dhw: Practical Consequences Pt.1 (Humans)

by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Thursday, November 12, 2009, 18:05 (5281 days ago) @ dhw

dhw...-> ...Until scientists find explanations, I'm prepared to consider other possibilities ... such as a power beyond our comprehension (which is far from saying a UI exists). Who are you, Matt, to lay down what is "reasonable" and what is not? Who are you to say that only scientific evidence counts (see below)? We have unsolved mysteries, and until they're solved, each of us must decide for himself what constitutes a reasonable or unreasonable explanation. In my case, the options stay open.
> -Hrm... I must have done a good job of not communicating myself. First, non-biological objects: you said that she has no basis for saying a UI doesn't exist. I was countering that there IS such a basis. A problem I have with flighty concepts such as a UI, is that you have to be able to account for how it interfaces with the physical world. Since we know that particles behave in predictable ways, and that we haven't seen anomalies to suggest otherwise, we don't have any evidence that would suggest there's merit to a UI, unless the UI is trying to hide itself from us--which for our purposes means it doesn't exist "to us." -> You write: "all questions are true or false", -You left out my qualification "In Science." -and the determination of the "true/false" always results in the rejection of conclusions that aren't supported by the evidence." (Let's ignore your earlier, vehement opposition to the very concept of "truth".) -Please, see above. Science isn't about truth in any absolute sense, but building testable models, and all tests must be falsifiable; therefore all questions must be binary in nature. -It's you who talk of conclusions, not me. The evidence for abiogenesis has not been found; the nature, origin, and workings of consciousness are unknown. No objective conclusions can be drawn. But you join GC in assuming that the conclusion will be ENTIRELY materialistic. Science is objective. Until there's evidence, there's no true/false, and so any judgement can only be based on preconceived ideas. That is the whole point of my earlier post, but again see below on the subject of "evidence". 
> -For abiogenesis--we have tantalizing clues from nature; self-construction of complex structures happens without intelligence guiding it. (Crystals for one simple example.) Also please note that the origin of life is clearly one of chemistry and physics; we're chemical creatures living in a physical universe. Even if we were "designed" lets note that we are clearly material beings and therefore there IS a material process that resulted in life being formed. We also know that life HAS had a progression on our planet that moves towards increasing complexity; just as we inferred the big bang, we infer a similar (relatively) simple origin for life. (Note, I'm still separating "belief" from "acceptance.") - -> You wrote: "Since I say it's unreasonable to believe in a UI because of no evidence, you will also say that the same lack of evidence prevents me from saying a UI doesn't exist." No, I won't. We all know you can't prove such a negative (Russell's teapot), so why attribute this silly argument to me? It's the lack of evidence for the materialist solution and not the lack of evidence against a UI that makes the alternative an equally reasonable/ unreasonable/subjective solution. You ask: "If you think leprechauns don't exist, what reason do we have to also believe that a UI exists? [...] Your reasoning of "sitting on the fence" resurrects ALL of these monsters." No it doesn't. Nor do I give you reasons to believe in a UI. You keep falling into this trap of your own making, which is your refusal to accept the negativity and neutrality of agnosticism. It's based on what we don't believe, not on what we do, and in putting the case for not rejecting, I do not put a case for believing. I'll try once more to get this across. Please read on.
> -I understand that agnosticism draws a line in the sand and says "I feel I don't know enough to pick this side or that side." I recognize this and don't (intrinsically) have a problem with this. Note that my own "agnosticism" is predicated upon epistemology, and the concept of what we really do/don't know about the universe at large. (Until you can "build" it, you can't fully understand it.) -What I'm driving at here is a question as to why you're willing to give equal hearing to things we can't gather evidence for. I can't, and that's my own problem. -We hear all the time about supernatural claims, but I find it interesting that they only come from religious people. In the great scope of things we don't hear about all the non-supernatural claims; because these never cause a stir. -Our "controversies" occur I think because we deal with these issues differently: I assume all claims are false until found reasonably true. When studying a claim, I ask "what is the evidence." We all know that I have a high threshold for evidence--which might well be another real sticking point. To me, evidence is something that can actually be studied; so *evidence* is inherently material in nature. (I'd be a bad person on a jury, because I don't care about "eyewitness testimony.")-Grad school: STILL unknown.

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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.\"