Happy Easter

[Jon Miller]

No, being able to predict the orbit of the moon, finding the Higgs-Boson, calculating chemical reactions etc etc etc is more than faith..

No person can prove all of that. Everyone is taking things on faith, beleiving in the institution of Science/etc.

I could even take the example of finding the Higgs-Boson. Many of my former colleagues were on the paper. None of them, and probably none were capable, proved the existence of the Higgs by themselves in all of it's details. They depending on many other members of their collaboration and other scientists and other collaborators and build based on that knowledge... which they didn't prove themselves. They believed. They didn't require seeing the proof of all the steps. And they were able to discover an incredibly difficult to observe particle.

All of science for a century or more has been like this.

Even if you go to things which have scientific proof that you have faith in... that wouldn't include beauty. Your personal observations are not scientific proof.

As I said, a rationalist could determine that things (such as the belief in God) were uninteresting or make some argument based on Occam's razor that they wouldn't consider such beliefs. But that doesn't make such beliefs fantasy by any definition that is used by academia.
JM

[EPW]

I basically agree (although Paganism is actually an umbrella for many different religions.../etc).

JM

Oh! So you don't actually believe in any of it, you just practice it? Why not just say that in the first place?!

[EPW]

No person can prove all of that. Everyone is taking things on faith, beleiving in the institution of Science/etc.

I could even take the example of finding the Higgs-Boson. Many of my former colleagues were on the paper. None of them, and probably none were capable, proved the existence of the Higgs by themselves in all of it's details. They depending on many other members of their collaboration and other scientists and other collaborators and build based on that knowledge... which they didn't prove themselves. They believed. They didn't require seeing the proof of all the steps. And they were able to discover an incredibly difficult to observe particle.

All of science for a century or more has been like this.

Even if you go to things which have scientific proof that you have faith in... that wouldn't include beauty. Your personal observations are not scientific proof.

As I said, a rationalist could determine that things (such as the belief in God) were uninteresting or make some argument based on Occam's razor that they wouldn't consider such beliefs. But that doesn't make such beliefs fantasy by any definition that is used by academia.
JM

I believe in the scientific process because, you know, it actually works. If you want to call that faith, fine by me, but it's obviously different that believing in Christ.

[Kidlicious]

He doesn't just believe in the scientific process. He believes in all that woke crap. You're being trolled JM.

[Dauphin]

No person can prove all of that. Everyone is taking things on faith, beleiving in the institution of Science/etc.

I could even take the example of finding the Higgs-Boson. Many of my former colleagues were on the paper. None of them, and probably none were capable, proved the existence of the Higgs by themselves in all of it's details. They depending on many other members of their collaboration and other scientists and other collaborators and build based on that knowledge... which they didn't prove themselves. They believed. They didn't require seeing the proof of all the steps. And they were able to discover an incredibly difficult to observe particle.

All of science for a century or more has been like this.

Even if you go to things which have scientific proof that you have faith in... that wouldn't include beauty. Your personal observations are not scientific proof.

As I said, a rationalist could determine that things (such as the belief in God) were uninteresting or make some argument based on Occam's razor that they wouldn't consider such beliefs. But that doesn't make such beliefs fantasy by any definition that is used by academia.
JM

I don't have faith that what a scientist tells me about some random fact I've no direct experience of is true, I have a reasonable belief that it is true because there is past experience that lends credance to the notion that it is true - however i will still hold skepticism about it's validity and place fair reliance on the word of others who have demonstrated sound logic, reasoning, experience, etc. In the case of an unfalsifiable claim, you and anyone else cannot accept it but on faith - there is by definition no way to support or refute it, no person to whom you can outsource reliance. ANy person who tells you to accept something on faith from a perspective of authority or supposed wisdom is not credible.

My beef here is with organised religion and people who claim to have any better idea about the existence of a god or gods than you or I.

[Dauphin]

As another point - if there were another intelligent life out in the galaxy, do you think they would inexorably come to the same view on scientific theorems (e.g. mathematics, relativity, electromagnetism) etc as humans have? And follow up, do you think they would also inexorably come to the same view of god or gods as us - is there a space pope? [directed at JM]

[Kidlicious]

It's just two different categories. You don't have to believe in something on faith. That doesn't mean people that do are wrong.

[Jon Miller]

As another point - if there were another intelligent life out in the galaxy, do you think they would inexorably come to the same view on scientific theorems (e.g. mathematics, relativity, electromagnetism) etc as humans have? And follow up, do you think they would also inexorably come to the same view of god or gods as us - is there a space pope? [directed at JM]

I would think that some things just come out of what I would expect to be any observations of the universe (Fibonacci sequence, Natural numbers, etc). But I am not sure if they will come to some of the same science as we have, even things as well understood and proven as QED/QCD. They might come to science that we haven't been able to conceive the proper mathematics for.

As far as religious beliefs... from a rational view I think that such speculation is far outside of what is most rational in the human thought framework. I could imagine (independent of the existence of God/etc) that some aspect of religion is an intrinsic part of experiencing the world in a conscious matter and making order of it early in civilization. It definitely seems to be intrinsic to how humans experience consciousness. But other intelligent life might experience consciousness very different... there might not even be civilization as humans experienced it. So human-like aliens would have religion, but aliens could be very different.

My assumption, but I haven't thought so much about it, is that aliens exist and are what the Bible refers to as angels. If we run into aliens and they really don't have a concept of God, I would find it a challenge for my Christianity (but not so much a challenge for my belief in a God in the Deist sense).

JM

[Jon Miller]

I don't have faith that what a scientist tells me about some random fact I've no direct experience of is true, I have a reasonable belief that it is true because there is past experience that lends credance to the notion that it is true - however i will still hold skepticism about it's validity and place fair reliance on the word of others who have demonstrated sound logic, reasoning, experience, etc. In the case of an unfalsifiable claim, you and anyone else cannot accept it but on faith - there is by definition no way to support or refute it, no person to whom you can outsource reliance. ANy person who tells you to accept something on faith from a perspective of authority or supposed wisdom is not credible.

My beef here is with organised religion and people who claim to have any better idea about the existence of a god or gods than you or I.

Saying that you believe what scientists say because of your experience with them and don't believe what preachers say because of your experience with them, is very reasonable.

But that is very different from saying that you only believe things that are proven to be true and that other things are fantasy or any similar claimed viewpoint. And I recognize that you didn't claim that viewpoint (or if you did, I didn't see you claim that viewpoint), and I believe that (basically) no one who claims to have that viewpoint actually holds it in a consistent fashion.

JM

[Dauphin]

Saying that you believe what scientists say because of your experience with them and don't believe what preachers say because of your experience with them, is very reasonable.

But that is very different from saying that you only believe things that are proven to be true and that other things are fantasy or any similar claimed viewpoint. And I recognize that you didn't claim that viewpoint (or if you did, I didn't see you claim that viewpoint), and I believe that (basically) no one who claims to have that viewpoint actually holds it in a consistent fashion.

JM

I'm not claiming you need to prove something to believe it, i am saying you need to have a basis for believing it, otherwise what distinguishes your belief from fantastic imagination.

I have no proof (in the sense of any prior facts to base an opinion) of Russell's teapot. I have no proof of a god. I have no proof of an invisible pink unicorn. I have no proof of a flying spaghetti monster. I have no proof that aliens speak perfect English. Etc. I also have no proof that none of these things are true. You can make any non-falsifiable statement you like - there is no value in it to me, as it's indistinguishable from any objective reality where the exact opposite or absence of it is true.

You can say something is beautiful - i may consider it ugly. The truth is not objective here. You don't have 'faith' that it is beautiful or ugly, it is just a subjective quality that you are ascribing it.

[Ming]

Right. It's the same thing with all the Pagan beliefs. Some people actually have faith in that kind of thing, but it's not fantasy. And I think it's silliness, but people believe all sorts of silly things.

And that's how many people feel about your religion... it's silly and a fantasy.

[Jon Miller]

I'm not claiming you need to prove something to believe it, i am saying you need to have a basis for believing it, otherwise what distinguishes your belief from fantastic imagination.

I have no proof (in the sense of any prior facts to base an opinion) of Russell's teapot. I have no proof of a god. I have no proof of an invisible pink unicorn. I have no proof of a flying spaghetti monster. I have no proof that aliens speak perfect English. Etc. I also have no proof that none of these things are true. You can make any non-falsifiable statement you like - there is no value in it to me, as it's indistinguishable from any objective reality where the exact opposite or absence of it is true.

There is a basis for believing in it. You just discount that basis, but that doesn't mean that there isn't a basis. It is reasonable to say 'I am not interested in non-falsifiable statements that are not addressable by science' and be a 'weak' atheist or agnostic. It is even reasonable to say 'preachers are charlatans' and be a 'weak' or 'strong' atheist. It is also reasonable to say ' religions are part of the development of mankind as mankind civilized' and be a 'weak' or 'strong' atheist (see Harari).

But it isn't reasonable to say that the existence of god is a fantasy the same the existence of an invisible pink unicorn or a flying spaghetti monster. This is because the experiences and reports of experts, of large groups of people and of individuals all provide a basis to believe just like the reports and experiences of experts, large groups of people and individuals provide a basis to believe that Rome existed and in Science and that ancient Tory existed and so on. No (or practically none) experts and large groups of people believe in invisible pink unicorns or flying spaghetti monsters, so those can be considered as fantasy. Have lots of people and experts and so on believed things that were not true before, definitely! But they were wrong... not believing in fantastic imagination.

You haven't went and disproved anything about Christ's life or about the life of Paul or even the life of Moses. You just don't believe in them, and you don't believe in the experts and people who believe in them. But there is line of experts and people who have believed in Paul (including the miraculous, although that isn't what is important for Christianity... none of the miraculously is centrally important to Christianity but the Resurrection) since Paul was alive.

You can say, 'this seems like a legend or a myth' but legends and myths are not fantasy. Some of them are true. And even the ones that aren't true, there was/is still a basis for believing in them. It is not similar to believing (or not believing) in invisible pink unicorns or flying spaghetti monsters.

I am not trying to convince you of Christianity or of the existence of God here. I am not even trying to make you think that Christians are reasonable people. I am trying to present some of the difference concepts and points that are commonly considered by thinkers including by the strong atheists.

JM

[Jon Miller]

And that's how many people feel about your religion... it's silly and a fantasy.

There is a big difference between saying that Christianity is silly and that Christianity is a fantasy.

JM

[Uncle Sparky]

How about 'fantasy anthology'? Besides, there is no such thing as 'Christianity'.. I think The Book of Mormon explained it quite well... religion (of any sort) successfully spreads when it adapts to what the locals want. "There are maggots in my scrotum!" 'Christianity' has had 2000+ years to spread and mutate, and is absolutely patriarchal, matriarchal, socialist, fascist, liberal, conservative, opened, closed, literal, fantasy, etc.
You can use it to deify or condemn Donald J Trump.
Have you ever experienced a Russian Orthodox Easter mass? Ever talk to a Catholic mystic? How about a black Southern Baptist service? Ever been in a Mormon tabernacle?
Christianity is a fantasy anthology.

[EPW]

There is a basis for believing in it. You just discount that basis, but that doesn't mean that there isn't a basis. It is reasonable to say 'I am not interested in non-falsifiable statements that are not addressable by science' and be a 'weak' atheist or agnostic. It is even reasonable to say 'preachers are charlatans' and be a 'weak' or 'strong' atheist. It is also reasonable to say ' religions are part of the development of mankind as mankind civilized' and be a 'weak' or 'strong' atheist (see Harari).

But it isn't reasonable to say that the existence of god is a fantasy the same the existence of an invisible pink unicorn or a flying spaghetti monster. This is because the experiences and reports of experts, of large groups of people and of individuals all provide a basis to believe just like the reports and experiences of experts, large groups of people and individuals provide a basis to believe that Rome existed and in Science and that ancient Tory existed and so on. No (or practically none) experts and large groups of people believe in invisible pink unicorns or flying spaghetti monsters, so those can be considered as fantasy. Have lots of people and experts and so on believed things that were not true before, definitely! But they were wrong... not believing in fantastic imagination.

You haven't went and disproved anything about Christ's life or about the life of Paul or even the life of Moses. You just don't believe in them, and you don't believe in the experts and people who believe in them. But there is line of experts and people who have believed in Paul (including the miraculous, although that isn't what is important for Christianity... none of the miraculously is centrally important to Christianity but the Resurrection) since Paul was alive.

You can say, 'this seems like a legend or a myth' but legends and myths are not fantasy. Some of them are true. And even the ones that aren't true, there was/is still a basis for believing in them. It is not similar to believing (or not believing) in invisible pink unicorns or flying spaghetti monsters.

I am not trying to convince you of Christianity or of the existence of God here. I am not even trying to make you think that Christians are reasonable people. I am trying to present some of the difference concepts and points that are commonly considered by thinkers including by the strong atheists.

JM

Yeah, a lot of modern Christians and Jews take this word salad approach and never actually say anything meaningful. Kinda annoying.

[EPW]

At least we know how to get under JM's skin in the future. Just call his point of view a fantasy and watch him squirm.

[Uncle Sparky]

Ah, now you're just fantasizing...