Searching for GOD...

[Enki]

Yes, very specific.But you have no idea what comprises a "design for life".  Where would one start?  Perhaps with a big explosion of energy followed by several billion years of intelligently guided manipulation of the consequences of this explosion?  Or can you come up with something better?

Good grief, yes.  If I was the omnipotent God of your Catholic faith, I could think of many different scenarios that I could produce which would be vast amounts better than what seems to be the totally unintelligently guided series of events that you are suggesting.

[Spud]

Spud

Thank you for your reply.

Sorry if it was a bit waffly! (and pancakey)

[bluehillside Retd.]

Spud,

Sorry if it was a bit waffly! (and pancakey)

Funnily enough I made a Belgian waffle only this morning...

... and this afternoon I made a Frenchman prevaricate.

I'll get me jacket.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Gabriella,

And I don’t mind if you want to cling to your alternative facts Kellyanne.

It’s not an interpretation of what you said – it’s a repetition of it. If you now want to say that you don’t think objective claims of fact (“soul”) to be analogous with subjective statements of belief (gender, transsexualism) then by all means retract. 

So you can’t tell us where you said the thing you claimed you’d said after all.

Funny that.

Wrong again. Words have meanings, usually described in books called dictionaries. If you want to adduce your own personal meanings for them instead though, that’s a matter for you but it makes any dialogue meaningless.

You’re abusing the term “believe” again here – mine is objectively verifiable; yours is unqualified opinion. People believe lots of things, but there are different categories of belief.

If dialogue is meaningless because I don't agree with you, not sure why you are continuing with this.

Like I said, this is the same argument we had about the Catholic schools document. I read it as describing teaching and having knowledge of the beliefs of Catholicism, and you saw the word "knowledge" in the document and decided that meant that they were teaching their beliefs as objective facts.

Similarly, as I have stated before and you rejected as an incorrect interpretation of Alan's words, I read the "plain words" in Alan's posts where he says he believes we have a soul, as Alan stating his beliefs. You seem to think the word "belief" is negated by what he believes in e.g a "soul". I disagree because I think the important word is "belief". This is also partly because Alan can't define a "soul" or explain how it works or provide any objective evidence for it so he just keeps making assertions using a word that is not defined and could mean "consciousness" or "spirit-mind" in dualism but as he is religious he prefers to use the term "soul". To me it's irrelevant which term he uses as I was commenting on the concept of dualism and his belief in it.

My post 33909 was responding to Torridon saying that there was no need for "a soul" in that scenario, as "a mind" was good enough.   

My post 33909 was also commenting on Alan's belief in dualism - his soul being him separate from his physical self. I then compared it to those trans activists who believe in dualism i.e. believing there is an innate gender that is born in the wrong body, and who believe that sex is a social construct and gender is not a social construct. I said society chooses to accommodate some beliefs or claims about objective facts e.g. gender dualism that claims biological sex is a social construct. 

Oh by the way, feel free to call me "Kellyanne" from now on - it is after all your posting style. Given your name-calling of Vlad as Troll Boy etc, it's about what I expect from you. I won't be going anywhere, so feel free to enjoy yourself with that. Or perhaps "Troll Girl" will raise a chuckle....or maybe some non-gender specific variation. You might prove some use - I was thinking of changing my name on here to something more non-gender specific so if you insert a new name for me in each of your posts to me, try to make it non-gender specific.

So what now? Are you going to try the short and snappy "you're wrong" response or the old "I'm sure this meant something to you while you were typing it" response or something fresh and new?

[Spud]

Spud,

Funnily enough I made a Belgian waffle only this morning...

... and this afternoon I made a Frenchman prevaricate.

I'll get me jacket.

Took me about 10 minutes to get that....

meanwhile, have you seen this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uYR2bRw8Wo

[bluehillside Retd.]

Gabriella,

If dialogue is meaningless because I don't agree with you, not sure why you are continuing with this.

Dialogue isn’t meaningless because you refuse to agree with me at all. It’s meaningless when you refuse to accept the standardised meanings of words in favour of whatever meanings suit you.

Like I said, this is the same argument we had about the Catholic schools document. I read it as describing teaching and having knowledge of the beliefs of Catholicism, and you saw the word "knowledge" in the document and decided that meant that they were teaching their beliefs as objective facts.

That’ll be that agreed meanings for words thing that seems to fox you again. If someone intends the meaning “knowledge” they use the word knowledge; if they mean instead “faith belief” or similar they use those words. What you do is to take the words that people use and then decide that they actually meant something else by them.   

Similarly, as I have stated before and you rejected as an incorrect interpretation of Alan's words, I read the "plain words" in Alan's posts where he says he believes we have a soul, as Alan stating his beliefs. You seem to think the word "belief" is negated by what he believes in e.g a "soul". I disagree because I think the important word is "belief". This is also partly because Alan can't define a "soul" or explain how it works or provide any objective evidence for it so he just keeps making assertions using a word that is not defined and could mean "consciousness" or "spirit-mind" in dualism but as he is religious he prefers to use the term "soul". To me it's irrelevant which term he uses as I was commenting on the concept of dualism and his belief in it.

I don’t think that at all and it would help if you stopped misrepresenting me. What I actually think – and have made clear throughout – is that everything we think we know is at some level belief, including your belief that the Eiffel tower is in Paris and, say, my belief that leprechauns are real. There are however different categories of belief – inter-subjectively experienced, objective, verifiable, factual, solution-producing beliefs on the one hand, and personal, unverifiable, subjective beliefs on the other. The former are called knowledge, and the latter opinion. Sometimes people like AB conflate these categories to assert their opinions to be facts, and these claims are more properly called guesses.
 
And sometimes too people try to draw analogies between them but they fail because the comparison is between two different categories of belief - ie, knowledge vs opinion.         

My post 33909 was responding to Torridon saying that there was no need for "a soul" in that scenario, as "a mind" was good enough.   

My post 33909 was also commenting on Alan's belief in dualism - his soul being him separate from his physical self. I then compared it to those trans activists who believe in dualism i.e. believing there is an innate gender that is born in the wrong body, and who believe that sex is a social construct and gender is not a social construct. I said society chooses to accommodate some beliefs or claims about objective facts e.g. gender dualism that claims biological sex is a social construct.

Which as you now know perfectly well is a false analogy for the reason I have explained to you several times now without response. 

Oh by the way, feel free to call me "Kellyanne" from now on - it is after all your posting style. Given your name-calling of Vlad as Troll Boy etc, it's about what I expect from you. I won't be going anywhere, so feel free to enjoy yourself with that. Or perhaps "Troll Girl" will raise a chuckle....or maybe some non-gender specific variation. You might prove some use - I was thinking of changing my name on here to something more non-gender specific so if you insert a new name for me in each of your posts to me, try to make it non-gender specific.

You seem to object here to describing people’s behaviour correctly. If someone trolls, then why not say so? If someone tries the “alternative facts” line, why not describe them accordingly? If you don’t like it stop doing it and try – finally – actually to engage with what’s being said to you rather than pretend you’ve addressed it already only can’t quite find the posts where you did it, oh is that the time already etc?   

So what now? Are you going to try the short and snappy "you're wrong" response or the old "I'm sure this meant something to you while you were typing it" response or something fresh and new?

Well, you could try some honesty and actually engage with the problems you’ve given yourself.

Just a thought.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Gabriella,
 
Dialogue isn’t meaningless because you refuse to agree with me at all. It’s meaningless when you refuse to accept the standardised meanings of words in favour of whatever meanings suit you.

Except that's not what I'm doing.

That’ll be that agreed meanings for words thing that seems to fox you again. If someone intends the meaning “knowledge” they use the word knowledge; if they mean instead “faith belief” or similar they use those words. What you do is to take the words that people use and then decide that they actually meant something else by them.

The document used the words "faith, beliefs, doctrines of the Catholic Church" and stated that they wanted their pupils to have knowledge of these beliefs, doctrines, and the Catholic faith. So no, not foxed about the way the words were used in the document on Catholic Schools teaching of R.E.   

I don’t think that at all and it would help if you stopped misrepresenting me. What I actually think – and have made clear throughout – is that everything we think we know is at some level belief, including your belief that the Eiffel tower is in Paris and, say, my belief that leprechauns are real. There are however different categories of belief – inter-subjectively experienced, objective, verifiable, factual, solution-producing beliefs on the one hand, and personal, unverifiable, subjective beliefs on the other. The former are called knowledge, and the latter opinion. Sometimes people like AB conflate these categories to assert their opinions to be facts, and these claims are more properly called guesses.

Incorrect. I know the Eiffel Tower is in Paris because I’ve been there. And I know that the Parthenon is in Athens because there is objective evidence such as photos.Which is different from AB stating that he thinks his beliefs about dualism are true.
 

And sometimes too people try to draw analogies between them but they fail because the comparison is between two different categories of belief - ie, knowledge vs opinion.

And sometimes they don't fail because some trans people also think their belief about dualism are true - that a person has an essence or innate gender.         

Which as you now know perfectly well is a false analogy for the reason I have explained to you several times now without response.

And you know perfectly well that I don't know any such thing for the reasons I have explained to you. 

You seem to object here to describing people’s behaviour correctly. If someone trolls, then why not say so? If someone tries the “alternative facts” line, why not describe them accordingly? If you don’t like it stop doing it and try – finally – actually to engage with what’s being said to you rather than pretend you’ve addressed it already only can’t quite find the posts where you did it, oh is that the time already etc?

You seem to have trouble comprehending what you read since my point was that I don't object to name-calling because it doesn't have an effect. I was just commenting on your posting style. Or in short: feel free to call me names if that's part of your posting style as it won't change what I write but if it gives you a chuckle then it seems as good a reason as any to keep doing it.

Also I keep addressing why I am not making a false analogy. I can't do much if you won't accept my explanation.

Well, you could try some honesty and actually engage with the problems you’ve given yourself.

Oh the honesty shtick - I forgot about that one. Good for you. What's coming up next? I should make a bingo card for these.

[SusanDoris]

Gabriella

I did re-read your shorter version of the longer post to which I hadreferred, but that, plus your subsequent, usualy rather wordy, posts, still, in my opinion, fails to work, because you compare two things which are in different categories.

It would help perhaps too differentiate clearly between 100% faith beliefs and beliefs backed up by objective evidence.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Gabriella,

Except that's not what I'm doing.

Try the word “analogy” for starters.

The document used the words "faith, beliefs, doctrines of the Catholic Church" and stated that they wanted their pupils to have knowledge of these beliefs, doctrines, and the Catholic faith. So no, not foxed about the way the words were used in the document on Catholic Schools teaching of R.E.

Not sure why you’ve revisited the catholic document issue, but it’s so long ago that if you think it said only “knowledge of our faith beliefs” or similar you’ll have to cite it.   

Incorrect. I know the Eiffel Tower is in Paris because I’ve been there. And I know that the Parthenon is in Athens because there is objective evidence such as photos.Which is different from AB stating that he thinks his beliefs about dualism are true.

Wrong again. You “know” that there’s an Eiffel tower in Paris because you believe you’ve been there; you “know” about the Parthenon because you believe that you’ve seen photos of it. These things are beliefs, as indeed ultimately is all knowledge – how for example would you eliminate the possibility that you’re actually just a piece of junk computer code programmed to believe these things? What we can also do with our beliefs though is to sift them probabilistically by employing the tools we (appear to) have of reason and evidence. By these means we derive working, provisional truths we can use as solutions. When by contrast our beliefs concern matters that fail or are not apt for these tests (leprechauns, “soul” etc) we can say that there are no good reasons available to us to think them probabilistically to be objectively true for anyone else.

This is basic theory of knowledge 101 by the way, and I have explained it to you before.

OK, now to AB. In his head, he has experienced “soul” every bit as much as you’ve experienced the Eiffel tower and pictures of the Parthenon. It’s as real to him as they are to you. So far as he’s concerned, epistemically there’s no difference at all between these narratives. The fact that any test of reason and evidence falsifies his claim of objective fact for “soul” is another matter, and whenever it's raised he runs away from the problem in any case. On the other hand, so far as I know he would not claim his beliefs and opinions about gender (or language or aesthetics, or….) to be objectively true for other people at all. That’s why, so far as he’s concerned, there’s no “dualism” at all, and it’s why your attempt at an analogy fails: to AB, “soul” is objective, factual, “out there”; gender, spit infinitives etc though are subjective, opinion, personal to the individual.     

And sometimes they don't fail because some trans people also think their belief about dualism are true - that a person has an essence or innate gender.

Wrong again – see above.         

And you know perfectly well that I don't know any such thing for the reasons I have explained to you.

Wrong again – see above. Claiming to have addressed something but being unable to tell us where you did it isn’t the same thing as addressing something.

You seem to have trouble comprehending what you read since my point was that I don't object to name-calling because it doesn't have an effect. I was just commenting on your posting style. Or in short: feel free to call me names if that's part of your posting style as it won't change what I write but if it gives you a chuckle then it seems as good a reason as any to keep doing it.

Also I keep addressing why I am not making a false analogy. I can't do much if you won't accept my explanation.

Not yet you haven’t. Just repeating the same analogy isn’t the same as explaining why it isn’t false.   

Oh the honesty shtick - I forgot about that one. Good for you. What's coming up next? I should make a bingo card for these.

Fallacy of pejorative language – asking someone to be honest isn’t a “schtick”, it’s just asking someone to be honest. I’ve explained to you (yet) again in this reply why the analogy is false – rather than repeat it, why not try at least to tell me why the argument that shows it to be false is wrong? I know it’s hard to pin you down because you keep shifting ground (“here’s an analogy”; “it’s not an analogy”; “I’m just telling you how I treat his claims”; “OK, it’s an analogy” etc) but if we can pin you down to having tried an analogy (for the reason I explained in reply 34024) why not now either defend it or retract it?       

[SteveH]

Re knowledge versus belief: the former doesn't quite always reduce to the latter, surely: I know (not merely believe) what my present thoughts and feelings are. It isn't possible to think you are happy, but later discover that you were mistaken, and were really sad.

[Nearly Sane]

Re knowledge versus belief: the former doesn't quite always reduce to the latter, surely: I know (not merely believe) what my present thoughts and feelings are. It isn't possible to think you are happy, but later discover that you were mistaken, and were really sad.

That's happened to me a number of times

[bluehillside Retd.]

OC,

Re knowledge versus belief: the former doesn't quite always reduce to the latter, surely: I know (not merely believe) what my present thoughts and feelings are. It isn't possible to think you are happy, but later discover that you were mistaken, and were really sad.

It's a good point but for the purpose of this conversation knowing we’re happy would be in the category of a subjective, experiential belief. That is indeed a type of knowledge, but only for the individual concerned. Moreover, we may think differently about it later on - there are many stories (not least from people who have “found god”) for example along the lines of, “I used to think I was happy but now I realise that I was covering up for deep sadness” etc.

If all we’re saying is something like, “in that moment to the best of my ability to judge these things I felt happy” then presumably a character in a SIMS game could be programmed to “think” the same thing. That would be a subjective, true for me only, experiential belief too but not one that had a universal, objective value. I think the best we could say is that we’re sincere in the belief we’re happy, but no more.           

[SteveH]

That's happened to me a number of times

Please explain how that is possible.

[Robbie]

That's happened to me a number of times

Happened to me too.

[Nearly Sane]

Please explain how that is possible.

How would I know? I'm just relating my personal experience.

[SteveH]

It is logically impossible to be mistaken about what you are thinking and feeling right now. You may not be able to describe your experiences if they are complex, but that's not the same thing.

[wigginhall]

Re knowledge versus belief: the former doesn't quite always reduce to the latter, surely: I know (not merely believe) what my present thoughts and feelings are. It isn't possible to think you are happy, but later discover that you were mistaken, and were really sad.

That's a common idea in therapy and psychiatry.  People have defences, and one of them is to go around convincing everyone (and yourself), that you feel fine, only to realize later that you're not.    We're not homogeneous beings in psychological terms, hence the ideas of unconscious, subconscious, preconscious, etc.  Or in fact, the idea of depth psychology meant that there could be different things going on psychologically, at the same time, including contradictory things.   

[SteveH]

You may come to realise that your feeling of happiness was a mask for anxiety or something else, but it was nevertheless a fereling of happiness at the time. What I said earlier about the impossibility of being mistaken about your present thoughts and feelings MUST be true: that's not me being cocky; it's a simple matter of logic. If I said "if a is greater than b and b is greater than c, then a must be greater than c", no-one would argue otherwise, because it must be true. Similarly this.

[wigginhall]

You may come to realise that your feeling of happiness was a mask for anxiety or something else, but it was nevertheless a fereling of happiness at the time. What I said earlier about the impossibility of being mistaken about your present thoughts and feelings MUST be true: that's not me being cocky; it's a simple matter of logic. If I said "if a is greater than b and b is greater than c, then a must be greater than c", no-one would argue otherwise, because it must be true. Similarly this.

Although your last post said, "It isn't possible to think you're happy and later discover ..."   I think people think all kinds of things, which turn out to be false.

[Nearly Sane]

You may come to realise that your feeling of happiness was a mask for anxiety or something else, but it was nevertheless a fereling of happiness at the time. What I said earlier about the impossibility of being mistaken about your present thoughts and feelings MUST be true: that's not me being cocky; it's a simple matter of logic. If I said "if a is greater than b and b is greater than c, then a must be greater than c", no-one would argue otherwise, because it must be true. Similarly this.

Except feelings aren't like that, knowledge of self is partial and we don't really understand the complex interplay of what makes us. It's not a matter where you have enough knowledge to apply logic.

[SteveH]

You obviously don't understand my post, or you're just arguing for the sake of arguing.

[Nearly Sane]

You obviously don't understand my post, or you're just arguing for the sake of arguing.

Yes, 'logically' they must be the only two possibilities. Except as with your position on feelings, you aren't showing much understanding of logic.

[bluehillside Retd.]

OC,

It is logically impossible to be mistaken about what you are thinking and feeling right now. You may not be able to describe your experiences if they are complex, but that's not the same thing.

Subjectively yes (though as others have already said, it's a more nuanced story than that) but objectively it's entirely possible to be wrong - what you're thinking (that "souls" exist for example) could be quite wrong even though you think it entirely sincerely.   

[SteveH]

Yes, 'logically' they must be the only two possibilities. Except as with your position on feelings, you aren't showing much understanding of logic.

You clearly don't understand my earlier post about the impossiblity of being mistaken about your present thoughts and feelings.

[bluehillside Retd.]

OC,

It would be helpful if you told us which post you're replying to. Thanks.