Atheists and the validity of reason

[Sarpedon]

The best explanations are always the invented ones. It’s only when an explanation has to justify itself that “best” is shown to be “best” in terms of appeal and robustness, and “worst” in terms of support by empirical evidence.

The most “appealing” religions with the “best” explanation have little support. For example, Unitarian Univeralism (morality is what you want it to be (!), believe what you want) has miniscule numbers of supporters compared to Catholicism, which forbids fornication, porn, and masturbation. Granted, not many catholics follow the teachings of the church, but at least if they converted to UU they wouldn’t have to worry about it.

I do not accept the primacy of empirical evidence. Since we only know empirical evidence through our minds, the accuracy of which is delt with by philosophy, empiricism requires philosophy to establish itself.

 

[Touchstone]

When I refer to “knowledge” I am using it in the broadest sense possible, including perception. I understand you view the term differently, but this is only a matter of linguistics.

Language, yes, but I’m striving for precision, here, to the extent we can achieve it, rather than just making “six-of-one-half-dozen-of-another” distinctions. A big part of what I identify as problematic in theism is very sloppy use of language and little rigor in applying concepts. That may appear to be pedantics around semantic exchanges, but I suggest it’s not. The devil is in the details on this.

Yes, I was generalizing it a bit. My point is that all the necessary skills used in soccer are directly selected for by evolution. Soccer is simply another application of abilties conferred by natural selection.

OK, great. Conceptualizing the mind bending phenomena of quantum mechanics – something we certainly do not see as a direct pressure point for natural selection – is just like soccer that way. Humans have powerful evolutionary advantages in the basic capabilites of abstraction, mathematical reasoning, and analysis, and these are the “running, kicking and balance” of thinking about quantum mechanics.

The thrust here is that the basic capabilities man has developed in terms of reasoning, observation and analytical thinking as means to survival and prosperity in survival provide a wealth of other applications that are not directly relevant to the process of survival.

For a parellel comparision to exist for our reasoning ability, we have to assume that the ability to reason to a specific level was directly selected for by evolution. We can’t say that because evolution has selected for some simple reasoning abilities in regards to survival, we can by extention use this reason for more complex reasoning that is not selected for. To say otherwise would be like saying that because evolution has selected for running ability, we can by extention run 500 MPH.

You are confusing the algorithm with the program’s output here. Reasoning is reasoning, and “algorithmically” it’s self-similar accross all applications, whether that’s coordinating a team strategy for bringing down a mammoth, or devising hadron experiments to provide some empirical validation or falsification of string theory. String theory is vastly more complex than the most nuanced strategy ever developed for Mammoth hunting, but the algorithm that drives both is the same. The capabilities to do one imply the capabilities to do the other.

Knowledge – real knowledge – is cumulative, and this means that concepts and ideas of mind-boggling scale and complexity arise. That’s what cumulative processes do, they produce staggering amounts of complexity at scale. But just like evolution is a fairly simple set of core dynamics that produces fantastic complexity due to accumulation over time, human knowledge and reasoning is a simple core that also produces fantastic complexity due to accumulation over time.

Some very, very simple algorithms produces extraordinary structures when the accumulate over time. Man, through collaboration with peers and standing on the accumulated works that came before him, can apply the rudimentary algorithms of reasoning – critical analysis of evidence and observation combined with testing and validation – and interact with fantastically complex and abstract concepts, having no more instrinsic abilities than what nature developed in man as one who needed to locate, plan and execute the hunt for mammoths to feed the tribe.

If evolution has selected for an extraodinarily high level of reasoning ability, then sure we could use it for idle games which have no survival advantage.

As above, I think the cognitive abilities implied by man as a social animal with the capabilities of using experience, tools and language sufficient to survive as “mammoth hunters” or some such is all that’s needed to produce a Richard Feynman in the population. The algorithm is not that demanding. What is demanding is the time and resources dedicated to the algorithm to let it run and accumulate over time. We’ve had lots of that, now.

I see no reason why evolution would have selected for such an ability. The other question is how we know what level evolution has selected for without a third-party observation. After all, there is not necessarily a penalty for going beyond our philosophic ability, especially for abstract ideas like the God question. We know the level of our running ability because our body will physically stop us from exceeding it. I see no parallel thing to stop our minds from venturing into harmless nonsense.

Exactly, and this is a compelling argument for the phenomenon of theism as a pervasive worldview in a world without any gods. There’s a distinct asymmetry at work – the downside of ‘false positives’ is nil to negligible in most cases. The downside of ‘false negatives’ is often catastrophic, lethal.

Take for example, the human disposition toward intentionality. Evolution punishes mercilessly those that fail to identify local threats – a predator nearby looking to eat you, for example. Those whose mental models are not sufficiently alert and vigilant become food for something else. But the converse doesn’t hold. Those whose mental models are “too alert” have little to no penalty associated with the ‘false positives’ that come up. A skittish deer who hears something suspicious and moves out of the meadow to somewhere else incurs the cost of movement; if there was no predator behind the snap of that twig, the energy to move and find new grass is a cost, but a very small one, given the cost of not moving and being set upon by a predator.

Humans, then, have very little cost associated with indulging their imaginations in this way. And humans do, ubiquitously, venture into “harmless nonsense”, although “harmless” becomes a cynical euphemism at the point these ideas end up catalyzing something like burning a witch at the stake, or flying a 757 into a skyscraper.

We do not, and should not grant validity to our conjectures just because we have bigger, more highly develoepd brains than chimps or any other species. We accept knowledge as knoweldge based on its performance against the real world, or, in the case of disciplines like mathematics, against the axiomata and constrainst of a formal, analytical system.

Exactly. I do not see any way to determine the limits of the general capability of the mind, as I do with running (my body will stop accelerating)

Demanding performance, justification, liability to falsification and prediction (where applicable) is a proven means of qualifying the capabilities and output of the mind. You seem to want to qualify thoughts by their ‘pedigree’. I say that’s an intractable proposition, and thoughts are qualified by their performance.

Of course, but the question remains: what are and how do we know the abilities of the mind in the first place? It seems to me that the level of ability selected for by evolution would be relatively low, and that much our our thinking, mostly in regards to abstract ideas, is nonsense (per atheism).

I don’t know why it would seem that way. If we do an inventory of what it takes to team-hunt a mammoth, or to cultivate grains in a field, we would have all the mental pieces we need to explore, say, quantum physics, or determine that “God” is quite likely a very convenient invention for human psychology.

Think of a calculator. With just a very small set of intrinsic functions(add, subtract, multiply, divide, etc.), you can do extremely complex calculations. The sky really is the limit, even with a very primitive calculator. It may take longer than using a MacBook Pro + Mathematica, but all the needed functions are there. The human brain is something similar, equipped with a “chip set” of intrinsics that provide untold wealths of exotic and complex applications, if enough effort and energy are invested.

What I mean is that reason is not a single, undividable ability. If one organism evolves the ability to use reason to some degree, it does not follow that that organism can use reason for anything beyond that degree.

Reasoning is a method, an algorithm. Certainly one algorithm (form of reasoning) may be more sophisticated than another – my dog likely doesn not have the ability to reason in the way I can do to her lack of linguistic prowess, for example – but the method is uncoupled from the data on which it acts. A calculator that can add, subtract, multiply and divide can be used calculate basbeball batting averages or probabilities for isotope decay.

As you have it, you seem to think the algorithm is tied to some discrete set of data. As if our ‘calculator’ only worked with positive integers less than 20, for example.

For example, if one organism evolves the ability to “run”, it does not follow that that single capability of “running” means that any speed and distance of running become possible to that organism. It can only run in regards to the degree that evolution has selected for.

OK, but that doesn’t seem a problem. If the cognitive faculties of a hunter working in a team-hunt to bring down a mammoth is enough “running speed” to produce Albert Einstein eventually, then what is the objection? In this case, reasoning about, say, general relativity isn’t so much running faster, but running farther, and as part of a collective, group run. Knowledge is cumulative, remember.

-Touchstone

 

[Touchstone]

(continued)

Sarpedon:

Likewise, the ability to reason about simple things does not translate into an ability to reason about complex things.

It requires more effort – “running further” – but complexity is tackled by the same basic algorithm.

If an organism can reason about complex things, then evolution must have selected for that high degree of reason. And if evolution has selected for that high degree, then that brings us back to the main question: “why has evolution selected the ability to know the answer to the God question?”

The God question is not a hard question as a direct matter. There’s no evidence of a god, and as a null hypothesis, it requires little reasoning to affirm, beyond the scan for evidence that would disconfirm or interfere with the null hypothesis. What is hard is explaining the factors that produce widespread theism, and that requires a long, term sustained effort to build the natural knowledge about physical law, and also about human evolution and human pyschology as phenomenon that fairly propel humans into credulity and “harmless nonsense”.

That is, there’s no difficulty in not-affirming the existence of a God. We’ve not got any evidence that would establish God’s existence, directly. But yet, people believe in God, and for the most part, don’t know why, or know why they trust their intuitions. Explaining those intuitions – helping mankind understand his proclivity for “harmless nonsense” is much more difficult, as it requires a significant “reverse-engineering” of humans themselves. And humans are extraordinarily complex, complicated machines to reverse engineer.

The only way we can validate it is by analyzing its reaction with reality, which entails analytic mental capability. This brings us back to square one: why would evolution have selected for this analytic ability, and how do we know the extent of our ability? (the last point being the most important)

We observe that humans (and other beings) that have more accurate mental models of reality tend (statistically) to survive longer and reproduce more than those with inferior models. Predators with the most accurate detection and mapping mechanisms will prevail in the competition for survival (statistically) over those with less accurate detection and mapping mechanisms. Truth – information and knowledge that corresponds to the actual state of the extramental world – is the ‘ultimate advantage’ for survival. It’s not a guarantee, but it is the sine qua non of tools for success.

As for the extent, we only gauge that extent by what we can demonstrate as performative.

The only way we know the performance is through the operation of the faculties in question. Therefore, it cannot justify the faculties, for otherwise you would have to assume the truth of the premise you are trying to establish.

That’s just a reductio to solipsism, once again. You are necessarily committed to the reality of reality, and the general veridicality of your senses, whether you like it or not, whether you admit it or not, whether you find it ‘justified’ or not. It’s simply a necessary commitment, and one you prove every time you post a message here.

Classical theology is not very mystical at all. Concepts like immutability and perfection (in the philosophical sense) are not very esoteric. You may disagree over whether they are true, but the ideas themselves are very clear and defined.

Perfection is intensely mystical, and perfectly intractable in the real world. What does ‘perfection’ mean in the real world? I contend this is conceptually impoverished, and nothing more than a euphemism for credulous ideas of ‘mystery’.

My basis for accepting the ability to reason about God (and the rest of reality) is because I have faith that God designed my mind that way.

Right, that’s your basis. But as a basis, it’s neither necessary (like accepting reality as real), nor justified by supporting knowledge or reasoning. It’s just a ‘basis-without-basis’, a brute preference.

Since I cannot test my ability to reason against the world without assuming my ability to reason in the first place, without faith in my mind’s ability all knowledge would come into question and I would become a soft universal sceptic.

You must, and you do assume your ability to reason in the first place, which is proven conclusively just by your composition of that sentence. This last sentence of yours is a textbook example of transcendental self-refutation. Here, you have embraced your ability to reason as the enabler for stating that you doubt your ability to reason.

Again, the only way we can know the results of its performance is through the very faculties in question.

Yes, it’s a tatuology, to be sure, but a necessary, unavoidable, and undeniable one.

The most “appealing” religions with the “best” explanation have little support. For example, Unitarian Univeralism (morality is what you want it to be (!), believe what you want) has miniscule numbers of supporters compared to Catholicism, which forbids fornication, porn, and masturbation. Granted, not many catholics follow the teachings of the church, but at least if they converted to UU they wouldn’t have to worry about it.

Most people I know are terrified of the prospect of ‘morality is what you want it to be’. This is not a recommendation for UU or atheism, despite Chrisitian apologist claims that unbelief is just antinomianism. Humans want anchors, assurances, absolute guideposts, whether imaginary or not, and within that, just hope for what freedom as can be had as “happy slaves” – something like Paul’s idea of doulos. That terror is not alien to me, by the way. As a Christian, I very much valued the security and convenience of delegating my moral framework to some other authority. Abidication is easy, and comforting. I always was perplexed by the divine hatred of homosexuality, for example, but it seemed a very small price to pay for “the whole package”, where I could just nod along with William Lane Craig in congratulating the Christian worldview for its “objective morality”.

People may not like parts of the package – fiery visions of hell, or a God who heals Pentacostals’ varicose veins while the kids in the Childrens’ Hospital down the road languish with brain tumors – but this is the ‘cost of purchase’ for theists. You take the bad with the good, but anything is preferable to having to build, maintain and execute moral and philosophical principles for yourself. I’ve only been an atheist for a little over a year now, but I’m keenly aware, more than ever, of the draw of theism as a practical matter. I can see more clearly than ever why people embrace it, even if it’s false, and even because it’s false.

I do not accept the primacy of empirical evidence. Since we only know empirical evidence through our minds, the accuracy of which is delt with by philosophy, empiricism requires philosophy to establish itself.

Again, your flirting with solipsism.

-Touchstone

 

[Sarpedon]

I will respond tommorrow, but just a quick question for now- what do you consider the minimal qualifiers for a reasonable belief?

 

[Touchstone]

I will respond tommorrow, but just a quick question for now- what do you consider the minimal qualifiers for a reasonable belief?

Minimally, expedient necessity. I believe in the reality of reality, and the general veridicality of my senses, as a matter of necessity. I do not have a choice if I want to live.

That’s the absolute minimum case, I think – necessity.

Beyond that, as I’m sure you weren’t asking about the qualifiers for necessary beliefs:

• justification
• coherence
• objectivity
• falsifiability

Books have been written on each of those, but the minimal requirements for me are evidence, self evidence or logical production as justification, making meaningful sense and avoiding internal or external contradictions as coherence, verification by others as a check against subjective bias as objectivity, and liability to being false as a means of making ‘true’ meaningful for falsifiability.

Objectivity and falsifiability aren’t always available options, so strictly speaking, reasonable belief can obtain from justification + coherence. In casual terms then, I expect my beliefs to be the best fit for the evidence, sensical, aware of bias, and meaningful as true.

Logistical factors obtain, too. The above assumes some opportunity for investigation, analysis and verification. In some cases, exigencies don’t afford such luxuries. A “fight of flight” decision may need to be made regarding a fast approaching attacker, in which case, all the above obtain, but factors like evidential analysis and falsifiability and objectivity become non-starters due to pure urgency. Whenever I’m asked this, someone always asks about situations where you have a split second to make a decision, a decision you cannot avoid. In those cases, you do the best you can, but in some situations, "reasonable belief’ is just the best crude approximation you can arrive at with the time and resources constraints you are operating under.

Also, from experience in this kind of discussion, I want to point out that justification is a big, broad process, and beliefs aren’t “justified” because evidence can plausibly be interpreted this way or that. Justification implies a vetting process of the proposition in light of available competing alternatives, with due preferences for parsimony, economy and generality.

-Touchstone

 

[john_doran]

Minimally, expedient necessity. I believe in the reality of reality, and the general veridicality of my senses, as a matter of necessity. I do not have a choice if I want to live.

the former does not entail the latter: you don’t need to believe in the reality of reality, or in the reliability of your senses in order to live - you just have to act as if they are reliable and that the world is the way it seems to be.

but the world may very well ***not ***be the way it appears, and our senses may be deceiving us at every turn: we could be brains in a vat, or weird gas-bag creatures living in the ammonia-clouds of a tropical world 10 billion light ears from here, or…

of course, if what you are primarily concerned with is survival, then the “expedient necessity” of acting as if is definitely warranted.

but if what you want is truth - to understand the way the world actually is rather than the way it appears to be - then you can’t simply assume the veridicality of appearances, and the usefulness of acting as if everything is the way it seems to be has got nothing at all to do with the question of whether ***it ***is that way or not.

basically, “expedient necessity” conveys no epistemic warrant on propositions and beliefs (however much it allows you to survive).

 

[Touchstone]

the former does not entail the latter: you don’t need to believe in the reality of reality, or in the reliability of your senses in order to live - you just have to act as if they are reliable and that the world is the way it seems to be.

I believe that is a distinction without a difference. When we say we believe X, we act as if X is true. That’s what ‘believe’ means, to proceed and behave under the provisions of the truth of X.

but the world may very well ***not ***be the way it appears, and our senses may be deceiving us at every turn: we could be brains in a vat, or weird gas-bag creatures living in the ammonia-clouds of a tropical world 10 billion light ears from here, or…

Right. Logical possibilities, those. We believe (and thus act as is) those propositions are false, of necessity. though.

of course, if what you are primarily concerned with is survival, then the “expedient necessity” of acting as if is definitely warranted.

It’s a much broader commitment than that. Using language depends a commitment to the reality of reality, for example. Posting this post of yours is hard justify as “survival-centric”, but it necessarily affirms your commitment to the reality of reality and the general veridicality of your senses. Your warrant for just about anything you do fundamentally stems from your commitment to reality.

but if what you want is truth - to understand the way the world actually is rather than the way it appears to be - then you can’t simply assume the veridicality of appearances, and the usefulness of acting as if everything is the way it seems to be has got nothing at all to do with the question of whether ***it ***is that way or not.

You can indulge yourself in solipsistic doubt, but if you want the truth, you still have no option but to accept the reality of reality, as it (generally) appears to be; it’s an unavoidable commitment. Should you want to investigate what actually is, apart from the testimony of your senses, you are totally stuck. Not only are you obliged by expediency to accept the veridicality of your senses, they are all you got. You’ve got no other channels available for epistemic analysis.

basically, “expedient necessity” conveys no epistemic warrant on propositions and beliefs (however much it allows you to survive).

As I said, it’s necessary for survival, but it’s much broader than that. There’s very, very little you can do without betraying your actual commitment to the reality of reality. You don’t need to read this post of mine to survive, but you do need to assume the reality of reality in order to read it, to parse it, to map the relationships between subjects and objects into concepts based on the words you read. When you move your hand to move the mouse to scroll the window down, you’re confirming the commitment, as well, and on and on…

-Touchstone

 

[john_doran]

I believe that is a distinction without a difference. When we say we believe X, we act as if X is true. That’s what ‘believe’ means, to proceed and behave under the provisions of the truth of X.

the distinction i am drawing is not between “believing X", and "acting as if one believes X”; i’m making the distinction between:

A) “believing X is true because one has evidence for its truth”; and

B) “believing X is true because it helps one survive”

and that is most certainly not a distinction without a difference.

(if it was, then what are you doing in all of your posts, trying to present reasons for your disbelief in god and religion? all you should be doing is pointing out how such belief is less adapted to survival (of course, you’d be wrong about that, too, at least for a lot of people who find strength in theistic belief)…)

Touchstone:

Right. Logical possibilities, those. We believe (and thus act as is) those propositions are false, of necessity. though.

not true: we actually believe they are false propositions, to be sure, but we don’t do so out of necessity - it is possible to withhold belief in them whenever it is that one considers them (which is almost never).

but whatever: again, “necessity” isn’t a good reason to believe anything (it’s not any kind of “reason”), and it certainly doesn’t pass the kind of rational muster you’re claiming for all of your other empirical beliefs.

if i told you that i believed that 1+1=3 because some nutbar was threatening to kill my entire family if i didn’t, that would make my belief in some real sense necessary; but it wouldn’t thereby make it more likely to be true.

Touchstone:

You can indulge yourself in solipsistic doubt, but if you want the truth, you still have no option but to accept the reality of reality, as it (generally) appears to be; it’s an unavoidable commitment. Should you want to investigate what actually is, apart from the testimony of your senses, you are totally stuck. Not only are you obliged by expediency to accept the veridicality of your senses, they are all you got. You’ve got no other channels available for epistemic analysis.

you miss the point: unless you believe that your senses are designed to be reliable, and that your rational faculties are designed to be reliable engines aimed at the production of true beliefs, then you have no reason to think that anything you think about the world is true.

but you do think that you have access to truth, and that you can have degrees of certain knowledge about the world. which means that you have a (very good) reason to think that your rational faculties and senses are designed rather than the product of the blind forces of nature.

neither i nor sarpedon actually doubt the legitimacy of our senses or our intellects, but we don’t doubt them only because we believe that they were designed by an omnipotent, omnibenevolent god accurately to report reality.

 

[Sarpedon]

Language, yes, but I’m striving for precision, here, to the extent we can achieve it, rather than just making “six-of-one-half-dozen-of-another” distinctions. A big part of what I identify as problematic in theism is very sloppy use of language and little rigor in applying concepts. That may appear to be pedantics around semantic exchanges, but I suggest it’s not. The devil is in the details on this.

Okay. I will refer to “knowledge” and “perception” as KP from now on. It does not affect my argument.

The thrust here is that the basic capabilities man has developed in terms of reasoning, observation and analytical thinking as means to survival and prosperity in survival provide a wealth of other applications that are not directly relevant to the process of survival.

Yes, but we can only adapt our abilities to the extent that we already have them. We can run, and can use that ability for idle games, but we cannot run 500 MPH. Thus, if we are able to correctly reason about highly abstract things, then our reason needs to be already developed to that level, presumably for survival needs.

You are confusing the algorithm with the program’s output here. Reasoning is reasoning, and “algorithmically” it’s self-similar accross all applications, whether that’s coordinating a team strategy for bringing down a mammoth, or devising hadron experiments to provide some empirical validation or falsification of string theory.

Per atheism, reason is an emergent attribute of the physical brain. Since the physical brain is composed of parts, reason as well is composed of parts and is not a single algorithm. All of the parts working together may form a single system, which could be called an algorithm, but this algorithm is only as encompassing as the parts that constitute it. For example, the degree to which a computer can process things is determined by its parts and their operation. In a like manner, the degree to which our minds can process information and deal with it (reason), is determined by the neurons in our brain.

You seem to be arguing that reason is a single, undividible entity, that if possessed, gives the owner the ability to reason about anything. This is like saying that because a computer has processing ability, it can process anything. It is like saying that because we can run, we can run as fast as we want. We can’t run as fast as we want, because the degree our ability reaches is determined by the parts that make it possible (cells and minerals, metabolism).

The theist can speak of reason as a single entity, because they can maintain that God created reason as a single thing and designed the parts of the brain to support it, rather than the other way around. For atheists, reason can only be spoken of as the result of parts working together, with all that entails.

Humans, then, have very little cost associated with indulging their imaginations in this way. And humans do, ubiquitously, venture into “harmless nonsense”, although “harmless” becomes a cynical euphemism at the point these ideas end up catalyzing something like burning a witch at the stake, or flying a 757 into a skyscraper.

(can’t help but notice that you left out communism…)

You seem to want to qualify thoughts by their ‘pedigree’. I say that’s an intractable proposition, and thoughts are qualified by their performance.

Not exactly. I think it is untenable to assume that we can know the results of our thought’s performance in the real world per atheism, so the only way we can qualify our thoughts is through theism. John Doran’s excellent post deals with this more in depth.

I don’t know why it would seem that way. If we do an inventory of what it takes to team-hunt a mammoth, or to cultivate grains in a field, we would have all the mental pieces we need to explore, say, quantum physics, or determine that “God” is quite likely a very convenient invention for human psychology.

My calculator has all the pieces necessary for performing simple math problems, but it cannot create CGI images for movies. It simply lacks the parts necessary for the latter action. I cannot fathom how the parts of the brain that deal with hunting and farming just happen to do double duty in dealing with highly abstract philosophical constructions. I would not expect the parts of my calculator that deal with math functions do do double duty as CGI imagers.

Think of a calculator. With just a very small set of intrinsic functions(add, subtract, multiply, divide, etc.), you can do extremely complex calculations. The sky really is the limit, even with a very primitive calculator. \

That’s because the calculator’s parts deal with math. You could not expect a calculator to form CGI images. This is precisely my point- if we can philosophize about God accurately, then we must have the necessary parts that deal with that specific function. I see no way to account for why we would have these parts per atheism, and I have no third party to actually check. Since I have to make a decision, I will go with the more likely explanation.

Reasoning is a method, an algorithm. Certainly one algorithm (form of reasoning) may be more sophisticated than another – my dog likely doesn not have the ability to reason in the way I can do to her lack of linguistic prowess, for example – but the method is uncoupled from the data on which it acts. A calculator that can add, subtract, multiply and divide can be used calculate basbeball batting averages or probabilities for isotope decay.

Of course, the calculator can do any function that comes under the scope of what its parts are capable of dealing with. If you try to create CGI images with a calculator, you will fail, because the calculator’s parts cannot perform that function. Likewise, we will fail in our attempt to resolve the God question if the parts of our brain are not equiped to deal with it.

I see no reason per atheism for our minds to have those necessary parts, which kind of undercuts atheism in the first place. If atheism is true, then we probably lack the parts necessary to know its truth.

.

 

[ateista]

This is like saying that because a computer has processing ability, it can process anything.

Actually, it can. It all depends on the proper programming. With a small hand-held calculator it can take a very long time, but it can. Anything that can be algorithmically examined can be processed.

This may look like a counter-intuitive concept (and it is very counter-intuitive) but is can be proven mathematically. The most complex “machine” we are familiar with is the human brain. But it is not different from a Turing-machine (just Google it).

 

[Sarpedon]

The God question is not a hard question as a direct matter. There’s no evidence of a god, and as a null hypothesis, it requires little reasoning to affirm, beyond the scan for evidence that would disconfirm or interfere with the null hypothesis.

Do you have the necessary neurons to make this determination? If so, please explain.

We observe that humans (and other beings) that have more accurate mental models of reality tend (statistically) to survive longer and reproduce more than those with inferior models. Predators with the most accurate detection and mapping mechanisms will prevail in the competition for survival (statistically) over those with less accurate detection and mapping mechanisms. Truth – information and knowledge that corresponds to the actual state of the extramental world – is the ‘ultimate advantage’ for survival. It’s not a guarantee, but it is the sine qua non of tools for success.

Again, this makes sense in regards to brute survival, but not highly abstract things that have little bearing on survival. Also, you can’t take basic survival abilites and extend them beyond their scope, as explained in my last post.

A single statistical anomaly would be enough to render us incapable of analyzing the God question or any other question or combination of questions

That’s just a reductio to solipsism, once again. You are necessarily committed to the reality of reality, and the general veridicality of your senses, whether you like it or not, whether you admit it or not, whether you find it ‘justified’ or not. It’s simply a necessary commitment, and one you prove every time you post a message here.

Exactly. The same goes for you. My point, as John Doran explained, is that you have no legitimate way to justify your belief, while theists do.

I find it curious that atheists place so many vigorous requirments of empirical proof on God, but then suspend these requirments when they come to this question about our mind. Rather than just saying “I accept it”, why not extend the same rigours of testing on this idea? Is it possible? If not, there may be something wrong with your approach.

Perfection is intensely mystical, and perfectly intractable in the real world. What does ‘perfection’ mean in the real world? I contend this is conceptually impoverished, and nothing more than a euphemism for credulous ideas of ‘mystery’.

“Perfection” means “lacking nothing”. Keep in mind that “sin” is a lack of the good. God is perfect because He is by definition the supreme being. If the supreme being lacked something, He would not be perfect. The below quote from newadvent.org expounds on this idea:

That the Divine nature is essentially immutable, or incapable of any internal change, is an obvious corollary from Divine infinity. Changeableness implies the capacity for increase or diminution of perfection, that is, it implies finiteness and imperfection. But God is infinitely perfect and is necessarily what He is.

Would you consider that precise? This is the argument for the immutability of God in a nutshell.

You must, and you do assume your ability to reason in the first place, which is proven conclusively just by your composition of that sentence. This last sentence of yours is a textbook example of transcendental self-refutation. Here, you have embraced your ability to reason as the enabler for stating that you doubt your ability to reason.

I don’t doubt my ability to reason, as John Doran explained.

Yes, it’s a tatuology, to be sure, but a necessary, unavoidable, and undeniable one.

It can easily be denied, but we usually choose to believe it, even atheists who deny having any faith.

Most people I know are terrified of the prospect of ‘morality is what you want it to be’. This is not a recommendation for UU or atheism, despite Chrisitian apologist claims that unbelief is just antinomianism. Humans want anchors, assurances, absolute guideposts, whether imaginary or not, and within that, just hope for what freedom as can be had as “happy slaves” – something like Paul’s idea of doulos.

What makes you think atheism is any different? People want control over their lives, and they can achieve this by eliminating anyone stronger than themselves. They don’t want to have to worry about being accountable for their actions, so they want they assurance of there being no judgement. Even though this means their life is meaningless and fleeting, atheists are willing to pay this price for control and freedom to do what they want. Of course, their conscience and intellect often bother them, so they try to reassure themselves by putting 15 angry bumper stickers on their cars and trying to evangelize for atheism.

 

[Touchstone]

the distinction i am drawing is not between “believing X", and "acting as if one believes X”; i’m making the distinction between:

A) “believing X is true because one has evidence for its truth”; and

B) “believing X is true because it helps one survive”

But these are very often the same thing. That is, if I see a lion running right at me some ways off, fangs bared, with a pair of lionesses approaching, one on each flank, idea that X is true – that I’m in an emerging attempt to convert me into food is both evidence based (I saw a pride of lions take down a huge water buffalo in this fashion last week!), and also survival friendly (if I act as if it’s a real threat, I’m more likely to survival than treating my perceptions as illusions).

Driving my car to the grocery store isn’t any different. My use of the evidence (visual perceptions of oncoming cars, stop signs, turns in the road, etc.) as my basis for truth is a predicate for my survival. Not only am I at risk of getting killed by driving off the road if I heed not my perceptions, without accepting the veridicality of my senses, I can’t even walk to the grocery store, or do anything at all to acquired the food I need to survive.

The necessity of accepting the reality of reality is not a substitute for evidence, but the basis for why we rely on it so completely.

and that is most certainly not a distinction without a difference.

I’m sure there are beliefs we could come up with which have evidence for their truth, but are hard to connect with survival, or even just operational convenience (getting around, etc.). But generally, the faculties we have have been honed by the demands of our environment over long periods of time and tens of thousands of generations to build mental models of our environment that are generally isomorphic to actual reality. We can’t see in the infrared or ultraviolet bands of the light spectrum, so there’s all kinds of “visual perceptions” we just don’t see, for example. But what perceptive capabilities we do have (in between infrared and ultraviolet, with our eyes, most of us, for example), there is a honed correspondence that is essential to our ability to survive and function. That the model and the extramental world correspond generally is the explanation for our being here as the “winners” in the survival game over millions of years to consider the question.

(if it was, then what are you doing in all of your posts, trying to present reasons for your disbelief in god and religion? all you should be doing is pointing out how such belief is less adapted to survival (of course, you’d be wrong about that, too, at least for a lot of people who find strength in theistic belief)…)

I think religion can and does have some nominal benefits for survival and well-being, even and especially as a matter of invention. The hard implications of a serenely rational view of man’s predicament can be detrimental to him psychologically. I’ve no trouble understanding many forms of religion as useful forms of “self-medication” that promote a hopeful demeanor that is conducive to “survival and thrival”. Thinking you will consciously survive your own death may be a most excellent and useful illusion to maintain. Believing – just because – that the evildoers will face an ultimate Day of Judgment, even if it is beyond the grave, may well be quite a tonic for indigestion for the heartburn that comes from seeing evil men succeed and prevail.

not true: we actually believe they are false propositions, to be sure, but we don’t do so out of necessity - it is possible to withhold belief in them whenever it is that one considers them (which is almost never).

I contend it is not possible to actually withold the belief that reality is real and survive. You cannot even suspend your belief in the reality of a small flame at the end of cigarette lighter underneath your head from more than a second or two. If you doubt this, please try it (being careful not to cause any real damage, of course, even if you pretend to doubt the reality of the damage).

but whatever: again, “necessity” isn’t a good reason to believe anything (it’s not any kind of “reason”), and it certainly doesn’t pass the kind of rational muster you’re claiming for all of your other empirical beliefs.

Necessity is the unassailable reason. If it’s necessary, then it *must *be that way. Repeat: must be that way. Cannot possibly be otherwise. Necessity has no basis for inference or probability analysis or any other analysis. If it’s necessary, it simply must be the case. Else it’s not necessary.

if i told you that i believed that 1+1=3 because some nutbar was threatening to kill my entire family if i didn’t, that would make my belief in some real sense necessary; but it wouldn’t thereby make it more likely to be true.

“true” is intractable, conceptually at this level. That’s what all the fantasizing about *The Matrix *and Cartesian brains in vats demonstrates. It’s all completely rendered pointless by the necessity of embracing the belief – true or false – that reality is real, and our senses are generally reliable. We don’t as humans accept that reality is real because it’s “true” – we have no way to know that, even in principle. Rather, we accept it because we must, it’s necessary for living through the day. Worrying about “true” at the level you are talking about is a luxury you cannot afford, provably (I refer you again to the experiment of sticking your hand in an open flame).

you miss the point: unless you believe that your senses are designed to be reliable, and that your rational faculties are designed to be reliable engines aimed at the production of true beliefs, then you have no reason to think that anything you think about the world is true.

I think that has been my point, throughout. If you mean “designed” as in “had to be the product of an intelligent designer”, I’d deny that. But “designed by the natural processes teasing out emergent properties of physics and biology over long periods of time and iteration” I’d be fine with.

but you do think that you have access to truth, and that you can have degrees of certain knowledge about the world. which means that you have a (very good) reason to think that your rational faculties and senses are designed rather than the product of the blind forces of nature.

It’s the best of reasons - necessity - but only in practical terms. The whole of reality, which I accept as real, could be imaginary for all I know. But it doesn’t matter, as that belief isn’t a practical option for me. My ONLY option is to proceed under the belief that reality is real. Not just ‘pretending’ that reality is real, but fully embracing the proposition.

As for ‘designed’, I think that is precisely what the blind forces of nature have effected; we are optimized and adapted by these processes to our environment and physical context. Designed!

neither i nor sarpedon actually doubt the legitimacy of our senses or our intellects, but we don’t doubt them only because we believe that they were designed by an omnipotent, omnibenevolent god accurately to report reality.

I understand, but I think you are simply mistaken. You don’t have any choice in the matter, as we’ve discussed, and God is just a superfluous part of the explanation, as far as the evidence reveals, and that is quite a lot, by now. We have a robust model in place that accounts for the reliability of our senses as a matter of natural expedience.

-Touchstone

 

[Touchstone]

Yes, but we can only adapt our abilities to the extent that we already have them. We can run, and can use that ability for idle games, but we cannot run 500 MPH. Thus, if we are able to correctly reason about highly abstract things, then our reason needs to be already developed to that level, presumably for survival needs.

I think you are confusing “running 500mph” with possibly “running 500 miles”. Running 500 miles is a tough job, but if done in cumulative fashion, either collectively, or by one runner over the course of several months, it’s very doable. It’s not clear that “knowledge of God”, whatever that means is achieved by cumulative and persistent reason, but it is clear that many of our most challenging achievements of knowledge are attained that way. As you have it, reasoning sounds like “magic” rather than tools that take disciple, energy and commitment to apply.

And particularly, you seem to be leaving out the collective cumulative parts of knowledge, which means most of all knowledge. Man stands on the shoulders of the men and women who went before him. Man has greater reasoning power today than ever before simply because he has access to so much more knowledge than he has in the past. A lot of serious “running” has been done for him.

Per atheism, reason is an emergent attribute of the physical brain. Since the physical brain is composed of parts, reason as well is composed of parts and is not a single algorithm. All of the parts working together may form a single system, which could be called an algorithm, but this algorithm is only as encompassing as the parts that constitute it. For example, the degree to which a computer can process things is determined by its parts and their operation. In a like manner, the degree to which our minds can process information and deal with it (reason), is determined by the neurons in our brain.

I think you are simply denying or misunderstanding the concept of emergence. Water is just hydrogen and oxygen. But its “wetness” isn’t found either component. In physics, when lower level elements and components combine and interact, new features arise. This is emergence.

You seem to be arguing that reason is a single, undividible entity, that if possessed, gives the owner the ability to reason about anything. This is like saying that because a computer has processing ability, it can process anything. It is like saying that because we can run, we can run as fast as we want. We can’t run as fast as we want, because the degree our ability reaches is determined by the parts that make it possible (cells and minerals, metabolism).

No, we don’t have unlimited speed. But analogously, since we can run, we can run in many directions and in all sorts of places. It’s a general ability. Reasoning is like that. We can point our “algorithm” at any topic we’d like. There’s no guarantee that reasoning as a tool will yield the results we’d like, but as a method, it’s something we can apply and work with across a cast number of subjects. And reasoning is given to validation and verification, meaning that we have the prospects, in principle at least, of getting a feedback loop going that provides confirmation or disconfirmation of our work.

The theist can speak of reason as a single entity, because they can maintain that God created reason as a single thing and designed the parts of the brain to support it, rather than the other way around. For atheists, reason can only be spoken of as the result of parts working together, with all that entails.

God explains anything and everything on the cheap, with no effort or demands at all. It’s the perfect answer to each and every question, so long as you don’t have to demonstrate the actuality of God.

(can’t help but notice that you left out communism…)

I think communism has been more destructive and and oppressive that Christianity or Islam.

Not exactly. I think it is untenable to assume that we can know the results of our thought’s performance in the real world per atheism, so the only way we can qualify our thoughts is through theism. John Doran’s excellent post deals with this more in depth.

That has me totally confused. As a theist, I had nothing that provided any validation or performance measurement to go on that was theistic in nature. The only knowledge I was aware of was “atheistic” or secular knowledge. That’s quite explainable by understanding that a skeptic capitulates to performance. Results as measure by performance, are just beyond the theistic epistemology. If I’m wrong, how does a theist measure knowledge in a theistic (non-secular) way?

My calculator has all the pieces necessary for performing simple math problems, but it cannot create CGI images for movies. It simply lacks the parts necessary for the latter action. I cannot fathom how the parts of the brain that deal with hunting and farming just happen to do double duty in dealing with highly abstract philosophical constructions. I would not expect the parts of my calculator that deal with math functions do do double duty as CGI imagers.

I don’t know if you are familiar with Turing machines, but this is exactly what you should investigate on this question. A turing-complete system is almost laughably simple and rudimentary, but, provably, it’s capable of computing whatever is computable. Just like the running example, the Turing machine may need to process (run) for quite a long time, but a Turing-complete system can calculate, render, simulate, interpolate or do whatever you can do with finite automata. It’s the dismantling of your idea that “expert reasoning” is “running fast”, as opposed to “running long” and “running cumulatively”.

That’s because the calculator’s parts deal with math. You could not expect a calculator to form CGI images. This is precisely my point- if we can philosophize about God accurately, then we must have the necessary parts that deal with that specific function. I see no way to account for why we would have these parts per atheism, and I have no third party to actually check. Since I have to make a decision, I will go with the more likely explanation.

Really, a Turing machine is the device and concept that overturns everything you are saying here. As an exercise, maybe think about what kinds of things are calculable that cannot be calculated by a Turing machine. A Turing machine is not a particularly complex system, and Alan Turing imagined such machines being fashioned with punch tapes and mechanical gears and the technology of his World-War era London.

Of course, the calculator can do any function that comes under the scope of what its parts are capable of dealing with. If you try to create CGI images with a calculator, you will fail, because the calculator’s parts cannot perform that function. Likewise, we will fail in our attempt to resolve the God question if the parts of our brain are not equiped to deal with it.

Our brains may well fail in trying to deal with the God question, and that’s been a major point I’ve been advancing throughout. “God” is in many ways like a “divide by zero” for a calculator. God may exist, but the “calculators” or “Turing machines” in our skulls we’ve been bequeathed by evolution do not have “supernatural processing” capabilities, so far as we can tell. We can reason about it, but without the crucial feedback loops that are essential for demonstrating that knowledge is knowledge, and not just self-indulgent caprice, we have no way of gauging our capabilities.

I see no reason per atheism for our minds to have those necessary parts, which kind of undercuts atheism in the first place. If atheism is true, then we probably lack the parts necessary to know its truth.
.

We certainly lack the parts necessary to know that God does not exist. Proving a universal negative like that is a non-starter. We do have faculties that we can understand would convince us reasonably that a God, or some evidence or phenomena that roughly matches the concept of “God” pointed to an actual, immanent deity. But we do not observe such evidence. An invisible, undetectable God that wants to remain hidden is an unfalsifiable idea, and no “parts” will ever help with that. But for a God or gods that are intelligible and identifiable through observation and reasoning, we can expect we would identify such if it were an actuality.

-Touchstone

 

[Touchstone]

Do you have the necessary neurons to make this determination? If so, please explain.

I have the neurons to understand the implications of being informed that tomorrow at noon God was miraculously transporting the earth in an instant to its place in orbit on the other side of the sun from where it is now. I also have the neurons to understand the reports from all over that yes, in fact, all the observations are that the earth was on the opposite side of the solar system from where it was yesterday.

That’s just one example, but it demonstrates the kind of direct evidence and demonstration we lack concerning God, an how little analysis it would take to conclude that something supernatural/miraculous/sovereign was interacting with us.

Again, this makes sense in regards to brute survival, but not highly abstract things that have little bearing on survival. Also, you can’t take basic survival abilites and extend them beyond their scope, as explained in my last post.

I don’t think you have any idea of what you mean by ‘scope’. I know I don’t know what you mean by that. A hunter planning a team-hunt with his tribe members needs to bring to bear a lot of sophisticated cognitive machinery to bring down the mammoth. Language, for example, as the vehicle of communication, is an extercise in abstraction. Plotting a strategy for a kill requires simulation and abstraction as well as the filtering of a great number of hypotheticals across a matrix of variables. You’re showing a lot of “philosophical chauvinism” here in dismissing the demands of ancient problems and the faculties of the men and women who faced them.

A single statistical anomaly would be enough to render us incapable of analyzing the God question or any other question or combination of questions

???

Exactly. The same goes for you. My point, as John Doran explained, is that you have no legitimate way to justify your belief, while theists do.

Justify what belief? That reality is real? It needs no justification, and cannot have any! It’s axiomatic. Axioms do not have justifications, else they are not axioms.

I find it curious that atheists place so many vigorous requirments of empirical proof on God, but then suspend these requirments when they come to this question about our mind. Rather than just saying “I accept it”, why not extend the same rigours of testing on this idea? Is it possible? If not, there may be something wrong with your approach.

What requirements have I suspended? When we test the mind as possibly essentially a construct of the brain, we see the following:

• Destroying the brain stops all evidence of the mind.
• Damage to parts of the brain affect the functional behaviors of the mind.
• Instrumentation shows tight corresponence between brian (neural) activity and reported mental events (this part lights up during language processing, and that part lights up with sexual arousal, etc.)

The brain is a fantastically complex machine, to the point of near intractability in terms of reverse engineering. But as you are probably aware, every year bring more understanding, and because knowledge is cumulative, the learning rate on this subject is accelerating.

“Perfection” means “lacking nothing”. Keep in mind that “sin” is a lack of the good. God is perfect because He is by definition the supreme being. If the supreme being lacked something, He would not be perfect. The below quote from newadvent.org expounds on this idea:

Would you consider that precise? This is the argument for the immutability of God in a nutshell.

It’s a tautology, no? “God is infinitely perfect and is necessarily what He is”? What makes God perfect? lacking nothing? What does he have, that he lacks nothing of? Goodness? What is “goodness”?

Oh, it’s whatever God is?

Immutability I don’t think is a problem for me conceptually. But the Euthyphro dilemma here very much is. God is perfect because he is all good, lacking nothing. What is ‘all good’? Why, whatever God’s nature is, of course.

I don’t doubt my ability to reason, as John Doran explained.

Ok, well that’s some ground gained. If we agree on that, and then just consider why we affirm our faculties, that is progress.

It can easily be denied, but we usually choose to believe it, even atheists who deny having any faith.

What makes you think atheism is any different? People want control over their lives, and they can achieve this by eliminating anyone stronger than themselves. They don’t want to have to worry about being accountable for their actions, so they want they assurance of there being no judgement. Even though this means their life is meaningless and fleeting, atheists are willing to pay this price for control and freedom to do what they want. Of course, their conscience and intellect often bother them, so they try to reassure themselves by putting 15 angry bumper stickers on their cars and trying to evangelize for atheism.

For me, it’s quite intimidating. As a Christian since I was 7 or 8 years old, I’ve always had my morality and ethics defined for me, by various interpretations, not the least of which my own, of a putatively divine book. I’m quite sure that many deny God for antinomian reasons – I know a couple people who deny God’s existence as an expedient measure for avoiding having to deal with religious moral codes. But at the end of the day, there’s a problem when the evidence is laid out, and reasoning applied. The philandering-thief-drug-addict who denies God does not reify God because his denials are bogus and irrational. There is still an empirical storehouse that is neatly compatible with an impersonal universe, and quite hard to square with the God hypothesis, if one is not intent through desire or credulity to presuppose God must exist to answer questions that we don’t have good answers for (what precipitated the Big Bang? for example).

As far as evangelizing atheism, I think a lot of the motivation comes from the scope and depth of confusion, muddled thinking, and lack of mental discipline that characterizes religious culture and ideology. Many of us were subjected to it, and also helped promote and foment it – me, for example. If we are collectively going to grow out of this, it will take some activism. I’m a libertarian, and fully support and defend the right to religious freedom and freedom of the conscience. Change must come through peaceful, positive means, not through coercion, oppression or tyranny. So, it seems that speaking up, each who is able, helps promote reason and rationality, hopefully by demonstrating reason and rationality! If theism is going to be something we outgrow, it will happen one discussion and interaction at a time. I was a devout, committed evangelical for more than 30 years. If I can be peacefully and thoroughly convinced of the error of my ways, I think anyone can. If not, there’s virtue in making an earnest effort, all the same.

-Touchstone

 

[Sarpedon]

I will respond but it may take me a little bit

 

[OTavern]

The topic of faith vs reason was touched upon in several posts in this forum and while seemingly at opposite ends of a spectrum, I would suggest the very existence of this polarity is based upon an error in understanding.

I have absolutely no qualm relegating to reason, aided by the scientific method, the role of “parsing” physical reality in order to help rational beings function in the “world,” understand it, make decisions, advance human life on Earth, etc. Indeed that would seem to be precisely its role, whether programmed or arrived at by some serial process of evolution inherent in the structural properties of STEM. I have no reason to doubt the functional adequacy of reason to further human endeavors in science, technology or in meeting many of the normal challenges of daily life. But this is not the province of faith and neither was it intended to be. Faith is not a replacement for reason, not should it be taken so by people of faith.

Let us add another “layer” overtop of this strictly physical stratum that, we can all admit, should be the proper realm of reason. Let’s call this added layer “free agency,” or, in ateista’s words, “emerging attributes,” also referred to as “will” or “personhood.” For the sake of argument, let us assume that there are states of being that “transcend,” for lack of a better term, the strictly material causal order that is the proper domain of reason/science. Let us also assume that these “personal” existences have some capacity to influence or “originate” causal sequences within the material realm.

It seems to me that within this added realm we can find some point or role for “faith” in the sense of “believing in,” “trusting” or “associating oneself with” this added “focal point” of faith. Having faith in someone, including ourselves, may make a great deal of difference in terms of how, as agents that have the capacity to initiate action, we do in fact act. My “faith” or “belief” – or lack thereof – in my child, spouse, friend, etc., can make all the difference in how we relate and function as a “unit” of change.

In other words, faith assumes and supports the capacity of the one who is the “object” of faith to rise above simple physical causal chains and be an originator or “prime mover” within the material “layer” of the universe; to “rise above” the physical situation so to speak.

Let’s start with one’s own self. If I restrict the view of myself/my capacity to act upon a purely “scientifically determined,” fact-based analysis, I am thereby, potentially, limiting myself to a certain set of “possibilities” with regard to my actions, my decisions and my willingness to initiate endeavors. My “track record” becomes the determiner of my performance. That is, if I apply a mere scientific “prove it” filter to my plans and “dreams” for the future. However, extending a strong “faith” in oneself, offers a “door” to new possibilities of being and acting. Thus virtues like courage, perseverance, determination, etc. seem to have an ally in “faith” that reason, on its own, does not provide.

Additionally, having faith in others around us entails a different “attitude” and perspective towards them than mere reason on its own can muster. Demanding rigorous “proof” before enabling trust seems unnecessarily restrictive and self-defeating where human endeavors and personal growth are concerned. Trust until proven untrustworthy seems a more humane mode of existence in this secondary layer of reality than a demanding “prove it” approach that reason takes. In fact, trust seems to nurture and foster development in the “personal realm,” where the demands of reason may stultify.

Given the difficulty we have in proving – to the rigorous standards of science – our own “personal” existence, to say nothing of the existence of others, it seems to me that having a priori “faith” in the existence and, dare I say it, the “goodwill” of myself and others is a reasonable and functional alternative to rational proof. I do not seek to prove the existence of others so much as to trust that they are who they pretend to be, and act accordingly.

Perhaps this is the subtle difference between the theist and atheist. The theist accepts the personal existence of other “wills,” besides one’s own in the universe, no longer requires “proof” of their existence but simply acts, in “faith” on that belief. In practice, this “faith” means treating others as “one’s self” despite the fact that no strict rigorous proof to verify that existence is forthcoming.

A materialist atheist, while acknowledging that human wills represent some form of “emerging attribute,” must necessarily understand “other” as simply brain chemistry in action, thereby reducing expectations and perspective about others to one which is devoid of any real “substantial,” transitive or creative quality. No “faith” in others is required since potential outcomes are restricted to materially caused, and therefore, determined and determinable reactions.

“Belief” in oneself and others seems to lose great potency since the object of belief, if materialism is true, is mere illusion that, in any case, cannot be “proven,” and therefore does not meet the criteria for believability.

My sense is that atheism and theism are more like outlooks on this “transcendent” layer of reality than anything else. Theism assumes that the reality of “other,” including God, needs to be trusted because this reality is far greater and more important than the limited “sensible” world.

Atheism, on the other hand, stresses proof by rigorous means in all areas including where “other” beings are concerned. No faith “in others” is required because “Other” cannot be proven to exist. All quite mechanical, in actual fact. Something seems lost in all that rigor, but who am I really, to question it?

 

[Sarpedon]

I think you are confusing “running 500mph” with possibly “running 500 miles”. Running 500 miles is a tough job, but if done in cumulative fashion, either collectively, or by one runner over the course of several months, it’s very doable. It’s not clear that “knowledge of God”, whatever that means is achieved by cumulative and persistent reason, but it is clear that many of our most challenging achievements of knowledge are attained that way. As you have it, reasoning sounds like “magic” rather than tools that take disciple, energy and commitment to apply.

The truth of a cumulation of things is dependant on the truth of the composite things. True, 500 miles can be run in a cumulative fashion. However, this is an extension of a single ability that emerges from various components. Do you have any evidence that reason is a single ability, like running?

And particularly, you seem to be leaving out the collective cumulative parts of knowledge, which means most of all knowledge. Man stands on the shoulders of the men and women who went before him. Man has greater reasoning power today than ever before simply because he has access to so much more knowledge than he has in the past. A lot of serious “running” has been done for him.

I’m questioning whether atheism can acount for our accepted powers of philosophic reason as a species. Thus, the knowledge gained by our forebearers is only true if human beings have the abilitity to discern that knowledge in the first place.

I think you are simply denying or misunderstanding the concept of emergence. Water is just hydrogen and oxygen. But its “wetness” isn’t found either component. In physics, when lower level elements and components combine and interact, new features arise. This is emergence.

Exactly. Without oxygen or hydrogen, the wetness disappears. These two things are the necessary components for wetness. Without them, wetness ceases to be.

This is what I am driving at. What reason does atheism provide for us to reasonably believe that we have the necessary components for the emergent attribute of philosophic reason?

Obviously, it is easy to tell whether the necessary components for wetness are present by merely touching the solution. It is not so easy to determine whether our mind has the necessary components to make our philosophy true. This is because we have no third party observation to check against (in relation to wetness, we are third-party), and there is not necessarily a noticable consequence for lacking philosophic ability and having a wrong idea as a result.

No, we don’t have unlimited speed. But analogously, since we can run, we can run in many directions and in all sorts of places. It’s a general ability. Reasoning is like that. We can point our “algorithm” at any topic we’d like. There’s no guarantee that reasoning as a tool will yield the results we’d like, but as a method, it’s something we can apply and work with across a cast number of subjects.

General abilities presuppose the necessary components that make them possible. You assert that we have the general ability of reason, which presumably can be used for any analysis. Can you list the necessary components for this ability, and whether they are present in the physical structure of the brain?

Look at it this way- my computer has the general ability of computation, but this ability is entirely dependant on my computer’s parts working correctly. A slight mistake or deviation will have unpredictable results. Unless I know the exact nature of the error and its consequences, I have to doubt anything that comes out of my computer.

I may not know that there is a mistake in my computer, because it still operates. Unless I catch it doing a computation I know is false, 2x2=6, for example, I may never know there was a mistake at all. Of course, I can only catch my computer doing a mistake if I have a third-party body to knowledge to check against (basic arithmetic)

Can atheism provide a “check” against our mind performing a wrong computation? Do we have a third party observation or knowledge to use? Since everything we experience and know comes through the computer in question, I think not.

Natural selection does not necessarily weed out computers with wrong computations, because those computations may not play into survival. For example, having a wrong arithmetic answer in the database will fatally impact most of the calculator answers that come out of a computer. However, if I only use my computer for browsing the internet, and don’t use the calculator, I have no reason to throw my computer out. I could use my computer for years and not know there was a mistake in an unimportant program.

And reasoning is given to validation and verification, meaning that we have the prospects, in principle at least, of getting a feedback loop going that provides confirmation or disconfirmation of our work.

This feedback loop goes through the computer in question, so it cannot validate the computer.

 

[Sarpedon]

God explains anything and everything on the cheap, with no effort or demands at all. It’s the perfect answer to each and every question, so long as you don’t have to demonstrate the actuality of God.

We have been demonstrating the actuality of God for thousands of years. You may disagree with us, but you can’t say we haven’t been dealing with it.

That has me totally confused. As a theist, I had nothing that provided any validation or performance measurement to go on that was theistic in nature. The only knowledge I was aware of was “atheistic” or secular knowledge. That’s quite explainable by understanding that a skeptic capitulates to performance. Results as measure by performance, are just beyond the theistic epistemology. If I’m wrong, how does a theist measure knowledge in a theistic (non-secular) way?

I’m not sure I understand your question exactly, but I’ll give it a shot.

A theist measures knowledge by its performance against the real world. Unlike atheists, we don’t start with the presupposition that the material world is the only “real world”. The real world composes both the visible, material world, and the non-material world. Philosophers have come up with many arguments for the reality of the supernatural world, which is the basis for its inclusion. Some knowledge can be gained by testing purely against the natural, material world. Other knowledge can be gained by testing its performance against the supernatural world.

This is the key difference between atheism and theism. Both measure knowledge the same way. However, atheists start with the presupposition that the material world is the only reality, and then fail to justify the supernatural world with the natural world. Theists start with the presupposition that there is more to reality than the material world, and try to justify their position by appealing to both aspects of the world.

Both positions require suppositions. I think the theistic assumption has more philosophic support than the atheistic assumption. I also think the atheistic assumption carries with it corolaries such as the unreliability of reason that I am not willing to accept.

Really, a Turing machine is the device and concept that overturns everything you are saying here. As an exercise, maybe think about what kinds of things are calculable that cannot be calculated by a Turing machine. A Turing machine is not a particularly complex system, and Alan Turing imagined such machines being fashioned with punch tapes and mechanical gears and the technology of his World-War era London.

From what I gathered on this machine, it uses certain necessary components to perform any possible calculation. This is not in dispute. Obviously, if the necessary components for philosophy are present, then we can do philosophy correctly. I do not deny this. What I argue is that atheism provides to reasonable assurance that the necessary components are in fact present, and that we have no way to know whether they are. It’s like using a veiled turing machine without knowing whether the necessary integers and endless tape are present.

Our brains may well fail in trying to deal with the God question, and that’s been a major point I’ve been advancing throughout. “God” is in many ways like a “divide by zero” for a calculator. God may exist, but the “calculators” or “Turing machines” in our skulls we’ve been bequeathed by evolution do not have “supernatural processing” capabilities, so far as we can tell. We can reason about it, but without the crucial feedback loops that are essential for demonstrating that knowledge is knowledge, and not just self-indulgent caprice, we have no way of gauging our capabilities.

Why do you stop at the God question? If even the possibility of not being able to answer this one question is present, why don’t you bring the rest of knowledge under scrutiny?

We cannot establish the feedback loops you mention because they have to pass through the thing in question.

But for a God or gods that are intelligible and identifiable through observation and reasoning, we can expect we would identify such if it were an actuality.

The Catholic faith has numerous miracles that can still be observed today, if you want physical (as opposed to philosophical) evidence. For example, incorrupt saints and the Eucharistic wine (Blood) that spontaneously changes from dried state to liquid state on a feast day. This blood is in Italy, and can be observed if you want. At the very least, don’t discount it unless you have actually examined it. I will look up the details if you want.

 

[Sarpedon]

I have the neurons to understand the implications of being informed that tomorrow at noon God was miraculously transporting the earth in an instant to its place in orbit on the other side of the sun from where it is now. I also have the neurons to understand the reports from all over that yes, in fact, all the observations are that the earth was on the opposite side of the solar system from where it was yesterday.

That’s just one example, but it demonstrates the kind of direct evidence and demonstration we lack concerning God, an how little analysis it would take to conclude that something supernatural/miraculous/sovereign was interacting with us.

What if you lack the necesary neurons to observe God? What if you lack the necessary neurons to do philosophy? What if you lack the necessary neurons to analyze natural observations? Where does it end?

I don’t think you have any idea of what you mean by ‘scope’. I know I don’t know what you mean by that. A hunter planning a team-hunt with his tribe members needs to bring to bear a lot of sophisticated cognitive machinery to bring down the mammoth. Language, for example, as the vehicle of communication, is an extercise in abstraction. Plotting a strategy for a kill requires simulation and abstraction as well as the filtering of a great number of hypotheticals across a matrix of variables. You’re showing a lot of “philosophical chauvinism” here in dismissing the demands of ancient problems and the faculties of the men and women who faced them.

I have no intention of slighting prehistoric peoples. In fact, I believe that they have souls and are as human as we are, which gives them more respect that the typical atheist who considers them evolving humans.

What I mean by “scope” is that we need to be extremely careful about generalizing broad abilities from less comprehensive abilities or possessions. For example, penguins have the ability to flap their wings but lack the ability to fly. Humans can reason for brute survival, but can we reason about other things?

???

Let’s say that our minds evolved to be 99.99999% accurate. While still with a core nucleus of individuals, the human species experienced a mutation that damaged a relatively unimportant brain function. Since this was not selected against, it spread throughout the population, and now most humans have it.

Unless you know the location of the mutation and its effects, you have reason to doubt anything that comes out of that mind. After all, anything could be affected by it. In the same way, if I gave you a computer and told you it had one error in its processing capability but did not tell you were and you could not find it, you would need to doubt everything that comes out of that computer- especially if your life is on the line.

Do you think this is a plausible evolutionary scenario?

Justify what belief? That reality is real? It needs no justification, and cannot have any! It’s axiomatic. Axioms do not have justifications, else they are not axioms.

Why not? Why can’t our brain be in a vat, or the matrix be real? It does not seem consistent to me for a sceptic to simply state belief in one thing while refuse to in another.

What requirements have I suspended? When we test the mind as possibly essentially a construct of the brain, we see the following:

• Destroying the brain stops all evidence of the mind.
• Damage to parts of the brain affect the functional behaviors of the mind.
• Instrumentation shows tight corresponence between brian (neural) activity and reported mental events (this part lights up during language processing, and that part lights up with sexual arousal, etc.)

All of these determinations are a result of the brain, so cannot justify it. That’s like running a self-test on a potentially defective computer. Simply put, it is not possible to establish the veracity of the brain with the same standard of proof that atheists insist on. In order to do so, we would have to observe the brain as a neutral third-party, which is not possible.

It’s a tautology, no? “God is infinitely perfect and is necessarily what He is”? What makes God perfect? lacking nothing? What does he have, that he lacks nothing of? Goodness? What is “goodness”?

Oh, it’s whatever God is?

God is goodness. Therefore, since He is goodness and He is by nature perfect, perfection must consist of the culmination of goodness (lacking no goodness). God would not have created evil, on account of His goodness. Thus, all that exists must be good. This is the basis for the belief that evil is not something that exists (and is thus created by God), but rather a term for what happens when an individual turns away from what God has created, goodness.

Immutability I don’t think is a problem for me conceptually. But the Euthyphro dilemma here very much is. God is perfect because he is all good, lacking nothing. What is ‘all good’? Why, whatever God’s nature is, of course.

God is goodness, and since He cannot lack something, the state of not lacking something must be the same as God’s nature, goodness. In other words, something possesing perfection must be the same as God. (since God is one, and cannot create an equal, only God can have His own nature, and be perfect). I don’t see a dilemma. Perfection is a term for an aspect of God’s nature, and is one that can be applied to lesser things, as a measure.

Ok, well that’s some ground gained. If we agree on that, and then just consider why we affirm our faculties, that is progress.

Yes

But at the end of the day, there’s a problem when the evidence is laid out, and reasoning applied. The philandering-thief-drug-addict who denies God does not reify God because his denials are bogus and irrational. There is still an empirical storehouse that is neatly compatible with an impersonal universe, and quite hard to square with the God hypothesis, if one is not intent through desire or credulity to presuppose God must exist to answer questions that we don’t have good answers for (what precipitated the Big Bang? for example).

Even if the universe could be explained through purely natural means, this would not mean that God does not exist or cannot be known. Society in general over the last several centuries has become welded to the idea of science as the only way to know truth. Many take the position that unless it can be known through science, it cannot be known. A major point I have been advancing is that this approach breaks down when we consider the mind. And if we can’t use this approach on the mind, and yet still know truth, haven’t we admitted that truth can be known outside of the scientific method?

As far as evangelizing atheism, I think a lot of the motivation comes from the scope and depth of confusion, muddled thinking, and lack of mental discipline that characterizes religious culture and ideology. Many of us were subjected to it, and also helped promote and foment it – me, for example.

I have grown up in an entirely different enviroment. I have been homeschooled for most of my life (1 year philosophically-oriented catholic school) and have been surrounded by both the devotional life the church and the rigourous philosophy that the church has developed to explain and defend hersef. Being exposed to the greatest minds of the western tradition and the church has fully convinced me, on my own, of the truth of the Catholic faith. Catholicism is the only religion I have not been able to break. So far I have broken (to my satisfaction) the other major religions of the world. I consider it fortunate that I was born into the only religion that I cannot break, for otherwise I would have to go through a lot of emotional and social turmoil.

I don’t know how familiar you are with Catholic philosophic and theologic thought, but we have much more of a framwork than the evangelical protestantism you were involved in. Have you read the Summa? If not, I would reccomend that you read it. Even if you don’t agree with everything St. Aquinas says (I disagree with him on some points) it will demonstrate the rigour of catholic intellectual life, and that not all theists are the emotional and illogical people that you seem to think we are. Many are, certainly, but not all.

If we are collectively going to grow out of this, it will take some activism. I’m a libertarian, and fully support and defend the right to religious freedom and freedom of the conscience. Change must come through peaceful, positive means, not through coercion, oppression or tyranny. So, it seems that speaking up, each who is able, helps promote reason and rationality, hopefully by demonstrating reason and rationality! If theism is going to be something we outgrow, it will happen one discussion and interaction at a time. I was a devout, committed evangelical for more than 30 years. If I can be peacefully and thoroughly convinced of the error of my ways, I think anyone can. If not, there’s virtue in making an earnest effort, all the same.

What is this “virtue” you speak of? Will you acknowledge anything other than the “world that is”, maybe the “world that ought”?

 

[The_Adversery]

Exactly what did you find in Catholicism that you could not break, that all the other religions had that made them fail? I’m honestly curious, because as far as I can tell, the religions I have studied have all pretty much boiled down to the same basic premises. “Do as we say, or bad things will happen”