Scientism & Philosophical Arguments

[Esquilax]

How can you possibly assert that a thing exists in nature if you're unable to provide an example of it? Shouldn't you already have an example in mind, if you think it exists?

I'm not sure what you are asking for here.   What do you mean by in nature?  

Well, if your contention is that specified complexity exists within the natural world, surely you would have had to observe specified complexity in nature to make that assertion, yes? I mean, if you hadn't observed it and were asserting that it exists anyway, that's indistinguishable from just making things up. You could make that claim equally about things that exist and things that do not, because the content isn't reliant on whether anybody has ever actually observed it.

So... you don't think you could tell the difference between a spaceship on mars and a bunch of rock?  

Not if it was my position that the spaceship was designed, but that the rocks were also designed by god, and the planet those rocks were on was designed by god, and the universe containing all of this was designed by god, while I looked upon it all with my designed eyes, situated in my designed head, atop my designed body, interpreting the data via a designed brain loaded with all the information of my- totally designed and according to god's plan- culture's history.

What's essentially happening is that you're picking up one designed thing in an environment of one hundred percent designed objects and saying that it looks so different from all these natural things (which are designed) that it has to have been designed. How could you ever come to that determination if it was your view that everything that exists came about as the result of god's purposeful design?

[Neo-Scholastic]

That's not what I mean. When natural science gets detached from absolutes, the kind that provide a glimpse of Nature’s God, nothing rationally justifies efficient causality, the reliability of intellect, objective being, or consideration of essential natures.

No, reliability of intellect is not justified rationally. Even worse, if intellect were unreliable, we would have no reliable way to ever know it, right? The reliability of intellect therefore must be a working hypothesis which appears consistent with observation.

"When we hear of some new attempt to explain reasoning or language or choice naturalistically, we ought to react as if we were told that someone had squared the circle or proved the square root of 2 to be rational: only the mildest curiosity is in order-how well has the fallacy been concealed?" - Peter Geach

[Alex K]

or language or choice? What is that supposed to mean? And what is meant by "explaining naturalistically" if I may ask.

[Esquilax]

"When we hear of some new attempt to explain reasoning or language or choice naturalistically, we ought to react as if we were told that someone had squared the circle or proved the square root of 2 to be rational: only the mildest curiosity is in order-how well has the fallacy been concealed?" - Peter Geach

"I'm going to use a quote in the hopes that its flowery language might conceal the fact that it simply presupposes that there can never be a naturalistic explanation for the things listed, using dismissive mockery as a replacement for an actual explanation of why that might be, and moreover that I've essentially borrowed someone elses' presupposition that doesn't adequately address what was actually said. My response is little more than "well, nuh uh!" dressed up in fancy condescension... but I really, really hope you won't notice that."- Chad Wooters.

[Neo-Scholastic]

No, reliability of intellect is not justified rationally. Even worse, if intellect were unreliable, we would have no reliable way to ever know it, right? The reliability of intellect therefore must be a working hypothesis which appears consistent with observation.

Actually, the reliability of intellect would not qualify as a hypothesis since a hypothesis could be tested. What you must mean is that the reliability of intellect is axiomatic, an epistemological necessity for the attainment of knowledge. I agree and say that this axiom is irrelevant apart from a second related axiom: reality is intelligible.

If both are in fact true then knowledge can be attain. However, if either of those axioms is not in fact true then knowledge cannot be attained. One of the following applies: 1) we live in a rationally ordered world while we ourselves are incapable of reason, or 2) our capacity for reason cannot be applied to an irrational world, or 3) we live in an irrational would and are incapable of reason.

Now you face an existential choice, one that cannot be rationally determined, empirically tested, or otherwise confirmed. Do you think these axioms are true? Regardless of what you choose to believe, do you have the intellectual honesty to live life consistent with that choice?

That said, if you choose to believe that reality is intelligible and that the intellect is reliable, then it is reasonable to apply the Principle of Sufficient Reason and ask the following questions. Why is reality intelligible and what makes people capable of reason? But of course, these are questions someone ideologically committed to atheism dares not ask.

Esquilax, it's amazing how you can be condescending while insulting someone for being condescending.

[Angrboda]

Oh bollocks.

[Cato]

That said, if you choose to believe that reality is intelligible and that the intellect is reliable, then it is reasonable to apply the Principle of Sufficient Reason and ask the following questions. Why is reality intelligible and what makes people capable of reason? But of course, these are questions someone ideologically committed to atheism dares not ask.

People are capable of reason because of the evolved trait of abstract thought. Reality becomes intelligible by the application of reason to the information acquired through sense perception.

[Esquilax]

That said, if you choose to believe that reality is intelligible and that the intellect is reliable, then it is reasonable to apply the Principle of Sufficient Reason and ask the following questions. Why is reality intelligible and what makes people capable of reason? But of course, these are questions someone ideologically committed to atheism dares not ask.

I think a far better question is: why should reality not be intelligible without a god, and why should evolved people operating in an environment that confers advantages for reasoned reactions to stimuli not be able to reason? But of course, these are questions that nobody ideologically committed to theism dare ask, instead they just presuppose them as already having been answered, coincidentally in ways that align with their own worldview. I've never yet seen a theist adequately explain why they think these things would be excluded by atheism.

Esquilax, it's amazing how you can be condescending while insulting someone for being condescending.

Meh. "No, you are!" is the lowest form of response.

[Neo-Scholastic]

…why should reality not be intelligible without a god?

Asking questions as double negatives makes it more difficult for readers to understand your questions. It’s either lazy writing, sloppy thinking, or disingenuous. More simply stated, the question actually asked is the following:

Question 1: “Why must reality be intelligible with God?” Answer: It need not. He could have willed a cartoon world.

That answers your question but I’m pretty sure you meant the question rhetorically in order to assert that the intelligibility of reality is a brute fact. Yet brute fact comes in three different flavors: 1) those that need no explanation, 2) those that have no explanation, and 3) those that cannot be explained.

So which did you have in mind?

[downbeatplumb]

[quote pid='1144652' dateline='1450311841']


Question 1: “Why must reality be intelligible with God?” Answer: It need not. He could have willed a cartoon world.

[/quote]

You really do have a child like view of the universe don't you!
I was going to mention about science and how there is no proof for god etc etc but I have done this dance with you and I will say that I do not NOT believe because of the science. The science just agrees with what my gut has always told me and that is that the idea of a god is a simple explanation to hard questions, it is intellectually lazy and your little line above is just an example of the thought process that has served to retard human understanding for millennia. "All is as it is because magic man willed it" pah and harrumph, stamps my wickle foot and shakes my wickle fist.