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Such as?
They're the same ones Christians make - reality exists, that sort of thing. Believers add in a bunch of other stuff about gods and whatnot, but ignoring those they share the same basic assumptions about reality as scientists use.
So I guess it makes for great sounding rhetoric to show that science has assumptions. Unless the believer in question is going to admit that they believe that reality is an illusion and the sun could just as easily rise in the west tomorrow they're not really making a substantive critique about the failings of science by doing so.
Some people don't seem to see how a thread criticising the FSM can entirely relate to how much of a waste of time it is to create, then get confused about what other people mean when they are really saying that just because you can create a comparison - does not mean your comparison was worthy of the time spent.
The argument goes like this.
You can't prove or disprove (offer empirical support for) God's existence.
You can't prove or disprove the FSM's existence either.
Therefore, they're comparable as an analogy; one is as good as the other.
The problem is that you're equating two different things based on a single quality, here being an epistemological problem in that neither can be proved, which shuffles away any other differences between these two things. Anyone can take two completely different things and unfairly equate them given a single quality. I have an arm. A chair has an arm. Therefore, I'm analogous to a chair. Meh.
But notice what else should be included in this.
You can't prove or disprove (offer empirical support for) science's existence.
You can't prove or disprove the FSM's or God's existence either.
Therefore, science, the FSM, and God are all as good as one another.
Or add another one: the phenomenology of any person's experience other than your own. You can't prove or disprove that; the best you have is a biological correlate in terms of brain functioning, but that's only a correlate, and you can't jump the infinite gap between objective neural stuff interacting and the consciousness that results "from the inside."
So God, science, the FSM, consciousness are all equally the same. Part of you would probably be like, "no, science is NOT AT ALL like something ridiculous such as the FSM." But from the criteria implicit in the argument (that only stuff that can be proven empirically is worth considering, and if not it's no different than imaginary stuff), this is by necessity where the road leads.
All this stuff rests on the nebulous assumption of positivism or scientism. Hume, who is a marvelous philosopher, put it like this:
If we take in our hand any volume; of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance; let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames: for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion.Thinking like this provides the presuppositions for considering the FSM as good as God or science or anything else that can't be proven empirically or mathematically. Except the problem here being...Hume's very statement fails the criteria he demands.
So what? The FSM analogy is flawed.
Science isn't just an activity; it's essentially a philosophy, a set of ideas that are believed in which are acted out. You might as well say God is an activity, given that people relate to him and "see it with my own eyes." Same phenomenological thing we're talking about here.
Either way, you can't prove or disprove science (or the existence of other consciousnesses, for that matter), and the reason the FSM is postulated is because you can't prove or disprove him, just like God. God, science, and the FSM are identical here with regard to being impossible to prove or disprove, in their unfalsifiability. God is an idea, the FSM is an idea, science is a set of ideas which are carried out. Same thing.
And you sure as heck don't know that the ideas and philosophical presuppositions of science (induction, uniformity, etc.) are true because you "see them with my own eyes." Those things are assumed to be true because of an intuitive sense that they must be true.
The promotion of a the theory that life evolved itself requires more gullibility than the most primitive religious system. What would be even more ironic is an uncaused evolutionary mechanism that evolved people who have consistently attributed their origins to an unseen deity! It would then be evolution, born out of existing existence that thinks there is a God.
You're missing the point of what an analogy is.
An analogy is (dictionary): Logic. a form of reasoning in which one thing is inferred to be similar to another thing in a certain respect, on the basis of the known similarity between the things in other respects.
The similarity between the FSM, fairies and the christian God is that all 3 are supernatural entities that can be claimed to exist and are defined in such a way that it can't be verified.
It's a perfectly reasonable analogy. When one points out the differences between the things offered as an analogy, one goes beyond the intended scope of the analogy. Which is clearly what you are doing here.
In another thread, you said that the FSM is not a "spaceless, timeless, all-powerfull, omniscient entity". Well, great. And I can't kick the earth away with my foot, but it's still perfectly reasonable to use a football as an analogy to the earth to make a certain point, since both are spheres.
The analogy of God and the FSM is that both are entities that can be claimed to exist and neither of them can be shown to exist.
I'm glad you cited the definition of "analogy". By that we can see that the FSM is a very limited analogy, and a perfectly unreasonable analogy for the ostensible purpose intended (trying to show that the idea of a creator-God is ridiculous),
Science is a freakin´ tool, for crying out loud. We measure the value of a tool by looking at how well it works for its intended purpose - and the scientific method does remarkably well, in that respect.Science is not an entity that is claimed to exist. Science, depending on what you mean exactly, is a process, a methodology or an idea. Not an entity that exists independently from humans.
Either my deity exists, or [argument form epistemological nihilism]. Amazing.They're the same ones Christians make - reality exists, that sort of thing. Believers add in a bunch of other stuff about gods and whatnot, but ignoring those they share the same basic assumptions about reality as scientists use.
So I guess it makes for great sounding rhetoric to show that science has assumptions. Unless the believer in question is going to admit that they believe that reality is an illusion and the sun could just as easily rise in the west tomorrow they're not really making a substantive critique about the failings of science by doing so.
I'm glad you cited the definition of "analogy". By that we can see that the FSM is a very limited analogy, and a perfectly unreasonable analogy for the ostensible purpose intended (trying to show that the idea of a creator-God is ridiculous), and I say ostensible because the real purpose is for entertainment; some childish ridicule. If I'm wrong about the purpose/meaning of the FSM, tell me the actual meaning.
The purpose/meaning of the FSM, is clearly written down in the post you are replying to.
Both the FSM and gods are supernatural entities that are claimed to exist, but can't be shown to exist.
What makes it ridiculous?
You bolded the part about "in a certain respect". I'm saying that respect is so limited as to be worthless for any intelligent, meaningful purpose.
And imagine the lens had never been invented; no emperical knowledge of germs and more distant celestial bodies. Therefore they couldn't be shown to exist. The conclusion? They may exist or they may not. So the FSM hasn't demonstrated anything for which a useful analogy might be helpful.
The noble idea of a great being, greater than ourselves, beyond space and time, contrasted with meatballs.
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