Gaps in theistic arguments. Secular theism vs religious theism

[robvalue]

We really need people to understand the difference between "assert" and "demonstrate/provide evidence for".

If someone expects me to just accept anything they assert, then they must also be willing to accept anything I assert. Are you willing to do that?

[The Reality Salesman01]

We really need people to understand the difference between "assert" and "demonstrate/provide evidence for".

If someone expects me to just accept anything they assert, then they must also be willing to accept anything I assert. Are you willing to do that?

Amen, brother Rob!

[Neo-Scholastic]

It could be the case that some stuff pertaining to the universe are unchanging. So the universe is not wholly changing but only partially changing.

Substitute reality for universe and I agree.

Psychological causes can't be taken as a given since final cause doesn't only mean psychological.

Very true. Psychological events are just one kind of event with determinate ends.

Final cause is actually very simple to understand. It is the principle that says that baring external interference, like circumstances always produce the same result. For example, white light shining through a prism always produces a spectrum and not “Citizen Kane”. Final cause is the empirically verifiable corollary of efficient cause.

Where final cause becomes important, as in the Fifth Way, is when we compare things that have intelligence, like animals, and things that do not, like billiard balls. We can explain the behavior of a cheetah in terms of its intentions, like its attempt to catch a zebra. The cheetah’s hunt is the efficient cause of the zebra’s death. The zebra’s death is the final cause of the cheetah’s hunt. In like manner, the cue’s strike is the efficient cause of the billiard dropping into a pocket, while dropping into a pocket is the final cause of the cue’s strike. Anyone can see that the actions of the cue and billiard ball can be traced back to an intelligent agent, the pool player.

But what about things that appear to happen with consistency seemingly apart from an intelligent agent, like the formation of a spectrum from light going through a prism? Doesn’t that show that the actions of an intelligent agent supervene on the collective action of undirected actions? The answer is no. Final cause is always at play because there are no undirected actions; particular efficient causes are always directed toward specific determined ends. Since the actions of the whole occur simultaneously we are presented with three possible interpretations: bottom-up causation, top-down causation, or harmonious action. Both the bottom-up and harmonious action interpretations have paradoxical results. Bottom-up causality doesn’t have a principle for directing actions at any level. Harmonious action does not provide a link between the parallel streams of intention and determined ends. What remains is top-down causality wherein intelligence operates at all levels of reality.

Anyone that calls this mere assertion only does so because they do not like the result and not any flaw in the demonstration.

[robvalue]

Erm, it's called special pleading, as has been pointed out endlessly to you.

[Mudhammam]

Anyone that calls this mere assertion only does so because they do not like the result and not any flaw in the demonstration.

Or because they realize that scholastic reasoning is no longer helpful but actually impedes on the fact that we can dig deeper into what triggers intelligent beings to action and discover a multitude of mechanical causes that have nothing to do with intention.

[Faith No More]

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Very true. Psychological events are just one kind of event with determinate ends.

Final cause is actually very simple to understand. It is the principle that says that baring external interference, like circumstances always produce the same result. For example, white light shining through a prism always produces a spectrum and not “Citizen Kane”. Final cause is the empirically verifiable corollary of efficient cause.

Where final cause becomes important, as in the Fifth Way, is when we compare things that have intelligence, like animals, and things that do not, like billiard balls. We can explain the behavior of a cheetah in terms of its intentions, like its attempt to catch a zebra. The cheetah’s hunt is the efficient cause of the zebra’s death. The zebra’s death is the final cause of the cheetah’s hunt. In like manner, the cue’s strike is the efficient cause of the billiard dropping into a pocket, while dropping into a pocket is the final cause of the cue’s strike. Anyone can see that the actions of the cue and billiard ball can be traced back to an intelligent agent, the pool player.

But what about things that appear to happen with consistency seemingly apart from an intelligent agent, like the formation of a spectrum from light going through a prism? Doesn’t that show that the actions of an intelligent agent supervene on the collective action of undirected actions? The answer is no. Final cause is always at play because there are no undirected actions; particular efficient causes are always directed toward specific determined ends. Since the actions of the whole occur simultaneously we are presented with three possible interpretations: bottom-up causation, top-down causation, or harmonious action. Both the bottom-up and harmonious action interpretations have paradoxical results. Bottom-up causality doesn’t have a principle for directing actions at any level. Harmonious action does not provide a link between the parallel streams of intention and determined ends. What remains is top-down causality wherein intelligence operates at all levels of reality.

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Anyone that calls this mere assertion only does so because they do not like the result and not any flaw in the demonstration.

Care to elaborate on what you mean by "actions of the whole occur simultaneously?"

People call it mere assertion because your metaphysical demonstration provides no testable results and it makes no predictions on future observation. When you critically analyze what is said and how it correlates with what we would expect to observe, we're left with nothing more than "Because I said so."

[Esquilax]

But what about things that appear to happen with consistency seemingly apart from an intelligent agent, like the formation of a spectrum from light going through a prism? Doesn’t that show that the actions of an intelligent agent supervene on the collective action of undirected actions? The answer is no. Final cause is always at play because there are no undirected actions; particular efficient causes are always directed toward specific determined ends. Since the actions of the whole occur simultaneously we are presented with three possible interpretations: bottom-up causation, top-down causation, or harmonious action. Both the bottom-up and harmonious action interpretations have paradoxical results. Bottom-up causality doesn’t have a principle for directing actions at any level. Harmonious action does not provide a link between the parallel streams of intention and determined ends. What remains is top-down causality wherein intelligence operates at all levels of reality.

Each of the bolded sentences contain either an unjustified assertion, or a hidden premise that is merely assumed to be true. At no point did you, for example, demonstrate your assertion that there are no undirected actions. More importantly, you didn't bother to show that any of this is required for the universe to exist; like Aquinas, you merely assert it based on a bunch of intuitive nothings.

Anyone that calls this mere assertion only does so because they do not like the result and not any flaw in the demonstration.

And you cover for your fiat assertions with passive aggressive well poisoning. Truly, you're a class act top to bottom, Chad.

But never forget: demonstrations, by necessity, require, you know, demonstrations.

[Neo-Scholastic]

…scholastic reasoning is no longer helpful but actually impedes on the fact that we can dig deeper into what triggers intelligent beings to action and discover a multitude of mechanical causes that have nothing to do with intention.

Is it your hope to remove intention entirely so that we can go about our lives like spring driven toys?

Care to elaborate on what you mean by "actions of the whole occur simultaneously?"

To say that a wood chucker chucks wood describes the action of a whole system. The whole system can be broken down into the concurrent actions of multiple sub-systems: muscles pulling on tendons, electrolytes crossing cell barriers, etc. The intentions of the wood chucker is the reason that motivates the actions of the sub-systems. The bottom-up way of looking at it is that the intention of the wood chucker is an inert illusion generated by the collective action of the sub-systems.

People call it mere assertion because your metaphysical demonstration provides no testable results and it makes no predictions on future observation.

Philosophy provides the foundational principles on which scientific inquiry depends.

Esqilax, you make me laugh, literally. Let’s take a closer look at what you call my assersions:
Final cause is always at play because there are no undirected actions;… I supported this statement earlier in the post by referring to an empirically verifiable fact. That fact is this: barring any impeding circumstances, particular efficient causes always produce the same specific ends. It is not necessary to show that it is possible to be otherwise, since this is not speculation, but an observation of how things work in reality.
Bottom-up causality doesn’t have a principle for directing actions at any level. If that statement is false then you should have no difficulty supplying such a principle. In actually, a principle acting from the bottom-up has already been excluded by its proponents that say mechanical actions suffice and that intentionality is an illusion.
Harmonious action does not provide a link between the parallel streams of intention and determined ends. Here I call out harmonious action as the unfounded assertion by claiming that intentions always but without reason match actions.

[Pizza]

Anyone that calls this mere assertion only does so because they do not like the result and not any flaw in the demonstration.

The flaw is this kind of reasoning rests on ill defined, unsupported, false analogy and empty metaphor because how can an unmoving, immaterial thing "bear some remote analogy to" a pool player, or to anything with "intention" or to anything we've seen in this universe at all. Anthropomorphism of "supreme being" will always be undefined garage and empty rhetorical posturing. This isn't even to mention the ill defined notion of "directed actions," and "directed toward specific determined ends." What? That things are order in such a way that things the produce effects that they produce and not others? This supports a thinking thing making things just so how? We could say the thinking producing order is the human mind and if a human mind can't create order because of unlikelihood or paradoxes then a non-human cannot for the same reasons.
If anything we could just use a formal cause as a final cause: Math and Logic produces the world just so and they are outside minds.

[Esquilax]

Esqilax, you make me laugh, literally.

I'm glad: it's so very hard to pull any kind of use out of your dry, philosophical wank-ssertions, and there's only so many ways to say "yes, but you haven't provided a shred of justification for any of that," before I start repeating myself.

Bottom-up causality doesn’t have a principle for directing actions at any level. If that statement is false then you should have no difficulty supplying such a principle.

Ah yes, the old "you can't prove me wrong!" style of theistic burden shifting. A classic, and I shouldn't be surprised: you do seem fond of dredging up old philosophical nothings and then acting as though they're some cutting edge observances of reality.

In actually, a principle acting from the bottom-up has already been excluded by its proponents that say mechanical actions suffice and that intentionality is an illusion.

Am I one of those proponents? Oh, I mean am I actually one of them; I don't want to know what the Straw-Esquilax you construct whenever you want to dishonestly jab at me thinks.

Harmonious action does not provide a link between the parallel streams of intention and determined ends. Here I call out harmonious action as the unfounded assertion by claiming that intentions always but without reason match actions.

Yes, I'm aware you're fond of constructing arguments with hidden premises, the one here being that intentions require some extra, external force to match actions. You can't palm these cards with me.