Christianity

[Harry Baird]

[T]he concept of programming [...] is used in various other fields [than computers] in regard to people. I already provided links.

You're right, and in the quibbling over the validity of this sense of the word, your original point has been lost, and it's an important one to make in the context of this exchange. Here is my paraphrasing of it:

Regularised ("programmatic") behaviour need not be deterministic; it can be habitual, and in that sense it is compatible with free will.

This further defuses the already bankrupt "programmatic behaviour => mindless automaton" inference.

[Gary Childress]

As I say, life thrives at the expense of life. What is the alternative for us--stand out in the sun and wait until one of our bodies figures out how to photosynthesize for nutrition?

And as I pointed out in response, in and through statements like these (including the rhetorical question) you are engaged in fallacious reasoning (and no, we don't need to photosynthesise to avoid killing, or at least to reduce it to negligible or just minimal levels).

Because I've seen you make these sort of statements multiple times in the same context, I've concluded that they are the way you rationalise your choices. I don't say this to be unpleasant or insulting, but to point it out to you and bring it to your attention, in service to those who suffer the consequences of those choices, in which you are not alone: most people make similar choices and indulge in their own processes of rationalisation.

I can see that now. It takes a lot to move me. I'm lazy and listless and not very interested in things I used to be interested in. I can say that I want to do something for a noble cause but in the end, my own selfish interests take over in the final decision I make. I'd like to change that tendency in me but I fear what it will entail. I was the student who always procrastinated. Sometimes I just got nothing done at all. Well, maybe that was most of the time.

[Gary Childress]

But I'm seeing urgency now. Maybe it's only urgency to be a part of reaching a better world though not necessarily getting there. That's a big sacrifice also.

[henry quirk]

non-human living beings behave in ways that only make sense if they are emotionally motivated

There's another, more sensible, explanation (one presented multiple times): anthropomorphization.

edited for correction

DA246AEE-B5A6-4206-8A6F-8B6CB7716F41.jpeg

[Lacewing]

The concept of programming [...] is used in various other fields [than computers] in regard to people. I already provided links.

You're right, and in the quibbling over the validity of this sense of the word, your original point has been lost, and it's an important one to make in the context of this exchange.

Yes. Thank you.

Here is my paraphrasing of it:

Regularised ("programmatic") behaviour need not be deterministic; it can be habitual, and in that sense it is compatible with free will.

Agreed.

This further defuses the already bankrupt "programmatic behaviour => mindless automaton" inference.

As with just about everything, I think there can be degrees of how it manifests. Some people seem more easily 'programmable': they have free will, but they may seemingly hand it over to someone or something for whatever reasons matter more to them than having clear and present awareness. It may seem mindless... but they're choosing to do it.

[Harry Baird]

I can see that now. It takes a lot to move me. I'm lazy and listless and not very interested in things I used to be interested in. I can say that I want to do something for a noble cause but in the end, my own selfish interests take over in the final decision I make. I'd like to change that tendency in me but I fear what it will entail. I was the student who always procrastinated. Sometimes I just got nothing done at all. Well, maybe that was most of the time.

I can relate to a lot of that. I think it helps us to be connected to people who share our understanding and goals, and who mutually support and inspire us. Probably, like me, you're not connected enough in that way at the moment.

But I'm seeing urgency now. Maybe it's only urgency to be a part of reaching a better world though not necessarily getting there.

It is urgent, and I'm glad that you see that.

That's a big sacrifice also.

For the most part, the sacrifice needn't be that great. There are alternatives to products and services based on exploitation that are satisfying in their own way. Yes, there's sometimes some social friction or sense of privation when you choose those alternatives, but it's getting easier as more and more people recognise them as the most ethical choices.

If you like, I can share resources that might help, such as in better understanding the nature, scope, and severity of the problem (which might preserve your sense of urgency), in finding supportive social media, in finding new recipes, or in understanding nutritional needs and how to meet them, etc.

Just ask if you think that any of that would be useful.

[Harry Baird]

non-human living beings behave in ways that only make sense if they are emotionally motivated

There's another, more sensible, explanation (one presented multiple times): anthropomorphization.

Presented multiple times, and wrong every time, firstly because...

"Q: What causes certain behaviour of non-human living beings?"

"A: The anthropomorphisation of Harry Baird (and others) causes it."

...is strictly nonsensical as an answer (as pointed out to you already in this exchange), and secondly because to infer that non-human living beings have minds based on their emotionally-motivated behaviour is not anthropomorphising them; it's arriving at a basic fact. To deny this basic fact is to falsely exceptionalise them.

"Anthropomorphisation" is not an alternative explanation as to why non-human living beings behave in the ways that they do; it's simply a rejection of the obviously correct explanation: that their behaviour is emotionally-motivated. You're still offering no positive alternative.

If not emotions, then what does cause this behaviour? (Hint: remember this time that "anthropomorphisation" is nonsensical as an answer. You need - but lack - a better one).

[Harry Baird]

Just a quick note to say: yep, that's all agreeable to me.

[henry quirk]

You're still offering no positive alternative.

'cuz there isn't one.

Harry, you believe the (pig) is capable of suffering, exhibits suffering, and has a mind of sorts.

I believe the (pig) is not capable of suffering, does not exhibit suffering, and is only a mindless meat machine.

You, and others, believe you see the (pig) suffering (it acts in ways you say indicate it suffers).

I believe you, and others, misinterpret the (pig's) actions. I don't believe you, and others, are assessing accurately.

You would have me agree God built the (pig) to mimic suffering.

I will not becuz the (pig) is not mimicking suffering; you, and others, are anthropomorphizing it. It's reactions are canned. it does not, cannot, respond. There's no one behind its (beady) lil eyes.

You, and others, see what you want to; you are not seein' what's actually there. You overlay personhood on that which is not a person.

A6C4FF40-D4B7-44A9-9FBD-93D169621A09.jpeg

[iambiguous]

Taking Issue with The God Issue
Raymond Tallis argues against theist arguments in PN 99

Craig’s Arguments

William Lane Craig offers no less than eight reasons for belief that God exists. Six of them take this form: ‘God is the best explanation of…’. According to Craig, He (God, that is) explains: 1) Why there is something rather than nothing; 2) The origin of the universe; 3) The applicability of mathematics to the physical world; 4) The fine-tuning of the universe for intelligent life; 5) Intentional states of consciousness; and 6) Objective moral values and duties. Impressive or what?

Yes, but as with my reaction to Craig in the 17 videos above, all he really provides are arguments. Words defending other words. Whereas I'm asking those like Craig and IC and other Christians here to go beyond "God is the best explanation" for this or that. After all, won't most of these folks...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions

...tell you the same thing about their God or spiritual path?

If the Christian God did create the Heavens and the Earth and did raise Himself from the dead, where is the hard evidence to substantiate it?

Empirical, experiential, experimental evidence that, once atheists and agonistics and those who worship other Gods are exposed to it, it will simply blow their minds. "I can't deny this! No one can!! The Christian God does exist!!!"

Some of these reasons are more clearly vulnerable than others. For example, the very idea of ‘objective moral values and duties’ is contested by some. Others would argue that, objective or not, there are biological, and/or psychological, and/or sociological bases for moral codes, rather than God.

Whether contested or not, the bottom line [mine] remains the same: arguing for this or that moral code is one thing, demonstrating that all rational men and women are obligated to embrace your own another thing altogether.

Given a particular context. And, Christian or atheist, I always challenge all moral objectivists to attempt that. It's just that if Christians can accomplish it, it includes immortality and salvation in turn for the faithful.

Yet others would point out that God, far from supplying the basis for morality, has, according to his fanzine the Bible, not only behaved amorally Himself, but has also inspired dreadful behaviour (torture, murder, oppression etc.) in His subjects.

Ah, His mysterious ways. And the Subjects ignorance of them.

[iambiguous]

Taking Issue with The God Issue
Raymond Tallis argues against theist arguments in PN 99

His argument goes as follows:

“Premise #1. Every contingent thing has an explanation of its existence.

In what sense do we have a (complete) explanation of anything? It also seems odd to call the universe ‘a thing’, contingent or not.

We don't of course. Well, not counting those who just skip right to God. A more or less blind leap of faith for example.

In fact, the far more intriguing question is this: In going back to how the human condition here on planet Earth fits into what may or may be an ontological -- teleological? -- understanding of existence itself, is it even possible for the human brain to grasp a complete understanding of the universe? Whether it is a "thing" or not.

Indeed, given the staggering enormity of the gap between what we think we know here and now about reality and all that there is to be known about the existence of existence itself, we can't even pin down for certain whether or not any assessment that we give is of our own volition.

At any rate, while there may be explanations of individual items, it does not follow that there is an explanation of the sum total of all things, even less a single, one word, explanation of them (‘God’); less still when that word carries so much historical baggage.

Of course the problem here is that however reasonable this might seem to some, it's still no less but another spleculative philosophical assessment about religion. God may well be the sum of all parts in the universe. Okay, but what for all practical purposes does that mean? Instead, each of us as individuals, given our own uniquely persoanl existential parameters, has come to embrace a frame of mind about it that becomes true simply because we believe that it is true.

That's the beauty of Big Questions like this. Since we have no capacity to demonstrate that what we believe is in fact true, we end up with this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_p ... ideologies
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_s ... philosophy

So while you might in some sense explain the existence of an item such as Raymond Tallis by referring to other items – his parents – you cannot generalise this process to the sum total of all items.

My guess: that probably true for all of us. The only difference being it never stops the objectivists among us from preaching to the choir. Or from mocking those who refuse to join in. The KT Syndrome, I'll call it.

The idea of a cause cannot be extended to apply to the totality within which all causation operates. It is logically possibly to consider a deus ex machina, but there cannot be a deus ex totalis: if the explanation and that which is to be explained are distinct, and the latter is the totality of things, then we have the logical impossibility of something which is additional to this totality.

Again, though, logic exists only because the human species invented it in order to establish the least subjective rules in regard to, among other things, exchanges like this. But how is the existence of God logical? Indeed, why is it logical that anything at all exists?

What’s more, the existence of a satisfactory explanation of Item X by Item Y does not imply that the chain of explanation will continue until we shall reach something that requires no explanation, namely God.

Okay, logically, what is the most satisfactory explanation here?

[iambiguous]

Taking Issue with The God Issue
Raymond Tallis argues against theist arguments in PN 99

Premise 2. If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is a transcendent personal being.

The passage from the universe needing an ‘explanation of existence’ to its being explained by ‘a transcendent personal being’ is even more wobbly.

For some this wobble eventually topples over into the theological equivalent of sheer speculation. Or magical thinking. It is derived in my view from the profoundly problematic reality that the existence of existence itself is ineffable. In other words, mysterious beyond words. Or, so far, any words I have come upon myself on this planet. In this forum.

Though, of course, that will never stop philosophers from speculating about it: https://youtu.be/lCfiQcVU_Xw?si=3SVQ8bIGcg6kZ2dH

And, as well, scientists and theologians.

Moreover, Craig’s claim that “this is what everyone means by ‘God’” is untrue: for some, God is impersonal; and for others God is immanent. But the claim is also irrelevant: the epidemiology of belief is not a secure guide to the nature of reality and that which brought it into being.

Actually, what everyone [here] is required to believe about the Christian God is what Immanuel Cant believes.

Just ask him.

Makes you wonder if Craig himself is a True Christian.

And what someone "means" about God in a theological or a philosophical assessment is still a far, far cry from what they can demonstrate about Him.

[Harry Baird]

You're still offering no positive alternative.

'cuz there isn't one.

In that case, given the absence of a causal explanation, the behaviour of non-human living beings is like the decay of subatomic particles: indeterministic.

It's also, though, according to you, canned and programmatic: deterministic.

It can't be both. Determinism and indeterminism are mutually exclusive.

You, and others, believe you see the chicken suffering (it acts in ways you say indicate it suffers).

I believe you, and others, misinterpret the chicken's actions. I don't believe you, and others, are assessing accurately.

And I don't believe that you really believe that, but I'm playing along simply to demonstrate that you can't justify your supposed - and false - belief anyway.

Yes, we do reliably infer suffering, joy, and a host of other emotional states in our fellow living beings, both human and non-human, and often from the same behaviour in both cases. There are positive reasons to believe that this inference is correct in both cases (on which, more below), but we also have no reason to believe that it's correct only in one case and not in the other: that the same behaviour in non-human living beings has a different cause than it does in humans.

The only reason you've purported to provide in this respect is that the behaviour of non-human living beings is (supposedly) "canned", whereas human behaviour is not. This distinction does not hold for much of the behaviour in question though. For example:

If you're alone and somebody physically threatens you in a serious way, you have basically two well-known choices: fight or flight. As an individual with a stable character and personality, you're likely to make a fairly predictable choice either way in any given situation (just like non-human living beings do). Canned...

If you're hungry and not suicidal, you have basically one choice: find food and eat it (just like many non-human living beings do). Canned...

If you're bored and lonely and there are friendly companions nearby, your choice is predictable: seek out their company (just like those non-human living beings who are sociable do). Canned...

Etc etc.

Rather than being evidence that we (or non-human living beings) lack minds, the more or less predictability of our (and their) responses to emotional drives demonstrates exactly the opposite.

The behaviour exhibited in those responses otherwise makes no sense. I've pushed you over and over to offer an alternative (causal) explanation of it, but - despite your one-time vague, meaningless, and unclarified reference to a "system reset" in one scenario - you've explicitly said that there isn't one. In that case, to paraphrase a well-known literary detective: when you've eliminated the possibility of any alternative (causal) explanation, the only (causal) explanation on the table is the correct one.

This brings us to the main positive reason to believe that the inference that living beings are sentient ("have minds" in your preferred terminology) is correct for both human and non-human living beings: the non-human living beings in question have very relevant similarities with human beings, namely, that they are also carbon-based biological entities on planet Earth who appear to share ancestors with us and are in that sense "relatives".

It's obviously true then that non-human living beings are conscious subjects (and thus have minds as you use that term), and it remains the case that in consuming the products of their enslavement, exploitation, and slaughter, you violate the natural rights you claim to defend.

[Gary Childress]

Most Christians deserve a trip to hell. If there really is a God, then God gave us science and philosophy, neither of which support unfounded speculation based on stories concocted and written down by psychotics thousands of years ago. Unless of course, God favors the dishonest, deceitful, and hypocritical.

[attofishpi]

Most Christians deserve a trip to hell.

Every time I at of the Tree of Know_Ledge I spent 3 months there, not a place I will survive if I return.

If there really is a God,

There is.

then God gave us science and philosophy,

Nah, God gave us REAL_IT_Y, what we do from there is down to us.

neither of which support unfounded speculation based on stories concocted and written down by psychotics thousands of years ago.

So says a psychotic.

Unless of course, God favors the dishonest, deceitful, and hypocritical.

wtf?