posted
It seems like trying to justify religion to someone who insists that only scientific evidence is important is a lot like trying to explain colors to someone who keeps their eyes closed 24 hours a day. If you don't use your sight, a world without colors is no different than a world with colors.
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posted
Are you arguing that there is a special sense, which cannot be detected or measured by any scientific equipment, which is necessary to use to sense God?
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posted
Assuming metaphor is a replacement for logic* and so completing the metaphor... if you think that atheists are blind, then imagine them listening harder, and acutely using their senses of touch, taste and smell to construct a world around them rather than simply accepting what they see and paying little attention to the rest.
If sight is the dominant human sense in your metaphor, then perhaps this metaphor is apt. Perhaps it is only by closing our eyes to what we think we see that we can really get a sense of what the universe is like.
*It's not. Metaphor is a good tool, but should never be considered as equal to the truth.
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posted
No - I'm arguing that science, though highly effective for studying a subset of life, by definition can't measure or directly study much of what is important in the world. The most important questions of religion generally fall in the realm of things it can't study - meaning that demanding a proof of religion entirely though the lens of science is probably going to be futile.
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"No - I'm arguing that science, though highly effective for studying a subset of life, by definition can't measure or directly study much of what is important in the world"
By definition, science can't study things that have no influence on the world. Is this what you mean by "much of what is important in the world?"
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posted
Because of the rules by which it is defined, the scientific method cannot directly study things that aren't physical, things that can't accurately be replicated (including historical events), things that rely on too many variables to be experimented upon, questions that we lack the time/resources to properly investigate, etc.
Examples include:
Happiness. Meaningfulness. Morality. Love. The internal nature of one's mind. The origin of the universe. Most of the unique but complicated judgement calls people must make in their everyday lives - like should Joe divorce his wife, or should Bob give to charity A vs. charity B, or is it wise for Amy to let her friend borrow a large sum of money, or most other significant decisions you or anyone else will be making today.
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posted
Prayer, meditation, interpretation of texts, divine inspiration, introspection, logical deduction, consulting authorities, etc. - the methods depend on which religion it is.
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Well, sheesh, then what's the use of saying that religion can study this? Any idiot can come up with advice which may or may not be useful! Your average Python script can do that much! To claim "science can't help with problem X" - which incidentally is not true, anyway - is not very interesting if religion can't, either.
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posted
I didn't say the results aren't useful. I said I have no way of knowing the results are useful.
I also have no way of knowing that the results of science are useful. But they still seem to be useful, so I use them!
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posted
Oh, right, I forgot about the special Tres-meaning of the word 'to know', where it requires absolute, total, 100% certainty, now and forever, praise the Lawd, amen. Beg pardon. I rephrase. Why do you think the results are useful?
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quote:Originally posted by GinaG: You turned my words around. I said "scientific marvel," you said eye-eating parasite.
So everything is divine, but not everything is "marvelous"?
quote:But is suffering the stuff of faith too? Absolutely. No matter what philosophy you adopt, you have to deal with it somehow.
But you said that such a phenomenon would be "food for your faith". I ask again...what kind of faith exactly grows on terrible pain inflicted on children?
quote:I think the problem of evil is much easier to deal with as a theist.
I doubt you are going to get much agreement there.
How does one reconcile a good God with such a phenomenon? You can say "This world doesn't matter one teeny tiny bit, so it's irrelevent", or "Everything is divine, and divine is good, therefore, everything that happens, no matter how pointlessly hurtful, is by definition good", or "this is the best of all possible worlds", but I think the weaknesses in those are pretty apparent.
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quote:And how do you know that the results are useful?
quote:Originally posted by Tresopax: [I don't.
See, here's the thing. The one thing that history has shown us about human nature is that humans get things wrong a lot.
If you don't know whether or not your idea is wrong, it's probably wrong.
That's the virtue of reality testing...you get to the point of knowing you are wrong very quickly, and by throwing out wrong ideas, you get to the right ones faster.
So when you say "I want to just trust my gut", the upshot is that you are openly declaring "I want to be wrong most of the time".
Can you see why sensible people don't think that's a good idea, and why they wonder at your consistant defending of this way of thinking as a good and worthy one?
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Ultimately, it all comes down to a personal judgement call. I think logic works because it seemed to work in previous instances and make sense to me. I think science works because it seemed to work in previous instances and makes sense to me. I think consulting authorities works because it seemed to work in previous instances and makes sense to me. And so on.
It is true that humans get things wrong a lot, but every method of gaining knowledge begins fundamentally with a personal human judgement to trust that method. I don't see any way around that. (And I actually think it would be immoral to try and give up your own judgement as the final arbiter of decisions and beliefs.)
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quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: Gina, before I reply to your latest, would you answer my earlier question?
I apologize that I have little time today to read or answer forum replies. I will try to get back to you later.
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Ultimately, it all comes down to a personal judgement call.
And here is the unbridgable gap between Tresopax and sensible people.
Sensible people think that there is a difference between ways of thinking that look for wrong ideas and throw them out, and ways of thinking that don't do this, that are in fact overly prone to retaining wrong ideas. Sensible people think that the former ways are better.
Tresopax claims he does not. Apparently, given a choice between trying to a child of cancer with prayer, and trying to cure a child with cancer with drugs that hav been demonstrated to be effecacious, there's no way of figuring out which way is better, so if people decide to skip the medicine, Troseopax thinks that's a perfectly good "personal judgement call".
quote:I think logic works because it seemed to work in previous instances and make sense to me. I think science works because it seemed to work in previous instances and makes sense to me.
But there is a reason those work, and it's not hard to figure out.
Reason and evidence work because they are reality tested, and wrong ideas are identified and thrown out.
If you don't understand the virtue of reality testing, I can't explain it better than that.
quote:I think consulting authorities works because it seemed to work in previous instances and makes sense to me.
Yes, by all means. Consult Galen when your child develops cancer. Tell us how that works out for you. Or consult the guy who wrote "Why the stock market will hit 30k in 2010" for your investment ideas. He's a great authority. How could that possibly turn out badly for you?
quote:It is true that humans get things wrong a lot, but every method of gaining knowledge begins fundamentally with a personal human judgement to trust that method.
Yes, but more reality testing is better. Much better.
Ah, but now I see the problem for you.
The statement "reality testing works well" only works if you accept that reality matters. And that's where the "personal judgement" comes in.
Well, try ignoring reality for a while, and get back to us on how that works out.
quote:I don't see any way around that. (And I actually think it would be immoral to try and give up your own judgement as the final arbiter of decisions and beliefs.)
Well, by all means. And when some crazy decides that his 'personal judgment' is that you should be tortured into accepting his religious beliefs, because being tortured to death by the faithful is better for you than living in sin, you can write a nice letter to your widow/er telling them that it is more moral for you to die horribly than for this stranger to not impose his personal judgment.
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posted
Why are we talking about science this or science that? There's no reason to exclude philosophy from this discussion. The problem (as I see it of course) with many religious beliefs is not that they are unscientific but that they can't be established with sound arguments.
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quote:Originally posted by Tresopax: And I actually think it would be immoral to try and give up your own judgement as the final arbiter of decisions and beliefs.
To drag this back to the orignal topic, what you are saying is that if someone conceeds that there is no logical or reasonable evidence based arguement against, say, same-sex marriage, but that person has strong and open biases against gay people, that it's okay for them to say "Well, you made the reasonable case for your side prefectly well, but my 'personal judgment' is that you shouldn't be married anyway, so I'm going to act to screw over you and your family", your argument is that this is perfectly fair and good and the right thing to do, and that it is in fact, immoral of this person to refrain from hurting innocent gay people if it his "personal judgement" that hurting them pointlessly is the thing to do?
So if it's immoral of a person not to act on their "personal judgment" when that "personal judgement" is to hurt other people, then is it also wrong for people to complain about being treated unfairly? Or is there just an unsolvable impasse, where you insist on the right to hurt innocent people for no good reason if your "personal judgment is to do so, and everyone else insists on the right to have their "personal judgment" that they not be hurt respected, and the two sides fight with legislation and crowbars to see which will prevail?
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quote:I disagree with Tom here, so I guess I'm one of those people who believes that the default for the majority (not all) of the human race is belief in the supernatural (rather than religious suggesting organized).
I believe that the default is to assume intentionality, but that doesn't necessary mean God. When I do things it's because I want to do them so when other things happen, it must be because someone wanted those to happen. If, upon investigation, I can't find who did it then obviously it's somone/something invisible with unconventional powers.
Given that so little was understood about what constituted natural vs supernatural causality, I'm not sure an early human could really make a distinction there. I don't know that the tendency is towards supernatural so much as towards being unwilling to leave questions open. If we don't know the answer, we create one, being more concerned about answering the question than about having a correct answer to the question.
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quote:I think the problem of evil is much easier to deal with as a theist.
Gina, can you explain this? This particular statement is one I can't get my head around; I've looked at it from a variety of perspectives, and I have no idea what you might mean.
In what way is the classical Problem of Evil -- which is what I assume you meant -- easier for theists? I can't think of any possible interpretation for which this would be true.
Have you ever heard a well-versed Christian, such as Greg Ganssle, discuss the "classical" problem of evil? Here is a transcript of a talk he gave on it.
I was actually using the phrase sloppily, meaning suffering in general, but I do think the theist has an easier time dealing with it both philosophically and practically. In many religions, suffering actually has meaning, and there is a promise of a final justice and redemption.
People are asking what good religion is for if it doesn't "work." However, it does in fact work, and indeed I even see Orthodox Christianity as a kind of science. One must, however, think of it as a people science, like psychology or sociology. The ascetic disciplines, for instance, have endured precisely because they have been tested and found to work.
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posted
I grant Ganssle's objections but I don't think they gain much ground. For God to be omniscient, omnibenevolent, and omnipotent this universe would have to be perfect (in terms of maximizing good). That is a breathtakingly huge claim and really makes no sense at all given what we know about the universe. I don't even think you can sensibly make that claim without just assuming that God has the "three O's" and working backwards. When it comes to explaining why God made the world the way it is I have never seen anything but shoulder-shrugging and hand-waving. Honestly, I think any argument that tried to establish a God with the "three O's" by examining the universe and concluding that it was perfect would be a total trainwreck. That's why we have stuff like ontological, teleological, and cosmological arguments instead of any direct approach to explaining whats so damn perfect about our world that it's creation (or an equivalent perfectly good action) was necessitated by an omniscient, omnibenevolent, and omnipotent being.
EDIT: Ack, that sounded ranty. I just wanted to convey how incredible some of these claims sound to me. I don't mean to mock anyone's beliefs so I hope it isn't interpreted that way.
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What makes you think we're done? Creation isn't something that happened and is over with; creation is now.
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quote:Originally posted by GinaG: People are asking what good religion is for if it doesn't "work." However, it does in fact work, and indeed I even see Orthodox Christianity as a kind of science. One must, however, think of it as a people science, like psychology or sociology. The ascetic disciplines, for instance, have endured precisely because they have been tested and found to work.
Sorry, but I don't buy it. The most basic rule of science is that when something is shown to be wrong, we throw it out and only stick with the right things. Science is constantly changing and improving.
Show me where Christianity has thrown out the bad ideas and added lots of new, better, more correct ideas in the last 1000 year. Even the "people sciences" are always updating their ideas and are willing to change in the face of evidence.
Christianity is not science. You cannot twist it in any way so that it even resembles science, because it refuses to change and it refuses to accept any sort of testing for truth, logic, or even utility.
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quote:because it refuses to change and it refuses to accept any sort of testing for truth, logic, or even utility.
That's not exactly true, albeit not in a way which gives any major religion any credit. Religions, being social structures governed by people, often change when they are forced to out of social necessity, or they go obsolete and fade away. They often spontaneously generate new Truths when it comes down to alteration vs. extinction.
Sometimes it is a simplification and/or spontaneous change ('whoops, I had a revelation that black guys aren't lower beings. god says that now') and sometimes it is a complication wherein new dogma is piled on levels of older dogma creating all the appearances of a byzantine, nigh-incomprehensible divine bureaucracy governed by very selective interpretation of 'primary sources.'
quote:In many religions, suffering actually has meaning, and there is a promise of a final justice and redemption.
Ah. And what if there isn't final justice, and no "redemption?" What if there is no meaning to your suffering? Is it really better to wrongly believe there is?
And that doesn't resolve the classic Problem of Evil, of course: that a God which is truly omnipotent and omnibenevolent doesn't need to allow pain, but does anyway.
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quote:I think the problem of evil is much easier to deal with as a theist.
Gina, can you explain this? This particular statement is one I can't get my head around; I've looked at it from a variety of perspectives, and I have no idea what you might mean.
In what way is the classical Problem of Evil -- which is what I assume you meant -- easier for theists? I can't think of any possible interpretation for which this would be true.
Have you ever heard a well-versed Christian, such as Greg Ganssle, discuss the "classical" problem of evil? Here is a transcript of a talk he gave on it.
I read it, but there was nothing I haven't seen here and elsewhere before. "God has reasons for allowing evil" is just "the ends justify the means." The analogies to children and relationships as a way of showing this draws a chilling moral equivalency between an upset child and the hundred million (or more) human lives that were ended by war in the 20th century. The parent might not buy the child the coveted ball, but I certainly hope that the parent would stop the child from cutting himself.
It's true that these atrocities were perpetrated by human beings, not by gods. This is exactly why the "problem of evil" is nothing of the sort for the atheist; the atheist already knows that some people are megalomaniacal sociopaths. When such people do such things it's hardly surprising. What is surprising is that these things occur in a world that is supposedly being watched over by a deity that is ostensibly just, kind, and loving.
I realize that you weren't talking about the classical problem of evil in your original post, though, and I agree that the notion of a just afterlife could certainly make personal encounters with evil easier to cope with. However, I don't see that as a selling point for religion, since I'm more interested in whether or not it's true than whether or not it's nice.
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quote:Originally posted by twinky: ... When such people do such things it's hardly surprising. What is surprising is that these things occur in a world that is supposedly being watched over by a deity that is ostensibly just, kind, and loving.
In other words, "You know, I used to think it was awful that life was so unfair. Then I thought, wouldn't it be much worse if life were fair, and all the terrible things that happen to us come because we actually deserve them? So, now I take great comfort in the general hostility and unfairness of the universe." - Marcus
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quote:Originally posted by MightyCow: Show me where Christianity has thrown out the bad ideas and added lots of new, better, more correct ideas in the last 1000 year. Even the "people sciences" are always updating their ideas and are willing to change in the face of evidence.
Christianity is not science. You cannot twist it in any way so that it even resembles science, because it refuses to change and it refuses to accept any sort of testing for truth, logic, or even utility.
Sorry, you obviously have no clue what you're talking about.
I would really be interested in a thoughtful atheist commentary from someone who really understood, and had empathy for, religions and the religious. Is there such a person? Dawkins certainly isn't the one, nor any of the other current crop of nattering "new atheists." Bart Ehrmann, maybe? Though his work is rather narrow in focus.
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quote:I would really be interested in a thoughtful atheist commentary from someone who really understood, and had empathy for, religions and the religious.
How are you defining "understand" and "empathize with?" I would wager that both of these descriptors apply to Dawkins.
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quote:I would really be interested in a thoughtful atheist commentary from someone who really understood, and had empathy for, religions and the religious.
How are you defining "understand" and "empathize with?" I would wager that both of these descriptors apply to Dawkins.
You're kidding, right? I've only seen and read interviews and perused his website, but he oozes hatred for the religious and that I can see shows no understanding at all. Patronization, yes, understanding, no.
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quote:I would really be interested in a thoughtful atheist commentary from someone who really understood, and had empathy for, religions and the religious.
What sort of thoughtful commentary are you looking for? A criticism of religion? I think Sam Harris expresses himself pretty thoughtfully in the dialog/debate that he had with a Catholic, Andrew Sullivan, a couple years ago:
quote:In many religions, suffering actually has meaning, and there is a promise of a final justice and redemption.
Ah. And what if there isn't final justice, and no "redemption?" What if there is no meaning to your suffering? Is it really better to wrongly believe there is?
And that doesn't resolve the classic Problem of Evil, of course: that a God which is truly omnipotent and omnibenevolent doesn't need to allow pain, but does anyway.
You know, I've increasingly been thinking that, even for the Biblical interpretation of God, there's a fair amount of suggestion that He is neither omnipotent nor omnibenevolent. And I'm not certain that I understand the insistence of many religions that He must be so. Surely a being capable of creating a universe could be more powerful than we could possibly comprehend without being all-powerful.
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quote:I would really be interested in a thoughtful atheist commentary from someone who really understood, and had empathy for, religions and the religious.
What sort of thoughtful commentary are you looking for? A criticism of religion? I think Sam Harris expresses himself pretty thoughtfully in the dialog/debate that he had with a Catholic, Andrew Sullivan, a couple years ago:
Excuse the title - I don't think either Andrew or Sam were responsible for it.
I'm sorry, I don't think I could read with a straight face a debate where Andrew Sullivan was meant to represent the religious point of view. Edit: In fact, after his election antics, I don't think I could ever read anything from Andrew Sullivan with a straight face ever.
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You know, I've increasingly been thinking that, even for the Biblical interpretation of God, there's a fair amount of suggestion that He is neither omnipotent nor omnibenevolent. And I'm not certain that I understand the insistence of many religions that He must be so. Surely a being capable of creating a universe could be more powerful than we could possibly comprehend without being all-powerful.
My take on this is if your goal is that people practice religion you need two things: 1)belief in the being to be worshiped 2)a reason to worship said being
Having the being be omnipotent, omniscient and perfectly good (oopg) provides a pretty good reason. Going out on a limb, prior to the rise of science, perhaps 2) was more of an impediment than 1)?
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quote:I'm sorry, I don't think I could read with a straight face a debate where Andrew Sullivan was meant to represent the religious point of view. Edit: In fact, after his election antics, I don't think I could ever read anything from Andrew Sullivan with a straight face ever.
*shrug* He's an earnest religious person, one that has kept his faith despite some pretty enourmous challenges (a gay Catholic? hello?). The fact that his political activities disagree with you really shouldn't disuade you from reading the discussion.
You can always just read Sam Harris' side - it's the thoughtful atheist commentary you're looking for, right?
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posted
Deep breath. Back to basics. The point of interest is whether there is a reason to believe in a god. BlackBlade has offered some evidence; there are flaws in his experimental procedure, as has been pointed out, but evidence is evidence. GinaG has stated that
a) She has always believed in a god and that therefore, b) Everything (or possibly "every scientific wonder", I am not really clear on this) is evidence for her god.
Now, if something is evidence for X, it is evidence against not-X; this follows from probabilities adding to one. Further, if a data point is equally likely under every known theory, then it is not evidence in favour of any particular theory. GinaG, do you agree with these statements? If not, there is no point in further discussion.
Assuming for the moment that this is agreed, I will ask these questions:
i) What would be evidence against your god? ii) Why do you believe that the evidence you see is not equally compatible with atheism?
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quote:Originally posted by GinaG: I'm sorry, I don't think I could read with a straight face a debate where Andrew Sullivan was meant to represent the religious point of view. Edit: In fact, after his election antics, I don't think I could ever read anything from Andrew Sullivan with a straight face ever. [/QB]
Can you laugh and read at the same time?
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quote:Originally posted by King of Men: i) What would be evidence against your god? ii) Why do you believe that the evidence you see is not equally compatible with atheism?
If reasonable evidence could be provided that Jesus Christ never resurrected from the dead, I would not be a Christian.
But no scientific evidence can ever ascertain whether or not there is a God. As I already said, it's the wrong instrument.
One can philosophize his way out of belief. I simply see no reason to do so. Nothing about atheism is compelling nor does it seem at all logical to me. The fact that the universe exists is all the evidence I need that there is a creator, and a benevolent one; reasoning that He would not create and then not try to communicate is also illogical.
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by GinaG: If reasonable evidence could be provided that Jesus Christ never resurrected from the dead, I would not be a Christian.
But no scientific evidence can ever ascertain whether or not there is a God. As I already said, it's the wrong instrument.
[\QUOTE]
Can you give an example of what might constitute "reasonable evidence"?
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quote:The fact that the universe exists is all the evidence I need that there is a creator...
I have to admit, this absolutely boggles my mind. It's like saying "Someone must have MADE this beach! And he wants me to not eat pork!"
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quote:Originally posted by GinaG: If reasonable evidence could be provided that Jesus Christ never resurrected from the dead, I would not be a Christian.
Hmmm...I think that I still would.
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