Has The Supernatural Hypothesis Failed?

Can we have confidence in conclusions and predictions made on the basis of consistent natural laws and the absence of supernatural agents overriding those laws? Or not?I am holding my pen in the air again. I am going to let go.

What do you think my pen will do

How confident are you of this behaviour?

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Assuming that you do have confidence in the predicted behaviour of my dropped pen on what possible basis do you have this confidence if not in the consistency of natural law and the absence of any supernatural agents overriding these laws?

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Bluejay writes:

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All except for Bluegenes’ theory, that is; Blugenes’ theory can only be falsified by a supernatural alternative.

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No. No. No. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. You KEEP asserting this. But this is simply untrue. As per Message 184. I even told you how Bluegenes theory could be naturalistically falsified. ALL scientific explanations can be falsified by both naturalistic and supernaturalistic alternatives. The difference here is one of emphasis. NOT one of principle.

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The entire basis of your opposition is based on a false premise. If you could just forget demands to disprove supernatural involvement for one moment we could actually get somewhere here. If you could instead apply the confidence in the consistency of natural law and absence of supernatural involvement that is present in every other naturalistic theory to the question at hand we could progress this discussion. If you could stop special pleading the question of supernatural human conceptual origins and treat it with the same confidence as any other evidenced naturalistic explanation - You might finally understand what it is myself and Bluegenes have been saying all this time.

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But instead you go down the tragic route of demanding disproof of the supernatural on the basis of a false premise. I find your blinkeredness utterly depressing.

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Bluejay writes:

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I can’t figure out why you are incapable of seeing that empiricism would not be a valid or meaningful way to study genuine supernature.

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Because this is only true if:

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"Genuine" supernatural agents have absolutely no role in observable physical nature whatsoever. Including any interaction with humans that can itself be the cause of human conceptualisation of the supernatural.

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Supernatural agents act completely in accordance with natural laws and are thus utterly undetectable because they are indistinguishable from natural laws in every way. (pantheism?)

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In either case the "genuinely" supernatural is completely imperceptible to us. Thus any human conceptualisation of the supernatural is necessarily derived internal to the human mind. I.e the product of human imagination. Any equivalence there may be between this supernatural reality (that may philosophically exist) and the concepts arrived at by humanity are thus purely coincidental.

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Or as I (and Bluegenes) would say - Very unlikely to actually exist.

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Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Agreed. Wholeheartedly. This is where our hair splitting difference lies.The requirement to consider something possible can be borne from ignorance. Until we know that something is impossible how can we consider it to be anything other than a possibility?Experience, or lack thereof, doesn't come into it.

If nothing else answer this: That isn't what I said is it? I said that it is impossible to have ANY confidence in ANY prediction borne of ANY naturalistic explanation without implicitly assuming both the consistency of natural law and the absence of supernatural agents that will override those lawsSo I ask you - Can we legitimately have confidence in conclusions and predictions made on the basis of consistent natural laws and the absence of any supernatural agents overriding those laws?Or are you still asserting that such assumptions are "heuristic" and statistically invalid?

And I completely agree with that too. We are essentially talking about the difference between what I would call "evidenced possibilities" and "unevidenced possibilities". It is this that I spent months fruitlessly trying to explain to RAZD. As per Message 217The existence of supernatural entities is an "unevidenced possibility". There is no evidential foundation for even asking the question. That it is even considered gives it more credit than it even deserves.All of which I suspect you will agree with and all of which I have been saying for some time. Again I agree. That should be the question by any standard of evidence worthy of the name. BUT a supernatural Jesus remains a possibility. I don't think I disagree with your point or that I ever have done. I think you are misreading me when I try to make the subtle distinction between something being possible (i.e. a positive claim that it is possible and can exist) and my insistence that something remains as a possibility out of ignorance as to whether it can exist or not (i.e. where no positive claim that it is possible is being made) That is what I am doing. That is what I am arguing for. I am not saying that we must consider the supernatural possible because I somehow know that such things can exist. I very much doubt that they can. But in the absence of knowledge that something is impossible it remains a possibility.That is a very subtle difference. Oh who are you kiddin? You know full well I will keep replying until I gag myself. Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

I agree. But still the existence of God remains a possibility does it not?See my post to Oni above for the distinction I am trying to make.AbE - Did you read the earlier conversation between myself and Oni in this thread where we basically disagreed about whether or not the supernatural could be defined out of existence by defining reality and existence as being limited to empirical experience.I still don't think we can simply define reality and existence in this manner and thus I continue to subtly disagree with Oni's conclusion that the term supernatural is "meaningless" and "nothing".Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

I agree. I have never said it is possible in the sense of a positive declaration. I have said it remains a possibility only out of ignorance. Only because we cannot say it is impossible. I don't think you and I are really disagreeing here at all.The problem as I see it lies with the language used and my inability to find the words that distinguish between something remaining a possibility out of ignorance and a positive declaration of something actually being possible. I am sure I have seen you describe all sorts of things from Immaterial Pink Unicorns to Flying Spaghetti Monsters via CIA plots and Gods as "possibilities". Albeit unevidenced ones. No?In the absence of knowledge that such things are impossible how can they be considered as anything but possibilities?If you can find better language in which to express this I would be happy to hear it.

Hello to you too. Such is the nature of these things. You are proposing that some creator left an imprint in the universe that billions of years later manifests itself in the evolved physical brains of humans as some aspect of consciousness? How Would this occur without some 'invisible hand' guiding human evolution along required lines rather than human brains being the product of natural selection and random mutation? How is this compatible with (to paraphrase Einstein) the God that does play dice that quantum mechanics suggests is the only sort of genuinely non-intervening God possible? I am unaware of humans ever having demonstrably expanded their perceptive abilities beyond our empirical senses? If you are suggesting that detecting the supernatural is simply a matter of developing technology in the same way that detecting electrons was a matter of technological progress then I would question if this is the sort of inherently non-empirical entity that theists or any other supernaturalists would recognise as the object of their conceptual beliefs.Take our old friend the Immaterial Pink Unicorn (as mentioned prolifically by RAZD in his debate with Bluegenes and an old favourite of mine). If genuinely immaterial in the sense of being inherently empirically undetectable then how could it ever be perceptible to us humans with our limited perceptory apparatus? How can this concept be derived from anywhere other than the internal workings of the human mind?And the same question applies to any other inherently non-empirical ethereal or immaterial concept one can name.

After a bit of thought I think this is the difference between us:You define reality and existence as being limited to that which is empirically detectable and bounded by natural law. You derive this definition from the entirety of evidenced human experience. As a result supernatural concepts are, by definition, unreal and unable to exist. They are, by definition, impossible. Thus they can accurately be described as meaningless or nothing. Then you slap on some tentativity to this as a sort of philosophical afterthought.In contrast I conclude that reality and existence are limited to that which is empirically detectable and bounded by natural law. I derive this conclusion from the entirety of evidenced human experience. But like any evidence based conclusion this conclusion is inherently and innately tentative to some degree. As a result supernatural concepts are a possibility which contravene everything we know and are thus "possible" only to the extent that our conclusions are tentative. But they are not nothing or meaningless. They are simply almost certainly wrong.The difference between us is thus derived from the point at which we apply tentativity to our thinking. As such the practical difference between our positions is essentially non-existant. But there is a hair splitting philosophical difference. I continue to advocate my position as more philosophically viable because the tentativity we both agree upon is innate and built in whereas in your position it appears to be nothing more than a sort of grudging concessionary afterthought. Sure they are actual concepts. A supernatural Jesus, for example, is no more or less of a concrete concept than is the concept of Superman or Spider-Man. And the concept of the supernatural is just as concrete in terms of meaning as is the concept of superpowered superheroes. Why have you concluded that Yahweh is less defined as a concept than The Green Lantern or Harry Potter?The fact that supernatural concepts are almost certainly human inventions doesn't make them "meaningless" or "nothing". Any more than the notion that there are people walking round who can fly or have spider sense is "meaningless" or "nothing". Such notions are just (all but certainly) the result of human fantasies and nothing more.I will now gag myself and let you have the last word on this. Well.until we bring it up again at least. Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

I somehow missed this out of my previous post. And if it is unfalsified it remains a possibility does it not? Certainly that would be the anticipated response from one advocating a theistic or agnostic position.And then we are still left with the problem of distinguishing between that which is possible and that which is a possibility (or evidenced and unevidenced possibilities respectively)"Unfalsified" doesn't seem to help much. The terminological problem remains as far as I can see.

As per your recent message Message 395 I am just as frustrated with your level of stubborn inability to grasp what this is about as you apparently are with what you perceive to be mine.I am going to have one last go at engaging you on this. This time on the issue of prediction. An issue which, once again, you have utterly misread as being related to disproving the undisprovable rather than being related to positive evidence in favour of the theory in question. Once again you show your obsession with disproving the undisprovable. But that is not and never has been what this is about.This human imagination theory predicts that where you find human ignorance you will find a strong tendency for supernatural explanations.The human imagination theory predicts that humans will naturally seek to find conscious intent, meaning and purpose of the sort science cannot provide behind all manner of mindless physical processes no matter how inappropriate such questions may be (i.e. the why questions such as why was my family wiped out by the tsunami or why were my crops blighted by disease or why is the universe here). The human imagination theory predicts that in an effort to answer such why questions humans will imbue mindless physical processes with anthropomorphic qualities such as emotions, desires and intent and that the resulting answers will very often be supernatural in nature.The human imagination theory predicts that where challenged by increased understanding of nature those who hold cherished supernatural concepts will either deny the validity of contradictory scientific conclusions or they will evolve their supernatural concepts to become ever more unfalsifiable and ever more ambiguous with ever less of an observable role in nature.So I ask you

Are these predicted conclusions in agreement with past observations?

Would you bet against newly discovered human cultures (past, present or future) or newly forming human cultures demonstrably displaying these same tendencies?

In the case of the last prediction what do you think future theists will do as science continues to progress?

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And finally — Why do we need to disprove the existence of the supernatural to have confidence in mankinds deeply evidenced proclivity to invent supernatural concepts for reasons that have nothing to do with external reality and everything to do with very human internal needs?

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Bluejay writes:

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I will not be participating further in this debate.

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That is up to you. But let it at least be noted that your repeated assertion regarding the naturalistic unfalsifiability of the human imagination theory, and thus your conclusion that it cannot be a theory, is false. As per Message 184.

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Let it also be noted that the human imagination theory can make predictions which have nothing to do with disproving the undisprovable. As discussed above.

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Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

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Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Let's take this step by step. So we can have confidence in our naturalistic explanation because it has resulted in verifiable predictions. Good. We agree on that.Now if we are confident that gravitational effects are caused by by space-time curvature then we must correspondingly consider it unlikley that gravitational effects are caused by dancing angels. Do you agree?This is rather fundamental so an answer would be appreciated. Except that this explanation is simply unable to make any verifiable predictions. And is thus unworthy of any confidence. In short it is unlikely to be a correct explanation as the cause of the observed phenomenon (gravitational effects in this case). No? So according to your argument we are only ever talking about supernatural entities which are utterly imperceptible. Utterly imperceptible because they either play no causal role in any aspect of observable reality or they do so in a manner that is indistinguishable from natural law.Is that your position?Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

How confident are you that when I drop my pen it will simply fall to the floor?How confident are you that the entire universe was not created supernaturally in full (including our memories) two nanoseconds ago solely to make me look silly when I drop my pen, expect it to fall to the floor, and isntead watch in bewilderment as it flies out of the window?Is the above supernatural possibility falsified? No. Obviously not until I actually drop my pen.So on what comparison are you rejecting this supernatural possibility as pointlessly unlikely?Or am I wrong to have confidence in my pen simply falling to the floor?

On what basis? Be specific.You haven't falsified the possibility that the universe was supernaturally created in it's entirety 2 nano-seconds ago and that our memories and expectations of gravitational law are nothing but false inserted experiences designed to fool us into expecting my pen to drop to the floor instead of shoot out of the window.According to your arguments any conclusion that unfalsified supernatural possibilities such as the above scenario are "very improbable" are heuristic, statistically invalid and unworthy of any confidence. So on what basis do you dismiss this scenario? Then how can you have any confidence in my pen simply dropping to the floor rather than shooting out of the window as per the above scenario?By the terms of your own argument - You can't.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

CS if we have confidence in space-time curvature as being the cause of gravitational effects how can we consider it anything other than unlikely that dancing angels are the cause of gravitational effects? I didn't say any observation ruled out your angels. I said that the ability of space-time curvature as an explanation to make predictions which have been verified makes this a superior explanation in which we can have confidence as being an accurate reflection of reality.And if we have strong confidence that space-time curvature is the cause of gravitational effects we are correspondingly sceptical about other competing explanations. Especially ones which are wholly unevidenced and unable to make any predictions at all.Surely this is simply inarguable?

So you think the existence of the supernatural has never been posited as the cause of any observable phenomenon?