geoff

Jlowder (Jeff?),

You wrote:

"Metaphysical naturalism is the view that the physical universe is a closed system in the sense that nothing that is neither a part nor product of it can affect it. Thus, metaphysical naturalism denies the existence of all supernatural beings, including God. So defined, metaphysical naturalism is compatible with the existence of abstract objects. So metaphysical naturalists could consistently agree with your conclusion, but regard moral truths as timeless, logically necessary truths."

Your description of metaphysical naturalism, as I see it, can be broken down as follows:

1.The physical universe is all that exists

2.This universe consists exclusively of physical “parts” (alternatively, would you accept “discreet, concrete entities” instead of “parts”?) or “products” (ditto?)

3.Abstract objects exist (alternatively, would you accept “immaterial, timeless entities”?)

How can ‘1 (and '2)be logically compatible with ‘3? The assertions seem to me to be contradictory. If I'm misrepresenting your description, please clarify. Thanks.

Geoff

Vorkosigan

Geoff:

How are we to regard abstractions used in math and geometry? Does i actually exist, and in what sense? Wouldn't they have the properties Lowder described?

It's good that you guys spell your names differently....

Vorkosigan

geoff

Vorkosigan,

Thanks for your questions. I suppose I did unintentionally pose a false dilemma of having to choose either "concrete" or "abstract" entities but not both, which I shouldn't have.

I should have consulted the Oxford Companion to Philosophy (or an equivalent authority) first. The selection on "abstract entities" follows:

"The dichotomy between the abstract and the concrete is supposed to effect a mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive ontological classification. The dichotomy is, however, too naïve to be of theoretical use. There are many different ways, themselves vague, to mark the distinction: abstract entities are not perceptible, cannot be pointed to, have no causes or effects, have no spatio-temporal location, are necessarily existent. Nor is there agreement about whether there are any abstract entities, and, if so, which sorts of entity are abstract. Abstract entities, conceived as having no causal powers, are thought problematic for epistemological reasons: how can we refer to or know anything about entities with which we have no causal commerce? Hence the existence of nominalists, who try to do without abstract entities."

Vorador

"Dave: the great thing about God is that He is not only MIGHT, but He is also, by nature, right, good, and just."

Dave, might I pose a question to you?

What you say appears to be something along the lines of "God's actions are righteous and just by nature. Anything God does it right because God is the one doing it."

Is this the case?

And if this is so, what if God were to committ an unconscionable act of genocide against people with, say, blue eyes.

Is that moral, right, and just? Even if God is the one doing it?

DaveJes1979

Jack the Bodiless

{QUOTE]
And I addressed it there, but I will reiterate it here. Blaming all members of a group for the actions of individuals within the group is a sign of incompetence, of non-omniscience, of inability to determine who ACTUALLY is guilty.
As there were supposedly only two humans on Earth at the time, and everyone else was born later, it doesn't actually take a deductive genius to figure it out in this case. God has an IQ of... what? 60, 50, 40?[/QUOTE]

Dave: once again, you are simply assuming that God does not or cannot treat mankind as a corporate entity, with Adam as the federal head (which is precisely the Christian claim). It is precisely BECAUSE God is omniscient and omnipotent that He can treat Adam's actions as truly representative of all humanity. That is to say, God knew very well that Adam's actions were indicative of the decisions that His posterity would have made, had they been in his shoes. Your childish rant fails to take into account the implications of God's omniscience.

Dave: the fact that you have YOUR ethics does not give me (or anyone else) a reason to adopt them. It is precisely because you do not see ethical norms as being an inherent part of reality that your ethical system collapses. You have given us, in effect, your preference only. There is no philisophical justification for one's preference over another's.

Dave: if my interpretation is in error, that I await to be shown proof of such.

Dave: once again, why should it be significant to human beings on the grounds which you provided - evolution? You didn't answer my critique at all.

Dave: I said more than that. If you want to challenge my claims, you are going to have to interact with the argumentation I originally offered, and at least try challenging my premises (be specific), or SOMETHING.

Dave: my premise is that God's existence is the necessary precondition to knowledge. Specifically, I am addressing ethical forms of knowledge in this thread. This premise has been supported with 1. a critique of atheistic attempts to account for ethics and 2. a positive presentation of how ethical norms are grounded in God's eternal nature as perfectly just and good.

Dave: once again, His eternal nature is simply axiomatic and defenitional of who He is as God.

Dave: and precisely WHY should I do no harm? What is the philisophical justification for this?

Dave: "should" implies ethical obligation and epistemological warrant.


Philosoft
Dave: when did I mention Christian motivations?

Dave: once again, I was simply responding to your defective understanding of how believers are saved. It was not supposed to be a defense of objective ethics. It was YOU who brought up the Christian conception of salvation, supposedly in the midst of a critique of our ethics.

Dave: is the assertion that the Bible is merely human-penned supposed to be some sort of argument? Originally you charged us with not being able to know God's will. I pointed out that, according to the Christian worldview, knowledge of God's will comes from the Bible. That assertion, based on atheistic assumptions, does little to deconstruct our view of knowledge.

Dave: but why is survival good? Evolution itself does not care if anyone in particular survives. All is well as long as the fittest survive.

Dave: you haven't given us a framework to derive, from observation, ethical norms. How do you attach meaning to brute facts, history, and sensory data?

Dave: I challenge the legitimacy of your objection on the basis that it is based on self-refuting premises.



Jack the Bodiless
Secular Web Regular

Dave: please justify your use (confusion?) of a dictionary (which one??) to establish philisophical definitions. This should be interesting.

Dave: actually, dictionaries define words according to social lexical convention only. They were not meant to be used as philisophical standards (since language itself changes). Really, dictionaries only describe words using OTHER words - they do not provide a philisophical justification for meaning in certain words. Webster would indeed be perplexed by your misuse of dictionaries.

Secondly, I would point out that no one is innocent before God, since Adam's actions were representative of corporate humanity, they are OUR actions and our sin as well.

Dave: these are nice sweeping generalization with no substance behind them. If this is supposed to be some form of argument, you are going to have to be more specific.

Mad Bastard

Dave: you cannot account for an ethical system using "only human values" since different humans hold to different values. If you have no foundation behind your ethical system, then that tells me that the ethical system you hold to is arbitrarily chosen - thus there is no epistemological compulsion that would lead me to adopt it. To put it another way: Why choose one set of "human values" over another?



Bill Snedden
Dave: well, if you would have been following the thread, I have argued that God's decrees form the foundation of ethics because of the fact that God is, by nature, eternally and perfectly good and just.

Vorador

Dave: sort of. What God does is a reflection of who He is by nature. By nature, God is perfectly and eternally just and good. So anything God does is right. "Rightness" is not a standard outside of God.

Dave: God cannot do what goes against His nature. Therefore, God can commit no act of injustice.

Dave Gadbois

Pomp

DaveJes1979,

you cannot account for an ethical system using "only human values" since different humans hold to different values.

It is true but irrelevant that different humans hold different values. I think you've missed a crucial distinction: when I say that human values are sufficient to "account for" ethical systems, I mean that they are sufficient to explain the existence of ethical systems, not that they provide any ultimate foundation for ethical systems, in the sense that you mean.

If you have no foundation behind your ethical system, then that tells me that the ethical system you hold to is arbitrarily chosen - thus there is no epistemological compulsion that would lead me to adopt it.

No, my ethical system is not arbitrarily chosen. My personal ethical system is dictated by the logical consequences of my actions on the fulfillment of the values that I hold. I cannot arbitrarily decide that murder is all right, for example, because other human beings will reliably object to murder and punish me accordingly.

To put it another way: Why choose one set of "human values" over another?

This is a nonissue. I'm not concerned with what set of values you "choose" (go ahead, choose not to desire living, or choose not to value the presence of the people you care for), but with the strategies that will best allow you to fulfill those values, whatever they are, and there are very good reasons to choose one strategy (say, not murdering instead of murdering) over another.

Philosoft

You said this:<strong> What difference does it make why Christians follow a certain moral code that, if objective, should be obvious to everyone?

<strong> I was making a deliberate caricature of the Christian concept of salvation which nevertheless still shows that God repeatedly overlooks violations of his so-called objective moral code.

<strong> That we must believe such a thing is question begging. Show why there must be a philosophical basis for evolutionarily selected behaviors.

<strong> As I have mentioned before, we are empathetic in addition to survivalistic.

Bill Snedden

Of course, I have been following the thread, and your "argument" amounts to no more than your assertion that what you say is true is true. You have offered no evidence nor points of logic to reinforce your assertion.

It's easy to use your formulation to create my own "presuppositional" foundation:

Carl Sagan is by nature eternally and perfectly good and just. Therefore, Carl Sagan is the source of all moral value.

This "foundation" is clearly unfalsifiable without venturing outside of the presupposition. Is that any reason to consider it correct?

Your most likely response will be to trot out the Bible as proof of God's morally perfect nature. In response, I offer the many books by Carl Sagan (whose authorship is indisputable) wherein his own morally perfect nature is revealed.

Further, your "critiques" of "atheistic foundations" are no more than strawmen which you criticize based upon the unproven "truth" of your assertion.

Wishing doesn't make it so.

It is quite clear (to most of us, anyway), that "morality" cannot be divorced from humanity without making a mockery of it. Ethical principles must have their basis in human nature and norms if they are to have any value to humans at all.

Even further, without gain or loss, value is impossible. Therefore, a perfect, omnipotent, immortal being cannot possibly be said to actually value anything. How is a creature without values supposed to supply us with ours?

Regards,

Bill Snedden

[ May 22, 2002: Message edited by: Bill Snedden ]</p>

Vorador

Dave: sort of. What God does is a reflection of who He is by nature. By nature, God is perfectly and eternally just and good. So anything God does is right. "Rightness" is not a standard outside of God.


Is that to say that nothing God could ever do would ever be an injustice? By whos standards are you guaging God's moral superiority, here? Can you claim to know him?

Dave: God cannot do what goes against His nature. Therefore, God can commit no act of injustice.

Again, by what standards are you guaging the concept of 'injustice'? Your standards? Your standards are imperfect, becuse by your very nture you are imperfect according to your theology.

The question stands: Woud he or would he not commit genocide?

The answer: You cannot profess to know.

The real question is: Would you agree with it, were he to commit such an act?

[ May 22, 2002: Message edited by: Vorador ]

[ May 23, 2002: Message edited by: Vorador ]</p>

Jeb351

I think this quote just about sums it up...
"Morality is doing what is right no matter what you are told. Religion is doing what you are told no matter what is right." - Unknown

- Jeb