Practical Consequences (Humans)

by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Tuesday, November 03, 2009, 05:31 (5291 days ago) @ dhw

Matt: [...] if you don't accept the claim that God exists, based on the fact that there is no scientific evidence for it, then you don't really have any other choice BUT to accept chance.
> 
> There seems to be a general reluctance, both on this forum and elsewhere, to accept the possibility that someone might not believe in God and might not believe in chance either. If I could accept either explanation, I would no longer be an agnostic! Most of your post follows on from this strange blind spot.
> -Well, the reluctance you perceive from me, is really the entire reason that I lean materialist. I pretty much spit out my entire thought process on why I think "no god" seems more reasonable. -At the same time, I realize that the total amount of knowledge we have access to is still going to be quite limited on this speck of dust. So I'm willing to keep the possibility open. One can't get a good picture of the entire cosmos by sitting in place. (Sorry my cosmological colleagues!) -
> You write: "faith in science is by no means an attempt at "gap-filling"." You have ignored the context of my remark (perhaps I should have said "her" atheist faith). Greta Christian's article is an attack on religion and the "God-of-the-gaps". She is clearly convinced science will prove that life and the mechanisms for evolution came about by chance plus as yet unknown natural laws, and consciousness will turn out to be "entirely biological". There is no evidence for this belief, -Actually, the one iron-clad argument she had is regarding consciousness: We have no evidence at all for non-biological consciousness. That was (to my mind) the most damaging argument against a universal consciousness that I'd ever heard. I don't know how much training you've had in logic, but she's using a proof technique here. (Though she might not know it.) I can't [EDIT] describe this without potentially seeming pedantic, but what she's doing is saying, "We have no evidence of non-biological consciousness." So what she then does is create the null hypothesis "non-biological consciousness exists." When you then analyze the statement and find that there is no evidence, the null hypothesis is proven false, making the converse statement true. -and there is no precedent by which to judge its likelihood (see the various assumptions she makes about how a designer ought to design life, and how evolution would be expected to work). Hers is therefore gap-filling faith. I'm not attacking science, or even faith in science ... I'm attacking the assumptions of atheists like Greta Christian who try to use science in order to do the very thing they accuse believers of. 
> -I agree with you more here, except that since both she, me, (and you) have already concluded there is no evidence of God; that leaves only one option: we study all the things we've GOT evidence for. Which means that yeah, we've got an incomplete puzzle, but it's the only one we've got any hope to work with. (And we won't find the answer just sitting here on this rock!)--> You write: "if you agree that there is no scientific evidence for God, and you accept naturalism, how is her position one of faith?" I do not accept naturalism/chance. I do not accept either theory (design v. chance). I'm an agnostic. See above for the nature of GC's faith. I would also point out that in the (so far) unique context of life in this tiny corner of the universe, scientific evidence is not necessarily the only form of evidence, since it presupposes the materialistic conclusion that the world is exclusively physical. I am not prepared to ignore, for instance, mystic or "paranormal" experiences.
>-If you accept science, then you accept naturalism--you have no choice. Science does not work without the assumptions of naturalism. (It's that one key assumption that pops back up time and again.) -Naturalism does not equal chance. -It seems to me that perhaps you are more frustrated that answers to those questions are so inconclusive. 
 
> Finally, you write: "To me the question is one of believing or not believing, and there is no middle-ground here." Of course there is middle ground. It's called agnosticism.-Here's the problem--and I get in many arguments with my other friends about this--when it comes to a belief, you've either believe it or you don't. Saying "I don't have enough information" is irrelevant--you still don't believe. I have a few other friends that also call themselves "agnostic." (Yes, I still consider myself agnostic too...)-If you don't have enough evidence to believe in God, it still holds that you lack that belief. Logically, atheists also do not believe in God. So to me, agnosticism is kind of an "artificial atheism." All agnostics are in fact, also atheists, when atheism is defined from its root "a" meaning "without," and "theism" meaning "belief in God(s)." All agnostics are "without belief in God." I still refuse to declare "There is no God," and I likely fall into that "bad category" of agnostics I remember you discussing in your original thesis, but that's exactly where I'm at. (My problem... not yours.)-[SEVERELY EDITED]

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\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"

\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"