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   ☭ 𝗖 𝗔 𝗧 ☭ (radical_egocom@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:04 JST ☭ 𝗖 𝗔 𝗧 ☭

   @stinky
   I also agree that gnostic atheism (definitive disbelief in a God) is not a logical position to take. I believe agnostic atheism is the most logical position to take. There's no way any person today can prove or disprove the existence of God, but it would also be illogical for a person to believe in something without evidence, so atheism would be the most logical position to take until evidence can be provided for the existence of God, i.e. agnostic atheism.

   • Embed this notice
     Unpartitioned Variance 50% off (guyjantic@c.im)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:52 JST Unpartitioned Variance 50% off

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     @AdrianRiskin I have issues with this statement: "The only way to define the truth of an explanatory system is if it allows people to get along in the world."

     First, why is that the ONLY way to define the "truth of an explanatory system"? I'm not big on thinking we can ever assess "Truth" but for evaluating explanatory systems, I favor "degree to which the explanations match empirical data" (where the last part needs defining, too).

     Why is "getting along in the world" better than "matching empirical data?"

     Fascist Germany and Japan were pretty good for getting along with each other; they only had problems outside their "worlds". Cargo cults are arguably great for helping people who believe them "get along in the world." should we be trying to convert the world to cargo cults, for "truth?"

     Various religious empires have had explanatory systems that, when accepted by millions of people in "the world," helped those people "get along."

     That criterion for evaluating ideologies makes no sense to me.

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:53 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Fabio G.
     • Ted Lemon

     @Radical_EgoCom @abhayakara @magitweeter There's no such thing as a logical belief. Logic as an explanatory system for the world is faith-based. The idea that explanations of the world must meet logical standards is not only a tool of oppression but displays a deep misunderstanding of logic.

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     Unpartitioned Variance 50% off (guyjantic@c.im)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:53 JST Unpartitioned Variance 50% off

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉
     • Fabio G.
     • Ted Lemon

     @AdrianRiskin @Radical_EgoCom @abhayakara @magitweeter I think maybe I have some faint common ground with you here: logic (as with any other system of thought) at some point relies on some "givens" that themselves can't be empirically proven. This isn't really "faith" or "blind belief," however; it's based on other considerations.

     I'm quite partial to logic because

     a. It is much more internally consistent than most other systems of thought

     b. The conclusions and explanations it offers up (i.e., pretty much everything from all sciences) are more likely than those of other systems to fit the real-world experiences and observations of lots of humans, as well as to predict other experiences.

     c. Science is logic-based. Compared to competing systems, logic leads to bridges falling down a lot less, electricity making our appliances work more, people being abused less (my field), vaccines helping fewer people get sick and die, etc.

     If you have an alternative system, explain. If you don't, and you just want to say "nothing works," the evidence strongly contradicts that position.

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:53 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Unpartitioned Variance 50% off

     @guyjantic I don't have an alternative system and I don't want to say that nothing works. What I want to say is this:

     Various people have various authentic explanatory systems of the world. The only way to define the truth of an explanatory system is if it allows people to get along in the world. So I want to say that all authentic explanatory systems are true, and all are a matter of faith. I.e. everything that works works and if it works there are no grounds for saying it's false.

     If people have beliefs about god that explain aspects of the world to them and they get along in the world using these beliefs there's no objective way to call them false. It's possible to interpret them into other explanatory systems and say that they'd be false in that system, but that doesn't mean they are false. If they're false, how do they allow their adherents to get along?

     Also, your reasons for being partial to logic are your reasons, but they're not objective reasons for anyone to be partial to logic. E.g. you prefer internal consistency, but other people don't care so much. Can they get along in the world? If so, how can you say that they're wrong?

     Finally, I don't know what you mean by "logic" anyway. Logic itself doesn't offer up any conclusions or explanations about the world, and science isn't strongly related to logic. It's not logic based in any sense of logic that I understand, and it certainly has no moral implications. It might be helpful if you gave just one concrete example of a conclusion offered up by logic, not just the conclusion but actually how it's a conclusion "offered up" by logic.

     To me none of the things you list in part (c) are derived from logic. They may be presented partly in logical terms as part of the communication style of the community of knowers that know them, but it's never essential. Again, a concrete explanation of what you mean by logic and how it relates to any of these things would be helpful.

     AnthonyJK-Admin repeated this.
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     ☭ 𝗖 𝗔 𝗧 ☭ (radical_egocom@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:54 JST ☭ 𝗖 𝗔 𝗧 ☭

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉
     • Fabio G.
     • Ted Lemon

     @abhayakara @AdrianRiskin @magitweeter
     You could literally replace the word "God" in your comment with "Invisible Unicorns" and it would functionally be the same.

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:54 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Fabio G.
     • Ted Lemon

     @Radical_EgoCom @abhayakara @magitweeter No, it wouldn't. Literally no one authentically believes in invisible unicorns as part of a functional explanatory system for the world.

   • Embed this notice
     ☭ 𝗖 𝗔 𝗧 ☭ (radical_egocom@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:54 JST ☭ 𝗖 𝗔 𝗧 ☭

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉
     • Fabio G.
     • Ted Lemon

     @AdrianRiskin @abhayakara @magitweeter
     That's kind of my point. The only difference between Invisible Unicorns and God is that plenty of people believe in God and no one believes in Invisible Unicorns. Both are just as illogical to believe in. If billions of people believed in Invisible Unicorns that wouldn't make Invisible Unicorns any more real, nor would it validate any religious beliefs centered around Invisible Unicorns.

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:57 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Fabio G.

     @magitweeter @Radical_EgoCom I'm not talking about nonexistence. Ive only ever talked about existence, which is something I understand much better.

     If you said you were convinced quarks did not exist I certainly wouldn't point you at anything or try to convince you. I have no stake in anyone's opinion on the existence of quarks. I would instead have interrogated you on how you came to be certain of the nonexistence of an imperceptible object. To me that's a thorny epistemological problem that I find fascinating.

     I don't do that with people who are sure that God doesn't exist due to negative experiences in the past. But you seem to be pretty reasonable, so if you want to tell me how you've come to be certain that an imperceptible object like god doesn't exist I'd be interested to hear about it.

     All I'm saying here is that both God and quarks have explanatory force within which appropriate worldviews. It's slightly disingenuous to say they're unspecified. Like I said there are over four billion Christians and Muslims. Many of them believe in God, which means God must have explanatory force in their worldviews. That's a specification.

   • Embed this notice
     ☭ 𝗖 𝗔 𝗧 ☭ (radical_egocom@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:57 JST ☭ 𝗖 𝗔 𝗧 ☭

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉
     • Fabio G.

     @AdrianRiskin @magitweeter
     >>there are over four billion Christians and Muslims. Many of them believe in God, which means God must have explanatory force in their worldviews. That's a specification.<<

     That doesn't prove anything. The amount of people who believe in something isn't an indicator of whether that thing exist or not.

   • Embed this notice
     Ted Lemon (abhayakara@mastodon.nl)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:57 JST Ted Lemon

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉
     • Fabio G.

     @Radical_EgoCom @AdrianRiskin @magitweeter

     What I understand him to be saying is that from their perspective “God exists.” This doesn’t prove God exists. He’s not saying it proves that God exists. What each of them mean by “God” is probably different anyway. But their basis for believing “God exists” is valid and the belief is functional for them.

     And that is what differentiates “God” from “invisible unicorns,” for example.

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:58 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Fabio G.

     @magitweeter @Radical_EgoCom this happens in science too. Thomas Kuhn wrote a whole book about it. Also there are mathematicians who don't accept non-constructive existence proofs and they already have studied it for a lifetime. There's no assurance that you'll accept scientific existence claims after enough study, and your claim that there is is not only an article of faith but there's evidence against it.

     It's the same with God. Not everyone who immerses themselves in the worldview comes to accept it sufficiently to feel the explanatory force, but that's legitimately true of science as well. Just ask a mathematical intuitionist about the law of the excluded middle or Albert Einstein about quantum entanglement.

   • Embed this notice
     Fabio G. (magitweeter@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:58 JST Fabio G.

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     @AdrianRiskin

     Let me tell you why this is controversial.

     If i had said i'm convinced that quarks do not exist, you would have pointed me to the concrete reasons why physicists believe quarks to be a real thing.

     Instead i said i'm convinced that God does not exist, and you're trying to get me to agree that on some unspecified worldviews there are unspecified reasons to take God's existence as fact.

     That's a completely different approach, and i would say not very fruitful.

     @Radical_EgoCom

   • Embed this notice
     Fabio G. (magitweeter@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:59 JST Fabio G.

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     @AdrianRiskin

     I believe those claims are checkable in principle because that's how academic knowledge works. I don't have a history degree nor have i even read Suetonius, but i'm reasonably convinced that if i spent twenty years on the topic i'd come to the same conclusion as most every other historian: that Julius Caesar was a real person that existed in first-century-BC Rome.

     @Radical_EgoCom

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:59 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Fabio G.

     @magitweeter @Radical_EgoCom And what's the difference between that kind of knowledge and knowledge of the existence of God? In both, once you accept the worldview in which the evidence makes sense the objects have explanatory power. That's how academic knowledge works, that's how religious knowledge works.

     I don't know why this is controversial. It's not possible to prove that either God or quarks exist. The reasons to assume they do are of the same nature.

   • Embed this notice
     Fabio G. (magitweeter@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:46:59 JST Fabio G.

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     @AdrianRiskin

     I have no reason to believe that if i spent twenty years digging after the evidence i would come out the other side believing that God exists. Many people have tried precisely this and not become any more convinced of God's existence after their research.

     It's fully possible to be a theologian or other scholar of religion while remaining an atheist. If the existence of God were academic knowledge this would be basically impossible.

     @Radical_EgoCom

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:00 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Fabio G.

     @magitweeter @Radical_EgoCom who said it was intimate? It's not. There are literally huge numbers of people organized into myriad communities with socially constructed knowledge of God. Many many more people are involved in this than in socially constructing the existence of quarks.

     The existence of quarks only directly explains anything to at most a few tens of thousands of people. I bet no more than a hundred thousand over all of human history. Everyone else is just taking it on authority. On the other hand more than 4 billion people alive right now are either Christian or Muslim.

   • Embed this notice
     Fabio G. (magitweeter@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:00 JST Fabio G.

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     @AdrianRiskin

     Sure, but with quarks and Julius Caesar it's possible, at least in principle, to trace the arguments back to some basic facts that anyone could check for themselves. In practice you have to take things on authority, but only because you don't have twenty years and thousands of dollars to spend running experiments and chasing the sources.

     With God the trail usually stops at Aquinas' Five Ways or scripture or untransferable personal experience.

     @Radical_EgoCom

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:00 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Fabio G.

     @magitweeter @Radical_EgoCom Why do you think those claims are checkable in principle? You can't prove that they are. In any case they're only checkable from within the worldview, which supplies the criteria for truth. Without coming to accept the worldview all the checking in the world won't convince. It's the same with claims regarding the existence of God.

     Have you given up your generally accepted socially constructed knowledge argument?

     Also there are plenty of people who believe in God who reject all arguments from authority, so that's kind of a red herring

   • Embed this notice
     Fabio G. (magitweeter@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:01 JST Fabio G.

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     @AdrianRiskin

     «Assuming God exists has adequate explanatory force in some people's authentic worldviews.»

     I don't know about this. I can definitely see it about quarks. I can see it about Julius Caesar, which was going to be my next example. I'm not convinced it's true of God.

     @Radical_EgoCom

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:01 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Fabio G.

     @magitweeter @Radical_EgoCom because it doesn't have any in yours. How can you know about other people? If they're getting along in the world they must have an understanding of the world that allows them to get along. What possible evidence could you have that they're wrong about the explanatory force of that worldview?

   • Embed this notice
     Fabio G. (magitweeter@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:01 JST Fabio G.

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     @AdrianRiskin

     Well, the existence of quarks and Julius Caesar are pretty well established as a matter of socially constructed knowledge.

     Why is the fact of God's existence so intimate and personal that it can't be shared across people in the same way, that we're required to say “they get along well enough, they're probably onto something”?

     I believe that to be a very significant difference between quarks/Julius Caesar and God, as subjects of existence claims.

     @Radical_EgoCom

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:02 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Fabio G.

     @magitweeter @Radical_EgoCom pathogens are mostly visible under under microscopes so I have no problem with saying that existence claims about pathogens can be proved. I believe my eyes. It's existence claims about imperceptible objects like quarks and God that I don't think can be proved. But also I don't think the impossibility of proof requires agnosticism. I'm also dubious that such claims can be disproved, but I'm not as sure about that as I am that they can't be proved.

     Can you give an example of an imperceptible object whose existence you think can be proved and a proof that it exists?

     Do you not accept non-constructive existence proofs in mathematics?

   • Embed this notice
     Fabio G. (magitweeter@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:02 JST Fabio G.

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     @AdrianRiskin

     I think the meaning of “imperceptible” is critical to the question. Even quarks, to use your example, aren't imperceptible as i understand it. Experimental devices respond more or less consistently as they're expected to if physical models with quarks accurately reflect reality—quarks are real, and their effects are perceptible.

     Yes, of course i accept non-constructive existence proofs. A proof is still very much a physical, (socially) tangible act.

     @Radical_EgoCom

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:02 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Fabio G.

     @magitweeter @Radical_EgoCom perceptible means you can sense it with your senses. Quarks are imperceptible and all the evidence for their existence is circumstantial. The world reacts to inquiries as we would expect it to if quarks exist. This can't reasonably be called proof since it's essentially deducing the antecedent from the consequent, but it's all we can do in science. Even freaking Karl popper thought so.

     But that's exactly the kind of evidence there is for the existence of God. Assuming God exists has adequate explanatory force in some people's authentic worldviews. Just not yours, though.

     None of this is anything like mathematical existence proofs, which are either constructive=perceptual, like your group example, or non-constructive, like nothing outside of mathematics.

   • Embed this notice
     Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉 (adrianriskin@kolektiva.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:03 JST Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     in reply to

     • Fabio G.

     @magitweeter @Radical_EgoCom @stinky There's no existence claim that refers to nontangible objects that can be proved or disproved. But no, that's no reason in itself to be agnostic about them.

     I'd argue, e.g., that the claim that God exists and the claim that quarks exist have the same epistemic status. Neither object is directly perceptible. All evidence for either is circumstantial.

     But that's not a reason to be agnostic about the existence claims. People believe or disbelieve such claims based on the worldview they're operating under. If the existence of a intangible object contributes to the functionalit's of the worldview it exists. If its existence detracts it doesn't. If it's neutral then agnosticism is an option.

     Do you think it's possible to prove an existence claim outside of mathematics, where those words have merely technical meanings? Can you give an example of such a proof?

   • Embed this notice
     Fabio G. (magitweeter@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:03 JST Fabio G.

     in reply to

     • Adrian Riskin 🇵🇸🍉

     @AdrianRiskin

     To be clear: i am a gnostic atheist; to me the answer to the question “does God exist?” is a clear no.

     I am very empirical even about mathematical claims—you prove the existence of (say) a nonabelian group of order 8 by carrying out the construction, which is a laborious real-world computation with real-world results.

     You prove the existence of a certain pathogen in a patient's body by running a certain lab test.

     Maybe i'm using a funny notion of “prove”.

     @Radical_EgoCom

   • Embed this notice
     Fabio G. (magitweeter@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 09-Feb-2024 10:47:04 JST Fabio G.

     in reply to

     @Radical_EgoCom

     Is there any existence claim that any person today has a way to prove or disprove?

     If yes: what's the difference between that and the claim of the existence of God in particular?

     If no: does that mean we should be agnostic about all existence claims?

     @stinky