Lack of Questioning Leads to Atheism?

[e_c]

You err in two respects:

1. I never said anything about physically measuring angels and demons - but we can measure what they allegedly do. You are the ones, who say that these beings physically interact with the physical universe - so there is a physical action involved. And that is exactly what science is about. So the scientific method is wonderfully adequate to test the supernatural / transcendent claims. The trouble is that result is always negative.

Demons allegedly infiltrate humans and there are exorcists who claim that they are able to expel them. The process is exactly the same as the one that science uses. The exorcist uses some physical method to decide if a demon is present. (what method?) Then he uses some other physical methods to expel that demon. (how does it work?) And finally, he uses some more physical methods to ascertain if the exorcism process was successful. (where did it go?) That is the exact replica of the empirical, scientifc method.

The same applies to the experiments about the efficacy of intercessory prayers. The petitioner asks for some concrete results, and waits for it to happen. He always adds “Insh’Allah” (God willing). If something positive happens, he asserts that the prayer “worked”. If nothing happens, he says: “Mash’Allah”, it was not God’s will, and shrugs it off. And that is bad science. It is also called “hedging the bets”.

1. No empiricist would demand empirical methods for the proof in deductive systems. Of course these systems are based upon axioms. The theological claims are not based upon axioms - unless of course God’s existence is accepted as an axiom.

I would not reject any answer which I could copy and use and receive the same results. Of course I reject the “this is what the church teaches” type of answers.

BTW, every time you ask for something in the form of a supplicatory or intercessory prayer, you use God as a vending machine.

1. I wonder what exactly you are thinking of. Give an example of what would be satisfactory. How about making someone or something levitate? Or making someone speak languages that person never learned? We have good accounts of all these kinds of things and more and more and more. What it comes down to Vera, is that you think that people who make these claims as first witnesses are either A, confused about what they saw, or B, lying.
2. So there are only two kinds of truth apt statements - those reducible to tautologies, and those verifiable by empirical observation? Are you sure you want to stick with that?

Angels are living and willing creatures, not rocks. So your challenge for “replication” is silly, although there are certainly patterns of behavior, just like in humans.

Yes, just like loving human children do when they ask a loving and wise human father for what they want. Sheesh.

 

[Wesrock]

If you find simple logic to be “insulting”, you certainly have a serious problem.

It’s “simple logic” that atheism is irrational in that it’s consequences are an unintelligible universe. Scenarios 1 and 2 both lead to this outcome.

The “principle of sufficient reason” is not “absolute”. You always need a starting point which is NOT subject to it, otherwise you run into an infinite descent.

There are no exemptions from the PSR. I never claimed one there was one.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

It’s not that [a well defined epistemic] method doesn’t exist; it’s that… some will assent [to a religious claim] easily, some after great deliberation, and some (by definition) never at all. This does not speak to the evidence, per se, so much as the individual’s interaction with it and his willingness to accept it. This, my friend, is a ‘method’

I mean, “letting people conclude whatever they want” is not a method. Indeed, if your “method” by definition gives different people different answers, then it is not a well defined objective method, and being as it is not unique to Catholicism, my earlier evidence that there is a problem still applies. Specifically, this evidence:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_denominations

Outside the hard sciences, one cannot rely on a “test and measure and conclude” approach. The scientific method works brilliantly in an empirical context; but it fails miserably outside of that context. In fact, this method has worked so mind-bogglingly well in its own context, that moderns tend to raise it up as a sort of deity in itself: all things are measured against it. If something doesn’t conform to it, then that thing, not the method itself, is construed to be deficient… The problem here, though, isn’t a lack of objectivity or epistemic method; it’s that you’re playing apples and oranges, and asking one method to be applied to a question outside of its sandbox.

There are all sorts of issues with this.

1. Science does work well, and people do like this fact. They are repulsed by religions that don’t use science because, as I have already pointed out, when religion decides science doesn’t apply anymore they don’t switch over to a second well defined epistemic method. They switch over to the “method” you’ve described as “whatever people feel is true after they think about it a lot (also the thinking is optional).” This is not an epistemic method because it offers no actual method to separate true claims from false ones, and anyone who has done science recognizes how dangerous that is.
2. Lets assume that “thinking really hard about something” is a method. One of the big important lessons science has to teach us is that “thinking really hard about something” is not a sufficient method to describe the way the world actually is. There is a long history of people in science who have come up with theories after thinking long and hard about a problem, only to find that their theories weren’t right after all. Indeed whoever brought up medieval medicine and alchemy was pointing out this very fact: the people who used a religious-style epistemic method to try to manipulate the world never got anywhere, because just thinking about the problem a lot isn’t enough to learn anything about things that actually exist. The only people who even try to debate this conclusion are religious fundamentalists like creationists and homeopaths.
3. You are explicitly asserting here that religion makes no testable claims. If religion did make testable claims, then of course those claims would be “in science’s sandbox.” But I’m sure you must realize the consequences of what you’ve just said. You’ve effectively de-clawed all religious belief. No longer can Catholics claim that their belief in ideas like “gay marriage will be bad for society” or “condoms will lead to worse disease/pregnancy outcomes” have some kind of reasonable secular-philosophical basis. The only legitimate basis for those claims is the scientific basis because those claims are testable.

 

[Wesrock]

1. Science does work well, and people do like this fact. They are repulsed by religions that don’t use science because, as I have already pointed out, when religion decides science doesn’t apply anymore they don’t switch over to a second well defined epistemic method. They switch over to the “method” you’ve described as “whatever people feel is true after they think about it a lot (also the thinking is optional).” This is not an epistemic method because it offers no actual method to separate true claims from false ones, and anyone who has done science recognizes how dangerous that is.

Any reasoned arguments on moral law should of course follow from the sciences, as the sciences are a way to gain knowledge of the object of study, and any valuable determination will need to be based on such knowledge. That said, science can help you learn more, but it cannot make value judgements or moral determinations. I can use science to figure what makes a healthy person and what makes an unhealthy person, but science can’t tell me that one of those is of any more value than the other. That comes from “thinking long and hard.”

There are also certain, non-empirical principles of reason which can be faithfully employed. These are the law of noncontradiction, law of identity, and the law of excluded middle. I would include among these the principle of sufficient reason, but even if you dispute that one, I presume you accept the others? Furthermore, we take as fact that there is a causal relationships ship between our perceptions and the outside world that is trustworthy in those who are healthy (not that they can’t ever be tricked) and that cause precedes effect in all things that come to be (in our experience), making things subject to empirical investigation and repeat observation.

 

[e_c]

There are no exemptions from the PSR. I never claimed one there was one.

Except God…?

I’d be happy to learn how God could be crammed into the PSR somehow, but it seems odd to try, seeing as neither Spinoza nor Leibniz tried. It also seems counter to the idea of transcendence and primacy and necessity. If it could be done without harming those, go for it, I say.

 

[Wesrock]

Except God…?

I’d be happy to learn how God could be crammed into the PSR somehow, but it seems odd to try, seeing as neither Spinoza nor Leibniz tried. It also seems counter to the idea of transcendence and primacy and necessity. If it could be done without harming those, go for it, I say.

The PSR states that all things have “a reason” for their existence, either within themselves or from another. (I prefer “all things have that whereby they exist…”, but whatever). A reason is not the same as a cause. A cause is a subset of a reason, and implies an external actor. God’s reason for His existence is “within himself”, or internal, and is due, in Thomistic thought, to his essence being the same as his existence. That will sound like gobbledygook to the atheists, here, but it’s that God is esse. It’s not separate from his essence. He is an unconditioned reality. All other things are conditioned. They have esse by participation. They could be or not be. Anything that is in any way conditioned in a sense does not possess that whereby it exists as an intrinsic part of it. God, however, can only be. So the PSR, as stated, applies to God, too.

To be honest, the atheist would probably have less of a knee jerk reaction if we simply spoke in terms of an unconditioned reality and avoid associations with any religion, but that unconditioned reality is what we refer to as God.

This deserves its own topic. There’s a good book called Thomas Aquinas and the Principle of Sufficient Reason which makes a much more coherent case for it. If you’re already familiar with some of these principles, perhaps my explanation at least makes a little sense, but it’s one of those things that took a lot to wrap my mind around. It sounds so basic as to be almost a tautology, but it’s not. What it means for essence and existence to be the same requires it’s own investigation, too. Essence, of course, isn’t some ethereal or mystical quality. It’s simply WHAT it is, whereas existence is THAT it is.

There are also weaker statements of the PSR, such as “all things that are contingent have a cause” and “all things that come to be have a cause”, but God isn’t an exception to those statements either, as he is neither contingent nor did he come to be, so the statements wouldn’t refer to him regardless and there’s no need for special pleading. We could use the simpler versions without issue if people just wanted to avoid attempts to rationalize God. They still point to God, as he is still the stopping point, but all that would need to be said is that he neither came to be nor is contingent, and it can be left at that without trying to probe the incomprehensible further, and there’d be no exception to the weak PSR being made.

 

[PRmerger]

So the PSR, as stated, applies to God, too.

Precisely. God’s “reason” for existence exists within Him, not outside of Him.

That is, God is not contingent.

Everything else that exists is.

 

[e_c]

The PSR states that all things have “a reason” for their existence, either within themselves or from another. (I prefer “all things have that whereby they exist…”, but whatever). A reason is not the same as a cause. A cause is a subset of a reason, and implies an external actor. God’s reason for His existence is “within himself”, or internal, and is due, in Thomistic thought, to his essence being the same as his existence. That will sound like gobbledygook to the atheists, here, but it’s that God is esse. It’s not separate from his essence. He is an unconditioned reality. All other things are conditioned. They have esse by participation. They could be or not be. Anything that is in any way conditioned in a sense does not possess that whereby it exists as an intrinsic part of it. God, however, can only be. So the PSR, as stated, applies to God, too.

To be honest, the atheist would probably have less of a knee jerk reaction if we simply spoke in terms of an unconditioned reality and avoid associations with any religion, but that unconditioned reality is what we refer to as God.

This deserves its own topic. There’s a good book called Thomas Aquinas and the Principle of Sufficient Reason which makes a much more coherent case for it. If you’re already familiar with some of these principles, perhaps my explanation at least makes a little sense, but it’s one of those things that took a lot to wrap my mind around. It sounds so basic as to be almost a tautology, but it’s not. What it means for essence and existence to be the same requires it’s own investigation, too. Essence, of course, isn’t some ethereal or mystical quality. It’s simply WHAT it is, whereas existence is THAT it is.

There are also weaker statements of the PSR, such as “all things that are contingent have a cause” and “all things that come to be have a cause”, but God isn’t an exception to those statements either, as he is neither contingent nor did he come to be, so the statements wouldn’t refer to him regardless and there’s no need for special pleading. We could use the simpler versions without issue if people just wanted to avoid attempts to rationalize God. They still point to God, as he is still the stopping point, but all that would need to be said is that he neither came to be nor is contingent, and it can be left at that without trying to probe the incomprehensible further, and there’d be no exception to the weak PSR being made.

I don’t think Thomas would like the PSR being applied to God… I don’t think you’ll find such talk in his explanation of God as His own subsistence, or of His Essence being His Existence. Show me the passage that seems to say such and we can talk, perhaps in another thread.

What it really comes down to is that there does not seem to me to be a meaningful difference between “reason” and “cause” in various PSR models.

 

[Bradski]

No. I’m just asking what the applicable standard for ‘evidence’ is. The game isn’t in the results… it’s in the way the game is defined. If the definition of the game rule out even the possibility of success, then the rules are flawed.

So… what are the rules? What’s the appropriate standard of ‘proof’?

Undeniable proof that something does not conform to natural laws. That is, something that is super natural.

It’s not that there are rules for the supernatural. There are rules for all things natural. The supernatural simply has to break them. Let me know when you find something that does this.

 

[Wesrock]

If the PSR is formulated “Whatever exists must have that in virtue of which it is distinguished from nothing, either self-distinguishing or being distinguished by another,” or “whatever exists has that whereby it exists, either in itself or from another,”.or even, “whatever exists must have esse,” we can better understand the PSR in a Thomistic way.

 

[Wesrock]

Undeniable proof that something does not conform to natural laws. That is, something that is super natural.

It’s not that there are rules for the supernatural. There are rules for all things natural. The supernatural simply has to break them. Let me know when you find something that does this.

I understand, but I find it ironic because this ultimate reality you seek to distinguish itself by breaking the natural laws is itself what many see as necessary in order to explain having natural laws at all as opposed to an unintelligible reality.

 

[PRmerger]

Undeniable proof that something does not conform to natural laws. That is, something that is super natural.

So, like someone dying and then rising in 3 days.

Like that?

 

[JapaneseKappa]

There are also certain, non-empirical principles of reason which can be faithfully employed. These are the law of noncontradiction, law of identity, and the law of excluded middle. I would include among these the principle of sufficient reason, but even if you dispute that one, I presume you accept the others? Furthermore, we take as fact that there is a causal relationships ship between our perceptions and the outside world that is trustworthy in those who are healthy (not that they can’t ever be tricked) and that cause precedes effect in all things that come to be (in our experience), making things subject to empirical investigation and repeat observation.

Look, mathematicians builds elaborate scaffolds of logic, postulates and theorems, and this is fine. There is nothing wrong with building such structures, but it would be folly for a mathematician to arbitrarily declare that the universe must conform to his scaffold. Whether or not the universe conforms to these scaffolds crucially requires information about the universe, i.e. empirical evidence.

So it is fine to invoke things like the law of non-contradiction and such, and indeed most of the successful theories of the world use these. But even if all these are true, along with the PSR, we still have to deal with the issue:

One big issue with this characterization is: who decides what reason is sufficient?

That is to say, can you give me a reliable test to determine if a reason is sufficient or not?

 

[e_c]

Undeniable proof that something does not conform to natural laws. That is, something that is super natural.

It’s not that there are rules for the supernatural. There are rules for all things natural. The supernatural simply has to break them. Let me know when you find something that does this.

What kinds of proofs are “undeniable”?

What exactly is a “natural law”?

Let me know when you find a definition of each that even conceptually allows for the supernatural being demonstrated.

 

[e_c]

If the PSR is formulated “Whatever exists must have that in virtue of which it is distinguished from nothing, either self-distinguishing or being distinguished by another,” or “whatever exists has that whereby it exists, either in itself or from another,”.or even, “whatever exists must have esse,” we can better understand the PSR in a Thomistic way.

I see two issues here.

1. It no longer seems to be a useful tool at all. It simply says, “What exists isn’t nothing or something other than itself.”
2. It seems to make “being” an attribute, which is not at all a good paradigm.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

Not true. You just reject the answer, or require that non-physical beings be measured physically. That’s not a reasonable answer.

So what is the answer that so often gets rejected? I’m pretty sure I’ve never heard it.

 

[Vera_Ljuba]

1. I wonder what exactly you are thinking of. Give an example of what would be satisfactory.

For example, show me an evocation which would force a demon to manifest itself.

What it comes down to Vera, is that you think that people who make these claims as first witnesses are either A, confused about what they saw, or B, lying.

Who claims to be a first witness? Do you accept the claims for the golden tablets that Mormons talk about? Or the claim about Mohammed traveling on a flying horse? Or the claims of people who assert that they were kidnapped by “little green men”, carried unto a flying saucer, and operated upon?

1. So there are only two kinds of truth apt statements - those reducible to tautologies, and those verifiable by empirical observation? Are you sure you want to stick with that?

First of all, axioms are not tautologies. They are self-evident truths. There are subjective statements, too. When a person says that they find the music of Mozart beautiful, I would accept it without demanding any evidence - because it is a subjective statement.

Angels are living and willing creatures, not rocks. So your challenge for “replication” is silly, although there are certainly patterns of behavior, just like in humans.

And you know this… how? Share it with me, please.

Yes, just like loving human children do when they ask a loving and wise human father for what they want. Sheesh.

Children are allowed to treat their parents as if they were “vending machines”. Skeptics are not allowed to “test” God. Why? Is the reason that God will fail any well designed test?

 

[jmcrae]

You err in two respects:

1. I never said anything about physically measuring angels and demons - but we can measure what they allegedly do. You are the ones, who say that these beings physically interact with the physical universe - so there is a physical action involved. And that is exactly what science is about. So the scientific method is wonderfully adequate to test the supernatural / transcendent claims. The trouble is that result is always negative.

Demons allegedly infiltrate humans and there are exorcists who claim that they are able to expel them. The process is exactly the same as the one that science uses. The exorcist uses some physical method to decide if a demon is present. (what method?) Then he uses some other physical methods to expel that demon. (how does it work?) And finally, he uses some more physical methods to ascertain if the exorcism process was successful. (where did it go?) That is the exact replica of the empirical, scientifc method.

I could use this exact same logic to decide that most of the technology in my house doesn’t exist - I don’t personally know how it works; therefore, it doesn’t exist.

The same applies to the experiments about the efficacy of intercessory prayers. The petitioner asks for some concrete results, and waits for it to happen. He always adds “Insh’Allah” (God willing). If something positive happens, he asserts that the prayer “worked”. If nothing happens, he says: “Mash’Allah”, it was not God’s will, and shrugs it off. And that is bad science. It is also called “hedging the bets”.

1. No empiricist would demand empirical methods for the proof in deductive systems. Of course these systems are based upon axioms. The theological claims are not based upon axioms - unless of course God’s existence is accepted as an axiom.

I would not reject any answer which I could copy and use and receive the same results. Of course I reject the “this is what the church teaches” type of answers.

BTW, every time you ask for something in the form of a supplicatory or intercessory prayer, you use God as a vending machine.

This is childish - do you decide that other authorities don’t exist, when they say “no” or don’t respond to your requests?

 

[Vera_Ljuba]

I could use this exact same logic to decide that most of the technology in my house doesn’t exist - I don’t personally know how it works; therefore, it doesn’t exist.

You misunderstand. If you don’t know how the technology works, you can learn it from those who know it. That is what is missing from the so called theological arguments; there is no one you can ask. It all boils down: “you must have blind faith in some self-proclaimed authority”… and that is all.

This is childish - do you decide that other authorities don’t exist, when they say “no” or don’t respond to your requests?

When that is the case, I decline to accept them as authorities, that is all. The definition of an “authority” is that they are able to provide evidence for their claims, without referring to ANOTHER self-proclaimed “authorities”.

Posters keep on asking me, what would I accept as evidence for the claims of supernatural. I give the specific answer: “present an evocation which will summon up a demon”. Can you? Because the other people simply fade into the wallpaper, without even attempting to give an answer.

The claims of the supernatural ARE subject to the scientific method, because the alleged supernatural entities are assumed to have a physical interaction with the physical world. Guardian angels are assumed to “protect us”. Demons are supposed to work on our “downfall”. Both of them interfere with the physical reality, and as such we can detect this interaction. Yet, any such attempt fails, there is no evidence of either guardian angels or malevolent demons.

 

[jmcrae]

You misunderstand. If you don’t know how the technology works, you can learn it from those who know it. That is what is missing from the so called theological arguments; there is no one you can ask. It all boils down: “you must have blind faith in some self-proclaimed authority”… and that is all.

You could ask an exorcist - or you could buy any number of books and video recordings published by various exorcists.

When that is the case, I decline to accept them as authorities, that is all. The definition of an “authority” is that they are able to provide evidence for their claims, without referring to ANOTHER self-proclaimed “authorities”.

Posters keep on asking me, what would I accept as evidence for the claims of supernatural. I give the specific answer: “present an evocation which will summon up a demon”. Can you? Because the other people simply fade into the wallpaper, without even attempting to give an answer.

Summoning a demon isn’t an experiment anyone should try, unless you really want a first-hand look at how an exorcism works - assuming you’re found in time, and people figure out what’s wrong with you.

The claims of the supernatural ARE subject to the scientific method, because the alleged supernatural entities are assumed to have a physical interaction with the physical world. Guardian angels are assumed to “protect us”. Demons are supposed to work on our “downfall”. Both of them interfere with the physical reality, and as such we can detect this interaction. Yet, any such attempt fails, there is no evidence of either guardian angels or malevolent demons.

God and the angels are not natural forces - they are persons, and have the same wide variety of possible reactions as any of the people you know. It’s unlikely that you would get the same result twice any more than repeating the same statement to a friend over and over gets the same result every time.