(January 25, 2015 at 11:31 am)Alex K Wrote:

(January 22, 2015 at 2:40 pm)AFTT47 Wrote: That's the only reason I can fathom for evolution selecting for emotion. Without that, I might not figure it's worth the trouble to continue on.

For example hunger and thirst are not rational reasons to take action, right? They are states of mind that urge you to do something. Then kicks in rationality and tells you how to obtain them.

I'm not sure. I can see that giving a crap about your own existence is not rational; it is emotional. Given that you DO care, taking action to protect your existence becomes rational. But you didn't answer my example about a simple creature like an ant; you only quoted it.

I can give you an even simpler example: An electrical generator powered by a diesel engine needs to be cranked in order to start. It relies on an external power source (usually a lead-acid battery) to provide power to a cranking motor. A relatively smart generator with a micro controller could monitor the condition of the battery. If it sees the open-circuit voltage of the battery approaching the point where it might not be able to provide enough power, it could initiate an auto-start in order to charge the battery before it's too late.

That would require a fairly simple programming task and it would be based entirely on logic. I couldn't even begin to fathom how I would program a computer to fear for its own existence, thus making damn sure it cranks up the generator before the battery deteriorates too much. And why would I bother, even if I knew how? Logic is simpler.

Maybe this question deserves its own thread in the philosophy forum but I wonder why simple logic works for the simple organism but more complex ones require emotion.

(January 25, 2015 at 2:14 pm)AFTT47 Wrote: I can see that giving a crap about your own existence is not rational; it is emotional.

At the human level, I am sure emotion plays a great part, but the survival instinct, down to the cellular level, would kick in and maybe even drive the emotions.

(January 21, 2015 at 1:14 am)PreV2 Wrote: Say you were in building in an earthquake zone and a large earthquake struck.
You were buried and in great pain as concrete trapped your legs and arms.
The hours went by and you heard some activity outside.

As days then passed without any rescue would you then decide to pray
to be rescued as a kinda last resort as the pain increased even more?

I don't know and I don't think you can truly know until you find yourself in such a situation.

If desperate enough people will try anything, I suppose.

(January 25, 2015 at 2:35 pm)Beccs Wrote:

(January 21, 2015 at 1:14 am)PreV2 Wrote: Say you were in building in an earthquake zone and a large earthquake struck.
You were buried and in great pain as concrete trapped your legs and arms.
The hours went by and you heard some activity outside.

As days then passed without any rescue would you then decide to pray
to be rescued as a kinda last resort as the pain increased even more?

I don't know and I don't think you can truly know until you find yourself in such a situation.

If desperate enough people will try anything, I suppose.

Still though you can't test the strength of atheism its a world view that no gods exist.

(January 25, 2015 at 2:35 pm)Beccs Wrote: If desperate enough people will try anything, I suppose.

In times of extreme anything, the survival instinct would kick in and probably work more from the subconscious level and may drag out some old memories to try and quell the situation.

(January 25, 2015 at 4:45 pm)dyresand Wrote:

(January 25, 2015 at 2:35 pm)Beccs Wrote: I don't know and I don't think you can truly know until you find yourself in such a situation.

If desperate enough people will try anything, I suppose.

Still though you can't test the strength of atheism its a world view that no gods exist.

Atheism by itself is not a worldview at all. It only tells you what a person does NOT believe - not what he/she DOES believe. It is a component in some complete worldviews such as Secular Humanism.

Most atheists do not actively assert that no god exists. They lack belief in any god because no god claim has provided credible evidence of such.

(January 25, 2015 at 2:35 pm)Beccs Wrote: I don't know and I don't think you can truly know until you find yourself in such a situation.

If desperate enough people will try anything, I suppose.

If I fell off a cliff, I might start flapping my arms. My behaviour tells you nothing regarding the efficacy of the action. Since all the available evidence suggests that flapping would be futile, I'd hope that I'd remain relatively rational and try to find a more practical way to cope.

How does one test non-belief?

I've never quite understood the desire to petition the idiot that could have prevented the catastrophe in the first place. Either god is totally inept, or he is a first rate cunt for allowing your pain and suffering as an invitation to kiss his ass.

Han Solo says it best:
"Threepio, you tell that slimy piece of worm ridden filth he'll get no such pleasure from us."

(January 25, 2015 at 2:14 pm)AFTT47 Wrote:

(January 25, 2015 at 11:31 am)Alex K Wrote: For example hunger and thirst are not rational reasons to take action, right? They are states of mind that urge you to do something. Then kicks in rationality and tells you how to obtain them.

I'm not sure. I can see that giving a crap about your own existence is not rational; it is emotional. Given that you DO care, taking action to protect your existence becomes rational. But you didn't answer my example about a simple creature like an ant; you only quoted it.

I think it is safe to say that simple creatures like ants are pretty hard-wired in whatever they do. The urges/instincts we experience are - and I'm going out on a limb here as I'm not a biologist, neurologist or psychologist - probably what happens if this hard-wiring gets paired with a high-powered independent brain in the course of evolution. Many of these functions can be overridden by conscious efforts now, even breathing, so this instinctive drive has to be somehow implemented into the workings of this apparatus which we call the conscious part of our mind. I conjecture that the urges and emotions we feel which lead us to do basic things like keep safe, eat and produce and take care of offspring, are exactly what this implementation of formerly hard-wired urges into the mind looks like "from the inside". Does that make sense?