Who designed the designer?

Discussion in 'Religion' started by Xelasnave.1947, Dec 6, 2017.

  1. Musika Last in Space Valued Senior Member

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    2,701
    It appears you have simply read on wiki that taoists don't worship God and now feel comfortable to use them as a stool pigeon for your atheism. Even atheists bring with them their own flavour of "baroque extravagence", what to speak of the various schools of taoism.

    .
    In the mind of an theist, this appears to be a fact.

    Its not clear what the limits of human design have to do with ideas of design as an explanatory concept.

    If you want to discuss "perfect design" beyond the human capacity, it seems the first point one would have to introduce is a teleological element beyond human interests, as opposed to a teleological element relegated to human interests.
    IOW discussion requires a better form than "on the whole, humans have a tough time in the universe, therefore the universe is not designed".
     
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  3. Musika Last in Space Valued Senior Member

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    Scurrying off seems to be your thing.
     
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  5. Beer w/Straw Transcendental Ignorance! Valued Senior Member

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    Well, what do you have to discuss?
     
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  7. Musika Last in Space Valued Senior Member

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    Hence, sometimes they get it right and sometimes they get it wrong. Such is the nature of guesswork the further one moves into guesswork.

    Your bias about religion aside, your ideas about science are plainly not true. The institutional momentum behind many of the sciences demands commitment to many unfounded propositions ( https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/jul/07/why-science-is-breeding-ground-for-sexism)
    at the peril of one's career. Its an inevitable aspect of human society that when something calls upon both money and power, it has the capacity to resist any change that disturbs the status quo.

    It becomes very debatable if you want to talk about the practical means it is open to revision or it encourages it.

    If you want to discuss the nature of things outside of direct experience, it is absurd to demand that they first be shown via direct experience. Of course empiricism is all about unlocking knowledge in that manner, but that says as much about why it fails in certain epistemological fields as why it succeeds in others.

    Technically when the pilot tells us to put a seatbelt on for upcoming turbulence we are hearing it, but it's not an empirical exercise for us. For most of the 250 passengers, the announcement is sufficient for them to put on their seatbelt without having to run into the cockpit and attempt to read the controls to assess the respective value of the pilot's instruction.

    Incorrect. Only one of them does.

    I guess epistemological philosophy will be a difficult and incomprehensible subject for you to approach so long as you cannot recognize the inherent variety within it.

    Hence the variety of demonstrations warrants varieties of epistemologies. As for empiricism, if you want kowtow it as topmost, your field of inquiry will simply be relegated to something very small and specific, no matter how much you fist pump enthusiastically.

    On the contrary, this is simply an atheistic belief. The notion that knowable things not operate from an ontological position superior to the knower is kind of the cornerstone of atheism.

    Or alternatively, the reality that does oblige such methodologies is not sufficiently broad enough to entertain many important questions (important questions that even atheists struggle to control themselves from and refrain from giving opinions outside such paltry parameters).

    Since you can't even fathom variety within epistemology, much less how to validate an eternal universe empirically, its obvious you could be in for a long wait.

    If you think the cockroach or a person wasn't suffering before they encountered the frying pan, you haven't understood the first lesson, what to speak of the second.
     
  8. Musika Last in Space Valued Senior Member

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    2,701
    I could ask you the same q
     
  9. Beer w/Straw Transcendental Ignorance! Valued Senior Member

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    OK.
     
  10. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    What I propose is the scientific method, which you need to look into, which demands a great deal more than a truck load of opinion.
    Well I have the idea that gravity is a pushing force and if I could present a better scientific model science would follow a new model.

    That is the wonderful thing about science it can change and does change and does not proclaim "we now have the answer we can stop now".

    Personally I dont like aspects of the big bang theory but I have the sence to know that I can present a better model if I have one.

    Try that with religion.

    Yes but we dont have that do we and given you raise such think about your claims ..less than marks in the sand you must admit.

    If you disagree with the big bang theory simply☺ present a better model.

    Present your God model following the scientific method and maybe you can elevate your claims to something more than unsupported superstition and made up stories from the bronze age.

    The casual way you use the word theory underlines your mistake.

    I suggest rather than theory "notion" could be the word that would fit your need.

    To underline just how wonderful the scientific method can be.

    Ideas change as we learn more a feature unknown to religion.

    Of course because if subject to those demands religion is out the door.

    It is indeed unfortunate...fancy demanding a rational approach to religion, a place where reason is the enemy and the believers called upon to rely on faith.


    You may recognise the name certainly but it seems you have not understood what he has said.

    You present to me as a well read chap but I doubt if you have read and comprehend exactly the proposition outlined by Popper.

    Try and put on some "Popper" glasses and although you may not change your beliefs you may benefit from a better understanding of science particularly what it wont say.
    Alex
     
  11. Musika Last in Space Valued Senior Member

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    2,701
    If you have changing scientific advancements that bring with it nothing except the rewriting of previous ideas because they found something they missed, it's difficult to understand how one can think of it as anything else other than opinions being changed.

    Then you would have difficulty explaining why light bends relative to mass.

    Opinions would change, no doubt.

    So it then beggars belief why one would use it as a yardstick to validate religion or God as a myth and stop there.

    If even that model is subject to redress by subsequent models, it's not clear how you are moving the process to a status beyond making marks in the sand.


    If you want to talk about the universe having some inherent quality (such as God being a product of myth or the universe being eternal), it's not clear why there is suddenly no need.

    The very notion of modeling God (or the universe) is absurd. You would have better luck sitting in your bathroom on the look out for whales in your basin, because, by all contemporary opinion, you just modelled the pacific ocean there.

    IOW my whole point about going on about the scientific method is that the very nature of modeling involves bringing flawed premises into the fold. Dressing up this inevitable and repeated need for scrapping models is the modus operandi of empiricism. Assuming that other epistemologies be remedied in the same fashion assumes that one be perpetually relegated to the realm of flawed knowledge.

    As such, it says less about what is knowable and more about the requirement of atheism that the knowable does not occupy a higher ontological status than the knower. Or, "I'm OK with knowledge, as long as I am/we are the brainy ones".


    Perhaps you are right.

    I'm not sure how you can even take a casual glance at history and say the same is not true of religion.


    Not just religion, but also your ideas of an eternal universe and a host of other claims with airs of authority hijacked from science.


    Its only unfortunate for those who lack self control to remain obedient to their self imposed epistemological glass ceilings.



    If you think Popper brings something to the discussion other than his name, now is the time to bring it up.
     
  12. iceaura Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    30,994
    No it doesn't. What's with the goofy? This is the quote: "Taoist beliefs are often bootstrapped from "validated reality" - careful observation brought into narrative - in the first place."
    It's not that hard to follow, though, as a suggested line of thought.

    It can help one avoid this kind of self-blindness:
    As posted, and as you quoted (so you must have at least glanced at it), I clearly and directly recommend not bothering with that but instead taking a different approach altogether - avoiding that self-contradictory muddle; recognizing instead that projecting or extrapolating from the human concept of "design" is immediately confused.
     
  13. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    8,502
    I can understand why you could think such but I do think there is more to it really.
    In any event things move forward and new observations are fitted in.
    I am not saying it is a perfect system but it has the merit of requiring any change of "opinion" has support by way of evidence and most importantly testable prediction.
    I would not but that means little as my whole idea about gravity being a pushing force is a mere notion.
    But although I form a notion I dont try to convert it to reality because I have a good feeling about it.
    Perhaps.
    Perhaps. But these marks in the sand have a great deal to back them up and really if you have a better model you stand out in history.
    One could look to a larger picture where all activities of humans could be looked at as a mere blink in time and space.
    Yes I can admit that is posible indeed probable.
    One of my reasons for disliking the big bang is it seems the church were somewhat fond of the cosmic egg idea which was origin inally a Pagan idea indeed many cultures had a creation model notion☺ where it all came about spliting an egg.
    I would have thought you would like the idea of a big bang approach as the theory leaves creation unexplained where must be a great place to say God did it.
    Anyways nice observations on your part I would like to make other small observations but they are trivial and I unfortunately must go.
    Alex
     
  14. Musika Last in Space Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,701
    Its more to do with your choice of key words. For instance this ...

    ... sounds a lot better as :

    "Atheism is often bootstrapped from "validated reality" - careful observation brought into narrative - in the first place."

    It seems obvious to me you are just playing with the topology of wiki-Taoism (taoism as understood through zero contact with communities who actually practice the lifestyle) to provide breathing space for atheism.
    (Although many atheists would be abashed to say they have anything to do with a narrative, despite looking, walking and quacking like a duck)

    At the very least, you will need to provide what aspect of "reality" is being "validated" (or as you say, "carefully observed") that enables taoists to bring forth the "narrative" of taoist heaven and hell and the rigmarole of the next life and so many other things intrinsic to the narratives of taoism. Once you perform that herculean feat, your next task will be to show how all this operates as the point of generation (or "first case", as you say) for taoism.
    Goodluck.

    IOW what is validating the reality here? The narrative or the "careful" observation?

    You are going to have to walk us through what you deem as self-contradictory here because it is not apparent.
     
  15. Capracus Valued Senior Member

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    1,324
    Except that science expects its guesswork to be rationally validated, where religion does not.

    You’re speaking of human character flaws, not flaws in the principles of science. These same character flaws also permeate the ranks of the religious.

    All human behavior is subject to social bias and inertia, and the principles of science are crafted to mitigate these influences.

    Apparently you missed the point. To infer an eternal universe, a sensiable existing universe exists to base that claim on. To propose an eternal existence outside of our universe, an infinite collection of like universes could be rationally proposed based on the known existence of the one. Essentially an extrapolation of our currently perceived cosmology would be a more reasonable model of an eternal reality than one that has no demonstrable properties. You can propose any conception of reality that suits your fancy, but you can’t equate it with conceptions that are more sensibly relatable.


    Let me count the ways. You empirically learned the language of the pilot, empirically acquired the knowledge of the identity, operation and use of a seatbelt, and were empirically conditioned to follow the instructions of authority figures such as pilots and flight attendants. Are you going to suggest the basis for this behavior was not derived through sensory experience? Maybe the motivational knowledge was acquired astrally during a period of self abandonment?

    Go ahead and explain your reasoning.

    When you occupy a body and mind that are designed to function by way of their senses, why would you suggest that we adopt a non sensory approach to investigation and validation of reality? How about we start desensitizing fetuses in the womb so that their developing minds will be unencumbered by their senses, and be able to more effectively tap into these sources of extrasensory knowledge.

    Then by all means enlighten us. The next trip you take to the astral library, check out the blueprints of reality, make a digital copy, and upload them to the web for all to see.

    Neither of us will live to see such an accomplishment, regardless of the looking glass employed, so no disappointment from my end.

    What, to be alive is to suffer? Is that why Jesus opted for the cross?
     
    Last edited: Aug 1, 2018
  16. sideshowbob Sorry, wrong number. Valued Senior Member

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    7,057
    Lack of belief is not a belief. Hunger is not a kind of food.
     
  17. Beer w/Straw Transcendental Ignorance! Valued Senior Member

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    I want to discuss what a waste of human potential it is to have some brain doing a factory job. Having all the life sucked out of them. Being forced into discontent and resentment for the almighty dollar.

    I want to discuss why being politically correct is bad. Is there a man on this board that will fight for the right of incels just because he believes it will help him not to be socially picked on in his desire to wear women's dresses?

    I want to discuss why the heck God enters politics.
     
  18. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    30,994
    And since I'm not, not even close, your next legitimate concern (which need not be a forum presence or topic) would be how you come to make - or at least post (no sense in presuming) - such goofy mistakes of perception.

    Maybe start here:
    Why would a rewrite contrary to what I posted, in conflict with even the basic idea and direction of implication and role in the argument of my post, be attributed to me at all - regardless of how it "sounds"?
    Taoism is a "lifestyle"? Are you by chance parodying some bigoted Abrahamic fundie whackjob?
    Would that we could assume that. We can't. Abrahamic fundies have no self-awareness whatsoever - no matter what their lifestyle http://unskkkk.com/vintagephotos/_640x480_/cdff_1.jpg_pic.htm
    No, I don't. I made a simple and true statement, in support of an argument here. Your need to deflect attention from that argument is of course obvious, but imposes no obligations on other people.
    Your question is a confusion, a misreading. And the error taken the other direction - asking whether reality validates the observation or the narrative - would be equivalently confused.
    The self contradiction referred to was of course not there, but referred to. It was and is - as noted in the post, somehow missed by you - in the common attempts to take ad hoc projections of the human concept of design and designer, bootstrapped from human devices and design, as an independent ground or embedding context of the universe in which human concepts exist.
    And if you have instead changing scientific advancements that bring entirely new capabilities and fundamental comprehensions with them, explaining the formerly inexplicable, altering the circumstances of one's daily life and possibly the course of human civilization in ways unimaginable in one's own childhood even, describing them as somebody's changed opinion about something seems - a bit - y'know - inadequate. At best.
     
  19. Musika Last in Space Valued Senior Member

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    2,701
    There you have it already.
    Somewhere along the merry way of civilization's development, the notion of delayed rewards, namely fiat currencies, attained for performing bizarre activities, such as sticking dohickies on widgets, got dovetailed with a collective need to acquire the glitter associated with widghickies, while people starve.
    In light of what many see as the inevitable collapse of fiat currencies, there is much discussion about what constitutes real wealth and real skills. The conclusion seems to be that neither money, nor widghickey production skills can provide eatables.
    From God's perspective, He has provided the real estate and the means to grow food and an instruction booklet that says "beware of the shiny shit". I guess ultimately it's a case of all that glitters is not gold and a question arises of whether a shitty world has its origin in shit on the brain. If we have shit on our brain, it is poor form to lay that blame at the feet of others, particularly God.

    Unity within diversity just becomes plain old competitive, disruptive, argumentative, express-my-self-with-high-powered-guns-in-public, etc diversity if unity has no practical point of reference. Kind of like a person experiencing a heart attack in public while some well meaning samaritan reassures them that everything is ok, just be calm, the science of treating heart attacks exists in the world, just not the practitioners.

    It would be more questionable if God didn't. If politics is our highest tier for duking out the application of important ideas, it seems reasonable to expect that God takes a place in politics to the degree God is deemed an important idea. To the degree God is not deemed an important idea, see your previous two points of discussion.
     
  20. Musika Last in Space Valued Senior Member

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    2,701
    It's the nature of existence that it's not passive. Belief, much like food, is a required intake.
     
  21. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    8,502
    Would you care to offer support for your claim?
    Alex
     
  22. Musika Last in Space Valued Senior Member

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    2,701
    Saying that you are not isn't the same as showing that you are not.

    Because it seems obvious it has less intrinsic substance in relation to taoism and more in relation to atheism.
    Since atheism is "your thing", it seems easy to understand why you might drape taoism in such a manner.

    If you can tag "ist" to "tao", then yes, it does appear certain behaviours relative to precepts determine an approach, or "style", in regards to "life".
    Disregard them, either the behaviours or the precepts, and it just makes others wonder about your language usage.

    No.

    Pointing out how your argument is neither true nor simple is not a deflection. Upon receiving such a critique, not clarifying how one's argument is true and simple is a deflection.

    Well whenever you finish going on about what your argument is not, feel free to begin explaining what it is, preferably not in the same manner that gave rise to the original critique ...

    Sheesh.
    So it was referred to there ...

    You are going to have to break it down to specifics of where are the ad hoc projections etc etc.
    At the moment you are just presenting a word salad.

    I was talking specifically about cerebral pursuits of scientific conclusions that lack any demonstratable change in everyday life, etc, etc.
     
    Last edited: Aug 2, 2018
  23. Musika Last in Space Valued Senior Member

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    2,701
    Refraining from action is simply another type of action that brings forth change, consequences etc. Non-participation is not the birthright of any living entity.
     

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