Discussion on answer by Cell: Asserting that Atheism and Theism are both faith based positions

Graham

00:47

Rejecting a person's cocoon is not the same as saying you know it is false, it is simply saying that their claim is not valid. An example. Suppose we're in a basement somewhere with no sight or sound of the outside world. I claim to know that it's raining outside because I "just know", or because a supernatural entity told me so.

Typo - claim, not cocoon.

You'd be justified in rejecting my claim based on my dodgy source of "information", without having to go and inspect the weather yourself. I may even be correct, of course - but only by coincidence.

In the same way, we can reject a theist argument which is not supported by direct evidence of the existence of the relevant god. We don't have to prove that the god doesn't exist, we simply have to demonstrate that the theist has no basis in fact for their claim.

H Walters

02:24

@a1s2d3f4 There's a severe flaw both in how people are arguing against you, and how you yourself are arguing. Put your definitions aside, and let's simply ask... is it possible at all for a person to simply not profess belief versus profess disbelief?

If you acknowledge that this is even possible, I grant that you must entertain the possibility that people in fact do so. And if that's the case, there's possibly people who both do so and profess the label of atheist.

The main problem I see here is that there are two "sides" that claim that atheism means x, versus that atheism means y; one committing an etymology fallacy and the other an appeal to motive. Ultimately, this is a linguistics issue, so a linguistic approach is demanded.

The secondary problem I see is a strong attribution bias. One should generally warrant caution trying to make attributions of someone (that is, to claim that x is just saying that because of y), simply because of natural susceptibility to this bias. But when that "someone" is actually a generalized other (i.e., not a particular person), that should set off alarm bells

H Walters

02:43

My goodness, we have horrible cheerleaders here... both of those starred comments are garbage

Agnosticism is originally about knowledge: "Roughly, Huxley’s principle says that it is wrong to say that one knows or believes that a proposition is true without logically satisfactory evidence..."....

As for what "the atheist" does, there's no such thing as "the atheist". There are only people who claim themselves to be atheists and people who don't.

If a quack diagnosis me as having cancer, because he sees I have a dark aura, I might reject that claim due to his methods being nonsense. That's not the same as affirming I don't have cancer.

terdon

09:38

@JMac Indeed it doesn't. But they are separate things. There is a huge difference between "I don't believe in the existence of a god" and "I believe there is no god". The former is not a faith based position, the latter is.

Konrad Rudolph

10:50

@terdon “I believe there is no god” is only a (blind) faith-based position if it’s not backed up by reasoning. This is clearly almost never the case. The converse (for “I believe there’s a god”) is true as well, by the way, it’s just that the reasoning in that case is materially worse by any standard of evidence, which is why that position is called “faith-based”, whereas the former isn’t (since it’s based on solid reasoning and, yes, evidence).

(Part of the confusion here is that almost all the evidence for the atheistic position is negative. But negative evidence is still evidence! There’s a common claim that “absence of evidence isn’t evidence of absence” but this sentence is so misleading as to be outright false; statistical hypothesis testing, as employed in everything from basic science to clinical research, routinely bases its reasoning on absence of evidence; and, with proper models and caveats this is entirely correct.)

terdon

11:09

@KonradRudolph Oh, absolutely. And by far the most likely hypothesis is that there is no god. However, as you correctly point out, the scientific method can only reject the null hypothesis ("there is a god"), the evidence isn't enough to be able to conclusively prove, beyond all shadow of doubt, that there is no such thing as a god. All we can say is that it is incredibly unlikely that there is one given the evidence we have available.

I, personally, take that one step further and believe, I feel quite deeply that there is no god. This goes beyond what I can rigorously prove and indeed enters the realm of faith. If I stopped at "the evidence cannot support the existence of god", there would be no faith involved, but I take it further: "the evidence cannot support the existence of god*, and I am absolutely convinced that no god exists*. The latter is a leap of faith.

Granted, it is a leap of faith that is very much supported by our observations of the world around us, but I'm still taking it a step further than what I can demonstrate. I wouldn't try to publish this, for example :)

Konrad Rudolph

@terdon If there are only two competing alternatives, then “rejecting the null” is equivalent to accepting the alternative hypothesis, by definition.

terdon

@KonradRudolph Not quite. Rejecting the null god exists is not the same as accepting god does not exist. Just like saying that god is not green does not mean you should accept that god is red.

Konrad Rudolph

@terdon Your example doesn’t work because it violates the condition I laid down: “there are only two competing alternatives”. Red and green are not the only alternatives; but “exists” and “does not exist” are.

terdon

@KonradRudolph Fair. OK, my point is that I don't think there are only two alternatives. Or, rather, there are only two, but we cannot be 100% sure based on the evidence that one of them is true. Of the two, it seems far more likely that there is no god, but I can't rule out that a god does exist and, well, is screwing with us. An omnipotent being would be quite capable of doing this, although the idea of such a trickster god is terrifying.

Since I cannot absolutely rule out the existence, but only consider it to be extremely unlikely, the fact that I take it to the point of claiming there is absolutely no such thing as god is a step further than I can back up with evidence. Small step, but a step. It is that step I call faith.

Konrad Rudolph

Right, this is what uncertainty implies. Likewise, I’m also not 100% sure of any god’s nonexistence. But, as with any other uncertainties in life, this doesn’t imply that I’m taking a leap of faith. Based on the best available evidence, and based only on evidence, I believe that no god exist, that vaccines don’t cause autism, and that smoking does cause cancer.

Belief simply does not factor into my consideration.

terdon

11:20

@KonradRudolph Precisely. I take that a step further. I am 100% sure. That is my faith, that is something I draw enormous comfort from. But if we're discussing philosophy, I will have to admit that I cannot know for sure.

Konrad Rudolph

OK, fair enough. The leap from 9x% (99.x%?) to 100% is indeed a leap of faith.

terdon

Also, smoking does not cause cancer. It causes mutations, and mutations cause cancer :P (As long as we're being pedantic)

@KonradRudolph Yes. It is that final step I am calling faith. The 99 steps before that require no faith at all.

Konrad Rudolph

causality is very much transitive, otherwise we end up nowhere useful. Because, by your logic, smoking does not cause mutations. Smoking causes irritation of cells in the pulmonary lining which causes cytokine emission, which causes … err. Hmm. And somewhere along the lines mutations come in. ;-)

terdon

Och, shut up and let me enjoy my cigarette! :P

Being a smoking biologist who works in genomics is hard enough as it is!

Mutoh

12:43

The thing about this discussion is that the faith of the atheist isn't in his disbelief in God itself, it's in the basis that the atheist uses for asserting his disbelief.

One can claim that "no one has found reproducible evidence for God", but this shows the underlying metaphysical system this person is presupposing for a validation of the existence of God. Namely, this person is expecting God to be validated materialistically by something akin to the scientific method. However, what reasons does this person have to believe in the scientific method itself? The axioms of the scientific met…

H Walters

13:34

@Mutoh You're a bit mixed up there. Trying something repetitively, seeing that it works, and then believing it isn't proof of that thing, true enough... but it's also not circular, nor is it faith.

Also, it's commonly repeated, even by brilliant people, that God's simply not verifiable... but I have no idea why such a thing should be taken seriously. If God heals people who have faith in him and pray to him, then it should easily be possible to measure this scientifically, no matter how that healing is actually done...

...you can speculate the healing is "supernatural" all you want, but the claim being true suggests that you can bias two populations, one more likely to have sick people who pray, and can measure a difference.

This isn't decisive of course... if you measure nothing, it doesn't mean God doesn't exist. But this draws severe question to the oft repeated notion that supernatural things simply can't be tested. Any real measurable effect should, tautologically, be measurable.

terdon

13:53

@HWalters It isn't, unfortunately. Taking your example, if no healing occurs, that is not evidence that god doesn't exist (maybe god was busy that day, or didn't like the patient much). Conversely, if healing does occur, that is only evidence that healing occurred, not that the healing was carried out by a deity.

By definition, an omnipotent being (if we're discussing the god of the abrahamic religions) would be capable of anything, including confounding your experiments.

H Walters

@terdon That doesn't convince me that God is beyond proof, which is what's being disputed.

terdon

The scientific method depends on repeatable observations. If you posit something that, for example, cannot be observed (as many theists do) then it isn't something that can be approached using the scientific method.

H Walters

Speculating that God might want to hide his existence is fun and all, and it could even be "true"... but it's fishy, and not necessarily true

terdon

@HWalters No, it isn't necessarily true, but it might. And since it might, that kinda throws the whole scientific method out the window. You can indeed use the scientific method to conclude that god most likely doesn't exist, but it is impossible to use it to prove anything on the subject either way.

Not when discussing a being with full control over the physical world.

H Walters

That's a black and white fallacy

terdon

13:56

@HWalters ?

What is?

H Walters

You are presenting two possibilities. Either the scientific method can necessarily address God, or that it should be thrown away.

You're essentially ignoring the argument

...which is, that there's nothing inherent in God's existence that makes the scientific method unable to address it

Sure, I can see a possible world where there's a god that really exists that hides from us

But that is woefully inadequate to demonstrate that God is indeed hiding from us

What I'm refuting is just that notion... that God, by his very nature, cannot be touched by the scientific method. There's nothing that convinces me to take this seriously.

terdon

@HWalters But why? A theist would tell you that god created the laws of nature and is quite capable of ignoring them at will. Therefore, you cannot expect to be able to perform repeatable experiments to detect this god.

Hell, a theist could also happily claim that their god is by definition unknowable. Therefore, no amount of experimentation that shows absolutely no evidence of that god's existence will be relevant since this being is already defined as being unknowable.

God is such a nebulous concept that the theist can define it any way they wish, including making it impossible to prove or disprove.

H Walters

@terdon You're injecting a presumption in the first case... the presumption that God would not repeat such violations

And the second case is irrelevant

terdon

@HWalters Yes. Why not? Let's say god would not repeat the violations, leading to completely chaotic results.

H Walters

Again, I've admitted to the conceptual possibility of god hiding from us. I regard that suspicious, but can't take it further.

terdon

14:05

@HWalters There you go then. As long as that is even a possibility, you cannot conclusively prove either the existence or the non existence using experimental methods rooted in the physical world.

H Walters

@terdon You're confusing the claim being made. You keep repeating the same, "what if we can't prove there's a god"? The obvious answer is, then we wouldn't be able to.

But that doesn't mean that if there is a god, we can't demonstrate his existence. It only means if we can't demonstrate god's existence, we can't demonstrate his existence.

terdon

@HWalters Exactly. Which means there is at least one theoretical scenario where god's existencial status would not be provable. Since that scenario exists, there is no way of knowing if my experiment's negative results are negative because there is no god or because there is one and it's screwing with my head.

H Walters

Look, let me make it easy. Here's the specific thing I'm refuting: "it implies that God is a physical phenomenon verifiable by the scientific method like an orbiting teapot would, whereas God is a META-physical claim, it can't be verified by the scientific method"

But that's implied by a particular, not by the general, as this phrase which effectively is saying "god's metaphysical therefore you can't use the scientific method" suggests

terdon

@HWalters That's a little sloppy. I am saying that god may be physical or not, but simply doesn't fall under the purview of the scientific method since a god could theoretically alter the results of any experiment I care to devise.

H Walters

That would require a god that does so

terdon

14:09

Yes

A god who is subject to physical laws and is not omnipotent would indeed be provable.

Or, more likely, disprovable.

H Walters

I think we're on different subjects... roughly from your discussions, the point you are specifically making is that there's at least some leap of faith necessary to rule out God's existence

All I'm doing is refuting the notion that supernatural things imply things beyond the scientific method

terdon

@HWalters To conclusively rule it out, to be 100% sure, yes.

@HWalters Oh, they don't. Only certain supernatural things, such as the abrahamic, omnipotent and omniscient god, do.

H Walters

...so I'm not actually attacking your notion, but the thing Mutoh said

H Walters

14:25

"A god who is subject to physical laws and is not omnipotent would indeed be provable." <- that's overly specific

God need only behave measurably to have measurable effects... he need not follow symmetries exact enough for you to call "physical laws"

Mutoh

15:21

@HWalters Sorry, but that's circular reasoning. If you're trying something repetitively, you're already presupposing that 2) there are natural laws and 3) these natural laws are constant (moreover, 2 and 3 presuppose axiom 1). If you don't presuppose that the natural laws exist and are constant, you have no rational basis at all for trying something repetitively.

God simply isn't verifiable - at least not on SCIENTIFIC grounds, but the concept of God can and has been analysed on metaphysical (logical and rationalistic) grounds. Here are other things that can't be verified on scientific gro…

H Walters

15:33

@Mutoh You're taking presuppositions way too seriously. You don't have to presuppose a pattern to notice one.

You seem to be implying just that; that the only way to notice a pattern is to presuppose there is one. That's just nonsense though.

Mutoh

@HWalters Well, Walters, I'm taking presuppositions seriously that's because I'm basically questioning the a priori judgement that the scientific method is the ultimate arbiter of truth, when in fact the scientific method deals with a very limited sphere of knowledge: physical phenomena, descriptive facts. If we assume God to be the creator of the universe then he can't be within the universe like a black hole or a planet would, he necessarily precedes the creation.

H Walters

But that's not the case... that's an illusion.

Mutoh

If God isn't some kind of physical phenomenon, like Russell disingenuously implies in his teapot analogy, then it can't be analyzed like a physical phenomenon. QED the teapot is a strawman.

@HWalters What is an illusion?

H Walters

The scientific method can address pretty much anything that is repetitively measurable.

If it can cause the numbers on my scale to go up, it can be addressed. It doesn't matter if that thing is a weight or a ghost.

And God doesn't have to be a vending machine we can put coins in and expect things out of to have an effect. He just has to have an effect.

You're putting all sorts of qualifiers on this which are really unnecessary

Mutoh

Well, if you want to ask whether he has an effect, just ask religious people and theologians.

H Walters

15:41

I'm not sure that's a great strategy... believers in just about anything would claim effects not there

...and not necessarily by being dishonest

This is why the scientific method is nice... it can help distinguish between your personal biases and real effects :)

To paint you a picture, think of something like homeopaths claiming that homeopathic medicine has an effect.

Mutoh

@HWalters Homeopathic medicine is scientifically verifiable, for it deals with physical phenomena. Now try using the scientific method to verify whether you're not a brain in a jar - you can't, you'll have to rely on metaphysics. The point is that the scientific method only deals with descriptive facts, not with normative facts. The axioms of logic aren't scientifically measurable, and we can't throw them away because of that, because to do so would be to saw off the branch we're sitting in.

H Walters

@Mutoh You're mixing things up again. You proposed as a measure of effect that I ask believers. Are you proposing I take a believer at his word if I can't scientifically verify it, but don't if I can?

Ah, I think I figured out what you're trying to get at. Somehow, you wound up confusing the fact that I don't take the notion that the s.m. can't address the supernatural with a claim of "scientism"... I was confused why you brought brains in jars and logic itself to the table, but this would explain it

Why is it so hard to picture a reality where God simply answers prayers, a group of scientists investigate prayer as a phenomenon, and they wind up measuring a bias? ...and that, possibly, with further study, they seem to find a small bias towards effects based on the type of thing prayed for?

In such a hypothetical world we might could explain the same effect in other ways than that there is a god, but if we picture with a "god's eye view" (pun not intended) that there actually is one, he would certainly be conveying a measurable effect in this reality, even if these effects were pulled off supernaturally

You don't need to appeal to "scientism" here; this doesn't invoke some grand gotcha counterargument for God's existence... it's simply a possibility that I am asking you to explain to me why I should discount, which is precisely what you do when you claim that God being metaphysical implies he cannot be studied using the scientific method

Mutoh

16:06

@HWalters No, I didn't propose that at all. I was addressing the false equivalency between homeopathic medicine and belief in God, because the two definitely aren't the same. God's effects don't necessarily have to defy the laws of physics. A believer's word may be something as simple as "God allowed me to find meaning in my life", or "God allowed me to see how one can objectively discern between good and evil". These claims are addressed on rational grounds, not through experiments. Maybe you may claim that the person changed their views simply because they were brainwashed into it or some…

H Walters

@Mutoh You're attacking this at the wrong level. You're coming up with specific scenarios and asking me how science can apply to them. But that is an inadequate method to attack this entire issue.

Mutoh

I'm trying to bring this into the correct level instead of settling on strawmen.

H Walters

@Mutoh Then you can start with my actual claim, which is not that there's no god; not that science can explain everything; but that it's not necessarily true that a phenomenon being "non-physical" implies science cannot address it

Mutoh

Yes, it is necessarily true.

It at least can't address it in its entirety. You'll need reasoning thrown in.

H Walters

We're done... you keep adding qualifiers, and complaining about straw men.

We could possibly take this up later but I've enough irony for now

Mutoh

16:13

Frankly, I came here to demonstrate why Russell's Teapot is a strawman, so yeah, I'm already done. Save your irony for some other poor soul, I'm sure that will be a nice display of rationality on your part.

H Walters

You're not addressing my arguments at all... you're just battling me.

(Incidentally, it's really because I have other things to do at the moment, which is why I say we could take it up later... but I'm imploring you to justify the broad assertion that we cannot measure effects that are extant because of some imagined significance of the metaphysical nature of their causes)

Mutoh

16:32

@HWalters You don't have to take any of what I said here as a personal attack since I was merely expressing my disagreements, in other words, addressing the arguments. I apologize if I came off as obtuse because that may have been due to misunderstandings on my part.

Either way, what's a broader assertion: that science can't fully adress the effects of non-physical entities, or that science can? If we're talking about effects, we're talking about physical effects in the first place. The scientific method can only deal with physical effects, if you want to do otherwise, you'll have to do so…

H Walters

Mutoh: Science is indeed limited in what it can show; the assertion though is that this limitation doesn't extend to all supernatural phenomena simply due to the fact that such phenomena are supernatural... really quickly since I'm low on time, let me propose it this way...

...suppose hypothetically that I myself have supernatural powers... some specific ones maybe... a degree of telekinesis perhaps

We can further suppose that we cannot find any physical explanation for these powers...

The proposition is, we can still measure them using the scientific method, because they would be real effects, and that falls in scope

We're not talking about scientism, only what science can do... we're not talking about certainty... science doesn't do that anyway

We're simply talking about science doing with the supernatural (in this case, my telekinesis) the same kinds of things you would use it for with the physical

Mutoh

19:09

@HWalters Okay, I understand where you're coming from, though there's a catch. Yes, theoretically we can do repeatable experiments to test whether you really have telekinesis. And, if you don't cooperate, we have reasons to doubt you. After all, the vast majority of humans don't display telekinesis, pretty much all other humans who claimed to do turned out to be charlatans, and it's more within the realm of human possibility that you're misguided than that you do have such extraordinary powers. But all these are mere inferences and we must recognize them as such (after all, it's not because…

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Discussion on answer by Cell: Asserti…