h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Continuing to lock horns with the drood...( I'll never learn)...

>>If "some" = over half the human population, and "that's it" means you are applying the narrow-minded view of the rationalist, again, well maybe you are right.

A contradiction in your argument here, surely? You yourself are constantly castigating the established religions, whose adherents make up the vast bulk of this 'over half the human population.' So...does it follow that it's these guys who are right, not the neo-pagan fluffies?

>>Sometimes you are as bad as the Catholic Church when faced by Galileo, you refuse to look beyond your own narrow understanding, clutching your small truth like a shield.

I kind of resent this one. I'm arguing for scepticism. Only accept evidence that you'd have to be wilfully perverse to ignore...with no place for faith or introspection or suspension of disbelief. It has to work for people (like me) who won't 'open our eyes'.

What Galileo did was to say 'Look...go and get two lenses. Stick 'em either end of a tube. Point it at Jupiter and draw what you see. Do this for a few succesive nights. See? ing moons orbiting ing Jupiter! So everything *doesn't* revolve around the ing world, does it?!!' (only in Italian, obviously).

Elementary stuff. It's evidence of this quality I expect.

>>"That the vast majority of humans believe in God is evidence. It is not *conclusive* evidence (there is none!), but it *is* evidence."

Unfortunately, there is no 'God' such that the vast majority of humans believe in *that* God.
The evidence really is only evidence about the convincing power of religions, and people's capacity to beleive in things on the basis of what they are told.

The fact that when there *are* different religions around in a particular area, people tend to keep very much to the religion of their upbringing would seem to fairly clearly indicate that upbringing and what people are told is true does seem more important than any objective evidence that might be available to them in the wider world.

It also appears the case that if someone chooses to invent a religion from scratch, as long as they can maintain some kind of internal consistency in their explanations of the way the world works, find ways around any awkward questions, and have someone reasonably convincing or charismatic person selling the religion, they can probably get *some* people to believe them.

That people believe in God may be evidence supporting God's existence, but I would be even more addled than I am if I characterised this evidence as anything more than 'flimsy'. I made the statement only to contradict the assertion that there is no evidence to support the existence of God. I take - and more or less agree with - the points you make, Potholer.

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

Yeah - and if you like there's *some* evidence to suggest a visit to Earth, some 75 million years ago, of an alien called Xenu, ruler of The Galactic Confederacy. *Some* people believe that, apparently. (John Tavolta, Tom Cruise, Beck, Isaac Hayes...)

We have to set criteria for evidence. Is it repeatable? Will it stand up to sceptical scrutiny? Otherwise...t'ain't evidence.

That people believe in something *purely because they have been told it is true* really *isn't* evidence that that thing is any more true, whether the thing concerned is one or other God, or Father Christmas. Having one more believer means nothing whatsoever other than that the story has some plausibility, and has been told to another person.

If people believe in something that has a means of independent verification and/or falsification, one might consider the beliefs of others to be some kind of evidence for the thing in question.
The objective checkability of the principles of electrical theory, and some trust in the *technical* competence of the people involved could lead someone to trust the theory without testing everything out for themselves.
Effectively, other people's beliefs are used as an indication that *someone else will have already checked things out* - the beliefs have no real evidential value in themselves, but only as a proxy for more objective critical testing that one concludes will probably have happened. If you *knew* that checks had been made, you'd ignore people's beliefs in a theory and just look at the tests which had been done.

By contrast, with an *uncheckable* clutch of ideas that may seem plausible to a particular person (as may be the case with religions), the fact that other people believe really means nothing beyond demonstrating that the ideas are plausible to other people, which is something that people could probably guess unless they thought their own way of looking at things was unusual.

So we're agreed that evidence must itself be examined, to confirm that it is meaningful and relevant in the context in which it is submitted.

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

>>"...and relevant in the context in which it is submitted"

I take it that the 'relevant context' in the case of religions claiming that a God *really* exists would be one where there was evidence that the God existed in actual reality, not merely as a metaphor for those who actually believe in it.

Are we agreed that in the light of the fact that even generally sane people can believe all kinds of things, the quantity of belief around isn't evidence of anything except maybe the incomplete implausibility of the ideas concerned?

In the presence of actual evidence, belief becomes irrelevant.
In the absence of evidence, belief doesn't fill the gap.
It's only really where we have a reasonable expectation that there *is* evidence that we are unaware of or [as yet] incapable of comprehending that we may rely to an extent on the superior knowledge or comprehension of others, though I suppose it's better in that situation to talk about relying on the confidence/competence of others than about relying on their *belief*.

I assume by "actual" you mean "objective"? I can't argue with the theoretical truth of what you say, but (as humans) we don't have objective evidence at our disposal. This tends to imply that often (always?), belief is all that we have to work with....

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

I'm never sure what point you're actually trying to make when you scamper off down this hole, P-C. I really don't see any practical implications. . That's Capricorns for you.

When I say 'actual evidence', I mean evidence obtained by looking at reality which could be agreed on by believer and non-believer alike.

For example, if a believer claimed they could see angels, but non-beleivers couldn't, I wouldn't count the believer's visions as evidence.

If there was agreement about a particular phenomenon existing, but different views as to how the phenomenon arose, the interpretation placed by a believer couldn't be taken as evidence for the belief unless it was also acknowledged that alternative explanations existed.
For example, the existence of good things in the world couldn't really be counted as evidence for the existence of a good God without an agreement that good Gods were necessary for good things to exist.

P-C: <<No, I'm not joking. As I said in the post you quote from: >>

Why is the existence of God subject to special rules that the existence of a table is not? If we've managed to come up with a set of processes which have demonstrated their ability to cut through the fog of our own beliefs and give us the world as it really is, why would we discard it when it comes to our most important questions?

<<BtM:

That's a description, not a demonstration. We all think we know what reality is, and that we can accurately observe it.>>

We also use those observations to predict future behaviors. Then when some predictions turn out to be false, we examine the beliefs that led to the faulty predictions and revise them. This is called "learning."

For example, I predict that Pokemon cards are a bad investment. If I am wrong, I've cost myself a lot of potential earnings for zero effort. If I'm right, I've saved myself a small fortune. Regardless of what I believe, over time people's opinions on the value of Pokemon cards will change, and that opinion is reflected in a price, and that price will change no matter what I believe.

<>

Actually, this happens to me all the time. Working on complex systems can be very humbling. No matter how I think the system should work, it always works however it is designed to. You have no idea how many times I've seen something fail which should work, or how many I've seen work that have every reason to fail. Computer engineering is an ideal field for anyone who wants to see the true power of belief.

<>

I don't reluctantly admit that my perception is flawed... I openly admit it. See above for an example. But at least I recognize a problem and am making an effort to correct it, rather than sticking God into all the gaps. The most important step to learning something is to know what you don't know.

<>

You're taking me out of context. I never said perception of reality for me or anyone else are constructions of imagination. In fact, I've argued quite the opposite. You observe an object, and you interact with that object... and that object would be there whether you imagined it was there or not. That is reality. We all have filters of preconceptions that affect the way we perceive the object whether we're religious or not.

My filter includes many things, some of which I'm not even aware of, but one thing it does not include is an imaginary god. Though it is difficult for me to say exactly how clear my view of the world is, I can state unequivocably that my current view plus a god would be a whole lot murkier. Apart from personal experience we have a vast body of historical knowledge to support that.

<<

Prove it!>>

Well, I made a sweeping generalization, so the proof is obvious: show conclusive evidence of God (any god will do) and you will have disproven the statement. Let me know how that turns out.

Potholer has suggested, as I understand it, that we should judge opinions by comparing them with a standard to which we have no access. It's like saying "you must conform to B.S.9750" without providing access to the text of the standard. And you can't see the point?

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

In this context...no. Because we *do* have a standard which, as BtM points out, is as valid for tables as for gods.

>>"For myself, I reluctantly conclude that my perception of reality is as flawed as anyone else's, and this leads me to the view that all beliefs are (in practice) equivalent. Not because they *really are* equivalent, but because I have no reliable means of assessment."

The problem with that humility-based argument is that it can be turned round by people to argue that nobody else's opinion might be closer to reality than their own, however hare-brained their interpretations might be.
Also, I'm not sure you really do think that beliefs are equivalent in any practical case where you have some way of looking at reality for clues. If someone walked into the room you are in, and started claiming that there was a huge purple elephant dancing around the room, I guess you'd be rather more likely to think they were drunk, deluded, or taking the p!$$ than correct.

What do you mean by '...reliable means of assessment...'?
Obviously, you accept that excluding the occasional person who takes philosopy too seriously, humans can't (and don't) look for absolute proof when deciding which theories to follow, so how reliable is 'reliable'?
As long as there are some methods to use to try and gain insight into likelihoods of *which people* are correct, which must necessarily take human nature into account, then theories need not be considered equivalent.

P-C...are you perhaps trying to make some sort of distinction between 'True enough to work with' and 'Ultimate truth'?

Sort of. If we had access to objective reality, we could indeed compare all opinions with it, and reach sensible conclusions. As we don't, what we each have in reality is our *opinion* of what objective reality is, which is an opinion, but is not objective. Such a 'standard' is unsuitable for the use we wish to put it to.

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

BtM:

P-C:

BtM:

So you make a statement which is unjustified, but *I* have to disprove it if you are to admit you're wrong. What strange logic your 'rational' beliefs follow.

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

>>"Such a 'standard' is unsuitable for the use we wish to put it to."

Well, in *practice*, most people are quite capable of dealing with less-than-absolute-proof when it comes to deciding between ideas.

I'd suggest that to most people there's a difference between ideas for which there is no kind of evidence in reality, and ideas for which there is some kind of evidence.

(Me)
>>P-C...are you perhaps trying to make some sort of distinction between 'True enough to work with' and 'Ultimate truth'?

(P-C)
>>Sort of. If we had access to objective reality, we could indeed compare all opinions with it, and reach sensible conclusions. As we don't, what we each have in reality is our *opinion* of what objective reality is, which is an opinion, but is not objective. Such a 'standard' is unsuitable for the use we wish to put it to.

Why?





Serious question: To what benefit? Just intellectual curiosity?

Surely the world we live in is the 'True enough' world? There may be deeper truths to discover, but which are of no relevance until discovered (For example - when we first discovered atoms and then discovered that they can be further sub-divided). If there's some deeper, unobtainable truth...then surely its irrelevant to us if we can't interact with it?

I think that most people would consider 'objective' as being a useful term to use in a practical sense even if absolute objectivity may be an unattainable goal.

If people are disagreeing over the weight of an item, they may well be prepared to accept the information provided by a weighing scale as being adequately objective, even if they know it isn't absolutely accurate, and they accept the possibility the scale may be accidentally or even deliberately quite inaccurate.