Do we have evidence against the supernatural?

We can ask whether there is anything that does not lie in principle within the naturalistic system. We must say "in principle" because we can't be expected to explain in detail some phenomenon that we are not very familiar with, but only need to suggest how in general it can be explained naturally (e.g., black holes can in general be explained naturally, I think).If there was anything that we knew existed that could not be explained in general to be within the naturalistic system, then naturalism would be false.I have the idea that naturalism is dependent on materialism. If everything is material, then it falls into the naturalistic system. Something that is not material would be "supernatural."edit: typoThis message has been edited by robinrohan, 10-04-2005 10:45 AM

This thing would need to be plausibily explained as producible by nature.Suppose there was this spiritual being walking about. It would not fit into the system of nature.

It sounds like you're saying that everything is natural by definition.But suppose there was a god and this god made nature. Now we've got something that is supernatural. And if we've got that, we could have more, like little gods that God made out of supernatural stuff.I would suggest that if something's spiritual it's not natural.spiritual=not physical

Here's a description that we are all familiar with through private experience. Spiritual=mental.

I don't know. I assume they are natural. I was just trying to describe "spiritual."ABE: In other words, I am assuming that what we call "mental" is really physical, despite my private experience of feeling incorporeal.But if one wanted a definition of "spiritual" besides just "not physical," "mental" is possible.This message has been edited by robinrohan, 10-04-2005 03:43 PM

I think I have been. I made a general reply to the thread in which I suggested that "supernatural" would mean whatever did not fit into the system of naturalism. In my view, black holes would not qualify as supernatural, even though our knowledge of them is uncertain because "in principle" we can fit them into the natural system.But if there was a spiritual being walking around, we might have trouble fitting that in. By "fitting in," I mean that we can see in principle how such a thing can be produced naturally.But if something is spiritual it's not physical, and I have the idea that something has to be physical to fit into the natural system. I defined "spiritual" as "not physical," and a poster suggested I needed a definition that was not a mere negation. So I came up with "mental." If there was a real mental entity hanging about, then such a being would fit the definition of the "supernatural."This message has been edited by robinrohan, 10-04-2005 04:25 PM

The advantage of using the word "mental" rather than "spiritual" is that we all have a private experience of mentality, so we know what is meant in a private sense even though we can't define it. But if "spiritual" was something different from "mental," we would have no idea about that.So a mental entity would be a mind with no body.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything natural is physical--that's my idea.

Maybe the physical is that which is or is made up of elementary particles.
I'm not sure what you mean by "patterns of process." Maybe something like electricity? That's physical. Presumably, what we call "energy" is physical.Thoughts, one would assume, are physical, although it doesn't seem like that to our private experience. In fact, I have an idea that the whole concept of "spirit" came originally from our private experience of mentality, which feels like, but presumably is not, its own special type of reality--an incorporeal reality. A physical reality cannot produce some other type of reality. It can only produce more physical stuff.The appropriateness of using the word "mental" as a synonym of "spiritual" becomes obvious when we think for example of the concept of "my soul." It cannot be distinguished from "my mind." Our identity, our soul, is our mind. So the soul, if there were such a thing, would be a different type of reality, not divisible and not made up of elementary particles or little packets of energy.So if there was something that was real, but was not physical, then we could call it supernatural.

Considered in one aspect, music is physical sounds. From other aspects, it is an abstraction.It can be compared to chess. The pieces are physical, but the rules assigned to them by chess are abstract. Physically, a bishop can move any which way, but according to the abstraction of chess, it can only move diagonally.But considering the definition of "supernatural," we can say that if it is not physical, then it does not fit the natural system. But if it is abstract, it is not real.So the supernatural is that which would be both real and incorporeal.

I don't think so. I was thinking in terms of beings not things. It makes sense to me to speak of an incorporeal mind, but it seems ridiculous to speak of an incorporeal stream where the incorporeal fishes play. Gravity, I think, is an abstraction--like a quality: the curviness of space-time.

This makes no sense to me.

If abstractions are real, God is real. No. "space-time" is, I think, an abstraction.
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God is either a being or an abstraction. If one claims that abstractions are real, then God has to be real, since a being is real.

Sounds to me like you are saying that something might be real but not exist. I've heard that before. Tillich said, notoriously, "God does not 'exist'" (but is nonetheless real).I didn't understand it when I read that, and I don't understand it now.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------