RE: Tooth Fairy Bullshit
January 20, 2017 at 12:39 pm
(This post was last modified: January 20, 2017 at 12:42 pm by Neo-Scholastic.)
Perhaps it would help it I gave an example of what would be a fair comparison to God, namely Truth. Consider the following two propositions:
P1: The tooth fairy exists.
P2: Truth exists.
In one trivial respect some smartasses could claim that neither of the proposition’s subject has sufficient empirical evidence to justify belief in it. I challenge these Champions of Reason to justify their self-conceit of being Truthseekers without tangible falsifiable evidence that Truth exists. If there was a tooth fairy, someone could at least, in theory, set a pair of dentures on a mousetrap and catch one. Not so with truth. If truth exists then it isn’t just another thing in a universe full of things. Has anyone seen truth? Distilled it into a test-tube? It’s not even reasonable to suggest that belief in truth is justified only after a sample has been produced under controlled conditions. Truth cannot be isolated. Either it informs everything or it doesn’t. Any comparison between the existence of the tooth fairy and truth is a ludicrous and obvious category error. I question the intellectual integrity of those who deny it.
I take that back. I don’t question it. They dishonest. Why is it that skeptics compare the existence of God to fairies, unicorns, and other fantastic mythological beasts as opposed to the existence of things like truth or personal identity or Platonic Forms or moral principles? I will tell you why. Because their only intention is to make believers seem ridiculous. Douches.
Now it is fine to say that you don’t accept the various logical demonstrations, cosmological arguments, fine-tuning, or design inferences. Let’s have those discussions, but the tooth fairy comparison is just a rhetorical quip whose only purpose is to infantilize and avoid serious philosophical problems. With respect to the human condition, it doesn’t matter one whit whether the tooth fairy exists. But whether or not God exists (or Truth for that matter) has far and wide ranging implications from the problem of universal to the nature of personal identity to moral values. The slightly more reasonable skeptics will say that God is so vague of a concept is to be meaningless. Really? The Christian God has been defined in exhaustive detail by the Church Doctors - Augustine, Anslem, and Thomas Aquinas for a start. So has its more general predecessor, the so-called God of the Philosophers, more broadly defined by Aristotle, Plotinus, etc. Vague? No, you're just lazy.
P1: The tooth fairy exists.
P2: Truth exists.
In one trivial respect some smartasses could claim that neither of the proposition’s subject has sufficient empirical evidence to justify belief in it. I challenge these Champions of Reason to justify their self-conceit of being Truthseekers without tangible falsifiable evidence that Truth exists. If there was a tooth fairy, someone could at least, in theory, set a pair of dentures on a mousetrap and catch one. Not so with truth. If truth exists then it isn’t just another thing in a universe full of things. Has anyone seen truth? Distilled it into a test-tube? It’s not even reasonable to suggest that belief in truth is justified only after a sample has been produced under controlled conditions. Truth cannot be isolated. Either it informs everything or it doesn’t. Any comparison between the existence of the tooth fairy and truth is a ludicrous and obvious category error. I question the intellectual integrity of those who deny it.
I take that back. I don’t question it. They dishonest. Why is it that skeptics compare the existence of God to fairies, unicorns, and other fantastic mythological beasts as opposed to the existence of things like truth or personal identity or Platonic Forms or moral principles? I will tell you why. Because their only intention is to make believers seem ridiculous. Douches.
Now it is fine to say that you don’t accept the various logical demonstrations, cosmological arguments, fine-tuning, or design inferences. Let’s have those discussions, but the tooth fairy comparison is just a rhetorical quip whose only purpose is to infantilize and avoid serious philosophical problems. With respect to the human condition, it doesn’t matter one whit whether the tooth fairy exists. But whether or not God exists (or Truth for that matter) has far and wide ranging implications from the problem of universal to the nature of personal identity to moral values. The slightly more reasonable skeptics will say that God is so vague of a concept is to be meaningless. Really? The Christian God has been defined in exhaustive detail by the Church Doctors - Augustine, Anslem, and Thomas Aquinas for a start. So has its more general predecessor, the so-called God of the Philosophers, more broadly defined by Aristotle, Plotinus, etc. Vague? No, you're just lazy.
