151. Dalai Lama defends Islam as peaceful religion

Comment #210564 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 7:48 pm

Jack Rawlinson,

actually, on many topics - he is really enlightened. For example, he once stated that since science shows complete mechanistic determinism to be false, that's the way it is and buddhist doctrine is false. Concerning a few political and moral issues, he's also very enlightened.

But yes, when it comes to rebirth - that's just unjustified dogma.

152. The Politics of God

Comment #210561 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 7:44 pm

In my opinion - Plantinga never fails to meet the "(son of the) great pumpkin"-objection, that his reformed epistemology is arbitrary concerning the object of knowledge (god).

Basically he argues that theism is justified if true, and unjustified if false. But I think one could twist and rationalize any stupid position in that way (with reformed epistemology) to make it appear that way.

153. The Politics of God

Comment #210560 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 7:41 pm

... you'll have to read Plantinga then.

I suggest you start with the section on reformed epistemology in the article "The Epistemology of Religion" on Stanford, if you haven't already read it.

154. Common New Atheist Fallacies

Comment #210557 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 7:40 pm

raytheist,

exactly!

And since you seem interested in the detailed discussions... I could point you towards a few highly interesting books. Difficult stuff, but worth it.

Because - there ARE very sophisticated arguments for theism out there, and there are very sophisticated discussions of these out there - if you want to engage with the cream of the crop of arguments and refine your position, you should take a look at the works of these people:

Theists:
-Richard Swinburne ("The coherence of theism", "The existence of god")
-Alvin Plantinga ("Warranted Christian Belief", "God, Freedom and Evil")
(-William Lane Craig) ("Reasonable Faith", "Apologetics")

Atheists:
-John Leslie Mackie (his "The Miracle of Theism" is probably the best book criticising theism ever, if slightly outdated)
-John Sobel ("Logic and Theism")
-Michael Martin ("Atheism: A Philosophical justification", "The improbability of God"(ed.), "The Impossibility of God"(ed.))
-Nicholas Everitt ("The Nonexistence of God")
-Richard Gale ("On the Nature and Existence of God")
-Graham Oppy ("Arguing about Gods")
-Keith M. Parsons ("Burden of Proof")


These are all pretty difficult for the layman (don't know if you are one, - just a disclaimer :), but I think they're definitely worth it!


... hope I didn't bore you with this or wasted your time. It's just that I find this stuff very fascinating and as you mentioned the arguments, I thought I'd shamelessly plug the top-notch people in the field of philosophy of religion/philosophy of atheism :)

155. The Politics of God

Comment #210555 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 7:29 pm

Yep - most theists are incredibly naive. I've even recently heard a theologian say that the problem of theology was not that people believed to little, but that they believed far too much. I was pretty close to asking him "So, do you stand up in your church and tell the entire congregation that they very likely have a far too simplistic, naive and philosophically definitely untenable concept of god?".

But then, Plantinga's reformed epistemology is exactly about defending the naive theism of the masses as justified because properly basic - an unspecified belief in the existence of the Christian God (with the central attributes, even if their definitions are unclear to the believer).

Oh well... we certainly have our work cut out for us.

156. The Politics of God

Comment #210552 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 7:26 pm

Mackie had an entire book - these guys only had a few pages and thus had to cut straight to the chase...

157. The Politics of God

Comment #210545 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 7:14 pm

So, Brian - what did you think of the parts of the book you've read?

Radesq,

-a favourite of mine. I spend hours at a time engaging with it. In fact, I probe it deeply on an almost daily basis. :)

158. The Politics of God

Comment #210539 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 7:04 pm

Seems my joke was worse than I thought.

Yes - that's the book I was referring to.

You said you were reading something of his - my question was, which of the two papers he contributed to this compendium did you read recently... and, what do you think of it?

159. The Politics of God

Comment #210534 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 6:53 pm

You think Martin is one of the books you're reading at the moment?

I was under the impression that he was a person, not a book - strange :)

So, are you reading "The impossibility of God"?
Martin is the editor, and has contributed two essays to that wonderful book:

"A disproof of the God of the Common Man"

and

"conflicts between the divine attributes"


Or are you simply referring to his TANG? The answer to the TAG?

(TANG= "Transcendental Argument for the Nonexistence of God"... TAG= "Transcendental Argument for the Existence of God")

160. The Politics of God

Comment #210529 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 6:42 pm

Oppy is great - but that particular book doesn't seem to offer anything beyond what you can find in the works of Martin and Sobel, and it doesn't seem to deal with Plantinga's epistemology at all... although it discusses Gödel's ontological argument.

161. The Politics of God

Comment #210527 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 6:39 pm

Modal Logic is still formal logic, Brian :)
It's interesting - but as I said, for all intents and purposes you are likely to need it, wiki will do.

Craig is interesting, but mostly because he's an extremely good debater. Some of his arguments are interesting - but Swinburne and Plantinga are more sophisticated I'd say.

Regarding Plantinga's epistemology, let me quote wikipedia:

Reformed epistemology

Plantinga espouses a Christian religious epistemology that he dubs "Reformed epistemology." According to Reformed epistemology, belief in God can be rational and justified even without arguments or evidence for the existence of God. More specifically, Plantinga argues that belief in God is properly basic. Plantinga eventually develops a religious externalist epistemology that, if true, explains how belief in God could be justified independently of evidence. His externalist epistemology, called "Proper functionalism," is a form of epistemological reliabilism.

Plantinga develops his view of Reformed epistemology and Proper functionalism in a three volume work on epistemology. In the first book of the trilogy, Warrant: The Current Debate, Plantinga introduces, analyzes, and criticizes 20th century developments in analytic epistemology, particularly the works of Chisholm, BonJour, Alston, Goldman, and others. In the second book, Warrant and Proper Function, he introduces the notion of warrant as an alternative to justification and goes deeper into topics like self-knowledge, memories, perception, and probability. In 2000, the third volume, Warranted Christian belief, was published. Plantinga applies his theory of warrant to the question of whether or not specifically Christian theistic belief can enjoy warrant. He argues that this is plausible. Notably, the book does not address whether or not Christian theism is true.

His critique of "evolution PLUS naturalism" as epistemically self-defeating is also interesting, but in my opinion quite lame compared to his epistemology.

Well, Sobel is pretty hard, and I think it would be beneficial to have a deeper knowledge of the creme de la creme of theistic philosophy before reading Sobel and Martin, so as to be able to judge if they deal with the arguments sufficiently.

162. The Politics of God

Comment #210521 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 6:26 pm

Worth learning? Depends - what do you want to do? Having a basic understanding is certainly useful - but you can get that from reading the wiki-entries on modal logic, Kripke-semantics and possible-worlds semantics.

Anyway - I suggest you read some Plantinga and Swinburne... the most interesting arguments are definitely Plantinga's reformed epistemology and Swinburne's cosmological argument (that is, after you have dealt with Plantinga's modal-ontological argument, which you have after reading Mackie). both Plantinga's epistemology and Swinburne's arguments have been refined and strengthened over the years - and are (for all I know) the best theists have to offer.

... for that, you can read either the original material, the many papers on the internet or some secondary literature like Keith Parson's "God and the Burden of Proof" or Michael Martin's "Atheism: A philosophical justification" and his follow-ups.

163. The Politics of God

Comment #210518 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 6:11 pm

Well, Ockam was one of those people who were very straightforward: About god, nothing can be known, not even about his existence or nonexistence - it is a matter of faith, not knowledge or rationality.

Anyway - if you want something challenging, pick up "The Coherence of Theism" and "The existence of God" by Swinburne.

He is definitely a worthy opponent! Something to sharpen your philosophical teeth on.

164. The Politics of God

Comment #210507 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 5:44 pm

Are all these words really necessary? What is wrong with simply saying "Religion is a tapestry of delusion, and those who still believe are fooling themselves"

Because left like this it would be a baseless accusation, without justification, and any actions taken because of this view would be morally barbaric (because resting on an unjustified premise).

That's why we need to argue for it - and it can be done. It is being done. But most people (theists and atheists) engage each other with (mostly) valid but not very sophisticated arguments.

I think the arguments for one's position (especially where it has a moral dimension) have to be watertight. For one thing because I aim to have knowledge, not just conviction - for another because intellectual honesty and a realization of the moral dimensions requires this.

Have a look at J.L. Mackie's "The Miracle of Theism" for a fair, detailed and sophisticated critique of theism.

Anyway - that's my position.

Brian,

well - at least we know these were present in Ockam before DeMorgan laid them out. But the latter is still seen (together with Boole) as the father of formal symbolic logic.

165. The Politics of God

Comment #210502 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 5:38 pm

Of course people who specialize in medieval philosophy and theistic philosophy will regard Augustine and all the others as really significant... but if you were to look at all the philosophy-departments in all the secular universities - you'd see that Occam/Ockham is by far more significant. Also, if you took a poll among philosophy-professors, you'd find the same.

At least that is how the situation appears to me.

I mean, the refinements of platonistic and aristotelian philosophy in the middle-ages are still somewhat significant, but Occam's philosophy of language, to logic (he formulated the DeMorgan laws!!!), his contribution to the problem of universals and of course his famous Razor made him immortal in philosophy.

166. The Politics of God

Comment #210499 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 5:25 pm

You know what undergraduate philosophy is like - the Greeks, then nothing happens until Descartes.

Actually, the only people regarded as really significant for philosophy in general (by philosophers) between the greeks and Descartes were Duns Scotus and William of Occam (who is also a favourite in Munich, since he lived there for about 25 years, having fled from the church, ironically), but Occam again much more than Scotus, who is mainly important for theologians.

167. [UPDATED] Venomous Snakes, Slippery Eels and Harun Yahya

Comment #210465 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 3:57 pm

decius,

I knew that Austria did this before they were annexed (and they were in no way the victims there as they like(d) to portray themselves).

For all I know you may be completely right... my point was about the value of a state you can trust to be neutral (in general). Perhaps Switzerland doesn't qualify completely, but it comes as close as any for all I know.

I do not recall serious actions of mediation in that conflict either... again, I was talking about historically reliable neutrality being an asset in providing mediators to conflicts in general.


Anyway, thanks for correcting me!

168. [UPDATED] Venomous Snakes, Slippery Eels and Harun Yahya

Comment #210439 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 2:35 pm

Jiten

The value of their Neutrality to everyone was the only thing that saved them from being annexed as well.

Of course it would have been something different if Switzerland was a superpower with a strong military that could really have made a difference.

You evidently just didn't get my point - and bring up platitudes instead. This was about the value of having a party that can be counted to be a neutral party for any conflict. Two warring factions for example would not want a mediator from a biased, non-neutral state. Conflicts can get resolved through neutral mediators. And I thought we realizes that violence is only ever the final option - efforts to mediate need not be appeasement.

Get a grip and stop throwing around platitudes. I'm unimpressed.

169. [UPDATED] Venomous Snakes, Slippery Eels and Harun Yahya

Comment #210413 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 1:39 pm

Also, don't forget that the Nato interventions in eastern Europe in the 90s were handled mostly by European forces... in fact, someone I knew died in one of those missions.

Fruthermore... you ought not to forget that some of the dispute in Nato pertaining to the military involvement are due to the fact that these missions in Iraq (not so much Afghanistan, but Iraq most definitely) are seen (rightfully if you ask me, but you know my position on this already) as being the follow-up to an unjust war of aggression, violating international law etc, which neither Germany nor some other countries that are involved in Iraq today wanted or approved of.


As for Switzerland - I find it highly commendable that there is one nation on earth who attempts (and largely succeeds) to be a neutral arbiter.

Probably the only country on this earth that hasn't got hectolitres of blood on its hands from starting or engaging in unjust wars.

170. The Politics of God

Comment #210401 by MPhil on July 14, 2008 at 1:11 pm

What a wonderfully insightful article...

...Very good analysis of the positions on political philosophy of the greats - though somewhat one-sided - the thoughts of Kant, Hegel, Rousseau, Hobbes et al were a bit more complicated.

It's missing a second half, though... the positions of Isaiah Berlin, John Ralws, Nozick - the most important political philosophers of the 20th century... and their view was truly enlightened with regard to religion (well, at least mostly, as I have shown in a paper of mine).

Again - we need to teach critical thinking in all such matters throughout the school-life of children ... ethics, political philosophy and so forth - how to approach these subjects rationally, and why this is of tantamount importance.

It's the only chance we've got.

171. Church Cancels Teen Gun Giveaway

Comment #210051 by MPhil on July 13, 2008 at 7:52 pm

a very high percentage were criminals killing other criminals and who cares about that?

What a cynical worldview.
So sad...

172. PLEASE WRITE IN SUPPORT OF PZ MYERS

Comment #210023 by MPhil on July 13, 2008 at 7:07 pm

Nah Brian, made perfect sense...

...but honestly. Most catholics (except for theologians, philosophers etc) will have no idea about the neo-aristotelian metaphysics behind transsubstantiation. They just have been told it is so, it's mystical and appeals to their desire to know "deep" truths - so they believe it.

And, what's more, you cannot disprove the transsubstantiation - it's a self-immunizing hypothesis. It isn't open to falsification. But still, there is no justification whatsoever for believing it - Occam's Razor does a good job here as well.

173. PLEASE WRITE IN SUPPORT OF PZ MYERS

Comment #209989 by MPhil on July 13, 2008 at 5:38 pm

Comment #209987 by decius,


I completely agree... but the statement "... it takes religion" is exclusive, and as such unwarranted.

174. PLEASE WRITE IN SUPPORT OF PZ MYERS

Comment #209988 by MPhil on July 13, 2008 at 5:37 pm

Decius,

well - saying "Don't make a fuss - it's just a cracker and you have no right to be offended" - that IS begging the question against the Catholic, because his claim is specifically that this is not just a cracker, that there is transsubstantiation taking place.

Of course this is silly, and of course the burden of proof is on the theist - and of course the fact that this contradicts known laws of the universe means that we have no justification for judging it to be anything but a cracker unless provided with sufficient evidence... but I don't think Steve objects to that.

Simply that saying "get over it, it's a cracker" is begging the question. Explaining why there is no epistemic justification for believing this to be the body of Jesus Christ makes it an argument - but the demand to stop crying because its a cracker in itself is indeed begging the question against the theist.

Anyway - that's how I see it.

175. PLEASE WRITE IN SUPPORT OF PZ MYERS

Comment #209981 by MPhil on July 13, 2008 at 5:06 pm

"...for good people to do evil- that takes religion".

I find that statement embarrassing - it's far too narrow. It's not religion, but every conviction-with-moral-dimension-held-without-sufficient-evidence - people are indoctrinated into stupid and dangerous political ideologies as well, and do "evil" things without being "evil" people per se.

176. Church Cancels Teen Gun Giveaway

Comment #209927 by MPhil on July 13, 2008 at 2:26 pm

prostitute goes out, priest comes in.

Yes... THAT's what the priests are going to do in such a situation... rrrrright.

177. Church Cancels Teen Gun Giveaway

Comment #209889 by MPhil on July 13, 2008 at 1:24 pm

That's the problem - isn't it. A dilemma. There is good reason for that - but it leads to a spiral of excessive violence.... and many many "accidents" with guns, like shooting someone who you mistake for a burglar. If you ask me, owning and operating lethal weapons shouldn't be the norm... and especially not for children.

Still - the only objective information we really can get about the "value" of gun ownership are such statistical comparisons as I outlined above.

But then there is the problem with the entire culture of violence, fear, bias, anti-intellectualism, machoism, lack of reflective ethics etc - as evident from the media. But sadly that's true (although to varying degrees) of most countries. Although Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland etc seem to suffer the least from this.

178. Church Cancels Teen Gun Giveaway

Comment #209878 by MPhil on July 13, 2008 at 1:11 pm

Just take a look at the statistics.
Compare countries regarding guns per capita and crimes involving guns per capita... one ought to take areas with roughly equal population density for a meaningful comparison...should make it pretty clear.

People who believe to have a direct connection to the creator and sustainer of the universe, the final and ultimate morality AND who think that their country is the bestest, freest, goodest, wonderfullest country on god's earth and that the "American Race" is the crowning achievement of the world (compare countries populations' levels of religiosity with prevalence of nationalism)... yes, that's exactly the kind of people I want to be armed to the teeth... not.

179. An Irishman's Diary

Comment #208912 by MPhil on July 11, 2008 at 11:22 am

Nice test, Raiko... though the average results are a little depressing:

# You scored 100% on Beginner, higher than 63% of your peers.
# 48/100 You scored 100% on Intermediate, higher than 48% of your peers.
# 38/100 You scored 93% on Advanced, higher than 38% of your peers.
# 80/100 You scored 93% on Expert, higher than 80% of your peers.

Someday I'll reach the 100%... but so far not bad for a non-native speaker I would say :)

180. Susskind Quashes Hawking in Quarrel Over Quantum Quandary

Comment #208056 by MPhil on July 10, 2008 at 2:33 pm

"Why does mathematics work?" "Why does logic work?" "What is the purpose of the universe?" "What is the connection between mind and matter?" As I said, these seem like legitimate questions, but you can't imagine what answers would be like. My sense is that consciousness is one of those questions.

Philosophy has some very good ideas on all those... and the connection between neuroscience and philosophy of mind is a very fruitful one, too.

181. McDonald's Makes Jesus Cry

Comment #206838 by MPhil on July 8, 2008 at 9:34 pm

An interesting perspective, Bonzai.

You may be seen as the embodiment of not so much the devil, but rather urban civilization that drives a wedge in their family

That might be so - but as my girlfriend told them - she had stopped to believe even before we got together, but was too afraid to tell them.

But from what I know about them, how they live, what they believe, where they work, how they integrate etc... this urban vs rural culture as the underlying factor isn't the case.

They (her parents) were born into a rural family, which was (is) part of a very religious community - but they moved to the inner city and lived there for over 25 years. They worked at a church-institution (priest-seminar - her father as a groundskeeper - both employed by the church), and very active in the lutheran protestant religious community of the inner city.
Now, lutheran protestantism in Germany is usually very liberal - they have no problem with homosexuality per se (although they don't allow homosexual priests) for example. This is one element accepted in urban culture and their religious culture. They allowed their children normal degrees of freedom when it came to going out, drinking, etc... and they're not the "no sex before marriage"-type either.

Generally, concerning such things which don't actually threaten their belief in itself or how they express it, they are very liberal.

They are thus not really opposed to modern, liberal urban-culture (which is not anti-theistic at all, mostly just indiffernt - and thus not "infringing" their religion.)

But their religious worldview is so important to the entire family that they indoctrinated their children (very successfully, in the case of my girlfriend's sister) - and that her not believing this is seen as a kind of betrayal. They ask themselves what they did wrong so that their daughter has become an atheist - they are shocked and appalled. I would even say they would have far less of a problem with her being gay if that were so... but a-religious, that's just the one thing that is impossible, unacceptable.

That's why I think it's not so much urban vs rural culture in general, just that they happened to be extremely religious, being born into families who were part of a very religious rural community where everybody believed and believed. And I literally mean EVERYBODY - and where this is seen as fundamental. It's perhaps (no, scratch that "perhaps") the one thing that unites this rural community and underlies the social structure there.

So I think that while you are right that they feel their culture, their social structure threatened in addition to the religious worries about meaning, afterlife etc... the root of this is religion, or better "religiosity" - not rural culture per se and just happening to include religion.

182. McDonald's Makes Jesus Cry

Comment #206822 by MPhil on July 8, 2008 at 9:07 pm

mordacious1,

thanks for sharing. If I may ask: How does your wife deal with this? What is her opinion?

183. McDonald's Makes Jesus Cry

Comment #206815 by MPhil on July 8, 2008 at 8:51 pm

I guess I'm saying that when talking about emotional topics, don't get too emotional. Perhaps as a philosopher you'll be able to do that with some ease.

You're right - and I hope I can do that. But it's just tearing me apart as well to see what they do to her - what this does to her... what religion does to her.... it's very hard not to get rude - because the truth in this case (that this is absolutely immoral and despicable behaviour based on an immoral and hypocritical belief-system) is offensive to them. But I will do my best.

184. McDonald's Makes Jesus Cry

Comment #206814 by MPhil on July 8, 2008 at 8:49 pm

Well what can I say? I think for some people religion is not just belief, but an identity. In this case if a family member convert to other religion or become atheist, it is consider not just an disagreement of metaphysics, but an act of betrayal.

Absolutely!

They cannot think outside their interpretation-scheme of Christian-theism which underlies everything else - they were indoctrinated into it, and the style of the indoctrination (the interpretation of the parents) and the content of that worldview (the dogmas) make them nearly (I hope not entirely) incapable of even considering that it might not be so.

(of course they told her "it happens that one doesn't feel god - but you have to pray and wait and keep on looking!" - basically they want her to reconsider her position, see if it is really so and try to find god. "Self-reflection" seems to be missing in their vocabulary - because concerning what they are demanding/requesting of her, this is exactly what they are incapable of seeing - that it applies to them who uncritically accept theism more than to her, who really struggled, but at one point simply couldn't believe any longer.)

They - as you correctly say - identify with this. It's part of who they are. Sadly, they are not the kind of moderate theist who would be disappointed and sad, but is accepting and tolerant. This kind is thankfully predominant in German culture - especially urban-area- and youth-culture, but in Bavaria, especially the rural areas it's different.


They really believe that life without god (or belief in god for that matter) is entirely devoid of meaning, that the world would be a terrible place without god - that love and morality would lose all their meaning... and above all, that she might or will be forever separated from her family, from them - and from God unless she finds god again. And of course they love their daughter and she loves them - so they cannot, must not let that happen.

That's the most disgusting and devious thing about the doctrines of Christianity if you ask me (I talked about this in my essay, Brian - remember?)

185. McDonald's Makes Jesus Cry

Comment #206804 by MPhil on July 8, 2008 at 8:35 pm

I'm - of course - grateful for every piece of advice. I just want to grab her parents and her sister and get it into their heads that they're emotionally torturing and blackmailing this wonderful person whom I love. How dare they!

You know what they said? (paraphrasing) "So, if I just happened to die in a car crash, you would be perfectly okay with thinking that you will never see me again"!

That is just so incredibly disgusting!

Oh - and of course her mother said "So, the brain-washing of your boyfriend worked, then - did it? Perhaps we gave you too much freedom [in choosing an atheist as a partner]"

I don't know whether to cry, puke or kick something - those seem all perfectly appropriate.

186. McDonald's Makes Jesus Cry

Comment #206798 by MPhil on July 8, 2008 at 8:27 pm

Her family still says they love her - and I think they do. They are just as of yet unable to see that what they're doing is definitely not good for her, and not the moral thing to do.

I hope that they will come to terms with her being an atheist - I had a conversation with Steve. I think I agree with him that in most cases, although it might take a while, they come to terms with such things.

What's more - she so loves her family that it is impossible for her to sever the ties and "live with the fact[...]"... not trying to make them at least tolerate this fact.

I'm doing the best I can... and I'm going to talk to her family soon. Try and show them that their worldview is at least not the only possible one, and that their daughter's life hasn't become devoid of meaning, morality, comfort, love etc... try to convince them that I love her, care for her and would never let something bad happen to her. Show them that they have to accept that either they can produce arguments for the position they take that stand up to scrutiny or admit that they are believing blindly, without justification and then have no right to treat her like this or make any demands regarding this whatsoever.

187. McDonald's Makes Jesus Cry

Comment #206793 by MPhil on July 8, 2008 at 8:18 pm

I do of course agree, Brian. And these people see themselves as upholding morality before and above all others.... and praise the perfect justice and morality of their dictator. Disgusting is the least.

That reminds me - my girlfriend came out to her very religious family as an atheists on monday... they're making her life hell now through emotional blackmail and intolerance of the worst kind. She suffers so horribly from this. It really breaks my heart. They are emotionally torturing this wonderful, loving, caring person who even know is so worried about her family and loves them so much. It's so absolutely despicable and horrible that it makes me wanna scream. I can only cry - nothing gets through to these people.

I won't say "For good people to do evil deeds it takes religion" - that's just a special case of "For good people to do evil deeds it takes a sufficiently dogmatic and uncritical worldview".

I really don't know what to do... this is tearing her apart.

188. McDonald's Makes Jesus Cry

Comment #206788 by MPhil on July 8, 2008 at 8:11 pm

Re: "fulfill"... ah, I see. Makes kinda sense, but is it the most reasonable interpretation? Anyway - how can one "fulfill" a law? One can "fulfill" a task, a prophecy, one can obey a law - or uphold, embrace and promote a law... but "fulfill" a law?

The only interpretation that would make sense to me is the logical, kinda-model-theoretic interpretation as in "Model M fulfills structure S", but that would be incompatible with "rendering obsolete".

189. McDonald's Makes Jesus Cry

Comment #206785 by MPhil on July 8, 2008 at 8:08 pm

Bonzai,

- This is a very good explication of the Christian doctrine of hell, and why it only be coherently interpreted one way. Very informative (and a christian-site). It makes sense if you believe all that stuff. It's utterly despicable and makes God literally an infinitely worse "person" than Hitler, Mao, Stalin and Pol Pot combines with regards to genocide, torture etc.

190. McDonald's Makes Jesus Cry

Comment #206782 by MPhil on July 8, 2008 at 8:04 pm

Bonzai - you're right. It was "fulfill"... but I don't see how that can be coherently interpreted as "rendering obsolete".

Anyway - Brian makes another very good point. God is thought of as perfect and immutable... so basically that precludes the veracity of him being so very different in the old and the new testament - which is why many theists try to argue that the OT god and the NT god are perfectly consistent.... and then they go on to say that some (many) parts of the OT are outdated and no longer valid.

But then, a perfect, immutable and omniscient god can have no desires - would be static, and thus couldn't make choices, or be angry or offend or disappointed or change his mind (creating the earth, seeing that it didn't work out and then sending a flood - to name the most obvious example).

And then of course the fact that Hell is an NT invention and the OT stating that the dead are simply dead.

191. McDonald's Makes Jesus Cry

Comment #206766 by MPhil on July 8, 2008 at 7:23 pm

And aren't you aware that quoting bits of Leviticus that don't apply any more since NT times [...bla....bla...]

Wonderful... Jesus said that he came to uphold and strengthen the old laws (as laid down in the new testament), not supplant them. It's so convenient, isn't it - The bible is the word of god revealed to mankind, and the OT is part of that. It's official dogma in most branches of Christiantity that the OT is just as much a part of the holy scripture and just as "right" or "true" than the NT - but since you cannot admit that the bible contradicts itself constantly, you move from one interpretation to the other, declaring this part irrelevant or outdated and another as actual and important as you see fit.

What's it like having to twist beyond recognition ones position to make it fit what you cannot deny?

And before you accuse atheists of the same... go stick your head in a pig.

(Sorry guys, had to say that)

192. [UPDATED] Venomous Snakes, Slippery Eels and Harun Yahya

Comment #205726 by MPhil on July 7, 2008 at 6:21 pm

Wow - now I see the error of my ways... you guys are right. I bet you have read through all the peer-reviewed papers, studied the evidence carefully - probably majored in biology and paleontology as well. You must have the best understanding of the scientific process ever, and of probability evaluation of evidence with respect to coherence, parsimony and explanatory broadness...

...and to think... all these millions of brilliant people who studied this stuff for decades were just deluded fools, where the truth can be seen by anyone.


...

...


Oh wait - that's right. You don't. You aren't. You obviously haven't got a clue - but the arrogance to think you know better than the scientific community in the field these people have devoted their lives and considerable intellect to study.

And the worst part - you don't even know how ridiculous you are.

193. Mormons urged to back ban on same-sex marriage

Comment #201590 by MPhil on June 29, 2008 at 9:06 pm

Finally, if you have had even a brief introduction to mathematics (set theory, algebra and the rest) these ontological arguments will be utterly painful to read as they are riddled with holes.

While I certainly cannot claim to have anything more than basic knowledge of mathematics, I have studied logic and philosophy of science, which - as you will know - make quite some use of set-theory, category-theory, model-theory etc.

I think it might not be possible to find all the holes in the ontological arguments from mathematics (including set-theory, category-theory) alone. I think you need basic first and second order predicate logic, modal logic, model-theory and semantic interpretations for that - but given that - yes, they are indeed painful to read - although technically interesting (as in - "Let's find out exactly where it fails")

Doesn't that remind you the typical undergraduate mistake that the maximum of any set of reals exists?

Hmm... I'm not sure if the analogy is sufficient to make this into a formal criticism. "Greatness" may have degrees, but does mean there is an ordered set of greatness-instantiations with the properties of the set of real numbers?

Yes, I've heard about that. That is basically assuming God exists without an argument. Personally, I find such an option unworthy of any answer.

I find it, well, not "worthy of", but demanding deconstruction - people who bring up that "argument" think they really have grasped some deep truth with this... they need to be taken down a notch or two.

Let's assume that a set of axioms A results in a sound logical system that mathematically describe our universe such that the statement that "God exists" is false in this system.

I doubt whether in such a system, "God exists" would be false. I would assume it would simply not be defined and thus meaningless.

194. Mormons urged to back ban on same-sex marriage

Comment #201577 by MPhil on June 29, 2008 at 8:23 pm

qomak,

actually, many theists claim that God is the ultimate source of reason, and of abstract entities/universals (the "ideas" of God) to which mathematical entities belong. Furthermore - I really don't see how a mathematical model of the universe could potentially dismantle the ontological argument.

Even if it were possible to construct a mathematical model that explains everything including the "beginning" of the universe, it would only disprove the "first cause" argument - not the ontological one... or perhaps I'm missing something, but I don't think so. (Then again, I don't think the ontological arguments are of any real consequence, either. I think they are technically - logically - interesting. But that's about it :)

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Comment #201571 by MPhil on June 29, 2008 at 8:16 pm

Actually, while it is certainly important, I wasn't actually talking about the conceptual/metaphysical assumptions pulled apart by Quine (and even he can be doubted), but about the fact that Hume's concepts of "ideas", "passions" etc and their relations are very outdated and simplistic - we know so much more about the mind, information processing, psychology and stuff.

Hume and Kant were absolute giants, and most theist arguments fail to even meet their criticisms - which aren't outdated at all (I think).

As for the last paragraph - I think I may just have to side with your wife here :) Either you are a fool like me and actually try to make a living out of it (all the while knowing that it's highly likely I will have to earn money some other way, maybe go into pre-university education or something) or you either wait until your retirement or restrict it to your spare time :D

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Comment #201564 by MPhil on June 29, 2008 at 8:00 pm

That is indeed an important section of Hume's, Brian.

I'm confident I wouldn't really need to tell you this, but you know me - I just can't keep my mouth shut: One thing you have to remember is that Hume's concepts of "ideas", "passions", "reason", their specific definitions and interactions are hopelessly naive. Not for his time, of course - but from what we know now from neuroscience, psychology, philosophy of mind etc... A brilliant, wonderful philosopher to whom we all owe very much, but I think this has to be kept in mind.

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Comment #201556 by MPhil on June 29, 2008 at 7:51 pm

mordacious1,

I'm not really, but I did watch the game. The German team was dreadful - the Spanish team was brilliant (especially Torres). They absolutely earned the cup.

I'm really anything but a soccer fan (and I really dislike the flag-waving and whole proto-nationalism in such sports), so I wasn't invested at all, I really don't care. But thanks anyway for extending your condolences :D

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Comment #201545 by MPhil on June 29, 2008 at 7:32 pm

Brian,

have you read Mackie's discussion of the ontological arguments as of yet? As I said, I find his arguments very convincing, except that I think he underestimates the force of the Kant-inspired argument that existence is not a predicate but a quantifier (and, as I said modal necessity or possibility are operators, not properties)

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Comment #201543 by MPhil on June 29, 2008 at 7:29 pm

Ah yes, I just re-read the last few relevant posts, and this indeed seems to be what he is claiming. Wow, I've never actually met anyone - including theist professors of philosophy who found the ontological argument convincing in any way.

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Comment #201538 by MPhil on June 29, 2008 at 7:23 pm

Brian,

you're doing fine, and for once I'm getting tired at an almost normal time... someone in your time-zone is better suited to do this right now - although I might stick around for a few more posts :)