UCE,
Well blow me down!
You seem surprised? I gave essentially this same little speech several months ago, remember? back before you became Juggler, and Franko went insane?
Unfortunately, there is still one big problem with it. It is unfalsifiable. It does not make any testable predictions.
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It's philosophy.
Yes, and very interesting philosophy, IMO. But since it is not falsifiable, that is all it can ever be. It can never be a useful model for reality.
There is no observation we could possibly make that would prove it false. This means that there cannot possibly be any logical reason to believe that it is true.
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Except for :
"It even has the nice advantage of being both logically self-consistent, and well-defined, which almost no other Metaphysical Philosophy can claim."
When everything impossible has been eliminated, then what is left, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.
Notice the emphasis on "almost". There are other coherent, logically self-consistent philosophies out there. In fact, in principle there are an infinite number of such possibilities. That's the whole problem. Unless you reject the unfalsifiable ones, there is no way to eliminate all but one. This is the whole point of my little digression. It doesn't matter how emotionally compelling, or intuitively satisfying the model is. What matters is that the model make testable predictions. If the model is unfalsifiable, then it can never be anything more than fanciful speculation.
What's more, attempting to argue that various subjective experiences could be relied on as logical reasons to believe, just undermines the position, and renders it incoherent.
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Well now we are heading out of philosophy and into the realms of religion. It is for individuals to choose to go there, not for science.
Nope, still completely within the realm of formal logic. remember that the idea that we can draw logical conclusions from our observations is, itself, fundamentally based on assumptions about the nature of reality. One possible set of assumptions that allows such conclusions to be draw is the set of axioms of the scientific method. If we accept the axioms of the scientific method, then we
must reject the hypothesis that nonempirical personal experiences can provide reliable information about the nature of reality, because this hypothesis can easily be scientifically shown to be false. What's more, even if you do reject the axioms o science, and try to construct some other logical framework that allows conclusions to be reliable drawn from subjective evidence, the fact remains that the only way such a framework can remain logically self-consistent, is if it completely rejects the notion of objective reality. And this defeats the purpose, because then there is no objective truth for your observations to allow you to draw conclusions about.
Sorry, but the simple fact is that subjective experiences just plain aren't reliable. This is very easy to demonstrate, and no amount of logical shenanigans is going to allow you to get around it. You can certainly construct hypothetical logical frameworks in which subjective evidence could be reliable, but such a framework is clearly
not an accurate representation of the World I live in.
Franko,
You know, I have always considered this kind of mathematical Platonism to be very intriguing. When you consider that the scientific model of reality is based on the idea that reality is isomorphic to a logical framework, it is not such a big conceptual leap to consider that reality might be a logical framework.
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Funny … because I have been telling you this for over a year now.
I know. And I told you early on in our discussions exactly what I have said here. Platonism is an intriguing possibility, but since it is unfalsifiable, it is of no practical value. It is fantasy, and can never be anything more than that.
Accounting for the fact that these other possible realities aren't observable is no problem, because although they are logically self-consistent, they are not logically consistent with each other. In other words, any possible reality is a set of logically self-consistent events, and our reality is just the one that includes us.
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Sounds like you are talking about Entangled Solipsism … ?
No, that is not what I am talking about. What I am saying is that you can, in principle, look at the set of all logically self-consistent possible Universes, and although they are internally consistent, none of them are consistent with any of the others. This necessarily means that no interaction between such Universes could exist, because such an interaction would necessarily entail logical contradictions. I am not saying that we all exist in our own Universe, Just the opposite, in fact. The fact that we interact implies that we are both elements of the same Universe.
This certainly addresses a lot of those nasty philosophical issues, like why there is something instead of nothing, the fine-tuning problem, and even Quantum indeterminacy …
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Yeah, there really isn’t any quantum indeterminacy – like I have been telling you for over a year now
I had an Uncle who told me that his cat talked to him, too. But much like you, he never gave me any reason to believe it was true.
It even has the nice advantage of being both logically self-consistent, and well-defined, which almost no other Metaphysical Philosophy can claim.
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That is why it is called Logical Deism.
Nope, sorry. What I have described does not involve the existence of a God (or Goddess). Nor does it imply fatalism. Nor does it imply that consciousnesses continue to exist after bodily death. And it sure as Hell doesn't imply that people are spin 1/2 charged gravitons, like you have claimed.
Unfortunately, there is still one big problem with it. It is unfalsifiable. It does not make any testable predictions.
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First of all I think you are wrong,
OK. Name one.
and second of all how is it any LESS falsifiable or how does it make any LESS predictions then A-Theism/Pseudo-Materialism?
I am neither an A-Theist, nor a Pseudo-Materialist, so don't ask me. As for Atheism and Materialism, I have already explained to you that Atheism is not a claim, and I have already explained to you exactly how Materialism is falsifiable.
You still cannot give ANY account of why Men should behave morally? You still are left in the absurd position of claiming that rewards and punishment are irrelevant to behavior.
Nonsense. There is no objective reason why men should behave morally, only subjective ones. In fact, there is no absolute morality. And I would never say anything as absurd as to claim that rewards and punishments are irrelevant to behavior.
There is no observation we could possibly make that would prove it false.
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Abolish the penal system and observe what happens. Or switch to a Socialistic form of government (remove incentives – remove rewards and punishment from the system).
Non-sequitur. The philosophical framework I described makes no predictions about these things.
This means that there cannot possibly be any logical reason to believe that it is true.
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What exactly is your reason for believing “free will” is TRUE?
I have already told you several times that I do not believe in free-will, as you have defined it.
What exactly is your reason for believing “There is NO GOD” is TRUE?
I don't.
Sure, there may be plenty of illogical, but nevertheless compelling, reasons to believe it is true, such as intuition, aesthetics, and even wishful thinking, but no logical reason.
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Atoms obey TLOP
You are made of Atoms.
YOU obey TLOP.
TLOP (God) makes/contols YOU makes/controls CAR
You just want to pretend it is complex, and pretend it is non-logical.
Non-sequitur. Atoms, and me, function according to Natural laws. You can call these laws God if you want. Makes no difference to me. None of this is in any way relevant to what I am talking about.
What's more, attempting to argue that various subjective experiences could be relied on as logical reasons to believe, just undermines the position, and renders it incoherent.
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I agree. How is what you believe more logical exactly? You can’t even explain what you believe? You can’t explain why you believe you have “free will”?
I can explain what I believe. I just can't explain what you claim I believe, because I don't actually believe it. If you want somebody to explain their belief in free-will, go find somebody who actually believes in it.
I can explain why I don’t believe I have it. As a matter of fact I just saw that consciousness time delay thing on the learning channel the other night. Several very prominent A-Theists going on and on about how there was absolutely NO DOUBT – no “free will”! Our brain has already committed to the action well before our minds are consciously aware that we have made the decision. It is all predetermined. We don’t decide anything – we just perceive the decision.
How does this fit in with your absurd belief that free-will is an atheistic construct, and that all atheists believe in free-will? Do you even realize how ridiculously battered your poor strawman is?
The hypothesis that personal experiences for which subjective bias has not been controlled, can yield reliable knowledge about reality, is easily falsified. The only way to accept such subjective evidence as valid, is to reject the hypothesis that you can draw logical conclusions from your observations, which is a premise of the very idea of there being such a thing as evidence.
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Any evidence which isn’t logical isn’t evidence.
If something isn’t coherent, if one person can’t explain it to another … then it isn’t logical.
You can’t explain what you believe, or why you believe it.
I can.
Really? Where is that explanation of Quantum Gravity I have heard so much about? Your not only a liar, you are a bad liar.
It's a nifty idea to play around with, and an excellent model to think about in an attempt to teach yourself not to rely on intuitive notions about what is "real" and what is not. But that it is all it will ever be.
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Stimpson don’t kid yourself!
All YOU have done is assumed that someone else had better “intuitive notions” then YOU do (based on non evidence) and then assumed their beliefs as YOUR own. You need to think for YOURSELF before I’ll ever call you a “Free-Thinker”.
Nice try. My personal philosophy is of my own construction, and is not at all based on intuition. It was only after I had arrived at it that I started to learn about philosophy, and discovered that there were already names for the conclusions I had come to.
If your beliefs were more logical then mine, you would be able to explain why you believe the things that you do, far better then you have.
Maybe. But since the only real way either of us have to judge things in that regard, is by asking other people how well they think we have explained ourselves, I guess all we can do is ask them. Tell me, Franko. If we were to do a pole on this message board for which of us has done a better job explaining their philosophical positions, who do you think would win?
Dr. Stupid
