No reason justifies disbelief.

[EgoDeath]

So, just for the hell of it, I'll say it again. Anyone actually going to back up the claim "no reason justifies disbelief?" Or are you morons just going to keep going back and forth for another forty pages?

[The Grand Nudger]

I'd put my money on the back and forth. It doesn't actually matter if a whole slew of reasons justify disbelief. There are articles of faith and nonsense to the contrary to maintain.

[EgoDeath]

I'd put my money on the back and forth.  It doesn't actually matter if a whole slew of reasons justify disbelief.  There are articles of faith and nonsense to the contrary to maintain.

I agree. But it would be nice to actually SEE one of these people arguing for the OP actually demonstrate a real reason. At least let us watch you try to shoot the moon, even if we know the bullet will never leave the atmosphere.

[bennyboy]

Straw men?  I repeated a thing you typed, literally, and corrected you with respect to what I've been commenting on.   I'd tell you to fuck off with that dumb shit, but I know you won't, not that you can't, ofc......  

No, you introduced it, I commented, and then you repeated it as though it was ever anything I was arguing. You've been doing a lot of that lately.

But..sure, science is a subset of empirical investigation, and on that basis alone it's hard to ascertain why any empirical whatsit would be a black box for scientific inquiry regardless of whether or not science has yet, or even will ever answer a specific empirical question.  It's the best tool we've come up with yet for answering questions of that sort..and you've been leaning on it, even if you can't quite bring yourself to accurately represent it, in this conversation.

Horseshit. Science has in fact neither answered, nor shown any capacity for answering, the kinds of questions we've been talking about. Here's you in a nutshell: "We can use science to answer some why questions, so. . . science is the best tool we've come up with yet for explaining why there's something rather than nothing."

Obvious non sequitur is obvious.

There's no such thing as a scientific conclusion independent of interpretation..or -any- empirical observation independent of interpretation, for that matter, but so what, still willing to assume your can'ts without any of this convoluted horseshit required.   It's simply not true that this statement is the entirety of your "thesis", and you do yourself a disservice claiming as much now when your posts still exist for anyone to scroll back and read...you know...empirically.  

I'm not talking about the conclusions. I'm talking about the observations themselves. If you want to argue that a ruler measurement or detection of X-rays is dependent on interpretation, then rock on. I'm going to argue that the kinds of observations use in what we normally call science, and the kind of subjective observations you've been equivocating about by babbling about "empirical observations" instead of "science" when I talk about questions answerable only by direct experience, are unlike in important ways.

[The Grand Nudger]

No, you introduced it, I commented, and then you repeated it as though it was ever anything I was arguing.  You've been doing a lot of that lately.

Sure, if you say so.  

Horseshit.  Science has in fact neither answered, nor shown any capacity for answering, the kinds of questions we've been talking about.  Here's you in a nutshell: "We can use science to answer some why questions, so. . . science is the best tool we've come up with yet for explaining why there's something rather than nothing."

Obvious non sequitur is obvious.

-and there you are, the other part of your "thesis".  That there are both questions and answers fundamentally beyond the scope of our best empirical tool.  Not hasn't, not won't.

Can't.

That this set of knowledge, metaphysics,  distinct from physics, is populated.  In what way is the question above other than empirical, in what other than empirical way could you answer it, and in what other than empirical way do you know either?    

I'm not talking about the conclusions.  I'm talking about the observations themselves.  If you want to argue that a ruler measurement or detection of X-rays is dependent on interpretation, then rock on.  I'm going to argue that the kinds of observations use in what we normally call science, and the kind of subjective observations you've been equivocating about by babbling about "empirical observations" instead of "science" when I talk about questions answerable only by direct experience, are unlike in important ways.

Empiricism - the theory that all knowledge is based on sensory experience.  Science, a tool for verifying (or falsifying) predictions by or against empirical observation.  Scientific observations -are- empirical observations, Benny.  Subjective experience -is- empirical, direct experience -is- empirical.  

Consider what you're saying here, particularly in light of your previous comments affirming the claim that empiricism makes.  In what way could any observation or knowledge be other than empirical if sensory experience is the basis of all knowledge? In what way is an empirical observation importantly different from empirical observation?

-and how or by what other than empirical process do you or could you know that? Hell, I've been having a convo in this thread about the two most popular candidates for being importanly different than empirical knowledge or observation. For populating the metaphysical set, the set of things that no empirical process could answer. Intuited knowledge and innate knowledge. Is the proper method for answering the question you posited above, of why there is something rather than nothing, intuition or reference to innate knowledge? Are these actually different than empirical knowledge?

[bennyboy]

-and there you are, the other part of your "thesis".  That there are both questions and answers fundamentally beyond the scope of our best empirical tool.  Not hasn't, not won't.

Can't.

As I said, there's no evidence to demonstrate that science is well-suited to answering those questions, and there are pretty clear reasons to believe that they can't be. I reserve my right to change my opinion if scientists DO break past the Big Bang singularity, or DO find a way to connect directly to subjective experience. So far, hasn't been done, and we have very good philosophical reasons to think they might not be.

That this set of knowledge, metaphysics,  distinct from physics, is populated.  In what way is the question above other than empirical, in what other than empirical way could you answer it, and in what other than empirical way do you know either?    

This is your song, not mine. I said there are some questions which science can't answer, and I have given my reasons.

Those questions are answerable neither by science nor by any other method I know of. Pretending that science is "the best tool" because there's no apparent tool is a non sequitur.

There are also other questions which aren't answerable by science: i.e. all those to do with experience. What's it like to enjoy a cup of hot chocolate with slightly numb hands while looking over a cafeteria table at a cute young ski bunny? Science can talk around it, but can't answer it. But I can, because I've done it.

[The Grand Nudger]

-and there you are, the other part of your "thesis".  That there are both questions and answers fundamentally beyond the scope of our best empirical tool.  Not hasn't, not won't.

Can't.

As I said, there's no evidence to demonstrate that science is well-suited to answering those questions, and there are pretty clear reasons to believe that they can't be.  I reserve my right to change my opinion if scientists DO break past the Big Bang singularity, or DO find a way to connect directly to subjective experience.  So far, hasn't been done, and we have very good philosophical reasons to think they might not be.

Airing the contents of your disagreement and dissatisfaction with science is useless with me.  

If empiricism is true aren't philosophical reasons ultimately empirical themselves?  

That this set of knowledge, metaphysics,  distinct from physics, is populated.  In what way is the question above other than empirical, in what other than empirical way could you answer it, and in what other than empirical way do you know either?    

This is your song, not mine.  I said there are some questions which science can't answer, and I have given my reasons.

Those questions are answerable neither by science nor by any other method I know of.  Pretending that science is "the best tool" because there's no apparent tool is a non sequitur.

There are also other questions which aren't answerable by science: i.e. all those to do with experience.  What's it like to enjoy a cup of hot chocolate with slightly numb hands while looking over a cafeteria table at a cute young ski bunny?  Science can talk around it, but can't answer it.  But I can, because I've done it.

Airing the contents of your disagreement and dissatisfaction with science is useless with me.

Why would an empirical object be immune to a method of empirical investigation? What method did you use to answer the questions that an empirical method can't, and what's the answer, for reference?

[bennyboy]

Airing the contents of your disagreement and dissatisfaction with science is useless with me.

Why would an empirical object be immune to a method of empirical investigation?  What method did you use to answer the questions that an empirical method can't, and what's the answer, for reference?

Why are you still babbling about empiricism? As I said, that's your song, not mine.

Nor did I claim to have answers to some of the questions science can't answer. It's almost like I'm. . . I dunno. . . agnostic or something. I think a sincere "I don't" is much better than a fervent subscription to the dogma of the day, whether its symbol is a cross or a microscope.

I like science. I'm not a big fan of Science.

[The Grand Nudger]

The claim that you know that there are questions that some empirical method can't answer isn't an agnostic claim.

I guess we'll just have to add the term agnostic to the growing list of things you have consequential misconceptions of.

Why would an empirical object be immune to empirical investigation, what method do you use, and what is the answer?

---

Let's see if you can spot the issue if I couch it in context of your own assertions.

I note that you haven't answered the question of what it feels like to hold a cup of hot chocolate on a cold day, etc etc etc.

Does this direct experience of mine justify an assertion that you can't answer that question?  Not only that you don't know, but can't know what it feels like?  That you can only talk around it?

If, otoh, you do or at least can know that, and the manner in which you arrive at this knowledge is fundamentally immune to empirical observation....then what kind of observation or knowledge is it?

[LadyForCamus]

I mean, an axiom is not absolute knowledge. I can't think of any knowledge that I have that could qualify as distinctively innate, and completely divorced from sensory input.  Can you?

Yeah, actually.  Human beings aren't born a blank slate.  I mentioned smiling in another post, not specifically directed at you..but that;s just one example.  There's a great deal of common behavior, and it would be difficult to argue that all of this is accounted for by us somehow all having the same empirical observations, at least not as the empiricists who envisioned both the tabula rasa and empiricism had thought.  We used to think that neurons didn't even form connections until they had some experience to build connections from, and the contents of those neurons, so far as we can tell, amount to all of our knowledge no matter what it's ultimate source may be.  We no longer believe that to be the case..because we've seen that it's not.  

We've always had this bouncing around in the back of our heads (and sometimes the front)..we were aware even when we lacked clarity on what it was we were aware of.  We used to call this sort of thing "instinct", our "our nature" (and hey, we still employ the terms).  Some intuition may be accounted for by it, but all of it qualifies as innate or nativist candidate.  Anything we are born possessing the knowledge required to accomplish is unlikely to be a product of any empirical observation..or at least any empirical observation we can understand the means or timing of, or possess ourselves as the source.  As with intuition above, this is something empiricists have to grapple with.  Even if we were to rehabilitate empiricism in light of this, and far be it from me to claim that we can't, it will still have been the case that empiricism was wrong as conceived.

Okay.  All fair points. But, perhaps "knowledge" is a misnomer when talking about these in utero instincts or reflexes. You're right; I don't "know" how to smile because I spent several weeks walking around watching other people on the street smile, and then practiced in the mirror until I got it right, but that doesn't turn these neurological reflexes into something more than the purely physical effects of a physically developing neurological system, just like it wouldn't be quite right to say that a fetus responding to light in the womb "has knowledge" of how to kick its legs. It's a learned, physical ability.

Even still, the capacity for these reflexes is intertwined with sensory experience, severely limited though it may be in early life. The fetus is responding to sensory input (light) in the example I just mentioned. And, it is suspected that many fetuses dream of the sounds, tastes, and sensations they experience in utero at quite an early gestational age. There is no tabula rasa. Humans are physical beings that begin having some base level of experience as soon as the neurological system is mature enough to start processing its external environment. The learned physical abilities of premature neurological development can hardly be conflated with intuitive, metaphysical knowledge, and I find it hard to believe that that is what most intuitivists mean when they're talking about intuitive knowledge versus empiricism. They still necessarily depend on a physical brain capable of experiencing, on some level, whatever exists outside of it. I suppose I could possibly get on board with this idea you mentioned, nativism, as at least it doesn't seem to be proposing some kind of woo-substance outside of the natural world. Either way, I clearly suck at this. What is your best argument for empiricism as the foundation of knowledge?