Are we done here?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Don't let the door catch your butt on the way out.

[Owlswing]

Don't let the door catch your butt on the way out.

Stop talking to yourself Vlad, it is one of the first signs of madness.

[Stranger]

The problem is that the methods used to dismiss the arguments of those with faith are based on a purely naturalistic understanding of life, which are necessarily unable to judge on matters that aren't purely naturalistic.

Utter, unadulterated drivel. It has been explained to you many times that any objective method to distinguish religious claims from guessing would do, but nobody has managed to come up with one (and no, I don't believe you've done so elsewhere or at another time).

These phrases of yours that accuse others of using "naturalistic" or "materialistic" methods are as empty and meaningless as Vlad's mantras about ontology and methodology.

There is nothing that anyone can use to dismiss the other argument without actually taking that other side of the argument to heart.

But you haven't even made an argument that provides a method that could distinguish religious beliefs from guesses.

The only advantage that those like me have is that we understand the naturalistic argument...

On the contrary, you have shown significant ignorance of science and total ignorance of logic.

[Humph Warden Bennett]

Actually the word 'human' is a rather loose term usually referring to our own species, Homo sapiens sapiens of the genus Homo. There is some dispute as regards neanderthals, as to whether they are a distinct species of Homo(Homo neanderthalensis) or a sub species of Homo sapiens(Homo sapiens neanderthalensis). The cro magnons were simply early Homo sapiens sapiens.

I will happily debate this with you & anybody else who is interested, but I am going to suggest a split of this topic, to the Science Board.

[SusanDoris]

Neanderthals were a species of homo sapiens. As were Cro-magnon people who arrived a bit later. I thought Susan was quoting from someone, I'll check back.  Done.  Not a quote but a paraphrase of what she read.

Yes, of course they were humans and a child born with part human, part neanderthal DNA is probably well within the range of things that could be done, but I was referring to the ethical situation of such a child being born into today's world. That child would find out he/she was born to be an experiment etc etc ... well, it just could not be done from any moral, ethical point of view.

[Enki]

I will happily debate this with you & anybody else who is interested, but I am going to suggest a split of this topic, to the Science Board.

Hi Humph, nice to hear from you.

Well that's the taxonomic position, as I understand it.  However, I would be certainly interested in hearing your views, so please feel free to start a new thread on the Science Board.

[ippy]

ippy, the same could be asked of many of the 'stories' that the naturalistic arguments are based on.

You're on the boarders of your negative proof fallacy again, Hope; have the guts to admit you've no definitive way of substantiating this evidence, that I'm sure you genuinely think you have.

As you have been reminded so many times, I'll have another go, in spite of the odds, atheism is that there isn't any evidence that would demonstrate in any way that god or gods exist and in my case why believe in something as preposterous as god or gods without the necessary appropriate evidence?

Don't forget to cut and paste my post in such a way that you're able to misquote me in some way or another, again, why break a habit of a lifetime?

ippy

[Andy]

The problem is that the methods used to dismiss the arguments of those with faith are based on a purely naturalistic understanding of life, which are necessarily unable to judge on matters that aren't purely naturalistic.  As such, the method that such people use is the one that collapses very quickly.

You're constantly being asked for an alternative method. No one is using a naturalistic method to dismiss those with faith - your faith is dismissed because you provide no method to investigate it.

[Owlswing]

You're constantly being asked for an alternative method. No one is using a naturalistic method to dismiss those with faith - your faith is dismissed because you provide no method to investigate it.

Why is it that people like Hope cannot understand that it is called "faith" becasue there IS no way of proving what anyone has "faith" in - it is only belief without any possibility of proof - hence FAITH!

Maybe I should go and explain this to the Wailing Wall - it doesn't say much, but it doesn't spout never ending bollocks either in negation either.

[wigginhall]

Naturalism cannot be used to dismiss theism, or any spiritual scheme.   In the familiar analogy, that's like using a metal detector to argue that there is no glass in the ground.

I'm struggling to see how theists can go forward after that.   Of course, they can cite their own experiences, and that of other people, and then argue that there is a commonality.   However, this immediately gets shot down by the observation that plenty of people have other experiences, which are different.   For example, plenty of people have no experience of God, or anything supernatural.  In fact, the idea of experiencing the supernatural seems problematic - how would you know that it is supernatural?

Then you are left with Kierkegaard's leap of faith, or maybe leap to faith,  I was looking for an incomprehensible quotation from him, but most of them are.

[Nearly Sane]

'People understand me so poorly that they don't even understand my complaint about them not understanding me. '


Kierkegaard

[wigginhall]

Life has its own hidden forces, which you can only discover by living. 

Ronnie Corbett. 

[Bramble]

the idea of experiencing the supernatural seems problematic - how would you know that it is supernatural?

Also, with which sensory facility might the natural detect the supernatural? Ghosts and suchlike have a convenient habit of appearing visually or making noises and so on, but I don't think God goes in for that kind of drama. I suppose a more interesting line of enquiry might by why humans ever came up with the idea of the supernatural in the first place. Perhaps as a useful source of things we can't find in the world, like verification of our special importance in the universe and the certainty of everlasting life. Or maybe it was the only place we could find a friend after we had turned our backs on nature.

[wigginhall]

Also, with which sensory facility might the natural detect the supernatural? Ghosts and suchlike have a convenient habit of appearing visually or making noises and so on, but I don't think God goes in for that kind of drama. I suppose a more interesting line of enquiry might by why humans ever came up with the idea of the supernatural in the first place. Perhaps as a useful source of things we can't find in the world, like verification of our special importance in the universe and the certainty of everlasting life. Or maybe it was the only place we could find a friend after we had turned our backs on nature.

Now that is an interesting point.  I think there are different aspects of the supernatural.   For example, the idea of a super-powerful being which causes earthquakes and tempests is a kind of pre-scientific explanations.  But then there is the idea of the trans-ego, or beyond the self, which is found in many religions, including non-theistic ones.   That is, there is a Self, which dominates the self, but this is transcendent,  not supernatural.   And so on.

[Shaker]

Life has its own hidden forces, which you can only discover by living. 

Ronnie Corbett.

"95% of the quotes you see on the internet are complete bullshit." - Abraham Lincoln.

[Bramble]

Yes, the realisation of non-self is not actually supernatural. Then there is the Tao, which is sometimes seen as the source of all things and to that extent god-like, but I don't think it is ever considered supernatural. Tao is not normally considered separate from the 'ten thousand things' -  its mode of creation is via organic growth and change, such that one is born out of the world rather than into it. I think the traditional idea of a creator God can only have arisen after human settlement led to the appearance of a world that seemed made. For the first time people would have been surrounded by manufactured artefacts and even the farmed landscape would have been 'made' by humans. One might even think of God as himself a product of domestication, as we brought the 'beyond' in from the wild and made it our own.

[wigginhall]

Yes, the realisation of non-self is not actually supernatural. Then there is the Tao, which is sometimes seen as the source of all things and to that extent god-like, but I don't think it is ever considered supernatural. Tao is not normally considered separate from the 'ten thousand things' -  its mode of creation is via organic growth and change, such that one is born out of the world rather than into it. I think the traditional idea of a creator God can only have arisen after human settlement led to the appearance of a world that seemed made. For the first time people would have been surrounded by manufactured artefacts and even the farmed landscape would have been 'made' by humans. One might even think of God as himself a product of domestication, as we brought the 'beyond' in from the wild and made it our own.

Although the notion of Self can include creativity, this is found in some Eastern religions, e.g. Zen and advaita.  I have heard people on Zen retreats exclaim: I do my being, or I love everything because I made it.   The I here is not ego I, i.e. it's not saying that Wigginhall makes the universe, but that Wigginhall is himself made.   

There is so much confusion here between transcendent, supernatural, and non-dualist, or whatever you call it, but it would take a book to unravel them.   But as Kierkegaard said, the truth is found in living.   No more books, too old and tired.

I just thought I'd add, that is why the Christian symbols make sense to me, but not as history. 

[ippy]

"95% of the quotes you see on the internet are complete bullshit." - Abraham Lincoln.

Love it, 

ippy

[Gonnagle]

Dear Wigs

I just thought I'd add, that is why the Christian symbols make sense to me, but not as history.

Can you unravel that please, oh and some cracking posts from you and the young Brambles

Gonnagle.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hope,

This seems to be held by people with no faith, as well, bh.  I'd even suggest that the latter are more convinced about their position than those of faith.

Then you'd suggest wrongly. First, the analogy fails because non-faith truths - about germs causing disease for example - rely for their force on methods to distinguish the claim from nonsense.

Second, it's precisely a characteristic of science in particular that it is not certain - that's why its theories include falsifiability tests, and that's why its findings are tentative. Now compare that with the terminology of the religious, with their "sure and certain" etc.   

The problem is that the methods used to dismiss the arguments of those with faith are based on a purely naturalistic understanding of life, which are necessarily unable to judge on matters that aren't purely naturalistic.  As such, the method that such peoiple use is the one that collapses very quickly.

No, the problem is that you've just committed another logical fallacy called the reification fallacy. Just typing the words "aren't purely naturalistic" doesn't pouffe such phenomena into existence. You need first to propose a method - any method - to distinguish the claim from white noise.

You then compound the problem by complaining that naturalistic methods aren't up to the job of investigating your assertions. Fine - it's your job then to propose a different type of method that is up the the job. The burden of proof remains in other words all yours.

I would agree with the underlying thinking here, bh.  As I've said on a number of occasions, the arguments on both sides are so different in nature that all the bluster from both sides of the debate is nothing more than that.  There is nothing that anyone can use to dismiss the other argument without actually taking that other side of the argument to heart.  The only advantage that those like me have is that we understand the naturalistic argument, even if it is only a partial argument.

No, the problem is that - so far at least - there is no argument of any kind for the non-naturalistic. If you really think that you understand it, at least in part, why not finally tell us what it is so we can look at it for ourselves? Why so coy?

Why not for example tell us what method the authors of the alleged articles you said were rejected by scientific journals proposed so the editors could distinguish their claims from complete nonsense?

[Brownie]

Yes, of course they were humans and a child born with part human, part neanderthal DNA is probably well within the range of things that could be done, but I was referring to the ethical situation of such a child being born into today's world. That child would find out he/she was born to be an experiment etc etc ... well, it just could not be done from any moral, ethical point of view.

I agree with that 100%.  The idea of the deliberate conception of a 'designer child' is quite frightening.

I read somewhere fairly recently that a lot of people have some Neanderthal DNA.  Not surprising really.  I can't remember now where I read it but I found this bit from Wiki:
"A team of scientists comparing the full genomes of the two species concluded that most Europeans and Asians have between 1 to 4 percent Neanderthal DNA. Indigenous sub-Saharan Africans have no Neanderthal DNA because their ancestors did not migrate through Eurasia."

[ippy]

I agree with that 100%.  The idea of the deliberate conception of a 'designer child' is quite frightening.

I read somewhere fairly recently that a lot of people have some Neanderthal DNA.  Not surprising really.  I can't remember now where I read it but I found this bit from Wiki:
"A team of scientists comparing the full genomes of the two species concluded that most Europeans and Asians have between 1 to 4 percent Neanderthal DNA. Indigenous sub-Saharan Africans have no Neanderthal DNA because their ancestors did not migrate through Eurasia."

I fear these things are being done somewhere before it comes up for discussion anywhere including here.

I share most peoples reservations held about this kind of engineering.

Another thought I have about this kind of genetic engineering, how much are the insurance companies investing into research in these areas, if not these areas have to be of considerable interest to them, then perhaps I'm just another conspiracy theorist? (Who said that)?

ippy

[Brownie]

No Ippy, you are right to be concerned.  I too think it is highly likely that it is being done somewhere quietly and privately, many other things too.  However if we and the public generally (including scientists and doctors) are against such things and voice our concerns, at least it will be kept 'small'.  We hope.

[ippy]

No Ippy, you are right to be concerned.  I too think it is highly likely that it is being done somewhere quietly and privately, many other things too.  However if we and the public generally (including scientists and doctors) are against such things, at least it will be kept 'small'.  We hope.

I don't have any answers, it needs some very involved discussion in the open.

ippy

[Shaker]

No, the problem is that you've just committed another logical fallacy called the reification fallacy. Just typing the words "aren't purely naturalistic" doesn't pouffe such phenomena into existence. You need first to propose a method - any method - to distinguish the claim from white noise.

I see your reification fallacy and raise you another one that he's just committed - begging the question. "Matters that aren't purely naturalistic" is begging the question - assuming the existence of such things in the absence not only of any evidence for them but also any methodology for becoming aware of them - as you pointed out.

What a car crash