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Post by ncsonde on Jan 18, 2012 10:11:52 GMT
Maybe but it was said inside a church at a family christening so..... no, you are right, the pews were full of fierce irrational people in deep conflict.  Lucky I wasn't invited then. (Else it would have really kicked off.) |
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 18, 2012 10:38:35 GMT
To know God, one must have faith. You can't believe in God without faith. To understand God and His works, you must have faith. Within this faith, you can doubt. But if you don't have faith, even the size of a mustard seed, you can't understand. Okay, I'll go along with you on that one, I think. You're aware that this same injunction and rationale is equally as strongly asserted in Buddhism and Taoism? "Great Faith" is said to be the most essential of the three pillars of Mahayana (Zen), for example. If you don't have it you can't stay on the path, you lose your determination and confidence you'll achieve satori. Okay. I'm just pointing out that, at root, the same applies to scientific belief, or rationality in general. No, but you've shifted the goalposts. Belief in "Black Holes" and other hypothetical entities in science do not equate with belief in "God". What I'm suggesting equates with this Faith in science and rationality is the faith in reason itself and that the universe follows consistent, comprehensible, discoverable principles. This is "faith" because ultimately it's an ungrounded belief - there's no evidence for it, because you need that belief for the notion of "evidence" in the first place, and there's no rational ground to it for the same reason.* This is much wider and deeper than Hume's famous Problem of Induction - that we have no rational ground for supposing that the future or unobserved parts of the universe will follow our past observations. It applies to mathematics itself - at bottom, the whole edifice depends on axioms, which are merely asserted, rather than supported by any evidence. Lewis Carroll pointed out that the same applies to our most primitive logical concepts - at least, no one has been able to demonstrate that they're rationally grounded themselves; rather, we depend on them to furnish what we take as rational grounds for anything else we might say - they themselves we take for granted are valid, in order to think rationally at all. Isn't this a parallel to your idea that we must have Faith in God to understand or "know" him? Faith that such and such an observation implies or is evidence for Black Holes etcetera is part of that recipe, however. Faith that the elements and structure of our mathematical equations somehow correspond to a reality that they're modelling is inbuilt into all science (there is, of course, no possible means to demonstrate whether this faith has any validity.) That's true, and it's an important part of what we mean by reason, and "science" in particular. But the same reservations apply - the very drawing out of such predictions depends on the relation of implication being valid, and the very idea of "testing" depends on certain observations and mathematical relationships being taken as evidence. Ah, now, this is something else - let's not get too narrowly focussed on particular doctrines of particular churches. Hmmm, yes, that seems to be right: I think this is a genuine and valid insight of all religions. * This is why Einstein, who gave very deep and penetrating thought to these matters, asserted again and again that the most incomprehensible thing about the universe was its comprehensibility. He was acutely aware that the whole scientific edifice - reason itself- rested on nothing more than this Faith. Anyone with an appreciable knowledge of the history of science or philosophy of science is unavoidably aware of this fundamental and mind-boggling paradox. (Unfortunately scientists themselves are rarely found among such people.) |
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 18, 2012 10:47:32 GMT
The reason that people, not just atheists, hold religion to higher standards than mortal man is that religion claims to be a higher standard. Should any of us be surprised that there are power hungry evil men like Mugabe or (insert any of thousands of names) in this world? No. Should we expect that a spiritual organisation -- claiming communcation with a supernatural power who is the very essence of good -- should not foster, protect, shelter, encourage or condone such activity, or such men? Hell, yes. The bible says that faith without good deeds is nothing. So what is faith with evil deeds? Less than nothing. A negative. Yes, I agree, of course. But it's very easy to point out the failings of any particular church, or sect of believers. That's one thing - and I wouldn't argue that such a critique is not desperately needed, at all times, as it is in politics, or any other form of human organisation. It's something else to say the force of such a critique is an argument against belief in God, or religion in general. That's my theory, anyhoo. |
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 18, 2012 16:28:11 GMT
I'm not sure that anyone is using the critique to say that you can't believe in God, although I am sure some of these evils have tested individuals' faith in God. It's a matter of record that they have turned people away from organised religion and particular churches. Errr...this is Hitchens and Dawkins' general technique, I think. They're not arguing against organised religion and particular churches. They're arguing against religious belief, and giving example after example of what particular churches have done to supposedly demonstrate it's not a good thing. Betty's banned that word. And I was trying my best to be so polite too. |
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Post by Synonym on Jan 19, 2012 21:59:41 GMT
FWIW, I agree that ultimately everything we believe comes down to faith. After all, we could all be living in The Matrix and the real world works by all sorts of - by our standards - crazy rules and logic. Maybe 2+2=4 on a Wednesday and 2+2=5 on a Murmsday. None of us can disprove this.
Does this mean that all faiths are equally rational? I'd say no, if you accept that ultimately whatever you believe is only provisionally true and base what you believe on observations. We don't know that the apple will fall to the ground tomorrow however we have a massive running set of consistent observations and massive experience of consistency. So it is reasonable to accept it as provisionally true that the apple will fall to the ground tomorrow?
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Post by ciggie stardust on Jan 23, 2012 14:49:23 GMT
Christopher Hitchens and Frank Turek debate. Sadly, Frank Turek is not quite up to the task but he does offer Hitchens all the hackneyed answers and questions so we get to hear Hitchens explain things nice and slowly and simply. And very,very well. The debate: Does God exist? (Atheism for Beginners) When I saw this I must have at first misread the time on the youtube clip thinking it said that the clip was 2 minutes and eleven seconds long - D'oh! Two hours later I couldn't believe that the time had passed so quickly! So firstly I'd like to thank Lady Markham for posting this and in so doing introducing me properly to Mr Hitchens who up until now I'd heard of but hadn't really encountered - so thanks. The question I'd like to ask is about the later (equally long but equally absorbing) clip where the two Hitchens brothers debate the war and god. I found that I agreed with one brother about God and the other brother about war. My question is - did anybody agree with either brother on both counts? |
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Post by ciggie stardust on Jan 23, 2012 14:51:04 GMT
Oh and may I also ask - who is the woman in the top hat?
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 23, 2012 14:57:56 GMT
They are rebutting the arguments that religion/s (and religious belief) makes. Religion argues that it's a path to enlightenment and operates as a force for good. They may think that their arguments are a rebuttal of this, but as far as I've ever seen they're mistaken. That would be to think that the pointing out of some paedophilic or abusive fathers is a successful argument against the notion of the family or nuclear fatherhood being a good thing.  Touche. The point is, Hitchens and Dawkins ignore this argument. And it's the fundamental one if one wishes to understand what religious belief is about. |
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 23, 2012 15:09:00 GMT
FWIW, I agree that ultimately everything we believe comes down to faith. After all, we could all be living in The Matrix and the real world works by all sorts of - by our standards - crazy rules and logic. Maybe 2+2=4 on a Wednesday and 2+2=5 on a Murmsday. None of us can disprove this. Indeed. Or, more of a parallel, what we take to be "proof" is not available here, any more than it is about the deep foundations of religious faith. 2+2=4 can be proven, but only by stipulating what we judge to be proof within the system of arithmetic. No. Yes, I agree entirely. Which is the reason why I haven't responded to your other posts, by the way - I didn't mean to seem rude or unwelcoming. The same applies to Pippa. I apologise that I haven't said hi, and nice to see you here. |
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 23, 2012 15:17:19 GMT
That's a good way of putting it. It's Trust in a System as opposed to Faith in an Answer. Well, no - the thing is, the answer that religious faith tries to give is to a question that science or other forms of rationality do not ask. That's what Hitchens and Dawkins miss. They give no indication of understanding this; or even of being aware that the question arises at all. |
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 23, 2012 15:25:50 GMT
No, but you've shifted the goalposts. Belief in "Black Holes" and other hypothetical entities in science do not equate with belief in "God". Well, this is where my goalposts started. Are you sure you didn't shift them? What I've been trying to point out is that religion is not about such attempts at explaining the universe. Not in any important sense, at least - and it never was. Dawkins and Hitchens proceed - largely - as though it was. No, it's the fundamental basis of religious faith. Yes, exactly. Religious faith is not about this sort of attempt at exploration and explanation of the world. It's about something else, so arguments that pick apart its failings in providing a putative alternative rational model of the world miss the point. That's not the mystery - that's easily explicable. The same reason the chicken assumes the farmer's going to feed him every morning. He doesn't discover that he has no rational ground to this belief until something odd happens to its neck. |
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 23, 2012 15:30:39 GMT
He is magnificent, I have no wish to give the impression that I think otherwise. Try also his incredibly courageous demolition of Islam.
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 24, 2012 16:54:22 GMT
What I've been trying to point out is that religion is not about such attempts at explaining the universe. Not in any important sense, at least - and it never was. Dawkins and Hitchens proceed - largely - as though it was. Well, yes, that's how I see things really. And I think it's probably how many, if not all, atheists see things. I expect many religious people see it that way too. Science is the how, religion is the why. Something like that. I've always felt that they were answering different questions. Yes, something like that. Denying that there is a "why" is not a satisfactory riposte. That said, we're still stuck too much on rational grounds. What religion is really about is not answering questions, trying to find a rational explanation to anything - it's about trying to come into tune with existence. We know we're not - Faith is the conviction that there's a way to become so. Call it transcending suffering, being reborn, coming to know God, attaining satori, the unio mystica...it's the same existential problem. Yes, the world is full of idiots. I have no disagreement with the battle against such ignorance - as I said, it's desperately needed, always, in this sphere as in politics or other ways society operates. It is, but not as presented by the people you're referring to, I agree. Absolutely. That's not my disagreement. And it doesn;t require the intellect and resources of Dawkins or Hitchens to do so. If that had been their only argument, not many people would have disagreed with them, outside of the Bible Belt - but neither would they have sold many books, or attained such a status. [ |
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 24, 2012 17:11:23 GMT
That's not the mystery - that's easily explicable. The same reason the chicken assumes the farmer's going to feed him every morning. He doesn't discover that he has no rational ground to this belief until something odd happens to its neck. I agree. It's no mystery. That's my point. The mystery is that we do not understand why it is so dependable, or even if it is, really, beyond the above explanation of habit and assumption. It seems to work, but how, and if you look closely at the "seems" it turns out to be very, very complicated exactly what this "works" consists of. Are we getting closer to truth with our ever-developing theories about how the universe works? How to account for what this means, and what evidence is there for such a faith? We discover more facts and acquire more instrumental power - as we did with Newtonian mechanics. But we know Newtonian mechanics wasn't true, in any correspondence sense; as we know the Ptolemaic model of the solar system was entirely fabricated, even though it described the motion of the planets better than the alternatives it replaced, and allowed us to discover facts that we wouldn;t have seen without its extrapolated predictions... As we do not. It's a great deal. And theories that to some extent account for them. But what is there to give us any assurance whatever that our theories are true? The facts can't furnish that role. Yes - but what gives that reasoning its rational ground? What reason have we to suppose that, for example, our observations of distant galaxies are conformable with our theories that supposedly explain them? We take it on faith that the theories we've evolved to explain observations here apply to observations there - even though, logically, we know that we have no grounds to this faith, and even if it turns out to be true, there are still an infinite number of alternative theories that would explain them just as satisfactorily. How do we manage to arrive at the "best" theory - do we, indeed, when all the evidence of history tells us that before long that "best" theory is destined to be completely overturned with a "better" one? In what sense was the theory "true", then? Yes, that's a mystery in itself - but Einstein's mystery is the above, and much else connected with it: how does this brainpower enable us to understand the world? I think it undermines Hitchens and especially Dawkins' main plank of argument - that science has no need for the hypothesis of God, and we can understand the world without it, and so should do. |
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jean
Madrigal Member 
Posts: 8,546
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Post by jean on Jan 31, 2012 21:18:52 GMT
You say something that sounds profound enough and people will think it's profound. I know someone who's very good at that. I'm not sure if anyone believes him, though. |
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Touche.