Scepticism and religion

[robvalue]

Thanks for the feedback

Yeah, I didn't put a lot of thought into angling it, I'll try and improve that next time. I was just lying on the bed where I happened to be.

Absolute certainty, well... it's always conditional at best, as far as I can see. We can get much closer to certainty in the abstract, such as with mathematics. But even then, were relying on the fact that we're not hallucinating or dreaming. And relying on the fact that we properly understand logic, and so on. In other words we have to assume our brains are working properly, and that other people aren't just figments of our imagination reinforcing a delusion.

For practical purposes, we simply make pragmatic assumptions. I assume my brain is working fairly well. I assume other people are real. I assume our collective understanding of basic logic is correct. From there, I can say with "absolute certainty" that 1+1=2. I can say lots of other abstract things are certain. But I still can't say anything for certain about the physical world, because there is always the chance we've somehow got everything wrong, or that the laws of reality might suddenly change etc.

It's not particularly useful in a practical sense to question the certainty of the abstract based on what seems like inevitable logic, nor to worry that all our science about reality could be wrong due to some bizarre cosmic coincidence. I think it's healthy however to acknowledge these factors, to keep us on our toes and for honest full disclosure.