Atheism and the existence of peanut butter

[polymath257]

You cant rule out pink pixies as well.

You're quoting me out of context. At the macroscopic level, we do have causality. The so-called uncertainty principle in QM implies that we can't have full information of what happens at the subatomic level. This simply means that we can't detect a violation of causality in the first place, that's my point, and that's why QM is irrelevant, it neither clearly confirms nor rejects causality, because as I said above, there is always room for determinism. Acausality in the context of QM means that we are unable to point out the causes of some effect , this certainly doesn't mean that are no causes of these effects.

In other words, you are saying that causality is a matter of faith and, even if the best theory we have suggests otherwise, you will *insist* that there is always a cause.

But the fact of the matter is that to regain causality in the context of quantum mechanics, you need to go to a version of superdeterminism. It isn't just that we cannot detect causality violations, but that the type of hidden variable theories required to have local causation have been excluded via observation.

Not being able to point out a cause is *observationally equivalent* to there being no cause. And, at that point, the best available thoery is the best thing to go with. And that is quantum mechanics, which is ultimately acausal (and non-realist).

There is literally no cause for the timing of a nuclear decay. There is literally no cause for whether a double slit experiment measures spin up or spin down.

And because the theory of relativity preserves causality, it's reasonable to assume that the principle is correct.

Actually, relativity is a classical theory, and not a quantum theory. It deals with the macroscopic level and not the quantum level (although quantum mechanics does have a special relativistic version--that is acausal).

[The Architect Of Fate]

You're quoting me out of context. At the macroscopic level, we do have causality. The so-called uncertainty principle in QM implies that we can't have full information of what happens at the subatomic level. This simply means that we can't detect a violation of causality in the first place, that's my point, and that's why QM is irrelevant, it neither clearly confirms nor rejects causality, because as I said above, there is always room for determinism. Acausality in the context of QM means that we are unable to point out the causes of some effect , this certainly doesn't mean that are no causes of these effects.

In other words, you are saying that causality is a matter of faith and, even if the best theory we have suggests otherwise, you will *insist* that there is always a cause.

But the fact of the matter is that to regain causality in the context of quantum mechanics, you need to go to a version of superdeterminism. It isn't just that we cannot detect causality violations, but that the type of hidden variable theories required to have local causation have been excluded via observation.

Not being able to point out a cause is *observationally equivalent* to there being no cause. And, at that point, the best available thoery is the best thing to go with. And that is quantum mechanics, which is ultimately acausal (and non-realist).

There is literally no cause for the timing of a nuclear decay. There is literally no cause for whether a double slit experiment measures spin up or spin down.

And because the theory of relativity preserves causality, it's reasonable to assume that the principle is correct.

Actually, relativity is a classical theory, and not a quantum theory. It deals with the macroscopic level and not the quantum level (although quantum mechanics does have a special relativistic version--that is acausal).

Now watch him create an irrelevant wall of text that refutes nothing you said and smugly declare himself the victor 

[Apollo]

Hey there,

When I first became interested in the questions of theology, God's existence, etc. I used to hold the atheist position in high regard, it looked like a very logical position to endorse when one isn't convinced of some particular account of God. I started to become highly suspicious of that when I discovered that all the big objections to theism simply fail miserably. 

A better way to show why these objections are really bad is to apply them to anything, to show that anything can't exist. So, let's rule out the existence of peanut butter;

Argument from the diversity of peanuts:

P1: There are many subspecies/types of peanuts. Each type has particular properties, a different taste, a different pod structure and variable seed sizes
P2: Peanut butter is so sweet that its sweetness should uniformly have the same miraculous taste for all mankind

C: peanut butter can't exist because it's incoherent

Argument from peanut evil :

P1: An ensnared fawn caught wildfire, the fawn is burned to death, it must have suffered heavily
P2: Something that tastes as sweet as peanut butter wouldn't let a fawn suffer, this food is too sweet to coexist with evil

C: peanut butter can't exist because of evil

Argument from peanut butter's hiddenness:

P1: Peanut butter isn't available in my local area.
P2: Peanut butter is so sweet that it wouldn't leave someone in my area who craves for it unsatisfied

C: peanut butter isn't that sweet after all

As you can see, these ridiculous arguments hardly differ from the objections we hear often aimed at undermining theism. Arguing from evil is by definition arguing from ignorance, when philosophers endorsing atheism became aware of that, they came up with an ad-hoc distinction between justified evil and unnecessary evil, which is, again, another fat fallacy of arguing from ignorance, because they can't prove that some instance of evil is unnecessary without begging the question. The issue of hiddenness is very similar because it presupposes that there can't be any good reason for God not directly revealing Himself to our senses. Finally, religious diversity is probably the most ridiculous of all three, simply because many conflicting accounts of the divine doesn't mean that they are all false, nor does it undermine any of God's properties.

All this simply means that atheology fails, whereas theology provides many compelling arguments/reasons to believe in God. Theism is the only acceptable worldview. QED.

I feel like this is a bait and I shouldn't engage. I mean, can an analogy fail so miserably? Ever? No.

[Jehanne]

I do hereby prophecy that this thread will never die; it is immortal.

[Simon Moon]

You're right. What did convince me of God isn't this argument, but simply the appearance of order and complexity around me, that's it.

Well...

There's just one of your many mistakes in thinking.

You even state one of the problems right in your statement above, "the appearance of design. Sorry, but the appearance of design, does not mean there is actual design.

Here is but just one of many examples of why appearance of design does not mean design:





Another problem with your thinking, is that, we don't detect design by their complexity, we detect design by contrasting designed things with things that occur naturally.

[The Architect Of Fate]

You're right. What did convince me of God isn't this argument, but simply the appearance of order and complexity around me, that's it.

Well...

There's just one of your many mistakes in thinking.

You even state one of the problems right in your statement above, "the appearance of design. Sorry, but the appearance of design, does not mean there is actual design.

Here is but just one of many examples of why appearance of design does not mean design:





Another problem with your thinking, is that, we don't detect design by their complexity, we detect design by contrasting designed things with things that occur naturally.

[R00tKiT]

In other words, you are saying that causality is a matter of faith and, even if the best theory we have suggests otherwise, you will *insist* that there is always a cause.

But the fact of the matter is that to regain causality in the context of quantum mechanics, you need to go to a version of superdeterminism. It isn't just that we cannot detect causality violations, but that the type of hidden variable theories required to have local causation have been excluded via observation.

You're not very coherent here, I am afraid. You're acknowledging above that we cannot detect causality violations, and yet at the same time declare that the best theory we have doesn't preserve causality...!!??? If QM doesn't allow observing violations, then how do you know causality is violated ?

Classical physics tells us that causality is preserved in the grand scheme of things, there is no reason to assert otherwise unless we can really observe causality violations.

There is literally no cause for the timing of a nuclear decay. There is literally no cause for whether a double slit experiment measures spin up or spin down.

Unless you are an omnipotent being, I don't see how you, or anyone, can assert that nuclear decay is uncaused. 

Not being able to point out a cause is *observationally equivalent* to there being no cause. 

Not being able to point out a cause means that our science is limited, this is called epistemic humility. It's clearly a dishonest move to say there is no cause if we can't currently detect one.

Another problem with your thinking, is that, we don't detect design by their complexity, we detect design by contrasting designed things with things that occur naturally.

I am familiar with this objection to the arguments from design. But there is a very big problem with it : if the only way to recognize that x is designed is to contrast it with some naturally occuring y. Then we are begging the question of whether y is designed or not. The hidden assumption in this objection is that naturally occuring things aren't designed, which is simply a restatement of naturalism.......

[polymath257]

In other words, you are saying that causality is a matter of faith and, even if the best theory we have suggests otherwise, you will *insist* that there is always a cause.

But the fact of the matter is that to regain causality in the context of quantum mechanics, you need to go to a version of superdeterminism. It isn't just that we cannot detect causality violations, but that the type of hidden variable theories required to have local causation have been excluded via observation.

You're not very coherent here, I am afraid. You're acknowledging above that we cannot detect causality violations, and yet at the same time declare that the best theory we have doesn't preserve causality...!!??? If QM doesn't allow observing violations, then how do you know causality is violated ?

Sorry, I misspoke. We *can* detect causality violations.  There are observations hat have been made that exclude *any* hiddent variable theories that are local.

Classical physics tells us that causality is preserved in the grand scheme of things, there is no reason to assert otherwise unless we can really observe causality violations.

Classical physics is known to be wrong. That is why we currently use quantum physics. And quantum physics is NOT a causal theory: it is a probabilistic theory.

And we have done so: look up Aspect's experiment related to the EPR paradox. The observations violate Bell's inequalities which *must* be satisfied by any locally causal system.

There is literally no cause for the timing of a nuclear decay. There is literally no cause for whether a double slit experiment measures spin up or spin down.

Unless you are an omnipotent being, I don't see how you, or anyone, can assert that nuclear decay is uncaused.

Well, the best predictive theory has it as uncaused. In other cases where that theory says the same sort of things, we have verified that no local hidden variable can explain the observations.

Not being able to point out a cause is *observationally equivalent* to there being no cause. 

Not being able to point out a cause means that our science is limited, this is called epistemic humility. It's clearly a dishonest move to say there is no cause if we can't currently detect one.

It isn't just not being able to detect one *right now*. it is that we have a workable theory that describes things incredibly well that is also not a causal theory.

At that point, it becomes arrogant to say that there *must* be a cause.

Another problem with your thinking, is that, we don't detect design by their complexity, we detect design by contrasting designed things with things that occur naturally.

I am familiar with this objection to the arguments from design. But there is a very big problem with it : if the only way to recognize that x is designed is to contrast it with some naturally occuring y. Then we are begging the question of whether y is designed or not. The hidden assumption in this objection is that naturally occuring things aren't designed, which is simply a restatement of naturalism.......

And at that point, it is a simpler system to not have a designer. Unless there is a definite explanatory advantage to postulating a designer (which there isn't, or else we could test it), then it is pointless to assume such exists.

[The Architect Of Fate]

I am familiar with this objection to the arguments from design. But there is a very big problem with it : if the only way to recognize that x is designed is to contrast it with some naturally occuring y. Then we are begging the question of whether y is designed or not. The hidden assumption in this objection is that naturally occuring things aren't designed, which is simply a restatement of naturalism.......

No, it doesn't. The fact we can say beyond reasonable doubt that a car was designed then say we have no reason to believe that blade of grass was designed simply because they are both complex. In no way assumes natural things couldn't be designed it's simply pointing out we have no reason to make that logical leap. It neither assumes naturalism nor begs the question.

[The Grand Nudger]

Why would an omnipotent being be better positioned to tell us whether nuclear decay is strictly classical? I think you mean omniscient. An omnipotent being can do all the things, but there's no implication or requirement that it even knows how it does a single thing. Just like you don't actually know how you breathe.