Atheists and the validity of reason

[Sarpedon]

It should not be. As I already explained to Sharpedon, this “surprise” of yours is based upon the ignorance of what probability theory means. You can go back a few pages and read it.

The explanation deals with the probability of things happening, assuming we know that it happened in the first place. Thus, you need to start with the assumption that the mind is accurate as is for your explanation to even be relevant. Do you make this assumption, and if so, why?

 

[Sarpedon]

For the Christian, the mind and the body are just “conduits”, which connect to the “soul” in some unspecified manner (and as such it is subject to “faith”).

For Christians, the “I” is both the spirit and matter united into a single nature. It’s not as if the “I” is the spirit and this “I” uses the body like a vehicle. The body is as much a part of a person as the spirit.

Therefore your answer is that of an atheist. (May I welcome you into our camp now? After all you repudiated one of the basic Christian concepts: “the soul”.) Christians would have to invoke “faith” to accept even their own existence, which is clearly unneccesary - for you.

Even if your view of Christianity was correct, I don’t understand your argument. Even if the “I” was independent of the body, one could still have knowledge of it without faith.

Naturally, this follows. If you are your body and your mind, then your mind is reliable in that respect.

Umm… no. If you are your body and mind, and you know that “I” exists, then all that you know is that you have a body and mind. Not that they are reliable.

If you mean that knowing that you have a body and mind due to your knowledge of self is an accurate exercise of the mind itself, all you could even try to prove is that one conclusion of the mind is reliable. You have about a trillion or more to go.

How would you come to the assumption (without faith, of course) that we are only body and mind from the knowledge of self-existence?

Now comes the second question:

Do you need any faith to accept that you have parents?

In other words, can you reasonably entertain the thought that you have been created ex-nihilo by God (one second ago!), without any ancestors, and you are the whole universe, by yourself? All the other humans with whom you seem to interact are just figments of your imagination? All the world which seems to surround you, all the memories you seem to remember are just illusions imposed by God, just to confuse you? Would you consider this a reasonable option?

Yes.

This is a valid philosophical position. There is no reason God could not do this, philosophically speaking.

Theologically, the answer is much different. Catholics believe that the reason a self-sufficient God creates is out of love. This love is not an emotion, but rather a choice made out of selflessness. God doesn’t “need” us at all, but chooses to create us anyway out of love.

I find this to be the only rational explanation of why God would create things He doesn’t need. After all, since God is perfect and self-existent, He needs nothing. Of course, we exist, so we were created. The only rational explanation I can give for why God did create us is that He choose to with nothing to gain at all. This is the very definition of love, and He charges us to do the same.

The reason I do not believe in your scenario is that it makes God a liar, which is not in accord with His love.

Could God have created us due to a different explanation? The only other one I deem possible is that God is pure evil, creating us with nothing to gain Himself, doing it purely to cause us suffering. While this might be philosophically possible, I have experienced enough in my life to choose the alternative.

So yes, I do choose to place faith in your scenario being false, but I think I have significant evidence to bolster my position. I think the above illustrates the danger of divorcing one method of reaching knowledge from all others. Your scenario is philosophically possible, so one who only uses natural philosophy could rationally believe in it. The same dangers lie with only using the scientific method or theology.

 

[ateista]

All I said is that I can be certain of my own existence without faith.

In that case how do you know that you exist? What epistemological method do you use to ascertain that you exist? Would it be… reason? That is the point I would like to see clarified.

I don’t see how you extrapolate from this to the matter of reliability of the senses.

If there is one thing that can be known without resorting to faith (and there are MANY), then your assertion of “faith is always needed”, is already proven incorrect. Another question: do you need faith to accept that the law of contradiction is true? Or do you accept it because its denial would lead to an absurdity?

It would be perfectly possible for me to exist, but to do so in a context completely different than what my inaccurate senses are telling me.

And how would you know that? I really would like to see some arguments, not just an “empty” assertion like this. (No insult inteded!)

For example is it possible that your gender is in doubt? Is it possible that you are actually a frog, who imagines itself to be an eagle, who in turn imagines itself to be an angel, who likewise imagines itself to be human? It is your “inaccurate” senses that tell you that you are a human, with a certain gender, with some specific hair color, with some specific ancestry, etc… and you put all that into doubt, due to your “inaccurate” senses.

And then, to top it all, you deny that you adhere to universal skepiticism. What you say is the quintessential universal skepticism, the “strong” variety of it.

Knowledge of existence does not imply knowledge of anything besides that existence.

That is what I consider unacceptable. Here is a reason why. You start from the undeniable fact that you exist.

Then you have two options: 1) either accept that you are part of something else, or 2) you assert that you are the only one in existence. (Solipsism).

If you choose option 2) or solipsism, then you believe that everything else is just an illusion, or a figment of your imagination. Since there are “illusionary” signals reaching you (both from without and from within), and not all of them reflect your own beliefs (for example my posts), you have two options again: a) you accept that there is “something” outside you and it sends you signals which are totally contrary to your own convictions, or b) you accept that you are insane, since your mind produces things that are diametrically opposite to your own beliefs.

Can you acutally believe that you are insane? Do you need faith to accept that you are not insane?

Obviously to accept one’s own insanity is not an option (even the crazy people believe that they are sane). So you must choose option a) that is there is something outside you, and thus you must discard option 2) which was the assumption of solipsism.

So, from the fact that you accept your own existence it logically follows that there is something outside you (the denial would lead to your own insanity).

Now, since you accepted that there is something outside you, and it communicates with you through signals, you can contemplate if the signals you received are accurate, or distorted in some way. Furthermore, the signals you receive only partially come from the “outside”, a sizable portion comes from the inside, your own body.

Do you need to resort to faith when considering the internal signals? Or do you accept them as correct? When you feel hunger, is there any doubt in your mind that you are really hungry?

To argue that the signals which come from the inside and from the outside are all “distorted” in some way also leads to an absurdity. Again, you have two options: 1) the signals are accurate, or 2) the signals are distorted.

To say that they are all “false” or “distorted” is nonsense. On what grounds would you consider them distorted? There is no ground for comparision. If you receive a signal and consider it distorted, you don’t dare to act on it. If you act on it - sometimes instinctively (like blinking when a small insect approaching your eye) - your body will react, no matter how hard you want to override it. Your body knows that the signals are valid, even if you try to imagine them incorrect.

Therefore option 2) would necessarily render you to total immobility, since you could not trust your senses. However, your body refuses that option. It is your own body which will prove to you that the signals are accurate.

And that concludes the reasoning, why there is no need for faith when contemplating the accuracy of the senses.

What this reasoning does not try to do is to substantiate that the mind, which receives the objective and accurate signals, will interpret them correctly. Many times it does not. If the misjudgment is minor, then it does not carry serious consequences (usually). If the misjudgment is “major”, the result can be serious injury or death.

No reasonable person (atheist or theist) could argue that our interpretation of reality is always accurate. And precisely that inaccuracy can be construed as the consequence of a random, undesigned process. The theist’s assertion of the design is belied by the sometimes inaccurate working of the mind.

As explained above, even if there is a transmission channel, nothing comes of it.

In the previous segment I explained why your assertion is wrong.

I don’t know how you define “soul”, but I want to make it clear that a human person is both body and spirit. The union of these two things form a single nature, the nature of man.

I don’t define “soul” as an ontological entity. It belongs to the category of imaginary existence.

 

[ateista]

Now comes the second question:

Actually I don’t consider it a “valid” philosophical position. It can only be the product of self-deceptive, maybe even insane mind.

Anyone who seriously would subscribe to solipsism, will be proven a liar if he would open his mouth. His involuntary reflex of breathing would prove that he relies on the “illusionary” reality. The only way to really adhere to solipsism is to hold your breath. Guess what? The only honest solipsist is a dead solipsist.

So yes, I do choose to place faith in your scenario being false, but I think I have significant evidence to bolster my position.

I rather doubt that the evidence would be convincing to anyone who does not a-priori accepts your premises. And then why bother?

I think the above illustrates the danger of divorcing one method of reaching knowledge from all others. Your scenario is philosophically possible, so one who only uses natural philosophy could rationally believe in it. The same dangers lie with only using the scientific method or theology.

I think differently. I think that philosophy only has merit, **if **it reflects reality. Otherwise it is an empty exercise.

 

[tdgesq]

The mind is the electro-chemical activity of the brain. Just like “walking” is the activity of the legs. There is no ontological object of “walking”, it cannot be separated from the physical foundation of the legs". Yet, walking and the legs are not the same, just like the mind and the brain is not the same.

I suspect you would admit that the electro-chemical activity of the brain exists. Change exists. Of course under a materialistic view of the world there would need to be an explanation for how change exists, and how we know change exists. The epistemic explanation of the activity of the brain would have to come from somewhere. Wouldn’t it be because you’ve seen an EEG or an MRI that indicates such activity exists? Yes. Well, that requires the reliability of the senses - sight and hearing at a minimum.

What “senses” are you talking about?

All of them. Sight, taste, touch, hearing, smell.

My question was: “do we need faith to know that we exist?”. Sharpedon said that he is not 100% sure, but he thinks “no”. He said because there is no “transmission” involved, there are no senses involved. Now you think otherwise. So what is your answer to the posted question?

Well, your question was that, from which you somehow deduced that “I” is a body and electro-chemical activity in the brain. To answer your question though: I can consider existence. I can think. That’s pretty good evidence that I exist. The question is what is “I”?

You say it is a body and electro-chemical activity in the brain. Why? Because that is what you empirically observe through the senses. How do you know your senses are reliable? You don’t. That you know you exist does not make it one whit more likely that your senses are reliable.

It is ironic that you equate “electro-chemical activity” with the mind. Since the very concept of electro-chemical activity is relatively recent in terms of human history, we apparently didn’t know what our minds were for all those thousands of years. Substantive verification only came in this last century with the advance of medical technology. That doesn’t bode very well for your claim that the senses are reliable.

It is the word “faith” which is not applicable here. The basic axioms and principles are not accepted of “faith”, they are accepted because their denial is impossible.

This is an absolutely false statement. Denial that the senses are reliable is not impossible. Certainly not logically impossible. If so, then give the syllogism. It is quite possible that the senses are completely unreliable. That is the claim of the solipsist.

You act like a college freshman who has just heard the skeptical challenge for the first time in Philosophy 101. “That’s impossible! I know that there is an external world because I can see it. Every body knows that the senses are reliable!”

That’s not an argument, it’s a presupposition without justification. Axioms are generally considered self-justifying. The reliability of the senses is not a self-justifying proposition. It is faith.

Do you need “faith” to accept the law of contradiction? Or do you accept it as a simple, self-evident necessity, since its denial would be its confirmation?

Yes. Neither are the laws of logic self-authenticating. It’s denial would be nonsense, just like every logical proposition that could be uttered. They would all be nonsense. And?

Answer me this: how is it in a materialistic world view that laws of logic exist that always and everywhere hold? I can’t touch a law of logic. I can’t see it. How does the materialist account for it in a purely material world?

It should not be. As I already explained to Sharpedon, this “surprise” of yours is based upon the ignorance of what probability theory means. You can go back a few pages and read it.

It should not be? Now you make normative ethical statement about my concern with materialism. I wonder what basis there would be for that statement in a purely materialistic ontology.

You mean the white balls red ball analogy.

1. We must first presuppose that always and everywhere and for all time statistical probability theory holds. Any justification for that?
2. It looks like we must assume the uniformity of nature for any statistical method to be reliable. You must then face the problem of induction, wherein induction is unable to verify that inductive reasoning is valid.
3. Even presupposing that nature is uniform (on faith), that statistical probability theory holds for all past and future events (on faith), we still have the added problem of any quantitative analysis of your hypothesis that enough random events have occurred to account for our existence and the reliability of our senses.

I would like to see the analysis of the age of the universe (prescinding from the obvious question of how the universe ever came into existence) and the chances that enough random events could occur to account for the uniformity we see today that led to an animal that can reliably “know” things from empirical observation.

If the answer is: “well, we don’t know, but it must be that the red ball got picked, lucky us,” we are no longer talking about science or knowledge. We are talking about belief in luck. In other words, we are talking about faith again.

 

[Touchstone]

Well, your question was that, from which you somehow deduced that “I” is a body and electro-chemical activity in the brain. To answer your question though: I can consider existence. I can think. That’s pretty good evidence that I exist. The question is what is “I”?

You say it is a body and electro-chemical activity in the brain. Why? Because that is what you empirically observe through the senses. How do you know your senses are reliable? You don’t. That you know you exist does not make it one whit more likely that your senses are reliable.

I suspect maybe you have not read the previous pages of this thread, which is understandable, given some of the twists and turns it has taken. But several times – many times – it has been pointed out by both ateista and myself that solipsism is a live option logically, but an absolutely unembraceable position in practice. One can suppose the senses are completely unreliable, but only in a naive, self-refuting form of a gedankenexperiment. You cannot even formulate the concepts for your hypothetical solipsism in your head without language, language that requires full faith in the integrity of our senses to learn, adopt, and use.

Ateista said a solipsist cannot even open his mouth without making himself a liar. It’s worse than that. He cannot even think conceptually, in terms of subjects, objects and their relationships, without betraying his allegiance to his senses.

So, it’s not Cartesian bootstrapping that underwrites a man’s commitment to his senses, it’s the act of living, and doing – just about anything at all – that gives the lie to any claimed solipsism. If you speak, post, move, eat, walk, etc., your every action testifies to your commitment to the integrity of your senses. It is this necessary commitment, and man generally success in many endeavors which demand reliable sense-data that justify the commitment to the reliability of our senses.

It is ironic that you equate “electro-chemical activity” with the mind. Since the very concept of electro-chemical activity is relatively recent in terms of human history, we apparently didn’t know what our minds were for all those thousands of years. Substantive verification only came in this last century with the advance of medical technology. That doesn’t bode very well for your claim that the senses are reliable.

I say that’s a feature of man’s development that commends the very idea. You don’t “feel” your brain, when you think. It’s conspicuously “sensation-free” in that regard, meaning that the mind, as a physical feature exists in a “cognitive blind-spot” for man. That is, it’s precisely because the function of the brain doesn’t produce tactile or other visceral sense-data when its working that man has struggled to understand and perceive the mechanics of the mind. If our senses are reliable, then the lack of sense data that signals “the mind is doing this, physically”, or “the brain is doing that” creates a perceptual ‘vacuum’ that lead many to suppose the mind is magic, or supernatural.

It’s only with recent advances in technology that man has had the tools readily at hand to observe and “de-mystify” the “magic” of the mind. Our senses are extended through technologies like the fMRI, and we are recently able to perceive the activity and behavior of the brain as a physical phenomenon in ways we could not for past millenia.

This is an absolutely false statement. Denial that the senses are reliable is not impossible. Certainly not logically impossible. If so, then give the syllogism. It is quite possible that the senses are completely unreliable. That is the claim of the solipsist.

It’s a logical possibility, but a practical impossibility. And that’s being charitable on the ‘logical’ side; as above, even the contemplation of solipsism is a transcendental argument for the reliability the sense. You can’t suppose your senses are reliable without presupposing the reliability of your senses, as those senses are necessary for doing any supposing conceptually in the first place.

You act like a college freshman who has just heard the skeptical challenge for the first time in Philosophy 101. “That’s impossible! I know that there is an external world because I can see it. Every body knows that the senses are reliable!”

That hasn’t been advanced by ateista or myself. Rather, the argument is different, and overwhelming. Rather than knowing our senses are reliable, we realize that accepting the reliability of our senses is axiomatic – necessary and unavoidable for any ‘self’ that chooses to live. If you exist, and you choose to continue to exist, you MUST embrace the axiomatic reliability of your senses.

An axiom isn’t true or false epistemically, else it wouldn’t be an axiom, but a conclusion or proof of it’s own. So, neither ateista or I will assert that we know any such thing about our senses and their reliability. We simply understand there is no choice but to accept it for those that choose to live.

That’s not an argument, it’s a presupposition without justification. Axioms are generally considered self-justifying. The reliability of the senses is not a self-justifying proposition. It is faith.

I’m fine calling it ‘faith’ as a charitable measure, so long as the crucial qualification gets tacked on – it’s a NECESSARY commitment, axiomatic. Reliability of the senses is not optional – I refer you back to the exercise I commended to Sarpedon: put your hand in an open flame for a few seconds, then report back how self-justifying your sense-data is. Can you hold your hand in the flame for more than a second or two? If not, why not.

Yes. Neither are the laws of logic self-authenticating. It’s denial would be nonsense, just like every logical proposition that could be uttered. They would all be nonsense. And?

So, too, with doubts about the reliability of our senses. Such doubts are transcendentally self-refuting.

Answer me this: how is it in a materialistic world view that laws of logic exist that always and everywhere hold?

Logic is an conceptual abstraction from our physical environment. If physical law applies with translational symmetry throughout the universe, then the derived logic will apply there as well.

I can’t touch a law of logic. I can’t see it. How does the materialist account for it in a purely material world?

It’s conceptual, and as such, only exists as intricate electro-chemical patterns in the brain. Those concepts are real, physically ‘actual’ as brain-states, and are tremendously useful for many bearers of those concepts, full of meaning and utility. But there’s no ‘ethereal existence’ for logic to account for, if that’s what you are asking. The universe and its dynamics are the grounding for the concepts humans develop that we refer to as ‘logic’.

-Touchstone

 

[Sarpedon]

I will not able to return to this thread until late today or tomorrow.

I gave maintened throughout this thread that we are obliged to accept the reliability of our senses. We cannot function in life withour doing this. Thus, I agree with most of your post, Touchstone.

As tdgesq explained at the top of page 6, the problem is that atheism can’t provide a reasonable explanation for this necessary assumption. There is no reason to assume that blind natural forces would assemble into a mind with reliable senses and thus functional reason. Even if this highly unlikely thing did happen, we don’t know if we are in possession of it because we lack a third-party observer.

Ateista, your probability explanation only works if you start with the assumption that our senses are reliable (that we have “won the lottery”, so to speak). You speak of earth being the “cosmic lottery winner” when we lack a third-party observation to confirm this. In order for your argument to be relevant, you must frame in in the context of not knowing whether we have won the lottery or not (with the winner having accurate senses).

You both keep providing experiences of life to justify the senses. You say that sticking your hand in a fire justifies your senses, when the entire experience of having your hand in a fire is mediated by senses as well. In an attempt to prove something you assume it is at least partially true in the first place.

Suppose a person has all his senses connected to a computer. He has earbuds, personal movie viewing glasses, and his senses of taste and touch are wired to a computer that uses electrical signals to mess with them.

Suppose his mind is wiped, so all he experieces is the imaginary world the operaters of the experiment feed from the computer. Within this fake reality, the person “sees” a fire. He then proceeds to place his “hand” in the “fire”. Instantly he “sees” his flesh burn away and “feels” the burning sensation in his hand. Has this experience validated his senses? You seem to be arguing that it does. Nothing actually happened to his hand.

 

[ateista]

I gave maintened throughout this thread that we are obliged to accept the reliability of our senses. We cannot function in life withour doing this. Thus, I agree with most of your post, Touchstone.

Very promising start.

As tdgesq explained at the top of page 6, the problem is that atheism can’t provide a reasonable explanation for this necessary assumption. There is no reason to assume that blind natural forces would assemble into a mind with reliable senses and thus functional reason.

Why not? I think there is every reason to assume it. You could just as well argue that “walking” is of a supernatural design, because the random chances of nature could not produce such an organized motion of the legs.

Those random chances of nature “filtered out” those beings, who did not interpret the signals correctly. I gave you a detailed explanation above.

Even if this highly unlikely thing did happen, we don’t know if we are in possession of it because we lack a third-party observer.

You are back to argue that this event was “unlikely”. Thus you claim to know what the probability of this event might be. How do you calculate this probability?

Ateista, your probability explanation only works if you start with the assumption that our senses are reliable (that we have “won the lottery”, so to speak). You speak of earth being the “cosmic lottery winner” when we lack a third-party observation to confirm this. In order for your argument to be relevant, you must frame in in the context of not knowing whether we have won the lottery or not (with the winner having accurate senses).

Why? You also accept that our senses correctly transmit the information. You really should make up your mind: do you accept axiomatically that our senses are reliable, or not? You can’t argue both ways.

You both keep providing experiences of life to justify the senses. You say that sticking your hand in a fire justifies your senses, when the entire experience of having your hand in a fire is mediated by senses as well. In an attempt to prove something you assume it is at least partially true in the first place.

Suppose a person has all his senses connected to a computer. He has earbuds, personal movie viewing glasses, and his senses of taste and touch are wired to a computer that uses electrical signals to mess with them.

Suppose his mind is wiped, so all he experieces is the imaginary world the operaters of the experiment feed from the computer. Within this fake reality, the person “sees” a fire. He then proceeds to place his “hand” in the “fire”. Instantly he “sees” his flesh burn away and “feels” the burning sensation in his hand. Has this experience validated his senses? You seem to be arguing that it does. Nothing actually happened to his hand.

There is no need for this thought experiment, though it is interesting. We can do this today. The pleasure / pain center of the brain can be excited directly with sending electic impulses to the proper center of the brain. Or one can even excite the actual nerve endings in the body itself.

The sensory information is just a path: nerve endings get stimulated, the signal travels the nerves, and the brain interprets the signals. We can artificially create the impulses and “simulate” the natural flow of information.

That does not invalidate that the actual, physical, natural sensory information is accurate. No matter how hard you try, exciting the pain center of the brain will never be pleasurable, since pleasure is perceived by a different part of the brain. The nerve ending responsible for feeling “heat” are different from the nerve endings that perceive “cold” or “pain”. Exciting a “heat” sensitive nerve ending will never give the personal feeling of being “cold”.

There are some people, whose body has a serious neurological disorder, they cannot feel pain. Just because some people do not feel pian you could not argue that there is no such things as pain.

 

[ateista]

It is quite possible that the senses are completely unreliable. That is the claim of the solipsist.

If you are a solipsist, then you just falsified your own belief by making your post - directed to someone else. If you are not a solipsist, then why did you bring it up?

There are some insane people who “claim” that they are Napoleon, too. Would you quote their claim in a discussion? (Unless you want to give an example of how an insane mind can think.) Who cares what insane people think? “Real” solipsists do not exist. They all died by withholding their breath in an attempt to “prove” that air around them does not exist.

I would like to direct your attention the long post to Sharpedon (#83 on this page above) where I gave a logical rundown on how the acceptance of one’s own existence (without resorting to faith) logically leads to the acceptance of the external world and the reliability of the senses.

 

[Sarpedon]

Why not? I think there is every reason to assume it. You could just as well argue that “walking” is of a supernatural design, because the random chances of nature could not produce such an organized motion of the legs.

Those random chances of nature “filtered out” those beings, who did not interpret the signals correctly. I gave you a detailed explanation above.

Walking has evolutionary advantages. Philosophy generally does not. Can you give me a detailed reason why our species would evolve the capability to know the answer to the God question? I won’t accept “its generally better to have a true world view” without some serious explanation.

You are back to argue that this event was “unlikely”. Thus you claim to know what the probability of this event might be. How do you calculate this probability?

I can’t calculate it precisely, but here’s a crude estimation:

Possible minds: entirely inaccurate -to- entirely accurate. In between, all factors of reality are combined with each other in as many combinations as possible. These constitute partially accurate minds.

By factor of reality, I mean “trees are green” “rocks are made of minerals” "dirt is minerals and organic matter, etc. All possible true statements about the world that are not gradations of other statements or combinations of them.

There you go- the odds are one out of the number of combinations of all factors of reality. I think this is a really big number.

Of course, things may influence which minds are more likely, changing the statistics. Even with this caveat, I still consider the number likely to be huge.

Why? You also accept that our senses correctly transmit the information. You really should make up your mind: do you accept axiomatically that our senses are reliable, or not? You can’t argue both ways.

As a theist, then yes.

As an atheist, then no.

I am willing to personally accept that my senses are true if theism is true, because that gives an adequate explanation for why that assumption about my senses is true.

I am not willing to accept the accuracy of my senses with atheism, because atheism provides to valid way to account for the truth of my assumption about my senses. I would be reduced to relying on near blind faith.

There is no need for this thought experiment, though it is interesting. We can do this today. The pleasure / pain center of the brain can be excited directly with sending electic impulses to the proper center of the brain. Or one can even excite the actual nerve endings in the body itself.

The sensory information is just a path: nerve endings get stimulated, the signal travels the nerves, and the brain interprets the signals. We can artificially create the impulses and “simulate” the natural flow of information.

That does not invalidate that the actual, physical, natural sensory information is accurate. No matter how hard you try, exciting the pain center of the brain will never be pleasurable, since pleasure is perceived by a different part of the brain. The nerve ending responsible for feeling “heat” are different from the nerve endings that perceive “cold” or “pain”. Exciting a “heat” sensitive nerve ending will never give the personal feeling of being “cold”.

There are some people, whose body has a serious neurological disorder, they cannot feel pain. Just because some people do not feel pian you could not argue that there is no such things as pain.

You didn’t really answer my question. Did the person’s “experience” of burning his hand validate his belief that it actually happened?

 

[Sarpedon]

Actually I don’t consider it a “valid” philosophical position. It can only be the product of self-deceptive, maybe even insane mind.

Anyone who seriously would subscribe to solipsism, will be proven a liar if he would open his mouth. His involuntary reflex of breathing would prove that he relies on the “illusionary” reality. The only way to really adhere to solipsism is to hold your breath. Guess what? The only honest solipsist is a dead solipsist.

He would just say that his suffocation and death are illusionary as well. I don’t believe in solipism, partially due to faith, but this isn’t a valid way to disprove their beliefs.

I rather doubt that the evidence would be convincing to anyone who does not a-priori accepts your premises. And then why bother?

Because you asked me about it. My beliefs extend past philosophy, and whether you accept them personally or not is your own decision.

I think differently. I think that philosophy only has merit, **if **it reflects reality. Otherwise it is an empty exercise.

Of course. And your “reality” is defined by the products of neurons that assembled due to blind forces into a rational computer.

 

[Sarpedon]

In that case how do you know that you exist? What epistemological method do you use to ascertain that you exist? Would it be… reason? That is the point I would like to see clarified.

Not reason, but immediate experience. Remember that I only gave a tentative answer, because I was far from certain on this question

If there is one thing that can be known without resorting to faith (and there are MANY), then your assertion of “faith is always needed”, is already proven incorrect. Another question: do you need faith to accept that the law of contradiction is true? Or do you accept it because its denial would lead to an absurdity?

When did I make that assertion?

I do not necessarily hold that nothing can be known without faith. Rather, I maintain that in this one question about the reliability of the senses faith is necessary.

Yes, I accept all laws of logic on faith. There is simply no way to prove them, because proofs are based off the truth of the laws. It is not enough to say they are self-evident, because this implies accuracy of the mind, which is also taken on faith.

And how would you know that? I really would like to see some arguments, not just an “empty” assertion like this. (No insult inteded!)

I couldn’t know it with certainty, but I also can’t eliminate the possibility. After all, I gave an example (hooked up to computer) of how it could be true. My example is entirely possible in reality, thus demonstrating that it is possible we could have an inaccurate image. Of course, I have faith that my scenario or any scenario like it is false.

And then, to top it all, you deny that you adhere to universal skepiticism. What you say is the quintessential universal skepticism, the “strong” variety of it.

You fail to realize that my argument for universal skepticism is grounded in atheism. From an atheistic perspective I am arguing for universal skepticism, but from a theistic perspective, I can escape that trap.

To argue that the signals which come from the inside and from the outside are all “distorted” in some way also leads to an absurdity. Again, you have two options: 1) the signals are accurate, or 2) the signals are distorted.

To say that they are all “false” or “distorted” is nonsense. On what grounds would you consider them distorted? There is no ground for comparision. If you receive a signal and consider it distorted, you don’t dare to act on it. If you act on it - sometimes instinctively (like blinking when a small insect approaching your eye) - your body will react, no matter how hard you want to override it. Your body knows that the signals are valid, even if you try to imagine them incorrect.

Again, you try to validate on sense by appealing to another. You only know you are “blinking” through your senses, and if your senses are in doubt, then you can’t say that your “blinking” proves that the senses are accurate. You don’t know if it occured in the first place.

We can’t know whether our body regards the signals as accurate, because we can only know how the body reacts to the signals through our senses, which are in question.

Again this is only from the atheistic perspective. I am not a skeptic, and skepticism can be found false through theology.

I don’t define “soul” as an ontological entity. It belongs to the category of imaginary existence.

OK. That’s your definition.

 

[tdgesq]

I suspect maybe you have not read the previous pages of this thread, which is understandable, given some of the twists and turns it has taken. But several times – many times – it has been pointed out by both ateista and myself that solipsism is a live option logically, but an absolutely unembraceable position in practice. One can suppose the senses are completely unreliable, but only in a naive, self-refuting form of a gedankenexperiment. You cannot even formulate the concepts for your hypothetical solipsism in your head without language, language that requires full faith in the integrity of our senses to learn, adopt, and use.

I agree with the vast majority of this. It is true that the solipsist goes further than the mere skeptic. He makes a positive statement that his own inner experiences are the only ones that exist, and that the only reality that exists is in his own mind. The skeptic might concede that there is an external reality and other minds that exist, but that it cannot be know because it does not have epistemic justification.

The language argument is also a compelling reason to reject solipsism. A purely private internal language is difficult to conceive. Language almost by definition is a public process. A private language might allow for some type of conceptual construct in the mind of the solipsist, but not one that he could ever communicate to something outside himself. And to the extent he could use his own language to speak to the specters inside his own head and conceptualize in this private language, it’s accuracy would be doubtful without any frame of reference other than what is happening in his own mind.

So, it’s not Cartesian bootstrapping that underwrites a man’s commitment to his senses, it’s the act of living, and doing – just about anything at all – that gives the lie to any claimed solipsism. If you speak, post, move, eat, walk, etc., your every action testifies to your commitment to the integrity of your senses. It is this necessary commitment, and man generally success in many endeavors which demand reliable sense-data that justify the commitment to the reliability of our senses.

I made this argument once to a die-hard skeptic. His answer was that none of us act perfectly in accord with our own philosophical system, which I’m sure is true. Of course that very statement was inconsistent with his belief that nothing truly existed outside of his own mind.

I obviously agree that the reliability of our senses is necessary to know anything, save for a handful of possible exceptions, one being knowledge of self-existence. I’ve said as much before in this thread. The point of positing the skeptical and solipsist positions is this: there is no independent epistemic justification for the reliability of the senses. That without it virtually all possibility of knowledge would be destroyed is not a justification. It would just mean that there are very few things we can know. That the opposition (solipsists and skeptics) act contrary to their own assertions is not a justification. It is at best a demonstration of inconsistencies within their own epistemology. A very good one by the way.

It’s only with recent advances in technology that man has had the tools readily at hand to observe and “de-mystify” the “magic” of the mind. Our senses are extended through technologies like the fMRI, and we are recently able to perceive the activity and behavior of the brain as a physical phenomenon in ways we could not for past millenia.

I accept that recent technological advances give us much insight into how the brain functions. My remarks were directed at our changing understanding of how the brain operates and the implications that has for the notion that the senses are reliable.

It’s a logical possibility, but a practical impossibility. And that’s being charitable on the ‘logical’ side; as above, even the contemplation of solipsism is a transcendental argument for the reliability the sense. You can’t suppose your senses are reliable without presupposing the reliability of your senses, as those senses are necessary for doing any supposing conceptually in the first place.

The best you can do with a Kantian transcendental argument is demonstrate that the solipsist position is internally inconsistent and therefore should be ignored, although even that is arguable since the premises of those arguments can be attacked. For most skeptics you can successfully show them that they are in fact accepting that the senses are reliable. That demonstration though does not and cannot provide epistemic justification for reliability.

Rather than knowing our senses are reliable, we realize that accepting the reliability of our senses is axiomatic – necessary and unavoidable for any ‘self’ that chooses to live. If you exist, and you choose to continue to exist, you MUST embrace the axiomatic reliability of your senses.

I want to be with you here, but it is obvious you still don’t accept what it really means to affirm the reliability of the senses. Death is not something any of us here have actually experienced. It is something we infer through sensory experience. When you make the statement that it is “necessary” and “unavoidable” to live unless one accepts the reliability of the senses, you are already presupposing they are reliable.

An axiom isn’t true or false epistemically, else it wouldn’t be an axiom, but a conclusion or proof of it’s own.

Unless you believe that there are some truths that are self-justifying, whether it be foundational or coherence. It is a term used in mathematics and modal logic. It may be used in place of epistemic presuppositions or preconditions of knowledge, but I haven’t ever encountered it in the context of the reliability of the senses. Perhaps because there are competing systems on the subject.

So, neither ateista or I will assert that we know any such thing about our senses and their reliability. We simply understand there is no choice but to accept it for those that choose to live.

You can only understand that after accepting the presupposition, not before. See above.

I’m fine calling it ‘faith’ as a charitable measure, so long as the crucial qualification gets tacked on – it’s a NECESSARY commitment, axiomatic. Reliability of the senses is not optional –

We need to call it what it really is. It is “necessary” to what? Not to the proposition that unless I accept it, I will die. It must be accepted before you can make that assertion because the statement already presupposes the reliability of the senses, not the other way around. It is not justification of any kind for the reliability of the senses.

I refer you back to the exercise I commended to Sarpedon: put your hand in an open flame for a few seconds, then report back how self-justifying your sense-data is. Can you hold your hand in the flame for more than a second or two? If not, why not.

I refer you to his answer, which I find compelling. I also saw ateista’s answer, that stimulating a pain center in the brain would not exact the same sensation as “really” touching a flame. Assuming he is correct, you would not have any basis upon which to compare the two without first presupposing sensory reliability. I see the flame, I touch it, I feel pain - whatever particular sensation of pain that might be. There would be no basis for comparison without first presupposing reliable sensory function.

So, too, with doubts about the reliability of our senses. Such doubts are transcendentally self-refuting.

You go further than a transcendental argument allows. A doubt about the reliability of the senses cannot be transcendentally demolished. Even if it could, it does not provide an epistemic justification for sensory reliability, as you earlier admitted.

Logic is an conceptual abstraction from our physical environment.

That sounds like Thomism.

If physical law applies with translational symmetry throughout the universe, then the derived logic will apply there as well.

Yes, if it does. Now we get to the second part of the exercise, which is how this consistent and explainable with a materialistic ontology.

 

[tdgesq]

. . . continued

It’s conceptual, and as such, only exists as intricate electro-chemical patterns in the brain. Those concepts are real, physically ‘actual’ as brain-states, and are tremendously useful for many bearers of those concepts, full of meaning and utility. But there’s no ‘ethereal existence’ for logic to account for, if that’s what you are asking. The universe and its dynamics are the grounding for the concepts humans develop that we refer to as ‘logic’.

Poisoning the well with “ethereal” existence isn’t very helpful. So we have a non-justified epistemic presupposition that the senses are reliable. We then know that we have a brain that works on certain electro-chemical principles (of which we know something about, but far from everything) that then abstracts concepts from sensory data of the universe. Those concepts may be logical concepts or mathematical concepts.

By the way, I don’t yet disagree with any of that. What I do disagree with is that this can be adequately explained by a materialistic world view. The laws of logic and laws of thought like mathematics are held to be universally applicable by the theist and the non-theist alike. I would like an explanation for that view in the context of what I propounded earlier:

1. We must first presuppose that always and everywhere and for all time statistical probability theory holds. Any justification for that?
2. It looks like we must assume the uniformity of nature for any statistical method to be reliable. You must then face the problem of induction, wherein induction is unable to verify that inductive reasoning is valid.
3. Even presupposing that nature is uniform (on faith), that statistical probability theory holds for all past and future events (on faith), we still have the added problem of any quantitative analysis of your hypothesis that enough random events have occurred to account for our existence and the reliability of our senses.

I would like to see the analysis of the age of the universe (prescinding from the obvious question of how the universe ever came into existence) and the chances that enough random events could occur to account for the uniformity we see today that led to an animal that can reliably “know” things from empirical observation.

Anybody care to give it a whirl?

 

[Touchstone]

(three paragraphs with basic agreement elided for brevity – thank you!)

I obviously agree that the reliability of our senses is necessary to know anything, save for a handful of possible exceptions, one being knowledge of self-existence. I’ve said as much before in this thread. The point of positing the skeptical and solipsist positions is this: there is no independent epistemic justification for the reliability of the senses. That without it virtually all possibility of knowledge would be destroyed is not a justification. It would just mean that there are very few things we can know. That the opposition (solipsists and skeptics) act contrary to their own assertions is not a justification. It is at best a demonstration of inconsistencies within their own epistemology. A very good one by the way.

I’ve not claimed there’s independent justification for the reliability of the systems – the necessity of accepting the reliability of the senses is not grounded in epistemology, but practical expediency. If you think about this (and I’m guessing you have many times), there must be a “stopping” point to prevent the infinite regress problem with epistemic justification. The practical demands of living as a human being are what breaks the regress, and grounds man’s belief. Not in terms of epistemic justification qua epistemic justification, but by brute necessity. If I were to provide you with some kind of epistemic justification for the reliability of the senses, then we’d be right of the races again, anyway, rightly wondering what the justifications were for those justificational epistemic elements, and on and on…

What you are asking for does not exist, and it’s a good thing, as it’s a regress-breaker, a desperately needed one for the rational mind. The human mind “bootstraps” itself by embracing the reality of reality as a NON-JUSTIFIED necessity. A necessity remains a necessity even without epistemic justification. That’s the “bedrock” here, for human reasoning.

I accept that recent technological advances give us much insight into how the brain functions. My remarks were directed at our changing understanding of how the brain operates and the implications that has for the notion that the senses are reliable.

Ahh, OK. I misunderstood then, and apologize.

The best you can do with a Kantian transcendental argument is demonstrate that the solipsist position is internally inconsistent and therefore should be ignored, although even that is arguable since the premises of those arguments can be attacked. For most skeptics you can successfully show them that they are in fact accepting that the senses are reliable. That demonstration though does not and cannot provide epistemic justification for reliability.

Right. I think I addressed our misunderstanding here. You are thinking some kind of epistemic justification is needed for the necessary embrace of the reality of reality. It isn’t, as it’s completely superfluous if that belief is already obligatory, unavoidably necessary.

I want to be with you here, but it is obvious you still don’t accept what it really means to affirm the reliability of the senses. Death is not something any of us here have actually experienced. It is something we infer through sensory experience. When you make the statement that it is “necessary” and “unavoidable” to live unless one accepts the reliability of the senses, you are already presupposing they are reliable.

Yes, that’s part of my argument. Very early on in your childhood development, when you cannot even reason in a form we would rightly use that word for with adults, you are accepting on some level the reality of reality. Visual integration, which happens in large part before your first birthday, is the ratification (visually) of the reality of reality for the infant mind and perceptual faculties.

That does NOT mean that those commitments to the reality of reality cannot be renounced in part or even in whole, later on. Theism is a form of partial renunciation of that commitment… you still remain committed enough to drive your car successfully to work, but you suppose that reality is plastic enough that all sorts of miraculous things happen all the time. But more than that, man can choose not to live, and is therefore empowered to indulge his solipsism. He may have firmly embraced the reality of reality as part of his physiological development as an infant undergoing the process of visual integration, but we know from experience that man can make the volitional choice not to live at some later point.

Unless you believe that there are some truths that are self-justifying, whether it be foundational or coherence. It is a term used in mathematics and modal logic. It may be used in place of epistemic presuppositions or preconditions of knowledge, but I haven’t ever encountered it in the context of the reliability of the senses. Perhaps because there are competing systems on the subject.

Axioms, “givens”, presuppositions, I’m flexible on the word, so long as we are clear on the concept. A priori commitments. I’m fine with saying they are “self-justifying” – I would then see the embrace of the reality of reality as “self-justifying” by virtue of its necessity, for example. But I want to be clear that there’s a problem with presuppositions which are not properly basic, obvious and necessary. For example, when I talk to Calvinists of a certain stripe, I am presented with “presuppositions” that are both their starting point, and the sum total of their conclusions (see van Til, et al, Presuppositional Apologetics). That’s a major throw down point, and a horrible abuse of a capable mind thinking that way.

I don’t see that here, but want to make sure that what you mean by ‘self-justifying’ is something that obtains of necessity.

You can only understand that after accepting the presupposition, not before. See above.

Agreed. I think we’re in accord on that point, now.

We need to call it what it really is. It is “necessary” to what? Not to the proposition that unless I accept it, I will die. It must be accepted before you can make that assertion because the statement already presupposes the reliability of the senses, not the other way around. It is not justification of any kind for the reliability of the senses.

Just to recap from the above. 1) the statement does have transcendental dependencies on accepting the reality of reality. I’m looking the “reversal” of that, the man who proves his loyalty to the reality of reality by using language, but then in other areas denies it. 2) There isn’t any justification needed for the reliability of the senses, once its necessity has been established. The only cases where justification would be needed are for those individuals who do not wish to proceed with the project and goals of living. For those of us who choose to live, no justification for the reliability of the senses obtains, or is needed in the least.

I refer you to his answer, which I find compelling. I also saw ateista’s answer, that stimulating a pain center in the brain would not exact the same sensation as “really” touching a flame. Assuming he is correct, you would not have any basis upon which to compare the two without first presupposing sensory reliability. I see the flame, I touch it, I feel pain - whatever particular sensation of pain that might be. There would be no basis for comparison without first presupposing reliable sensory function.

That’s a curious scenario for me, just because it’s a restatement of the Cartesian problem, or Matrix redux. That’s the idea of the movie (The Matrix) that we are wired up like Sarpedon suggested. In that case, if I’m stipulating that the sensory (name removed by moderator)ut is a passable impostor for what we are wired to perceive in the real world (whatever that means here), then we would necessarily accept the reality of that (simulated) reality. Wired completely into the “computer”, and completely “unwired” from my original physiological endpoints, I’d be perfectly fooled. But that’s just a recapitulation of the ‘brain in a vat’ idea. That may be the case, but it’s a moot question for us.

You go further than a transcendental argument allows. A doubt about the reliability of the senses cannot be transcendentally demolished. Even if it could, it does not provide an epistemic justification for sensory reliability, as you earlier admitted.

Right. I think we’ve beat that ‘what is the epistemic justification for sensory reliability’ horse thoroughly to death, now. There’s not supposed, or needed. I should go back and look, I guess, but I believe I qualified my doubts with “conceptual argumentation” or some such, there. Pure doubt I will grant does not presuppose the reality of reality. But once you adorn it with conceptual scaffolding to sustain your doubt, you immediately find your self working from reality-of-reality-affirming presuppositions.

That sounds like Thomism.

Heh, I’ve heard that before. Someone mentioned that to Leonard Susskind in a lecture that he gave that I attended once, during the Q&A session. He didn’t even know what Thomism was. I’ve wrangled with Thomists many times over the years, so I’m quite familiar, although many self-described “Thomists” bear little resemble to my knowledge of Aquinas, or are recognizable in the words of Summa Theologica. That aside, I think Thomism (as I understand it) is much closer to anti-thetical to the ontology and cosmology I’m working from. However, I do think I understand why you said that.

Yes, if it does. Now we get to the second part of the exercise, which is how this consistent and explainable with a materialistic ontology.

OK, thanks for the feedback.

-Touchstone

 

[Sarpedon]

Can we agree that our acceptance of the reliability of our senses is based on expediency? We accept it because we need and want too, not because we have any real scientific or philosophical proof for it?

I would consider this a form a faith, but I am willing to not use that word if you dispute this characterization.

This thread has been getting caught up in this one factor of the argument. If we can agree on this point, the rest of the argument becomes much clearer- how we justify our belief.

 

[ateista]

Can we agree that our acceptance of the reliability of our senses is based on expediency? We accept it because we need and want too, not because we have any real scientific or philosophical proof for it?

I agree. We may have a different starting point for it, but we can agree that reality exists, it interacts with our sensory organs (and we interact with it). The sensory (name removed by moderator)ut is accepted as valid, though we may interpret the (name removed by moderator)ut data incorrectly. (As in the example of a mirage vs. a lake.)

We might return to the problem of virtual reality, because that is also a very interesting scenario to explore. (Though Touchstone has already preempted most of my argument.)

I would consider this a form a faith, but I am willing to not use that word if you dispute this characterization.

Thanks. My problem with the word “faith” is that it has too many meanings. First, it may be used as a synonym for “belief”, whether that belief is totally unfounded or it is extremely well justified.

Two personal examples of these extremes. The unfounded belief might be: I believe that there are other intelligent beings in the Universe. There is absolutely no justification for that. The well-founded belief would be: I have been together with my wife to 28 years. During these years I saw no reason to doubt her, all the signals I received indicate that she has been faithful (yet another meaning of the word!). But that is not absolute certainty, since we have not been together every second of our life.

Furthermore, there is another use of “faith”: a purported epistemological method to obtain valid knowledge about reality. When you use the unqualified word “faith”, I never know which meaning you happen to refer to.

If we would agree to use “e-faith” for the epistemological meaning, and “b-faith” for the simple belief for something that is not 100% established, then the confusion would be less likely. Also it would be nice to differentiate the levels of justification for “b-faith”, since it can go from zero to 99.9999…%. (But that may be too complicated.)

This thread has been getting caught up in this one factor of the argument. If we can agree on this point, the rest of the argument becomes much clearer- how we justify our belief.

Right on! Looks like to me that we are making progress. (I may not be able to return until tomorrow. This will be a very busy day for me.)

 

[Sarpedon]

In an attempt to justify my belief in the reliability of the senses, I see two options.

One is that some entity designed our minds that way, presumably because he/she/it desired our minds to be that way.

The other explanation is that matter assembled due to blind forces with no purpose or direction into a brain that works that way.

I will concede that it would make sense under evolutionary assumptions that the mind would be at least partially accurate. Obviously, a creature that doesn’t know reality can’t function well in it.

Philosophy, however, is a different case. I see no reason why evolution would select for a philosophically accurate mind. Simply put, knowledge of the God question does not seem to confer any advantage. The most successful creatures in evolution (think living fossils) have done fine without it. In terms of survival, being able to philosophize about God brings no advantage, at least that I can see. Personally, I know that I have “wasted” (in terms of fitness) a lot of time on this thread that I could have used to procure food or shelter or something like that.

Thus, I see no reason to think that, per atheism, we would have developed philosophically accurate minds. The possibility still remains, but I am not inclined to believe it happened despite the odds.

Your probability explanation needs to be adapted to fit this argument. You said that given the fact the we know we have won the lottery, the chances of us winning that lottery are not particularly relevant. In essence, perhaps we simply got lucky.

The problem is that we don’t really know if we have won the lottery in the first place. We are both willing to say that we did. If we did know with absolute certainty that we do have accurate minds, the chances of us having them per atheism would be much different (perhaps we did just get lucky). Since we both agree that we don’t really have certainty about whether the senses are accurate, your argument needs to be adjusted.

Atheism refutes itself like this- if atheism is true, then we most likely do not have the philosophical capabilities to know its truth in the first place. If it is true, then we can’t know it is true.

 

[tdgesq]

I’ve not claimed there’s independent justification for the reliability of the systems – the necessity of accepting the reliability of the senses is not grounded in epistemology, but practical expediency. If you think about this (and I’m guessing you have many times), there must be a “stopping” point to prevent the infinite regress problem with epistemic justification.

You are correct that there must be a foundational beginning point for knowledge in order to avoid the infinite regress that would make knowledge impossible. I reject the pragmatic justification espoused by the likes of William James though (which I realize is not really an attempt at epistemic justification), primarily because I don’t believe it gives any more insight into the reason why accepting first principles without justification is necessary. I will explain below.

What you are asking for does not exist, and it’s a good thing, as it’s a regress-breaker, a desperately needed one for the rational mind. The human mind “bootstraps” itself by embracing the reality of reality as a NON-JUSTIFIED necessity. A necessity remains a necessity even without epistemic justification. That’s the “bedrock” here, for human reasoning.

I’m not demanding an epistemic justification for sensory reliability. I’m only pointing out that first principles are accepted by non-theists at the outset without empirical justification or any other justification normally demanded of epistemology that would constitute what we call knowledge.

When you say the reliability of the senses is a non-justified “necessity,” you must mean it is necessary for something. By demanding that it is necessary for something though doesn’t mean it is justified by that “something.” So long as we are clear on that score, I agree with you, although I’m not sure I agree with you on what that “something” is ie. to live and not die.

But more than that, man can choose not to live, and is therefore empowered to indulge his solipsism. He may have firmly embraced the reality of reality as part of his physiological development as an infant undergoing the process of visual integration, but we know from experience that man can make the volitional choice not to live at some later point.

I understand, but what I am saying is that to posit that sensory reliability is necessary to live and not die is already to presuppose the reliability of the senses. It is already an affirmation that one’s sensory experience about living and dying is reliable. That is why I don’t find it particularly helpful as a pragmatic justification, or even as an explanation of why sensory reliability is necessary.

I would be willing to accept that sensory reliability is necessary to know reality, regardless of what that reality may consist. Now, I may be accused here of also presupposing that the senses are reliable to make such a statement, but I don’t see it right off. If you think there is an error in thought on my part, please let me know.

Axioms, “givens”, presuppositions, I’m flexible on the word, so long as we are clear on the concept. A priori commitments. I’m fine with saying they are “self-justifying” – I would then see the embrace of the reality of reality as “self-justifying” by virtue of its necessity, for example.

I meant self-justifying in the sense the Foundationalist means it. I do not believe that sensory reliability is self-justifying in that way, but it’s been a long time since I’ve looked into Foundationalism.

For example, when I talk to Calvinists of a certain stripe, I am presented with “presuppositions” that are both their starting point, and the sum total of their conclusions (see van Til, et al, Presuppositional Apologetics). That’s a major throw down point, and a horrible abuse of a capable mind thinking that way.

Yes, I have read Rushdoony’s account of Van Til’s Presuppositional Apologetic. As a Christian, albeit a Catholic Christian, I believe it is an abuse of the treatment of first principles. The starting point being the sum total of conclusions is not what bothers me about it (fideism). There is a type of coherence theory put forward in the final analysis, which is a questionable method of justification in itself. The error that I see is that it must assume the same starting points of knowledge (empirical reliability, the validity of the laws of logic, etc.) that we all must accept to assert yet additional presuppositions about God and revelation. R.C. Sproul et. al. authors a book entitled Classical Apologetics that imho completely demolishes the Calvinistic approach to presuppositional apologetics.

That’s a curious scenario for me, just because it’s a restatement of the Cartesian problem, or Matrix redux.

I was thinking more in terms of Descartes’ Evil Genius. I believe it escapes the brain in a vat dilemma.

Heh, I’ve heard that before. Someone mentioned that to Leonard Susskind in a lecture that he gave that I attended once, during the Q&A session. He didn’t even know what Thomism was.

That doesn’t surprise me. And I am sure that we would very much disagree on how the intellect abstracts universals from what is perceived in the world and makes judgments about them. I doubt even our respective nomenclatures are the same. It is obviously my contention that a materialistic ontology is inconsistent with the epistemology offered by most non-theists, and particularly their first principles. I’m sure you would argue the same against my position.

I thank you for the interesting and civil discussion.

 

[ateista]

In an attempt to justify my belief in the reliability of the senses, I see two options.

One is that some entity designed our minds that way, presumably because he/she/it desired our minds to be that way.

The other explanation is that matter assembled due to blind forces with no purpose or direction into a brain that works that way.

I will concede that it would make sense under evolutionary assumptions that the mind would be at least partially accurate. Obviously, a creature that doesn’t know reality can’t function well in it.

Very good. I can’t argue with it.

Philosophy, however, is a different case. I see no reason why evolution would select for a philosophically accurate mind. Simply put, knowledge of the God question does not seem to confer any advantage. The most successful creatures in evolution (think living fossils) have done fine without it. In terms of survival, being able to philosophize about God brings no advantage, at least that I can see. Personally, I know that I have “wasted” (in terms of fitness) a lot of time on this thread that I could have used to procure food or shelter or something like that.

Yes, and so could I. But obviously we did it, because we have spare time, and such conversations are interesting. Neither of us is pressed to deal with everyday survival problems 24/7.

Acutally, the same can be said about many other human endeavors. What use is “music” or creating pieces of art or watching the Super Bowl? Good entertainment, but not essential.

There is one positive thing to be said about these conversations: they sharpen the mind. We don’t teach mathematics in school, because it is essential for the everyday Joe Schmoe to know how to calculate the area of a triangle. We teach it because it helps to develop analytical skills, which are very useful. So they don’t have direct value, but they have indirect value.

Thus, I see no reason to think that, per atheism, we would have developed philosophically accurate minds. The possibility still remains, but I am not inclined to believe it happened despite the odds.

You are back to the “accurate” again. Our mind is certainly well developed to contemplate these questions. And that we can certainly do, we are doing it right now.

Now I don’t see why these questions are so special and important. I engage in these discussions simply for their entertainment value, and cannot deny that sometimes I receive answers which I have never seen before.

Your probability explanation needs to be adapted to fit this argument. You said that given the fact the we know we have won the lottery, the chances of us winning that lottery are not particularly relevant. In essence, perhaps we simply got lucky.

The problem is that we don’t really know if we have won the lottery in the first place. We are both willing to say that we did.

It is undeniable that we won “some” prize. Maybe not the jackpot, but at least some consolation prize. (And that actually increases the likeliness of atheism. After all the lesser prizes are much more likely than the jackpot.)

If we did know with absolute certainty that we do have accurate minds, the chances of us having them per atheism would be much different (perhaps we did just get lucky). Since we both agree that we don’t really have certainty about whether the senses are accurate, your argument needs to be adjusted.

I am not sure what you mean here by the accuracy of the senses. We should differentiate between the information conveyed by the senses (the raw data) and the processed information (what the mind does with the information).

To say that our senses are not accurate in giving us the raw data, would be akin to say: “we cannot really see, because we have eyes”, and “we cannot really hear, because we have ears”, etc… To say that the senses are inaccurate means that the senses are an impediment and not an asset in gleaning information about reality. And that assumption really leads nowhere.

Furthermore, they are accurate enough to withstand the test of the pudding. They allow us to survive (mostly), and that is all that counts.

Atheism refutes itself like this- if atheism is true, then we most likely do not have the philosophical capabilities to know its truth in the first place. If it is true, then we can’t know it is true.

I see philosophy quite differently. It is an idle mind game for the ones who are “lucky” enough to have spare time in engaging in it.

Now, having said that, I will give you my analysis of the God-question.

The basic problem is that of the Matrix. Is this existence “real” or do we live in a Matrix? The relevance of this question depends on a few things. If we live in the “natural” world, then the question is irrelevant. The assumption that we live in the Matrix is simply false, and should be discarded. And that is the solution of the atheists.

The theist’s assumption is different. They assume that we do indeed live in the Matrix. Let’s examine what follows from this assumption. First, they can never be sure that the creator of the Matrix is “real” or it simply dwells in “his” Matrix, and his creators also live in “their” Matrix, and so on. (By the way, it is not necessary to posit one creator. There may be a team of creators. There is no logical necessity to assume only one. For the sake of simplicity I will speak of “one”.)

Obvioulsy the infinite regress must be discarded, so even the theists will assume a “final” world, which is truly “natural”. They assume that it is the “next” level, which is the final one. Nothing at all supports this assumption.

The real thorny question is the interaction between the hypothesized creator and the created world. If the creator does not interfere with the creation, does not reveal his existence, does not perform any purported miracles, then for all practical purposes, his existence is irrelevant. He may as well not exist. That is the reasoning of the deists, whose stance is very close to that of the atheists.

The final possible scenario (which is what the theists believe) is that the creator communicates with his creation. First of all, that is the ultimate cruelty. To notify your creation, that their existence happened simply as a “whim”, that they are created as hopelessly inferior, whose existence can be terminated at any time, just because the creator “feels like it”, is so horrendous, so evil that I am at a loss finding the proper words. To tell them that they could have been created as equals, but you chose to do it otherwise - tells them that they are of no consequence, their whole existence is for your amusement only. What could be more cruel than creating living, feeling beings with at least **some level of understanding **and then relegate them to the role of helpless slaves?

And that cannot be whitewashed by some nonsense talk about “love”. There cannot be “love” between such vastly different beings. At least not the love of mutual respect and understanding, only the love of a loyal pet dog, who will not cease to love his master even if the master keeps on kicking him.

Now let’s go one step further. The creator of the Matrix can create two more additional “units”. One, where he will “reward” those who worshipped and obeyed him (heaven), and the other one, where he will punish the ones who chose not to (hell). This would be the “icing” on the cake - as far as cruelty goes. It is the most “naked” equivalent of “I have the power, so OBEY me” type of the “might makes right” “moral” system.

That is my analysis of the God-question. So even if you would be correct, I would side with the Lightbringer, and proclaim: “Non Serviam!”. I would say: “you cannot punish me in the name of decency and justice”, you can only punish me in the name of power.