Why I am not a Christian

[Ned]

Boris, I must say, you made some very goods points. I agree with them.

I think the ultimate test of the existence of God is the search for how the universe was created because of all definitions of God or his attributes we all seem to agree that God created the universe or to some IS the universe. This search for our origins is relevant to us and is based on science.

But if that was the LAST interaction of God with this universe, it does leave the status of Jesus Christ in doubt. This is one of the reasons why I approach Jesus as a moral teacher rather than as a God. I have asked this question before: Whether it would be legitimate to call oneself a Christian without believing that Jesus was a God. The consensus seemed to be that one could not; but I feel in my heart that this consensus is wrong. Jesus has an enormous and positive impact on the world even if organized religions, often it seems, go seriously off track and become organs of hate and cruelty and not of love and peace.

[Whaleboy]

that would explain your understanding of empericism

so how about this (because I have gotten frustrated with you, as you can probably tell I was a poor teacher), you read something on empericism, and we can continue this later perhaps?

Ah I think we may have a case of misunderstood irony here. That my qualifications are lacking did not stop me from spending years of reading up on epistemology and debate with philosophy grads. But I'm no blowhard and I'm perfectly willing to accept others in this debate when they have a point and not attack their basis.

Empiricism at the heart of scientific method (that hypotheses need to be tested upon our observations (be they conceptual or "real world) in a consistent manner. That we accept hypotheses provisionally as theories when we induce them on the basis of such research rather than deduce them in the unapplied mathematical sense. You split empiricism into rationalism (analytic and continental) and objectivism. Analytic rationalism is the more atheist of the two, in that truth exists and can be determined by critical reason and analysis which tends to manifest itself in humanism or science to that end. Continental rationalism is more epistemological, in that reason is the source of knowledge and that we start with a priori principles and work up from them, which "British empiricism" rejects, in saying that all knowledge is sensory. That's reconciled by Objectivism (of Ayn Rand fame *cringe*) which checks the intrinsic implication of the former empiricism and replaces is with a Kantian universalism. I personally reject that, but only on the epistemological level, it is still the basis for scientific method.

ok, than why did you say that experiment was not needed in all cases?

The experiment as you define it would not apply to philosophy (whereby predictions are tested by conceptual observation), and my argument is that there is no natural distinction between science, logic and philosophy.

If you accept that experiment is a term that is not exclusive to science, then your definition of science becomes meaningless and it instead applies to all fields. Is that your concession?

I think the ultimate test of the existence of God is the search for how the universe was created because of all definitions of God or his attributes we all seem to agree that God created the universe or to some IS the universe. This search for our origins is relevant to us and is based on science.

I concur. Again this is one of those areas that rationality in theism undermines the faith, and faith renders theism irrelevant to its scientific pretensions.

[Jon Miller]

no

I don't agree

you are missing the point, science requires physical observation or experiment

so I go back to my early point of being extremely baffled at how you are not understanding

science requries physical observation/experiment

logic (and philosophy) does not

Jon Miller
(you also seem to be arguing that all of philosophy and logic is emperical, anyone will tell you that they aren't)

[Whaleboy]

science requries physical observation/experiment

logic (and philosophy) does not

Which is based upon the assumption that observation and experiment is solely empirical, which I have shown to be not the case. Say one has a philosophy which one seeks to test against another. Each makes a prediction, and each can be tested, using the same logical processes, the same manner and the same process of investigation. The only differences? That one occurs empirically and one occurs conceptually, and that one is (presumably for science in almost all cases) quantative and one is qualitative.

Now some epistemological theories, representative realism and skepticism namely, would hold that even that is empirical, and broadly in an epistemological context I concur, however this debate rests on the distinction between the hypothetical and the categorical, so for now empirical is consistent within the categorical. The Lockean position for example, would hold that the mind comes to be "furnished" as he puts it, through experience, experiment, observation and thus also doubt. So even if we accept that empiricism applies to the hypothetical context, it holds that logic and philosophy do rely upon it.

anyone will tell you that they aren't

Not so, as I think I have shown. Yours seems to me not an empirical position but a rationalist, in other words that reason is of much greater importance than sense experience with regards to empiricism, which favours my position naturally. So both sides of the debate between rationalism and empiricism (a long running one I might add), reject your distinction.

[Jon Miller]

but everyone but some philosophers agree with it

including scientists, which are most important (since they are the ones who are actively engaged in it)

maybe we will continue this later

Jon Miller

[Whaleboy]

but everyone but some philosophers agree with it

In a philosophical field forgive me but I'd be more inclined to go with philosophers than those who are not. It's simple common sense? Who would you trust to fix your pipes... one single plumber or a legion of merchant bankers?

including scientists, which are most important (since they are the ones who are actively engaged in it)

I disagree. Scientists are in my experience aware and very good at the science, but not in the basis for the science. One learns scientific philosophy and method by rote and learn to apply it in every more spectacular manifestations, but relatively few scientists in my opinion truly know what they are doing as a philosopher would see it. That is why it is prudent in my view for scientists to have some philosophical background in what they are doing, just as scientific philosophers tend to have grounding in science, or medical ethicists tend to be of the medical profession.

I found that out to my great joy and surprise when I was able to have a fulfilling debate on the topic of medical ethics a few weeks ago when I was staying with a friend who's a final-year medical student at Queen Mary's in London. Her and her friends, and myself were able to debate even though we were coming from completely different angles, and because of that difference, able to inform each other, and for my part interest them in philosophy and for their part I now have a plethora of differing medical opinions and concepts to inform my ethical debating.

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
what I call science

which are the fields of physics, biology, etc

are all based upon experiment

ask any scientist

Well, you saw this one coming, didn't you; I've heard more than one scientist (or at least people commonly thought of as scientists, like professors of physics) say that mathematics is a science.

I was also going to say that I've frequently heard things like astrophysics - which is practically entirely observational - described as science, but I notice that you further down claim that observation is subsumed under experiment. I'll have noted I've never run across that terminology before ...

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
but thinks that the lack of evidence of something means that science suggests it doesn't exist

my answer to that (Besides read back through the arguments) is think about the history of science

there was no evidence (as far as we could see) for electrons or up quarks or down quarks or even hydrogen in the 18th century

but did scientists say that they were not there?

no, they didn't say anything about them (Scientifically) which is the proper thing to do about god (and your little elves)

Duh! The concept of quarks didn't exist in the 19th C, for a start - they said nothing of them because they literally could not.

That aside, it's unclear to me how mentioning a few things that turned out to exist despite there being no evidence for them at some point defeats the idea that if there's no evidence for something it probably doesn't exist. Of the set of things that could exist, but have no evidence for their existence, no doubt many don't exist (for the simple reason some of them are gonna be mutually exclusive with one another). I'll hazard the majority of them don't exist.

[Whaleboy]

t's unclear to me how mentioning a few things that turned out to exist despite there being no evidence for them at some point defeats the idea that if there's no evidence for something it probably doesn't exist

Agreed, it seems circumstancial, and there is no evidence offered for the proposition why God might exist, or why we should take God as seriously as we might elves dancing on electrons.

[Jon Miller]

mathematics is a science under one definition of the word

I made it very clear though that I was refering to emperical sciences

and I would say that astrophysics is a sciences

my point is that sciences, using the common definition of the word, are emperical, and thus are based upon physical observations or experiments

so for the purposes of the argument observations and experiment are equivilent, since both are physical

quit trying to poke holes in my argument with meaningless quibbles

Jon Miller

[Last Conformist]

quit trying to poke holes in my argument with meaningless quibbles

That post wasn't attempting to poke any holes in your arguments (except in-so-far "ask any scientist" is considered an argument), but to point out the definitional issue. Definitional "quibbles" are not necessarily meaningless - I was wondering what crack you were on re: observational science for a full page before you clarified your usage (which, as said, is news to me).

Incidentally, your usage of "science" to mean only observational and experimental science may be the common definition where you're from, but it isn't where I'm from. I do find it annoying when people, confronted with a definition different from their own, say theirs is the correct one, period.

[Elok]

UR: I'm not attacking logic, I'm attacking "logic." Defined as the dressing-up of one's own prejudices as self-evident, generally by hiding behind jargon, distortions of accepted truths, whatever. Many people here seem to think that creation scientists and company have a monopoly on that sort of thing, but it seems to me that everyone does it. Every single person. You do it, I do it, we all do it at least some of the time. So we can't "rely on" anything, to best answer your question. There's no messiah of reason in my book. That would require human beings to be consistently rational, which is not the case. But I get the feeling we're not really communicating here. Or at least I'm not. Nertz.

WRT science, it's impossible to have a genuine spirit of scientific inquiry that considers the presence of God. If you accept the existence of God, you have to admit that he/she/it is not and never can be a controlled variable. So any scientific study of anything has to try to describe things without deity. But that's just the nature of the discipline. To go from there to "there's no scientific evidence of God," is sort of duh. It's a tautology.

And I've said that before lots of times. The usual response I get is, "science says no such thing. The only qualification for scientific evidence is such and such." So I guess I don't see why I bother. Just to say I tried, I guess. But it's still true that a lot of basic scientific assumptions exclude the possibility of God. Just off the top of my head, uniformitarianism: if there is a God, there's no reason to assume that what happens now is what happened way back when. Yes, that's not a scientifically valid thing to say. That's the whole bloody point, and that's all I have to say.

Whaleboy, I agree that this has been an interesting discussion, and the longest I've had on Poly on the subject that hasn't turned to flames. Huzzah. From what I read in that Wikipedia entry, Moore doesn't count as anything you can cite in an argument like this Russell fellow did. It's not a system of morals so much as an intellectual agnosticism. Good exists, and we can't explain it, so don't try. Or something like that. To be honest, I found the wikipedia rather obtuse on that point. I'm not terribly well-read in philosophy, I just know from my scant overview that all the ones I've heard of use less-than-ideal reasoning. Just to give you fair warning though, don't get me started on Nietzsche...

[Elok]

Originally posted by Odin
Phopsophers telling scientists what science is (yes, I'm talking about you, Whaleboy).

Poor spelling combined with intellectual condescension.



Oh, and it's spelled, "empiricism." JM's emperer wears no clothes.

[bayraven]

after several pages I hope we've come back around. I thought the thread had been changed to Why I am not a Scientist

[Whaleboy]

so for the purposes of the argument observations and experiment are equivilent, since both are physical

I disagree, since an experiment can comprise an observation, but an observation is not an experiment... so experiment is necessarily observation, whereas observation is only sufficiently an experiment. Penguins and birds .

From what I read in that Wikipedia entry, Moore doesn't count as anything you can cite in an argument like this Russell fellow did. It's not a system of morals so much as an intellectual agnosticism. Good exists, and we can't explain it, so don't try. Or something like that. To be honest, I found the wikipedia rather obtuse on that point. I'm not terribly well-read in philosophy, I just know from my scant overview that all the ones I've heard of use less-than-ideal reasoning. Just to give you fair warning though, don't get me started on Nietzsche...

Indeed, I can't say that I agree with Moore either. I think it's perfectly possibly to construct a sociological moral system without using God, instead the presumption that other people exist as I said much earlier, but I think that Wittgenstein and Russell can be far more helpful to us here than Moore, whom Russell used in the debate with Copleston as merely an illustration I suspect.

after several pages I hope we've come back around. I thought the thread had been changed to Why I am not a Scientist

True. It's gone in the direction I'd initially hoped it wouldn't, and I'm partly responsible for that... namely that someone would pick up on a relatively inconsequential point, we'd debate the point satisfactorily, and then go off at a tangent on something almost pointless to a point that itself is almost pointless to the debate! It's an Off Topic tradition I think .