Argument for God from Reason

[Hugh_Farey]

You mean events that have no causal relationship between one another? Events arbitrarily following one-another?

Yes. That’s exactly it.

 

[Hugh_Farey]

You don’t understand my point.

You can conceive of a world without minds within it. You cannot conceive of a world without mind, however, because the act of conceiving of such a world is done by you, with your mind.

You can attempt to conceive of a world created without reason, but you cannot, as you are conceiving of it with your reason.

I’m not sure I understand this one. It is true that I personally have to use my mind to imagine any kind of universe. However, I can certainly imagine that there could be rational universes which contained no minds able to understand them - our own, a few million yeas ago, for a start.
Similarly, although I have a mind and live in a rational universe, I can easily imagine that there could be a universe which was not rational, and in which I do not exist.

 

[Kei]

That’s not at all similar to any chaos theory I am aware of. Chaos theory I am aware of depends on deterministic systems that are highly dependent upon initial conditions that appear to fall to chaos after a certain point in time, in which chaos comes from order, as opposed to order from chaos.
In fact, if we leave alone the precise mathematical definition of chaos used in chaos theory and focus on the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, closed systems tend to disorder, and not the opposite.

But what I’m talking about is something much more fundamental than a “watchmaker” of Paley.

I also find it funny to refer to a mechanism as disorderly.

 

[IWantGod]

Nobody is arguing for an intelligent designer

‘Chaos’ is an interdisciplinary theory stating that within the apparent randomness of chaotic complex systems, there are underlying patterns, constant feedback loops, repetition, self-similarity, fractals, self-organization

In other-words, even in chaos there is order. There is no true absolute chaos because there is order underlying it…

Nobody is arguing that an ordered chain of events cannot arise out of randomness. It’s irrelevant to the discussion.

.

 

[Kei]

I was not claiming that a rational universe must contain minds within it.
You seme to understand my point, though.

Any “irrational” universe you imagine is imaginesd by a rational mind. Is a universe conceived of by a rational mind truly irrational, or founded on rationality? I can imagine a universe where trees just pop into and out of existence, yet I am the one thinking it in an attempt to escape rationality.

 

[Dan123]

Something to ponder. How would one differentiate between a universe where events had no causal relationship and one where they DID have a causal relationship but that relationship wasn’t understood (or wasn’t understandable at all)?

 

[Hugh_Farey]

Any “irrational” universe you imagine is imaginesd by a rational mind.

Yes.

Is a universe conceived of by a rational mind truly irrational, or founded on rationality?

Truly irrational. A rational mind can imagine a state of irrationality. I think the crux of your inquiry is almost the opposite. Can a rational universe be brought into being by something which isn’t a “mind” at all? That’s what we are trying to establish.

I can imagine a universe where trees just pop into and out of existence, yet I am the one thinking it in an attempt to escape rationality.

Yes. As I say, a rational mind can imagine a state of irrationality. That’s not to say that a state of irrationality requires a rational mind to imagine it.

I think this line of thinking is getting off the track. As far as we know, ten million years ago the universe contained no entity capable of imagining anything, but it was no less rational and coherent than it is now, so a human “mind” is clearly not essential to a universe. But is any kind of mind? Does “God” have to have “mind” or not? I think this is the essence of the debate, no?

 

[Hugh_Farey]

Something to ponder. How would one differentiate between a universe where events had no causal relationship and one where they DID have a causal relationship but that relationship wasn’t understood (or wasn’t understandable at all)?

I don’t know. Perhaps one can’t. It is more likely that we would desperately try to derive some kind of pattern from randomness, even if there wasn’t one.

School math tests often ask students to provide the next two or three or ‘n’ terms of a given sequence. It would be fun to set a similar test to university math graduates, but make the given sequence completely random.

 

[Dan123]

So interesting thought. Assuming some kind of intelligent reasoning being found themselves in a universe that after careful study and observation followed no understandable laws of reason or order, would they be justified in concluding a powerful (possibly all powerful) agent was the cause of all these unrelated caused events? Humans have traditionally been willing to ascribe unexplained events to the deities their culture believes in, seems like they’d be left ascribing pretty much everything to one. So could a universe without any explainable reason appear more likely to be the product of an all powerful deity (though that deity would likely be thought of much differently than one who creates an ordered universe).

The math test example is good though it leaves one nagging question. If the student submits two numbers, are they wrong because they tried to add to an unpatterened sequence, or correct because any two numbers would be correct?

 

[AndrewAxland]

If the student submits two numbers, are they wrong because they tried to an unpatterened sequence, or correct because any two numbers would be correct?

There are no inherently “right” answers in exercises like this. What is being tested is the ability of the student to logically justify their reasoning using mathematical principles. Two students can come up with two different answers, and both of them could be “right”.

 

[Dan123]

Oh I know, I meant it rhetorically as from a matter of perspective any answer would be both right and wrong.

 

[Dan123]

Are we so attuned to finding patterns in things, that we will find them even within a set of random numbers?

I think this is definitely yes. We’re good at patterns and bad at randomness for the most part. We see big dippers and warriors in the sky where only dots of light exist, or bunnies in clouds. Conversely there was an interesting study done where they took the results of actual coin flips, so like a list “HTTHTHTTH” and compared that to a similar list but one made up by a person asked to create a random result. They were able to discern the real list from the one a person made because we’re really bad at random. In the real world despite 50/50 odds of heads or tails you’ll occasionally have say 10 heads in a row if you’re doing a large enough sample set. Our brains don’t see that as random and so when we try to make up a random result we often imbue a pattern into it.

One interesting idea from non-theists regarding why, if there is no creator or higher power, the idea would be SO prevalent in humans kind of rests on our pattern finding as well as assigning agency. If you were on the African savvanah as a prehistoric human and the pattern of movement in the tall grass suggested there could be a predator there, it’s safer to believe there’s an agent causing it and be wary than to assume it’s the wind. It’s kind of Pascal’s wager but with lions. If you believe there is a predator and you’re wrong you lose nothing, if you believe there isn’t a lion and you’re wrong, you’re dinner. So a brain tuned to see patterns where there may or may not be one and to believe a conscious agent is causing things to happen are both consistent with a more naturalistic human progression. Doesn’t make it true (or false), just found it interesting.

 

[Dovekin]

Nobody is arguing that an ordered chain of events cannot arise out of randomness. It’s irrelevant to the discussion

Kei is arguing that if a mind can discern the order in the universe, then a mind must exist to give it that order. If we agree that an ordered “chain of events” can arise out of randomness, then we disagree with his argument.

Chaos theory seeks to deal with chaotic systems by uncovering unknown determinants within them. Theorists assume the system they are working with is determined by initial conditions, but that is a subset of chaotic systems, ie those that can be worked with. The question being raised ultimately, is if every chaotic system has “order underlying it.”

 

[Hugh_Farey]

Kei is arguing that if a mind can discern the order in the universe, then a mind must exist to give it that order.

I believe that is indeed one of Kei’s arguments. But how can we tell if it’s true or not?

 

[Dovekin]

how can we tell if it’s true or not?

Beats me.

Kei’s argument is like St Anselm, Descartes, Heisenberg, the anthropic principle, chaos theory, etc. in posing the question about the relationship of mind to reality. It is a tough one! I just hope to clarify the discussion, and I am not sure I’m doing that.

 

[Rhubarb]

I would say 3 doesn’t lead to God. I agree reasoning required Mind. And we all accept that humans are in possession of Mind.

I don’t think the deterministic nature of our world points to any sort of reason in the same sense that we say humans can reason.

But I also don’t find the principle of sufficient reason to be very compelling either, at least not in the way that some use it.

 

[AlNg]

In a world where the correct answer is uncertain, if not unknowable, does truth become relative?

Some truths are absolute, and some truths are relative (to the culture and the times).

 

[AlNg]

If we agree that an ordered “chain of events” can arise out of randomness, then we disagree with his argument.

In a random sequence of digits, you may at one point arrive at the string 7777777777777777777 leading you to believe incorrectly that the whole sequence is ordered.

 

[Dovekin]

In a random sequence of digits, you may at one point arrive at the string 7777777777777777777 leading you to believe incorrectly that the whole sequence is ordered.

Or just that section is ordered. Eiher way, Kei’s idea, that an ordered universe means a mind established that order, is contested. Order can arise from chaos, without mind directing it.