Underlying Philosophy

PaulK, It seems that when you say I am taking God as axiomatic, you say it means that I have no good reason whatsoever for believing in God. But this is not true. God is the foundation for my thinking, which does not mean that I have no reason for believing it. It just means that no other presupposition comes before that presupposition that there is a God. This presupposition is to be first and foremost in my mind, so that I interpret things according to this metaphysical presupposition. This does not mean, however, that it is an arbitrary, unfounded presupposition. One of my most basic reasons for believing it, is because of the impossibility of the opposite.Since when does my worldview undermine evidence? I have said negative things about evidence in your worldview, but not in mine. I have said that you have no basis for using evidence as support for your worldview. This statement doesn't undermine evidence (at least not in my worldview). It does, however, undermine your using of evidence.My reason for saying this is not a bad one. If you bring a bit of evidence that points toward there being no god, I ask, "how do know this evidence is reliable, and how do you know that it is even possible for evidence to support a particular position?". Maybe you would say in reply, "I have never observed evidence that did not support something, e.g., if the evidence said that the car was green, then I have always observed the car to be green", to which I would reply "how do you know that your memory (past experiences) is reliable?" to which you may reply "my memory has never been incorrect, so why should it be in the future?". But this is the same answer as before. In both cases, you rely on experience to justify your claims. I ask "how do you know experience is reliable?", and you then say, "I have never experienced experience to be unreliable". But how do you know that your experiencing of experiences is reliable?

Huntard, But this is not an ultimate answer, because it still leaves questions about what evidence is, how it relates to reality, what effect it has on us, etc. Basically, you answered a metaphysical question with something that relates to epistemology. When I answered the question, I said, "God is real". This is a clear, definitive answer that can be used as a starting point for the rest of my thinking. Ultimately, that answer only relates to metaphysics (about the nature of reality), and nothing about how we know what is real. However, your answer related to how we know what is real (epistemology).The problem is that you have blurred metaphysics and epistemology into one. The two do go hand in hand, but they are separate, because metaphysics must come before epistemology.So when you answer the question, your answer is limited to metaphysics.

Says you. I gave you my answer, the fact that it doesn't ft in with your mumbo jumbo view of this is not a valid reason to reject it.You said "God is real", this makes no sense, since you haven't even shown him to be real, you just assume he is. I told you that reality is real, and what reality is is determined by evidence. The fact that this isn't a mumbo jumbo answer does not make it any less valid.I could give you a mumbo jumbo answer if you would so prefer: "Dertilly is real". So, now what? You haven't learned anything, and this answer makes absolutely no sense, just like your answer "God is real" makes absolutely no sense if you can't show that he is.So, the answer I will stick with is "reality is real" and evidence shows what reality is.

Dr. Adequate,First, let me rephrase the metaphysical question: what is the nature of reality? You - as most everyone else on this forum - are placing knowing (epistemology) above reality (metaphysics). There is a reason I asked the questions in the order that I did; because metaphysics necessarily comes before epistemology. You must first answer the metaphysical question before you can answer the epistemological question. You said that the answer to the first question must be "deduced", but it shouldn't be.And I'm not just arbitrarily saying you must do this. Note that you said you must observe the world in order to determine what things exist. This statement is an epistemological statement. However, it has an underlying metaphysical belief: that we can observe the world, and that by doing so, we [i]can[i/] determine what things exist.. Edited by sac51495, : No reason given.

Hyroglyphx, Is matter the only reality? Okay. For example (note that this is exclusively an example; I'm not saying you believe this), if you were to say that reality is contained in matter, then I could start racking off the implications of this. For example, if all is matter, then all my actions amount to is the actions of chemicals within my brain, whose actions are pre-programmed, and over which I have no control. So we can then conclude that it doesn't matter what I do, because if I do something, it isn't really me that is doing it, it's just my brain, over which I have no control. So then I could live my life just following every natural impulse I felt was going on in my brain, and ultimately just caring about nothing.That is one way you could live your life if you believed that all that reality amounted to was matter. Oh really? Tell my why?And just as an aside, I'm not saying that my speaking of a statement makes it true. To respond to your statement, my saying that God is real doesn't make it so. I was just answering the metaphysical question. With regards to my above question (tell my why [I can't win an argument by saying that I'm right]?), I was trailing off onto a different discussion.So, I asked the question, "what is real?", or, "what is the nature of reality?", and I simply answered by stating my belief; that God is real. I did not attempt to bring any evidence in support of the claim, because that wasn't the point of the question. I'm not expecting you to bring evidence either. I just want you to answer the question. Way to rip my statements out of context. Um, no this isn't evidence. I was explaining to you why I answered the question in the format that I did. In my answer, I separated God from God's creation, so you would understand them to be different (because God is not contained within His creation).And just out of curiosity, with regards to your signature, do you know who Blaise Pascal is? Edited by sac51495, : No reason given.

dwise1, Then we can just discount it, because I think the entire story is bad because the answers to both of the questions were faulty.So I then ask "why is death bad?".

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You - as most everyone else on this forum - are placing knowing (epistemology) above reality (metaphysics). There is a reason I asked the questions in the order that I did; because metaphysics necessarily comes before epistemology.

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Which means that your "reality" has no basis in reality. Because to give it a basis in reality would require an epistemology. If it is necessary to make some assumptions before producing an epistemology then they should be as few and as minimal as possible. This much is obvious to anyone who cares about attempting to produce a reliable epistemology.What you want is to place assumptions - not reality - before knowing. Something that no rational person should do without a very real need.

This is a very badly perverted view of my beliefs. Giving glory to God is enjoyable. God is merciful to us because He gave us a way of giving glory to Him. In fact, we who believe that He has saved us would be foolish to do anything but glory in God. Rather than asking "why should we glory in Him?", we should be asking "why was He so merciful as to let us be able to glory in Him?", and further, "why was He so merciful as to give us a reason to glory in Him?". To give glory to God, in that they provide a testament of God's glory through his handiwork. Well it should have been the reality of the situation for those children.As to how I know this, I have been trying to show you, but I'm having a difficult time because you won't answer my simple questions (such as "what is real").Ultimately though, as a Christian, the reason we shouldn't commit suicide is because we were created by God in His image, and to kill ourselves would be killing one that is created in the image of God.

I gave you an ostensive definition.If you haven't grasped my meaning, perhaps I could elaborate on it: I say that something is real if I believe that at least in principle it could be the cause of an observation one could make. I think you mean ontology; and yes, I am --- I regard ontological questions as vacuous. In your philosophy, perhaps. In my philosophy metaphysics is a disease of language. And you were asking me about my opinions, not yours. But again, that "shouldn't" is a tenet of your philosophy, not mine. In mine, there is no synthetic a priori. And to the best of my knowledge, I am and I can. Why you call this a metaphysical belief, I don't know: it is derived from observation, and if you will present me with evidence that I am confined in a mental hospital and hallucinating, or trapped in the Matrix, or whatever, then I shall reconsider this position.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

And we could bring exactly the same facile arguments against your belief in the existence of walruses or the nonexistence of unicorns. Theism doesn't help you there.The only thing that an a priori belief in the existence of God seems to buy you is that it supplies you with a worse reason for believing in God than you have for believing in real things such as giraffes. And I would point out that you would hardly find yourself in need of such a bad reason if God was in fact real like giraffes are. As has been pointed out to you, we have no such guarantee and nor have you.

Your god creates a world where minor disobedience to him results in one's entire descendents suffering under a curse - a curse so terrible that it commits you to an eternity of unimaginable pain, unless you are lucky enough to hear of his "salvation" from his own curse he layed up on you. And this means we should give him "glory"? I'm sorry, this god of yours sounds like a complete tosser. Are you sure he's real? There are artists in the world far more deserving of glory than this bizarre concept. Here's one (sorry, embedding disabled)Edited by cavediver, : No reason given.

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It seems that when you say I am taking God as axiomatic, you say it means that I have no good reason whatsoever for believing in God.

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It doesn't automatically mean that, but in fact is true.

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This does not mean, however, that it is an arbitrary, unfounded presupposition. One of my most basic reasons for believing it, is because of the impossibility of the opposite.

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The fact that you must close your mind to the possibility that God might not exist simply illustrates the fact that that it IS an arbitrary, unfounded, assumption.

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Since when does my worldview undermine evidence

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Where did I say that it did ?

And yet when I simply answered the same question by stating my belief that waffle irons and cantaloupes and alligators and income tax and ketchup and Zanzibar and firecrackers and armadillos and teacups are real, somehow you found my answer insufficient.

If your words really are capable of bringing deities into existence, then could I please ask you to speak some different words and make us a better deity?

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Let's make this very simple for you:

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A couple of hundred thousand years ago, Ug discovered that dropping a rock on an ostrich shell nicely broke it so that he could eat what was inside. A larger rock dropped onto small mammals would stop them running away, and they could be eaten. Later still, larger rocks smashed into the skulls of large mammals meant that not only could Ug eat today, but also tomorrow and the day after that.

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A little bit later, this learned behaviour enabled UG's descendants to walk on the Moon.

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Please explain where in the above scenario, any such thing as a god was required?

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There was a joke about Darwin arguing with God about he can create life from dirt. and God agreed to challenge Darwin. when Darwin reached down to grab a handful of dirt God replied " no no, Get your own dirt.Because things are today by evolution does not mean evolution was not the design for things to survive in an ever changing environment. evolution does not kill God. understanding some things doesn't mean you understand all things. UG has been progressing because UG didn't think himself so smart he stopped learning.UG's descendants seem to believe they are the center of a universe so large their entire planet is a speck next to a single red giant in an apparently infinite area. You know that already. Does that no longer humble you?

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keep your mind from this way of enquiry, for never will you show that not-being is
~parmenides