Proof and evidence will always equal Science

[Ferrocyanide]

If the god that Neo-Scholastic is talking about is a principle, then it doesn’t exist, just like emotions, numbers, names, languages, songs, stories, colors, ideas, designs, information, logic do not exist on their own.

I’ve already given the example with music, but here it is again.



In order for such things to exist, such as the design of a chair, you need atoms. A certain group of atoms can represent the “chair”.

Such things do not have an effect on reality. For example, you will never see the number 5 walking down the street, kicking a ball.
Music does not go around and push air molecules and other atoms around.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-hiding_theorem

Information is conserved.  In fact, one can use rules about information to derive Quantum Mechanics.

One could argue that without "things" there would be no information, but without information, there can be no things.  I see information as something just as real as a chair.

Unfortunately I do not know enough about Quantum physics to understand what they did as an experiment.
It would be nice to see a schematic of the setup, something visual, an explanation of the experiment.

To me, it looks like information is not something that gets conserved, because, one could write a software that write the same file, many times onto a hard disk.
You can have a copier machine, that keeps making copies of the same CD.
So, information can be cloned and it can be destroyed.

You can even have a factory that makes the same car over and over again. The car itself is a piece of information.

In fact, forget matter. Let’s talk virtual.
Let’s say I have a set of numbers = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5}
and they get placed in order =  1, 2, 3, 4, 5 <===a piece of information
and then, they get placed in another order 1, 5, 3, 4, 2 <=====another piece of information

but I think you were talking about the information content of the universe.

[polymath257]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-hiding_theorem

Information is conserved.  In fact, one can use rules about information to derive Quantum Mechanics.

One could argue that without "things" there would be no information, but without information, there can be no things.  I see information as something just as real as a chair.

A lot of care is required here. The definition of 'information' in quantum systems is very technical and may not agree with intuitions.

Quantum particles have properties (information) encoded in a quantum state. That quantum state can be manipulated in a variety of ways, but because of something called unitarity (which is invertible), it is always theoretically possible to regain state no matter what is done.

That said, the practical ability for recovery is strongly limited by whatever other systems are interacted with. A large, macroscopic, system is very unlikely to be manipulated in giving up the information again (in essence, this is linked with entropy).


So, yes, those properties are 'real' although they may not be specified (for example, in superpositions or entangled states). They may well be probabilistic.

[The Architect Of Fate]

There is another 'closer to' option. The God of Classical theism may better be described as something more like the Principle of Non-Contradiction. Does the PNC exist?  If so, based on what evidence? Or is it something from which we reason rather than to which we reason. Everyone has first priciples even if they are only tacitly aware of them. I am sincerely curoius...

Could many atheists defend their first principles using the same standard by which they judge theistic first principles?

So God is a principle of logic? Or of math? In what way does such deserve the word 'God'? Does it have *any* of the porperties usually assigned to deities? Knowledge? Nope. Intentional? Nope. Power to create? Nope.

This feels to me like an even worse version of identifying God with the universe. Sure, you can do it, but at that point it seems that you are just abusing language.

Oh, and to answer your question: the PNC, like all logic and math, is a rule of language more than anything else. There are paraconsistent logics out there that are perfectly workable.

So, no, PNC doesn't exist in any way different than language. It's a convention.

As for first principles, I tend to hold them all as tentative. let's face it, solipsism is internally consistent. There is no *logical* way to argue against it. So an assumption is made about that. After that, there are assumptions about whether memory is accurate at all, whether the patterns I see are valid,, etc. Then we get to testability of ideas, eliminating those that are wrong.

Yes, there are a number of first principles that pretty much everyone adopts, whether or not they believe in a deity.

Which gets to the question of whether the God assumption actually gives any usable information. Is it really an assumption that helps in a way similar to how getting out of solipsism helps? From what I have seen, the answer to that is no.

There Neo goes which his definitional parasitism

[arewethereyet]

Miss Eng laughs and sips some tea.

Well, I have been waiting for this Miss Meng....I know you from elsewhere and know you are a troll/sock.

Bye now.