Why I think being a Muslim is rational.

[Siro]

I do not agree. People are indoctrinated into particular belief systems, not into 'belief' per se. The basic human need is not for a particular religious dogma but for comfort, clarity, understanding, knowledge, etc. People who don't fill these needs with religion (and not everyone does) fill them in other ways. Religion is just one method, albeit a very prominent method, of meeting these basic human needs.

Still, if religion, or belief in Gods, or whatever we call it, didn't serve some very fundamental, basic human need, I'm hard pressed to account for its pervasive occurrence in every culture and in every epoch of human history.

That's a bit simplistic. Dominance of men over women have been just as common as religious belief. Yet, it has practically disappeared in some cultures, and on its way out in many others. Humans need explanations. Science is very hard and takes time and effort. Religion is easy. All you need is someone who claims access to privileged information from a source of higher knowledge. While people probably do need comfort and understand and everything else, those attributes are broad and can be said to relate to many other endeavors. What matter is that religion is irrational, and any benefits it might provide can be attained elsewhere much more productively.

 

[AtheistPreacher]

That is broad enough a definition to be completely useless. I've had many discussions that included "so don't you believe the sun will rise tomorrow?". Obviously human cognition is strongly based on future planning, which cannot possibly be totally divorced from "faith". But one word can express more than one idea, as is the case here. I do not have faith that sun will rise tomorrow. I know why it rises every morning, and my experience confirms the theory. I expect it to rise tomorrow due to the understood mechanism and humanities shared experience that extends back as far as the written record. That is a completely different concept from religious faith, which means accepting something regardless of evidence for or against it.

Maybe on your definition of religion, it requires believing something without evidence, but not on mine. Religious beliefs still require as much evidence as it is possible to have for them. On the other hand, there are some things which simply can't be proven empirically one way or another.

Along these lines, I'd be interested to hear what you think of this.

 

[Siro]

Maybe on your definition of religion, it requires believing something without evidence, but not on mine. Religious beliefs still require as much evidence as it is possible to have for them. On the other hand, there are some things which simply can't be proven empirically one way or another.

Along these lines, I'd be interested to hear what you think of this.

I'm at work, so it'll take me some time to formulate a response.

 

[AtheistPreacher]

I'm at work, so it'll take me some time to formulate a response.

Cool, thanks.

 

[Siro]

You know, I've already responded to this a little bit, but some other thoughts occurred to me.

My identical twin brother is an atheist, and his primary criticism is the one you make here: I've adopted a worldview that I find comforting. And I won't deny that there is some element of Pascal's wager in it -- not in the sense of heavenly reward, but simply in the sense of believing today in the meaningfulness of my actions for the future. After all, we can never really be sure either way.

But the unwritten assumption in this criticism is that there is an atheistic worldview that is more likely to be true than the theistic position I've outlined. I'm not so sure that's the case. Atheists in this day and age usually take their position as the default one, and demand some sort of demonstration of God's existence. But I don't believe that God's existence can ever be proved empirically, anyway. Why? Because I very strongly believe that God's existence is either necessary or impossible; it is not a contingent matter. In other words, if God exists, then it is because the universe could not have been any other way; likewise, if God does not exist, then it is because the universe could not have been any other way. What I can't accept is the idea of a God who might have existed or might not have... that kind of being, to me, can't really be God. God must be a basic fact about existence... or a basic fallacy about existence. And if this is true, if God's modality must be as a basic reality which is compatible with all other actual and possible realities, it follows that no empirical arguments can demonstrate either that God exists or that he does not exist. Since, that is, God is the necessarily existent who is therefore tolerant of all empirical realities, his existence can be neither verified nor falsified empirically.

The best that can be done, then, is some sort of rationalistic argument for or against God -- a metaphysical system which attempts to make sense of the universe from top to bottom. The idea of doing metaphysics is passe nowadays, probably because we are more aware than ever of how much we don't know. But any scientific theory rests on the shoulders of a metaphysics -- a comprehensive view of how the universe works -- whether that metaphysics is stated or not. We don't get to ignore the need for metaphysical speculation simply because of the liklihood that we will get very much of it wrong... because it isn't any less wrong when it's unstated. It's just disguised better.

And there are certain basic realities -- such as the emergence of complex organisms -- which science doesn't explain particularly well. Certain theistic theories have a more credible ring to them than any scientific theories I know of.

Allow me now to share some extended passages from Alfred North Whitehead's little book, The Function of Reason. It's only 90 pages long and was originally given as a lecture, though I can't remeber at the moment where and when he gave it. In any case (any emphasis is in orginal):

Your definition of god is too vague to be discussed in any meaningful way. Like many sophisticated people who try to justify their beliefs, any argument can be made unfalsifiable if we make it vague enough. If you do not define what exactly your idea of god means, then there is nothing to discuss. The fact is that the ocean of possibilities is too vast to pretend that the issue is confined to a godless universe versus one with a god. Maybe the universe is one of infinite others, with different characteristics and attributes. Maybe reality is a simulation like The Matrix. There is a book called Iron Sunrise that posits that humans created god in their distant future, who in turn created the universe in its distant past. The position of theists is not of equal validity to that of atheists. A godless naturalistic universe is indeed the default position. We know so much about nature. SO MUCH. We have accumulated an astounding amount of data on life and the universe. And all of it is naturalistic and can be explained perfectly well without the intervention of whatever god is. A few gaps remain where the believers can still fit their god, but that is all what their god is; the god of the gaps. Despite of its sophisticated modern incarnation. But I'll get to that in a bit.

-----------------------------------------------------

I will start with a preliminary definition of the function of Reason, a definition to be illustrated, distorted, and enlarged, as this discussion proceeds.

The function of Reason is to promote the art of life.

In the interpretation of this definition, I must at once join issue with the evolutionist fallacy suggested by the phrase "the survival of the fittest." The fallacy does not consist in believing that in the struggle for existence the fittest to survive eliminate the less fit. The fact is obvious and stares us in the face. The fallacy is the belief that fitness for survival is identical with the best exemplification of the Art of Life.

In fact life itself is comparatively deficient in survival value. The art of persistence is to be dead. Only inorganic things persist for great lengths of time. A rock survives for eight hundred million years; whereas the limit for a tree is about a thousand years, for a man or an elephant about fifty or one hundred years, for a dog about twelve years, for an insect about one year. The problem set by the doctrine of evolution is to explain how complex organisms with such deficient survival power ever evolved. They certainly did not appear because they were better at that game than the rocks around them. It may be possible to explain "the origin of species" by the doctrine of the struggle for existence among such organisms. But certainly this struggle throws no light whatever upon the emergence of such a general type of complex organism, with faint survival power. This problem is not to be solved by any dogma, which is the product of mere abstract thought elaborating its notions of the fitness of things. The solution requires that thought pay full attention to the empirical evidence, and to the whole of that evidence.

...

There is another factor in evolution which is not in the least explained by the doctrine of the survival of the fittest. Why has the trend of evolution been upwards? The fact that organic species have been produced from inorganic distributions of matter, and the fact that in the lapse of time organic species of higher and higher types have evolved are not in the least explained by any doctrine of adaptation to the environment, or of struggle.

In fact the upward trend has been accompanied by a growth of the converse relation. Animals have progressively undertaken the task of adapting the environment to themselves. They have built nests, and social dwelling-places of great complexity; beavers have cut down trees and dammed rivers; insects have elaborated a high community life with a variety of reactions upon the environment.

Even the more intimate actions of animals are activities modifying the environment. The simplest living things let their food swim into them. The higher animals chase their food, catch it, and masticate it. In so acting, they are transforming the environment for their own purposes. Some animals dig for their food, others stalk their prey. Of course all these operations are meant by the common doctrine of adaptation to the environment. But they are very inadequately expressed by that statement; and the real facts easily drop out of sight under cover of that statement. The higher forms of life are actively engaged in modifying their environment. In the case of mankind this active attack on the environment is the most prominent fact in his existence.

I now state the thesis that the explanation of this active attack on the environment is a three-fold urge: (i) to live, (ii) to live well, (iii) to live better. In fact the art of life is first to be alive, secondly to be alive in a satisfactory way, and thirdly to acquire an increase in satisfaction. It is at this point of our argument that we have to recur to the function of Reason, namely the promotion of the art of life. The primary function of Reason is the direction of the attack on the environment.

This conclusion amounts to the thesis that Reason is a factor in experience which directs and criticizes the urge towards the attainment of an end realized in imagination but not in fact.

-----------------------------------------------------

How old is this article? Survival of the fittest is a colloquial concept that people push on evolutionary theory. I do not recall the term in 'On the Origin of Species', and I know that modern biologists reject it. I will ignore the proposition that inanimate objects are more fit than living ones since it is irrelevant, but I'll address the modern understanding of evolution.

Evolution is driven by whichever gene gets an advantage in replication. This has nothing to do with the fitness of the individual, or even the species. The result does tend to be a species more adapted to its environment, but that is simply because all failures are weeded out over the incredible lengths of time involved. Evolution in fact very often hurts a species, or causes it to go extinct.

Take this situation:

A species of bird migrate to a chain of islands around the start of the spring to mate and reproduce. The ideal time for migration happens to be around the first week of April. That time is ideal as it presents the best combination of weather, lack of predators, and availability of food. Now let's say a mutation occurs that compels an individual to migrate a week early. The mutation shifts the migration time to a less ideal date. But the advantages of such shift are obvious. The bird will have the Island for itself for a few days. It will establish the best mating position, and acquire a lot of food easily (those outweigh the slight disadvantage in weather or predator presence).

Consequently, the gene will find its way to more and more offspring, until the ideal-time nesters are no longer "fit". This cycle can continue until the whole species goes extinct.

The same goes for increasing complexity. It is true that evolution typically results in more and more complex organisms (because of complicated biochemical reasons that I won't get into), but that is not always the case. Not by a long shot. Nature is full of creatures that were once more complex, but managed to drop genes. That is actually common when a species start depending on another for a certain function, like alligators and the birds that clean their teeth.

I do not really see the point of the argument. It seems like the empty metaphysical philosophy that Nietzsche often complained about. Evolution is a fact that cannot be disputed by any reasonable person. To assign some divine significance to the pattern seems a bit desperate.

But you see, this is the problem with the god of the gaps. The role of this god gets smaller and smaller as our understanding progresses, but his imagined significance increases! Back in the day, god/s did everything. They blew the wind, cried the rain, and created people out of mud. Yet they were very human-like in characteristics. Now, god/s provided the essence for... abiogensis and the jump from unicellular to multicellular life? And yet, those gods are now a mysterious incomprehensible essence that infuses everything with divinity, or some similar nonsense.

The fact is, you are making QUITE the claim. You're making a claim far bigger than evolution, relativity, or any other scientific idea. You're saying that the physical universe have a supernatural overlay that guides its nature. You, or at least many believers, claim not only is this mysterious power real, but that it is relevant to the way we conduct our existence on this tiny pebble! Astounding!

 

[TroutBum]

I hate smart people.

 

[squareinthecircle]

I hate smart people.

Is that why you cut?

 

[Siro]

Come on AP, say something. I made a big pot of coffee and I'm in the mood for a debate!

 

[AtheistPreacher]

Your definition of god is too vague to be discussed in any meaningful way. Like many sophisticated people who try to justify their beliefs, any argument can be made unfalsifiable if we make it vague enough. If you do not define what exactly your idea of god means, then there is nothing to discuss. The fact is that the ocean of possibilities is too vast to pretend that the issue is confined to a godless universe versus one with a god. Maybe the universe is one of infinite others, with different characteristics and attributes. Maybe reality is a simulation like The Matrix. There is a book called Iron Sunrise that posits that humans created god in their distant future, who in turn created the universe in its distant past. The position of theists is not of equal validity to that of atheists. A godless naturalistic universe is indeed the default position. We know so much about nature. SO MUCH. We have accumulated an astounding amount of data on life and the universe. And all of it is naturalistic and can be explained perfectly well without the intervention of whatever god is. A few gaps remain where the believers can still fit their god, but that is all what their god is; the god of the gaps. Despite of its sophisticated modern incarnation. But I'll get to that in a bit.

Actually, I think I've defined God and the role of God pretty specifically in this thread. Just look at my big post on page 4 about God and the world, not to mention the opening two posts of my "On God and Religion" thread.

But more than this, you seem to say that I'm being intentionally vague or self-delusional when it comes to God. But the vagueness, where it exists, is certainly not there intentionally to bolster the argument. The thing is that I in no way believe in a supernaturalistic, interventionist kind of God that most of the more "traditional" religions subscribe to. Nothing is "supernatural" or "unnatural," per se... the universe is all of a piece. What you seem to be wanting is for me to describe some very specific phenomenon and argue we can distinguish God's agency from natural processes. But the fact is, I don't believe they can be distinguished in this way.

I made a similar sort of reply to One Brow:

God is omnitolerant of all possible realities (at least on my conception). You say "God has no detectable effects." And all I can say in response is: of course not. God is a basic fact of the universe. Everything is tinged with God... much as Paul Tillich asserted that "God is being as such." We will never be able to detect God apart from reality, because all is a part of God, and God is a part of all things.

I'll grant you that this is not a very satisfying answer. It's also why many people will not kind this kind of conception very helpful, because it depersonalizes God to such a high degree. If God is indistinguishable from the universe at a basic level, one that we can never overcome by definition, then is this conception appreciably different from atheism? Functionally, in terms of how it affects how we live our lives, it makes very little difference at all.

You see why I say that I still have a lot more in common with atheists than conservative Christians.

So if you want to suppose that I'm just using the term "God" as a metaphor for the universe as such, you could probably do that. I'm very decidedly agnostic not in the loose sense of "I'm not sure there's a God" but in the highly technical sense of "I'm quite certain we'll never know either way." And that's because I don't think God is the sort of being who pops out and says "look at me! I'm God!" but is rather a fundamental fact/nature about the universe, or a fundamental fallacy/misunderstanding of the nature of the universe. You saying that my conception is vague doesn't help your case... reality is vague. That's why there are so many different philosophies and conceptions of how it works.

How old is this article?

The original lecture was delivered in 1929.

I will ignore the proposition that inanimate objects are more fit than living ones since it is irrelevant, but I'll address the modern understanding of evolution.

...

I do not really see the point of the argument. It seems like the empty metaphysical philosophy that Nietzsche often complained about. Evolution is a fact that cannot be disputed by any reasonable person. To assign some divine significance to the pattern seems a bit desperate.

If you're "ignoring the proposition that inanimate objects are more fit than living ones since it is irrelevant," then you have missed the entire point.

Put it this way. There is no agreed upon purpose or point to existence. The fact is that we're here, we exist (and everything else in the universe exists), but there seems to be no non-arbitrary reason why that is.

But if there is one state that can be taken to be a positive good over its antithesis, it is being over non-being -- because being is the basis of anything at all. The state of not existing cannot have either positive or negative value in any sense. Only existing things can.

So, I think the proposition that "to exist is good," is about as safe a statement as we can make. I know there are people who would argue this, but frankly, I think that anyone who doesn't acknowledge this idea is being very silly, and should not argue when I dispassionately kill them, since apparently their non-existence is not any better than their existence.

The point, then, is that rocks are really good at existing. They can do it for a really long-*** time without breaking a sweat (both literally and figuratively). Then life somehow evolves... things which can persist only a small fraction of the time that rocks can. If the only goal of things is to persist in existence, then it seems very odd to me that life would ever evolve.

Which makes me think that 1) there may be value in the universe beyond mere existence, and 2) that "inorganic matter" may not be so "dead" as it appears. The idea that one can arrange "dead" matter in very complex way to create things that are "living" strikes me as a pretty ludicrous claim. So when Whitehead and Teilhard talk of things like an "interior dimension" to matter, the smallest latent capacity for consciousness in all things, those are not things I easily discount. They seem to me to be perfectly reasonable hypotheses which help explain our current situation.

But you see, this is the problem with the god of the gaps. The role of this god gets smaller and smaller as our understanding progresses, but his imagined significance increases! Back in the day, god/s did everything. They blew the wind, cried the rain, and created people out of mud. Yet they were very human-like in characteristics. Now, god/s provided the essence for... abiogensis and the jump from unicellular to multicellular life? And yet, those gods are now a mysterious incomprehensible essence that infuses everything with divinity, or some similar nonsense.

The fact is, you are making QUITE the claim. You're making a claim far bigger than evolution, relativity, or any other scientific idea. You're saying that the physical universe have a supernatural overlay that guides its nature. You, or at least many believers, claim not only is this mysterious power real, but that it is relevant to the way we conduct our existence on this tiny pebble! Astounding!

First of all, I again object to the term "supernatural." If there is a God, there is nothing supernatural about it, and no way for us to distinguish it from the normal processes of nature. And are not the mechanics and nature of the universe relevant to how we live our lives within it (at least, if anything at all is relevant to how we live our lives)?

And yes, of course I realize that I'm making a claim that goes beyond empirical verification. That's what I've been saying all along. But then again, you make similarly far-reaching claims. You seem to say that eventually science will be able to understand and predict everything, at least in principle, that there is nothing that cannot be proven or falsified through empirical evidence. This seems to me to be a very far-reaching assumption indeed. And I can only guess that you will think the idea of an interior dimension to all matter to be a ridiculous one, but that would again be sheer assumption on your part. I've posited it because it seems to make better sense of the universe than the alternative.

 

[AtheistPreacher]

Come on AP, say something. I made a big pot of coffee and I'm in the mood for a debate!

Sorry, took me a while...

 

[Siro]

Actually, I think I've defined God and the role of God pretty specifically in this thread. Just look at my big post on page 4 about God and the world, not to mention the opening two posts of my "On God and Religion" thread.

But more than this, you seem to say that I'm being intentionally vague or self-delusional when it comes to God. But the vagueness, where it exists, is certainly not there intentionally to bolster the argument. The thing is that I in no way believe in a supernaturalistic, interventionist kind of God that most of the more "traditional" religions subscribe to. Nothing is "supernatural" or "unnatural," per se... the universe is all of a piece. What you seem to be wanting is for me to describe some very specific phenomenon and argue we can distinguish God's agency from natural processes. But the fact is, I don't believe they can be distinguished in this way.

I made a similar sort of reply to One Brow:



So if you want to suppose that I'm just using the term "God" as a metaphor for the universe as such, you could probably do that. I'm very decidedly agnostic not in the loose sense of "I'm not sure there's a God" but in the highly technical sense of "I'm quite certain we'll never know either way." And that's because I don't think God is the sort of being who pops out and says "look at me! I'm God!" but is rather a fundamental fact/nature about the universe, or a fundamental fallacy/misunderstanding of the nature of the universe. You saying that my conception is vague doesn't help your case... reality is vague. That's why there are so many different philosophies and conceptions of how it works.

I do not see any possible response to what you're saying. Every phenomenon, observation, theory, or thought can be said to be in support of your hypothesis. You even claim the vagueness of your argument to be a confirmation of your philosophy. I do not see any definition of what that god is. I see some philosophy about human destiny and such, but no specifics about god that I can refute. Is this the old "why something instead of nothing" argument? I'd rather you quote what you want me to respond to from your previous posts. I'd prefer to address your other points anyway.

The original lecture was delivered in 1929.


If you're "ignoring the proposition that inanimate objects are more fit than living ones since it is irrelevant," then you have missed the entire point.

Put it this way. There is no agreed upon purpose or point to existence. The fact is that we're here, we exist (and everything else in the universe exists), but there seems to be no non-arbitrary reason why that is.

But if there is one state that can be taken to be a positive good over its antithesis, it is being over non-being -- because being is the basis of anything at all. The state of not existing cannot have either positive or negative value in any sense. Only existing things can.

So, I think the proposition that "to exist is good," is about as safe a statement as we can make. I know there are people who would argue this, but frankly, I think that anyone who doesn't acknowledge this idea is being very silly, and should not argue when I dispassionately kill them, since apparently their non-existence is not any better than their existence.

The point, then, is that rocks are really good at existing. They can do it for a really long-*** time without breaking a sweat (both literally and figuratively). Then life somehow evolves... things which can persist only a small fraction of the time that rocks can. If the only goal of things is to persist in existence, then it seems very odd to me that life would ever evolve.

Which makes me think that 1) there may be value in the universe beyond mere existence, and 2) that "inorganic matter" may not be so "dead" as it appears. The idea that one can arrange "dead" matter in very complex way to create things that are "living" strikes me as a pretty ludicrous claim. So when Whitehead and Teilhard talk of things like an "interior dimension" to matter, the smallest latent capacity for consciousness in all things, those are not things I easily discount. They seem to me to be perfectly reasonable hypotheses which help explain our current situation.

Rocks are all that exist on Mars, Venus, the Moon, and everywhere else we look. So in a way, rocks are the universe's beloved children. Well, that and gas, of course! A certain set of chemicals combined under certain conditions to produce a molecule that has the mechanics to replicate itself given an environment containing its constituent elements. A coincidence that can be replicated in the laboratory.

The evolution from that cosmic coincidence (that possibly happened elsewhere as well, since many systems share similar composition and conditions) to what we see today is fairly well understood. The creation of life from non-living elements has already been accomplished by Craig Venter, one of the world's greatest biologists. He made up a new genome on a computer, created the DNA from non-living chemicals, and programmed a cell from scratch. In fact, completely novel multi-cellular organisms build from scratch using vats of chemicals is not considered that incredible an accomplishment. It should be achieved within the next 5 decades. But then again, that fact, like any other, can be used as a confirmation of your argument, and thus is shown god's wondrous creation that enables life to be made from non-life.

To exist is good. Okay, I like existing, but I don't see how this is an objective truth. A meteor can come along and wipe all life from earth, and the universe would keep turning unabated. That is how it's always been even on earth. Well over 99% of all that existed is now extinct. The problem with the statement "to exist is good" is the same with your idea that "god is the universe". It has no specific meaning. Those who do not exist would not object to their lack of existence. So the value of existence can only be measured by those who already exist. But let's say existing is good. So what? You seem to be forcing purpose on the universe. But purpose is the personal property of the intelligent. To question the purpose of the universe is no more meaningful than questioning its mood. You are, by definition, assuming the existence of a purposeful being when you ask the question. In reality, there are many theories that try to answer "why something?". Most of them are far FAR more sophisticated than theologians ever dreamed up, but they are all equally useless. Until we have a way to test the validity of one theory over another, the question is not really worth asking.

While you start out being unfalsifiably vague, your later points can be easily refuted. Your claims on the internal dimension (whatever that means) of inorganic matter violate Occam's Razor, as you must know, but that is not my gripe. They are simply wrong. I've already explained how life can indeed be created from non-living elements. Some living elements are still impossible to synthesize (like cell walls), so the experiments had to use living vessels for the genetic materials. But that is god of the gaps at its most obvious. VERY soon, a completely synthetic cell will be created. Soon after, inorganic self-replicating nanobots will be created (a wholly new paradigm for self-replication and life!). Intelligence will be synthesized, and death will be conquered. And your god will shrink further and further until it is no more than a footnote about the philosophies of existence.

But maybe none of that will happen. Maybe it will turn out that there is a missing mystical element to life that distinguishes it from dead matter, then what? How will that lend a single bit of credence to your philosophy? How is your god superior than any other. If we accept unprovable, almost incomprehensible, claims as valid explanations, then why stop at yours? Maybe god is a guy with a beard who's sitting on a throne watching us. And why not?

 

[The Black Swordsman]

We are all agnostic in a sense. We do not know if God exists or does not Exist. Theists believe that God exists (also I must add personally I think Muslims have the best reasons to believe but w/e). We do not know that god exists. I know my brother exists. I don't believe my brother exists I know he exists, I met the guy.

It is atheists who make the positive claim that God does not exist.