What is this "scientific method" you all speak of?

[Peter_Plato]

If so, then you should be able to present an actual analysis of some object and enumerate the “essential” and “accidental” properties. You can choose the object. Go ahead; make my day.

It would seem, at least on the surface, that it would be far less daunting a task to “enumerate” the essential properties of a human being, since that, at least superficially, is what I am. It would seem far easier to describe the essential properties of what one IS as compared to going on about those properties that belong to classes of objects that can only be known from afar.

I have no idea what it means to be a chair and, therefore, cannot venture much in terms to what that entails. I can venture guesses as to what I observe a chair to be or describe how I might use a chair, but that would seem far from telling its essential properties, as in what it means to BE a chair.

Therefore, since I am somewhat familiar with what it means to be human, I can speak to that. Here, unfortunately, I run into more problems since I can only speak for myself and tell you what is means to be “me,” whereas speaking for the entire class of humans and rambling on about what it means to be any other member of that class would seem audacious and at best, presumptuous.

Therefore, I will restrict my post to relating to you what it means to be me and then you can take from that what you will, regarding how the points I make impinge upon the larger question of what it means to be human.

Here, too, problems arise since I, as me, have changed and continue to change and, that, for good reason. I am in the process of becoming myself.

Here is where I find Christ, Aquinas, Aristotle, Socrates, Confucius and Lao Tse most helpful, along with a few others that I take to have privileged insight into what it means to be human and therefore into my ultimate end of becoming one.

You see, Hee_Zen, I have come to the conclusion that being “human” is my ultimate goal as a “self,” it isn’t a “given” in the sense of simply being one or not. We have been “gifted” with the possibility of becoming human and that gift is, itself, morally critical, but it is in the becoming or “filling out” that capacity that is what we, as “humans,” (in the hollow or capacious sense of having the potential to become human) have been tasked with.

In his writings, Confucius, for example, stresses the importance of cultivating one’s character, likening that task to crafting something fine and exquisite from raw material - similar to carving bone or horn, or grinding and polishing a piece of jade. Aristotle, in Nichomachean Ethics, echoes this when he refers to happiness being a perfect fulfillment of one’s essential nature.

In other words, I take the task of forming the internal man, the “self” as being the ultimate and crucial project for me as a human being - that is, to become fully human. It may seem puzzling to make such a claim because how would anyone know what it means to be “human” if they are not already one?

You see, Hee_Zen, it is precisely in deciding or making a choice about what that “final form” is, that one chooses to become or determine, fully, what that means. Since it is in the very making of the determination that one chooses what it means to BE as human, that determination should be made very carefully and seriously. As Confucius would hold, an artist carving a precious piece of jade or horn will only begin and pursue the task with much circumspection and preparation, lest he irreparably damage the raw material. Such is no different from the task facing us as “humans” in terms of forming the character we will take on - for it is in the choosing and forming of that character that is essentially what it means to BE human and the extent to which one succeeds at doing so.

So, just as an artist can be called an “artist” only to the extent they have succeeded at being one according to the beauty and quality of the works of art produced, so, too, being “human” is the same KIND of endeavor - having the capacity to carefully form and shape the artful beauty of one’s internal “human” character is the feature upon which we will be judged as to whether we qualify to be called “human.”

Now, cyborgs and robots, as far as can be known, depend for their capacity to act upon the programmed code which determines their every act. For that reason, I do not believe they are human in the sense required above - they are not self-forming, nor have the capacity to be.

Does that stop me from treating them in particular ways? No because, ultimately, my endeavor and the one that “drives” my every intention is to form my character in the artistic sense of sublime beauty. Treating human-like beings in human-like ways is fully in accord with my being and doing in a manner that seeks to retain a high level of ren, in the Confucian sense.

What does this have to do with science or the scientific method? Well, it seems to me, that the scientific method is of ultimate importance only if you grant that the ultimate purpose for being human is to control the world around you with no thought or deference to the internal character of the “you” you are forming as a result.

Science has absolutely nothing to say about that. On the other hand, the “you” that you are forming has very much to say about how you will use the knowledge that accrues from science. That can be a very tenuous and even dangerous thing. So to promote science at the expense of character development as if character development is an innocuous or merely “subjective” thing is mindless and foolish, as far as I can tell. We need to get the character development - the subjective parts - right as a priority in terms of how, when and why we approach objective knowledge. It is entirely a matter of priority. Ignoring that priority will land us in a whole heap of ugly.

Have I made your day?

:tiphat: Ignatius

 

[davidv]

It would seem, at least on the surface, that it would be far less daunting a task to “enumerate” the essential properties of a human being, since that, at least superficially, is what I am. It would seem far easier to describe the essential properties of what one IS as compared to going on about those properties that belong to classes of objects that can only be known from afar.

I have no idea what it means to be a chair and, therefore, cannot venture much in terms to what that entails. I can venture guesses as to what I observe a chair to be or describe how I might use a chair, but that would seem far from telling its essential properties, as in what it means to BE a chair.

Therefore, since I am somewhat familiar with what it means to be human, I can speak to that. Here, unfortunately, I run into more problems since I can only speak for myself and tell you what is means to be “me,” whereas speaking for the entire class of humans and rambling on about what it means to be any other member of that class would seem audacious and at best, presumptuous.

Therefore, I will restrict my post to relating to you what it means to be me and then you can take from that what you will, regarding how the points I make impinge upon the larger question of what it means to be human.

Here, too, problems arise since I, as me, have changed and continue to change and, that, for good reason. I am in the process of becoming myself.

Here is where I find Christ, Aquinas, Aristotle, Socrates, Confucius and Lao Tse most helpful, along with a few others that I take to have privileged insight into what it means to be human and therefore into my ultimate end of becoming one.

You see, Hee_Zen, I have come to the conclusion that being “human” is my ultimate goal as a “self,” it isn’t a “given” in the sense of simply being one or not. We have been “gifted” with the possibility of becoming human and that gift is, itself, morally critical, but it is in the becoming or “filling out” that capacity that is what we, as “humans,” (in the hollow or capacious sense of having the potential to become human) have been tasked with.

In his writings, Confucius, for example, stresses the importance of cultivating one’s character, likening that task to crafting something fine and exquisite from raw material - similar to carving bone or horn, or grinding and polishing a piece of jade. Aristotle, in Nichomachean Ethics, echoes this when he refers to happiness being a perfect fulfillment of one’s essential nature.

In other words, I take the task of forming the internal man, the “self” as being the ultimate and crucial project for me as a human being - that is, to become fully human. It may seem puzzling to make such a claim because how would anyone know what it means to be “human” if they are not already one?

You see, Hee_Zen, it is precisely in deciding or making a choice about what that “final form” is, that one chooses to become or determine, fully, what that means. Since it is in the very making of the determination that one chooses what it means to BE as human, that determination should be made very carefully and seriously. As Confucius would hold, an artist carving a precious piece of jade or horn will only begin and pursue the task with much circumspection and preparation, lest he irreparably damage the raw material. Such is no different from the task facing us as “humans” in terms of forming the character we will take on - for it is in the choosing and forming of that character that is essentially what it means to BE human and the extent to which one succeeds at doing so.

So, just as an artist can be called an “artist” only to the extent they have succeeded at being one according to the beauty and quality of the works of art produced, so, too, being “human” is the same KIND of endeavor - having the capacity to carefully form and shape the artful beauty of one’s internal “human” character is the feature upon which we will be judged as to whether we qualify to be called “human.”

Now, cyborgs and robots, as far as can be known, depend for their capacity to act upon the programmed code which determines their every act. For that reason, I do not believe they are human in the sense required above - they are not self-forming, nor have the capacity to be.

Does that stop me from treating them in particular ways? No because, ultimately, my endeavor and the one that “drives” my every intention is to form my character in the artistic sense of sublime beauty. Treating human-like beings in human-like ways is fully in accord with my being and doing in a manner that seeks to retain a high level of ren, in the Confucian sense.

What does this have to do with science or the scientific method? Well, it seems to me, that the scientific method is of ultimate importance only if you grant that the ultimate purpose for being human is to control the world around you with no thought or deference to the internal character of the “you” you are forming as a result.

Science has absolutely nothing to say about that. On the other hand, the “you” that you are forming has very much to say about how you will use the knowledge that accrues from science. That can be a very tenuous and even dangerous thing. So to promote science at the expense of character development as if character development is an innocuous or merely “subjective” thing is mindless and foolish, as far as I can tell. We need to get the character development - the subjective parts - right as a priority in terms of how, when and why we approach objective knowledge. It is entirely a matter of priority. Ignoring that priority will land us in a whole heap of ugly.

Have I made your day?

:tiphat: Ignatius

Thank you for your insights. There is much to ponder here.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Thank you for your insights. There is much to ponder here.

Tell me I’ve made your day and I will count that as accomplishing my task, even if I fail to make Hee_Zen’s day.

 

[cisco_1]

Of course I do. There is one important feature for all of them. None has an evidence for it.

Nope you did not. Your mistake is that you are making the claim of being god and coming back from a Roman Execution as even a doctrinial like claim. Remember the term “extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence” and you are dealing with a claim that is very extraordinary and given it’s time, a claim that is warrent of death penalty. So level of this claim does demand a high showcase to get religious jews to believe it. So if the resurrection was not real, then what made them believe it? You have not answered that and due to that you are not on the point. If you are still trying to make that claim as simple to believe then sorry you are not applying absolute logic on sociology anymore.

This is special pleading. You singled out Judaism as if it were somehow “special”.

Not special but very strict. They do not just shift in beliefs and abandon cultural like practices. So again, stick with my point… what is it that convinced them to not only abandon and break their religious laws but horribly die for it.

Some people might. People are still extremely gullible. People were willing to drink poison, and give it their children in Jonestown. Does that lend credence to the claims by their leader?

So you think that the vatican would just abandon christianity over a guy who claimed to be god, got shot and killed and never returned again? You are becoming a self-rationalist now. People were willing to drink poison because of ignorance, a man can lie about a substance, calling it regular juice or even steroids and if the group of people don’t know anything about it then they get fooled… and after those people were fooled, what happens next? There is no social impact… and for the countless times you are not taking in regard of how big a claim is “returning from the dead after a roman execution”. People will not believe a claim like that with out a really good staged lie fooling them. How about if one of your friends die in such a manner, do you think anybody would believe any statement of them returning to life with out any evidence?

 

[Hans_W]

Science was never supportive of Atheism at all. People of this generation think so because they’ve read too many stuff on google and just believe it. The majority of the foundations of Science was founded by Christians/religious people. The Big Bang - founded by a Priest, the Law of Gravity - Newton, the Debunking of Heliocentric theory - Galileo, even Evolution - St Augustine. Religion does not get us close to the Physical world because it is meant for spirituality however science was never a counter to it.

There is nothing in science that shows Language, order, and systems can just pop out of thin air unintentionally. Saying there is no maker forces the person to provide a reason for an accident to be logical… and until there is even just a common example, atheism is nothing different than a person looking at my car, seeing the engine that allows it to run, and then comes telling me that it made itself. No disrespect… but please do not buy into those google sites.

Science is, or at least should be, never supportive of anything supernatural, and that includes the denial that there is something beyond the natural world.

Your second paragraph looks dangerously close to the Intelligent Design “theory”. Being new on this forum, you might not know that there is currently a thread running on the topic of ID.

 

[Hee_Zen]

Have I made your day?

Yes, it was a fine effort, and the only reason I do not quote it in full is to save bandwidth. Your post shows the difficulties of trying to p(name removed by moderator)oint the “essence” of something.

Even such a simple object as a “chair” is elusive. Something to sit on would be the first approximation. But we can sit on a table, on a bed, on a sofa, or even on a rock, or on the ground… so to define a “chair” as “something to sit on” does not lead anywhere. You can look at all the properties, and try to find which are the ones which “cannot be anything else”, and which pertain only and solely to “chairs” - and then you would have the “essence” of a chair. And there are no such properties… there is no “essence” for the chair.

You declined to deal with the essential properties of a “human”. And you correctly pointed out that even if you wish to concentrate only on yourself, “you” are a changing phenomenon. So, if the final conclusion would have been: “essence is a useless concept” - I would have given you full mark for the effort and the conclusion. As such you only get full marks for the effort.

But that is not too bad.

 

[Hee_Zen]

People were willing to drink poison because of ignorance, a man can lie about a substance, calling it regular juice or even steroids and if the group of people don’t know anything about it then they get fooled… and after those people were fooled, what happens next?

Those people at Jonestown drank poison knowing full well what it was. First they fed it to their children, watched them die, and then drank it themselves. Maybe you wish to classify them as “fanatics”, but they were simple, everyday people who “swallowed” the teaching of their “spiritual leader”. So don’t underestimate the gullibility of people.

 

[Peter_Plato]

You declined to deal with the essential properties of a “human”. And you correctly pointed out that even if you wish to concentrate only on yourself, “you” are a changing phenomenon. So, if the final conclusion would have been: “essence is a useless concept” - I would have given you full mark for the effort and the conclusion. As such you only get full marks for the effort.

But that is not too bad.

Hee_Zen, you need to rethink your assignment of marks. I did not conclude that being human is a changing phenomenon and, therefore, you are warranted in your belief that human essence is a useless concept. You need to read the post again. I argued against that very point.

The reason i brought up the Confucian/Aristotelian idea of forming personal character is that human essence, like bone or horn, is a malleable, changeable essence; but that does not make it useless. Malleability does not make human essence “useless,” since it is precisely by virtue of the fact that human essence can be formed into beautiful moral character that it, like bone or horn IS useful - especially since that by forming it carefully and “artistically” a person becomes fully human and achieves his/her “usefulness.” It is by fully becoming a “self” that allows or brings about eudaemonia or happiness in the ancient Greek sense, or beatitude in the Christian sense. That is the “usefulness” of it, if one chooses to express the endeavor crudely; as crude, I suppose, as conceding that art can be useful because it can be appreciated.

It is true that human essence cannot be useful in the disposable sense that a nail or automobile can be useful, but who would want to settle for that conditional level of utility where human essence is concerned? You think it proper to dispose of yourself as so much refuse when you are done utilizing yourself? This is why art has enduring value, Hee_Zen and why merely useful things end up in landfills or incinerators.

The problem for you, it would seem, is that - logically speaking - human essence can only bring about happiness (and be “useful” in the crude sense you intend) IFF (if and only if) the individual makes the determined decision to form character AND dependent upon his/her being successful doing so.

The other side of the coin, though, is that if this is the correct view of human essence, then any individual who chooses not to set about properly forming character or isn’t successful, that individual will not be truly happy AND all objective knowledge or endeavors will have merely occupied his/her time but never have resulted in “happiness” in the full-bodied Aristotelian/Confucian sense. From my own experience of 60 years, I can vouch for mindless or external activity, done for its own sake, having that shortcoming.

Some people insist that without good health you have nothing, I would insist that even more crucial to happiness is the forming of an integrated human moral character.

 

[CrossofChrist]

So, if the final conclusion would have been: “essence is a useless concept” - I would have given you full mark for the effort and the conclusion. As such you only get full marks for the effort.

If essence is identical with existence in material things, then everything that materially exists exists in itself. In other words, matter just “is”, and the only “essence” we can speak of is existing as matter.

This means you have to deny the distinction between different parts of reality. It makes no sense to speak of “me” and “you” and “this blade of grass” if there is only one essence (existing), if there is no distinction between forms. Unless you say some things either a) don’t exist, or b) are somewhere between existing and not existing.

If a, then how can you know anything of it, if it doesn’t exist? If b, how do you justify saying something “kind of” exists? Things either exist or they don’t–to end up in the middle is to deny the principle of non-contradiction.

 

[Hee_Zen]

Hee_Zen, you need to rethink your assignment of marks. I did not conclude that being human is a changing phenomenon and, therefore, you are warranted in your belief that human essence is a useless concept.

You turned down to discuss the “essence” of a generic human, and were talking about yourself only. And then pointed out the difficulty that you are dynamic being, so it is impossible to point out the your “essence”.

 

[Peter_Plato]

You turned down to discuss the “essence” of a generic human, and were talking about yourself only. And then pointed out the difficulty that you are dynamic being, so it is impossible to point out the your “essence”.

Paul Simon might think he is a rock, I don’t.

If by “essence,” you mean “inert,” well…

…I’ll take dynamic and you can have “essence.”

Disappointing reply, by the way.

 

[Hee_Zen]

If by “essence,” you mean “inert,” well…

…I’ll take dynamic and you can have “essence.”

If your essence is changing then it is not an “essence”. Enough of this dancing around the question. Of course I take “dynamic”… no such thing as “essence”.

 

[Peter_Plato]

If your essence is changing then it is not an “essence”. Enough of this dancing around the question. Of course I take “dynamic”… no such thing as “essence”.

I beg to differ. Water has an essential nature that can be radically changed from solid to liquid to gas, even though the nature of water is not observably the same, it is still H2O, the same essential substance.

By the way, I said internal nature was malleable in the sense of capable of being formed (carving bone or horns was the analogy) - I didn’t imply “changed” in the sense of becoming completely different.

The problem here is using ambiguous words to represent very abstract and difficult to understand realities.

Your claim seems to be that the inability of human beings to arrive at a succinct and concrete definition for an abstract reality provides sufficient warrant for dismissing the reality with no further thought.

 

[Gregory_Olson]

Yes, real life can be distracting.

Going off on a tangent: …

Hey Aloysium,

I greatly appreciate your going off on a tangent! It was good for me to hear this. Of course, I would never jeopardize my performance on an exam just to talk philosophy with all you old geezers.
However obnoxious this may sound coming from someone seemingly half the age of most of the posters, by my participation in this discussion I had hoped to help defend the Church. The word “distract” was my own sad attempt at humor. I hope I do see the distinction between living by the teachings of the Church and getting wrapped up in the *idea *of those teachings. Is this what you were trying to say?

… I promise you that when you have finished the story, you will have a much better understanding about my line of thought.

Hey Hee Zen,

You have good taste in names! I’m actually named after St. Gregory the Great, and to a lesser extent, some guy my mom had a crush on in the 8th grade.

I did read Mr. Lem’s short story… I know he’s highly regarded as a writer, and I know you say he’s your favorite author, but would you be offended if I said I didn’t like his style? It’s not because I disagree with his ideas; I still thoroughly enjoyed Asimov’s* I, Robot* and Forward’s The Dragon’s Egg… His story was too much of an effort to read to be likable for me–too many many big words and tedious, complex paragraphs, as if he if he wanted it to read like something out of, as you say, a college textbook.
The story itself seemed to compile a good portion of every argument of atheism in one swift blow; I believe the word for it is “shotgun argumentation.” But he did present them well by using the personoids as a vehicle, and as you said, I think I do truly have a much better understanding of your line of thought.

Perhaps the reason they didn’t get though to me as much as you or Stanislaw Lem would have watched for is that neither of you have a good understanding of the Christian line of thought. (Sun Tzu said: “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”) This is where his and your logic falls short–you presume things about God and about a Christian’s concept of God and morality. Even the personoid that argues against atheism in the story still thinks like an atheist.

For example, the personoid ADAN said: “For in all worlds it is thus; when there is no full certainty, there is no full accountability. … It is therefore thus: either God is perfectly just, in which case He cannot assume the right to punish the ‘ungodlies’ by virtue of the fact that they are ‘ungodlies’ (i.e. that they do not believe in Him); or else He will punish the unbelievers after all, which means that from the logical point of view He is not perfectly just.”
Based on the pretexts, this is logically sound. It’s wrong not because of false logic, but because of presumption. It presumes two things that I’m surprised Stanislaw Lem himself didn’t catch as a ex-Catholic; 1) that the main purpose of damnation is punishment, and 2) that the unbeliever is at the center of the matter.
For #1: In hell there can be no goodness left in a person. On earth, no matter how despondently sinful a person chooses to make himself, he is still a creation of God, in the image of God, and in at least some kind of communion with other, less corrupted creations of God. If he dies unrepentant, this last bit of goodness (Godliness) dies with him, and sending him to hell is more like the washing off of some gruesome, vile, dead thing than the punishing of a rational someone that can learn from his mistakes. The washing off metaphor leads to #2:
People tend to forget that sin is by nature a communal hurt; it can never be totally isolated to a single individual. Of course until an unrepentant sinner is totally gone, God still loves him and gives him the opportunity to turn back to God. But all the while his creation, us, suffers. At death, the most merciful thing to do, for God and his creation, is to send the person overcome by sin to annihilation.

As I said, I’m not going to try to take on every case of atheism made in the story, but I did seriously scrutinize most of them. They all fell short in ways that, if one has an actual grasp of Christian teaching, are fairly obvious. (One would think since the main point of new atheism seems to be to debunk Christianity, a few atheists would try to really learn about the religion they’re attacking… But I guess if they would do that, they would cease to be atheists any more. )

Here’s another example. ADAN later says: “Otherwise, for the sake of someone who perhaps does not exist, we may well be sacrificing that which exists here, and exists for certain.”
This one makes no sense to me. Christians don’t see giving up sin as a sacrifice. Even you, who still hold on to morality in spite of being atheist, must see the giving up of evil as a good thing–for the sinner and everyone concerned.
The only reason I can think to say this is if Stanislaw Lem has a different idea of good and evil than Christians do, and so sees no evil being given up when we fast or serve penances, and no good taking place when we do ministry work or pray. Instead, he sees only waste. This, I guess, is an ironic case where both the atheist and the Christian pities the other.

Thanks though, for sharing a link to this story. I do like science fiction, and had never read anything before by Mr. Lem … I might still check out some of his other books, perhaps one that doesn’t try to tear down Christianity.

-Greg

 

[magnet]

Where do the following science discoveries fit in with the God Created Life on Earth idea?

Viruses, long thought to be biology’s hitchhikers, turn out to have been biology’s formative force.

This is striking news, especially at a moment when the basic facts of origins and evolution seem to have fallen under a shroud. In the discussions of intelligent design, one hears a yearning for an old-fashioned creation story, in which some singular, inchoate entity stepped in to give rise to complex life-forms—humans in particular. Now the viruses appear to present a creation story of their own: a stirring, topsy-turvy, and decidedly unintelligent design wherein life arose more by reckless accident than original intent, through an accumulation of genetic accounting errors committed by hordes of mindless, microscopic replication machines. Our descent from apes is the least of it. With the discovery of Mimi, scientists are close to ascribing to viruses the last role that anyone would have conceived for them: that of life’s prime mover.

discovermagazine.com/2006/mar/unintelligent-design

 

[CHRISTINE77]

Hey Aloysium,

I greatly appreciate your going off on a tangent! It was good for me to hear this. Of course, I would never jeopardize my performance on an exam just to talk philosophy with all you old geezers.
However obnoxious this may sound coming from someone seemingly half the age of most of the posters, by my participation in this discussion I had hoped to help defend the Church. The word “distract” was my own sad attempt at humor. I hope I do see the distinction between living by the teachings of the Church and getting wrapped up in the *idea *of those teachings. Is this what you were trying to say?

Hey Hee Zen,

You have good taste in names! I’m actually named after St. Gregory the Great, and to a lesser extent, some guy my mom had a crush on in the 8th grade.

I did read Mr. Lem’s short story… I know he’s highly regarded as a writer, and I know you say he’s your favorite author, but would you be offended if I said I didn’t like his style? It’s not because I disagree with his ideas; I still thoroughly enjoyed Asimov’s* I, Robot* and Forward’s The Dragon’s Egg… His story was too much of an effort to read to be likable for me–too many many big words and tedious, complex paragraphs, as if he if he wanted it to read like something out of, as you say, a college textbook.
The story itself seemed to compile a good portion of every argument of atheism in one swift blow; I believe the word for it is “shotgun argumentation.” But he did present them well by using the personoids as a vehicle, and as you said, I think I do truly have a much better understanding of your line of thought.

Perhaps the reason they didn’t get though to me as much as you or Stanislaw Lem would have watched for is that neither of you have a good understanding of the Christian line of thought. (Sun Tzu said: “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”) This is where his and your logic falls short–you presume things about God and about a Christian’s concept of God and morality. Even the personoid that argues against atheism in the story still thinks like an atheist.

For example, the personoid ADAN said: “For in all worlds it is thus; when there is no full certainty, there is no full accountability. … It is therefore thus: either God is perfectly just, in which case He cannot assume the right to punish the ‘ungodlies’ by virtue of the fact that they are ‘ungodlies’ (i.e. that they do not believe in Him); or else He will punish the unbelievers after all, which means that from the logical point of view He is not perfectly just.”
Based on the pretexts, this is logically sound. It’s wrong not because of false logic, but because of presumption. It presumes two things that I’m surprised Stanislaw Lem himself didn’t catch as a ex-Catholic; 1) that the main purpose of damnation is punishment, and 2) that the unbeliever is at the center of the matter.
For #1: In hell there can be no goodness left in a person. On earth, no matter how despondently sinful a person chooses to make himself, he is still a creation of God, in the image of God, and in at least some kind of communion with other, less corrupted creations of God. If he dies unrepentant, this last bit of goodness (Godliness) dies with him, and sending him to hell is more like the washing off of some gruesome, vile, dead thing than the punishing of a rational someone that can learn from his mistakes. The washing off metaphor leads to #2:
People tend to forget that sin is by nature a communal hurt; it can never be totally isolated to a single individual. Of course until an unrepentant sinner is totally gone, God still loves him and gives him the opportunity to turn back to God. But all the while his creation, us, suffers. At death, the most merciful thing to do, for God and his creation, is to send the person overcome by sin to annihilation.

As I said, I’m not going to try to take on every case of atheism made in the story, but I did seriously scrutinize most of them. They all fell short in ways that, if one has an actual grasp of Christian teaching, are fairly obvious. (One would think since the main point of new atheism seems to be to debunk Christianity, a few atheists would try to really learn about the religion they’re attacking… But I guess if they would do that, they would cease to be atheists any more. )

Here’s another example. ADAN later says: “Otherwise, for the sake of someone who perhaps does not exist, we may well be sacrificing that which exists here, and exists for certain.”
This one makes no sense to me. Christians don’t see giving up sin as a sacrifice. Even you, who still hold on to morality in spite of being atheist, must see the giving up of evil as a good thing–for the sinner and everyone concerned.
The only reason I can think to say this is if Stanislaw Lem has a different idea of good and evil than Christians do, and so sees no evil being given up when we fast or serve penances, and no good taking place when we do ministry work or pray. Instead, he sees only waste. This, I guess, is an ironic case where both the atheist and the Christian pities the other.

Thanks though, for sharing a link to this story. I do like science fiction, and had never read anything before by Mr. Lem … I might still check out some of his other books, perhaps one that doesn’t try to tear down Christianity.

-Greg

Excellent post and I so agree with you in regard to sin. When you let go of sin and evil, you realize what a trap it had you in.

 

[The_DNA_Rose]

Please explain what do you mean by this phrase? What does it entail, and how is it different from some “other” methods? What are the precise steps one must take to find out if a proposition about the external reality is true or not? What are its alleged limitation?

Please be specific. Thank you.

The scientific method, has disproven spontaneous generation, and thus does not permit life from lifelessness, or “life just happened in a warm pond one day Daddy”

Science reaches conclusions, that can be verified, by observation and experiment.

 

[Ignatius]

Well, in this case, what are you talking about?

Sorry for the delay, I’ve been very busy. Let me retrace the conversation for you.

I said:

The historicity of the specific individual known as Jesus Christ is a well documented historical fact. Denial of the fact of the existence of Jesus Christ is counter to the facts. The vast preponderance of accredited, knowledgeable historians will attest to the fact that the existence of Jesus Christ is far more well documented than that of most ancients known to history.

To which you replied:

Could you please quote some historical . . . . For feeding a crowd “with one loaf of bread and one fish”? …

To which I posted:

I didn’t say anything about any miracles.
Are you seriously attempting to deny the existence of the vast mountain of historical evidence for the existence of Jesus Christ? Really???

You Responded:

. . . . what are you talking about?

So, You postulated that Jesus did not exist. Then I stated that the historical evidence is substantial. Then you said something about not believing certain miracles. I had not said anything about miracles.
That is fallacious logic. It simply does not follow that the The historicity of the specific individual known as Jesus Christ, which is a well documented historical fact, is dependent on the existence of miracles.

Let me draw an analogy to illustrate the fallacy.
1 Someone says that Socrates did not exist.
2 I say that he did and it is a well documented historical fact.
3 The first person says that there is no proof that he developed that he developed the Socratic method.

So, even if there is no Socratic method it does not follow that Socrates did not exist. In other words, The existence of Socrates does no depend on the existence of the Socratic method just as the fact of the historical evidence of Jesus Christ does not depend on the miracles you mentioned.

That would be like denying the existence of George Washington because there is no evidence that he chopped down a cherry tree. Your see the error, to wit: the existence of some historical person does not depend on whether they did something attributed to them. That is a red herring argument.

Perhaps the following link will help clarify the situation.
facebook.com/TheChurchMilitant/photos/a.171704916350422.1073741828.171688403018740/328923820628530/?type=1&theater

 

[Hee_Zen]

I did read Mr. Lem’s short story… I know he’s highly regarded as a writer, and I know you say he’s your favorite author, but would you be offended if I said I didn’t like his style? It’s not because I disagree with his ideas; I still thoroughly enjoyed Asimov’s* I, Robot* and Forward’s The Dragon’s Egg… His story was too much of an effort to read to be likable for me–too many many big words and tedious, complex paragraphs, as if he if he wanted it to read like something out of, as you say, a college textbook.

Yes, Lem came up with this concept of writing a story as if it were a short summary of a book. But that is just one of the ideas he came up with, his other writings carry widely different styles.

If you permit me to suggest another one, I would recommend “The Cyeriad”, also a very “strange” style. It contains fairy tales for the cybernetic age, and those stories are also delightful, in my opinion of course. One little piece from it is available on-line: Mymosh the self-begotten. In a sense it also “attacks” the base concept of every religion, namely the idea that the world is “created”. But it is playful and still has a lot of deep thoughts.

Perhaps the reason they didn’t get though to me as much as you or Stanislaw Lem would have watched for is that neither of you have a good understanding of the Christian line of thought.

I am sorry, but I cannot agree. If one disagrees with another point of view, it cannot be brushed aside with the objection: “you simply did not understand”. I used to be a believer, so I am perfectly aware of the Christian line of thought - I simply disagree with it. It is rather frustrating to see this “staple” answer: “you don’t understand”, instead of an actual analysis.

This is where his and your logic falls short–you presume things about God and about a Christian’s concept of God and morality.

Hold on for a second. The atheist only presumes about God one thing: that God does not exist. Atheists only talk about the “Christian’s concept of God” and nothing else. And since these concepts are human concepts expressed in human word and terms, they cannot be brushed off by asserting that the atheist did not understand the Christian view. Moreover, there is no single, uniform “Christian view”. There are many, and not just the difference between Catholics and Protestants, but also within Catholicism as well. Pretty much all Christians agree on the idea that unrepented mortal sins “merit” eternal damnation. But they cannot agree on the “meat”, just what is a “mortal sin”? I am aware of the three requirements, so no need to quote them.

For example, the personoid ADAN said: “For in all worlds it is thus; when there is no full certainty, there is no full accountability. … It is therefore thus: either God is perfectly just, in which case He cannot assume the right to punish the ‘ungodlies’ by virtue of the fact that they are ‘ungodlies’ (i.e. that they do not believe in Him); or else He will punish the unbelievers after all, which means that from the logical point of view He is not perfectly just.”

This is the perfect example. If there is no full disclosure, there is no full accountability. That is a very simple, and fully rational human concept, there is nothing what could be misunderstood about it. There is a basic dogma, namely that “the **obstinate **lack of belief in God is an offense against the Holy Spirit” and as such it merits eternal damnation". How can the lack of belief be called “sinful”? There is another one: “one unrepented mortal sin” will be punished by eternal torture. But if a simple act, like not being “open” to procreation (no matter what method is used) and it is left “unrepented” would merit eternal torture and suffering, then you should not “blame” the atheists for not accepting that sentence as “just” - not to mention “loving” and “merciful”. The problem is that the believers assert very “strange” things about God, things which are simply incompatible with the assumed creator of the Universe.

Based on the pretexts, this is logically sound. It’s wrong not because of false logic, but because of presumption. It presumes two things that I’m surprised Stanislaw Lem himself didn’t catch as a ex-Catholic; 1) that the main purpose of damnation is punishment, and 2) that the unbeliever is at the center of the matter.

I think that you had a typo here. Should not your sentence read: “1) that the main purpose of damnation is NOT punishment”? Because no matter how you view it, “eternal damnation” for a finite deed cannot be called “just” under any definition of “justice” I am aware of. And this cannot be countered by the argument that God’s justice is fundamentally different from human justice. If they are fundamentally different, then the same word should not be used to describe them.

To be continued below…

 

[Hee_Zen]

… continued from above:

For #1: In hell there can be no goodness left in a person.

So, if someone performs a single act of masturbation, and does not “repent” it, that means that there was no “goodness” left in him? The reason he does not repent it, because he disagrees about the “gravity” of such action.

If he dies unrepentant, this last bit of goodness (Godliness) dies with him, and sending him to hell is more like the washing off of some gruesome, vile, dead thing than the punishing of a rational someone that can learn from his mistakes.

Since God never points out our temporal mistakes, how could we learn from them?

People tend to forget that sin is by nature a communal hurt; it can never be totally isolated to a single individual.

Please, get real. There is nothing in performing a “non-procreative” act of sex which would “hurt” anyone. There are all those victimless crimes, which are considered “sinful acts”. If the church would like to be taken seriously, it should quickly re-classify those as “no one else’s business”.

Of course until an unrepentant sinner is totally gone, God still loves him and gives him the opportunity to turn back to God. But all the while his creation, us, suffers. At death, the most merciful thing to do, for God and his creation, is to send the person overcome by sin to annihilation.

Hell is not supposed to be “annihilation”, it is supposed to be “eternal torture”. And that is a huge difference. Annihilation would be quite acceptable.

Here’s another example. ADAN later says: “Otherwise, for the sake of someone who perhaps does not exist, we may well be sacrificing that which exists here, and exists for certain.”
This one makes no sense to me. Christians don’t see giving up sin as a sacrifice.

I accept that you don’t. But that is neither here nor there. If you never experienced all those deliciously “sinful” sexual practices, which have nothing to do with procreation, but everything to do with pure, unadulterated pleasure, obviously you will not miss them. But you still miss out on them. And if you have tried them, and now you feel ashamed for it, then you suffer needlessly. If there would be an absolute, irrefutable evidence that the church’s assertions are correct, that would make a difference. But there is none.

The only reason I can think to say this is if Stanislaw Lem has a different idea of good and evil than Christians do, and so sees no evil being given up when we fast or serve penances, and no good taking place when we do ministry work or pray. Instead, he sees only waste. This, I guess, is an ironic case where both the atheist and the Christian pities the other.

Now, you got that one right! This is exactly the point. Evil is not the “privation of good”, it is a volitional, malicious act to inflict some gratuitous harm on someone. If you simply pursue what you think is “right”, then it is none of our business, but we can still pity you for wasting your time on meaningless rituals.