Plotinus' hypostases are both personal and free from evil (as well as infinite, which we agree is needed (but not sufficient, I maintain!) for the problem of meaning). ... An impersonal origin results in everything finally being equal. Why? This reminds me Smullyan describing two possible reactions of a human in front of the comp hyp: 1) The human does not trust himself and believes that machine are stupid at the start. His reaction about comp is: I am machine thus I am as stupid as a machine. 2) The human trust himself: his reaction with the comp hyp is Cute, it means machine can be as nice as me. Where you can really see that numbers are impersonal is in the fact that they don't solve the problem of evil. Yes, Man is finite and cf Sartre, Plato etc. is not a sufficient integration point within himself for meaning. But man, as a person, is also noble and cruel in his relationship with himself and other persons. With an impersonal core, the universe/multiverse is totally silent in this area. With an impersonal core, Man's alienation with himself and other persons is only because of chance. With an impersonal core, man is simply statistically out of line with the rest of the universe. With an impersonal core, the only possible definition of right vs. wrong is statistical (e.g. the average), and ultimately there is no difference between cruelty and non-cruelty. As Marquis de Sade said, What is, is right. If we were all tied to a computer which takes the average and spits it out as the current definition of right, then after a while, if it weren't for meaningless random fluctuations, it would filter into a constant and we would all end up flat-lining. ... Impersonal+complexity does not produce personal. I would like to see a proof of that statement. The comp first person seems to me to be a counterexample, unless you assume at the start the negation of comp (and weaker-comp). See above paragraph. Impersonal+complexity produces something with evil intrinsically in the mix, and no real solution can exist. See below for more on this. This is the problem Plato had. He knew that you need absolutes in order to have meaning. Plato's gods weren't big enough to be the point of reference needed to define a person. The gods and fates were continuously fighting one another. You are right, but Plato did not know about Church thesis, or incompleteness. I know you get some nice relative forms, G*/G and all that. But in the end it is all meaningless. You are quite quick here. Why would machine's beliefs and hopes be meaningless? You are talking about relative meaning, meaning relative to the machine. This is why I said *in the end* it is all meaningless. Meaning has to address evil and nobility. See below. As Satre pointed out
RE: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Brent meeker writes: Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Tom, The question I am interested in is not whether it would be a *good thing* for a personal God to exist, but whether it is *the case* that a personal God exists. There are all sorts of things that people would like to be true, but that does not make them true. Stathis Papaioannou In fact the problem of evil is that things people don't like, such as cancer, AIDS, tsunamis,..., exist in spite of the supposed existence of a loving, personal God. If the world is impersonal, then there is no reason to suppose that it is all good or all evil, but a mixture - which is the way it seems to be. Brent Meeker It could be argued that not even God could create a world in which there are no accidents, conflicts of interest, disappointments, and so on, at least not without severely limiting his creatures' freedom. However, it would have been possible for God to limit the capacity for suffering, favouring pleasure rather than avoidance of pain as a motivating factor. Philosopher David Pearce in The Hedonistic Imperative gives an account of how this might be done, arguing that it is our duty to abolish all suffering at its final common pathway in the brain. Evolution doesn't care how much we suffer, but a God who did care about us could have designed us differently. Stathis Papaioannou _ Be one of the first to try Windows Live Mail. http://ideas.live.com/programpage.aspx?versionId=5d21c51a-b161-4314-9b0e-4911fb2b2e6d --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Brent meeker writes: It could be argued that not even God could create a world in which there are no accidents, conflicts of interest, disappointments, and so on, at least not without severely limiting his creatures' freedom. However, it would have been possible for God to limit the capacity for suffering, favouring pleasure rather than avoidance of pain as a motivating factor. A sado-masochistic world would do the trick, wouldn't it? George :-) --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Brent meeker writes: Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Tom, The question I am interested in is not whether it would be a *good thing* for a personal God to exist, but whether it is *the case* that a personal God exists. There are all sorts of things that people would like to be true, but that does not make them true. Stathis Papaioannou In fact the problem of evil is that things people don't like, such as cancer, AIDS, tsunamis,..., exist in spite of the supposed existence of a loving, personal God. If the world is impersonal, then there is no reason to suppose that it is all good or all evil, but a mixture - which is the way it seems to be. Brent Meeker It could be argued that not even God could create a world in which there are no accidents, conflicts of interest, disappointments, and so on, at least not without severely limiting his creatures' freedom. However, it would have been possible for God to limit the capacity for suffering, favouring pleasure rather than avoidance of pain as a motivating factor. Philosopher David Pearce in The Hedonistic Imperative gives an account of how this might be done, arguing that it is our duty to abolish all suffering at its final common pathway in the brain. Evolution doesn't care how much we suffer, but a God who did care about us could have designed us differently. Stathis Papaioannou And He could have created a world without smallpox - something even we poor humans managed eventually. Brent Meeker --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Le 04-déc.-06, à 23:41, Brent Meeker a écrit : All the theologians I know of (except maybe Bruno who has his own definition of theology) hold that God provides all meaning - in fact many regard that as a kind of proof of the existence of God: If God doesn't exist our lives will have no meaning. A kind of proof-by-nihilism. Brent, you already talked once as if I was using the word theology in some personal sense, and I already give you the source of my definition. I am using the word theology in the sense of the one who invented the world, and as it has been used during more than one millenium: Plato. The definition is in the laws. Plato defined it by the science, that is what reason can say about, the Gods and the God and more generally any attempt toward fundamental matter. It is an entirely contingent and sad fact that theology has been more or less stolen by the temporal authoritative power of the Roman, and that still today many people forget that theology has been and can still be a science, ie something than can be driven by the modesty attitude. The reason is that the Church and their objective allied, the atheists which are as dogmatic as the leaders of institutionalized churches, know that such reasoning on such fundamental matters, is always threatening their temporal power. Now all tradition have had good theologians at all time, even if sometimes some are obliged to talk in coded way just for not finishing on the fire. To refuse the use of the original word theology is just a way to defend (purposefully or not) 1500 years of institutionalized charlatanry. Scientist who says today that the mind body is a false problem are just playing that game, and today, atheism is much more an aid to fake religion than even moderate christian theology (which indeed borrowed many things in science from the greeks). You can search for many informations and references on the web which will confirm what I say by Googelling, for example, on the word plato theology. Just one second goggeling: from http://mb-soft.com/believe/txn/theology.htm: The term theology is a compound of the Greek words theos (god) and logos (word, discourse, thought, reason). Theology may therefore be defined as reasoned discourse about God. In a strict sense theology considers only the existence and nature of divine being. In its wider and more usual sense, however, it may encompass the full range of the divine's relationships to the world and to humanity as well as the full variety of human responses to the divine. Although used more commonly of Western religions, the term may be applied to the systematic study and presentation of any religion. The first to use the term was apparently the Greek philosopher Plato, for whom theology meant a rational conception of the divine as opposed to poetic myths about the gods. The subsequent Greek tradition of rational theology survived well into Christian times, and aspects of it have been influential in shaping various Jewish, Christian, and Islamic theologies. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Brent Meeker wrote: Tom Caylor wrote: OK. I'll take the belief out of it for your convenience. 1) If the infinite personal God of love exists this makes it possible for me to take my eyes off of myself, by looking at God (granted that such a thing is allowed). (not done yet) 2) If the infinite personal God of love does not exist, then looking at God is just a weird way of looking at myself (the make-believe God would be in my image, instead of visa versa). Both of the above statements are true. We are talking about two different underlying beliefs. This is important. *But*, I am saying that if a personal God does not exist, modern philosophy, literature, art, (and true theology in my view) etc. has concluded that there is no basis for personal meaning and significance. Just because *some* philosophers, writers, and artists (and *all* theologians) I have to say that a huge percentage of theologians that have concluded that you can provide your own meaning to life. All the theologians I know of (except maybe Bruno who has his own definition of theology) hold that God provides all meaning - in fact many regard that as a kind of proof of the existence of God: If God doesn't exist our lives will have no meaning. A kind of proof-by-nihilism. ... Brent Meeker People are more unwilling to give up the word 'God' than to give up the idea for which the word has hitherto stood --- Bertrand Russell Brent (and also Bruno), Schaeffer's trilogy I've referenced deals with modern theology's abandonment of God (the personal God who is there and has communicated and interacted with us, rather than just an idea). Of course theologians haven't given up the word 'God' or else they wouldn't be called theologians. As Bruno has mentioned, early Christianity was influenced by ancient Greek thought, specifically the neo-Platonists, but this was really in the use of their powerful reasoning tools. The content of Christianity remained based on the history-based Hebrew God. The Hebrew view of truth was based on historical facts, in modern terms I guess empirical evidence would be sort of an analogue, but in an open system where God is in control and is free to act, rather than the modern closed system. The modern abandonment started in philosophy around Kant, then with Hegel's abandonment of antithesis, then with Kierkegaard's founding of existentialism, where the history/fact-based view of truth was abandoned in lieu of irrational (non-rational) ideas. This abandonment moved through art, music, and culture and finally theology. So now a large percentage of theologians are existentialists (like most of the rest of society) who use the word 'God' to refer to an idea that is not based on the God who is there, but on ideas that they believe work. The modern meaning of meaning is a first-person feeling which ultimately has no communicable rational meaning (as the existentialists confirm) in the sense that science has meaning in that it can pursue something based on reality. Modern existentialist theology's faith is a contentless faith, even though it uses words. It has abandoned the original faith in the personal God who is there and is not silent. (Schaeffer's phrase Is Not Silent is an answer to Wittengenstein's famous quote.) Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom Caylor wrote: (Schaeffer's phrase Is Not Silent is an answer to Wittengenstein's famous quote.) Sorry, Wittgenstein. I must have had Witten on the brane ;) Regarding Bruno's use of the word 'theology', I agree with Brent that it is unconventional to the point of targeting the wrong audience, at least from the perspective of the English speaking Western world. Largely, only believers in a personal God are interested in 'theology' in this day, as far as Western theology goes. An impersonal god is not considered as part of this theology. On the other hand, I still stand by my statements regarding the present day abandonment of the historical connection of the real personal God (in whose image we are made), and turning to a personal (new meaning: non-rational, first-person perspective) God made after our image. With this abandonment comes putting man at the center of the philosophical universe, which is the tendency of all of us since the Fall. My guess is that Bruno's impersonal 'god' falls into the category of philosophy. The believer in the personal God believes that all of philosophy can be pursued from this perspective (it would only make sense!). However, of course only a believer in the personal God can have this perspective. From the modern existentialist view, philosophy can be pursued only by first cleansing the mind of all historical facts. The following link on Thomas Aquinas, a controversial character between theology and philosophy, has some interesting thoughts on the perceived (relative) border(s) between the two. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aquinas/ Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
RE: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom Cayolor writes: Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, why does it make sense? What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? What is the basis for truth? What is truth? The first two questions are difficult, but they apply to God as much as the universe, despite ontological argument trickery whereby God is just defined as existing necessarily (Gaunilo's answer to Anselm was that you can also just define a perfect island as an island which exists necessarily, and therefore cannot not exist). The other questions are easy: blind evolution made us this way. The word blind here is a statement of faith in impersonality. I would paraphrase Brent Meeker and ask, Why does 'blind' have to be the default? My response to Bruno addresses the assumption of impersonality. It's Occam's Razor: why add the complication of guided evolution (or other theistic intervention) when you can explain a phenomenon without it? There doesn't seem to be anything in biology that could not have come about through random processes in a universe with physical laws such as our own. If God played any role in it he is at best completely indifferent to the plight of his creatures. It suits blind evolution very well that being devoured by a predator is as unpleasant as possible for the prey, but how does this fit in with the plans of the gentle God of modern Christian apologists? However, from the birth of modern science, we have taken a journey to dispense with any kind of faith and try to be exhaustive in our automony and control. Ironically we have abandoned rationality (including antithesis), and we have abandoned ourselves to ourselves. We are lost in a silent sea of meaningless 0's and 1's, and man is a machine. This is why I said that when we put ourselves at the center of our worldview, it is a prison. Er, science is usually taken as more concerned with rationality than religion and less anthropocentric than religion. Turning it around seems more a rhetorical ploy than a defensible position. Stathis Papaioannou Science has to take rationality by faith. Without a personal God both science and religion are anthropocentric because in such a configuration there is no one else besides us. Science doesn't have to take anything by faith, even though scientists, being after all the same species that created religions, often do. Science is at bottom just systematised common sense. I see storm clouds so I take my umbrella: that's meteorology. If you want to call it faith because there is no way of being certain that past storm cloud behaviour will be repeated in future, then what term would you reserve for the person who leaves his umbrella behind because he believes that today God will miraculously make the raindrops miss him? As for anthropocentricity without a personal God, I think that is a subterfuge. Of two groups of fish, one believing that God is a big fish watching over them and the other lacking any such belief, which group would you say is the more fish-centric? Stathis Papaioannou _ Be one of the first to try Windows Live Mail. http://ideas.live.com/programpage.aspx?versionId=5d21c51a-b161-4314-9b0e-4911fb2b2e6d --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
RE: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom Caylor writes: I agree (with the proviso that I suppose that by machine you talk about the old pregodelian conception of (non universal) machine. We don't know what universal machine are capable of, and I don't see why a present God would abandon them. I hope you can harbor some doubt about the proposition that machine are stupid, lack subjective phenomenality, etc. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ I don't want to commit my future to a machine. Tom It's an interesting turn of phrase in the current discussion: did you really mean to say I don't want to or I don't think it is the case, independently of what I want? Anyway, I don't see how you could deny you are a machine any more than you could deny a car is a machine. You are made up of tiny little components all working together smoothly, and if something breaks, you break. God could have made us solid like a potato animated by an immaterial soul, or left out the solid part altogether, but instead he made every part function in accordance with the basically very well understood chemistry of a handful of elements. It's amazing that these chemical reactions give rise to walking, talking humans, but then I'm still pretty impressed that my car can take me to places in quiet comfort while thousands of explosions are occurring in the engine. Stathis Papaioannou _ Be one of the first to try Windows Live Mail. http://ideas.live.com/programpage.aspx?versionId=5d21c51a-b161-4314-9b0e-4911fb2b2e6d --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Le 04-déc.-06, à 08:34, Tom Caylor wrote : The existence of a personal God who is not silent answers the questions in a way that an impersonal god or reality does not... I certainly have a methodological problem with such an idea. This is due to my motivation in the subject. I am searching an explanation of what is a person, so assuming the existence of a person (any person, godlike or not) seems to me to beg the question. The same reason explains why I don't assume a physical reality. This is because I'm interested in understanding where physical realities or their appearances comes from. As a wanting to be a scientist in those matter I have to be agnostic at the start, if only methodologically. Note also that the major critics by the neoplatonists on Aristotle, besides their diverging opinions on the nature of matter, is the non-person character of the big unnameable, but then for Plotinus the second God (the second primary hypostase is personal), and indeed G* has a personal aspect from the point of view of the machine. I agree (comp agree) with Plotinus that the big first cannot be a person. The second one can. To be sure Plotinus is not always completely clear on that point (especially on his chapter on free-will). Numbers are impersonal. You say so. Assuming comp we already have to accept that numbers can have personal features. Worst, by Godel Co. Numbers cannot not have personal (indexical) features relatively to each others. (cf the Wi and the Fi). An impersonal origin results in everything finally being equal. Why? This reminds me Smullyan describing two possible reactions of a human in front of the comp hyp: 1) The human does not trust himself and believes that machine are stupid at the start. His reaction about comp is: I am machine thus I am as stupid as a machine. 2) The human trust himself: his reaction with the comp hyp is Cute, it means machine can be as nice as me. Only an infinite personal God is big enough to produce personality. Even just applying Theaetetus' standard definition of the knower to the godel-lob predicate of provability gives rise to a genuine knower which is right in its non belief that he is a machine. (I have not said that he believes he is not a machine, I am just saying that he does not believe being a machine. careful because such a nuance is often dismissed). Impersonal+complexity does not produce personal. I would like to see a proof of that statement. The comp first person seems to me to be a counterexample, unless you assume at the start the negation of comp (and weaker-comp). This is the problem Plato had. He knew that you need absolutes in order to have meaning. Plato's gods weren't big enough to be the point of reference needed to define a person. The gods and fates were continuously fighting one another. You are right, but Plato did not know about Church thesis, or incompleteness. I know you get some nice relative forms, G*/G and all that. But in the end it is all meaningless. You are quite quick here. Why would machine's beliefs and hopes be meaningless? As Satre pointed out, no finite point has any meaning without an infinite reference point. I totally agree with Sartre's point here. Church thesis is exactly what gives an absolute infinite reference point. But this is all a relative faith, which ends up being faith in faith in...(?) When talking about ultimate questions, a relative faith doesn't do. When your life is on the line, an impersonal structure just doesn't do. This could be a reason for hoping, not for accepting a personal being *as an explanation*. Cautious: wishful thinking. I don't want to commit my future to a machine. Me too. But I do it when I take a plane, car, train, lift, etc. I can imagine that tomorrow some people will accept an artificial brain just for being able to pray their God a little longer ... In another post you said: Everything that there is is there. But this is the ultimate in begging the question. The question remains, why is everything (I see) there? Why do I exist? We have to accept something, if only because we cannot explain prime numbers without accepting the numbers, then comp explains why numbers talk like if they were sensible person, like if they were not numbers, like if they believe in a physical reality and beyond. And above all, G* explains why those beliefs are correct. I can indeed sum up a part of the interview by: machine will correctly discover their unnameable self and G* will correctly prove that such a self is not a machine from the first and third person point of view. Relative truth is ultimately useless when it comes to the end of my life. I agree with you. It is really the discovery of Church thesis, which introduces a lot of absoluteness in math (Godel found this miraculous) that I have begin to take mathematicalism seriously. I would paraphrase Brent
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Tom Cayolor writes: Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, why does it make sense? What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? What is the basis for truth? What is truth? The first two questions are difficult, but they apply to God as much as the universe, despite ontological argument trickery whereby God is just defined as existing necessarily (Gaunilo's answer to Anselm was that you can also just define a perfect island as an island which exists necessarily, and therefore cannot not exist). The other questions are easy: blind evolution made us this way. The word blind here is a statement of faith in impersonality. I would paraphrase Brent Meeker and ask, Why does 'blind' have to be the default? My response to Bruno addresses the assumption of impersonality. It's Occam's Razor: why add the complication of guided evolution (or other theistic intervention) when you can explain a phenomenon without it? There doesn't seem to be anything in biology that could not have come about through random processes in a universe with physical laws such as our own. If God played any role in it he is at best completely indifferent to the plight of his creatures. It suits blind evolution very well that being devoured by a predator is as unpleasant as possible for the prey, but how does this fit in with the plans of the gentle God of modern Christian apologists? I'm not talking about the practice of science. I'm talking about the underlying beliefs. The practice of science concentrates on what we can see, the road past and present. Our underlying beliefs are what really count when it comes to what our destination is going to be. This is the level at which Carl Woese is talking in his paper A New Biology For A New Century. However, from the birth of modern science, we have taken a journey to dispense with any kind of faith and try to be exhaustive in our automony and control. Ironically we have abandoned rationality (including antithesis), and we have abandoned ourselves to ourselves. We are lost in a silent sea of meaningless 0's and 1's, and man is a machine. This is why I said that when we put ourselves at the center of our worldview, it is a prison. Er, science is usually taken as more concerned with rationality than religion and less anthropocentric than religion. Turning it around seems more a rhetorical ploy than a defensible position. Stathis Papaioannou Science has to take rationality by faith. Without a personal God both science and religion are anthropocentric because in such a configuration there is no one else besides us. Science doesn't have to take anything by faith, even though scientists, being after all the same species that created religions, often do. Science is at bottom just systematised common sense. I see storm clouds so I take my umbrella: that's meteorology. If you want to call it faith because there is no way of being certain that past storm cloud behaviour will be repeated in future, then what term would you reserve for the person who leaves his umbrella behind because he believes that today God will miraculously make the raindrops miss him? As I've mentioned in my other more recent posts, I'm talking about our different beliefs underlying the fact that we live as though there is a nature to reality, as though we have personal meaning and significance, that there is a why to our existence, not just a how (evolution etc. etc.) 1) I say that a true belief in the existence of a personal God would make it possible for me to take my eyes off of myself. 2) You say that the false belief in the existence of a personal God implies that looking at God is just a weird way of looking at myself. Both of the above statements are true. We are talking about two different underlying beliefs. But, I am saying that if you accept that the existence of a personal God is false (in line with what #2 is talking about), modern philosophy, literature, art, etc. has concluded that there is no basis for personal meaning and significance. Yes lab scientists and engineers (I'm one)
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Tom Caylor writes: I agree (with the proviso that I suppose that by machine you talk about the old pregodelian conception of (non universal) machine. We don't know what universal machine are capable of, and I don't see why a present God would abandon them. I hope you can harbor some doubt about the proposition that machine are stupid, lack subjective phenomenality, etc. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ I don't want to commit my future to a machine. Tom It's an interesting turn of phrase in the current discussion: did you really mean to say I don't want to or I don't think it is the case, independently of what I want? I said I don't want to... to bring it back to the point that meaning is ultimately personal. The modern philosophers redefined personal as meaning meaningless and this is the suppositional sea of 0's and 1's that we are all swimming in, actually sinking in if we are a machine. Anyway, I don't see how you could deny you are a machine any more than you could deny a car is a machine. You are made up of tiny little components all working together smoothly, and if something breaks, you break. God could have made us solid like a potato animated by an immaterial soul, or left out the solid part altogether, but instead he made every part function in accordance with the basically very well understood chemistry of a handful of elements. It's amazing that these chemical reactions give rise to walking, talking humans, but then I'm still pretty impressed that my car can take me to places in quiet comfort while thousands of explosions are occurring in the engine. Stathis Papaioannou _ This is going to be fun exercise. I am not a machine. There, I just denied it, even though you don't see how. But you now have some empirical evidence. Unless you don't consider me as a valid part of the population. Just kidding, my point is that we can't use science to answer these questions. You and Bruno already are hypothesizing that we are machines. It's fun to see where it leads, but after a finite number of steps I want to stop (not it is the case that I will stop independently of what I want, whether or not that is true) because I *believe* I am not a machine. By the way, a car cannot do what I just did (in a finite number of steps), unless it is preprogrammed to do it, but then that isn't the real thing. Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom Caylor wrote: Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Tom Cayolor writes: Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, why does it make sense? What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? What is the basis for truth? What is truth? The first two questions are difficult, but they apply to God as much as the universe, despite ontological argument trickery whereby God is just defined as existing necessarily (Gaunilo's answer to Anselm was that you can also just define a perfect island as an island which exists necessarily, and therefore cannot not exist). The other questions are easy: blind evolution made us this way. The word blind here is a statement of faith in impersonality. I would paraphrase Brent Meeker and ask, Why does 'blind' have to be the default? My response to Bruno addresses the assumption of impersonality. It's Occam's Razor: why add the complication of guided evolution (or other theistic intervention) when you can explain a phenomenon without it? There doesn't seem to be anything in biology that could not have come about through random processes in a universe with physical laws such as our own. If God played any role in it he is at best completely indifferent to the plight of his creatures. It suits blind evolution very well that being devoured by a predator is as unpleasant as possible for the prey, but how does this fit in with the plans of the gentle God of modern Christian apologists? I'm not talking about the practice of science. I'm talking about the underlying beliefs. The practice of science concentrates on what we can see, the road past and present. Our underlying beliefs are what really count when it comes to what our destination is going to be. A peculiarly Christian view - faith trumps all. Why don't our actions count more than our beliefs? If I'm driving to San Francisco, I'll get there I'll if I make the right turns - even if I believe I'm driving to San Diego. This is the level at which Carl Woese is talking in his paper A New Biology For A New Century. However, from the birth of modern science, we have taken a journey to dispense with any kind of faith and try to be exhaustive in our automony and control. Ironically we have abandoned rationality (including antithesis), and we have abandoned ourselves to ourselves. We are lost in a silent sea of meaningless 0's and 1's, and man is a machine. This is why I said that when we put ourselves at the center of our worldview, it is a prison. Er, science is usually taken as more concerned with rationality than religion and less anthropocentric than religion. Turning it around seems more a rhetorical ploy than a defensible position. Stathis Papaioannou Science has to take rationality by faith. Without a personal God both science and religion are anthropocentric because in such a configuration there is no one else besides us. Science doesn't have to take anything by faith, even though scientists, being after all the same species that created religions, often do. Science is at bottom just systematised common sense. I see storm clouds so I take my umbrella: that's meteorology. If you want to call it faith because there is no way of being certain that past storm cloud behaviour will be repeated in future, then what term would you reserve for the person who leaves his umbrella behind because he believes that today God will miraculously make the raindrops miss him? As I've mentioned in my other more recent posts, I'm talking about our different beliefs underlying the fact that we live as though there is a nature to reality, as though we have personal meaning and significance, that there is a why to our existence, not just a how (evolution etc. etc.) Asking why? already assumes a teleological answer. So what's your answer and what's the evidence for it? 1) I say that a true belief in the existence of a personal God would make it possible for me to take my eyes off of myself. So would a false belief in God, or any belief that anything exists besides you. Only a solipist fails to believe there are things outside him. 2) You say that the false belief in the existence of a personal God implies that looking at God is just a weird way of
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Brent Meeker wrote: Tom Caylor wrote: Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Tom Cayolor writes: Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, why does it make sense? What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? What is the basis for truth? What is truth? The first two questions are difficult, but they apply to God as much as the universe, despite ontological argument trickery whereby God is just defined as existing necessarily (Gaunilo's answer to Anselm was that you can also just define a perfect island as an island which exists necessarily, and therefore cannot not exist). The other questions are easy: blind evolution made us this way. The word blind here is a statement of faith in impersonality. I would paraphrase Brent Meeker and ask, Why does 'blind' have to be the default? My response to Bruno addresses the assumption of impersonality. It's Occam's Razor: why add the complication of guided evolution (or other theistic intervention) when you can explain a phenomenon without it? There doesn't seem to be anything in biology that could not have come about through random processes in a universe with physical laws such as our own. If God played any role in it he is at best completely indifferent to the plight of his creatures. It suits blind evolution very well that being devoured by a predator is as unpleasant as possible for the prey, but how does this fit in with the plans of the gentle God of modern Christian apologists? I'm not talking about the practice of science. I'm talking about the underlying beliefs. The practice of science concentrates on what we can see, the road past and present. Our underlying beliefs are what really count when it comes to what our destination is going to be. A peculiarly Christian view - faith trumps all. Why don't our actions count more than our beliefs? If I'm driving to San Francisco, I'll get there I'll if I make the right turns - even if I believe I'm driving to San Diego. This is the level at which Carl Woese is talking in his paper A New Biology For A New Century. However, from the birth of modern science, we have taken a journey to dispense with any kind of faith and try to be exhaustive in our automony and control. Ironically we have abandoned rationality (including antithesis), and we have abandoned ourselves to ourselves. We are lost in a silent sea of meaningless 0's and 1's, and man is a machine. This is why I said that when we put ourselves at the center of our worldview, it is a prison. Er, science is usually taken as more concerned with rationality than religion and less anthropocentric than religion. Turning it around seems more a rhetorical ploy than a defensible position. Stathis Papaioannou Science has to take rationality by faith. Without a personal God both science and religion are anthropocentric because in such a configuration there is no one else besides us. Science doesn't have to take anything by faith, even though scientists, being after all the same species that created religions, often do. Science is at bottom just systematised common sense. I see storm clouds so I take my umbrella: that's meteorology. If you want to call it faith because there is no way of being certain that past storm cloud behaviour will be repeated in future, then what term would you reserve for the person who leaves his umbrella behind because he believes that today God will miraculously make the raindrops miss him? As I've mentioned in my other more recent posts, I'm talking about our different beliefs underlying the fact that we live as though there is a nature to reality, as though we have personal meaning and significance, that there is a why to our existence, not just a how (evolution etc. etc.) Asking why? already assumes a teleological answer. So what's your answer and what's the evidence for it? 1) I say that a true belief in the existence of a personal God would make it possible for me to take my eyes off of myself. So would a false belief in God, or any belief that anything exists besides you. Only a solipist fails to believe there are things outside him. 2) You say that the false
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom Caylor wrote: Brent Meeker wrote: Tom Caylor wrote: Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Tom Cayolor writes: Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, why does it make sense? What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? What is the basis for truth? What is truth? The first two questions are difficult, but they apply to God as much as the universe, despite ontological argument trickery whereby God is just defined as existing necessarily (Gaunilo's answer to Anselm was that you can also just define a perfect island as an island which exists necessarily, and therefore cannot not exist). The other questions are easy: blind evolution made us this way. The word blind here is a statement of faith in impersonality. I would paraphrase Brent Meeker and ask, Why does 'blind' have to be the default? My response to Bruno addresses the assumption of impersonality. It's Occam's Razor: why add the complication of guided evolution (or other theistic intervention) when you can explain a phenomenon without it? There doesn't seem to be anything in biology that could not have come about through random processes in a universe with physical laws such as our own. If God played any role in it he is at best completely indifferent to the plight of his creatures. It suits blind evolution very well that being devoured by a predator is as unpleasant as possible for the prey, but how does this fit in with the plans of the gentle God of modern Christian apologists? I'm not talking about the practice of science. I'm talking about the underlying beliefs. The practice of science concentrates on what we can see, the road past and present. Our underlying beliefs are what really count when it comes to what our destination is going to be. A peculiarly Christian view - faith trumps all. Why don't our actions count more than our beliefs? If I'm driving to San Francisco, I'll get there I'll if I make the right turns - even if I believe I'm driving to San Diego. This is the level at which Carl Woese is talking in his paper A New Biology For A New Century. However, from the birth of modern science, we have taken a journey to dispense with any kind of faith and try to be exhaustive in our automony and control. Ironically we have abandoned rationality (including antithesis), and we have abandoned ourselves to ourselves. We are lost in a silent sea of meaningless 0's and 1's, and man is a machine. This is why I said that when we put ourselves at the center of our worldview, it is a prison. Er, science is usually taken as more concerned with rationality than religion and less anthropocentric than religion. Turning it around seems more a rhetorical ploy than a defensible position. Stathis Papaioannou Science has to take rationality by faith. Without a personal God both science and religion are anthropocentric because in such a configuration there is no one else besides us. Science doesn't have to take anything by faith, even though scientists, being after all the same species that created religions, often do. Science is at bottom just systematised common sense. I see storm clouds so I take my umbrella: that's meteorology. If you want to call it faith because there is no way of being certain that past storm cloud behaviour will be repeated in future, then what term would you reserve for the person who leaves his umbrella behind because he believes that today God will miraculously make the raindrops miss him? As I've mentioned in my other more recent posts, I'm talking about our different beliefs underlying the fact that we live as though there is a nature to reality, as though we have personal meaning and significance, that there is a why to our existence, not just a how (evolution etc. etc.) Asking why? already assumes a teleological answer. So what's your answer and what's the evidence for it? 1) I say that a true belief in the existence of a personal God would make it possible for me to take my eyes off of myself. So would a false belief in God, or any belief that anything exists besides you. Only a solipist fails to believe there are things outside him. 2) You say that the false belief in the existence of a personal God implies that looking at God is just
RE: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom Caylor writes: As I've mentioned in my other more recent posts, I'm talking about our different beliefs underlying the fact that we live as though there is a nature to reality, as though we have personal meaning and significance, that there is a why to our existence, not just a how (evolution etc. etc.) 1) I say that a true belief in the existence of a personal God would make it possible for me to take my eyes off of myself. 2) You say that the false belief in the existence of a personal God implies that looking at God is just a weird way of looking at myself. Both of the above statements are true. We are talking about two different underlying beliefs. But, I am saying that if you accept that the existence of a personal God is false (in line with what #2 is talking about), modern philosophy, literature, art, etc. has concluded that there is no basis for personal meaning and significance. Yes lab scientists and engineers (I'm one) are perfectly content living in the lab, but hopefully they too eventually wonder what's the point of it all. OK, but there is a big difference between facts and desires. The most hard-nosed scientist or engineer presumably entered his profession because he thought it was fun, a way to help people, a good source of income, or whatever. Without these things his work would lack personal meaning, and perhaps he would be a less effective scientist or engineer, but personal meaning has no bearing on the facts, and it certainly does not warrant, for example, postulating that there is a deity overseeing electrical engineers in order to make them feel good about themselves. Stathis Papaioannou _ Be one of the first to try Windows Live Mail. http://ideas.live.com/programpage.aspx?versionId=5d21c51a-b161-4314-9b0e-4911fb2b2e6d --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
RE: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom Caylor writes: Anyway, I don't see how you could deny you are a machine any more than you could deny a car is a machine. You are made up of tiny little components all working together smoothly, and if something breaks, you break. God could have made us solid like a potato animated by an immaterial soul, or left out the solid part altogether, but instead he made every part function in accordance with the basically very well understood chemistry of a handful of elements. It's amazing that these chemical reactions give rise to walking, talking humans, but then I'm still pretty impressed that my car can take me to places in quiet comfort while thousands of explosions are occurring in the engine. Stathis Papaioannou _ This is going to be fun exercise. I am not a machine. There, I just denied it, even though you don't see how. But you now have some empirical evidence. Unless you don't consider me as a valid part of the population. Just kidding, my point is that we can't use science to answer these questions. You and Bruno already are hypothesizing that we are machines. It's fun to see where it leads, but after a finite number of steps I want to stop (not it is the case that I will stop independently of what I want, whether or not that is true) because I *believe* I am not a machine. By the way, a car cannot do what I just did (in a finite number of steps), unless it is preprogrammed to do it, but then that isn't the real thing. Tom If a machine is a device made of moving parts which interact according to the laws of physics, then I am a machine. The evidence certainly seems to suggest that having the right parts in the right configuration is *sufficient* to give rise to a conscious human (whether it is also *necessary* is another question, discussed many times on this list). Do you doubt that placing carbon, hydrogen, oxygen etc. atoms together in just the right way would result in a living organism? Stathis Papaioannou _ Be one of the first to try Windows Live Mail. http://ideas.live.com/programpage.aspx?versionId=5d21c51a-b161-4314-9b0e-4911fb2b2e6d --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Tom Caylor writes: One thing Schaeffer did was remind us that the assumptions of nature and cause were foundational to modern science. We have to assume that there is a nature to reality in order to study it and use our reason to make sense of it. Reality has to make sense inherently, i.e. it has to have an order to it, in order for us to make sense of it. Our reason (rationality) makes use of antithesis, to induce cause and effect. Perhaps nature and cause do not appear as formal assumptions in comp, but do you not make use of a belief in them in the process of thinking and talking about comp, and surely in the process of empirically verifying/falsifying it? Who said nature has to make sense? We make sense of it to the extent that it is ordered, but it goes: we can make sense of nature, therefore it must be ordered, not, nature must be ordered, therefore we should be able to make sense of it. You didn't exactly say the latter, I know, but my assumption is that the universe doesn't care in the slightest what I think or what happens to me, which is not something theists are generally comfortable with. So you understand my point: Reality does not have to make sense (in the grand non-scheme of Everthing), but it does. Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, why does it make sense? What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? What is the basis for truth? What is truth? The first two questions are difficult, but they apply to God as much as the universe, despite ontological argument trickery whereby God is just defined as existing necessarily (Gaunilo's answer to Anselm was that you can also just define a perfect island as an island which exists necessarily, and therefore cannot not exist). The other questions are easy: blind evolution made us this way. The word blind here is a statement of faith in impersonality. I would paraphrase Brent Meeker and ask, Why does 'blind' have to be the default? My response to Bruno addresses the assumption of impersonality. However, from the birth of modern science, we have taken a journey to dispense with any kind of faith and try to be exhaustive in our automony and control. Ironically we have abandoned rationality (including antithesis), and we have abandoned ourselves to ourselves. We are lost in a silent sea of meaningless 0's and 1's, and man is a machine. This is why I said that when we put ourselves at the center of our worldview, it is a prison. Er, science is usually taken as more concerned with rationality than religion and less anthropocentric than religion. Turning it around seems more a rhetorical ploy than a defensible position. Stathis Papaioannou Science has to take rationality by faith. Without a personal God both science and religion are anthropocentric because in such a configuration there is no one else besides us. Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Brent Meeker wrote: Why should nothing be the default. Or to paraphase Quine, Nothing is what doesn't exist. So what is there? Everything. Everything that there is is there. But this is the ultimate in begging the question. The question remains, why is everything (I see) there? Why do I exist? It's not that I don't believe in what I see, like the evidence for evolution, but it doesn't answer the ultimate question. Relative truth is ultimately useless when it comes to the end of my life. Tom i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, The reason that there is Something rather than Nothing is that Nothing is unstable. -- Frank Wilczek, Nobel Laureate Physics 2004. why does it make sense? Part of it makes sense to us because we evolved to make sense of it. Quantum mechanics doesn't really make sense, it's just an inference from what does make sense. What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? Why does reality need a basis? Beauty is, famously, in the eye of the beholder. 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? Evolution. The web of this world is woven of Necessity and Chance. Woe to him who has accustomed himself from his youth up to find something necessary in what is capricious, and who would ascribe something like reason to Chance and make a religion of surrendering to it. -- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? Because he evolved to make decisions, see William S. Cooper, The Evolution of Reason. What is the basis for truth? What is truth? True (and false) are abstract values we assign to sentences for the purpose of making inferences. In application we usually try to assign true to those sentences that express facts supported by evidence - unless we are religious, in which case we may ignore evidence and go with revelation. Brent Meeker --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Bruno Marchal wrote: Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). I agree with this a priori. At this stage making a difference between reality, nature and god seems to me to be 1004 fallacies. In order to have the motivation for doing science you have to believe in some reality. OK. I'm just saying that (a belief in) the existence of a personal God entails (a belief in) antithesis. You get a lot more than antithesis, as I say below. The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, why does it make sense? What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? Here I disagree. The existence of God does not explain why is there something rather than nothing. It could be a promise for such an explanation but using god or reality as an explanation does not work, indeed such belief are related to faith. There is a difference between believing or trusting God, and using badly the God notion for explaining genuine problem away. The existence of a personal God who is not silent answers the questions in a way that an impersonal god or reality does not... 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? What is the basis for truth? What is truth? Here the comp hyp provides genuine answers including testable predictions. Of course the comp hyp presuppose a reality (number's reality, truth about numbers). Then it can explain why we have to have some faith in numbers in the sense that we cannot explain numbers from something simpler. Numbers are impersonal. An impersonal origin results in everything finally being equal. Only an infinite personal God is big enough to produce personality. Impersonal+complexity does not produce personal. This is the problem Plato had. He knew that you need absolutes in order to have meaning. Plato's gods weren't big enough to be the point of reference needed to define a person. The gods and fates were continuously fighting one another. I know you get some nice relative forms, G*/G and all that. But in the end it is all meaningless. As Satre pointed out, no finite point has any meaning without an infinite reference point. ... That is a poetical way to put the things, but remember that if we are machine there are at least about 2 * 8 utterly different (and interacting, sometimes conflicting) sense for ourselves, some including notions of faith. So some care is needed here. But this is all a relative faith, which ends up being faith in faith in...(?) When talking about ultimate questions, a relative faith doesn't do. When your life is on the line, an impersonal structure just doesn't do. You add: I want to be clear that it isn't modern science that is to blame, but the abandonment of faith (being certain of what we do not see). It isn't that there's something unique to this time in history either. This has happened multiple times in history. Now we are seeing perhaps a backlash from man as a machine, in lots of different ways e.g. postmodernism, fundamentalism... But if there is a God who is there and is not silent, then faith takes on a different meaning. Faith in and of itself does not do the trick. It has to be faith in a real reality, a true truth. I agree (with the proviso that I suppose that by machine you talk about the old pregodelian conception of (non universal) machine. We don't know what universal machine are capable of, and I don't see why a present God would abandon them. I hope you can harbor some doubt about the proposition that machine are stupid, lack subjective phenomenality, etc. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ I don't want to commit my future to a machine. Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Sorry for my long reaction time. I have my thoughts on Bruno's, Stathis' and Brent Meekers' posts, but I will not be able to post until this weekend. Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Le 29-nov.-06, à 05:57, Tom Caylor a écrit : Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 24-nov.-06, à 10:03, Tom Caylor a écrit : Have you read Francis Schaeffer's trilogy of books: The God Who Is There, Escape From Reason, and He Is There And He Is Not Silent. He talks about the consequences of the belief in the uniformity of natural causes in a closed system. No. But if you want to send a little summary, please do. If by uniformity of natural causes in a closed system you mean something describable by a total computable function, I can understand the point (but recall I don't assume neither the notion of Nature nor of Cause). Now, the computerland is closed for diagonalization only. That is something quite different, making computerland much open than anything describable by total computable functions. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ There is no way that I can give a little summary, but I'll try anyway. I think this will also go towards addressing Stathis' allusion to faith. One thing Schaeffer did was remind us that the assumptions of nature and cause were foundational to modern science. We have to assume that there is a nature to reality in order to study it and use our reason to make sense of it. Reality has to make sense inherently, i.e. it has to have an order to it, in order for us to make sense of it. Our reason (rationality) makes use of antithesis, to induce cause and effect. Perhaps nature and cause do not appear as formal assumptions in comp, but do you not make use of a belief in them in the process of thinking and talking about comp, and surely in the process of empirically verifying/falsifying it? Sure. Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). I agree with this a priori. At this stage making a difference between reality, nature and god seems to me to be 1004 fallacies. In order to have the motivation for doing science you have to believe in some reality. The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, why does it make sense? What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? Here I disagree. The existence of God does not explain why is there something rather than nothing. It could be a promise for such an explanation but using god or reality as an explanation does not work, indeed such belief are related to faith. There is a difference between believing or trusting God, and using badly the God notion for explaining genuine problem away. 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? What is the basis for truth? What is truth? Here the comp hyp provides genuine answers including testable predictions. Of course the comp hyp presuppose a reality (number's reality, truth about numbers). Then it can explain why we have to have some faith in numbers in the sense that we cannot explain numbers from something simpler. However, from the birth of modern science, we have taken a journey to dispense with any kind of faith Let us define faith by belief in unproved or unprovable truth. The idea that science dispense with faith is a myth. A lot of physicists have faith in a primitive physical reality (I lost *that* faith unless you enlarge the sense of physics). and try to be exhaustive in our automony and control. Ironically we have abandoned rationality (including antithesis), I agree. We have abandoned rationality in theology (the science of the fundamental reality whatever it is, say) since a long time, and this made us partially abandoning rationality in the study of nature, appearances, etc. as well. For some reason many scientist just abandon the scientific attitude when they talk in fields in which they are not expert, instead of remaining silent. And this is doubly true when the field in which they are not expert is related to fundamental question. and we have abandoned ourselves to ourselves. That is a poetical way to put the things, but remember that if we are machine there are at least about 2 * 8 utterly different (and interacting, sometimes conflicting) sense for ourselves, some including notions of faith. So some care is needed here. We are lost in a silent sea of meaningless 0's and 1's, and man is a machine. ??? You talk like if you were subscribing to some pre-godelian reductionist conception of machine (like so many materialist). This is why I said that when we put ourselves
RE: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom Caylor writes: Have you read Francis Schaeffer's trilogy of books: The God Who Is There, Escape From Reason, and He Is There And He Is Not Silent. He talks about the consequences of the belief in the uniformity of natural causes in a closed system. There is no way that I can give a little summary, but I'll try anyway. I think this will also go towards addressing Stathis' allusion to faith. One thing Schaeffer did was remind us that the assumptions of nature and cause were foundational to modern science. We have to assume that there is a nature to reality in order to study it and use our reason to make sense of it. Reality has to make sense inherently, i.e. it has to have an order to it, in order for us to make sense of it. Our reason (rationality) makes use of antithesis, to induce cause and effect. Perhaps nature and cause do not appear as formal assumptions in comp, but do you not make use of a belief in them in the process of thinking and talking about comp, and surely in the process of empirically verifying/falsifying it? Who said nature has to make sense? We make sense of it to the extent that it is ordered, but it goes: we can make sense of nature, therefore it must be ordered, not, nature must be ordered, therefore we should be able to make sense of it. You didn't exactly say the latter, I know, but my assumption is that the universe doesn't care in the slightest what I think or what happens to me, which is not something theists are generally comfortable with. Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, why does it make sense? What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? What is the basis for truth? What is truth? The first two questions are difficult, but they apply to God as much as the universe, despite ontological argument trickery whereby God is just defined as existing necessarily (Gaunilo's answer to Anselm was that you can also just define a perfect island as an island which exists necessarily, and therefore cannot not exist). The other questions are easy: blind evolution made us this way. However, from the birth of modern science, we have taken a journey to dispense with any kind of faith and try to be exhaustive in our automony and control. Ironically we have abandoned rationality (including antithesis), and we have abandoned ourselves to ourselves. We are lost in a silent sea of meaningless 0's and 1's, and man is a machine. This is why I said that when we put ourselves at the center of our worldview, it is a prison. Er, science is usually taken as more concerned with rationality than religion and less anthropocentric than religion. Turning it around seems more a rhetorical ploy than a defensible position. Stathis Papaioannou _ Be one of the first to try Windows Live Mail. http://ideas.live.com/programpage.aspx?versionId=5d21c51a-b161-4314-9b0e-4911fb2b2e6d --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Tom Caylor writes: Have you read Francis Schaeffer's trilogy of books: The God Who Is There, Escape From Reason, and He Is There And He Is Not Silent. He talks about the consequences of the belief in the uniformity of natural causes in a closed system. There is no way that I can give a little summary, but I'll try anyway. I think this will also go towards addressing Stathis' allusion to faith. One thing Schaeffer did was remind us that the assumptions of nature and cause were foundational to modern science. We have to assume that there is a nature to reality in order to study it and use our reason to make sense of it. Reality has to make sense inherently, i.e. it has to have an order to it, in order for us to make sense of it. Our reason (rationality) makes use of antithesis, to induce cause and effect. Perhaps nature and cause do not appear as formal assumptions in comp, but do you not make use of a belief in them in the process of thinking and talking about comp, and surely in the process of empirically verifying/falsifying it? Who said nature has to make sense? We make sense of it to the extent that it is ordered, but it goes: we can make sense of nature, therefore it must be ordered, not, nature must be ordered, therefore we should be able to make sense of it. You didn't exactly say the latter, I know, but my assumption is that the universe doesn't care in the slightest what I think or what happens to me, which is not something theists are generally comfortable with. Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? Why should nothing be the default. Or to paraphase Quine, Nothing is what doesn't exist. So what is there? Everything. i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, The reason that there is Something rather than Nothing is that Nothing is unstable. -- Frank Wilczek, Nobel Laureate Physics 2004. why does it make sense? Part of it makes sense to us because we evolved to make sense of it. Quantum mechanics doesn't really make sense, it's just an inference from what does make sense. What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? Why does reality need a basis? Beauty is, famously, in the eye of the beholder. 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? Evolution. The web of this world is woven of Necessity and Chance. Woe to him who has accustomed himself from his youth up to find something necessary in what is capricious, and who would ascribe something like reason to Chance and make a religion of surrendering to it. -- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? Because he evolved to make decisions, see William S. Cooper, The Evolution of Reason. What is the basis for truth? What is truth? True (and false) are abstract values we assign to sentences for the purpose of making inferences. In application we usually try to assign true to those sentences that express facts supported by evidence - unless we are religious, in which case we may ignore evidence and go with revelation. Brent Meeker --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 24-nov.-06, à 10:03, Tom Caylor a écrit : Have you read Francis Schaeffer's trilogy of books: The God Who Is There, Escape From Reason, and He Is There And He Is Not Silent. He talks about the consequences of the belief in the uniformity of natural causes in a closed system. No. But if you want to send a little summary, please do. If by uniformity of natural causes in a closed system you mean something describable by a total computable function, I can understand the point (but recall I don't assume neither the notion of Nature nor of Cause). Now, the computerland is closed for diagonalization only. That is something quite different, making computerland much open than anything describable by total computable functions. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ There is no way that I can give a little summary, but I'll try anyway. I think this will also go towards addressing Stathis' allusion to faith. One thing Schaeffer did was remind us that the assumptions of nature and cause were foundational to modern science. We have to assume that there is a nature to reality in order to study it and use our reason to make sense of it. Reality has to make sense inherently, i.e. it has to have an order to it, in order for us to make sense of it. Our reason (rationality) makes use of antithesis, to induce cause and effect. Perhaps nature and cause do not appear as formal assumptions in comp, but do you not make use of a belief in them in the process of thinking and talking about comp, and surely in the process of empirically verifying/falsifying it? Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, why does it make sense? What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? What is the basis for truth? What is truth? However, from the birth of modern science, we have taken a journey to dispense with any kind of faith and try to be exhaustive in our automony and control. Ironically we have abandoned rationality (including antithesis), and we have abandoned ourselves to ourselves. We are lost in a silent sea of meaningless 0's and 1's, and man is a machine. This is why I said that when we put ourselves at the center of our worldview, it is a prison. Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom Caylor wrote: Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 24-nov.-06, à 10:03, Tom Caylor a écrit : Have you read Francis Schaeffer's trilogy of books: The God Who Is There, Escape From Reason, and He Is There And He Is Not Silent. He talks about the consequences of the belief in the uniformity of natural causes in a closed system. No. But if you want to send a little summary, please do. If by uniformity of natural causes in a closed system you mean something describable by a total computable function, I can understand the point (but recall I don't assume neither the notion of Nature nor of Cause). Now, the computerland is closed for diagonalization only. That is something quite different, making computerland much open than anything describable by total computable functions. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ There is no way that I can give a little summary, but I'll try anyway. I think this will also go towards addressing Stathis' allusion to faith. One thing Schaeffer did was remind us that the assumptions of nature and cause were foundational to modern science. We have to assume that there is a nature to reality in order to study it and use our reason to make sense of it. Reality has to make sense inherently, i.e. it has to have an order to it, in order for us to make sense of it. Our reason (rationality) makes use of antithesis, to induce cause and effect. Perhaps nature and cause do not appear as formal assumptions in comp, but do you not make use of a belief in them in the process of thinking and talking about comp, and surely in the process of empirically verifying/falsifying it? Schaeffer maintained that the basis for antithesis is not that it was an invention of Aristotle or anyone, but that the basis for antithesis is reality itself, based on the God who is there (as opposed to not being there). The existence of the personal God answers the questions: 1) Why is there something rather than nothing? i.e. the question of the origin of the form of the universe, why does it make sense? What is the basis for the nature of reality and beauty? 2) Why is man the way he/she is? Why is man able to have language and do science, and make sense of the world? Why is man able to love and figure out what is right? What is the basis for meaning? What is the basis for mind? How can persons know one another? 3) Why is man able to know anything, and know that he knows what he knows? What is the basis for truth? What is truth? However, from the birth of modern science, we have taken a journey to dispense with any kind of faith and try to be exhaustive in our automony and control. Ironically we have abandoned rationality (including antithesis), and we have abandoned ourselves to ourselves. We are lost in a silent sea of meaningless 0's and 1's, and man is a machine. This is why I said that when we put ourselves at the center of our worldview, it is a prison. Tom I want to be clear that it isn't modern science that is to blame, but the abandonment of faith (being certain of what we do not see). It isn't that there's something unique to this time in history either. This has happened multiple times in history. Now we are seeing perhaps a backlash from man as a machine, in lots of different ways e.g. postmodernism, fundamentalism... But if there is a God who is there and is not silent, then faith takes on a different meaning. Faith in and of itself does not do the trick. It has to be faith in a real reality, a true truth. Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Le 24-nov.-06, à 10:03, Tom Caylor a écrit : Have you read Francis Schaeffer's trilogy of books: The God Who Is There, Escape From Reason, and He Is There And He Is Not Silent. He talks about the consequences of the belief in the uniformity of natural causes in a closed system. No. But if you want to send a little summary, please do. If by uniformity of natural causes in a closed system you mean something describable by a total computable function, I can understand the point (but recall I don't assume neither the notion of Nature nor of Cause). Now, the computerland is closed for diagonalization only. That is something quite different, making computerland much open than anything describable by total computable functions. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Russell Standish wrote: On Tue, Nov 21, 2006 at 04:32:37PM +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 21-nov.-06, à 03:42, Tom Caylor a écrit : 1. What is the purpose of this 0-person? What role does it play? As soon as we say it has a purpose or role, we've just instantiated it. Why do you (or Plotinus) think we need it? The 0-person is the big whole. It is the everything. A physicalist could say it is the whole UNIverse. A physicalist MW could say: it is the whole multiverse. It is something which could only be viewed from outside the universe: that is from nowhere. For anyone who has read my book, it should be obvious that this 0-person view is what I call the 3rd person view in my book. (page 160) What Bruno is now calling the 3rd person point of view I label 1st person plural. Bruno is now distinguishing several different types of 1st person plural viewpoints. I believe I took an accurate snapshot of the terminological usage at the time I wrote the book, but terminology in this field does have a habit of moving on (and so it should). Cheers A/Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile) Mathematics UNSW SYDNEY 2052 [EMAIL PROTECTED] Australiahttp://www.hpcoders.com.au Wait. The 0-person view is a view that none of us can take, so it can't be the 3rd person view or discourse. The 0-person view has no thought or discourse. It is the whole universe, or the whole of arithmetic truth... Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 21-nov.-06, à 03:42, Tom Caylor a écrit : 1. What is the purpose of this 0-person? What role does it play? As soon as we say it has a purpose or role, we've just instantiated it. Why do you (or Plotinus) think we need it? The 0-person is the big whole. It is the everything. A physicalist could say it is the whole UNIverse. A physicalist MW could say: it is the whole multiverse. It is something which could only be viewed from outside the universe: that is from nowhere. See me comment below #2. ... The eight hypostases: ... OK. I follow all of your logic (propositional calculus) once we get into it. There are two problems with going too far in this. One has been noted before, that this is pretty technical stuff, although I enjoy it and would like to hear it out. The other problem is how all of this logic connects to Everything. That is why I am trying to understand the 0-person. I think questioning the 0-person might be the same thing as questioning the assumption of Arithmetic Realism (AR), but I'm not sure. In the past it may have sounded like I was supporting AR, but actually I was just arguing that physicalism is not any more well founded than AR. What I am worried about is that all of the fancy calculus might end up being something like string theory, beautiful but how can it be proven that it is the key to understanding and living in the world around us? 2. This 0-person cannot be the basis for saying that the scientific discourse (and allegedly the Everything List discussions) has to have an impersonal basis. As you say, this 0-person has no discourse. And the hypothetical existence of a 0-person does not rule out the existence of person at the deepest level to which we can relate (as persons). The trick is that a lobian machine as rich as ZF is able to prove the whole (provable and unprovable by PA) theology of a simpler lobian machine like PA. There is nothing hypothetical in the notion of arithmetical truth from the pov of a rich (set theoretically based) lobian machine. Faith arrives only when a machine begins to bet on its *own* correct theology, i.e. its *own* G* if you want (or G* minus G). Here you talk as if the 0-person is always relative to a given limited G. But above you say that the 0-person is viewed from outside everywhere (nowhere), i.e. an absolute notion. Which is it? I believe the reasoning behind an impersonal basis is based on the desire to get away from the personal at the core level of being. I don't think so. It comes only from the scientist desire to get away of first person truth in the scientific discourse. Actually, the cute thing here is that we get a extremely powerful defense of the existence of the first person, at the core level of being (despite the need to restrict the scientific discourse in the third person discourse). Doesn't the 3rd person provide the discourse of 1st person? Again, why is the 0-person needed? You didn't answer that question above; you simply restated what the 0-person is. So the 3rd person is the discourse of the 1st person. OK. That's simply labeling what's there. It isn't trying to get away from 1st person truth. We don't have to *try* to get away from 1st person truth. When we say anything about 1st person we *automatically* are in the 3rd person by definition. What I am calling into question is the need for 0-person, and the motive for saying we need it. As I stated before, I think it is an attempt to elevate the impersonal to the god level. That way we don't have to worry about the personal at the core of being because we've artifically stuck the impersonal at the core. Exercice: show that the UD is not a Universal Machine (at all). It is enough to show that the UD cannot crash. Indeed it has no inputs! (Now there is a sense in which we could say that the UD is borned crashed given that it is programmed for non stopping (my usual definition of crashed). So there is a sense to say that the UD is a crashed universal machine. The other definition of crashing is that the machine takes an input for which the output is not defined. So since the UD does not have an input, crashing is not possible. I also see your reasoning about the crashed UM based on your usual definition of crashed. But this makes me think that I should not trust the output of the UD, if it is crashed. So would you call a machine that generates the natural numbers a crashed machine? Probably just a linguistic curiosity. Weyl quote is interesting though in that it cites the infinite in the first half in reference to good, and it cites our finiteness in the second half in reference to evil. I would say that our finiteness (or other limitations such as a need for a particular reference frame) is not sufficient for the existence of evil. ... Yes, evil belongs intrinsically to the realm of the ideally correct self-observing universal
Re: Hypostases (was: Natural Order Belief)
Tom Caylor wrote: Russell Standish wrote: On Tue, Nov 21, 2006 at 04:32:37PM +0100, Bruno Marchal wrote: Le 21-nov.-06, à 03:42, Tom Caylor a écrit : 1. What is the purpose of this 0-person? What role does it play? As soon as we say it has a purpose or role, we've just instantiated it. Why do you (or Plotinus) think we need it? The 0-person is the big whole. It is the everything. A physicalist could say it is the whole UNIverse. A physicalist MW could say: it is the whole multiverse. It is something which could only be viewed from outside the universe: that is from nowhere. For anyone who has read my book, it should be obvious that this 0-person view is what I call the 3rd person view in my book. (page 160) What Bruno is now calling the 3rd person point of view I label 1st person plural. Bruno is now distinguishing several different types of 1st person plural viewpoints. I believe I took an accurate snapshot of the terminological usage at the time I wrote the book, but terminology in this field does have a habit of moving on (and so it should). Cheers A/Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile) Mathematics UNSW SYDNEY 2052 [EMAIL PROTECTED] Australiahttp://www.hpcoders.com.au Wait. The 0-person view is a view that none of us can take, so it can't be the 3rd person view or discourse. The 0-person view has no thought or discourse. It is the whole universe, or the whole of arithmetic truth... I think I am guilty of introducing the term 0 personal in a conversation with David Nyman. His point was that you can't have a 3rd-personal view without persons. I don't think that is necessarily an important distinction. The 0 personal view could coincide with the 3rd personal view. Just because you are a person, doesn't mean your personhood infects everything you see and do. Tom --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
