Is nihilism the logical extreme of atheism?

[Thumpalumpacus]

Nah, I meant equivocating, thanks.

If you want to conflate the meaning of conflation with that of the word equivocation, I'm fine with that.

***eagerly anticipates dictionary vs. wiki link war with basic etymology references and philosophical arguments about whether words really have to mean what they mean, then appeals to multiple quotes of people or online references also using the word wrongly***

Sorry to disappoint, but I'm not really worried about your misapprehension of my point, certainly not enough to go digging through links.

[bennyboy]

You don't equivocate much do you Benny?

Only in choir!

[fr0d0]

Great. a blind assertion. Why do you think that? Gimme something.

You first.

You are responding to my statement. If you have no comment. Great.

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The notion that that which creates a thing is always superior to the thing created is not a presumption I'll buy whether Thomas A. said it or not. By what standard would you measure such superiority? Many men have built things stronger, faster, and with greater longevity than themselves.

We've already covered our understanding of the goodness of God. We disagree. My evidence is clear. Yours is based upon obvious and deliberate misunderstanding. In the absence of actual evidence, I must leave it there.

The point you mention here, concerns the ability of any creator to create something superior to itself. So far, humans haven't created better humans. Taking it back to a primary level, a substance cannot create something not contained in the source. The singularity had to contain all of the information necessary to form everything in the universe. It isn't possible for the universe to create anything that it doesn't already have the physical information to create.

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The singularity is perfectly 'good'. It is functional in that it brings about a universe. God, having produced said singularity, has to be superior to it (see Aquinas). So Good is morally superior to the universe, and needs to be perfectly good.

Doesn't that only mean that he needed to be good enough? We don't know if this is the best possible universe that could have been made, after all. Maybe his older brother Wehyah (their parents were practical jokers) created a universe where all of the planets sustain life and no one ever sinned. Wehyah might need to be perfect to get that particular recipe right, and maybe the reason we never see god is because he's in the middle of receiving a 20,000-year nuggie from his big bro.

Exactly.

[genkaus]

Software does emerge naturally from hardware. People insert it. People structure the hardware and software to represent propositional states. Neither the software or the hardware have any meaning except for what has been assigned in advance.

Missing the point completely - how software emerges from hardware is not relevant - the fact that it does is. You - and I mean specifically you - may not be able to understand how it emerges, but that is not a deterrent to software being an emergent property of the hardware. Same goes for brain and consciousness.

My point exactly. The relationship between a sign and the signified is assigned and arbitrary, not causal.

And self-assignment is not possible because...?

Which function? Any function or specific to consciousness?

Any function.

[/quote]

Too broad a question - the function of a light-bulb is on a whole different level than that of a Venus Fly-trap. The simplistic answer would be: when the sequence of events within a system affects something external to the system then it becomes a function.

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People cannot help but to assign value to the things in their lives. The nature of the OP question is whether or not someone’s philosophical position, in this case atheism, is inconsistent with the very human ability to find value. Thus it doesn’t matter whether the person has hope; but rather, what matters is if that hope is justified, i.e. does their philosophy fulfill its promise.

You might want to keep in mind that atheism is not a philosophy nor does it automatically result in a specific one.

I think it reasonable to interpret phrases like “if only for us,” that reference arbitrary sources value as falling within my definition of nihilism as “the doctrine that all values are baseless.” The general objection has been that people find their own meaning, as in...

On what basis are you considering it an arbitrary value source?

By making meaning a matter of personal preference and cultural whim, people remove again alienate signification from the larger reality. Once the relation between signfiers and the signified has been severed, then multiple interpreters have no consistent basis by which they can relate. The key to avoiding nihilism (in the Western sense) is to identify absolutes that apply to and govern the relationships between multiple knowing subjects. This is a project that self-referential systems cannot logically undertake.

Identifying absolutes is unnecessary - the principles need to be either objective or derived from consensus - that would provide a consistent basis you are looking for.

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You are responding to my statement. If you have no comment. Great.

Excuse me? You made the foolish claim first. You were the first to claim that "belief in just god/reality leads to a preferable moral system". So go on and prove your assertion first and then go around asking others to prove theirs.

That being said - this is a common Christian tactic to ask the opponent to prove their case so as to distract from your inability to prove yours. So take this post as a coupon to be redeemed in future - once you have provided arguments for your assertion - then I'll provide arguments for mine.

We've already covered our understanding of the goodness of God. We disagree. My evidence is clear. Yours is based upon obvious and deliberate misunderstanding. In the absence of actual evidence, I must leave it there.

Tautology is not evidence.

The point you mention here, concerns the ability of any creator to create something superior to itself. So far, humans haven't created better humans. Taking it back to a primary level, a substance cannot create something not contained in the source. The singularity had to contain all of the information necessary to form everything in the universe. It isn't possible for the universe to create anything that it doesn't already have the physical information to create.

Ofcourse humans have created better humans. If they hadn't we'd all still be living in caves. Ofcourse creation of new information not contained in the source occurs - that is how evolution works. That's why the idea that the singularity had all the information - or that it had any information at all - is simply ridiculous.

[fr0d0]

No need to prove anything genkaus. My statement was concise. At the moment all you're doing is ridiculing it with no good reason. Others have questioned the detail and I've provided background. All I see is you trolling. I have nothing to respond to. Now if you'd like to make a point, then I might address it. Let me give you a clue though, it isn't looking good for you. You and the other trolls may go hungry.

[genkaus]

No need to prove anything genkaus. My statement was concise. At the moment all you're doing is ridiculing it with no good reason. Others have questioned the detail and I've provided background. All I see is you trolling. I have nothing to respond to. Now if you'd like to make a point, then I might address it. Let me give you a clue though, it isn't looking good for you. You and the other trolls may go hungry.

Concise statements still need to be proven. That no one else has asked you to prove it (they may have, I'm not going to look for it right now), doesn't mean you have escaped the burden of proof. All I see here is you dodging the question.

My point is your presupposition is ridiculous. The idea that assumption of a just reality/god leads to a better morality is nonsensical. If you want us to take any of your arguments seriously, you need to justify your presupposition.

As it is, others and I have already shown how ridiculous your conclusions from those presuppositions are - many times over. I'm going a step further and questioning the presupposition itself. This is the last leg you are standing on and it is about to be cut off.

[fr0d0]

No, they have not gen. Troll is blocked.

[Whateverist]

I may be catching your drift, Fr0d0. I think you are seemingly being obtuse to make a point. Namely, if we atheists bear no burden for disbelieving in gods, then neither do you for doing the opposite. This could be summarized as

"that which can be dismissed without reason, can also be claimed without one."

Interesting. What follows should be some bickering over who holds 'the burden'. But, from your perspective, why should you justify your positive assertion to those who put so little effort into their casual negation. Kind of an object lesson to us. Okay, fair enough.

I personally don't harbor the notion that one should attempt to justify every single one of his beliefs. Indeed I don't think this is possible. Whether or not someone should have to justify his belief in gods to atheists would seem to be precisely your bone of contention. in a debate one scores points for justifying ones assertions, but whether or not "debating" is what we are doing here is itself debatable. It can be. Should it be? If I answer no, should I have to back that up with evidence?

[fr0d0]

I don't see it like that w. This to me has nothing to do with belief. It's just a simple point of logic that I shared. I thought it quite neat. I've tried to expand upon it several times, and have come to the conclusion that 3 people at least are simply trolling me here, and indeed, my block list has gained new members. People seem to be treating this as if it's some massive affront to their beliefs and have quarantined it in the "must not think about at any cost bucket". I've had enough. Like I've said, I have no investment in the idea. If anyone is interested, please go check out the original. Thomas Aquinas. The Summa. Thank you.

[Whateverist]

Swing and a miss then. But reading Thomas Aquinas on religion is just too heavy a price. The thought of missing one butterfly or bloom on that account would seem a price far too dear.