Hondo

Over the course of the last several years I have been discussing my agnostic beliefs with a very intelligent, evangelical friend. We have covered many of the premises encountered on this website. I've always been highly puzzled by my friend's adherrance to Christian doctrine. I think I have finally found the missing piece to the puzzle.
My friend has such a deep seated hatred of naturalism, that the only way he can face the world is if his life is filled with meaning, from a higher source.
His basic argument is that, "if naturalism is true then nothing exists, and life is an illusion. There is no love, horror, good, bad, evil, choice, etc. Only chemical reactions. If the Universe is only matter, matter is amoral, therefore we are amoral. There is no destiny. We have 70 years, then we are gone, there is no point whatsoever. We are simply part of the Matrix."
How does one proceed to deal with this fatalistic argument.

Valis

I'm a christian, but I don't think naturalism necessarily implies meaninglessness. In fact, it doesn't even necessarily imply a lack of transcendent meaning - transcendent in this case meaning "coming from or leading the mind towards that beyond anything which the mind can comprehend."

Even the most basic experience in your life comes to you jam-packed with meaning. A trite example: Those molecules are organized into an honest-to-god *stone* for goodness sake. Those molecules *mean* something - namely, they mean "stone." You can't help but see the stone - it's not like you made the stone up. The stone's there. Meaning is inherent in the world of your experience - which is your world in toto for all intents and purposes.

So that's a trite example, but go up several levels of human experience and you get all the greats like love, good, evil, etc... No one made these up - they come to us from outside ourself, and their source and goal is beyond our comprehension. They are both inherent to, and truly transcendent towards, our own existence as human beings. (By transcendent I mean they don't come *from* us but rather are encountered *by* us as realities and hence are in a real sense beyond us.)

Well my point is, love, good, evil, etc even in a "naturalistic worldview" are realities which can't be ignored and must be dealt with.

That sounds pretty meaningful to me, anyway.

-Kris

PS Another way to put it - if reality is an illusion, then illusion is the only reality there is so what's the problem?

[ March 01, 2002: Message edited by: Valis ]</p>

MortalWombat

Ask him how you can have destiny and choice at the same time. They seem mutually exclusive to me.

You could simply reply to him that he may need a belief in a god to be happy, while you don't. It's his problem, let him sweat it.

owleye

I think Valis makes some good points. The sentiment being expressed I think can be summarized by the Christian interlocutor's unfortunate regard of naturalism as implying a mere form of reductionism. That is, this position would regard naturalism as insisting that we are merely molecules or atoms in motion.

Regarding naturalism in this way casts aspersions against it without taking into consideration that emergent qualities could very well be a product of evolution by natural selection. This same sort of mere regard occurs when it is suggested that chimps and humans have each evolved from a common origin. That is, this is somehow interpreted by the mere reductionists, that we are nothing but apes.

I grant that this form of thinking has been promulgated by many advocates of naturalism, for example, by Desmond Morris from his book, "The Naked Ape." And it could very well be the case that those who take a Creationist position take these folks as their adversary. However, I don't believe that naturalism requires its adherents to believe in this form of reductionism.

The crucial difference between creationists and evolutionists, regarding species, is that for creationists, species have an eternal form (structure), whereas for evolutionists, forms (structures), though more stable than than that which is formed (structured), are subject to evolutionary pressure.

Thus, for the creationist, I can appreciate that any evidence of structure being subject to evolutionary change at all is tantamount to breaking the will of God, and it is no wonder then, that despair and disillusionment would be the result. Nevertheless, the distinction between being permanent and taking one million years or so (depending heavily on how a species is determined) is not particularly significant in my mind.

Fell

svensky

You cant.

I used to see much the same picture in the universe when I was an athiest.

What I think you may be missing is that the view presented is a long view of history. If naturalism is the correct interpretation of the universe then eventally you will die, your lineage will die out, the species will become extinct and the sun will consume the earth, and eventually cease to exist itself.

All the struggle, the striving, the learning the discovery, what was it for ? Nothing in the end, the whole history of humanity will be little more than a gasp in the long quiet history of the cosmos. That is the view you need to take to understand the argument.

you can invent all the transient meaning you like, but the above is the ultimate reality, if matter is all there is and all there ever will be.

"Eat drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die"

Jason

svensky

And I suspect that he will respond that you need to face the reality of what you claim to believe.

Jason

excreationist

Ok, so that would give the world a purpose, but what's the purpose of God then? To just exist for his own sake?

Physical reality would just be eternal in someway (e.g. multiverses or a static "Platonia" describing all possible states of the universe)

Well the "life force" would be an illusion but things would still be born and eat and grow and die, etc.

Love just involves us really seeking something and becoming really attached to it. Or feeling a "connectedness" warm-fuzzy pleasure from it. Horror involves fear or disgust responses that are associated with something. Good and bad and evil just relate to whether something aligns with your goals or long-term vision or not. Humans can have their own opinions of good and evil - there can be more than one opinion. Even the Bible has different opinions (e.g. divorce - see OT God, Jesus and Paul)

There is also a very complex computational structure in the brain - 100 billion neurons and all that - it's not just a chemical soup.

People can have personal morals (codes of behaviour). Individual water molecules aren't wet but together they can be wet. Individual molecules don't fly around and gather nectar, but bees, which are made up of molecules, do.

As many people say "it is the journey that matters, not the destination."
Just because a belief system sounds nice it doesn't mean it is true. And just because a belief system sounds bad, doesn't mean it is false.

[/quote]We are simply part of the Matrix."[/quote]
Does he mean that our world is created by intelligent AI creatures from the future!?!

So basically he's trying to "refute" naturalism by saying that it is bleak. I don't see why it follows that nothing exists and life is an illusion. Choice is probably and illusion though... even though we need to go through the decision making process to make good decisions. (If we don't put enough effort we make hasty decisions based on small amounts of data)

Kent Stevens

It is wrong to base your life's happiness about someone being there or not being there. If a relationship does not work this does not mean we give up on trying to have a good life.

If something does not exist it would be doubly wrong to give up on trying to have a good life. If Santa Claus does not exist does that mean that our lives will be miserable based on that knowledge. Instead we would be free from illusion.

If life is finite that does that mean that we should be miserable. This seems weak to base your happiness on yourself eternally existing. Why not have a good life whether you were eternal or not eternal?

If god exists we become slaves to him. For if we go we choose different from him then he can have us burn in hell for all eternity. With no god we then become free from this imaginary evil dictator.

excreationist

svensky:
If there is no afterlife then what does it matter what becomes of the universe? I think it is much better to be one of the select few people who lived in the universe while it existed than being one of an infinite number of people in an eternal universe.
Having a limit to our length of life makes it precious so we can have some passion in our lives. I think eternal life would get to be a drag after a few zillion years. (Unless our "newness" desire was eliminated)
With a limited life we can find a lot of newness. This isn't possible if you have eternal life since there are a limited (though huge) number of possible experiences.
So basically our situation is about one of change and adventure.
BTW, in heaven you're just meant to worship God and be a servant of God. At least non-believers are free to feel that all beings are equal. (at least in this life....)

svensky

I used to think like this.

As I said, try to look at it from a different perspective.

The bleak outlook is the realistic one, when you die the universe will go on as it always has, your existence (our entire species exisitence) will not change anything. A few genreations after you die you will be forgotten and it will be as if you never existed at all. How a thousand years from now will it be in the universe if you never did exist ?

All things we hold of value perish and fade over time, all things we love die or decay, everything we acheive fades and is lost. On a strictly naturalistic approach everything we do is a vain struggle against then the end, then oblivion, and finally after some more time passes we cease to exist even in the memory of others.

This prospect doesn't feel wrong to you ? Ok, its just a gut instinct, but the universe doesn't feel that way to me.

How do you know this wont be a good thing ?

Jason