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Thanks Esquilax. You're asking me to imagine a world I don't believe in (God saying some things that I consider bad are actually good) and then to comment on that. To be honest I'm not sure I can say much useful about a world that I don't believe in and that doesn't make sense to me. All I can really say is 'that world doesn't make sense to me'.
I sense we've probably reached an impasse on this one.
(September 5, 2014 at 8:03 am)Michael Wrote: On Satan. Yes, I was assuming you meant as the bible describes him (though he's generally the accuser or the tempter, at least outside of John the Revelator's vision with which I really struggle). I certainly assumed we'd both see Satan as part of creation rather than the creator. Sure, if you want to redefine Satan as something different you can, but then your words start to have no clear meaning to me because if you do that, without defining them in advance, you'll be speaking a different, and private, language that I can't translate.
Sorry if you've already answered this question .. but do you then think of Satan as a separate being, with intentions independent of you and God? I assume the answer is no but I'm interested in how you envision the being of this Satan of the bible.
September 5, 2014 at 11:07 am (This post was last modified: September 5, 2014 at 11:08 am by Michael.)
It's a Friday isn't it. Well on Fridays I think of Satan as the personification of Temptation, something inside all of us. On Saturdays I think of him as real.
Sorry, that's rather glib. But not too far from the truth :-)
I probably have a lot more Fridays than Saturdays. But there are times when what I hear on the news makes me wary of rejecting the idea of a real evil force (something beyond mental illness). Thankfully I have never encountered such evil, and am quite sure that all my own sins are truly mine and stem from me.
September 5, 2014 at 11:35 am (This post was last modified: September 5, 2014 at 11:37 am by The Grand Nudger.)
I have a similar experience. I find myself assigning familiar animate attributes to clearly inanimate objects and concepts. So I cuss at a wrench when it doesn't work and make disparaging remarks about it's mother's character and maidenhood.
I am the Infantry. I am my country’s strength in war, her deterrent in peace. I am the heart of the fight… wherever, whenever. I carry America’s faith and honor against her enemies. I am the Queen of Battle. I am what my country expects me to be, the best trained Soldier in the world. In the race for victory, I am swift, determined, and courageous, armed with a fierce will to win. Never will I fail my country’s trust. Always I fight on…through the foe, to the objective, to triumph overall. If necessary, I will fight to my death. By my steadfast courage, I have won more than 200 years of freedom. I yield not to weakness, to hunger, to cowardice, to fatigue, to superior odds, For I am mentally tough, physically strong, and morally straight. I forsake not, my country, my mission, my comrades, my sacred duty. I am relentless. I am always there, now and forever. I AM THE INFANTRY! FOLLOW ME!
Hey Esquilax, I hope your day went well? I've had a long day today, I'm tired, but I wanted to give you a partial response to our dialogue.
Oh, I also rearranged what you had said so my response reads better.
(September 5, 2014 at 12:47 am)Esquilax Wrote: So, let's recap: I bring to the table over a century of research in psychology, evolution, and the intersection of the two, performed painstakingly and rigorously by great minds working with live subjects, and you respond with "I just don't feel that you're right."
As to just-so stories, are you serious? We know things evolve, we know evolution selects for specific instincts and reactions, we know it does so within the context of sexual reproduction, and these are things that have been studied. Following the evidence from the beginning does lead us to the conclusion that attraction to signs of health is a trait that would be selected for. And your proposed alternative, that you're attracted to stuff because it's hot, is profoundly backwards. It's not even a just so story, it mistakes the reaction you have for the reason why you have that reaction. You might as well have just said that you're attracted to blondes just because.
My position is well researched and based on observations of the real world, it's not going to be toppled by your feelings because it's not on the same level as your feelings. It's far better substantiated than that.
The “Mr. Scientist” thing? Pffft! That’s my own personal incredulity; it’s not an argument. I do hope you understand my joke though? It’s an equivocation, “Mr. Scientist” might as well have said “just because.” Evolutionary psychology could not possibly be contradicted; it espouses unverifiable narratives of cultural and human behavior that amounts to nothing more than fluff and ‘ad hoc’ nonsense.
Yes, things evolve, I agree. I’m not arguing against evolution per se, I’m arguing about the substance of the mind and how evolutionary psychology has it’s propositions “profoundly backwards.”
If the mind is simply matter than the mind becomes nothing more than a mechanical process that reacts to certain stimuli in the brain, and it would mean that some form of determinism is true. If that’s the case, than anything we say or believe is the result of heredity and our environment; it would effectively nullify science because we would be measuring our own sense impressions, not the external world.
(September 5, 2014 at 12:47 am)Esquilax Wrote: Oh? You don't agree that I can go to pretty much anyone and interview them and find that they agree that the sun rises in the morning and sets at night? I can't record that with machines? I don't have any recordings at all, both scientific and otherwise, that demonstrate observations of the past and evidence that nature has behaved the way it does for the entirety of recorded human history?
… This is the dishonest equivocation that these kinds of argument tries to make, of pretending that something with imperfect evidence is the same as something with no evidence at all.
This isn’t “imperfect evidence,” you’ve totally switched to a metaphysical position about science. You might as well be appealing to your own cognitive ability on this one because you assume that other’s can be relied upon. You’ve exited ‘empirical rationalism,’ and entered into a metaphysical presupposition. It is one thing to infer from the past to all future cases, it’s another to be able to justify that position using science.
Help me out here; explain why you believe this to be a “dishonest equivocation?” Because it would seem you have some sort of double standard as to what’s “rational” to believe.
(September 5, 2014 at 12:47 am)Esquilax Wrote: I'm not going to play games with you, we have a vast world filled with continuous personal experiences and recordings in writing, video, audio, that count as evidence of the past.
It’s not that I’m simply not listening to you, it’s that I have reason to believe you’re wrong. Video recordings, writing, audio are all taken in as ‘sensory input’ and you assume that our cognitive faculties are capable of more than ‘sensory impressions.’ I’ve made this statement before; it’s a presupposition of science, we could not do good science apart from it. You have not provided “evidence of the reality of the past,” and my point still stands that apart from evidences it is rational to believe some things.
(September 5, 2014 at 12:47 am)Esquilax Wrote: Absent any evidence that the mind exists independent of the brain… there is no reason to believe that the mind is not tied to the brain, which is what the evidence tends to indicate.
Right now, it's like... 12:34. Although I haven't given a reason for "mind-body dualism," but you have an opportunity to formulate a response.
The parts about materialism, Plantinga, and your deffinition of evidence are all in the works.
I need sleep.
Hey! how would you feel about an "open dialogue," we could make a new thread for you and I. Or, there's always the option of a private correspondence? In any case, you're bright guy; fun to talk to. If you're ever in the States (I'm assuming you live outside the States?), specifically Wisconsin we should get coffee, my treat.
(September 5, 2014 at 11:07 am)Michael Wrote: It's a Friday isn't it. Well on Fridays I think of Satan as the personification of Temptation, something inside all of us. On Saturdays I think of him as real.
Sorry, that's rather glib. But not too far from the truth :-)
I probably have a lot more Fridays than Saturdays. But there are times when what I hear on the news makes me wary of rejecting the idea of a real evil force (something beyond mental illness). Thankfully I have never encountered such evil, and am quite sure that all my own sins are truly mine and stem from me.
So what to make of the biblical Satan is not an essential question for your theology? Good. It certainly isn't anything that keeps me up at night either.
(September 5, 2014 at 11:35 am)Rhythm Wrote: I have a similar experience. I find myself assigning familiar animate attributes to clearly inanimate objects and concepts. So I cuss at a wrench when it doesn't work and make disparaging remarks about it's mother's character and maidenhood.
