Scientific knowledge versus spiritual knowledge

[Brian37]

Another way to frame the argument is to say, "If no hypothetical creator can decide or create morality from nothing in a hypothetical world, then neither can anything else".

Anyways, it's a shame. I have a lot of arguments. But if you don't want to discuss them, that's up to you. You want to believe there is no good arguments out there, that's up to you. There is even a paradox of consciousness in naturalism which we once had interesting discussion about, till someone (won't mention name) spit fired a bunch of things in frustration of where the topic was leading to that didn't deal at all with the issue at hand, but put an end to the discussion. As for that one, I don't know the strength of it, to be honest, will try to get into a discussion with it with scientists that know about the issue deeply before reaching conclusions, but from the scent of it, it does seem to point to a Creator.

The only "creator" of god/s are human's imaginations.

[LadyForCamus]

How can you be certain such things exist at all?

It dwells within us all. Dormant in most. It is causal to life, not just the physical trappings of it. There is some life force or energy that isn't simply the product of the physical parts, but is the reason for the parts, or what gives the parts purpose.

Everything happens for a reason. With that being said; significance is in what you do, not what you attain.

My personal knowledge of the soul or spirit will no doubt sound like lunacy or drivel to the third party. I only hope that through honest introspection, the selfless conscience, patience, lack of bias and pride, and the will of the Creator, that those actually, heartfully seeking, might find.

Peace

Faith in selfless Unity for Good.

Join you in your irrational, wholly unsupported beliefs which stifle scientific advancement? Pass...

[Neo-Scholastic]

Mr. Hanky, with all due respect and not trying to be insulting, you really must choose your words more carefully to better express your thoughts. It would also help if you attend to why others choose to use the words they use, not only in their everyday conventional definitions but also as they are used in particular fields. ‘Nature’ has different connotations depending, for example, on whether someone is talking about biology or physics or philosophy. That is the meaning of a ‘term of art’. It’s not as you suppose a specific reference to aesthetics when you said:

I believe that you believe it's art, but when you challenge a scientific idea, art need not apply.

Next,

If you dispute that nature and reality are different, then instead of going apeshit with insults when we disagree you should 1. Not do anything until you've taken another hard look at your position, considering why you believe it's correct and 2. If you still hold the same position after Step 1, then give us a reason why anyone, including the skeptics (not the few special snowflakes who are so enlightened above us because they had an "experience") should believe it too.

Ummm, yeah. I only made one insult in passing. I called Camus Lady stupid after she took disproportionate offense to the previous comments of theists and told them to leave AF. I stand by it. Her getting “all riled up” is her problem. My comments have been quite restrained. There is nothing personal about the idea that some ‘notions’ are inane. Ignorance is simply a lack of knowledge. There is no condensation in telling someone that they are ignorant of certain facts. Everyone is ignorant of something. That’s different from stupid.

The fair minded people on AF know that I have thought extensively about these problems and provide relatively comprehensive and carefully crafted posts. That doesn’t mean I must reach the same conclusions as you or any other person.

Q: What have circles, rectangles, and other mathematical realities ever meant to species other than Homo Sapiens?
A: Nothing - when they come upon or are confronted by an object, a body, or other life form, most species don't need to describe it, therefore they don't need to call it one thing or another

You present a non-sequitor. Only humans have intellect, so of course they can recognize and describe things of which other animals are oblivious.

...it's shape and other mathematical figures which characterize it are strictly human constructs which we created in order to help us sort out the disparate realities which we are capable of perceiving.

Whether mathematical objects are invented human constructs or actually discovered by people is the question at hand. You can assert that they are human constructs but that does not dispel the legitimate challenges to that position, which are several.

if I draw this circle on paper with a pencil, and you say that isn't natural, well you would be making at best a subjective argument.

Actually, that is the opposite of my position. A circle drawn on paper isn’t a truly perfect circle and neither is a cookie or a bicycle wheel. Yet people can rightly say that each instantiates the form of circularity to various degrees of perfection. Circularity is not a truly subjective concept. I say that the idea of circularity is objective because circles are objects that can be identified independently by various observers. If it circularity was only an empirically derived concept known only by abstraction then values like pi would only be approximate. Moreover, I say that the value of pi is the value of pi even when no one is around to know of it. That is why I say that the type of radical empiricism some atheists advocate ignores its own precommitments about what is real.

[robvalue]

If someone only views "morality" as "what big daddy thinks I should do" then of course they are never going to understand real, empathy driven morality. The kind of morality they probably have themselves just fine, but are desperate to project onto something else for reassurance.

"Don't be a cunt."

There. Morality in a nutshell. It ain't hard you know.

Of course, some people may genuinely have no empathy and so cannot understand regular morality. But religion seems to want to convince everyone that they are psycopaths, and will behave as such without religious "guidance". It's just not true at all.

If God is doing something that is stopping me killing and raping, he's still doing it just fine as a professed atheist who calls him a twat monkey. So clearly joining the religion is superfluous.

[LadyForCamus]

Mr. Hanky, with all due respect and not trying to be insulting, you really must choose your words more carefully to better express your thoughts. It would also help if you attend to why others choose to use the words they use, not only in their everyday conventional definitions but also as they are used in particular fields. ‘Nature’ has different connotations depending, for example, on whether someone is talking about biology or physics or philosophy. That is the meaning of a ‘term of art’. It’s not as you suppose a specific reference to aesthetics when you said:

I believe that you believe it's art, but when you challenge a scientific idea, art need not apply.

Next,

If you dispute that nature and reality are different, then instead of going apeshit with insults when we disagree you should 1. Not do anything until you've taken another hard look at your position, considering why you believe it's correct and 2. If you still hold the same position after Step 1, then give us a reason why anyone, including the skeptics (not the few special snowflakes who are so enlightened above us because they had an "experience") should believe it too.

Ummm, yeah. I only made one insult in passing. I called Camus Lady stupid after she took disproportionate offense to the previous comments of theists and told them to leave AF. I stand by it. Her getting “all riled up” is her problem. My comments have been quite restrained. There is nothing personal about the idea that some ‘notions’ are inane. Ignorance is simply a lack of knowledge. There is no condensation in telling someone that they are ignorant of certain facts. Everyone is ignorant of something. That’s different from stupid.

The fair minded people on AF know that I have thought extensively about these problems and provide relatively comprehensive and carefully crafted posts. That doesn’t mean I must reach the same conclusions as you or any other

Chad, if you had continued reading you would have seen my post where I clarified I did NOT mean all theists should leave AF; only the nasty trolls who come here to insult and nothing more. So let's not get hung up on that.

[Mystic]

Of course, some people may genuinely have no empathy and so cannot understand regular morality. But religion seems to want to convince everyone that they are psycopaths, and will behave as such without religious "guidance". It's just not true at all.

What religions claim that? I am not aware of any, so perhaps you can inform me which ones make this claim. I understand the poetic exaggeration so I'm not taking it literally. Which religion claimed people can't be empathetic, loving to one another, good to their parents, respecting to one another, have good manners etc, without religious guidance?

[popsthebuilder]

It dwells within us all. Dormant in most. It is causal to life, not just the physical trappings of it. There is some life force or energy that isn't simply the product of the physical parts, but is the reason for the parts, or what gives the parts purpose.

Everything happens for a reason. With that being said; significance is in what you do, not what you attain.

My personal knowledge of the soul or spirit will no doubt sound like lunacy or drivel to the third party. I only hope that through honest introspection, the selfless conscience, patience, lack of bias and pride, and the will of the Creator, that those actually, heartfully seeking, might find.

Peace

Faith in selfless Unity for Good.

Join you in your irrational, wholly unsupported beliefs which stifle scientific advancement? Pass...

Yeah, cuz my knowledge stifles scientific advancement....sure.
Thanks for playing.

Peace

Faith in selfless Unity for Good.

[God of Mr. Hanky]

‘Nature’ has different connotations depending, for example, on whether someone is talking about biology or physics or philosophy.

That's what you say. How exactly is that so?

You called your use of it "art" in your last post, but art is subjective, while language is not. Argument is art, but it's constrained by limited parameters by which you can choose your words. "Nature" has its definition according to parameters set when it was coined, and although they may change over time with popular usage, consistency still rules - nobody gets to change a word willy-nilly, as it suits them.

That is the meaning of a ‘term of art’. It’s not as you suppose a specific reference to aesthetics when you said:

I believe that you believe it's art, but when you challenge a scientific idea, art need not apply.

No, that is not what I suppose art is! Art can be any sort of subjective pursuit, which means there are no absolutes to determine whether it works. A visual artist could make sculpture from his dookies and that may work for some people, which would make it good art for them. Argument is the art of playing with verbal dookies. You have the sheer balls to bring art into a field which has no place for it - art can be used any way you like it, but language and science may not. You cannot use "Nature" any way you wish to - I'm sorry I have to be the one to tell you this, but it's just not allowed!

If you dispute that nature and reality are different, then instead of going apeshit with insults when we disagree you should 1. Not do anything until you've taken another hard look at your position, considering why you believe it's correct and 2. If you still hold the same position after Step 1, then give us a reason why anyone, including the skeptics (not the few special snowflakes who are so enlightened above us because they had an "experience") should believe it too.

Ummm, yeah. I only made one insult in passing. I called Camus Lady stupid after she took disproportionate offense to the previous comments of theists and told them to leave AF. I stand by it. Her getting “all riled up” is her problem. My comments have been quite restrained. There is nothing personal about the idea that some ‘notions’ are inane. Ignorance is simply a lack of knowledge. There is no condensation in telling someone that they are ignorant of certain facts. Everyone is ignorant of something. That’s different from stupid.

Uh-huh, so everyone here other than you is ignorant of something, oh Enlightened One .

Q: What have circles, rectangles, and other mathematical realities ever meant to species other than Homo Sapiens?
A: Nothing - when they come upon or are confronted by an object, a body, or other life form, most species don't need to describe it, therefore they don't need to call it one thing or another

You present a non-sequitor. Only humans have intellect, so of course they can recognize and describe things of which other animals are oblivious.

The point was strictly to point out that math is a reality of nature whether or not some brainy creature assigns its realities names, talks about them, and puts them to its use. Mathematical realities occur in nature, therefore how can reality and nature be separable? I don't think they are.

...it's shape and other mathematical figures which characterize it are strictly human constructs which we created in order to help us sort out the disparate realities which we are capable of perceiving.

Whether mathematical objects are invented human constructs or actually discovered by people is the question at hand. You can assert that they are human constructs but that does not dispel the legitimate challenges to that position, which are several.

if I draw this circle on paper with a pencil, and you say that isn't natural, well you would be making at best a subjective argument.

Actually, that is the opposite of my position. A circle drawn on paper isn’t a truly perfect circle and neither is a cookie or a bicycle wheel. Yet people can rightly say that each instantiates the form of circularity to various degrees of perfection. Circularity is not a truly subjective concept. I say that the idea of circularity is objective because circles are objects that can be identified independently by various observers. If it circularity was only an empirically derived concept known only by abstraction then values like pi would only be approximate. Moreover, I say that the value of pi is the value of pi even when no one is around to know of it. That is why I say that the type of radical empiricism some atheists advocate ignores its own precommitments about what is real.

Alright, so now we're (maybe) getting somewhere.

Yes, true circularity and true spheres are objective. They are also theoretically nonexistent in nature. Nature displays no perfection, and you harp on that fact to support your assertions that it's separate from the reality of perfection which humans can imagine and strive toward. Uh...what reality?

The last time I checked, the value of pi was an approximation, it is theoretically impossible to reach absolute precision with this number. This is because it is a number for perfection, and perfection is a human construct, or a construct for what I suppose is (yes, I said that) a naturally-occurring human ideal? Well, why would it not have arisen naturally in the human brain, thus enabling us to do what other animals cannot through the manipulation of our habitat? Humans can aspire to make the perfect shape through elimination of imperfection, working toward the infinitesimal, correct? Now what is the infinitesimal other than the polar opposite of another fantastical human construct, the infinite? So then, if we say that perfect circles are reality, then we must also allow that the infinite and the infinitesimal are too, but I doubt that, therefore the perfect shape is not reality - we work with shapes in approximations, approximate to the point that they work for us. There is no sign of perfection in the universe, only what is close enough to work for each star as it is, each planet as it is, and each life form as it is.

You suggest that we discovered perfection rather than created the idea, but where in nature (or anywhere, if there is another "where") could we have made such a "discovery"? The very first animal to create a snowball discovered the sphere, but attempting to perfect it would have been its own idea. Moreover, the ability to form ideas is itself a product of nature, therefore non-separability from reality.

[LadyForCamus]

Join you in your irrational, wholly unsupported beliefs which stifle scientific advancement? Pass...

Yeah, cuz my knowledge stifles scientific advancement....sure.
Thanks for playing.

Peace

Faith in selfless Unity for Good.

Yes. Using, "God did it" as an explanation for the world around us works against scientific inquiry.

And what knowledge are you referring to, exactly? I am still waiting for a demonstration.

[Brian37]

Of course, some people may genuinely have no empathy and so cannot understand regular morality. But religion seems to want to convince everyone that they are psycopaths, and will behave as such without religious "guidance". It's just not true at all.

What religions claim that? I am not aware of any, so perhaps you can inform me which ones make this claim. I understand the poetic exaggeration so I'm not taking it literally. Which religion claimed people can't be empathetic, loving to one another, good to their parents, respecting to one another, have good manners etc, without religious guidance?

Again, you need to learn the difference between what religion claims, and what it actually produces in reality. The kind motifs religions like to claim, in reality can be done without religion. The empathy as religion sells is not set up to be universal, although it does claim that. The empathy religion sets up in reality is tribal and at best "separate but equal" or is fine with others being a pet our house guest. That is empathy for the tribe, not empathy for all of humanity. The love for outsiders as depicted back then is conditional.

The God/s of Abraham are tribal characters because back when all three of those books were written, humans lived in feudal times and back then the mortality rate was much higher and it was extremely important for your own survival to tow the tribal line. So the love of others back then was for the tribe, those three holy books describe very violent revenge to anyone attacking the tribe. The obeying your parents were not because you were seen as an individual, you obeyed your parents because you were their property. 

Those books put you down even before you are born, teach you to assume the worst and only the sky boss can save you from the game he didn't have to set up. He blames you for the conditions he didnt have to put in place. Those books teach you to kill for the tribe. No, that is not the way the religious in the civil west like to view it, but again, those books were not written with our modern values in mind.

Religious people don't claim those things no, but they are totally unaware of how their false perceptions lead to bad actions. "Sin" is the concept that you are a piece of shit and are doomed to fail even before you do anything wrong. 

Robvalue is right. Religion convinces people they are nothing without it. The truth is if you have to live under promise of reward or threat of punishment, that is a very childlike and ignorant form of regulation. It is immoral to treat an adult as if they need a sky parent. As immoral as Kim Jong Un who will treat you well if you obey and "respect him". Doing the right thing is doing it even when nobody is watching and you don't get rewarded.

If someone needs bribes or threats to self regulate, by all means do it. But to expect others who do the same and do so without threats or bribes is vile. I am an adult and I don't need a sky parent watching me every second of my life or bullying me with threats of hell to do the right thing. And I don't need someone to dangle a cookie in front of me either.