Then it's not a good analogy for how to view Christian theism because one of the base claims of Christianity is that God can be known personally through Christ. We don't claim God is unknowable, which is what your thought experiment is claiming "No one can know if the number of gumballs is even or odd".
I know what a thought experiment is, which is how I know yours needs to be adjusted. Christian theism does not claim God is unknowable.
This is true, but it might also be said that God's existence isn't quite demonstrable on just a human whim for those who say they'd like to find out ... I wish it were.
You claim that you can know Christ. And you claim that a book which details supposed prophecies and miracles is true. Yet, the reality is that not a single Christian is capable of producing prophecies or miracles. So what exactly do you have to offer aside from a snake-oil claim?
I can grant everything you have said in this post and it doesn't make the slightest difference. You claim to understand what's being said in the thought experiment, but obviously you don't.
As has been pointed out, not only in the OP but by other atheists as well, is that the gumball analogy points out the difference between lack of belief in a god and belief that there is no god. Go re-read the OP: the very next thing I say, after paraphrasing the gumball machine analogy, is, "This is why most atheists are the "lack of belief" type of atheist." So your objection that Christians are able to solve the gumball odd/even problem doesn't mean anything, it is not relevant to the OP, and you need to re-read the OP without any preconceived notions on your end.
The way in which any one of us assesses a knowledge and/or truth "claim" will depend on one's meta-epistemology.
In other words, if you are a Strong Foundationalist and Evidentialist, you'll probably view the justification of a truth-value in a particular way (depending, of course, on what one holds to be axiomatic in all cases).
But if one is a Moderate Foundationalist...all of this can be something a little different.
Or if one is a Weak Foundationalist...it may yet again be something different.
Or if one instead subscribes to Coherentism, there may be another conclusion reached as to how justification works, and thus how other belief constructs and other conclusions end up being held as 'true.'
Or if one is a Reliabilist, yet again, another way of justification may come forth.
Or, if one is a Pragmatist, another position may be reached.
Or, if one is an Existentialist or a Nihilist, different yet again ...
Or if one adds in various Psychological predeterminers that affect how we might even conceive of how ANY epistemological position can work, such as whether one is a Direct Realist, a Representational Realist, a Constructivist, or other Non-realist, then this choice in what is seen as proper epistemology may bring in yet one more factor (or more...) to be added to the outcome of what also ends up being viewed as Justified-True-Belief.
And of course, none of the above specifically reflects that a person might also identify as a Rationalist, or an Empiricist, or an Idealist, or one given only to Materialism and the doing of **ahem** ...something called pure science.
However, you forgot to actually answer the question...
How do you assess the truth-value of a claim, if you can't justify the claim to be in accordance with reality?
I mean, do you at least agree that "true" are those things that are in accordance with reality and that "false" are those things that aren't?
... because religious claims will be not only subject to the peculiar epistemic position one actually holds, but if the actual nature of religious knowledge is different than that of typical, then scientific knowledge gained by experiment or whatnot, then a scientific application may not be suitable for that kind of knowledge. Science can get you to the Moon and back, but it may not quite get you to the 'face' of God (...unless one is Prometheus, of course, in which case you not only 'meet' God, but you steal His knowledge away to use for another day! ).
Disagree completely. You are literally creating a "special case" for religious claims.
... epistemology isn't 'special pleading'; it is what it is, and if you want to ignore the fact of perceptual relativity that is involved in individual perceptions of, and interactions with, whatever Reality we are all in, then that's your choice--you can be aware of it all and take it into consideration, or you can ignore what you don't happen to like, just like everybody else.
Then it's not a good analogy for how to view Christian theism because one of the base claims of Christianity is that God can be known personally through Christ. We don't claim God is unknowable, which is what your thought experiment is claiming "No one can know if the number of gumballs is even or odd".
Yet, no christian theist can demonstrate this "knowledge".
So you can claim whatever you want. The fact of the matter is that reality doesn't play along with your claim here....
Incoherent? No, the watchmaker analogy is incoherent:
The watchmaker argument is fundamentally nonsensical.
The wanderer contrasts the watch with the trees and concludes that the watch is designed. We are left to assume that the trees are not designed (if not, what property of each is being contrasted?). But then (???) happens, and we conclude that trees (and indeed all of nature) are designed.
So a premise is being contradicted, but this is not a reductio ad absurdum argument.
But, again, you clearly don't know the point of the analogy. Will you tell me that a knife doesn't function as it's supposed to when you're attempting to use it as a car?
This is because we are on the grounds of the collective authority we choose to accept or reject, not just musing ourselves.
Except sometimes the best answer is, "I don't know, and neither do you."
Rereading the OP, I see you never made a claim that some said racing stripes make cars quicker against which the null hypothesis was juxtaposed. I was under the impression you had. If it is merely the hypothesis itself, not one supported by subjective evidence, then yes, Mea Culpa.
But that is the thing. There are people, with experiences, that assert Religion. It is not no-data, but data that needs to be overthrown, to assert atheism.
It requires insistence upon merely repeatable empirical data, as if this is the only data we have, instead of merely another form of qualia, for such an assertion.
Suppose a naked man is waving a machine gun around in the middle of the street, screaming, "I'm from the future!" Should we take him at his word or should we ask for evidence? Or should we not even take him seriously at all?
Religious people have made equally absurd claims and accompanied those claims with equally absurd actions. Is it to be taken seriously because there are so many religious people? Is there anything to your argument beyond that?
This statement is incongruous. So you're saying the Atheist position is not lack of empirical evidence, but positive empirical evidence against the existence of God? What, pray tell? So you say you do have data on God, then? Is this not against your whole attempt to co-opt agnosticism?
I'm not co-opting agnosticism. Of the gnostic-agnostic dichotomy I am agnostic, and of the theist-atheist dichotomy I am atheist.
But there is not 'no evidence'. There is no repeatable evidence that fulfills methodological naturalism, true, but the concept does not require this.
There is however a lot of human experience and other forms of qualia in support. You can even argue methodological naturalism supports Theism, but that requires teleological assumptions which I assume you are loath to make.
Do you believe I'm from the future, or do I have to get naked first?
Noted. How they described it in your linked article wasn't as clear. But it was wikipedia though, so of course a poor source.
My own background in statistics is in Evidence Based Medicine. This concept is never used there, or at least not in its application in clinical practice. We assert confidence intervals, areas in which we think the answer may or may not fall. We don't assert one hypothesis as necessarily more valid in this manner, we talk of Best Evidence or evidence class. It is a system of deductive reasoning from data, while this seems more inductive reasoning then tested by data, so is a quite different animal. In practice, there can be no null hypotheses in EBM then; so in my, admittedly biased, opinion, this is a thoroughly inferior means of statistical reality testing to EBM. Anyway, by that reasoning you describe, the null hypothesis is agnosticism then. This is bordering on the sophistry of equating agnosticism with Atheism, which you seem to ascribe to - which renders the latter a meaningless term, seeing that you need to ask in detail every person what they mean by it. While people can call themselves whatever they wish, if their terms are robbed of utility, it is robbed of meaning as well. I shall say no more on this.
It's clear to me that you don't know what agnosticism and atheism are. I, along with most atheists, am an agnostic atheist. Most theists are gnostic theists.
You asked for my arguments and I gave them. I fail to see how you think such a flippant broadside is called for in response to what I wrote. This was thoroughly within your OP anyway, being reasonable arguments for Christianity.
Please enlighten me where I have been so proud? When I am wrong, I admit it. When I have not been shown in error, it is not humility, but sycophancy to the OP, to do so. I explained concepts of assertoricity and apodicticity in excruciating detail in your previous thread, with you mostly choosing to ignore, in fact often refuse to even read, what I wrote. Our discussions will be fruitful if you extend me the courtesy I extend you.
OK. But what *is* logic? I said that it is merely assumptions, definitions, and the conclusions that follow. When one is doing logic, one is pushing symbols. These symbols are ultimately meaningless because they can be reduced to primitive terms.
Nothing I'm saying here is refutable in the slightest.
Logical sequences can have all their propositions replaced with placeholding letters and still remain coherent. The actual propositions are irrelevant to the logic of the sequence, which tests the relations between them.
Correct. This is the whole point. Because the symbols have no meaning, we can substitute any meaning we like. Just like we can attach any units we like to, say, the number 2, because 2 is unitless.
You appear to equate logic with reasoning now. Curiouser and curiouser, as Alice said...
No. As I said, computers can perform logic - and that is in fact all they do - but it cannot be said that they can reason.
You really should read up a bit on what Logic actually is, before launching into snide insistence on your own correctness. You seem intent on parading your ignorance though, and I tried my best - once again, you can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink.
Great, but it's clear which of us knows what they're talking about.
I don't really care to continue any of this nonsense. You can have the last word. I don't care. If you want to continue to contribute to this thread, please just answer this question:
Do you positively affirm that all gods aside from Jehovah do not exist (and if so, what is your supporting argument?), or do you accept that other gods can exist (and if so, why is it that you believe in Jehovah but not in other gods?)?
I think what is really going on is that, despite whatever epistemological construct atheists or Christians decide to choose, atheists tend to lean more toward an Internalist view of epistemology while the Christians lean more toward an Externalist view.
On top of this, atheists also tend to define themselves as a Direct Realists, while some Christians do, and some Christians (like myself) do not.
Atheists also seem to think that the use of Logic (of whichever variety), along with various scientific methods, are the primary tools by which we should be able to 'define' the meaning and/or applicability of any religious thought. In which case, religious thought is pretty much doomed to fail if both Logic and Scientific Method(s) are the sole arbiters of religious thought. [Note: I'm not saying they aren't useful and purposeful in exploring the epistemic contours of religious thought, but I am saying that these analytic tools of human thought aren't going to get us the whole way to God if they are relied upon solely, all by themselves. They are helpful, just not conclusive...]
So, we have to ask: is the application of Epistemic Externalism and/or Indirect Realism a form of Irrationalism? And what is "being rational" in regard to religion, or to Christianity in particular?
The answer to that will depend on the person being asked. (Or, everyone could just same themselves some time and effort and go ahead and take that red pill which Morpheus is offering ... )
So, do we want to say that people like....mmmm..... C.S. Lewis, Josh McDowell, Lee Stroble, or any other person...even brighter ones like Quid est Veritas here on CF...were not 'REAL' atheists before they became Christians? And that when they moved from atheism to Christian faith, they had no 'good' reason to assume
I could not agree more! Quid has given me much sharper & deeper TECHNICAL replies to my problems than all 3 listed. Although I give Lewis the nod when it comes to extraordinary articulation...than again, who ISN'T less articulate than Lewis?
No one has objective data on anything. All human data is subjective. Even observation is the subjective data of those observers, with others merely trusting them on it. This would be no different than the subjective experience of the spiritual and others trusting that it had occurred. If two observe or two have spiritual experiences, they weave a inter-subjective agreement, but it is still not objective per se - so this is as much the problem of any materialist as well.
Suppose a naked man is waving a machine gun around in the middle of the street, screaming, "I'm from the future!" Should we take him at his word or should we ask for evidence? Or should we not even take him seriously at all?
Religious people have made equally absurd claims and accompanied those claims with equally absurd actions. Is it to be taken seriously because there are so many religious people? Is there anything to your argument beyond that?
How is this an argument for only using Empirical repeatable data? This seems very tenuously connected to the part you quoted.
Anyway, usually religious claims are held from respected pillars of the community, from revered forebears, including of course scientists of old, and are not so clearly outside the cultural or quotidian spectrum. Claims are made by Naturalistic Materialists as well that can be construed as equally absurd, though. This is really not a strong argument, but more a 'People who live in glass houses should not throw stones' thing here, regarding reality testing.
Data and evidence are not the same thing.
I'm not co-opting agnosticism. Of the gnostic-agnostic dichotomy I am agnostic said:
I am fully aware of this nonsensical drivel. Some person, let's call him Stultus Maior, inventing this in the 1970s or thereabouts. This is not what the words historically mean, nor are used in general. 'Atheists' abuse this, by using the traditional meaning of atheist, but then co-opting this disingenuous little framework when pressed on the basis of their position - as if they are fooling anyone.
Atheists disbelieve or lack belief in the existence of God, Agnostics don't know on this question. A Gnostic is an old religion believing in secret knowledge that will help you ascend the heavenly spheres. Simple really. All that these redefinitions you espouse do, is muddy the waters that no one knows what you are talking about. You need to ask intensively on views, as labels are so fluid, and adjectival determinitives left off or added randomly.
For a 'gnostic-atheist' is basically an atheist; a 'agnostic-atheist' is an agnostic; an 'agnostic-agnostic' tautology; an 'gnostic agnostic' nonsense; a 'gnostic theist' a theist and an 'agnostic-theist' an agnostic again. This system is frank idiocy that just doubles meaning and gives you no further information, in fact makes it less clear.
Well, right below this you continue your rambling about what you think logic is despite having been corrected.
Well, I defined Logic. You have yet to give a definition, just saying a few simplistic 'its arguments et al.' that singularly fail to do so, and that I explained why it does not constitute Logic itself.
OK. But what *is* logic? I said that it is merely assumptions, definitions, and the conclusions that follow. When one is doing logic, one is pushing symbols. These symbols are ultimately meaningless because they can be reduced to primitive terms.
Nothing I'm saying here is refutable in the slightest.
You are still confusing the noun Logic with the adjective Logical. Assumptions, definitions and conclusions aren't logic, logic is the system of evaluating those as to soundness and validity. I am done with this, as I have tried to explain this to you in two threads already. It has grown too tedious. Please look up Logic when you have some time.
Correct. This is the whole point. Because the symbols have no meaning, we can substitute any meaning we like. Just like we can attach any units we like to, say, the number 2, because 2 is unitless.
I wasn't really talking about your computer-thing you wrote at all though. Computers don't perform logic nor do they reason. They act logically as perceived by man, but this is based off of programming and is therefore as deterministic as hardware allows, just 0s and 1s.
Great, but it's clear which of us knows what they're talking about.
I don't really care to continue any of this nonsense. You can have the last word. I don't care. If you want to continue to contribute to this thread, please just answer this question:
I agree, it is very clear. I feel like the Fox in the Aesop fable, talking to the Monkey while walking in a graveyard.
Do you positively affirm that all gods aside from Jehovah do not exist (and if so, what is your supporting argument?), or do you accept that other gods can exist (and if so, why is it that you believe in Jehovah but not in other gods?)?
... in the jargon of the field of philosophy, Internalism means that coherence and/or justification of belief is essentially a part of a person's cogntive state, that they have most, if not all, of the proper reasons and reasoning that goes with being justified in one's beliefs, and thus having truth. Externalism, on the other hand, is the assertion that a person can basically be justified of beliefs even if they don't have full reasoning as to the justification of those claims--as long as the beliefs really do turn out to be true in reality.
So, as you can see, these terms as used in epistemology are a bit different in their meaning than they their connotations can be within the various sciences. It's kind of like the difference of meaning in the word "theory" between a scientist referring to 'scientific theory' and a pedestrian referring to any run of the mill usage of a 'theory.'
The way in which any one of us assesses a knowledge and/or truth "claim" will depend on one's meta-epistemology.
In other words, if you are a Strong Foundationalist and Evidentialist, you'll probably view the justification of a truth-value in a particular way (depending, of course, on what one holds to be axiomatic in all cases).
But if one is a Moderate Foundationalist...all of this can be something a little different.
Or if one is a Weak Foundationalist...it may yet again be something different.
Or if one instead subscribes to Coherentism, there may be another conclusion reached as to how justification works, and thus how other belief constructs and other conclusions end up being held as 'true.'
Or if one is a Reliabilist, yet again, another way of justification may come forth.
Or, if one is a Pragmatist, another position may be reached.
Or, if one is an Existentialist or a Nihilist, different yet again ...
Or if one adds in various Psychological predeterminers that affect how we might even conceive of how ANY epistemological position can work, such as whether one is a Direct Realist, a Representational Realist, a Constructivist, or other Non-realist, then this choice in what is seen as proper epistemology may bring in yet one more factor (or more...) to be added to the outcome of what also ends up being viewed as Justified-True-Belief.
And of course, none of the above specifically reflects that a person might also identify as a Rationalist, or an Empiricist, or an Idealist, or one given only to Materialism and the doing of **ahem** ...something called pure science.
No one has objective data on anything. All human data is subjective. Even observation is the subjective data of those observers, with others merely trusting them on it. This would be no different than the subjective experience of the spiritual and others trusting that it had occurred.
Except for the fact that in some cases we can get consistent subjective data that everyone involved agrees on. Those cases aren't the ones involving the spiritual, interestingly enough. It is almost as if there actually is some sort of difference - like the word objective was coined to describe a phenomena we actually experience.
Except for the fact that in some cases we can get consistent subjective data that everyone involved agrees on. Those cases aren't the ones involving the spiritual, interestingly enough. It is almost as if there actually is some sort of difference - like the word objective was coined to describe a phenomena we actually experience.
Are you sure that in the case of defining atheism, you atheists haven't gone so overboard in paring down and reducing your definition(s) of atheism that the finer rational distinctions existing between each of you haven't been obliterated?
If the word 'atheism' is subjective (and it is)...then I'm having a hard time seeing how the perspective of each individual atheist on the matter of religious faith will by necessity employ a conception of "evidence" consistent with that of every other atheist. My point? That just as each individual Christian has a psychological "fingerprint" of faith (no two being identical, but maybe similar), each atheist also has a psychological "fingerprint" of non-belief.
The upshot of this is that our individual psychologies reflect more dissimilarity than do our actual fingerprints, especially when we try to define and construct individual conceptions of how our mental furniture relates to christian faith. So, what counts as evidence, the sufficiency of evidence, the nature of facts, the nature of reason, etc., etc., will differ between each Christian and between each atheist as well...
Then, are you going to tell Peter Boghossian that his insistence upon the use of a Foundationalist framework for a person's epistemic evaluation of "faith" is just a bit of "stamp-collecting" and that it is really unneeded?
All words are subjective. It’s why several of us keep mentioning that we don’t care if disgruntled theists don’t like how we define atheism, focus on our statements about what our positions are.
Except for the fact that in some cases we can get consistent subjective data that everyone involved agrees on. Those cases aren't the ones involving the spiritual, interestingly enough. It is almost as if there actually is some sort of difference - like the word objective was coined to describe a phenomena we actually experience.
Well, if you do a scientific experiment, all involved agree on certain points like Empiricism and Realism. So their subjective data, being in accord with it, would be agreed on. It need not be, as look how often eyewitnesses recount different events. Similarly we cannot determine if one person's perception of 'Green' say, is the same as another's, for although we can measure lightwaves, the perceptions cannot be shown equivalent. Even raw sensory data is up for debate, as multiple interpretations of the same findings are common - just look at Medicine where the same studies are trumpeted by both opposing camps in a debate, such as Colloids vs Crystalloid fluids. I think you are really overplaying your hand.
Likewise, if a bunch of Pentocostals fall down and speak in tongues, all of them will agree on the Holy Spirit as operative agent, with glossolalia as external sign thereof - so to their minds, their subjective data will also be consistent and agreed upon.
The fact is that spiritual intersubjective experience have factors in common, is consistent between certain individuals - hence Religions exist. If it was not, then having mystic literature and books like Spirutual Exercises or Imitation of Christ would make little sense, nor shared liturgies.
We even see commonalities between religions, like Thomas Merton the Trappist monk's experience accords so well with the Buddhist of non-duality or Sufi experience of God.
