What is an act of God?

Discussion in 'Religion Archives' started by water, Mar 1, 2005.

  1. Jenyar Solar flair Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    3,833
    Interesting comment. I was just thinking of the same problem: what does someone who believes in a deterministic universe want to achieve? Who does he wish to influence, when he believes all influence is illusion? Just look at this:
    To you, there is no true rationale, their is only "it" -- and what you believe is "it". Their is no such thing as influence (although still you try to influence what *we* do, for some reason) there is only a mechanistic running down, from first cause to last cause.

    What point is there in saying anything? Do you think it makes a difference?
     
  2. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  3. Sarkus Hippomonstrosesquippedalo phobe Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    10,355
    This is true, I think, certainly from an intellectual point of view - i.e. when I'm bothering to think about it / debate it etc.
    But on a practical level my definition of free(will) makes it an impossibility, and I accept that, and thus in everyday parlance use the definition of "free" that is of the non-deterministic derivative.

    It is because I can see no flaw in the logic of this theory that I stick with it. It is also part and parcel of why I am not a theist or a spiritualist. If I was a theist/spiritualist then I almost certainly wouldn't accept that the Universe is deterministic.

    Indeterminate, yes - but this merely introduces probability into the determinism. As stated in a post above, you can have different deterministic outputs from the same inputs due to the indeterminate nature of the universe - but there is still no freedom involved in this. The output is merely a matter of probability.
    Roll a 6-sided die. Don't look at it until it has stopped rolling.
    Can you choose which face it lands on?
    But you know it will land on any one of the 6 faces.
    You have no choice - the outcome is indeterminate until observed.
    But the outcome can be determined as a matter of probability.
    It's a simple analogy but I think it explains things.


    I don't think it is an untenable position. Determinism merely has cause and effect. It only makes untenable things that don't follow that idea - i.e. an effect without a cause (such as your definition of freewill). There aren't many other concepts that cross this idea.


    Now I'll move on to replying to Water...

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  4. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  5. water the sea Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    6,442
    What are you trying to say?
    Do you think we are here only because we want to change you?

    We talk, whoever joins in, for whatever reason, they join in.


    And you have not answered my question:

    Condemned by whom? By people, or by God?
     
  6. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  7. Sarkus Hippomonstrosesquippedalo phobe Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    10,355
    Okay - understood.

    Sure - no argument - emotions are life's way of expressing the interpretation. But how does this answer the question?
    If you're agreeing that there IS an objective reality and that we can only view it through subjective means, then are you not agreeing that "Acts of God" are merely subjective views of an objective reality?

    Again, what is the relevance of this?
    This is subjective. It is merely adding weight to the argument that there are no Acts of God other than people's subjective view of objective reality.
    Or are you saying there is no objective reality?


    Okay - a couple of points on this:
    1. This is a logical fallacy - appeal to emotion. Just because the law system collapses does not counter the argument that free-will is an illusion.
    2. The idea that "free-will is an illusion" is nothing more than intellectual discourse. My "illusion of free-will" works in EXACTLY THE SAME WAY as your "free-will" - so why would the law system collapse?
    It would certainly be an interesting discussion in the court for someone to argue their defence from a deterministic viewpoint.
    But the law does not operate with a deterministic viewpoint.




     
  8. Jenyar Solar flair Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    3,833
    Similar to people arguing that they cannot "sin" because they don't believe in God, so his laws do not apply to them.
     
    Last edited: Mar 16, 2005
  9. Sarkus Hippomonstrosesquippedalo phobe Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    10,355
    Technically it is true if you define a "sin" as breaking a religious rule.
    You don't go to court because you "sin" - you go because you break the laws of society.
     
  10. Jenyar Solar flair Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    3,833
    And laws of society are also expressions of beliefs - about the nature of justice and order. Religion can be a political power just as easily, as it had been through most of history. There is no difference between sin against God and sin against people - breaking the law is still "sin". Look at some of the laws of Hammurabi, for instance:
    8. If any one steal cattle or sheep, or an ass, or a pig or a goat, if it belong to a god or to the court, the thief shall pay thirtyfold; if they belonged to a freed man of the king he shall pay tenfold; if the thief has nothing with which to pay he shall be put to death.

    110. If a "sister of a god" open a tavern, or enter a tavern to drink, then shall this woman be burned to death.

    240. If a merchantman run against a ferryboat, and wreck it, the master of the ship that was wrecked shall seek justice before God; the master of the merchantman, which wrecked the ferryboat, must compensate the owner for the boat and all that he ruined.​
     
  11. water the sea Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    6,442
    First of all, we have to allow for the premise that God interacts with what we can refer to as objective reality -- if God is to be omnimax.

    Acts of God "are merely subjective views of an objective reality" -- but more must be said. To say "subjective view" also entails our ethical evaluation, our values and preferences show in this. And they are important in how we lead our lives.

    You can relegate it all back to the deterministically disposed personality, of course, but by that, you also discard the notion of personal responsibility.
    For further analysis, see below.


    It is subjective, but it is not nonsense.

    We do not know objective reality directly (so the premise), thus objective reality doesn't really matter for us. All we can do is view our subjective reality -- within itself.


    I'm not saying there is no objective reality; I'm saying that since we can't get to it, since we can't make claims about it (as long as we stick to there being an observational distance) -- thus, objective reality doesn't really matter to us.

    What does matter though is the stance we will take towards this objective reality. We can't do as if it isn't there (for our sanity depends on the belief that objective reality is consistent!), but neither can we do as if we knew it. The only stance we can then take towards objective reality is an ethical or emotional one; for we cannot take a cognitive one.

    The topic can be summed up in the question: "If you do not know much about something, but know it may come, what will you do when it comes?"

    One can never be fully prepared anyway. So it is up to the ethical and emotional stance we will take: will we fear the unknown, will we hate it, will we embrace it, will we be indifferent; will we think it is worthless, will we think it will be superior or inferior to us?


    How is this an appeal to emotion?


    No, the law system does not operate with a deterministic viewpoint. The law system operates on the principle of personal responsibility, and personal responsibility is derived from free will.

    If free will would be declared to be an illusion, personal responsibility would then be an illiusion too. As it is, the law system does not and can not operate with illusions.

    If anything, one can plead temporal insanity (the equivalent of claiming that free will is an illusion), and then the law is different for such a person as opposed to one in possession of free will.
    But if free will is to be declared to be an illusion, then all people who are on trial should be treated the same way as now cases of temporal insanity are treated. Nobody would be sentenced, and all would be sent to mental institutions.


    And a potentially dangerous one.


    Survival. Practicality. It is not wise to waste time and energy on things that are counterproductive to one's survival.

    And yes, apparently, life is too easy nowadays, this is why people can dwell on things that are "*just* an intellectual discourse".


    Now think of what you've said in terms of a self-fulfilling prophecy.
    Will you end up happy? Or will you even say that yor own happiness doesn't matter to you?


    Beware of the day when you will have to experience the consequences of this on your own skin.


    Well, this would be so if by "spirituality" we would mean 'something supernatural, unearthly, inexplicable, mystical'. If by "spirituality" you mean some hippie buzz after you're full of LSD, or the extasis of the dervish spinning in circles -- then I think you have a very empoverished understanding of what spirituality is and can be.


    WHY is it IS OUR RESPONSIBILITY to assess what it means to be human?


    As long as it is humans who design and make the robots, the robots will prove nothing about human nature.

    The robots did not and can not come by themselves "on the same plane as humanity".

    If they could come on the same plane as humanity, if they would be capable of that -- and they inherently are not, as long as it is man who designs and makes them, and sustains them -- then you could compare humans and robots that way as you propose. Otherwise, we can't compare them that way.


    And I think everyone should be afraid of this.


    I haven't "placed" humanity anywhere. I have no absolute measures by which I could make a list and place phenomena on it.


    Says the smugger.


    Not remove, but relativize it. Ever watched any science fiction films that happen in the future? They are a prediction, a theory of what happens when human life is devalued down to chemicals and chemical reactions: a person's life becomes worthless. And this is taking place already.


    "Ascribe it to divinity"? Where did you get this from? I do not "ascribe it to divinity".


    Chronological snobbery. Plus, which is worse, you are assuming that there is a lot that is unknown, yet you make proportional estimations of how much of this unknown we know or not know.


    Unfounded? Why do you think it is an unfounded fear?


    And yours is happy to accept that -- due to some deterministic logic. And mine is not happy to accept that -- again due to some deterministic logic.

    Why do we talk then at all? It is all for naught, nothing more than an "intellectual discourse"?


    And what have you said by this?


    No, even the ""objective reality" of the cause and effect relationship" must be questioned -- when our understanding of the relationship between cause and effect is open to research.

    Neatly posing there to be a cause and an effect connecting phenomena is a scientific axiom. Unprovable.


    Oh? But when we have agreed that objective reality cannot be known, and now you are making claims about it ...?


    As long as you are in your deterministic discourse, you will interpret everything your way, and nothing we say will have the same meaning in your discourse as it has it in ours. All we can do is poke holes into your discourse and search for inconsistencies -- but even this is futile, as those inconsistencies will be evened out deterministically.
    Determinism, nihilism and relativism are irrefutable from the onset on.

    The only way to refute them is to practically "refute" the person holding that stance.


    I'm not sure you understood my analogy.

    To talk about free will on the level as you proposed is nonsensical inasmuch as on that level, there is noone to have this free will. There can neither be nor not be free will on that level.

    If we look at cells and cells alone, we cannot say anything about the organ they make, we cannot say anything about the functions of the organ as a whole when all we have in sight are a few cells.

    Or the analogy with bricks: If we look merely at an individual brick, we can't say anything about the properties of the wall -- for if all we have in sight is a single brick, we do not even know whether it is a part of a wall or not. The concept of wall is indeterminate if all we see is a brick.


    Uh. To talk about choice on the quantum level -- either as present or as absent -- is as nonsensical as to talk about walls if all you have in sight is a single brick.

    If all you have in sight is a single brick, you cannot make valid inferences about what the wall is like, and it would be nonsensical to make such inferences in the first place. For the concept of wall is indeterminate if all we see is a brick.


    Yes, but any knowledge has the nature of being an ex post knowledge.


    And my idea of what my decision will result in is an ex post knowledge. It is something I have learned from previous experiences.


    You do not have to believe that you are free, but not believing it will mean that you continue working as if you're not free.

    Well, you say you are happy with not being free, and happy with your QM explanation -- sice your personality is so determined and everything.

    But beware of the day when someone comes and puts a gun to your head, or when life turns ugly for you.

    This is an argument from fear -- and it is a valid one. Maybe one day you will see what I mean.


    Indeed. I think you have committed the fallacies of transposition of concepts into non-native discourses and discourse reductionism (not listed yet).

    To transpose a concept from its native discourse into another one often renders the concept meaningless, or gives it a new meaning.
    Meaning is something that emerges from the interrelatedness of elements within a system. Take out an element and put it into another system: it might become interrelated, but it won't necessarily make sense -- even though it did in the native system. But for this, you can't blame the element, but your transposing of it.

    Whose fault is it that the word "babica" means nothing in English? The word is foreign to English.

    But both to say that the word "babica" means nothing as well as to say that it means something is beyond your reach if all you know is English. It is indeterminate for you, and you can't make any claims about it -- neither that the word itself means something, nor that the word itself means nothing.

    And similar for free will: On the quantum level, free will is indeterminate. You can neither say that there is free will on the quantum level, nor that there isn't free will on the quantum level.
     
  12. MarcAC Curious Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,042
    My definition of free will is not what you state above. My definition falls more along the lines of having the ability to consciously choose a or b relative to the foreseen consequences and the precursors (causes) - effect with cause. I doubt anyone can state with all authority that if I chose a as opposed to b there is no way on earth I could have chosen b as opposed to a. Of course, there's no way to prove it. Well, have fun...
     
  13. §outh§tar is feeling caustic Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,832
    Although Sarkus' statement is morbidly counterfactual and one no doubt fueled by egocentrism and arguments from ignorance (ie. I have free will because I am saying so), water's response is even more troubling.

    water, must the truth not be revealed, even if it must necessarily steal the carpet from underneath all legal and moral systems ever devised? Must the truth that there is no "I" not be revealed, even though it will shatter all beliefs that the "I" will go to heaven or hell? Must the truth not be revealed that we are shamefully arbitary, that we have not earned life, that we have no right to this chimerical "free will", must it not be revealed and bruited.

    Knowledge does not tell us truth. Knowledge, truth, is an inference. We don't know, we infer.

    As best as reason and experience will allow inference, we are in a purely deterministic world. In this purely deterministic world, there is a chance for free will. I had been meaning to tell you about that in the other thread, but I have been too lazy till now. But not the free will, we usually think. Not what we have become so satiated and so complacent with. The most basic description of free will, which is the free will of knowledge, is self evidently an unreality. By no means will anyone ever be able to show something that isn't there. This new free will I speak of has been granted by nature and its implications are distressing to the individual, for it dashes hopes to the grounds and spits back out our most intimate aspirations. You'll be shocked to know.

    And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."

    John 8:32​

    Is the purpose of free will, not to be free? Selah
     
  14. water the sea Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    6,442
    What *truth*?
    First of all, if you agree that objective reality is something we cannot directly know and understand, that we are bound by the observational distance and thus our search for truth will go on as long as the observational distance exists, and this is: as long as we are limited beings -- then claims about having "discovered the truth" are inconsistent with the premise of there being an observational distance.


    You are deriving your truth from what seems to be applying to the quantum level.
    At the quantum level, the concepts of morality, beauty, right and wrong, etc. are indeterminate, which means that you cannot make definite statements about them.


    This would apply if there is no God.


    Well, well.

    Go back to the beginning:

    Then this truth that you are talking about is also an inference, a valid or an invalid one, and your fears of

    are as founded as, say, the conspiracy theory.


    Really? Has it ever occur to you that people consider it purely deterministic so that they would not crush under their own free will?


    There is more to laziness than is usually admitted.


    I have said several times how terrifying free will can be -- even without knowing about your theory.


    The way the concept of free will has been popularily treated lately is misleading. It is used to mean "I have an identity, I am someone, I matter" -- which is in contradiction with the law principle that all people are equal. Modern godless society functions on the basis of such tensions between obvious contradictions.
     
  15. §outh§tar is feeling caustic Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,832
    Truth lies deep down in the nitty gritty. Back to the atomist vs holist discussion. We will find all truth on the microscopic level - I'm not sure if I've said this yet, I was planning to say it - truth is truth as long as we don't know it, for as soon as we know it, we must make inference to understand it. This is why the savante is so glorious. The savante does not make interpretations or inferences, he does not understand his trade the way we would expect him to, his knowledge is pure in every regard. His knowledge, whether it be or prime numbers, art, calendar calculating, or music, is unspoiled by society's arbitrary whims and interpretations. His knowledge is flawless in every regard. When he sees a city scene, he draws the scene impeccably, not knowing how he is able to. He does not know what prime numbers are, he has never even heard of music theory. He cannot form two sentences but can know entire volumes in just one read. This is a son of god who needs not understand truth to know it. There is no application of reason, no modification, truth is not defiled by lies, not despoiled by society's influence. The neurons ensure that truth remains truth, that truth is not understood (read misunderstood).

    And we call his knowledge: sublime. Isn't God jealous?

    Our truth too, if it cannot parallel the sublime, must lie as close as possible. As I pointed out in the Godel thread, the savante's mode of knowledge, experience, is no different from ours. All we have to do to know truth is experience ourselves and know that we can't possibly have free will without our atoms having free will, for any such notion free will would otherwise have to be wholly illusory and deceptive. We would do well to know that Libet's experiment predicted our failures in knowledge - our circularity and unreasonableness.

    There is no observational distance between us and ourselves. This makes it possible to know that we don't exist. It is simply marvelous really. The key lies buried in knowledge and consciousness.

    By this token, will you not agree that these are not concepts at all, but means of relativizing established by egoists?

    Regardless of whether or not God is, we must know that we cannot earn, for to believe one has earned something is to know that one is an egomaniac. Only egomaniacs earn. And this is truth: no one can earn life or free will.


    By knowledge, I meant knowledge on the level of the holist.

    Then this rebuttal that you are talking about is also an inference, a valid or an invalid one, and is founded as, say, the conspiracy theory.

    You see, outside of the egomaniacal notions of "valid" and "invalid" lie the atoms, which are neither valid nor invalid, neither good nor bad, neither true nor false. And so you see, this is where truth lies. In the nitty gritty.

    What free will I say? Outside of society, which has again permeated out thinking with this egomanical notion of free will, where is free will? Show me this self evident thing.

    I am here now aren't I?

    With free will, even if it was only to think or even to know, why, we would be Gods.

    Yes. This is the way of a society hellbent on discovering truth.

    /* Chuckle */ Yup, that's the way to do it. Start from an egoists POV.
     
  16. MarcAC Curious Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,042
    *Applause* You'd think that alone would have been enough to stem the whole discourse.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  17. Alter Ego Banned Banned

    Messages:
    30
    An act of God is father slipping on the wet tiles as he enters the bathroom unbuckling his pants, while I'm taking a shower at the age of 10.

    Thanks God.

    Sure you could have saved a few millionpeople but you chose to spare me the indignity that night.
     
  18. water the sea Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    6,442
    This is still atomistic thinking that says that a unit has meaning all by itself, regardless of context.


    The savant can't survive all by himself.


    If God were a man, then yes.


    Have you read my post in You HAVE to believe, where I sketched out the idea that truth is about what is important to us?


    Again, atomistic demands that are impossible to fulfill.


    No, and this is a frequent mistake to make. As long as there is observation, there is the observer and the observed, the subject and the object of observation. As long as there are these two, the observational distance remains.


    By the same token, you can say that the whole society, culture are "means of relativizing established by egoists"; and that culture, for example, doesn't exist, that no concepts exist.

    Again, we are back at the *mode* of the existence of a phenomenon. The only mode of existence to which you do seem to ascribe veracity is the mode in which we feel a tree exists once we have bumped into it -- while every other mode of existence is false.

    But then again, such a position undermines itself -- for it makes out its own statements to be nonexistent. Which is theoretically alright, but practically untenable.

    It might have been easier for you to say,

    The human mind, oh how I hate you, and I hate you for letting me think these thoughts and I hate you for letting me say these words.


    No, and this is why religions say they are given to you by God. One should be thankful for them.
    Life and free will is all we have gotten for sure, and everything else is mercy.


    You have no impression of what my fists can do.


    What truth could there be in the atoms? Objective reality is absolute and absurd to our mind.


    Shall I punch you in the face?

    I mean it. Nowadays, we live our lives so detached from the immediate reality, in abstracts.


    Again, said from your pespective that to have free will means to be able to move mountains.


    Alright. Then tell me why do you think we are egoists.


    * * *

    No. For he argues from the egotistical perspective.
     
  19. Sarkus Hippomonstrosesquippedalo phobe Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    10,355
    Eh?
    Please explain how my comments are:
    1. Counterfactual
    2. Fueled by egocentrism
    3. Arguments from ignorance

    You make these allegations yet give no justification.
    Why?

    You claim I am saying "I have free will because I am saying so" - so am I to assume that you haven't actually read anything I've been saying?

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  20. (Q) Encephaloid Martini Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    20,855
    An 'act of god' is simply the label theists apply to an 'act of nature.'
     
  21. §outh§tar is feeling caustic Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,832
    Context requires arbitrary interpretation. Arbitrary interpretation skews truth.
    The raw information we have is void of this contamination.

    Who is to blame?


    Anthropomorphism is close enough.


    Yes I have read it and began to respond last night. I'm not quite done yet but I thoroughly addressed the idea with respect to.. egoism.


    If the brick cannot give strength, then the foundation cannot give strength.


    No. Not in our case, there needn't be. For there is no "observer" or "obeservee" in our case - there is no "I". Rather we observe experience; we experience experience. The distance is only percieved but is not there, it is only a mirage.


    Practically eh? Where have I heard that one before..
    It is not the mind I hate, for it is not the mind which makes me say these things. There is another cause, and it is society. But more of that in the other thread since I already begun talking about it there. Society is the corruptor of man, as you will soon discover.

    If we had any free will (and we don't), society has already taken it away from us. Not just through general influence (I speak of this elsewhere), but through laws. Life - life is not given to us. It is not a gift, and it is not a curse. It is merely a thing we use to relativize - it is meaningless for we do not understand it and can only hope to grasp it. How silly, for who can hope to fathom a concept based solidly on an intangible thing, an abstraction for that which our minds cannot hold.

    Rather, let us say: Lord, I don't know. Ignorance is not best kept secret.

    As for mercy, why, this too is a means of relativizing and hence - it has no meaning outside of society. For which feral child, being raised outside of society, knows of this mercy, or knows of this life. These things are merely rude awakenings to the fact that we own nothing, we earn nothing, and we can have nothing.

    In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread
    Till you return to the ground,
    For out of it you were taken;
    For dust you are,
    And to dust you shall return."

    - Genesis 3:19​

    From dust to dust. What room is there, for ego?

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!




    By the atoms, I mean the "raw information". I'll say more about this elsewhere since I have already begun.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!



    Because of none other than society I say. This, is most self evident.

    Do remind me of what free will means to you and whether or not we have it.

    Any man who kowtows to society and thinks himself to be independent and free, why, he is a fool first and then an egomaniac. Why else should he believe he has autonomy when society strips him of all individuality and all latitude and leaves him a pup desperate to suckle the vain comforts of community. And these are the seven vices: Pride, Covetousness, Lust, Anger, Gluttony, Envy, Sloth.

    Argues against.
     
  22. §outh§tar is feeling caustic Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,832
    The idea that "free-will is an illusion" is nothing more than intellectual discourse.

    1) We are not self aware.

    I think that pretty much covers all three.
     
  23. MarcAC Curious Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,042
    So I've been observing. Anyway - finally - have fun...
     

Share This Page