Thoughts on the Creator Conclusion

I am not arguing that science is a tool. The reason I had "truths" in quotes was because even though people are quick to say they don't exist, they herald discoveries made through science as fact, proof, and hard evidence, which are soft forms of absolute truth. The reason our knowledge changes with new discoveries is because absolute truth exists. As a matter of fact, logic is rather absolute. To say that absolute truth does not exist is a contradiction since such a statement would be an absolute truth. If we conclude that all truth is relative, it is relative to something: absolute truth.Edited by goldrush, : No reason given.Edited by goldrush, : No reason given.Edited by goldrush, : No reason given.Edited by goldrush, : No reason given.

Sheesh.Nice try little one, but first learn to read.If you read what I have written you will see that I have said there are things that are absolutely true, for example in our normal counting system 2 + 2 = 4.That is different than saying that there is some "Absolute TRUTH".And I don't really care that you are "not arguing that science is a tool" because it most obviously is a tool. No one has said it is not a tool.A "soft form of absolute truth" is what?It certainly is not a fact, for example the hard fact that the Biblical Flood never happened. Now that is an absolute truth unless the God that that did it is also a liar and a cheat.And what we find when we get away from facts and into areas such as morality is yet again, not some absolute truth. Morals are relative to the individual situation, the society and other relative morals. No absolute morals needed.But what does any of this have to do with the topic?Edited by jar, : appalin spallin

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

I would argue yes, in the same way that the angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees whether or not humans exist. Does 2+2 equal 4 just because we say so?

So finally you admit the validity of absolute truth.

Read what I write. In case you missed it...

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Sheesh.

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Nice try little one, but first learn to read.

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If you read what I have written you will see that I have said there are things that are absolutely true, for example in our normal counting system 2 + 2 = 4.

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That is different than saying that there is some "Absolute TRUTH".

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And I don't really care that you are "not arguing that science is a tool" because it most obviously is a tool. No one has said it is not a tool.

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A "soft form of absolute truth" is what?

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It certainly is not a fact, for example the hard fact that the Biblical Flood never happened. Now that is an absolute truth unless the God that that did it is also a liar and a cheat.

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And what we find when we get away from facts and into areas such as morality is yet again, not some absolute truth. Morals are relative to the individual situation, the society and other relative morals. No absolute morals needed.

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But what does any of this have to do with the topic?

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

Since we agree that logic holds true beyond us and evolution, on what basis does logic hold true? What governs logic? Does logic create? BTW, to say that logic is true b/c it works ("is logical") is circular reasoning which is a logical fallacy.

Oh, I read what you wrote. And I never said anything about morals, ever. You did. Are you sure you read what I write?Edited by goldrush, : No reason given.

Why does it need governing? False. It could be that logic does not work, and therefore is false.

Let's say humans don't exist, as well as anything else that may have concepts of angles, triangles, and degrees. Without any such entities existing, in what sense do angles, triangles, and degrees exist? Angles, triangles, and degrees seem to me to be complete abstractions and idealizations of what we encounter in the external world. We map them imperfectly to actual space via mapping a real number coordinate system onto actual space (actual space seems to be discrete, instead of continuous like our real number coordinate system). Even in our own minds we can't represent angles and triangles without lines, which are not the same as mathematical lines, which have no thickness (in that sense, mathematical lines are also abstractions and idealizations). I had to ask this first, since it's the analogy you used to answer goldrush's question.Regarding my own answer to his (?) question, my thought on the matter is that logic always and only exists in the mind. Logics (note the 's') are, as far as I can tell, non-ambiguous distillations of our own thought processes and language. We may represent logic on paper, with computers, or however else, but that which gives the symbols any meaning is a mind. Logics are formal systems. This is an important fact.Now, I am not aware that a logic can express absolutely everything we can in our natural languages. If no such logic exists, there is not a one-to-one mapping of language to logic. We get logic from language and with language we talk about things that occur in reality. Logics, it seems to me, are analogous to scientific models, in that they need not -- and perhaps can not -- talk about things as they truly are; yet, we use them for their utilitarian value (and this fact underlies the fact that we use different logics for different domains -- there is not a single, all-encompassing "Logic"). Logics would reside in our heads the same way that scientific models do. And while they can be expressed externally, the meaning of it all is always and only in our minds. Logics are, in a sense, mental models based on the language we use to describe certain things (for some things we use different logics than for other things).And, like logics, math is a formal system that occurs always and only in the mind (but represented in other forms). Because of this, "2+2=4" is true always and only because we make it true by virtue of established lingual tendencies (which were codified in mathematical systems). "2+2=4" says nothing at all about real-world objects. Nor does the sum operation have anything to do with combining real-world entities. 2 drops of water + 2 drops of water could either refer to 1, more massive, drop of water, or, alternatively, to 4 drops of water. Or to 2. Or to 3. "2+2=4" contains no units of measurement and hence does not refer to objects of any sort. If something has no referent in the external world, it can only have a conceptual nature, which means it is contained in the mind and can be altered.Now, I admit that it's been a while since I've thought or read about these matters in any sort of satisfactory depth. I don't think I ever concluded that my thoughts are consistent or complete, having been unable to agree entirely with any one position (I'm referring to the positions set out in the relevant Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entries). So, if my views seem muddled or otherwise not feasible, please point that fact out. I'd love to know with what position I stand on these matters.Edited by Darth Daggett, : No reason given.Edited by Darth Daggett, : No reason given.Edited by Darth Daggett, : No reason given.

They exist in the realm of physics where matter and the forces of nature interact. These interactions occur whether we are there to observe them or not, and they follow what we would consider to be logical rules. I look at it a bit differently. Reality follows logical rules which is independent of us. In our minds we construct models that are abstractions of reality, but we reject or accept these models by how well they represent the external and independent reality. That is why I speak of logic "working", in that it can be verified independently of our beliefs. E=mc^2 whether we are around or not. The intensity of light drops by 1/4th at twice the distance whether we are there to see the light or not.At the same time, I do understand where you are coming from. From a metaphysical standpoint there is always Descartian doubt and the rest. However, I tend to look at logic from a more pragmatic viewpoint.

Hi and welcome to Evc forum.
Would you be by any chance a mathematician? Somehow your point of view seems to remind me of some professors I had.

If only I were a mathematician! I just graduated from a state university with a B.S. in math, and minors in computer science and physics. Might go back for grad school in math. That said, I didn't meet my goals as a math student (had horrible study habits that caused the concepts to not stick very well). So, at least for the time being, just consider me as someone with higher level math experience who really likes philosophy relating to it (and to science in general, as well as ethics).Thanks for the welcome.

You need to brush up on your logic.For one thing, "works" is not a synonym for "is logical".For another thing, something can be bleedin' obvious without being circular reasoning, nor any other kind of fallacy.If I say that my washing machine washes clothes because it works, would that be fallacious? No, that is why it washes clothes. If it was broken, it wouldn't.

Your post is difficult to respond to. At first, some of what you said struck me as absolutely wrong. However, the more I think about my objections, the more I wonder if the view I'm espousing makes an unwarranted distinction between scientific+mathematical models and our usual mental models that we see the world through. That is, what I seemed to be saying was that physics, as a science, contains no facts, but rather models that are highly reliable because they make verified predictions. However, if physics contains no facts (in its theories), then shouldn't that imply that our everyday mental models of reality also contain no facts? This seems to lead inevitably to the conclusion that no one knows any facts -- a view which I will not accept.However, math itself does not tend to map onto reality well. For example, as I alluded to, the R^3 coordinate system (real numbers on all three axes) is infinitely fine (i.e. points are dimensionless), a concept that doesn't make a whole lot of sense when it comes to space and matter. For any existing thing or region in space, there are an infinitude of points contained therein. And for any triangular arrangement of matter, there is still no triangle, because reality has at least three spatial dimensions, whereas triangles are composed of one-dimensional things, each of which contains infinitely many zero-dimensional things. Triangles can only be approximated in the world, whereas the perfect triangle, if it can be said that there is one, is wholly a mental and/or linguistic entity. In short, the geometric shapes we think about don't exist "out there". (It's interesting to notice that I just called reality "three-dimensional", which is a mathematical concept that only makes sense in light of math.)Natural language developed the logic it has based on our experience with the world. In that sense, logics are something like theories that we then turn around to apply back to the reality from which we derived them, and in so doing we test logic. I think this might be what you mean when you talk about logic "working". However, given my view on this, I wouldn't say that reality "follows" logical rules -- rather, logical rules follow reality, and then we attempt to use these rules to guess how reality will behave next (or did behave previously).The relationship expressed by "E=mc^2" exists whether we are around or not, correct. However, the equality is not a logically necessary one established by convention. In that way it differs from something like "2+2=4".We probably agree, ultimately. Like so many areas of philosophy, anyone discussing it can easily get bogged down in the language. I'm thinking that's what's happening here. Frankly, though, I don't feel like continuing this discussion, for the aforementioned reasons. Plus, getting this in-depth with it is probably too tangential to the thread topic.

In my view of things, what you are leaving out is reality.When I brush my teeth in the morning I don't worry about such questions as "Is this toothbrush real, or is my visual model of the toothbrush a simulacrum of an external reality that is unreachable by my sense." Guess what? I just brush my fucking teeth. It seems to work.I don't want to make light of interesting philosophical questions or ideas because they are interesting and do tell us a lot about ourselves. However, at some point we all take a pragmatic position with regard to reality. Yes, there could be the evil demon in our head that tells us that 2+2 = 4 even though it really equals 5. Who fucking cares? 2+2 = 4 seems to work out when we interact with what seems to be the real world so why not use it?The real world seems to work in a logical and rational manner from everything we experience. Dogs bark and cats meow. Water boils, and rocks are hard. These things act this way in a consistent and predictable manner. I see no reason why that they act this way simply because we are around. Therefore, reason and logic are things that exist outside of ourselves. It is how the real world acts, with or without our existence.I only say this to help you understand where I am coming from. I know that later in your post you state that you will not be discussing this thread much farther, so I don't expect a reply. I just hope that this post helps you understand where I am coming from.