tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1905686568472747305.post2709658160050642729..comments2024-03-22T06:22:08.010+00:00Comments on Stephen Law: On a weird misreading of my bookStephen Lawhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02167317543994731177noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1905686568472747305.post-5283185876543266092011-08-24T23:59:07.985+00:002011-08-24T23:59:07.985+00:00I am not an atheist nor a believer in god. I just ...I am not an atheist nor a believer in god. I just think the whole issue is moot, for a number of reasons.<br /> One is that no one bothers to define what god is. Is god just existence? Well then surely there is a god--but why not call it existence or what is or "factor x"<br />instead of god?<br /> Is god an old man in the sky as on the Sistine Chapel? Is god love or is god a companion who is omnipotent? There is rarely any attempt to clarify the notion.<br /> And these are all intuitions that posit some entity and irrefutable on that basis, as is the belief that there is no such thing as god or seeking intuitively for such a god and not finding it.<br /> To say that the intuiter of the man in the sky has no confirmation of his intuition can equally be applied to the atheist who intuits no such creature or intuits that only evidence that conforms to scientific norms is worthy of assent or some such. What are you going to say, that your intuition is okay but theirs is not? To me this is like saying that one's finding chocolate delicious is legitimate but another's finding it repulsive is not legitimate.<br /> Seems to me that ultimately<br />there is no recourse away from one's basic personal intuitions about things. <br /> You believe in god or you dis-believe in god---so what? <br /> It seems to me the evidence and<br />argument on either side of the issue is inconclusive at best, and in any case provoked no concern in me either way.<br /> Yes, I think the integrity of science should not be compromised by any religious influence--that would be a step backward. But otherwise--who the fuck cares?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1905686568472747305.post-70052580575298826612011-08-21T23:32:41.209+00:002011-08-21T23:32:41.209+00:00Hi, Charles Myro here,
How the debate will go I...Hi, Charles Myro here,<br /><br /> How the debate will go I think I know.<br /> It can be argued that when<br /> simple single atoms and forces are examined they do not indicate there must be such things as tomatoes or the game of poker or the human body. The behavior and interactions of single atoms and forces lend no necessity to the forms around us. <br /> Science simply presumes that all things descend exclusively from the atom and forces, and all forms and events arise by the character of atoms as they are wont to combine under the circumstances. This is a premise, not a conclusion reached by experiment. There is, it seems to me, no necessity to the notion that the character of tiny grains must be the only factor determining what shows up. This notion is a premise. <br /> All above presuming I subscribe to a definition of necessity that supports my assertions.<br /> <br /> The intelligent design advocate for god's existence presumes that the character of atoms and forces is such that there is no potential of atoms and forces to combine and interact to form the human body, tomatoes and the game of poker and so on. This presumption is a premise.<br /> Can one prove that there is no other notion possible to account for the forms of the world?<br />I think it cannot be so proved unless one defines "account for" in one's favor.<br /> Thus, the debate will, I predict, come down to the question what is it to account for the world?<br /> The scientist will defend his reduction and the intelligent design advocate will defend his reduction. And each will deny the validity of the other's reduction.<br /> The scientist will say that he accounts for all that is worth accounting for and the other will say that the slim candle of science cannot account for the whole ball of universal wax.<br /> So it will go. Or am I being too presumptuous, and this is not how it will go at all? So, how will it go? <br /> It will go someway or other.<br /> My own notion of the circumstance of the world is this:<br /> All things are, or you could say that isness is, or being is or be's<br />or some such. This seems the most obvious premise to me. If any generalization is valid, it seems to me, it is that of being. <br /> If correspondence is what validates a notion then I would say that general being is the most validated. What, after all, does all have in common? Aristotle might reply that there is no being apart from individual forms of being. But it seems to me that existence needs no form---and that distinction itself is a form of being, and that we may make or abandon distinctions of form-- we may divide things up or combine them as we will as sense or thought or what have you---and being is untouched by any such machinations. Sans thought and sense existence still is. <br /> If the universe disappears tomorrow then what will exist--what will be the state of affairs-- is whatever there is when the universe is extinguished. Is can't go anywhere, for what ever is or isn't, is.<br /> In other words,the statement "nothing is" is not self-contradictory or paradoxical.<br /> If you want to label being --god-- then absolutely, in this view, god exists. <br /> If you want to say why there should be forms of being at all,<br />have at it. Science has no answer at all to the question except to <br />ignore the import of the question, which asks why such a thing should be and offer a physical rule or material principle as though the question were just another way of asking by what physical mechanism or physical rule are forms produced. <br /> In retort one may further ask, presuming there is such a rule or principle, why should there be such a rule or principle, or any such? <br /> This is the final question that may be asked of all such answers, ad infinitum.<br /> I will stick with what I think is obvious. That all is. If I am lolling with no thought at all, I still taste that being.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1905686568472747305.post-76165058772304204412011-07-27T12:13:47.359+00:002011-07-27T12:13:47.359+00:00"To be misquoted is preferable to being ignor..."To be misquoted is preferable to being ignored". The Atheist Missionary. July 27, 2011.The Atheist Missionaryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07191035196328725888noreply@blogger.com