Atheist VS Naturalist - the latter sounds more appealing to me...

[LadyForCamus]

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Do you think of the supernatural as a force of some kind? Or a realm? Are there things that exist as supernatural entities? If the supernatural exists, it must have some ontological presence or form, yeah? What is the nature of the supernatural?

If you refer back to the definition I've given several times, you'll see that I define the supernatural as when something acts over and above its nature.

Could you be more specific? How do we determine 1. what something’s nature is, and 2. what constitutes “over and above” it? What do you mean by over and above?

So I haven't said anything about some supernatural thingy with form and ontology. I've only talked about events.

That’s why I’m asking you to be more specific in your definition.

It is helpful for me to see that this is probably what people have in mind: not just inexplicable events but some kind of unknown realm.

Well, if we’re considering the supernatural as a possible cause, then it must be something. We need to have a rough idea of what it actually is before we can attempt to evaluate its probability as a cause of some event versus an alternative cause.

[LadyForCamus]

@LadyForCamus

My "Alerts" list indicates that you've replied to me a couple of times in the last hour or so, but I don't see the posts. It may be that my computer is glitching.

I'm not ignoring you.

No worries, I think it was just a glitch on the forum!

[Belacqua]

How do we determine 1. what something’s nature is

That's what science does. It tells us what a thing is made of, how it functions, what its limits are, etc. All those things together are its nature. 

2. what constitutes “over and above” it? What do you mean by over and above?

Science gives us high confidence to say what a thing isn't and can't do. A frog isn't made of solid lead, isn't a million miles long, and can't live in the center of the sun. If we observed any of those things, we'd have to conclude that all of biology is wildly wrong, or, more likely, what we saw was incorrect. What we saw isn't really a frog.

Our colleague polymath is sure that science follows any observation. So that if we saw a frog at the center of the sun, all the frog scientists would say, "Gee, I guess they really can live there. How about that. It must actually be in the nature of frogs to live in the center of the sun." I don't believe that extreme cases would be accepted in that way. They'd have to posit that the observation was wrong, or something other than a terrestrial frog was involved. 

"Over and above" just means that an event is outside of the limits that science tells us exist. (But I accept that the nuance of superiority in that phrase might be ethnocentric on my part. I happen to be an opera fan and jump to the impression that frogs who can sing Mozart would be "superior." But I should be more accepting of different values.   Instead of "over and above" I could say "wildly differing from.") 

As I've said before, if it turns out that science has been wrong before and there is a good solid explanation for why frogs can live at the center of the sun, then such a thing would be natural. If, on the other hand, we think it's pretty certain that they can't do that, then we can be comfortable in ruling that out as a natural habitat.

Well, if we’re considering the supernatural as a possible cause, then it must be something. We need to have a rough idea of what it actually is before we can attempt to evaluate its probability as a cause of some event versus an alternative cause.

I haven't thought about that yet.

So far I've been talking about the supernatural as a kind of event.

I really don't know how to think about a supernatural realm, or something like that. If it means "outside of our material world," there is some precedent in theology. But even that immaterial world operates according to its own nature, and so isn't supernatural according to the definition I've been using. 

If there were such things as supernatural events, I don't know that we could assume they have causes. Cause and effect applies to the natural world, but since by definition the supernatural world doesn't work that way I don't know how we'd identify regularities there. 

And again, I'm not saying supernatural events occur. I'm only saying what it is that would constitute a supernatural event if it did occur.

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No worries, I think it was just a glitch on the forum!

I will NOT suggest that it was a supernatural event!

[polymath257]

Please give one.

The form of the good.

I am still waiting for your definition of 'natural' that would allow for a supernatural.

You rejected the definition by begging the question. We've been through this.

No, I used your definition to show that there could not be a supernatural based on that definition. That was simple logic.

I asked if you had a different definition.

[Belacqua]

The form of the good.


You rejected the definition by begging the question. We've been through this.

No, I used your definition to show that there could not be a supernatural based on that definition. That was simple logic.

I asked if you had a different definition.

No, you asserted that anything we can observe is in the nature of the thing observed. That's your definition of what a nature is. It begs the question. For most people, the nature of a thing has limits. See my post to LadyforCamus above.

[GrandizerII]

Even if we couldn't come up with a clear definition of natural vs supernatural, I do believe there is nevertheless a general imprecise intuition shared by many of us regarding the boundary between what's natural and what's supernatural. If there are gods involved that spin fire out of "nothing" and mysteriously make frogs sing Italian songs randomly and unpredictably, I think we're more likely to intuit that as supernatural rather than simply an unexpected instance of the natural. It's a bit weird to me when people seem to be equating naturalism to something that could be aptly labeled "possibilism".

[Belacqua]

It's a bit weird to me when people seem to be equating naturalism to something  that could be aptly labeled "possibilism".

That's fair. 

I have been defining "natural" as that set of things which it is possible for a given thing to do. If we see it doing something which we take to be impossible, that is evidence for the supernatural, for people who don't rule it out a priori.

And in this view, since it is possible for Zeus to shoot lightning from his fingertips (or would be if he existed), then it would be natural for him.

I think our whole category of natural/supernatural is likely modern and misleading. The Greeks thought that daemons, muses, and gods were a normal part of the world. In their view, there was no separation between the part of nature we observe and gods with powers greater than human. I can't think of any ancient text that talks about the supernatural -- only the super-human, the hidden, the greater-than-we-can-know.

[GrandizerII]

It's a bit weird to me when people seem to be equating naturalism to something  that could be aptly labeled "possibilism".

That's fair. 

I have been defining "natural" as that set of things which it is possible for a given thing to do. If we see it doing something which we take to be impossible, that is evidence for the supernatural, for people who don't rule it out a priori.

And in this view, since it is possible for Zeus to shoot lightning from his fingertips (or would be if he existed), then it would be natural for him.

I think our whole category of natural/supernatural is likely modern and misleading. The Greeks thought that daemons, muses, and gods were a normal part of the world. In their view, there was no separation between the part of nature we observe and gods with powers greater than human. I can't think of any ancient text that talks about the supernatural -- only the super-human, the hidden, the greater-than-we-can-know.

I think the way you have defined "natural" here is making everyone else here confused. In some posts you make it clearer what you mean by natural like in your response to LFC. It's easier to understand if nature is linked to scientific prediction or something and the supernatural is what cannot be predictable through science. But like I implied before, I don't have any clear definitions here, only an intuition which may very well be a modern thing regarding the distinction between natural and supernatural.

By "possibilism", I meant it in an unofficial sense, something akin to "if it can exist, it can exist". Not to be confused with modal realism which can also be named that.

[The Grand Nudger]

No, I used your definition to show that there could not be a supernatural based on that definition. That was simple logic.

I asked if you had a different definition.

No, you asserted that anything we can observe is in the nature of the thing observed. That's your definition of what a nature is. It begs the question. For most people, the nature of a thing has limits. See my post to LadyforCamus above.

You asserted that you loon......that was your definition. Sure you want to go from appealing to ignorance straight to an ad pop? By page 66, are you going to be bitching at others for the things you say about what most people believe?

I get the feeling that we're watching you burn to the ground in real time.

[polymath257]

No, I used your definition to show that there could not be a supernatural based on that definition. That was simple logic.

I asked if you had a different definition.

No, you asserted that anything we can observe is in the nature of the thing observed. That's your definition of what a nature is. It begs the question. For most people, the nature of a thing has limits. See my post to LadyforCamus above.

And you had previously *defined* the nature of something as being 'what it is and does'.

That *means* that anything it does is, BY DEFINITION, natural.

That is simple logic.

Now, if you want to change that definition, please suggest another. But my claim directly follows from your definition.

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It's a bit weird to me when people seem to be equating naturalism to something  that could be aptly labeled "possibilism".

That's fair. 

I have been defining "natural" as that set of things which it is possible for a given thing to do. If we see it doing something which we take to be impossible, that is evidence for the supernatural, for people who don't rule it out a priori.

And in this view, since it is possible for Zeus to shoot lightning from his fingertips (or would be if he existed), then it would be natural for him.

I think our whole category of natural/supernatural is likely modern and misleading. The Greeks thought that daemons, muses, and gods were a normal part of the world. In their view, there was no separation between the part of nature we observe and gods with powers greater than human. I can't think of any ancient text that talks about the supernatural -- only the super-human, the hidden, the greater-than-we-can-know.

And, by this definition, if a frog is singing duets, then it is *possible* for it to sing duets, which means that singing duets is 'natural' for that frog.

If it happens, then it is possible.

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Even if we couldn't come up with a clear definition of natural vs supernatural, I do believe there is nevertheless a general imprecise intuition shared by many of us regarding the boundary between what's natural and what's supernatural. If there are gods involved that spin fire out of "nothing" and mysteriously make frogs sing Italian songs randomly and unpredictably, I think we're more likely to intuit that as supernatural rather than simply an unexpected instance of the natural. It's a bit weird to me when people seem to be equating naturalism to something  that could be aptly labeled "possibilism".

I disagree with this. If you went back 200 years, many of the things we do on a daily basis would have been considered 'magical' or 'supernatural'. We communicate instantly with people across the world, we can remotely control machinery, we can bring up moving pictures of events, we can cure diseases, etc.

Much of the modern world would have been considered to be supernatural not all that long ago. The only reason we don't consider it so today is because it is part of the technology we use and we feel we understand it.

I have yet to see a coherent definition of the term 'natural' that takes into consideration the actual methods of science and the possibility of scientific revolution that can lead to significantly different technologies.

As Clark said, 'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic'.