Argument against atheism

[Perhaps]

What subject has been changed? You made an assumption about consciousness, and then used this assumption to draw an inference. The assumption was not a very good one, the inference (a justification of assumptions no less) a bad one. I couldn't have asked for a better example.

What on earth made you think that I was implying that mollusks lacked consciousness? That would be where your argument for the justification of assumptions would lead. That assumptions and axioms about the "fundamental blah blah....." are required or we would be unable to do anything. Well, show me a mollusks assumptions, a mollusks axioms, and yet they are able to do many things. You replied that mollusks did not have consciousness (apparently because you thought that I would make such a strange claim....), and that as such they did not perceive things the way that we do. I wouldn't argue on the latter, but the former can be discredited via evidence. They solve problems, can learn to perform tasks, remember those actions, and some even have a wonderful little camo routine that is the very definition of awareness of self and surroundings. No change of subject, and still no assumptions, at least not coming out of this corner.

Before you respond....again...with "you're assuming the axiom of reason". Not quite. I'm applying reason to evidence and reaching a conclusion based off of a starting point called observation. If reason would lead me to conclude that an octopus did not posess consciousness I would doubt my use of reason first, then the evidence, then reason itself, then evidence itself again, and at some point something would have to break, or I would have to admit that the phenomena was in-explicable. That I did not possess enough knowledge about the subject, or the proper tools, and could not proceed. See all of that going down that has nothing to do with assumptions?

Or....I could go on until the end of time with a philosophical argument, full of assumptions......likely learning nothing whatsoever.

This is precisely why I continue to attempt to explain to you why a conclusion reached by the use of philosophy alone is not equivalent to a conclusion reached by science. That the limits of philosophy begin and end with the fact that it deals merely in concepts, whereas other methods continue further to establish whether or not a concept has application outside of our own minds.

This is the perfect time for me to make my point, ever more clear.

There are two types of assumptions made in life. Those of axioms - made without our choice, they simply are self-evidently true, and form all other 'truths'. The other is those of knowledge assumptions - like the one I made about the consciousness of mollusks.

I am arguing the former, and you are arguing the later. Science, your words, our discussion, these thoughts, would not make sense without the assumed axiom that reason is the source of truth. None of them would exist if the axiom: I exist was not true. Once these are established, all thoughts are sensible if they apply reason, our discussion is sensible if it applies reason, your words are sensible if they apply reason, and science is sensible if it applies reason.

What you have a problem with, as do I, is when people make assumptions about the way the world works (which is the field of science) and assert them as truths. If I want to know how the world works I will refer to science, but if I want to know why the world works I will refer to philosophy. Science is the most useful tool we have at our dispense, but it is limited by our understanding of self.

I hope that made my point a little more clear. I think we agree, we're just referring to two different concepts and posing them against each other, when we really just need to realize that they are two different concepts.