Intergalactic Summit

No. I'm done "arguing" with Pilot Mithra, but I HAVE to draw the line at this:



Science is a process specifically calculated to remove faith from the equation at every step. The gaps in and borders of our scientific understanding are clearly known, flagged and acknowledged. Credible scientists happily and eagerly answer any question to which they don't know the answer with "I don't know... yet."

Instead of faith, you have the construct known as a "null hypothesis". These are default positions that have been demonstrated and observed to such a high degree of probability, that their odds of being wrong are effectively zero. Null hypotheses include statements like "The laws of physics are constant" or "Light travels at a fixed speed regardless of the observer's frame of reference". These are not predictions - they are observations.

When science makes a prediction, that prediction is tested. The results of said test dictate whether the prediction is shown to be accurate, or inaccurate, and whether the inaccurate prediction is either refined or discarded.

There is no leap of faith involved. Quite the reverse, the engine that drives science is skepticism. Skepticism is a synonym for doubting, and whatever definition of faith you happen to be using, pretty much the one thing I hope we can agree on is that faith and doubt are as opposite as on and off.

The fact that somebody can claim that logic has led them to god as the source of all that exists does not make their claim true. People make that claim an awful lot - to my knowledge, they have invariably been wrong, their logic has been flawed, and their understanding of the subject has been willfully, stubbornly inaccurate.

I mean this with the utmost sincerity - The quest to be right is one of my defining personality traits. I don't mean that I wish to be seen as being right, I don't mean that I want to remain secure in my arrogant certainty. I mean that wherever possible I want my opinions to correlate with and conform to reality. I only care about being factually correct. About the most important values I have are: "Are my beliefs justified? Are my opinions correct? Do I have my facts straight? Have I considered the possibility that I could be wrong?"

I shouldn't care who believes that or not - it's as true as the fact that my parents named me Yakiya Verin Gariova Hakatain, that I became a capsuleer in YC107, that I tend to swear when I get angry or that I currently have a beard. Anybody who claims otherwise - who thinks that I am the kind of person to stubbornly cling to what I believe out of nostalgia and indoctrination? Is wrong. But the most infuriating thing in all of New Eden, for me, is to be accused of being closed-minded and stubborn. I am anything but. The reason I am not willing to change my opinion is not out of prejudice, or recalcitrance, or pride.

I refuse to change my mind because if I did, I would then be wrong.



But absence of evidence most definitely IS evidence of non-involvement. The Scriptures and the Amarr orthodoxy describes a god who interferes actively in human affairs, who answers prayers, who heals the sick, who returns dead heirs to life and hands them fleet-mangling superweapons. Supposedly.

The absence of evidence at the very least is evidence enough that, whatever form a hypothetical god may take, it most certainly is not the form described by Amarr theology.

Why then do you insist to be any more justified in your trust and belief in the scientific method and rationality, logic and reason than Amarr are in the belief in the divine, when you are not?

You can't justify your trust in the scientific method by the scientific method as the scientific method presupposes that logical reasoning works and because that would be begging the question.

You can't justify logical reasoning by the scientific method, because it presupposes that logical reasoning works.

You can't justify logical reasoning by logical reasoning, as that would be begging the question, circular or too weak on the one hand and too strong on the other.

All you did so far to justify your belief in these things over the belief in god is throwing your hands up in the air and to evoke the pragmatic "but it works apparently". That belief in the divine works apparently can be just as well claimed and as much as you deny that claim: you have nothing in your hands to refute it.

So, yes, the scientist has to and does take a leap of faith: He accepts the preconditions for the application of the scientific method and usually does so unquestioning. Only few scientists venture into the fields of theory of science or epistemology. And why should they? It's not their business. But if they want to know if their beliefs are justified they have to do so and usually they are quite shaken when they discover that the foundations they thought to be so firm are quite up in the air. Many of them harden and reject philosophical considerations as irrelevant or something like that. But someone who's questing for truth rather than reassurance would have little problems with accepting the analytical truth that science does, in fact, require a leap of faith: Of faith in reason and rationality which are the very foundations of science. And there is no shame in that faith.

This leaves the question, why don't you change your mind? Is it because you were wrong, if you did? Or rather because you insist that you would be wrong, because you can't allow to be, what shall not be? If your main values are the questions up there, you should have no problem to question whether rationality and reason are the so firmly grounded, so imperishable and all-mighty "tools" as you seemingly believed them to be. And you should have no problem in leaving open the question whether faith in the divine is or is not reasonable - at least that much, you should be able to do on your quest for truth, for nothing lets us stray as much from the truth as us thinking that what we think is the truth and thus those ideas should never be changed. To leave the answer at the stage of that honest "I don't know... yet.", when we don't.

As to Amarrian theology: You don't really honestly assume that Amarrian "folk-theology" or religion is meant to be understood literally, do you?


As to Mr. Braitai:
First, you don't seem to grasp that the "cogito ergo sum" isn't as self evident as you claim it to be. It is more than just a few centuries old and thus there are tomes filled with criticism of the position that it is. If you'd read up on that you might start to grasp what I mean. Second, there are methods to assess what is not naturalistic: They are actually more exact than the ones to assess the naturalistic. Third, it's a bold claim that nothing under the umbrella of theism can provide knowledge of the divine, you should be prepared to back this up, I hope?

As to the Ad Hominem, I was referring to you being so quick to agree that debating with theists is futile as they are unable to bring any (valid) arguments anyway. You know, the thing with the pigeons, that boiled down to "you are wrong because you're a theist"? Also, I didn't accuse you of having taken refuge to any Ad Hominems, yet: I merely asked you to not take refuge to them but to rather show that what I said is invalid logically. I am still waiting for your attempt at the latter. But it seems people that are like you rather do simply insult people they don't agree with. How very civilized of you.

With those that are barbarians by your standard, I am apparently in good company.

Regards,
N. Mithra

I appreciate the irony of that statement: You're the uncrowned master of self-defeating propositions.

Exactly brother.

However, it continuous to amaze me that those not of a religious persuasion continually deny or fail to see that *they* are taking a leap of faith at some point too. It galls me that they attack others for taking such a leap of faith, pretending that taking that leap is unreasonable, illogical or simply wrong.

All people put faith in things they haven't verified, haven't seen but simply assume to be true, regardless of their religion or culture. It is the basic denial that many people make that they too take a leap of faith (likely because they are scared that admitting so will shake their moral foundations) that makes these debates so hard.

Confronting them with their own denial or failings often causes them to abandon all attempts at further debate, often in a rude and accusatory manner, typical of the ego-protection of a person who's beliefs are under attack:

Science is not a person, it is a method. People take leaps of faith, methods don't.

When was the last time you proved mathematical formula's, when is the last time that you tested the big-bang theory, when is the last time you performed and verified the annihiliation energy of antimatter reactors, did you ever visit all recorded systems to test if they really exist?

It is my estimation that you scientifically test less than 1 millionth of the knowledge you have and simply make a leap of faith on all the other subjects.

Yes, this is separate from the leap of faith you take in basing your world-view on the scientific method, but as I've understood, that subject is not up for discussion by you and you prefer to remain stubborn in that area.

Captain Mithra, I am still in the process of formulating a response to your excellent topic,so please do not consider this to be one. I simply had to reply on this point particularly.

Sir, to address your points in order:

1) I formulate mathematical proofs daily, and have at times worked back to base axioms from same.
2) My profession is not in cosmology, but I am the acquaintance of a doctor of physics employed at the Todaki Linear Supercollider, whose daily experimentation relies on and provides evidence to the origin of the universe.
3) As above.
4) That's a little silly. There is a difference between faith and trust.

More generally, sir. If we only believed the things that we could see, hear, touch, taste, or feel, we would still be throwing rocks at one another and scratching the dirt in search of tubers. This argument is solipsism and is purposeless.

My consciousness is self evident to me. It exists, I exist, in some form. That is absolute.



What's incredible about this statement is what comes next.



I should not have to prove a negative.



I made an observation, and insulted you. The insult is justified and the observation accurate. Deal with it, barbarian.

Mr. Braitai,

I suggest you educate yourself on the topic you speak of so boldly, while evidentially not knowing about the difficulties attached to them. To make studying those a bit easier, I recommend you get a look at the essays "Cogito ergo sum: inference or performance?" and "The Cogito and Its Importance" - the latter unfortunately not available in its entirety for free, but I'm sure you already have access to a library or are easily able to get such. Anyway, the important conclusion of this scholarly article is:


That aside, if you accept the Cogito argument, you probably also accept the consequence it entails? The existence of God.

Also, you should be aware that the impossibility to directly prove a negative existential claim makes it not exempt from having to back it up: All you have to do, really, is to show that it is impossible that there is an object x and that this object x has the properties "under the umbrella of theology" and "provides knowledge of the divine". So your negative claim can easily be proven by showing that the the negation of your negative - which is a positive - is impossible. In case you fail to do that you might want to try other methods to back up your claim, aside rigorous proof.

Now, then, I wait for you engaging me with arguments.

Faithfully,
N. Mithra

Mr Braitai,

in case you didn't get what this thread is about (apparently you did not): This thread is about the claim that everything and therefore religion as well can only be accepted if one can show it to be rationally justified. Describing the paradoxes that come to be through this position is exactly an argument against this claim and if those that are supporting these claims are unable to solve these paradoxes, they are not vindicated in their claims.

Second, the position of atheism isn't the mere rejection of the claim of theism: It's more than just that as it doesn't remain indifferent on the question of the existence of the divine, but rather claims God's non-existence. That is making a a claim and yes, this one one should be prepared to back up as well, it is not somehow miraculously exempt from the need of justification.
Furthermore, you claimed explicitly that "nothing that comes under the umbrella of theism can actually provide knowledge of the divine, if such a thing exists."

So, I'm waiting for your arguments, still.

N. Mithra

I have a reasoned position to reject what is not reasonable. The limitations of reason do not diminish this position, I accept them. What I reject is the idea that theism overcomes such limitations, or provides a position worthy of study beyond it's historical and social impact. The limitations we should be discussing are not of reason as a concept, but of the human mind and language. Theism does not overcome these limitations.



Incorrect. The central position of atheism is the rejection of theism. Your problem, like so many barbarians, is that you elevate theism beyond it's position. The study of theism cannot provide insight into the supernatural, because we are restricted by natural limitations.

What reason is there to ACCEPT theism? Tradition. Imagination. Social expectation. Delusion. Emotional dependence. You still expect people to prove a negative, there is no claim here, only the rejection of one that has not been justified, logically or otherwise.