(The "Vast Dream" Revisited, or the Big Brain makes a comeback as God...)
I still don't get it.
Christians say that the universe couldn't have been here forever, so it must have had a beginning. There was once nothing at all, and then *poof* there was a universe. Hard to explain all right. I agree.
(Which is why I maintain that there was always something, and not nothing)
However let's say that there was once nothing, and then there was something, like they say.
This they say proves in some way that there had to have been a creator god to start the ball rolling.
However, they absolutely refuse to even discuss where said creator god came from! In fact, they maintain that said creator god is eternal and has always been here!
This makes zero sense. How can God be eternal, if the universe cannot be? Either one is, I think, equally unlikely. In fact, it's more unlikely that it's God that is eternal, since God is a being.
Now here's the rub: I can imagine *something* coming from nothing, as in, a vacuum fluctuation. A huge one. That is actually possible. But not a fully formed deity. Such a thing cannot just arise out of nothing. A deity is an organized personality, so something needed to organize it. A vacuum fluctuation would just release energy and particles, but creating a God is harder than creating a man, no? Such a thing just doesn't appear out of nothing, already organized into a vast hypercomplex personality with powers and desires.
God, if he exists, had an origin, rest assured. Even a deity doesn't come from nowhere, or just exist forever. For one thing, this would mean that before God decided to create this universe, He waited FOREVER. A literal eternity, and then He made His move. Sure.
The idea that God has just been around forever is a huge cheat. He cannot have been. However, it seems even less likely that He just popped into existence out of nothingness. So, we can conclude from this that God is highly unlikely to exist at all, at least as advertised.
Unless... (Here I go again) Unless instead of a creator God, there is just a mind, a mind that has always existed, and NOTHING ELSE. In other words, this universe would not 'really' exist like we think it does; it would all be the dream of that eternal mind. This means that even questions of time wouldn't apply to the mind itself, since it dreams the time as well. It has to dream in a sequence, not 'all at once,' so it has to introduce the concept of time into the dream for changes to happen in it.
Or rather, we do. Because in this concept here, we are the ones really doing the dreaming, and not God, not the mind. We comprise the mind. It is literally us. Everything, even the 'inanimate' objects, are just made up of consciousness.
However, this is not in any way like the God of the Christians.
If God is a vast mind in which we exist as dreams, then said mind might be all there is, anywhere. No real matter, no real energy, no real space. Just a consciousness. A discorporate consciousness. Or perhaps rather, a discorporate data 'field' on which consciousnesses naturally arise.
Such a thing is surely possible as unlikely as it sounds, and it is not nearly 'as impossible' that a mind has been around 'forever' since in this scenario, the mind is all that ever was, all that is, and all that ever will be.
Of course, if this is true and everything is all a part of one vast consciousness, said consciousness would not in itself be 'self-aware.' Not like a deity, in other words.
More like maybe a huge computer database on which we are the only files, we meaning this whole universe. The database itself has no 'will' or 'consciousness,' it merely holds and stores information which does. As in, us.
Now as unlikely as this may seem to those conditioned to only believe in this reality as it appears to be, it does basically solve ALL questions. All of them. No, really.
Is the universe infinite or finite? It can now be infinite, because in a dream, there is no boundary. You can always think of something else being 'just over that horizon there...' And if we expect to find something, we will.
Is there life after death? What death? You are a pattern of consciousness which in our communal dream, dies. However that pattern is not dependent on matter and energy to exist since its 'real' existence is as a pattern of consciousness, or data. So it is free to die in the dream and wake up in another dream, for all we can know. At any rate, it is not bonded to matter, because matter isn't real, either.
This sounds like nonsense, I realize. However it's only when you get past how silly it sounds that you start to realize just how very possible it all is.
If it is true, wouldn't that be funny? Here we all are, so convinced that it's all matter and energy and that we have a good handle on what reality is, and then we would have to change our entire perspective on all of that. We'd have to get rid of what I like to call 'reality-bias' or the conditioning we all have to believe that reality is as we see it. It wouldn't be easy for most people to believe. Impossible is the right word, I think.
When you look at what science is finding at the quantum level, the seeming contradictions, the ‘quantum strangeness,’ the fact that it seems that matter is almost completely empty space, the phenomena of entanglement, the wave-particle duality and the collapse of the wave-form having something to do with our observations of it, and so many other things, they all seem to be hinting at something, and this is what I think they might be hinting at.
It’s just an opinion. I’m not starting a religion over it or anything. I just maintain that it’s a hell of a lot more likely that we seem to be giving it credit for.
It’s certainly a lot more likely than God.
What's the computer that contains this database made from, again, Brian?
ReplyDeleteThe database.
ReplyDeleteThink of why you believe a computer is necessary.
Because it always is, here, within the dream that we think is real.
If the database actually came first, how would we tell? We are already in the dream, and then we invent computers and they have databases. But if we're all a huge database, that means that the only reason we think a computer is necessary is because for us it is necessary to create such a thing.
What if all reality is, is a naturally occurring database, within which have evolved patterns of data called people that created other paterns of data called computers to store patterns of their data?
Your question is an excellent example of what I term 'reality bias' which is just that we cannot conceive of how very different what I'm talking about here, really is.
So, you're saying that the 'database' is an analogy, much like Eric says that God is an analogy?
ReplyDeleteI have a 'reality bias'?
Brian?
Okay, I see your point.
ReplyDeleteI'm using 'database' here, but that's not right. There isn't really anything like this to use as an analogy, but I think if we go back to it all being consciousness rather than data... we only believe that a brain is necessary for thought to occur, but what if we only think that because that's how we dreamt it? As in, the dream is the ground of being, and then, within the dream, every mind or consciousness that we can see resides in a brain. The brains are in the dream. We've dreamt that we are solid beings so in the dream we are bodies with organs that we identify with thought, again in the cream. So really, we have no example of which came first, the consciousness or the brain.
As to the 'reality bias,' I swear that I don't mean that as a negative or a slur. I mean, we're 'trained' by this dream to believe that the dream is the reality, and not that the reality is a dream. So asking 'where's the computer' or 'where's the brain,' while a totally valid and even obvious question *within the dream* does not apply to the dream itself.
Another analogy.
The Matrix. Back to computers, except imagine that instead of computers and machines, that it is the nature of reality to be a vast field within which data comes and goes, evolves and changes, just like a computer. Reality is a natural computer, with no physical 'machine' necessary. It doesn't 'hold' data; it *is* data, and nothing else. It is the nature of this data/conscious/spirit or whatever to exist, with nothing else required. Indeed, there *is* nothing else, not anywhere.
Doesn't make any sense though, Brian.
ReplyDeleteOkay.
ReplyDeleteIt seems to, to me. Maybe we're wired differently.
I don't remember eric saying that god is an analogy, actually. I beleve you though...
ReplyDeleteThis is something that we haven't ever thought of before that is greatly different from every other familiar theory of cosmogenesis or religion, or from just about everything we know and are familiar with, so how can I try to describe it to you without using an analogy?
I don't think it's a question of 'wiring'.
ReplyDeleteIn a way everything is energy. Energy in 'bundles' is informationlike, so viewed from the smallest perspective, the Universe IS a bunch of energy packed into larger and larger bundles, from protons and electrons, to galaxies.
Couching that in terms of, "It's a consciousness.", or "It's a database.", and we, as a group make it up as we go along, is all very well, except it doesn't work!
If it were true, we 'should' have found God above the clouds, keeping everything running by magic, no?
Brian; I had an emotional experience reading a book that I think disqualified me from seeing your big brain theory. It was "On the Beach". Not sure if you are familiar with the book, but the story centers around some australians waiting for nuclear fallout to end all life on earth.
ReplyDeleteI read this when I had lost my christian faith, but was still a "seeker" and was settled on "reincarination", well the thought that all life on earth could end while many had not reached god blew that thought out of my head. Most natural process require no consciousness for them to occur. Plates will shift, moons will orbit, galaxys will spin into oblivion, suns will be born and die, all with or without our notice.
To make a long story short, I can't see how the "big brain" would necessitate quasars or even the death star galaxy. If most of the universe is unnessesary, then I think your model is wrong.
To make a long story short, I can't see how the "big brain" would necessitate quasars or even the death star galaxy. If most of the universe is unnessesary, then I think your model is wrong.
ReplyDelete-------------
Not unnecessary. A part of the dream. And we have no way of knowing if other civilizations are dreaming it, too.
All I'm saying is that, when we looked closer at the sky, invented telescopes, and started to write our observations down, and later invented radiotelescopes and the Hubble and all that, we were looking at what we'd never looked at before, expecting to see *something* and that something had to mesh with all that we already 'knew' about science at the time, or what we knew had to change slightly to mesh with it and make it one coherent dream that all could believe in. So when we looked for things, we found them, and they all make sense taken together and shed more light on what we 'know' about the dream, which is to say, expanded it. Now, those things are as real as the ground beneath us, but before anyone ever looked to see them, they either did not exist or existed as 'something' that cold have manifested to us in many forms, one of which we 'chose' with our expectations at the time. The collective expectations of mankind, mostly of science, since that's the area in question here.
We'd already done all this in stages, of course. When we first noticed the sky we saw little lights up there, because we were expecting to see *something* and that's what we saw, just points of light. Then when we developed the science to 'see' things better, more detail was 'revealed' since we were now capable of perceiving it. Our collective expectations formed what we saw. And still do, in ever greater detail.
ReplyDeleteI'm not saying that that's how it *did* happen, but that that's how it *could have* happened, if the ground of all being is consciousness. An alternative that is very hard to investigate, much less prove. But it is still a completely valid alternative to a god or to atheism.
ReplyDeleteBrian said "and that something had to mesh with all that we already 'knew' about science at the time,"
ReplyDeleteBut at a time, we thought the world was flat. Shouldn't the dream have continued in that direction? We didn't we ever discover the turtle under the earth?
You seem to be saying that 'things were undecided 'til we looked'.
ReplyDeleteOf course that is true, and all we really have is a scientific model. Same with quantum physics, just a scientific model.
There doesn't seem to BE any difference between reality and 'B.B.' except you saying that undiscovered 'stuff' is 'up in the air', which, since it's undiscovered, in a way it is.
Once again, seems to me that you're just turning tables on 'discovery' or 'scientific discovery' to make it some kind of 'made up as we(including the B.B.) go along'.
But it's as unfalsifiable as God is.
Only, instead of scientists saying 'didn't we do well' discovering stuff, they 'mean', 'didn't we do well inventing stuff by looking to see what was there'.
But at a time, we thought the world was flat. Shouldn't the dream have continued in that direction? We didn't we ever discover the turtle under the earth?
ReplyDelete-------------
How do you know that the world was not flat when we were looking at it back then? We had no way of really knowing, so perhaps it was, until a flat earth no longer satisfied our expectations. At some point as people became more sophisticated a better explanation was necessary for the already-observed phenomena that needed eventually to be all put together seamlessly so we'd all agree on all of it (with religion exceptions here and there, which satisfy themselves with delusion so they don't have to agree with reality.)
We were already seeing ships disappear over the horizon, so once we'd noticed that (someone's bright idea that had enough strength to be real to others?) and other similar things, something had to happen. Either we'd have discovered that the phenomena still didn't disprove the 'flat earth' (Some alternate explanation for why the ships disappeared?) and the paradigm would have never shifted to the round earth one, or that they did disprove it (most of us expected that, apparently) and from then on the world was considered round, and so it was evermore. It was kind of arbitrary in a way. It might be as simple as we just collectively got bored with the more simple view and so people started to look for deeper explanations of things, and this is what the concensus expectations of everybody came up with eventually.
As to turtles et al, any explanation had to somehow satisfy the expectations of everybody's worldview, not just one religion's. That complicates things a bit, but it makes perfect sense. Once science came on the scene, it became the dominant worldview precisely because of it's precision and record-keeping and documentation of how everything fits together. Once it was 'proven' scientifically, it became set in stone, so to speak. Science solidified our worldview into a working whole, a huge pyramid with each layer neatly based in the one below it, and so solidified the universe for us. Now in order for something really huge and different to happen or 'be discovered,' it would have to fit in with or at least explain all of the already-observed and recorded phenomena, so it's harder for huge changes to occur. Any changes can only happen in areas where we haven't looked yet, and even they have to fit in somehow with all the stuff we already know.
That's one way out of many possible ways that it could have happened, of course.
There doesn't seem to BE any difference between reality and 'B.B.' except you saying that undiscovered 'stuff' is 'up in the air', which, since it's undiscovered, in a way it is.
ReplyDelete-----------
I'd say the main difference effectively is that the undiscovered stuff is discovered when we expect to discover it and takes the form of whatever best satisfies logic and our expectations. We are involved in the manifestation of the discovery rather than merely finding something that already existed in precisely that form. It may have even existed as a superposition of many possible forms, or as nothing at all, before it was 'decided' by our looking at it.
Brian; "How do you know that the world was not flat when we were looking at it back then?"
ReplyDeleteBecause the heat would have disappated downward and we'd be living on a cold ball of rock right now.
Or are you saying the basic laws of physic changed based on our observations?
This is where you wander into the realm of "unfalsifiablity"...
Which is the same thing as I said.
ReplyDeleteWhich means 'no difference' to us at all.
Another point here would be that the basic logic of this place was set down a very long time ago, likely by 'us' before 'we' were humans. As in, by the lower life forms that came before us. And we continued that. We lived by logic. If you stab something, it dies. If you fall off a cliff, you hurt yourself or die. And a zillion other things like that. All these primitive 'observations' created 'ground rules' that we continued to modify, but not eliminate altogether because they are so basic to how this place runs, and has always run. So one good reason that no particular religion has ever dominated and changed the whole paradigm is that religions are comparatively new, as are humans, to this place. They are fantasies which can be believable, but *none of them can fit in with the ground rules of logic already established long ago.* Science however, does. It's made of it.
ReplyDeleteTwo words Brian.
ReplyDeleteCold fusion.
Explain?
ReplyDeleteWhy it didn't work? The 'doubters' won out in the expectations game. Simple.
"The doubters won.."
ReplyDeleteThat's too easy. Shouldn't the doubters have won other 'controversies' too.
Plate techtonics, galaxies etc. etc.?
You're just 'apologising' now.
One side wins, or the other one does. The doubters win until it's acceptable to enough of the people, then the doubter's doubts lessen enough, and then it goes the other way. There are even times when it gets doubted, then there's a breakthough, then it is accepted, then someone else comes up with a new brilliant reason to doubt it again, then it gets refuted, and so on.
ReplyDeleteSeems simple to me.
I'm just explaining how something like this might work. There are infinite variations, all within the theme of 'reality is consciousness.' For instance, perhaps reality is only slightly 'flexible' and must remain within certain parameters, so it isn't a 'free choice' of any old thing when someone's subconscious 'chooses' as it observes. Or perhaps we all have our own dream, we all see reality differently but there's no way to tell since what I call 'red' you also call 'red' etc, and it's just natural in the universal 'mind' for these separate dreams to 'get together' in much the same way that primitive unicellular organisms eventually grouped up to form the multicellular ones.... Infinite ways that it could happen. I'm just hypothecating on my thoughts of how it might. How is that an apology? I'm not trying to get the facts to fit my 'theory' so much as I'm trying to explain how my 'theory' also fits the existing facts as we know them, as well as does many other variations of it, and better than any religion, albeit perhaps not quite so well as pure materialism does at this juncture.
I look at it this way: How difficult would it hypothetically be if something like this is true, to look back and try to trace the order of what happened when and how and what factors influenced it? It defies logical thought to re-trace such a subtle thing. It's so difficult because it requires it's own 'inverse' logic to see what the influences might have been. And so anything that is that hard to even see a glimmer of isn't something that I just dismiss without any further thought, since I can't use my 'gut' to fathom it. It doens't make 'common' sense at all. That much I agree with. However it does make sense, if one spends the time considering it carefully and acknowledges and adjusts for the possibility of one's natural 'reality bias' creeping in as one does so.
I know that you can go on and on about this, but it doesn't make any difference at all.
ReplyDeleteIf reality is what we think of as 'real' or if it's what you think it is, or even if a supernatural being created it all somehow, it doesn't matter.
It makes ZERO difference, except the religious think that prayer and faith healing might work, and you think that synchronicities(co-incidences) MEAN something.
I find it an interesting possibility to consider. I see important differences from a religion or a belief in a deity. Plus it has a certain elegance that appeals to my esthetic sense.
ReplyDeleteI respect your disrespect for it.
Brian:
ReplyDeleteI have to agree, at least in principal, with Pboy.
What you propose here (the BB)as a possible explanation for reality seems to have no utility. It amy or may not be correct, it is neither provable or refutable, and, in any event, serves no particular purpose, except possibly as a counter argument to believer's efforts to convince the rest of us. It does, I think, have one salient advantage over any religious "explanation" of reality, in that there is no call to "take part" in a response to the BB.
seems to have no utility.
ReplyDelete-----------------------
If nothing else, it's another possibility to consider when we look to what might be the answer to the question "what is this place?" and so it's one more thing that the Christians have to knock down.
I have to say I was a bit taken aback when you said 'no utility.' Are you expecting it to be able to open boxes or slice and dice?
It is posibly a completely different and yet valid paradigm, and it needs to have utility? How about making more sense to someone like me than any religion? That's useful to me. I like to have an alternative to materialism that isn't theistic, just in case. ;-)
It has utility to someone having unusual coincidences on a regular basis that they can't explain to themselves rationally in spite of honestly trying to.
ReplyDeleteWhat I don't like about your hypothesis here is your past allusion to the idea that the 'database'(for want of a better analogy?) may be 'allowed' to be manipulated.
ReplyDeleteSeems to me this brings magic into the deal, alteration of 'reality'.
Seems like 'woo' to me, and it seems as dangerous* as technology which uses the energy causing the Earth to revolve, or drains the magnetism of the Earth would be.
Then there's the question of what we percieve as free will(I believe we have no free will for entirely different reasons), time being linear(presumably the past is simply 'old data' which might be manipulated to affect the 'now', and such things.
I think, have one salient advantage over any religious "explanation" of reality, in that there is no call to "take part" in a response to the BB.
ReplyDelete------------------
That's it? Oh, I see more than that.
Here's another one. Like science, it's logically consistent all by itself. You're asked to believe ONE really hard-to-believe thing, that we've got reality backwards sort-of, which is hard to swallow I admit but it's not like being asked to believe in the resurrection or something logically impossible like that. It IS logically possible! Just very strange to us. And once you adjust to that, literally every single problem, every single dilemma that science faces, evaporates. They all make sense all of a sudden.
No changes need to be made to science. It agrees with all our science, except for extending some quantum mechanical concepts a bit further, but those concepts are already very 'strange' to begin with and seem to lean in that direction anyhow.
I call explaining all of sciences conundrums in a satisfactory manner a 'utility.'
Seems to me this brings magic into the deal, alteration of 'reality'.
ReplyDelete-------------
I can see where that would offend you.
It is, nevertheless, possible, I admit, in that worldview, much to your consternation. Things like my son are possible. Not huge changes though. 'Flexing' reality a tiny bit can possibly be done, *but not in any way that is massively CREDIBLE to others* because after all, that's the rule. If everyone believed me it would change the entire world paradigm, so that cannot happen, not without science getting into the picture and finding some 'proof' that would allow the doubters to lessen their doubts enough, etc. Science is ruler in this paradigm at the moment, and hopefully forever, because I like it that way just fine.
So in theory, small stuff that makes little difference to the world at large can be changed, by sheer will and very emotionally charged meditation. Nothing anyone else would really believe though, unless maybe it's one or two people close to me that later on won't be beleved themselves.
If I wanted to 'change the world' by intense meditation, I have to overcome the willpower of everyone on the planet to 'not change' the world. Not going to happen.
Interestingly enough, if a person is a hard-core realist who instinctively rejects anything that even smacks of 'woo,' then there is zero possibility for anything 'strange' to manifest itself in their life. They will never see anything like say, my strange coincidences, themselves. This sounds like a cop-out on my part, but that's really how it works, off of our beliefs and not out thoughts.
ReplyDeleteIn fact, the doubter has deep subconscious doubts which could and would manifest *to the doubter* as seeming proof that this is bullshit. In other words, the doubter would likely get 'confirmation' from reality in some form that they are right, that this is poppycock, because that's what they're expecting to find!
Which I'm sure that you can see, makes this very hard for someone like me to get any of this across to others.
" Things like my son are possible."
ReplyDeleteWhat? Is that you MI?
Yeah, nice. Thanks, William Hays.
ReplyDeleteHey, I can take it. I still see something here that you are not. And unlike MI I'm not asking that you convert to my point of view here.
As to my son, it is either a very nice coincidence that it turned out exactly as I desired it to, or it wasn't. I like to consider both.
I'm sure that you are a very proud dad, as you have every right to be.
ReplyDeleteStill, it's not very surprising that you have a child, you and your 'missus', after all we're ALL built to do that thing, right?(pass on our genes)
I see the unique circumstances which you couch in 'spiritual' terms as part of each of us's unique circumstances that point to 'no free will'.
We ARE all unique and it is easy to imagine that some who are under better circumstances imagine that they got there by willpower, rather than they are just living their unique lives in unique circumstances.
I totally see you point, pboy. I hardly think I've become a fanatic about it. I'm just not willing to close the door on it solely because it seems silly at first blush.
ReplyDeleteI feel that whatever the ultimate truth of this reality is, we haven't got there yet, so whatever it turns out to be, it will be a big surprise that a lot of people will initially reject with extreme prejudice, as it were, so I'm not going to do that.
Still, it's not very surprising that you have a child,
ReplyDelete---------------
Yeah, actually it was. The doctors gave us a very slim chance on only one treatment (ICSI) and no chance without it. As you know, we could only afford one treatment when the doctor said it typically takes five or six. So it worked, and it was also a boy and he also looked just like me only with blue eyes, which I had requested specifically.
Just saying, is all. It wasn't a 'shoe-in.' It went against the odds by at least ten to one.
See, I see this as the Christians saying 'the universe is not eternal, it had a beginning, so there must have been a 'first cause' which can only be God, and me saying 'hey, you missed one other possibility!'
ReplyDeleteYou see, it doesn't have to be more likely and more realistic than the current scientific paradigm, just more realistic than any religion. Which it most definitely is.
Still, it's not very surprising that you have a child,
ReplyDelete---------------
"Yeah, actually it was. The doctors gave us a very slim chance on only one treatment (ICSI) and no chance without it."
But I was talking in general terms, you two as a human couple having a child, then I covered the 'unique circumstances' thing later.
So, you reduced my response to one line and we were all supposed to forget what I said about unique circumstances then?
That must be it, why else would you answer like this?
You are surprised that I dismissed your dismissal of it?
ReplyDeleteHey, I wasn't arguing the point. I admit the possibility or even the probability that I am wrong in this.
So, it's not Brian's wife I'm talking to here then?
ReplyDelete"You are surprised that I dismissed your dismissal of it?"
This is silly. I pointed out that having a baby isn't an unusual event and everyone's experience is unique, and I think that you're confusing the 'uniqueness' of your event with 'the event'.
You even had to cut my sentence in HALF to make your 'dismissal' sound better.
What would you say to a Christian who deliberately tried to argue against a part of a sentence that you made.
Seems that you're trying to have a verbal argument where we can't take a peek at what I actually said.
What the hell are you talking about? It's like you're seeing an argument where there isn't one.
ReplyDeleteI just said that I might well be wrong. When do you ever hear that from a crhistian about their faith, other than Eric's tentative claim that he might be, but of course he isn't?
This is a valid thing to consider. I know of quantum physicists that think it's a valid alternative to the materialist paradigm. It's at least an honorable thing to consider, not pure 'woo' as you are wont to think it is. So I'm considering it. If this makes you think that you need to fight with me over it, have at it, but I'm not fighting here.
So, it's not Brian's wife I'm talking to here then?
ReplyDelete-------------------
And what's this supposed to mean? I'm sensing a slur here, and frankly this places you on the side of the kneejerk scoffers of everything they've never heard of... Is that where you want to be? You'd be in interesting company. Lots of Christians.
So, you reduced my response to one line and we were all supposed to forget what I said about unique circumstances then?
ReplyDelete----------------
I reduced your reply because of brevity, not as a technique. It wouldn't have mattered if I'd included the entire reply; you were stillsaying that it wasn't an odd thing, and I said that it was, due to the factors aligned against us. You were no doubt including that in the set of 'all things not odd' because it does admittedly fit in there as an outlier, but still a part of normal distribution, and I said that even if that is true, we still managed to beat some heavy odds here, and isn't it funny that I self-hypnotized to produce exactly the result we got? It's statistically significant to me that we produced an outlier 'on demand,' or so it seems. Perhaps not of course. I'm NOT saying that it DEFINITELY happened the way that it did because of my meditations on it. I'm saying that I must NOTICE the fact that it did happen as a long shot, an unlikely occurence, and factor that into my 'calculations.'
LOL, yea. That's right! I'm a knee-jerk scoffer of your totally unfalsifiable drivel!
ReplyDeleteSo now you're getting cruel?
ReplyDeleteI didn't thing atheists were as base as that. Sure shows me, huh?
Hey, whatever. Have fun. That's what we're here for, right?
Hey, ya know what pboy?
ReplyDeleteI am realizing that you are as adamant that others follow your 'belief system' as anybody is.
Can't we both be atheists with slight differences? Can't I consider something that you think is silly without you acting as if I'm a little girl for it?
your totally unfalsifiable drivel!
ReplyDelete---------------
Have you tried to self-hypnotize to produce results? For years? Have you found a way to temporarily supress your current belief system to examine another one with no pre-existing biases, as if you were new to reality?
It's only falsifiable/provable to those who can do that. You wouldn't even consider the attempt.
It seems that Eric read something long ago that he agreed with , and has been reading to prove what he first agreed with is right, and of course can find many authors that agree with what ever one thinks. So I would say he reads to find agreement with his preconceived ideas, which he refers to as facts. On the other hand most on this blog seem to take the facts, and then come to some kind of understating of what they mean. Using the BB idea it would seem, that Eric is an actor trying to form something into reality, while waiting for the facts to determine what one thinks would be a non-actor, that responds to Eric's creation? I must have missed something here??????????
ReplyDeleteAs I understand it Brian, this is exactly how Astrology works, the alignment of the planets and such are just 'tools' for the Astrologer to work with.
ReplyDeleteAs I understand it Brian, this is exactly how Wicca works, the spells and candles and such are just 'tools' for the witch to work with.
As I understand it Brian, this is exactly how Christianity works, the prayers are just the 'tools' for the Christian to work with.
. .. and on and on.
In the BB, it wold be Eric who is holding onto a belief that is not in accord with 'concensual reality' or what we atheists consider the 'real world.' So according to the theory, he will receive actual confirmation of his belief from reality, thereby sealing him into it forever. When you 'pray' and it works, then you're caught. When you look for confirmation in literary sources, you will find something that fools you into believing that it is your confirmation, and you're caught. It's reality giving what you are expecting it to give you. Of course, it can give Eric no 'proof' that is strong enough to overturn concensual reality, to be credible to everybody. That's against the rules. Other wills are involved here. But it can and will give him things that he cannot 'prove' scientifically to any serious person, but nevertheless things that 'prove' it all to him.
ReplyDeleteIf this sounds like what I get, it is. The salient difference is that while Eric and others unconsciously allow their expectations to influence their reality, I have set the process up as an experiment whereby I say to myself "if this works due to my expecting it to work and nothing else, all it proves is that my expectations are what is causing it to work, and it in no way is verifying the truth of what I believe in, just the truth of the process." I'm isolating out the process, the mechanism, by 'pretending to myself' that it will work just because I've caused my subconscious mind to believe that it will. Because it does work, it caused me to realize that other people do it unconsciously all the time, like Eric.
So, I did it consciously, to isolate out the process. That's the difference as I see it.
.. and on and on.
ReplyDelete--------------
You poor thing. You're not getting it.
;-)
"You poor thing. You're not getting it.
ReplyDelete;-)"
What else did that little girl say?
" I admit the possibility or even the probability that I am wrong in this."
Yes, the little girl admits the possibility that she's wrong here, and the big tough macho man just can't bring his big macho self to do likewise.
ReplyDeleteI'll take being the little girl in this fight, thank you very much.
And taking my joke there (see the winky smily face?) as serious and rebutting it in a serious manner, well, let's just say that it's not making you look any smarter here. The appropriate response would have been to 'bust me up' back.
ReplyDeleteSo serious.
And so what that I admitted that I might be wrong? We were talking about understanding the process that I was describing, not deciding that it's impossible beforehand. Even if I'm wrong, you're still not understanding it.
I don't see how you can't make the link between religious 'woo', astrological 'woo', Wiccan 'woo' and your 'woo'.
ReplyDeleteAre you absolutely sure that there's not two of you commenting here?
ReplyDeleteOne comment realises that I was making a joke with YOUR 'little girl' comment and the other denies there's a joke there.
hmm.
I don't see how you can't make the link between religious 'woo', astrological 'woo', Wiccan 'woo' and your 'woo'.
ReplyDelete-------------
And I wasn't denying the link; in fact I explained it above, using Eric as the example.
I'm saying that IF there is any accuracy to astrology, and if you simply look at sun signs and meet a lot of people you'll see that whatever you want to say about it, there's often a high correlation between what the sun sign says bout the person and what kind of a person they really are, said 'accuracy,' where it's more than just coincidence (and it may not be) would be due solely to the expectations of those who believed in and still believe in astrology, and not to any pattern of stars or whatever. If prayer is ever answered (and it may not ever be, but if it is) then it is due not to any god hearing it, but to the belief of the followers that he does. If a wiccan spell ever works (and I'm not saying that they ever really do, but...) it would be due solely to the beliefs of the wiccans involved.
And a wiccan spell, btw, is not that different from the things that I do to enhance my concentration and my 'belief' in the result. It's just props. Whatever means something to you can be effective in altering your deep beliefs, and that's the goal, not summmoning Cernunnos or whatever.
Are you absolutely sure that there's not two of you commenting here?
ReplyDelete-----------
Oh sorry; that's because I was employing both my Yin and my Yang side in answering you.
(another joke; this time I actually spelled it out for you so you won't answer me seriously!)
Oooooooo... I'll yang you my lad!
ReplyDeleteIf you yang me, I'll yin! I swear I will!
ReplyDeleteThere are nearly an infinite way that one could describe reality. This BB idea is but one of many. Can I falsify it anymore than I can disprove that a God exists? No. But I think we can make some valid points that would argue against this type of belief based upon some things we are pretty clear about. People have posited existentialist models of perceived reality - akin to your dream state here, for a long time. I have to say that I do see analogs to the kinds of arguments other deists use to defend their belief structures and I think the difficulties are similar.
ReplyDeleteThe dream of the BB is no more resistant to the eternity problem than Christianity from what I can see. To say a dream or a God can be external to reality is I think the same thing.
To be true the dream state would have to violate all of our perceived natural laws. You might argue that we convince ourselves of these laws but that argument is no different than a religion one - reality is defined by the God and what we see contrary to the God is a trick of some kind. As a child I was absolutely convinced I could fly and no adult had bothered to argue the point until my header off the roof ran into the reality of a force I was at that time unaware of - gravity. I believed in all my heart that I HAD already flown (from a simple biochemical dream a couple of nights earlier)
Where did the BB come from? How did it become organized? How can everything noted in our reality be unable to violate the 2nd law of thermodynamics when something as vast as a cosmic consciousness does not? Where did its structure come from? What sustains it? Everything in our reality requires vast energy to remain viable (including stars) - where does the BB get enough energy to sustain itself over cosmic distances? How did it evolve? Animals on the earth came from descent with modification - the process of nonrandom sexual and natural selection upon random processes of genetic drift and mutation - what forces could shape a cosmic entity? Are there infinite layers above BB to answer these questions? Any kind of intelligence we can fathom requires some type of physical matrix - what is the BB's?
These are but a few questions that would have to be answerable in some falsifiable manner.
Many of the connections and coincidences that make people see patterns that don't necessarily exist are very well studied in cognitive science. Bias and false pattern recognition is a huge problem in human decision modeling. We are prone to see what we want to see which is why falsification has achieved such an exhalted status in science.
Finally, BB fails (in moi's opinion) the most critical test against deism - parsimony. Although we don't know all the details as yet about the nature of reality, what is pretty clear is that we rely less and less on deistic fudge factors to explain the gaps. And in science and math, when the contribution of a factor becomes superfluous to the solution to the equation, we drop it.
But to each his own - as long as you never claim that the BB told you that gays are evil or some such nonsense, try to teach BB in science class, or get a tax exemption, then old Pliny is fine with it ;)
Brian:
ReplyDelete"I have to say I was a bit taken aback when you said 'no utility.'"
Sorry to delay so long in response, but I am actually away in a different time zone than usual.
I meant by "no utility" that although your BB theory is as likely (or unlikely) to be correct as are the usual religious ones, theirs are made "useful" as an excuse to try to get affirmation of their unprovable ideas about reality/afterlife, as well as to try to manipulate both their Gods and their adherents. Certainly I think I tried to indicate that your BB theory is just as useful (or not) a way to try to explain reality as are the more standard religious theories, but as means to "respond" to that reality, not so much. I think I agree with Pboy that your theory is no less WOO than any other, even though it is, perhaps, a convenient way to think about what we know and don't yet know about our Universe and its realities.
To say a dream or a God can be external to reality is I think the same thing.
ReplyDelete----------------
If I may...
I'm not saying that. A God must be external to reality, however this *IS* the dream. There is nothing external to it, or at least, nothing external is necessary to it. Yes, we all believe it isn't a dream and so we automatically think that a dream would be 'outside' this reality, but that would not be the case. This IS the dream itself. We only believe it to be real.
I actually se a utility in it, too. Because of it I would be better able to see why so many people are delusional. If this reality confirms people's deep beliefs to them in some way, it actually encourages delusion. This is, or would be, an aid to understanding human nature, no?
ReplyDeleteAlso there is utility in thinking about the idea that this is all a dream, in that one can wake up from a dream, and not death, no? So it introduces another tantalizing (and less unrealistic) possibility for an afterlife of sorts.
Where did the BB come from? How did it become organized? How can everything noted in our reality be unable to violate the 2nd law of thermodynamics when something as vast as a cosmic consciousness does not?
ReplyDelete------------
I can answer all of the subsequent questions by answering these. This is my idea of how it MIGHT have happened. I'm sure there are many other ways that it could have.
Where did it come from? It is the default state of the 'universe,' a blank slate waiting to be written upon, a blank field of consciousness, like an empty mind. There is no matter or energy in the universe, only our dream of them, so this state doesn't violate anything we know of, since all we know of is the dream, which deceives us of course into believing in the universe as we've dreamt it.
This blank slate, or likely more accurately a full field of chaotic undifferentiated consciousness, had the potential to 'evolve' or rather, the consciousness in it started to form patterns. This may be an eternal cycle that constantly repeats itself or a one-time deal. These patterns were the forerunners of the beginning of the dream. It is likely the nature of even undifferentiated consciousness to form into patterns, perhaps much like a fractal in that 'strange attractors' cause similar 'bits' to find each other. More complex patterns led to organization. Organization of consciousness led to 'viewpoints' if you will, wherein consciousness contemplated itself. (getting hairy here, I know...) The dream started with a dream of primitive matter, *solidity* and *movement.* The dream and the dreamers evolved from that point together.
Sounds almost like the beginning of the Greek pantheon.
ReplyDelete"In the beginning there was Chaos.."
Yeah.
ReplyDeleteSo, hopefully we've cleared up THAT! It's time to put that one to bed.
ReplyDeleteEric will never admit it, but I think that there is a growing body of people at least practicing to oppose his, "Smarter than thou!" version of philosophical theism.("Why my 'proofs' are logically consistant!")
Eric himself seemed proud to admit that 86% of modern philosophers(was it?) are atheists!
This seems to indicate that he is happy to come on these kinds of blogs to argue the point with us 'amateurs' and debate us to, at worst(for him) 'the draw'.
Why, for instance, does it take Eric half a dozen comments to admit that there ARE different 'senses' to one of the main ideas of one of his 'proofs', "..beginning to exist.."
Seems to make him a word-magician, a debater, a 'damned deducer', giving me the impression that he thinks that all's fair in this kind of conversation and he's willing to give anything a 'try' if it might stump you.
I get that sense too.
ReplyDeleteIt's all a dance. Signifying nothing.
The God debate will go on until there are no more religions. Or no more humanity. And why is it that I can't help thinking that if it's the latter, it'll be the former's fault?
I mean, the christian narrative already includes armageddon, so many of the really fundamentalist type christians are workin' toward that now, so they get to see Jesus. They have their eye on the horizon, but what they're seeing there are mushroom clouds.
So, hopefully we've cleared up THAT! It's time to put that one to bed.
ReplyDelete-----------
I agree. I mean, you're never gonna get it...
Eric's proofs remind me of the old conundrum about throwing a rock at a tree.
ReplyDeleteYou can 'prove' that the rock will never hit the tree.
After you throw it, at some point it will be halfway to the tree. After that, as it continues toward the tree, at some point it will be halfway from THAT previous halfway point, to the tree. And at a later time it will be halfway from THAT halfway point to the tree. And so on, forever. It is always going to keep on being halfway to the tree, therefore it will never reach the tree.
Only with him the words are a lot bigger and harder to parse.
But they still constitute a fallacy. That damned rock does indeed, hit the tree.
Ah, good old Zeno. I was just recently thinking exactly that in relation to Eric's causal argument.
ReplyDeleteIn Zeno's paradox, it presupposes that you actually can halve the distance of a moving object and in Eric's first cause, he presupposes that a causal chain cannot be infinite by playing with the definitions of "cause".
Another thing that comes to mind, this time relating to how Christians always try to speak out about the 'gaps' in science, never considering how it's the nature of science to have gaps and also to fill them in eventually, is the bumblebee.
ReplyDeleteA few years back, modern science had a problem with the bumblebee. It's weight-to-lift ratio was all wrong. In fact, science could at the time 'prove' that the humble bumblebee *could not possibly ever get off the ground.* It could not mathematically fly, was the problem. And yet, there it goes... bzzzzz....
Was it GOD??????????????????
Er, nope. Turns out that the bumblebee wing stroke pattern was too complex for us to fathom at the time. Now it is known that the odd figure-eight pattern of the bee's wing in flight produces twin vortices which add considerable lift. The bee was too advanced for our science at the time. That was it.
And that, or a variation of that, is also 'it' for most of those other 'gaps' in science that the christians harp on as evidence for God.
Oh, so that's Zeno's paradox!
ReplyDeleteI've heard of it, but I didn't know that I already knew it.
And in science and math, when the contribution of a factor becomes superfluous to the solution to the equation, we drop it.
ReplyDelete-------------
We don't know yet if it's superfluous to the 'equation' of this universe, because we haven't solved that equation yet. It may in fact simplify the equation tremendously just at the point where we're a bit 'stumped.'
All the velocity paradoxes do is point out the strangeness of time and confuse the time it takes something to happen with the time it would take to split a number in half an infinite number of times.(Infinity)
ReplyDeleteZeno was so close to the idea of a 'limit', which just takes the idea of a set 'time' or a set 'distance' as the limit of the infinitesimal parts of the 'time' or the 'distance'.
The question boils down to, "How long does it take for a second to pass if it is split up into an infinite amount of infinitesimal parts of a second."
Answer:- One second.
The 'paradox' boils down to, "Since we can't imagine 'infinity' we're screwed! HAH!"
But no, not since old Isaac we haven't been.
St B, the indisputable nature of humans is to find a reason for our own existence. Man has a real need to believe in something and if you have kicked your 'God(s)' to the sideline then you are left looking for an even more abstract idea as to why we evolved from the single cell.
ReplyDeleteA universal conciousness (database!) is not such a far flung idea - we are made from the same materials so surely there something other than religion to hold us together?
In your comment on my Little Minx blog you presumed my label was 'wiccan'. The closest that I would allow you label me is Pagan, that is, Paganism in its most basic form with a God and Goddess within all of us, the yin, the yang, the right and the wrong. The perception of Pagans/witchcraft etc, is of a bunch of nuts dancing naked around a fire (great fun when fuelled with a few glasses of wine!!!) not of someone who believes that we are part of nature.
Unfortunately, whether you have a God, a belief system, or have shunned all organised religions man still finds himself opinionated on the wrongs of another's view.
You and Pboy are singing from the same hymn sheet (heh heh) so why don't you compare your similarities rather than trying to twist the point that you both agree on - just my opinion!
pee ess - concerning 'Theft', men are not dogs - I am a writer, I make things up!!
"..the indisputable nature of humans is to find a reason for our own existence."
ReplyDeleteThis is what's called a 'bald assertion'.
If you changed, "..the indisputable..", to, "..it seems to me that the..", it would make your comment much nicer.
I like to imagine you dancing, shit-faced on wine, 'round a bonfire, Minx.(Sandra Bullock is there too, for some reason.)
Indisputibly!(sp?)
Oh, yea, and you gals are dancing to, 'Child in Time', by Deep Purple!
ReplyDelete(who knew?)
Off topic, it's funny to watch this oil spill thang unfold on the 'lame-stream' media.
ReplyDeleteI call it that 'cos, if Palin was 'all for conservation, leaving the oil under the sea, and that', we'd never hear the end of the 'see I told ya sos'.
It's hilarious to me that everyone is blaming British Petroleum as if they're somehow not a global corporation working under the rules of the country concerned, in this case, the U.S.A.
But no, "ultimately", we hear, the responsibility belongs, not to 'drill, baby, drill' advocates, but to the corporations, even though, with a little tweak to Palin's policy(what a laugh), the 'ultimate responsibility' would be set squarely on OBAMA's shoulders!
Wouldn't it?
Hmm.. disappearing comment.
ReplyDeleteThe perception of Pagans/witchcraft etc, is of a bunch of nuts dancing naked around a fire
ReplyDelete-------------
Hi Minx! So nice to see you stop by.
The perception has gotten better then. It used to be 'someone to kill.'
I should have thought of 'pagan' instead of 'wiccan.' A much broader term.
I have none of the misperceptions. In fact I generally find pagans more fun to talk to than most. I'd love to find out more about your beliefs and thoughts.
Pboy, I admit I seem to share your Sandra Bullock fantasy there. Shame on me.
See Minx, you were right about men being doggies even though you were
'only fictionalizin'....'
You and Pboy are singing from the same hymn sheet (heh heh) so why don't you compare your similarities rather than trying to twist the point that you both agree on - just my opinion!
ReplyDelete-------------------
If we did that we'd never talk about this stuff...
I like pboy's arguments, actually. He's a check to my tendencies toward the 'fantastic.' And usually we do agree, on most other subjects. Just not this one. He calls such thinking 'woo.' And for all I know, he may be right.
Paganism in its most basic form with a God and Goddess within all of us, the yin, the yang, the right and the wrong.
ReplyDelete--------------
While I do not consider myself a pagan, I do see much value in learning to think about things in terms of duality, and have done so for years now.
Many of my meditation techniques I borrowed and modified from ceremonial magic. (gasp!)
I also have found it useful on occassions to divide the duality further. A 'quaternity.' As in , the tetragrammaton. I find it particularly useful in judging *people.* When I was single I'd use it as a mental checklist almost. Ask myself 'is she compatable with me in all four areas, as in, fire, water, air, earth, or yod, heh, vav, heh. Personal energy and drive, emotionality, intellectual capacity, and 'earthly' qualities such as appearance and sexuality. I wasn't looking for exact matches to me, just compatability in all four areas. Hard to find. When I did, I married her.
ReplyDeleteI think part of the problem is that you don't have an angle. There's no symbol that you could stick on a wall at the end of a building. No narrative.
ReplyDeleteYour theory will only make sense once you start taking money from innocent people and using it for prostitutes and that yacht you've been wanting.
C'mon in Brian, the sulfur's fine.
Judge you!
Harry, where you been? Missed you around the place, you and your 'altar' ego.
ReplyDeleteSo what papers do I have to file to take this show on the road? I need your expert advice. I'll give you a small percentage of course. I'll need to invest in a tent. I have this buddy Omar that makes them, but only in sets of four. Still, his fondness for wine might allow me to influence him in this matter.
So now that the moving finger on the keyboard has writ, writ again sometime. And never forget that it's all a checkerboard of nights and days, on which God with men for pieces plays.....
How about a circle split in quarters?
ReplyDeleteYou could explain how Jesus, of course(pfft), believed exactly as you do!
"Eric himself seemed proud to admit that 86% of modern philosophers(was it?) are atheists!
ReplyDeleteThis seems to indicate that he is happy to come on these kinds of blogs to argue the point with us 'amateurs' and debate us to, at worst(for him) 'the draw'."
Pboy, nonsense.
This isn't the only blog I comment on.
For example, I've often commented on Pharyngula, where most of the regulars are either hard core science buffs or working scientists. I enjoy commenting on blogs like that because I get to interact with smart people who are well trained in an area that I'm not well trained in.
But I also comment on blogs, such as Debunking Christianity or Common Sense Atheism, where many of the regular posters do have philosophical training. I enjoy such blogs because it's just fun to talk to others who share your passion for philosophy and philosophical reasoning, even if we disagree.
Finally, I comment on blogs like this one, or Rational Response Squad, or even Catholic Answers, where you get not so much people who are specialists in science or philosophy, but smart, well educated people who are interested in discussing the issues. The advantages of commenting on sites like this is that you guys will question things that others will take for granted (e.g. the whole discussion on whether Cambridge changes are changes at all).
So I enjoy talking to people with diverse backgrounds about the ideas I'm most interested in, and I learn a lot from every blog I comment on.
"Why, for instance, does it take Eric half a dozen comments to admit that there ARE different 'senses' to one of the main ideas of one of his 'proofs', "..beginning to exist..""
Pboy, I just have a difficult time understanding where you're going with much of what you write. The problem may be with me, I admit. But I did not try, as you suggest, to deceive you until I was forced to admit the different senses of "begins to exist." It just took me a few comments to see precisely where we were disagreeing.
"So, you're saying that the 'database' is an analogy, much like Eric says that God is an analogy?"
I never said God *is* an analogy, but that much of our talk about God is analogous with respect to the terms we use.
"I just said that I might well be wrong. When do you ever hear that from a crhistian about their faith, other than Eric's tentative claim that he might be, but of course he isn't?"
No, I genuinely mean it: I might be wrong. There's nothing tentative about it. I don't think I am, but that's entirely consistent with my knowing I might very well be wrong. (I think I'm correct when I say, "My fiancee isn't cheating on me," though I know I might be wrong. I don't think I'm wrong, but I admit -- and I don't say it tentatively at all -- I might be wrong.)
"It seems that Eric read something long ago that he agreed with , and has been reading to prove what he first agreed with is right, and of course can find many authors that agree with what ever one thinks. So I would say he reads to find agreement with his preconceived ideas, which he refers to as facts."
ReplyDeleteNot quite. Look at the blogs I mentioned above. Except Catholic Answers, they all have one thing in common: they're dominated by atheists, most of them very well informed atheists. Similarly, if you were to browse my home library
(which, at over 1400 volumes, is quite respectable! ;) ), you'd find a large number of books by atheists, from Bertrand Russell's classics to the more sophisticated treatises of Martin and Nielsen to all the works of the New Atheists. If you were to take a look at my MP3 player, you'd find (altogether) nearly two thousand debates between atheists and theists, lectures by atheists and theists, or interviews of atheists and theists. See, I actually seek out those who disagree with me, whether in person, in books, in media files, or online. Sorry, but you've obviously misread me.
"The salient difference is that while Eric and others unconsciously allow their expectations to influence their reality"
How in the world could you claim to know what's going on in my subconscious?
"Eric's proofs remind me of the old conundrum about throwing a rock at a tree.
You can 'prove' that the rock will never hit the tree."
No, those are paradoxes: we know the rock does hit the tree, but have a difficult time finding the flaw in the argument. My arguments would only be analogous if you're conclusion that God doesn't exist is as solid, or nearly as solid as the conclusion that the rock will hit the tree. I doubt even you would claim that that's the case.
"In Zeno's paradox, it presupposes that you actually can halve the distance of a moving object and in Eric's first cause, he presupposes that a causal chain cannot be infinite by playing with the definitions of "cause"."
I don't "presuppose" that certain causal chains cannot be infinite, I argue that they cannot. And I don't "play with definitions" of the term "cause," I draw distinctions among different kinds of causes and causal chains.
Do you deny that, say, a father is the cause of his son in a different sense that a lever is the cause of the motion of the stone? In the first case, we can remove the father after conception -- say, he dies -- and his son will still be born. In the second case, if we remove the lever -- say it disappears -- the rock will roll back and settle into its original position. That is, the lever is an *instrumental* cause of the rock's motion, and the rock only moves when the lever is moving. But, since the father need not even be alive for his son's birth -- and even if he is alive, he doesn't have to do anything subsequent to conception to bring the birth about -- the father is not an instrumental cause of his son's birth.
That's not "playing with definitions of cause," but making careful observations and drawing important distinctions.
Can we not remove the father's penis from the mother's vagina and the son will not be born, in precisely the same sense as if the lever disappears the rock settles back in place?
ReplyDeleteSimilarly if you do not remove the lever in time the rock will roll away independantly from further influence from the lever.
ReplyDeleteThey seem to be the same kind of cause to me, basically.
How are they not? I'm missing it again. I need 'schoolin...
"Do you deny that, say, a father is the cause of his son in a different sense that a lever is the cause of the motion of the stone?"
ReplyDeleteThe father is the cause of the lever moving the stone.
Do you deny that, say, a father is the cause of his son in a different sense that a lever is the cause of the motion of the stone?
ReplyDelete-----------
Uh yes, I guess that's what I'm a doin'....
Eric, this is really a fantastic example of how you play fast and loose with words.
The father is the cause of the lever moving the stone.
ReplyDelete----------------------
Or the father gave up, got stoned, and pulled his own lever.
Now here's what I think will happen:
ReplyDeleteEric, in order to bend the meaning of the word 'cause' has tried to differentiate between differen kinds of causes.
I replied in a very simple, straightforward manner, using basic logical examples, showing that said difference is not important, is not even a real difference.
Now, here's the prediction part. He starts with convoluted, I reply with direct, so now he is forced to go more convoluted in order to stay in the 'game.'
Here are the crucial differences that obtain among the two conceptions of causal chains:
ReplyDelete(1) In one causal chain, the action takes place over time: Joe is the father of Bill who is the father of Rob over the course of a few decades. In the other causal chain, the action takes place at the same time: the arm moves the hand that moves the lever that moves the stone.
(2) In one causal chain, each part of the chain acts on its own (the father, the sperm, and so on), such that the father could die immediately after ejaculation, e.g. prior to conception, and this wouldn't in any way alter the Joe/Bill/Rob chain). In the other causal chain, each part of the chain, rather than acting on its own, is acted upon by each preceding link (so that the stone doesn't move itself, but is moved by the lever, and the lever doesn't move itself, but is moved by the hand, and so on). This is what it means to speak of each link as an instrumental cause: it doesn't act on its own, but is the instrument of a preceding cause (unlike, say, the sperm, which act on their own).
(3) One causal chain can be infinite. We can easily conceive of an infinite causal chain of fathers and sons. But the second kind of causal chain cannot be infinite: If no part of the chain moves itself, but is moved by the preceding part, then an infinite chain of this sort would have no source of motion, since it would lack any part that moves itself.
"Now, here's the prediction part. He starts with convoluted, I reply with direct, so now he is forced to go more convoluted in order to stay in the 'game.'"
ReplyDeleteWell, if "acts over time/acts at the same time," "moves itself/is moved," and "can be infinite/must be finite" are "convoluted" distinctions, then your prediction is verified, but if not, then...
One thing i like about the BB analogy (I haven't quite decided if you are being deliciously ironic about this or not.) is how incredibly easy it is to create a religion.
ReplyDeleteAs long as it is based on an unfalsifiable claim it's hard to eradicate. Whether God or the BB it gets to change the rules for convenience. Violate physics? - no problem - the entity calls the shots. Like Freddy Krueger’s domain a dream state can be anything we wish it to be. We are a species obsessed with closure and labels. We seem to prefer almost any explanation of any sort to ambiguity.
It become impossible to change someone's mind once they latch onto something that by definition gets to write its own rules. You can't falsify it because you run head on into that realm of 'understanding being beyond human comprehension’ because the deity, God, consciousness whatever gets to alter play during the game. Our everyday lives have to play by some pretty repeatable rules sets but not 'It'.
This is a great metaphor however for empathy. If one believes that a BB universe is indeed the best explanation for reality then they would have to be pretty understanding of all the people who essentially believe the same thing but just think of it as a really old guy with a fuzzy beard. Thousands of people over centuries have had the opportunity to fine tune the circular logic of the great religions an add greater detail to the construct. So if BB makes sense then religion should be more compelling. The rules are the same but the story is more fleshed out. All share the same problems with origins and self organization without any external forces as well as trying to apply concepts of time that may only have relevance in BigBangdom but we hate not knowing anything.
This is why I am an amystic - at the end of the day when all is known I am sure that we will find that our existence is nothing more than a really lucky break that we should enjoy while we can. And not try to make anything more than that.
(1) In one causal chain, the action takes place over time: Joe is the father of Bill who is the father of Rob over the course of a few decades. In the other causal chain, the action takes place at the same time: the arm moves the hand that moves the lever that moves the stone.
ReplyDelete-----
So what?
(2) In one causal chain, each part of the chain acts on its own (the father, the sperm, and so on), such that the father could die immediately after ejaculation, e.g. prior to conception, and this wouldn't in any way alter the Joe/Bill/Rob chain). In the other causal chain, each part of the chain, rather than acting on its own, is acted upon by each preceding link (so that the stone doesn't move itself, but is moved by the lever, and the lever doesn't move itself, but is moved by the hand, and so on). This is what it means to speak of each link as an instrumental cause: it doesn't act on its own, but is the instrument of a preceding cause (unlike, say, the sperm, which act on their own).
----
A distinction that means what, practically, in this case?
(3) One causal chain can be infinite. We can easily conceive of an infinite causal chain of fathers and sons. But the second kind of causal chain cannot be infinite: If no part of the chain moves itself, but is moved by the preceding part, then an infinite chain of this sort would have no source of motion, since it would lack any part that moves itself.
---
A person moves the lever. Levers do not move themselves. So a part of *that* causal chain moves itself as well.
Sophistricated argument!
If a lever moves a rock it's one thing, but what if one lever is used to move a heavy baby, which grows up to move levers under other heavy babies, and so on forever?
ReplyDeleteEric; "Do you deny that, say, a father is the cause of his son in a different sense that a lever is the cause of the motion of the stone? In the first case, we can remove the father after conception -- say, he dies -- and his son will still be born."
ReplyDeleteYes, I do. More word games. They're differnt because on is a stick and one is a person. However, moving the rock past it's ultimate stability point and shooting sperm onto an egg are basically the same thing when you look at as far as "cause" goes. In your example, you are removing the stick too early for it to truly be analogous.
Not really different at all if you ask me.
Eric; "But, since the father need not even be alive for his son's birth..."
ReplyDeleteBut he does have to be alive for conception, or at least a couple minutes before conception...
Word games...
each part of the chain, rather than acting on its own, is acted upon by each preceding link
ReplyDelete-------------------
I see one chain where we are describing a three-stage process and another one in which the same process can continue indefinitely, but that is only because *its* same three-stage process produces a living organism that is capable of recreating the three-stage process.
So lever the rock down an infinite sloping channel wherein it hits another lever stopping it and thereby levering and starting the motion of another identical rock which soon hits another lever-rock setup, and so on, indefinitely.
That's kinda the same thing.
What is the point of making your distinction, dare I ask? A distinction that is to me like making a distinction between red and white roses when you're only considering buying roses for their value as mulch.
But he does have to be alive for conception, or at least a couple minutes before conception...
ReplyDelete----------
Shit I missed that one. I knew it felt all wrong.
He's very snaky, isn't he?
Brian; "Can we not remove the father's penis from the mother's vagina and the son will not be born, in precisely the same sense as if the lever disappears the rock settles back in place?"
ReplyDeleteYeah, I should read all the comments before I respond. Your response was much more... um.. elegant?
"So a part of *that* causal chain moves itself as well."
ReplyDeleteNot quite. Follow the logic of the causal chain further. The hand that moves the lever doesn't move itself, but is moved by the arm. The arm doesn't move itself, but is moved by the flexing of the muscles etc. The muscles don't move themselves, but are moved by various aspects of the nervous system, to the firing of neurons, etc. So, if you trace the chain back, tell me: Where *precisely* do you get to the part of this chain of instrumental movers that moves itself?
"So lever the rock down an infinite sloping channel wherein it hits another lever stopping it and thereby levering and starting the motion of another identical rock which soon hits another lever-rock setup, and so on, indefinitely.
ReplyDeleteThat's kinda the same thing."
No, you forgot the temporal aspect. Your example takes place over time, while the sort of causal series I'm talking about occurs at the same time. Think about it this way: not "backwards" in and through time, but "downward" at one point in time.
"But he does have to be alive for conception, or at least a couple minutes before conception...
ReplyDelete----------
Shit I missed that one. I knew it felt all wrong.
He's very snaky, isn't he?"
Huh? How did you miss this, which I just wrote:
"such that the father could die immediately after ejaculation, e.g. prior to conception"
Huh? How did you miss this, which I just wrote:
ReplyDelete"such that the father could die immediately after ejaculation, e.g. prior to conception"
-------------
In Ryan's example the father needs to be alive to ejaculate into the mother. In yours he can die but only AFTER he ejaculates.
Word games.
This is silly. I never said the father doesn't have to be there just before conception (assuming this all goes about in the normal, natural way); what I said is that he doesn't have to be there as a causal agent after that. That's the difference. This causal chain moves through time and the earlier causes don't have to be active to continue the chain; in the other kind of causal series, the causal chain is simultaneous (since we're looking at one moment of it, when the stone is in motion by the lever) and each causal element must be acting at that moment.
ReplyDeleteSo the father has to be there for the conception, and the lever has to be there to move the rock. If you take away either the father or the lever before the 'key action' that they're both there to perform, the chain ends.
ReplyDeleteIsn't that what I said?
You seemed to indicate that just because you can take away the father AFTER the conception and the chain doesn't end, that it was different. Of course it isn't, now that we've correctly defined the 'critical point' in the chain as the conception and not the birth of the son.
the causal chain is simultaneous (since we're looking at one moment of it, when the stone is in motion by the lever
ReplyDelete-----------
The causal chain set in motion may be different, but the type of change is identical, sir.
"You seemed to indicate that just because you can take away the father AFTER the conception and the chain doesn't end, that it was different. Of course it isn't, now that we've correctly defined the 'critical point' in the chain as the conception and not the birth of the son."
ReplyDeleteBrian, you're forgetting the two causal chains we're talking about: one is "...Joe, Bill, Rob..." and the other is "...muscles, arm, hand, lever, stone." *Of course they're different.* One takes place over the course of decades, doesn't require the action during those decades of each causal agent in the chain, and could in principle be extended infinitely back in time; the other takes place simultaneously, requires all causal agents in the chain to be active, and could not be infinite.
Here's another distinction (it's a little technical, and I try to avoid technical distinctions and terms as much as possible, but it might help): In the case of the hand/lever/stone, the causation is 'transitive,' i.e. if the hand moves the lever that moves the stone, we can say the hand causes the stone to move. But the Joe/Bill/Rob series is 'intransitive,' that is we cannot say that if Joe causes Bill and Bill causes Rob that therefore Joe causes Rob.
ReplyDeleteSee this difference?
So, one series takes place through time, doesn't require the constant action during the series of all causal agents, can be extended infinitely, and is intransitive, while the other takes place at the same time, requires the action of all causal agents during the causal chain, cannot be infinite and is transitive.
But the Joe/Bill/Rob series is 'intransitive,' that is we cannot say that if Joe causes Bill and Bill causes Rob that therefore Joe causes Rob.
ReplyDelete-----------
Can Bill and Rob exist without Joe even having been around?
Nope.
So it's been so long... how does all of this relate to your God being real again?
"Can Bill and Rob exist without Joe even having been around?
ReplyDeleteNope."
True, and irrelevant. I never denied Joe is part of a causal chain; in fact, I said quite clearly that he is part of a causal chain. The point is that it's a different kind of causal chain from the hand/lever/stone chain.
This distinction is important because it plays a key role in Aquinas's first way. (I didn't bring it up in this thread; I think it was Ryan who mentioned what I said about causation, and I was responding to him. However, when you work out the argument, it does answer the OP's issues with God's eternity.)
From Aquinas' first way:
ReplyDelete"9. Hic autem non est procedere in infinitum, quia sic non esset aliquod primum movens; et per consequens nec aliquod aliud movens, quia moventia secunda non movent nisi per hoc quod sunt mota a primo movente, sicut baculus non movet nisi per hoc quod est motus a manu.
But this is not to proceed infinitely, because then there would not be some first mover; and consequently neither some other mover, because second movers do not move save through being moved by a first mover, just as the stick does not move save through being moved by the hand.
--------------------------
But this is not to proceed indefinitely.
--------------------------
Why not? I don't see why not. The first cause of this universe could have been a 'seed' from another universe, perhaps a dying one. Or other, similar explanations. Or, science isn't exactly right about things yet and it needs a little more time to establish where it might have come from. Either way, this statement of Aquinas' is hopeful at best.
(I mentioned 'Aquinas' first way' to my wife and she said 'What? Six and a half pounds?')
ReplyDeleteEric "Brian, you're forgetting the two causal chains we're talking about: one is "...Joe, Bill, Rob..." and the other is "...muscles, arm, hand, lever, stone." *Of course they're different.*"
ReplyDeleteNo, really they are not. "...Joe, Bill, Rob..." and "...muscles, arm, hand, lever, stone." are the same if you replace "...Joe, Bill, Rob..." with "penis, cooter, seman, egg...".
"...Joe, Bill, Rob..." are not real, actual change, "penis, cooter, seman, egg..." is the only actual real causation taking place.
Eric; "i.e. if the hand moves the lever that moves the stone, we can say the hand causes the stone to move. But the Joe/Bill/Rob series is 'intransitive,' that is we cannot say that if Joe causes Bill and Bill causes Rob that therefore Joe causes Rob."
ReplyDeleteAgain, there is no differnce, because with "Joe/Bill/Rob" you are leaving out all the inbetween steps (and actors) that reduce down to "hand/level/stone" (i.e. penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby/penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby/penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby/penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby/and on and on).
because then there would not be some first mover;
ReplyDelete------------------
Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.
I'm afraid that I am capable of imagining a series of universes each arising somehow from the ruins of the previous, or a scenario where there are multiple universes and new universes are springing up all the time in some manner and we just happen to be in one of them, and also other similar scenarios wherein 'reality' including all the series of universes had no beginning in time and just stretches in both temporal directions infinitely.
ReplyDeleteMust be the weed.
Not sure why I used the term "cooter". One of the funniest things I've ever seen was Robin Williams on "Inside the Actor's Studio" explaining why "pussy" was his favorite "dirty" word. It's genius...
ReplyDeleteI see the problem now.
ReplyDeleteAquinas didn't have good weed. Limited his imagination.
Pussy is a dirty word?
ReplyDeleteNot to me or Robin Williams. Check out the clip, it's in here somewhere, it really is worth watching...
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evq8wnvTC3M
Basically, it seems like Eric, to manufacture a "distinction" is zooming out. He's looking at what amounts to basically the same thing, once with a microscope and once from 30,000 feet and then is prentending that they are differnt.
ReplyDeleteRyan, interesting choice of words, since this was the general impression that I was getting from it in my mind but hadn't put into words.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure if Aquinas' logic is as valid in the age of astrophysics.
ReplyDeleteThere are too many unknowns out there. In his day he had no idea of the coimplexities involved. And of course, he was looking for a particular result, not just looking at the data and drawing an impartial conclusion from that. He didn't have any 'bubble universes' concept in his day for instance, so he left no commentary about them. Same with most of it. We as a species still have basically no idea how it happened, but it certainly doesn't seem to be as simple as God going 'poof.'
And where does Aquinas address the paradox of God being eternal when he attempts to defeat that very sort of thing in his argument? He somehow sees no problem with a deity having no cause? What, has he met many deities and studied them or something? Where does he get his 'insider info' about deities so that he never even questions the idea of the cause of the creator?
What an obvious bias.
Thomas 'Equinus' is putting the cart before himself.
ReplyDeleteI know a really nice Pagan woman that lives here, locally. (in the Bible Belt!).
ReplyDeleteJudging from her and other interactions I've had (Hi Minx!), I'd say Pagans are some of the most spiritual people one could hope to meet.
Yes Mac, that and they have a lot less hang-ups.
ReplyDeleteHi Mac, and Hi again St Brian.
ReplyDeleteYour Merkan arguments fascinate me - I guess no one is interested in your personal beliefs over here any more,
so I suppose I'm off to define my personal woo...
After you define it, let us take a look and tell you what's wrong with it. I'm sure pboy will oblige you.
ReplyDelete(joke)
Stop in any time... your presence is a ray of sunshine in this sad little gathering of ruminating animals.
Just don't feed the Christians.
Your Merkan arguments fascinate me
ReplyDelete-----------------
Your Albionese lack of contentionsness is showing. Join in; the catharsis is refreshing, I assure you. Much like a deep colonic lavage.
"Harry, where you been? Missed you around the place, you and your 'altar' ego."
ReplyDeleteoneblood? He and I have solipsistic discourse on occasion :-)
Um, I mean, how dare you Brian! I'm shocked and appalled by your implication.
You have peed in my sandbox.
Judge you!
55 today.
ReplyDeleteGotta tell you that I'm mystified about the supposed difference between two chains of events.
I understand that we're supposed to have in our minds that the people are alive and 'do things', things happen to them and that, AND we're supposed to have in our minds that nothing happens to the rock or the lever after we're done comparing these things with the people.
But so what if the rock and the lever lay there 'forever' getting rained on? The unnamed levering guy brought the lever and the rock together from somewhere and there they lay circling once per day with the rest of the Earth, once per year around the sun.
Biggest 'difference' here seems to be that a whole lot more happens when one is dealing with living processes.
So what is the point?
Hi, oneblood and the Regulators, did I mention that I'm 55 today?
Happy Birthday, Pboy! 55! Wow.
ReplyDeleteAnd to think, I knew you when you were 54.
Happy Birthday Pboy
ReplyDeleteoneblood? He and I have solipsistic discourse on occasion :-)
ReplyDelete-----------
Meaning you discuss which of you is real?
I had solipsistic intercourse once... It was very lonely.
Thanks guys!
ReplyDeleteI think you knew me when I was 53 Brian! Time keeps on slipping, into the future.
Happy 55, pboy!
ReplyDeleteI remember a booze soaked birthday posting fest over on DDs blog a while back.
That was, I think, 2 years ago. We may have known a 52 year old Ian?
You quized me on a train riddle of some sort. Of course, I had no answer for you. I ain't a math guy, or science guy, or grammar guy apparently ;-)
Pboy - Happy Birthday! Hope you you're having an awesome day...
ReplyDelete=D
Pboy - Happy Birthday!! =D
ReplyDeleteHappy belated birthday you maple leaf clad brigand from the highlands.
ReplyDeleteMine's in five days.
Te juzgo!
Thanks everyone! I had a good day!
ReplyDeleteYea, mac, I remember that puzzle. Tough problem for 7th. graders.
Took me a while to figure it out.
I'm watching the Hitchens versus Boteach debate again on YouTube.
ReplyDeleteIn short.
Hitchens:- You can't just think GOD up!
Boteach:- Let's think GOD up!
Blech!
I'm trying to imagine the Big Bang and the billions of years that passed, the even more billions of years that passed, life forming, the even more billions of years that passed, then man.
Suddenly, since writing, the 'word of GOD' is codified, the Jews run from the Egyptians and that is hailed a great victory!
Hundreds of years pass and the utter defeat of the Jews is hailed as a great victory!
Science defeats many viruses and germs and overcomes much of the drudgery of day to day life for us, and is hailed as a great thorn in the side of religion!
Why not?
Science defeats many viruses and germs and overcomes much of the drudgery of day to day life for us, and is hailed as a great thorn in the side of religion!
ReplyDeleteI don't think science is a thorn in the side of religion, I think it is a thorn in the side of the religionist that refuses to give up on myths that science has proven wrong. Obviously religionist that endorses myths that have been proven wrong are not truth seekers while those religionists who are sincere truth seekers are willing to leave the myths, proven wrong by science, in the past.
Okay, Jerry.. science is hailed as a great thorn in the side of religion.. but not by EVERYONE!
ReplyDeleteWTF?
What amazes me, is that someone like MI(and I'm absolutely sure that you are a happy, happy person, don't get me wrong) can go through life not knowing the difference between 'libertarian' and 'liberal', the difference between 'secular' and 'sectarian', yet still feel they have a good grasp on things, still feel that they aren't being manipulated by, what amounts to, grifters.
ReplyDeleteThe political side of MI has been largely quiet here, as if someone told them, "Shhh! We don't know what to say right now, 'cos everything we say we believe is looking a lot like total bullshit!"
I predict that this won't last.
What do you say MI? Is there a difference between liberal and libertarian, between secular and sectarian?
You just don't know, do you?
I have a theory.
ReplyDeleteYou're all heathens.
Evidence.
You're all heathens.
Judge you!
.. and Infidels.
ReplyDeleteWhen someone asks me what religion I am, I like to say 'Apache' just to fuck with them. Is that wrong?
ReplyDeleteI'm not really seeing the point for Dawkins or even Hitchens to debate the Godders. I guess they can get a bit of fame and money out of it, but as far as doing any real good, it's impossible.
ReplyDeleteWhenever they debate a religious person the religious person doesn't have to win the debate; all they have to accomplish is to make it look like the atheist is wrong, even if they have to use idiotic illogical horribly wrongheaded 'evidence' of that, and the ignorant religious
'base' believes that they won!
It's a sisyphean task to get a believer to THINK.
You're right of course, Brian.
ReplyDeleteThat Rabbi, supposedly arging the point with Hitchens, had studied Hitchens book and was hell-bent on criticizing the book, and NOT debating whether or not there is a GOD at all!
Still, if I could pick the exact moment, Eric's way (very soon after ejaculation) might be the moment?
ReplyDeleteHappy belated birthday, Pboy!
ReplyDelete"It's a sisyphean task to get a believer to THINK."
Watch or listen to any one of William Lane Craig's debates and you'll see the opposite is the case. And Craig has debated Hitchens. Check out atheist reviews of the Craig/Hitchens debate, and you'll see that Hitchens lost badly. (If you check every now and then, you can find the video of the debate on youtube, but it always gets removed after a short time.) I have the debate on mp3, but the file is no longer available for free.
Actually, check out any of Craig's debates. He's debated Bart Ehrman, Hector Avalos, Victor Stenger, Keith Parsons, Christoper Hitchens, John Dominic Crossan, John Shelby Spong, Marcus Borg, Antony Flew, Frank Zindler, Paul Draper, Peter Atkins, Austin Dacey, John Shook, Massimo Pigliucci, Walter Sinnott Armstrong, Louise Antony, Paul Kurtz, Torbjorn Tannsjo, Quentin Smith, Ray Bradley, Richard Carrier, Gerd Ludemann, Kai Nielsen, Eddie Tabash...I could go on and on. These are all high quality opponents. And Craig has repeatedly challenged Dawkins, but Dawkins won't debate him.
Okay, guys, I know how fond you are of my cutting and pasting jobs. Lol! =D
ReplyDeleteI came across this article and wondered what you guys think about some of the ideas about midway down.
I'm not always into "prophecy" as such and that's not so much why I bring this link here to you.
I'm not asking you to "believe" or any of that: specifically wishing to engage in discussion on the possibilities of the future that are laid out here in the article.
Has anyone heard anything about any of the topics mentioned?
(I've seen a little about the seaweed.. and heart a teency bit about the satellites....)
Anyway, I'm curious to gain much from everyone's rational and intelligent standpoints.
BRIAN, if you don't mind, just incase the link below doesn't show up, would you mind if I cut and pasted the article? I'll check back hopefully in a day or two to see if that's okay... if not: anyone wanting the article can email me at thomasmch663@aol.com and I'll shoot it through to you.
MI
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.spiritdaily.org/espeanzapoower.htm
Hi, Eric! (and Brian, Flyod, Ryan, mac et al... ;~)
ReplyDeleteI really need to catch up with everyone's posts..
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
another try here:
http://www.spiritdaily.org/espeanzapoower.htm
"It's a sisyphean task to get a believer to THINK."
ReplyDeleteThat's something akin to what my mother would say to me. Except Sissy Peon was my nickname.
She would say, "It's a Sissy Peon task to get a believer to hand over a fat wad of cash."
Mom had a way with words.
---
Sissy Peon... man that's bad. If it weren't the Internet I wouldn't have attempted.
See what you've brought me too Brian? It's your fault.
You're now officially the patron saint of ridiculous puns for their own sake. Congratulations.
Well MI,
ReplyDeleteAs much as I like the phrase, "the registration of equations to their final expression," your two Catholic cats seem to not have been prophesying whatsoever.
They sound like reasonably intelligent religious people who were trying to grasp things they weren't trained in; but nevertheless tried to make some 'predictions.'
Predictions like sportscasters or weathermen make.
There's nothing there that screams, "Transcendent deity!"
Hey, Harry, thanks for the reply.
ReplyDeleteLike I said, I'm not interested in "prophecy", and I also said I'm not asking you to believe (ie: not discussing Transcendant/God here) but rather wanted to know what you guys knew, if anything, about the "possibilities" for our future of which were mentioned in this article.
"Judge you!" =D
(just joking with you ;)
+++++ I love your moniker and pic and "motto" +++++ and, apparently, your great sense of humor....
I've come to notice that Eric's way of saying he's been show to be wrong is just to not respond to the point at all.
ReplyDeleteOh, and Happy Birthday Ian.
"I've come to notice that Eric's way of saying he's been show to be wrong is just to not respond to the point at all."
ReplyDeletePlease, tell me *specifically* what I've been shown to be wrong about.
Eric; your distinctions of causation.
ReplyDelete"Again, there is no differnce, because with "Joe/Bill/Rob" you are leaving out all the inbetween steps (and actors) that reduce down to "hand/level/stone" (i.e. penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby/penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby/penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby/penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby/and on and on)."
ReplyDeleteRyan, if this is what you were referring to, then I'm sorry, but you haven't even come close to 'showing' that I'm wrong. In fact, you've just ignored everything I said to Brian and have gone on to commit the same error he did. Notice that the "penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby/penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby/penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby/etc." chain that you claim is "the same thing" as the hand/lever/stone chain" is nothing of the sort: the "penis/cooter/seman/egg/baby" (1) occurs through time, (2) is intransitive, (3) has causal links that don't need to be acting throughout the entire causal chain (the father could die just after ejaculation, the woman during birth, etc. and the chain will continue), and (4) could in principle be extended infinitely into the past, while the hand/lever/stone chain (1) occurs at the same moment in time, (2) is transitive, (3) requires the action of each link in the causal chain simultaneously, and (4) cannot be extended infinitely (because each link in the chain is an instrumental mover). You've missed each and every point I've made.
Eric; no, this...
ReplyDeleteRyan Anderson said...
Basically, it seems like Eric, to manufacture a "distinction" is zooming out. He's looking at what amounts to basically the same thing, once with a microscope and once from 30,000 feet and then is prentending that they are differnt.
April 30, 2010 10:51 PM
Ryan Anderson said...
Basically, it seems like Eric, to manufacture a "distinction" is zooming out. He's looking at what amounts to basically the same thing, once with a microscope and once from 30,000 feet and then is prentending that they are differnt.
April 30, 2010 10:51 PM
It's ok to admit you are wrong.
Ryan, show me how the Joe/Bill/Rob chain could (1) take place at the same moment in time, (2) work transitively, (3) require the action of each part of the chain *throughout* the chain, and (4) could not be infinite. If you are to defend your claim, this is what you must show. Either that, or you must deny that either Joe/Rob/Bill or hand/stone/lever are causal chains. And you know as well as I do that you can't make a case for either one.
ReplyDeleteAnd this distinction isn't one of my own. It goes back to Aristotle and is still taught in secular university classrooms today (usually with the more technical "causation per se/causation per accidens" terminology).
If you think you can show that this 1300+ year old distinction (it goes all the way back to Aristotle, and, like much of his work, has been in use ever since, up to the present day) is a false one, write it up and publish your argument in a journal.
Eric; well first off, neither is "taking place at the same moment in time". How long does it take for the ball in the game mouse trap to move from the begining to the end? Some amount of time, right?
ReplyDeleteOr alternativly, it could be argued that seman hitting egg is "taking place at the same moment in time" (it's not though) in the same way hand moving lever "takes place at the same moment in time" (it doesn't though).
"well first off, neither is "taking place at the same moment in time"."
ReplyDeleteHuh? The stone is moved by the lever during times t1 to t4, from points p1 to p4 (say). Are you saying that at t2 it's not the case that the stone, the lever and the hand are all in motion?
"Or alternativly, it could be argued that seman hitting egg is "taking place at the same moment in time" (it's not though) in the same way hand moving lever "takes place at the same moment in time" (it doesn't though)."
*sigh* How hard is it to grasp that the point at which the semen and the egg unite is not the Joe/Bill/Rob chain? Now, if you want to say that each causal chain of the Joe/Bill/Rob type contains elements that can be further analyzed in terms of the hand/lever/stone type, well then no kidding. In fact, that's a part of my case. But the fact that the one contains parts that can be analyzed in terms of the other no more dissolves the distinction I'm making than the fact that we can understand large scale activity in terms of classical mechanics, and subatomic activity in terms of very different quantum mechanics, dissolves the distinction between classical and quantum mechanics.
Eric; sigh... how hard is it to grasp that there actually is no Joe/Bill/Rob chain, there is only a seman/egg chain?
ReplyDelete"how hard is it to grasp that there actually is no Joe/Bill/Rob chain, there is only a seman/egg chain?"
ReplyDeleteRyan, of course your father's semen and mother's egg are a part of the causal chain that led to you. I've alreddy said this is the case in this very thread:
"In one causal chain, each part of the chain acts on its own (the father, the sperm, and so on), such that the father could die immediately after ejaculation, e.g. prior to conception, and this wouldn't in any way alter the Joe/Bill/Rob chain)."
Did you miss that part?
Now that we're clear that your father's sperm was invovled in the causal chain, let's see if we can agree that your father himself was invovled in the chain. If he was, then my point stands.
Hand = father
ReplyDeleteLever = seman
rock = egg
etc...
etc...
etc...
Actually, now that I think of it, the lever is simply a tool, so it's superflous to the example.
ReplyDeleteHand pushes rock.
Seman fertilizes egg.
The way I'm reading you Eric, is that you are saying, simulatniously, that "John put a nail in a peice of wood" and "John's hand moved a hammer to hit a nail into a peice of wood".
The only difference between those two statement are the level of detail... i.e. it's a manufactured lingustic difference.
What this gets you on your quest to "rationally prove [a very specific version] of god" I have no idea.
Eric; "let's see if we can agree that your father himself was invovled in the chain. If he was, then my point stands"
ReplyDeleteNo duh. But your point doesn't stand. The actual being that is the father is just another point in the chain so many steps back, like the hand is to the rock (or the hand to whatever the rock effects, etc...).
Me:- Bit of a critique of the Hitchens/Boteach debate.
ReplyDeleteEric:- HAH! (A whole slew of debates!)
What?
MI: do you happen to go by the name "ITs All About Jesus!!!" over at Ray Comfort's blog?
ReplyDelete"It's a sisyphean task to get a believer to THINK."
ReplyDeleteWatch or listen to any one of William Lane Craig's debates and you'll see the opposite is the case.
---------------------
I will see that? Are you sure? Because I don't see things like you do, through a lens of belief which taints all of my perceptions. I think you need that special lens there to 'see' how your side is right. Your Jesus Goggles.
Believers are funny, believing that they're right when they're so sadly and pathetically wrong. Funny. Like a toddler funny. You believe in a giant fairy in the sky. Of course you're right. Giant sky fairies are all over the place. How cute. Now eat your biscuit.
Willing to argue all day for Giant Fairy. Willing to lie for it, too. Some willing even to die for it. Too funny. But it's a sick joke, on society.
So Eric, you surely must see that you are a thousand light years from convincing me of anything other than the fact that you're a religious person that believes in what they believe in so much that they insist that it's true and right when it's fairy-tale-wrong, like the goose and the golden eggs. You're a tad better at the justification game, but so what, apologists devote a lot of time justifying idiocy so they get good at it. It's all a huge con, and you're the mark AND the con man, so I'd be stupid to take anything that you say seriously in this matter.
You prove my point. You can't think in the sense of seeing reality, because you've been corrupted. Your 'faith' has made you into a fool for Jesus. And they my friend, are a dime a dozen. You've just got a bit better vocabulary, which in my opinion is almost sad in a way, since your subject matter is a childish waste of time. Why waste the intellect defending stooooopid?
"In one causal chain, each part of the chain acts on its own (the father, the sperm, and so on), such that the father could die immediately after ejaculation, e.g. prior to conception, and this wouldn't in any way alter the Joe/Bill/Rob chain)."
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And the hand can be taken away from the lever after it moves the rock, dude. So what? The rock is already moved, the egg is already fertilized from the semin that the soon-to-die father ejaculated.
Why are you having a problem seeing this, eric? It's like it's intentional. It's not hard to follow, you know. The only difference is the final 'product' in one case can start the chain all over again, being alive.
In essence, I'm wondering why you're insisting that one plus one is five here, and thinking that you've proven it somehow.
"You believe in a giant fairy in the sky."
ReplyDeleteIf after all I've said you still blithely identify pure act, the ground of all being, the sustaining cause of 'to be' itself, or ipsum esse subsistens, with "a sky fairy,", then I've been wasting my time.
It's sad: you think I'm the one playing a game when it's clear that you are. You've decided, before the fact, that everything I say must be wrong, so you've just been looking for loopholes this entire time, and that's not honest inquiry; it's a game.
It's the ultimate irony: you're the one who is in fact guilty of what you regularly, and vituperatively, charge me with -- playing word games, and of choosing to blind yourself to the arguments and data.
You need to take a close look at yourself, my friend.
"In one causal chain, each part of the chain acts on its own (the father, the sperm, and so on)
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That's like saying that it's a completely different kind of change if we substitute in a person for the ball. Someone moves a lever and it moves a person, who goes on to lever another person, and so on. But a hand still pressed a lever and it moved something, so the actual nature of the change, is identical.
then I've been wasting my time.
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Are you telling me that you were trying to get me to believe in what you do? And now it comes as a surprise that it is not effective with me?
If that was your goal, then of course you're wasting your time. I just thought that you were demonstrating the arguments to me, not expecting me to actually BELIEVE them. C'mon, dude!
You need to take a close look at yourself, my friend.
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That's pretty funny coming from the person who believes in sky fairies.
It's the ultimate irony: you're the one who is in fact guilty of what you regularly, and vituperatively, charge me with -- playing word games, and of choosing to blind yourself to the arguments and data.
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If somebody came up to you and tried using elegant and complex philosophical arguments to prove to you that cats are the actual rulers of this world and not humans, and the cats have just been playing dumb all this time, but they're planning a takeover, would you have an open mind to their arguments and let them sway you if they sounded logical but were also very complex? No. However, you'd definitely want to hear their arguments, wouldn't you? And it's likely that you'd be fascinated by them, too, and by a person being that smart and logical-sounding about defending the idea of hyperintelligent cats taking over the world...
"Are you telling me that you were trying to get me to believe in what you do?"
ReplyDeleteNo, but I was hoping to have an honest discussion. Honest discussions advance: If I explain what I mean by 'God,' and proceed to argue for and on the basis of those arguments attempt to define God as I and classical theists throughout the ages have, while you insist on saying, after all this, that I believe in a sky fairy, we've moved no where. There has been no advancing of the discussion, and it's due to your prejudices, not mine. If you want to waste all your time attacking caricatures of what others believe, fine; that doesn't bother me. But don't pretend that you're interested in honest discussion, and in honest inquiry, when it's obvious you're not. You can't name a single time I've caricatured your views after being corrected by you, yet as the above quote demonstrates, you've done just that to me. And that's simply dishonest.
And I don't blind myself to the arguments and data! That would be inaccurate. I consider them very carefully, however as I do I remind myself how all of that elegance is based on one really old book written by men with agendas, that doesn't even make sense when you read it. This is the ground on which you've chosen to build. All of your argumentation springs from Mother Goose, essentially. So before your argtuments could have a possibility of swaying me, you'd have to produve other evidence, and you cannot other than mere words and sophistry.
ReplyDeleteI am sorry for how insulting all of this must sound, but I face a dilemma when talking to you or to any believer. My genuine opinion of it all, is quite negative, so if I share my honest opinion, it will invariably be perceived as a high insult. So I can lie and be nice, or tell the truth and hurt feelings. Unfortunately I tend to cleave to the truth over good manners. Hope you can stick it out, since I genuinely do like you for some reason. I guess I appreciate your mind even though in my opinion it is not perceiving reality accurately at all.
Try to imagine 'nothing'.
ReplyDeleteIt's impossible. The best one could do is to imagine an empty space, perhaps within it's own time-frame, with nothing in it.
Okay, now try to imagine 'everything', the entire Universe.
Vast reaches of void, empty space with galaxies of stars, with somewhat fuzzy edges where we imagine that even our imagination runs out.
Right there is where that 'ultimate' question, "Why is there something instead of nothing!", runs into trouble.
Are we talking the impossible to think of 'nothing' here, the empty space where 'something' could exist if it weren't for the fact that there's 'nothing' there, what?
I don't understand how you, Eric or anyone of your heros could say anything logical at ALL without defining your terms!
The 'first mover' there. Are we talking 'in time and space', or are we talking 'something impossible to even imagine!'??
Assuming the latter, no-one's logic is so good as to postulate from the known to the unknown and somehow imply that they've said anything sensible about the 'still unknown'.
But you can ALL pretend that you can, right?
There has been no advancing of the discussion, and it's due to your prejudices, not mine.
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Due to the nature of the argument any 'advance' of it would result in me becoming a believer in your God. I mean, I'll never get you to see your delusion; that's the nature of one. So all that CAN happen if the argument advances, is me starting to believe in what you're talking about.
And it's 'judice' and not 'prejudice.' Yes, I have judged your faith long ago, multiple exposures to it, and also to *reality* which your faith denies, and I'll take option 'B' thank you very much. It's not like I'm prejudiced; that would mean that NOTHING would get me to believe it. That is not the case. As soon as you produce your God before me, I promise you that my credibility will soar. But all you're doing is what the fundies do, only more elegantly. You cling to the BELIEF over all else, and bend the facts to fit. The fact that you're better at making it sound real, in no way sways me into thinking that it is.
I've told you plenty of times, Brian, insults don't bother me one bit. But dishonesty does. And if, after I define God as the ground of being, the sustaining cause of being itself, or pure act with no admixture of potentiality, you insist on identifying that with 'a sky fairy,' well, that's dishonest.
ReplyDelete"So all that CAN happen if the argument advances, is me starting to believe in what you're talking about."
ReplyDeletePure rubbish. One could understand the rather obvious differences between a sky fairy and pure act without accepting either, and that basic understanding would advance the discussion.
As I said, insults don't bother me. Heck, they can sometimes make a conversation more interesting by adding some humor to it (if you don't take yourself too seriously). But dishonesty does bother me, and for this reason: discussions with dishonest people are *boring*.
And if, after I define God as the ground of being, the sustaining cause of being itself, or pure act with no admixture of potentiality, you insist on identifying that with 'a sky fairy,' well, that's dishonest.
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If I define your god as nonexistant, would that feel better? Because that's the real truth. As to it being 'dishonest' for me to look at all your verbiage and spurn it utterly, I don't see how. In fact, that's NAKED BALDFACED HONESTY. You rarely get that elsewhere, dude.
I only chose 'sky fairy' to allow you to see how ludicrous it all is to me, elegant arguments for silliness. I thought you needed to know that. I really actually truthfully do see you as a brilliant defender of Mother Goose. This is not something that should come as a shock to you, sir.
Pure rubbish. One could understand the rather obvious differences between a sky fairy and pure act without accepting either, and that basic understanding would advance the discussion.
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Pure act? Ooooooo. Sounds real.
I'll tell you what's an 'act.' Christianity. And it's not a pure one, either. I only wish that they'd lower the curtain already. We're tired.
Eric; "If after all I've said you still blithely identify pure act, the ground of all being, the sustaining cause of 'to be' itself, or ipsum esse subsistens, with "a sky fairy,", then I've been wasting my time."
ReplyDeleteWell, to be fair, Elohim does have a couple "fairy" features.
Of course, that part of the bible is "inspired", not "revelatory". An especially convienent distinction for people who are grounded in modern thought but want to try to keep the bible relevant.
But dishonesty does bother me, and for this reason: discussions with dishonest people are *boring*.
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That's odd. I never get bored talking to you.
Maybe that's because when it's creative dishonesty, it's a lot more entertaining?
;-)
One could understand the rather obvious differences between a sky fairy and pure act without accepting either,
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Obvious differences? Two things, both of which are nonexistant, are identical. Zero is equal to zero.
And yes, that's really how I see it.
the sustaining cause of 'to be' itself
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As heinlein would say, you're putting descartes before des horse.
"I AM" is the core of me, and I am not sharing it with your deity, sorry.
"And if, after I define God as the ground of being, the sustaining cause of being itself, or pure act with no admixture of potentiality.."
ReplyDeleteMeaningless drivel.
I was thinking I might have some ground-of-being burghers for supper tonight, with some cause-of-being chips!
Of course that would go well with a admixture of potentiality of Heinz Ketchup and some pure act of root beer!
Well, to be fair, Elohim does have a couple "fairy" features.
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He does magic, grants wishes, and has problems with iron. He's a fairy allright.
Yeah, 'after I define God, for you to deny what I'm defining, is dishonest.'
ReplyDeletePretty heavy stuff. Sounds like something Yaweh would say.