Underlying Philosophy

So Adam and Eve and their descendants passed down from generation to generation a system of mathematical notation which (as a matter of historical record) wouldn't even be invented for thousands of years after the creation?I think not. I think that sometimes people can have original ideas. I know I have.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

But his question was addressed to RAZD personally. He even put the word "you" in italics to emphasize this.Of course, since RAZD is a deist, his question was founded on a misconception, but not on the one you attribute to him.

Well, the key word there is evolved. It is conceivable that a species (us) might have made an evolutionary specialty out of being good at thinking, so that we're better at understanding the world we live in than aardvarks and giraffes and haddock. And in fact, looking at our scientific and technological achievements, this seems to be the case.It is not conceivable that we could have achieved this encephalization quotient just for the purpose of being wrong about everything.

This is perfectly true. However, you mean it as a criticism.Let me draw your attention to a couple of points.Point (1). If there is some fundamental method of getting knowledge, and if we know what it is, then of course that method will testify to its own validity. We can't ask for anything more. Obviously if the scientific method is the correct way of getting knowledge, and if we know that the scientific method is the correct way of getting knowledge, then we must know this by the scientific method. You could substitute anything else for "the scientific method" in that last sentence --- call it "X" --- and that last sentence would still necessarily be true, otherwise we'd be involving ourselves in a paradox.Point (2). You yourself believe in the scientific method --- except when you don't want to. When you cross the road, do you rely on observation, or do you close your eyes and pray? To quote David Hume: You actually do not wish to remove the scientific method from your own life: if you did, you would be insane, and you know it. The reason that you have been led down this philosophical path is not that you wish to abolish science altogether --- you just wish that you could ignore it when it conflicts with your religious beliefs.This is what is known as "special pleading". So long as you cling to observation, to known scientific laws, and to rational inquiry, when it's a matter of life or death, as it is when you cross the road, then I would find it hypocritical if you should abandon such principles when it involves your religion.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

Circular? No, it's just false.Some people are mentally retarded. Some people are mentally ill. And even those of us who suffer from neither of those absolute defects will still blunder through life making mistake after mistake. There are simple problems in logic that over 90% of humans will get wrong.Now this presents no problem to me, since I attribute our intelligence to the ramshackle hit-or-miss process of evolution. But if you want me to say that all this is the product of a perfect creator --- well, then we have a problem. Did he make the moron, the madman, and the bunch of fools that we all in fact are? Are stupidity, madness, and error really the product of intelligent design?And are the moron, the madman, and the fool really made in God's image?Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

I should like to say that at the very least sac51495 has raised a few interesting questions and done so in an articulate way, rather then making me think oh, no, here's another dumbfuck creationist who should have read his biology textbook back when he was in high school.Sac51495, I salute you.

A distinction without a difference. Well, apart from anything else, in my universe you say so --- except when it conflicts with your beliefs. As I explained at length.Why should we trust it? That you must answer for yourself. Why is it that when crossing the road you rely on experience and observation rather than bibliomancy and a Magic 8 Ball? When you can understand why you trust the scientific method in matters even of life or death, then you will understand why other people feel the same. Sure, like absolutely everything else we do. But it's still the best thing we've got. As to whether it's a major problem, that's more than we can know, since we don't know how much better we'd have done if we were immortal Martians instead. Well, say rather that the people who apply it aren't. Fortunately part of the scientific method involves reducing the influence of one's prejudices on one's results.

Why, nothing guarantees it. Even when you perform such a straightforward observation as (for example) counting your legs, it is always conceivable that you are hallucinating and delusional.Still, have you got a better idea for finding out how many legs you have? "Determined" is the wrong word, and confuses a very simple issue --- scientists test their beliefs about reality by looking at reality.

Let me give you an counterexample.I am an atheist.I say that from the propositionsAandA v Bwe can deduce:BThere, you see, an atheist using logic. Therefore the reasoning which led you to say that this was impossible must be fatally flawed. But this is not true. Even if one's logic is perfect, to arrive at the correct conclusion requires premises which are correct, and where do we get them from, eh? No, the process would be logically sound. That is not an attribute that a conclusion can have.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

And even if it did, that wouldn't prevent an atheist from using logic. By analogy, if the existence of horses depended on an act of fiat creation by God, that wouldn't mean that no atheist could ride a horse.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

But this is to change the meaning of the word "biased" and indeed "presupposition" in such a way as to make them almost meaningless --- certainly to wrench "biased" away from its meaning in conventional English usage and to give it a strange new meaning of your own.Consider the following little parable.In a darkened room, I hand Alice a sphere and ask her what color it is. Alice freely confesses that she doesn't know, because she is literally in the dark. However, she says, maybe she could tell me if she saw it in a good light. I give her my permission to take it outside, where she inspects it from all angles in a good light, and sees that it is blue. She returns to the darkened room and reports that it is blue.Then I hand the sphere to Bob and ask him what color it is. "Ah," he replies, "it is most certainly pink. I know this because the Holy Book Of All Spheres Being Pink says that all spheres are pink, and is the H.B.O.A.S.B.P. not the work of the Great Pink Goddess herself, all praise to her pinkness?"Now, the way that you are using the word "bias", they are both biased: Bob by his belief in the Great Pink Goddess; and Alice by her belief that she can find out what color a thing is by looking at it.But this is not at all what an ordinary person would mean by "bias". A normal person would detect no hint of "bias" in Alice's behavior, but rather see it as a model of objective neutrality. She had no belief about the color of the sphere until she saw the evidence, and when she saw the evidence she allowed her beliefs to be conditioned by it. In the English language as it is spoken, that's what it means to be unbiased.In particular, to say that someone's view is biased is to imply that it may be unreliable. But Alice's "bias" in favor of looking at things in order to find out what color they are is actually something which gives credibility to any statements she might make about what color things are.Similarly with "presupposition". In English as it is spoken, Bob exhibited a presupposition because he made his mind up before he saw the evidence, whereas Alice didn't exhibit presupposition because she didn't make her mind up until she saw the evidence. That, to an English-speaking person, is the exact difference between having a presupposition and not having one. The "pre" in "presupposition" means "before", i.e. presupposition is supposing something before examining the evidence.Now you apparently wish to change the meanings of the pejorative words "bias" and "presupposition" so that they include things which in English they exclude (and which normal people would in no way wish to disparage). And of course you wish to change their meaning while maintaining their pejorative implication --- so that you can speak of things like neutrality and objectivity as though they were in some way bad things.Well, you can't change the English language. So I suggest that you find some word that genuinely does include the behavior of both Alice and Bob, and continue the discussion on those terms.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

Derived from observation.My point is this. Given the premises that all pigs have wings, and that all animals with wings can play the trombone, it would be logically correct to deduce that all pigs can play the trombone. But it would also be wrong. Logic supplies us with nothing useful unless we have correct premises to feed into it. And in order to get correct premises, we rely on observation. ... you are, as I have demonstrated, completely wrong. So perhaps you should stop saying things that you know to be false. And you are, of course, wrong. As I have pointed out to you about a zillion times, my "worldview" is based on the idea that we can find out about the world by looking at it --- to put it concisely, my worldview is to view the world. And one of the things which we find out about the world by looking at it is that logic correctly applied to correct premises leads to correct conclusions. And I hold that on those occasions when you use logic and reasoning, you are participating in my "worldview". You look to see whether a car is coming before you cross the road, don't you? Rather than, for example, just praying to God to keep you safe and then marching out there regardless of the evidence?When it comes to a really serious matter, a matter of your own life or death, you adopt an evidence-based approach just like me, don't you?Of your morality I know nothing, and if it comes to that, you know nothing of mine, since this is not a topic that we have discussed. Before you say that I have borrowed my morality from you, perhaps you should take the trouble to find out what it is.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

I think he's trying to paraphrase your argument there, not to state his own opinion.---You leave us with a bit of a puzzle. If I have understood you correctly, you claim that someone who says that there is no Santa Claus is biased. They're one of those people with a "biased presupposition" in favor of making their minds up based on the evidence.On the other hand, someone who has never even heard of Santa Claus and has no opinion on this subject whatsoever is also (according to you) biased.So, could you please explain to us what neutrality and objectivity on this subject would look like? What statement would someone need to make on the subject of the existence of Santa Claus which would not (according to you) be "biased"?Please do let us know.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

Good grief.Objectivity does not require one to deny the facts, but rather that one's beliefs should be conditioned by the facts. I think I'm going to have to quote David Hume again: Has it occurred to you that your fantasies about what you would think if you were an atheist may be inaccurate? I am an atheist, and I have no difficulty at all with the questions which perplex and bewilder you, who are a theist. It all seems very straightforward to me, but apparently it baffles you completely. By refusing belief in some fact a priori, whatever the evidence. You know, like creationists do. And if you will ignore this "assumption" next time you cross the road, then I shall refrain from calling you a hypocrite.Also, you will die when the car hits you.You use my worldview every time it comes down to something important, like whether you live or die. You reject it only when you want to do something trivial and inconsequential such as spouting religious bullshit. But when your life is in your hands, you don't make a fool of yourself with some pathetic epistemological balderdash. Instead, you look to see if a car is coming before you cross the road.So long as you continue to do so, I can't take you seriously. And if you ever cease to do so, I won't have to take you seriously, because you will be unable to post here after people put you in a wooden box and bury you.

I have noticed that you have a tendency to use the phrase "your worldview" when what you actually mean is "the imaginary worldview of the imaginary people who live in sac51495's head".This strikes me as being either delusional or dishonest.