Immanuel Can wrote:Greylorn wrote:
Why the squabble? It turned out that the female in question was his ex-girlfriend.
Nice. Diplomacy at its best.
I'm vastly entertained.
greylorn wrote:I'm in complete agreement about the correspondence-causality relationship, yet I cannot help but notice how well it works as a determinant of human behavior, and how effective it has been throughout the history of science. Had this relationship been ignored, for example, you'd not know of Louis Pasteur.
If a particular cause-effect sequence occurs once, it is likely to be coincidence. However, if the same sequence occurs repetitively, it is conveying useful information...
Well, can I agree but modify? I would say if a cause-effect sequence occurs more than once it can increase the likelihood there's a common cause worth detecting; but what it still cannot imply is that we know what that cause is. In my example of the tea-drinking woman, she may have repeated her "experiment" a hundred times or one; but either way, her attribution of cause was simply wrong, and repeated trials increased her certainty she had a problem, perhaps, but led to no increased likelihood that tea was hurting her eye.
That's a distinction worth noting, I think.
Huh?
I think what you've noted is the propensity of philosophers to think that there is something to be gained from repetitively reiterating essentially the same thought process and obtaining a negative result, without trying Plan B. (redundancy for emphasis)
A scientist would stop the experiment and say, "Let's isolate the variables and see what happens." (different cups, different teas, etc.).
An engineer would say, "Drink coffee instead. I do, and my eyes are fine."
An etiquette expert (husband) would say, "It's your pinky that's supposed to be sticking out. Leave the fucking spoon on the saucer."
greylorn wrote: Now back to point. As a philosopher I don't give a shit about proving anything.
Immanuel Can wrote:Not even rationally? Not even to yourself?
I misspoke here. I'm not a philosopher, and have no business pretending to be one. As a kid I was taught Catholicism and the usual school stuff. At college I was trained in physics, EE, math, and computers, and later made my living in astronomy, engineering, biochemistry, and computers. My style of thinking was shaped by my experiences in these fields, and by the realization that the religious teachings I had so happily embraced as a child (serving mass and all) were utter bullshit. At that point I realized that I could not trust the teachings of any believers, particularly those who regarded anyone who disagreed with their beliefs as somewhat stupid, or wrong.
Regrettably, all of science fell into the same category as all religious beliefs. After many intense conversations I realized this:
- Trust my own mind, my own ideas.
- I will often be wrong. When that happens, simply acknowledge the error, correct it, and move on.
This is so much more powerful than when I found myself wrongly defending foolish religious beliefs, the opinions of others. In those instances I could not do a damn thing about the source of my mistakes except to be pissed off and embarrassed at having been conned.
Believe me, it is much easier to admit a personal mistake 
than to admit that you've been conned. 
- Proof is overrated. For example:
- You can prove (as per Descartes' reasoning) that you exist, but only to yourself.
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You can prove mathematical and geometrical theorems, but not the axioms from which they are derived.
-
You can prove the validity of certain physics and engineering principles-- but you cannot prove that the assumptions upon which they are based are true.
Like nearly everyone else on this silly forum, I don't know jack shit about philosophy. I learned about the relationships between logic and implementation, theory and practice, my high opinion of my logic and how it actually worked out, truth and bullshit; all by writing machine-language programs to control telescopes and their instrumentation. I apologize for implying that I am or ever will be a philosopher.
Immanuel Can wrote:Finally, you wrote, "
So the existence of HT doesn't prove his causality (or invention) of monotheism. He may, in fact, have discovered it."
greylorn wrote:I have several quibbles with this, and should precede them by noting that there is no evidence for HT's existence, just like there is no evidence for the existence of Jesus Christ. Neither of them wrote down anything that they supposedly taught. There is only lore, third-hand or derivative information about either of them. Yet, cults have formed around their alleged teachings.
This is what I would call an unjust analogy. There are multiple sources and witnesses, plus written accounts for the latter, plus demonstrable after effects of His activities, and only speculation for the former. From a dispassionate historiographical perspective, the high degree of agreement in disciples' testimony has to be viewed as useful evidence and considered. After all, even today eyewitness testimony is enough to send a man to jail for life. So to reject coordinating testimony merely because it is from a bygone age would seem an arbitrary decision, especially if we continue to accept present-day testimony on a more generous footing, wouldn't you say? I dare say we would have little or no historical knowledge of any kind if we imposed so stringent a standard.
We don't have any historical knowledge. History is bullshit invented by victors and losers and modified with time to say whatever puts their actions in the best light. Repeating the lies convinces the bulk of ignorant history students. The Kennedy assassination is an excellent example. The "History" Channel is still showing films of Kennedy's head being blown rearward, supposedly by a single killing shot from above and behind. No one with a three digit IQ and a knowledge of simple physics could possibly believe such bullshit. That hardly matters, since the percentage of people with 3-digit IQs and a knowledge of simple physics is no higher than 4%, thus irrelevant.
Biblical history? The O.T. is interesting, IMO, but the N.T. is a joke. I read the first four books and found them highly divergent, especially John, who writes like someone on mushrooms and wine. When young I was impressed by J.C's first miracle. Then after a course in nuclear physics settled in and a conversation raised the subject, I looked at the energies involved. The amount of energy and pressure necessary to construct the large molecules present in wine from water (oxygen and hydrogen), is normally present only at the core of a star. Had Christ actually created carbon, nitrogen, sulphur, potassium, sodium, etc. from oxygen and hydrogen, the amount of energy released would have vaporized the entire modern city of Jerusalem and most of Israel.
Even more tragically, it would have ruined the wine.
It is so much simpler to figure that Jesus, with the help of followers, bought a barrel of really good wine and stashed it in a back room. As the wine at table was running low, predictably, since they'd kept a barrel of it to themselves, they swapped the good wine with a water barrel. All Jesus had to do was saunter into the wine room, perform incantations over the subtly-marked "water" barrel, and, Voila!
"History" is a concatenation of "his story," and the wise man should treat it as such. Nothing wrong with enjoying a good story, unless you confuse it with truth. One of my neighbors is an intelligent and capable person who believes that the WWII Holocaust was a lie, and that the photos Eisenhower ordered were faked. The Japanese are now taught that they were victims in WWII, and know nothing of the atrocities committed by their soldiers. Modern USSR history is a joke. The Nazi party is alive and well in Germany and elsewhere. Why? Everyone rewrites their history in a politically favorable manner, and a majority believe it.
H.T. is clearly a story. J.C. likewise. You would do well to read "The Passover Plot," and "Those Incredible Christians," by Hugh Schonfield. He is a historian.
By way of historians, you might appreciate Herodotus, who provides various stories for the same historical event.
Immanuel Can wrote:
greylorn wrote:
HT cannot have "discovered" monotheism, no more than LeMaitre "discovered" Big Bang theory or Darwin discovered how life evolved. The only things that can be discovered are those which actually exist. The rest is invention.
I don't disagree with your last two sentences. But I see no warrant for your first claim. It would be pure assumption to say "monotheism cannot be discovered," if it is an existent fact. That is, in fact, the important question.
I don't believe monotheism is a relevant question, much less important.
The real question of value: Is the universe entirely the result of naturally occurring random events, or is it in any respect deliberately created? The answer to this question affects another issue: whether or not an individual person has purpose and existence beyond his current life. Ultimately that is the only issue people care about, when they care about such things, which is not frequent.
In the context of this larger picture, what difference does is make if the creator was Islam's genuinely monotheistic Allah or Christianity's three Gods, or Beon Theory's Geon plus myriad assistants?
My goal is to elucidate a creator-concept that works in the context of scientific knowledge, and I have no interest in quibbling over the quantity of creators. One or many, whoever is needed to get the job done.
Greylorn
My cat doesn't need to "evolve" to shed hair in the Spring. And moths don't need to evolve for a population of them to favour white, grey or black depending on tree soot. Those are simply non-sequiturs in any case for evolution.
