IF YOUR COMPLAINT ABOUT AN EMPIRICAL METHOD IS THAT IT CANNOT BE USED TO INVESTI

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hello Gabriella,

BHS - I am not sure what you meant when you said love is an observable phenomenon or a response to stimuli as there are so many often contradictory definitions of love. Some people claim to love people they abuse or love people who abuse them so in that instance is there universally agreed criteria that can decide whether what you are observing is love or wishful thinking? Yes you can possibly observe changes in brain structure or function, hormone levels, chemistry but since people are self-reporting feelings of love how would you come up with a method of distinguishing real love from wishful thinking?

Some people will think indulgence of children is a sign of love while some psychologists see it potentially as a form of child abuse. Again, I would think in those situations love is hard to define and therefore observe. That we can observe the person who claims to feel love or observe the object of their love is not really helping us know conclusively if they are in fact feeling love or deluding themselves or mistakenly labelling their feelings and emotions as love.

Many religious people claim to feel something they have defined as spiritual interaction with a higher power or knowledge of god. There is no agreed upon definition of spiritual experiences and certainly no method to investigate whether the experience is a spiritual interaction with anything or wishful thinking. That is possibly the comparison Vlad was making between love and religious experiences where claims are made that god is unknowable. People may have changes in brain function during spiritual experiences, as do many people who meditate, but that is all anyone can observe and as people are self-reporting, no conclusions can be reached as to who or what the person mentally interacted with. https://psychcentral.com/blog/how-meditation-changes-the-brain/

If we observed your brain during your interactions with leprechauns it is possible that we would see similar brain functions to the brain of a person having a religious experience. But I have no idea if such studies have been done?

I‘m afraid I don’t know what point you’re making, but in any case it’s probably something you should take up with Vlad. He’s the one who introduced it as a (albeit false) analogy for “god”. It’s an old trick – you take something that observably happens (people experience love – and hate, and grief, and anger, and….) but that’s difficult to explain fully in neurological terms, and then slip “god” in through the back door as if that was an epistemically equivalent proposition. Apart from being wrong on it own terms (it conflates and observable phenomenon with an unqualified speculation) it also produces the problem that the same switcheroo would allow in leprechauns, tap dancing moomintrolls and anything else that takes your fancy: “Love is hard to explain. So are pixies. Therefore pixies”.

As for similar brain functions whether the object that causes them is real or imagined, fairly obviously yes I’d have thought. Think of the horror film trope where lots of scary stuff has happened, then a cupboard door creaks open and the “monster” falls out only it turns out to be a mop. The comely young actress screams with just as much genuine terror before the reveal as she would have done it if had been the monster after all. In short, there’s no necessary causal path from “I’m in a relationship with god” to there actually being a god at all. That’s Vlad’s problem (one of many): all he has is a belief about that, but no means to justify it.                 

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Hello Gabriella,

I‘m afraid I don’t know what point you’re making, but in any case it’s probably something you should take up with Vlad. He’s the who introduced it as a (albeit false) analogy for “god”. It’s an old trick – you take something that observably happens (people experience love – and hate, and grief, and anger, and….) but that’s difficult to explain fully in neurological terms, and then slip “god” in through the back door as if that was an epistemically equivalent proposition. Apart from being wrong on it own terms (it conflates and observable phenomenon with an unqualified speculation) it also produces the problem that the same switcheroo would allow in leprechauns, tap dancing moomintrolls and anything else that takes your fancy: “Love is hard to explain. So are pixies. Therefore pixies”.

As for similar brain functions whether the object that causes them is real or imagined, fairly obviously yes I’d have thought. Think of the horror film trope where lots of scary stuff has happened, then a cupboard door creaks open and the “monster” falls out only it turns out to be a mop. The comely young actress screams with just as much genuine terror before the reveal as she would have done it if had been the monster after all. In short, there’s no necessary causal path from “I’m in a relationship with god” to there actually being a god at all. That’s Vlad’s problem (one of many): all he has is a belief about that, but no means to justify it.                 

Hi BHS - yes I would agree with you that you can't go from having a feeling or belief to demonstrating to yourself or someone else that the subject of your feeling is real. Faith in gods is belief without demonstrable evidence - especially as the subject matter - the supernatural - can only be defined very loosely if naturalistic terms cannot be applied. It would be simpler if there was clear, demonstrable evidence that could not have any other explanation than god. But clearly not having that evidence isn't going to eradicate faith for many people and not having the objective evidence is actually part of the attraction - not just for gods but for many other idealistic concepts..... or even Trump conspiracy theories about rigged elections unfortunately.

If we cannot employ naturalistic methods to demonstrate concepts, descriptions of ideas such as the supernatural are expressed and defined in many different ways by different people, much like "fairness, justice, equality, power, civilised values". There is no way of demonstrating justice to someone else - you just have to hope they agree with you that they experience justice.

One particular definition of a concept is privileged for a period of time, until its privilege is overthrown by an alternative definition. People influence and define public policy and laws that affect all of us based on their particular definition of such concepts even if we don't agree with their particular definition. So given we have a place in society for such undefined concepts, gods is just another idea to add to the list, if the idea gains traction or has public support.

Whether gods can be demonstrated to exist or not - and given we lack a method to objectively prove existence for things that cannot be measured or detected using the tools of science - atheism seems a perfectly reasonable approach until you feel a personal conviction to the contrary, which may never happen. I find many personal convictions that other people hold on many different topics unfathomable.

I think atheists and theists have an increasingly easier time figuring out a way to co-exist in society today, much like the majority of theists of different persuasions or people with different political affiliations co-exist. It's only extremists that cause problems for the rest of us. The number of traditional Labour voters who voted Tory in the last election, or the number of Republican voters who voted for Biden https://eu.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2020/11/02/mccain-why-republican-votes-biden-column/6113484002/ even if all their other votes for the Senate and House of Representatives were for Republican candidates shows that people increasingly make pragmatic choices rather than hold blind allegiance to a single party or religious denomination. I think the less blind allegiance to a cause or idea, the better.

   

[jeremyp]

you take something that observably happens (people experience love – and hate, and grief, and anger, and….) but that’s difficult to explain fully in neurological terms, and then slip “god” in through the back door as if that was an epistemically equivalent proposition.     

Actually, I think emotions like love and hate and anger are quite good analogies to God. Love and anger are very real to me but they are jut psychological and physiological responses to certain stimuli. They are contained entirely within me. There are no love particles mediated my interactions with certain other people. There's no anger field that gets distorted when I feel rage. Likewise, Vlad's experience of God is very real to him, but it is entirely contained within his own mind.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Gabriella,

Hi BHS - yes I would agree with you that you can't go from having a feeling or belief to demonstrating to yourself or someone else that the subject of your feeling is real. Faith in gods is belief without demonstrable evidence - especially as the subject matter - the supernatural - can only be defined very loosely if naturalistic terms cannot be applied. It would be simpler if there was clear, demonstrable evidence that could not have any other explanation than god. But clearly not having that evidence isn't going to eradicate faith for many people and not having the objective evidence is actually part of the attraction - not just for gods but for many other idealistic concepts..... or even Trump conspiracy theories about rigged elections unfortunately.

If we cannot employ naturalistic methods to demonstrate concepts, descriptions of ideas such as the supernatural are expressed and defined in many different ways by different people, much like "fairness, justice, equality, power, civilised values". There is no way of demonstrating justice to someone else - you just have to hope they agree with you that they experience justice.

One particular definition of a concept is privileged for a period of time, until its privilege is overthrown by an alternative definition. People influence and define public policy and laws that affect all of us based on their particular definition of such concepts even if we don't agree with their particular definition. So given we have a place in society for such undefined concepts, gods is just another idea to add to the list, if the idea gains traction or has public support.

Whether gods can be demonstrated to exist or not - and given we lack a method to objectively prove existence for things that cannot be measured or detected using the tools of science - atheism seems a perfectly reasonable approach until you feel a personal conviction to the contrary, which may never happen. I find many personal convictions that other people hold on many different topics unfathomable.

I think atheists and theists have an increasingly easier time figuring out a way to co-exist in society today, much like the majority of theists of different persuasions or people with different political affiliations co-exist. It's only extremists that cause problems for the rest of us. The number of traditional Labour voters who voted Tory in the last election, or the number of Republican voters who voted for Biden https://eu.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2020/11/02/mccain-why-republican-votes-biden-column/6113484002/ even if all their other votes for the Senate and House of Representatives were for Republican candidates shows that people increasingly make pragmatic choices rather than hold blind allegiance to a single party or religious denomination. I think the less blind allegiance to a cause or idea, the better.

I think there’s still a basic point of difference here: we can “employ naturalistic methods to demonstrate concepts” such a justice, or for that matter morality in general. That’s not to say that there’ are objective rights and wrongs about the conclusions of these things, but the concepts themselves at least are coherently explicable. By contrast though, what would “supernatural” mean even conceptually (apart from “other than natural”)? It seems to me to be so unmoored from anything coherent as to be just white noise. This is the a priori issue for atheism – you can’t actually get past igtheism (“I have no idea what you mean by “god”, and nor have you”). As a practical matter we talk about theism/atheism as if the coherent meanings issue had been resolved, but it actually hasn’t.

Short version: a “god” about which nothing meaningful can be said is indistinguishable from no god at all.                   

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hi Jeremy,

Actually, I think emotions like love and hate and anger are quite good analogies to God. Love and anger are very real to me but they are jut psychological and physiological responses to certain stimuli. They are contained entirely within me. There are no love particles mediated my interactions with certain other people. There's no anger field that gets distorted when I feel rage. Likewise, Vlad's experience of God is very real to him, but it is entirely contained within his own mind.

Not sure I agree – there’s a category difference between our feelings or responses (love, hate etc) to something, and the “something” itself we’re having these feelings about (whether that something is real or not).

Either way though, so far as I can tell Vlad isn’t attempting an equivalence between his internal emotional responses like love and hate and “god”. Rather he thinks “god” (but only the god he happens to be most proximate to) is an “out there”, objective fact of the existence of something, not just a feeling or response to it. That he thinks he has a “relationship” with it is a second order issue.

Moreover the cheat he’s trying (“love is hard to explain, so is god – therefore god”) doesn’t even get its trousers off as an argument.         

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Gabriella,

I think there’s still a basic point of difference here: we can “employ naturalistic methods to demonstrate concepts” such a justice, or for that matter morality in general. That’s not to say that there’ are objective rights and wrongs about the conclusions of these things, but the concepts themselves at least are coherently explicable. By contrast though, what would “supernatural” mean even conceptually (apart from “other than natural”)? It seems to me to be so unmoored from anything coherent as to be just white noise. This is the a priori issue for atheism – you can’t actually get past igtheism (“I have no idea what you mean by “god”, and nor have you”). As a practical matter we talk about theism/atheism as if the coherent meanings issue had been resolved, but it actually hasn’t.

Short version: a “god” about which nothing meaningful can be said is indistinguishable from no god at all.                 

BHS

You will have to give me an example of demonstrating justice. For example, a recent case of a 7 year old girl who had her throat slit in the park by a lady suffering from a psychotic episode because she was refusing to take her oral meds, was deemed to not have been preventable. It was considered justice that such patients could not be compelled against their will to receive injected meds from medical staff even though the risk of non-compliance with oral meds was highlighted to the medical staff by the lady's relatives and the lady had displayed worryingly aggressive tendencies during psychotic episodes. Similarly not indefinitely locking up people engaged in supporting terrorist propaganda and activities, who are indoctrinated into a belief that terrorism is justified, is currently considered justice even though the police say they do not have the resources to monitor all these people and prevent a terrorist act. Justice keeps changing over time depending on political will and circumstances.

In each of these cases I am not sure how you would employ naturalistic methods to demonstrate the concept of justice or a coherent explanation of the concept. It seems to be a series of feelings, and the outcome is based on which of those competing feelings gains primacy.

In terms of gods and white noise. Supernatural is just one aspect of a god and yes it means not natural. The rest of the descriptive words used to explain the concept is words like "eternal" ie no beginning, no end, and "Creator" ie where there was nothing naturalistic something naturalistic appeared, "unique" ie there aren't lots of them or anything comparable in the natural world etc etc. In Islam for example the concept has 99 attributes or names that are impossible to demonstrate eg. merciful, just, beneficent, the greatest, the pure etc etc. In other religions the concept is similarly fleshed out. These words clearly mean something to the people who use them.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Hi Jeremy,

Not sure I agree – there’s a category difference between our feelings or responses (love, hate etc) to something, and the “something” itself we’re having these feelings about (whether that something is real or not).

Either way though, so far as I can tell Vlad isn’t attempting an equivalence between his internal emotional responses like love and hate and “god”. Rather he thinks “god” (but only the god he happens to be most proximate to) is an “out there”, objective fact of the existence of something, not just a feeling or response to it. That he thinks he has a “relationship” with it is a second order issue.

Moreover the cheat he’s trying (“love is hard to explain, so is god – therefore god”) doesn’t even get its trousers off as an argument.         

Yes I would agree that not being able to explain love is not an argument for the existence of gods.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Yes I would agree that not being able to explain love is not an argument for the existence of gods.

I never said it did.
What I want from Hillside as you do is to show us the method for finding love love as you have asked him to show you the method of finding Justice.

Of course that would just be icing on the cake of Hillside debunking his own God. Leprechaun analogy.

[Stranger]

Of course that would just be icing on the cake of Hillside debunking his own God. Leprechaun analogy.

Trumpeting an imaginary victory really does make you look rather dimwitted. If you had any grasp of the analogy, perhaps you wouldn't be so keen on embarrassing yourself like this...

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Trumpeting an imaginary victory really does make you look rather dimwitted. If you had any grasp of the analogy, perhaps you wouldn't be so keen on embarrassing yourself like this...

I grieve for your loss. Denial is part of the process.

[Stranger]

I grieve for your loss. Denial is part of the process.

I tried...   

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

I never said it did.
What I want from Hillside as you do is to show us the method for finding love love as you have asked him to show you the method of finding Justice.

Of course that would just be icing on the cake of Hillside debunking his own God. Leprechaun analogy.

I actually don't see a problem with the God Leprechaun analogy if both ideas claim to be undetectable or examinable by science and rely on faith or belief. How is an a-Leprechaunist or atheist supposed to know that either Leprechauns or gods exist? Anymore than I know if Jesus the god exists or you know if Allah the god exists. You can't demonstrate Jesus's godly existence to me any more than I can demonstrate Allah's godly existence to you.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

I actually don't see a problem with the God Leprechaun analogy if both ideas claim to be undetectable or examinable by science and rely on faith or belief. How is an a-Leprechaunist or atheist supposed to know that either Leprechauns or gods exist? Anymore than I know if Jesus the god exists or you know if Allah the god exists. You can't demonstrate Jesus's godly existence to me any more than I can demonstrate Allah's godly existence to you.

They don't since the leprechaun is an extremely smalll irishman, who wears green clothes , smokes a pipe, they congregate near pots of Gold at the end of rainbows. I have put the properties which are material and therefore are detectable or examinable by science.

This is probably why you can be an a-leprechaunist and a theist although I would never say because you cannot detect God by science that means he definitely does exist. As you know belief cannot effectively be based on that.

[Stranger]

They don't since the leprechaun is an extremely smalll irishman, who wears green clothes , smokes a pipe, they congregate near pots of Gold at the end of rainbows. I have put the properties which are material and therefore are detectable or examinable by science.

Whoosh!

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

They don't since the leprechaun is an extremely smalll irishman, who wears green clothes , smokes a pipe, they congregate near pots of Gold at the end of rainbows. I have put the properties which are material and therefore are detectable or examinable by science.

This is probably why you can be an a-leprechaunist and a theist although I would never say because you cannot detect God by science that means he definitely does exist. As you know belief cannot effectively be based on that.

If BHS is referring to spiritual or supernatural entities then presumably leprechauns are not really material - I thought that was the point of the analogy? Someone can claim they saw/ conversed/ interacted with a leprechaun but are unable to provide any evidence of its existence.

And if a pot of gold mysteriously appeared, the gold may be material but there is no way of demonstrating that the source of the gold was a leprechaun, God or there was some naturalistic explanation. In the absence of evidence some people may believe that it was a leprechaun, others that it was God, but it would not be surprising if other people do not find either a convincing proposition due to lack of evidence.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Morning Gabriella,

You will have to give me an example of demonstrating justice. For example, a recent case of a 7 year old girl who had her throat slit in the park by a lady suffering from a psychotic episode because she was refusing to take her oral meds, was deemed to not have been preventable. It was considered justice that such patients could not be compelled against their will to receive injected meds from medical staff even though the risk of non-compliance with oral meds was highlighted to the medical staff by the lady's relatives and the lady had displayed worryingly aggressive tendencies during psychotic episodes. Similarly not indefinitely locking up people engaged in supporting terrorist propaganda and activities, who are indoctrinated into a belief that terrorism is justified, is currently considered justice even though the police say they do not have the resources to monitor all these people and prevent a terrorist act. Justice keeps changing over time depending on political will and circumstances.

In each of these cases I am not sure how you would employ naturalistic methods to demonstrate the concept of justice or a coherent explanation of the concept. It seems to be a series of feelings, and the outcome is based on which of those competing feelings gains primacy.

You’re asking me to defend pretty much the antithesis of what I said. What I said was that, conceptually, the term “justice” is coherent. I also said though that that’s not to say that its specific outcomes can be said objectively to be just or not just as if there were universal laws about such things. The same is true of morality generally, of aesthetics, of any other human-made or derived judgements. It is in other words a workable concept. Now compare that with “god(s)” – what would that term even mean any sort of coherent sense, especially when theists place these gods outside of the material (whatever that would mean too)?       

In terms of gods and white noise. Supernatural is just one aspect of a god and yes it means not natural. The rest of the descriptive words used to explain the concept is words like "eternal" ie no beginning, no end, and "Creator" ie where there was nothing naturalistic something naturalistic appeared, "unique" ie there aren't lots of them or anything comparable in the natural world etc etc. In Islam for example the concept has 99 attributes or names that are impossible to demonstrate eg. merciful, just, beneficent, the greatest, the pure etc etc. In other religions the concept is similarly fleshed out. These words clearly mean something to the people who use them.

Yes, but attaching labels like “eternal” to white noise doesn’t make it less white noise. It’s like saying uh77hj90u0[9uj00- is eternal, a creator etc. It doesn’t change the initial incoherence problem. 

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hi Gabriella,

If BHS is referring to spiritual or supernatural entities then presumably leprechauns are not really material - I thought that was the point of the analogy? Someone can claim they saw/ conversed/ interacted with a leprechaun but are unable to provide any evidence of its existence.

And if a pot of gold mysteriously appeared, the gold may be material but there is no way of demonstrating that the source of the gold was a leprechaun, God or there was some naturalistic explanation. In the absence of evidence some people may believe that it was a leprechaun, others that it was God, but it would not be surprising if other people do not find either a convincing proposition due to lack of evidence.

Pretty much. Actually leprechauns are both material and non-material, able to flit at will between the two states. I know this to be true because that’s my “faith”. When in material form they do indeed wear green etc, just as when in material form (over 60 times if scripture is to be believed) Vlad’s god has various identifiable physical characteristics too – as a burning bush, as an angel etc. Thus the two claims are analogous.

Vlad knows this because it’s been explained to him many times, but for his own purposes he misrepresents the claim “leprechauns” so as to try to put clear water between it and his claim “god”. That’s all he has though – dishonesty.   

[bluehillside Retd.]

Vlad,

They don't since the leprechaun is an extremely smalll irishman, who wears green clothes , smokes a pipe, they congregate near pots of Gold at the end of rainbows. I have put the properties which are material and therefore are detectable or examinable by science.

When in material form your god was a burning bush, a pillar of light, a whisper, an angel etc. "I have put the properties which are material and therefore are detectable or examinable by science."

This is probably why you can be an a-leprechaunist and a theist although I would never say because you cannot detect God by science that means he definitely does exist.

Nor does anyone else.

As you know belief cannot effectively be based on that.

But it should be based on something that's coherent to justify it don’t you think? You know, the part you always fail to provide.
 

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Morning Gabriella,

You’re asking me to defend pretty much the antithesis of what I said. What I said was that, conceptually, the term “justice” is coherent. I also said though that that’s not to say that its specific outcomes can be said objectively to be just or not just as if there were universal laws about such things. The same is true of morality generally, of aesthetics, of any other human-made or derived judgements. It is in other words a workable concept. Now compare that with “god(s)” – what would that term even mean any sort of coherent sense, especially when theists place these gods outside of the material (whatever that would mean too)?

Yes, but attaching labels like “eternal” to white noise doesn’t make it less white noise. It’s like saying uh77hj90u0[9uj00- is eternal, a creator etc. It doesn’t change the initial incoherence problem.

Hi BHS - we seem to be focusing on different terms. I would agree that God could just as easily be called uh77hj90u0[9uj00 or a leprechaun as it's the description of the concept that matters to people - if a leprechaun is described with the attributes of gods such as not bound by natural laws, eternal, creator etc, then I am happy to interchange god for leprechaun or uh77hj90u0[9uj00.

The word "justice" needs other words to try to explain it such as "fair" and "reasonable" to describe it. No one can actually demonstrate what "fair" or "reasonable" means. They are ideas that mean different things to different people and there is no evidence that could be tested using the natural laws of science to demonstrate that something is objectively just or fair or reasonable though we might be able to detect specific electrical activity in the brain as we think about the words - I think we both agree on that point? If the concept of justice as something fair and reasonable has coherence than I would argue that the descriptions for god have coherence.

For example, Allah is the Arabic word for god whereby it has no masculine or feminine gender or plural and cannot be converted to masculine or feminine by adding a suffix. Arab Christians use the term Allah as well as Muslims. If similar attributes for Allah could be said of the concept "leprechaun" or " uh77hj90u0[9uj00" the terms could be interchangeable. I have heard a few Muslims making this point that if Brahma or Shiva or Jesus encompassed the same attributes as Allah - then what's in a name and they would say they accept Brahma is interchangeable with Allah.

Some people will say the consequences of a terrorist attack make it just to lock people up indefinitely based on their beliefs. Other people will say the occasional terrorist attack is the price we have to pay for a just society where people cannot be locked up indefinitely for what they might do in the future.  The person could go through a de-radicalisation programme to counter his beliefs that violence against civilians can be justified, but there is no guarantee that he will take on the values  promoted by the programme, and he could tell you what you wanted to hear when assessed, but still subscribe to terrorist beliefs or those beliefs could resurface later. So not seeing the problem with comparing the coherence of the word "just" to the word "supernatural".

[bluehillside Retd.]

Hi Gabriella,

Hi BHS - we seem to be focusing on different terms. I would agree that God could just as easily be called uh77hj90u0[9uj00 or a leprechaun as it's the description of the concept that matters to people - if a leprechaun is described with the attributes of gods such as not bound by natural laws, eternal, creator etc, then I am happy to interchange god for leprechaun or uh77hj90u0[9uj00.

The word "justice" needs other words to try to explain it such as "fair" and "reasonable" to describe it. No one can actually demonstrate what "fair" or "reasonable" means. They are ideas that mean different things to different people and there is no evidence that could be tested using the natural laws of science to demonstrate that something is objectively just or fair or reasonable though we might be able to detect specific electrical activity in the brain as we think about the words - I think we both agree on that point? If the concept of justice as something fair and reasonable has coherence than I would argue that the descriptions for god have coherence.

For example, Allah is the Arabic word for god whereby it has no masculine or feminine gender or plural and cannot be converted to masculine or feminine by adding a suffix. Arab Christians use the term Allah as well as Muslims. If similar attributes for Allah could be said of the concept "leprechaun" or " uh77hj90u0[9uj00" the terms could be interchangeable. I have heard a few Muslims making this point that if Brahma or Shiva or Jesus encompassed the same attributes as Allah - then what's in a name and they would say they accept Brahma is interchangeable with Allah.

Some people will say the consequences of a terrorist attack make it just to lock people up indefinitely based on their beliefs. Other people will say the occasional terrorist attack is the price we have to pay for a just society where people cannot be locked up indefinitely for what they might do in the future.  The person could go through a de-radicalisation programme to counter his beliefs that violence against civilians can be justified, but there is no guarantee that he will take on the values  promoted by the programme, and he could tell you what you wanted to hear when assessed, but still subscribe to terrorist beliefs or those beliefs could resurface later. So not seeing the problem with comparing the coherence of the word "just" to the word "supernatural".

I think you’re trying a false analogy here. “Justice” conceptually at least is coherent – you might for example describe it as something like, “the process by which individuals or societies attempt to reach conclusions and to obtain practical measures that satisfy various principles or fairness and equality” or some such. Fine – that’s a useful and workable definition. What those conclusions and measures ought to be is another matter, but the concept itself is a comprehensible and cogent one.

Now consider the term “god” – it’s white noise, a blank canvas. You can populate it with any meanings and characteristics you like – after all, they’re all faith claims so any one claim is epistemically equivalent to any other. One man’s vengeful god is another man’s merciful god; one man’s prayer-answering interventionist god is another man’s arms’ folded indifferent god etc. That’s the problem – a god about whom anything can be said as a faith claim is also a god about whom nothing can be said as a fact, even conceptually.     

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Hi Gabriella,

I think you’re trying a false analogy here. “Justice” conceptually at least is coherent – you might for example describe it as something like, “the process by which individuals or societies attempt to reach conclusions and to obtain practical measures that satisfy various principles or fairness and equality” or some such. Fine – that’s a useful and workable definition. What those conclusions and measures ought to be is another matter, but the concept itself is a comprehensible and cogent one.

Now consider the term “god” – it’s white noise, a blank canvas. You can populate it with any meanings and characteristics you like – after all, they’re all faith claims so any one claim is epistemically equivalent to any other. One man’s vengeful god is another man’s merciful god; one man’s prayer-answering interventionist god is another man’s arms’ folded indifferent god etc. That’s the problem – a god about whom anything can be said as a faith claim is also a god about whom nothing can be said as a fact, even conceptually.     

It's only white noise and a blank canvas if you can't get past not having to know about theology as prescribed by Dawkins and Myers in moment of loss of intellectual rigour. It does get worse I'm afraid since this approach is indistinguishable from Goddodging.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Vlad,

It's only white noise and a blank canvas if you can't get past not having to know about theology as prescribed by Dakins and Myers in moment of loss of intellectual rigour. It does get worse I'm afraid since this approach is indistinguishable from Goddodging.

Its theologies (plural), of which there are as many as you can shake a stick at. That’s the problem – and whenever I’ve asked you how someone should distinguish your theological beliefs from any other person’s different theological beliefs you’ve always run away remember?   

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Vlad,

Its theologies (plural), of which there are as many as you can shake a stick at. That’s the problem – and whenever I’ve asked you how someone should distinguish your theological beliefs from any other person’s different theological beliefs you’ve always run away remember?   

Theism divides into monism and dualism. The other way of dividing theology is into 
Monotheism or various pantheons. It seems that theism has fewer general categories than you can shake your.......not so much a stick......more of a Twig, at.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Hi Gabriella,

I think you’re trying a false analogy here. “Justice” conceptually at least is coherent – you might for example describe it as something like, “the process by which individuals or societies attempt to reach conclusions and to obtain practical measures that satisfy various principles or fairness and equality” or some such. Fine – that’s a useful and workable definition. What those conclusions and measures ought to be is another matter, but the concept itself is a comprehensible and cogent one.

Now consider the term “god” – it’s white noise, a blank canvas. You can populate it with any meanings and characteristics you like – after all, they’re all faith claims so any one claim is epistemically equivalent to any other. One man’s vengeful god is another man’s merciful god; one man’s prayer-answering interventionist god is another man’s arms’ folded indifferent god etc. That’s the problem – a god about whom anything can be said as a faith claim is also a god about whom nothing can be said as a fact, even conceptually.     

BHS - I agree and disagree. Where I agree is in the claim that god "exists" if that term can only be used for things science can detect or explain then that word should not be used to describe supernatural gods. Another word should be used.

Where I disagree is I think the only words used in your definition of justice that add to the coherence of that word are "fairness" and "equality" but then those terms need to have coherence. Is "fairness" some form of punishment and deterrence or is "fairness" the needs of the many outweighing the needs of the few so lock people up to protect the many, or is fairness that depriving someone of their liberty is so extreme that you can only do it once they have done something extreme rather than simply because you think there is a risk of them committing mass murder but you don't have the resources to monitor them 24/7 to prevent mass murder? Fairness and equality are ideas - and if there are no agreed upon definitions of what is fair, would you say these ideas could be verified by the laws of physics, chemistry, biology or maths?

Similarly, you could populate "god" how you want because "god" is not coherent until people can explain what they mean by the term and then you can examine the ideas that describe their god. I think most people agree that the god they believe in is supernatural ie not part of the natural world whereby it would be bound by natural laws.  But yes, you are right, after the supernatural part, the descriptions could diverge and a god that punishes could be seen as just by some people and seen as vengeful by others.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Vlad,

Theism divides into monism and dualism. The other way of dividing theology is into
Monotheism or various pantheons. It seems that theism has fewer general categories than you can shake your.......not so much a stick......more of a Twig, at.

Oh dear. Try here to get you started on the labyrinthine taxonomy of Christian denominations:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_denomination#:~:text=Christianity%20can%20be%20taxonomically%20divided,widely%20diverging%20beliefs%20and%20practices. 

“A Christian denomination is a distinct religious body within Christianity that comprises all church congregations of the same kind, identifiable by traits such as a name, peculiar history, organization, leadership, theological doctrine, worship style and sometimes a founder. It is a secular and neutral term, generally used to denote any established Christian church.”

So here we have multiple “theological doctrines”, and that’s just within Christianity. Now add all the other religious faiths there are (and, presumably, have been). What deep knowledge of any of their countless theologies do you think would enable you to conclude that any one of them is more likely to be correct than any other? 

That’s the car crash reasoning you keep trying: theologies just document their various faith claims, but tell you nothing about why they’re (supposedly) true – let alone any more true than the competing theologies. That’s also why you keep going wrong with the Courtier’s Reply.

Oh, and speaking of car crashes have I missed your withdrawal of your repeated fuck up re the leprechauns/god analogy?