The worth of Knowledge

[diffidus]

There seems to be a pre-ponderance of people on this site who claim that the only worthwhile form of knowledge is empirical knowlege based upon measurement. This is not true.

Take as examples the following statements: ' It is an absolute fact that in Euclidean geometry, the internal angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees', 'I think therefore I am', 'The earth is smaller than the universe that contains it', 'The law of cause and effect is based upon faith and cannot be proven'.

These are all statements of fact, but cannot be proven by emprical measurement. Emprical measurement is useful, but only a part of what is required to make a scientific assertion about the world. Imagine measuring how hot the radiation from the sun is, at different distances from its surface. This would give you a set of measurements, but without any understanding, you could not say what the temperature would be at points in-between your measured points. To do this, you have to employ a different type of knowlede that is based upon abstract reasoning. Without this type of reasoning, empirical observation would be virtually useless.

This is why some statements can be made with 100% certainty that they are true, while others are doubtful.

There are even people on this site who believe there is a real difference in meaning between the statements 'I believe that God doesn't exist' and 'I don't believe in God'.

Finally, there are people on this site who believe that God does not exist based upon it being unlikely, due to the lack of empirical evidence. But this 'unlikely' implies a knowledge of the probability that God does not exist. Upon what set of empirical measurements is this probability estimated? The answer is none!! Atheism, on these grounds, is a huge leap of faith into the dark world of Humankinds lack of knowledge.

[Darth]

Before this descends into whatever it will descend into, like a big descendy thing, are you arguing for agnosticism and not atheism towards a creator deity/s of some kind, or, as the way you worded your post would suggest, agnosticism and not atheism towards "God" (Yahweh the malevolent)?

[tackattack]

@diffidus.. They are not statements of fact as most people here define facts. It is however called axiomatic. I think your arguement breaks down because 100% certainty is not 100% fact without redefining words.

[Ace Otana]

Finally, there are people on this site who believe that God does not exist based upon it being unlikely, due to the lack of empirical evidence. But this 'unlikely' implies a knowledge of the probability that God does not exist. Upon what set of empirical measurements is this probability estimated? The answer is none!! Atheism, on these grounds, is a huge leap of faith into the dark world of Humankinds lack of knowledge.

If it takes faith to lack belief in god, then it takes faith to lack belief in anything else. So by your argument, we all have huge amounts faith in many things. We all have huge faith in lack of belief in Santa Claus, we all have faith in lack of belief in big foot.

Try and refute my point without resulting to special pleading or argumentum ad populum. For which both are fallacious arguments.
I don't even need to put any effort into this. Your arguments were flawed from the start.

[Faith No More]

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There seems to be a pre-ponderance of people on this site who claim that the only worthwhile form of knowledge is empirical knowlege based upon measurement. This is not true.

Take as examples the following statements: ' It is an absolute fact that in Euclidean geometry, the internal angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees', 'I think therefore I am', 'The earth is smaller than the universe that contains it', 'The law of cause and effect is based upon faith and cannot be proven'.

These are all statements of fact, but cannot be proven by emprical measurement. Emprical measurement is useful, but only a part of what is required to make a scientific assertion about the world. Imagine measuring how hot the radiation from the sun is, at different distances from its surface. This would give you a set of measurements, but without any understanding, you could not say what the temperature would be at points in-between your measured points. To do this, you have to employ a different type of knowlede that is based upon abstract reasoning. Without this type of reasoning, empirical observation would be virtually useless.

This is why some statements can be made with 100% certainty that they are true, while others are doubtful.

There are even people on this site who believe there is a real difference in meaning between the statements 'I believe that God doesn't exist' and 'I don't believe in God'.

Finally, there are people on this site who believe that God does not exist based upon it being unlikely, due to the lack of empirical evidence. But this 'unlikely' implies a knowledge of the probability that God does not exist. Upon what set of empirical measurements is this probability estimated? The answer is none!! Atheism, on these grounds, is a huge leap of faith into the dark world of Humankinds lack of knowledge.

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I wrote up a response to this that broke down your arguments but then my computer froze so I will sum it up. First, some of your facts, such as a triangles angles equaling 180 can be proven like this -
http://www.mathsisfun.com/proof180deg.html

Your argument fails, however, because you make the assumption that empirical evidence is the only thing atheists use to come to their conclusions on the probability of god. We factor in concepts such as the nature of life, the nature of the universe, and the nature of the deity, while weighing the evidence. This is the third time you have tried, and failed, at proving that atheism takes faith. The more you post, the more you prove that your position is just lack of conviction, and not the intellectual high ground you try so hard to make it sound like.

[BloodyHeretic]

"Imagine measuring how hot the radiation from the sun is, at different distances from its surface. This would give you a set of measurements, but without any understanding, you could not say what the temperature would be at points in-between your measured points."

You can actually, it's called drawing a graph.

[SleepingDemon]

Goddammit, again???? Diffidus will you just change your religious views to theist and get it over with? This is becoming abbhorently banal. You have yet to prove why a space god with superpowers is more likely to exist than a unicorn so until you do that, your argument is bunk.

[diffidus]

"Imagine measuring how hot the radiation from the sun is, at different distances from its surface. This would give you a set of measurements, but without any understanding, you could not say what the temperature would be at points in-between your measured points."

You can actually, it's called drawing a graph.

Diffidus:

But the points in-between the measurements on the graph are not empirical, they have been invented and may be completely fallacious.

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Before this descends into whatever it will descend into, like a big descendy thing, are you arguing for agnosticism and not atheism towards a creator deity/s of some kind, or, as the way you worded your post would suggest, agnosticism and not atheism towards "God" (Yahweh the malevolent)?

Diffidus:

English is an organic language and so words are continually changing in their meaning. For example, someone who is epicurean would, nowdays, be more to do with fine dining than the lifestyle of Epicurus, who led a frugal existence. Similarly, the word Agnostic originally meant, someone who believes that nothing is known or can be known about the existence of God. However, this word has evolved, so that, to say 'I am agnostic towards the idea of telepathy', means having a non-commital attitude toward it. I am Agnostic towards the question of the existence of God in this second sense. In my case, the non-commital attitude stems from an inability to estimate the probability of something that may be outside the scope of our current knowledge or measuring equipment.

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@diffidus.. They are not statements of fact as most people here define facts. It is however called axiomatic. I think your arguement breaks down because 100% certainty is not 100% fact without redefining words.

Well we could argue over the definition of words if you want. But I agree with you that most people mean 'fact' in a different way to that which I am intending. What I am interested in, is the truth of a claim made by someone. So that if someone claims that 'the internal angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees' I can verify it. In this sense that statement can be proven to be 100% true. In the case of empirical measurement we should be able to verify that the earth is smaller than the universe. However, empirical measurement, more generally, involves an element of uncertainty. This uncertainty is where probability arises with regard to a claim.

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Finally, there are people on this site who believe that God does not exist based upon it being unlikely, due to the lack of empirical evidence. But this 'unlikely' implies a knowledge of the probability that God does not exist. Upon what set of empirical measurements is this probability estimated? The answer is none!! Atheism, on these grounds, is a huge leap of faith into the dark world of Humankinds lack of knowledge.

If it takes faith to lack belief in god, then it takes faith to lack belief in anything else. So by your argument, we all have huge amounts faith in many things. We all have huge faith in lack of belief in Santa Claus, we all have faith in lack of belief in big foot.

Try and refute my point without resulting to special pleading or argumentum ad populum. For which both are fallacious arguments.
I don't even need to put any effort into this. Your arguments were flawed from the start.

I hold that if somebody claimed that 'In Euclidean geometry, the internal angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees', then their claim is 100% true. I have verified it and I know it to be true. There is no element of faith whatsoever.

[Ace Otana]

I hold that if somebody claimed that 'In Euclidean geometry, the internal angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees', then their claim is 100% true. I have verified it and I know it to be true. There is no element of faith whatsoever.

Can you tell me what the difference between Santa and god is?

[Anymouse]

But the points in-between the measurements on the graph are not empirical, they have been invented and may be completely fallacious.

I hold that if somebody claimed that 'In Euclidean geometry, the internal angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees', then their claim is 100% true. I have verified it and I know it to be true. There is no element of faith whatsoever.

Your friend Diffidus might argue, however: You have not measured "all" triangles, therefore you cannot know "all" triangles have only 180 degrees of angles, in the manner that to disprove all crows are black, one must only turn up a single white crow.

However, every time you measure another 180 degree triangle, it makes the chance of finding one that is not a little bit smaller. At some point, one can reasonably expect the next one will have 180 degrees, and say with confidence there are none that won't.