Feeling Reality (General)

by dhw, Tuesday, February 15, 2011, 20:31 (4839 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: We are still left with a theoretical choice between a UI and an impersonal, non-conscious universe.-It is an argument from complexity AND incredulity, because neither you nor I can believe that such complexity could arise by chance.-DAVID: Here we agree. But for your thinking, if chance can't do it, what does? -This is the great difference between theists and atheists on the one hand, and agnostics on the other. You say God, the atheist says chance, and the agnostic says: "I don't know." Not believing in God and not believing in chance are not the same as DISbelieving. We keep an open mind, because, as you said yourself, it's all a mystery.-dhw: The design argument therefore leads us down the same cul de sac as the 'first cause' argument ... who caused the cause / who designed the designer? ... and so it supports agnosticism, not theism.-DAVID: Your answer does not follow. Either you accept a first cause or you do not. By definition there is nothing before a first cause. -The "first cause" may be a non-conscious, undesigned universe which by chance has spawned life, or it may be a conscious, living, undesigned intelligence which designed life. Either way, the first cause was NOT DESIGNED. Since both versions require faith that a living intelligence (God or us) can exist without having been designed, the design argument does not favour either version. It favours the "we don't know" and the "we shall never know" versions, which = agnosticism.-dhw: I was simply expressing my bewilderment at the fact that although atheists may appreciate the miraculous complexity of it all, they are still able to dismiss the idea of design. -DAVID: But you cannot dismiss design, and you seem unwilling to accept first cause. No Aristotle for you. Back to the picket fence!-Correct and incorrect. I cannot dismiss design, and I am happy to accept first cause ... but see above: first cause need not be a UI or demiurge. (Thank you, shanoxilt, and welcome. Didn't the demiurge mess about designer-fashion with existing material?) First cause may be a mindless universe. MAY be. We don't know. And so agnostics keep an open mind and do not dismiss design, do not dismiss chance, do not dismiss a UI, do not dismiss a mindless universe. Those who actively believe in (feel the reality of) one or the other do so by way of faith ... though the word is anathema to many atheists ... and those of us without such faith sit on our fence and get pelted from both sides. We are heroic martyrs, scorned and vilified because we sit up for our non-beliefs, but though we patiently point out the flaws in the reasoning of those on either side, we remain wonderfully humble and modest and conciliatory because ... how many people can admit this? ... in at least one of our non-beliefs, we are wrong.