danielius

To Bumble Bee Tuna - what is your 'real' name? By the by, is your pseudonym real? I will be interested to hear your thoughts.

I can't remember being specially sarcastic about 'freethinkers', other than that they are about as free as 'free-lovers'. I find the term a contradiction.

Firstly, your comment: 'I could be wrong' is the same as saying, 'this is my view, except it mightn't be!'

Secondly, if you truly think you hold no thing to be absolutely true, than you are mistaken. It is saying: 'I hold nothing to be absolutely true, except this statement!'


You hold nothing to be absolutely true - except that you hold it to be absolutely true that you hold nothing to be absolutely true. By your own definition - that of holding a truth as absolute - the one with meaning remember, you hold a dogma. I'm sure it's not the only one.


Do things represent other things by their very nature? Can something be a 'thing of a thing' - a dog of a man, or a book of a sun? (Do not answer 'what about a son of a father?' The son is not a representation of the father. You do not see the father when you see the son.)

Is a ghost a thing too? If a ghost is unreal, and real is the same as exists, a ghost is unreal so it doesn't exist. It it doesn't exist, it isn't a thing, right?


Is non-existence real?

Also, I need to be clear on this: is your perception of the sunflower (which is different to everyone else's) real like the sunflower itself is real?

I'm not ignoring your point about 'degree of reality', I just don't believe we've reached the point in our debate where it can be positively agreed that reality is what you have claimed it to be.

Looking forward to your response,

Daniel

Biff the unclean

Danielius I'd like to ask a question.
What other topics do you feel it necessary to give such convoluted and evasive answers in?
For instance if I asked you "is there beer in your fridge?" would you be able to say yes or no and then give proof of why you believe what you do about the existence of beer? Or would you start going on about defining and redefining what the word fridge means? Would you become concerned about if a can of beer were more real than a Xerox of a can of beer?

Why do you consider behavior that is evasive and disingenuous if used in existential discussions of beer appropriate to use when talking about God?

Calzaer

Something just occured to me...

Is any world-view that believes in a Magic Happy Kingdom in the Sky "reasonable"?

Abel Stable

Danielius, I suggest you get off of the semantics train, because its headed nowhere. You're obfuscating to the point of giving me a headache with all this dogma business. Why is it so important to you?
No, you're just completely misunderstanding what he said. I believe he means that in the future he may learn something that could change his position...or possibly that it is impossible to estimate how one's beliefs may play out in the real world, and are therefore relative. I'm seeing a lack of ridgid dogmatic structure here, but I have the feeling you're in too deep now to consider anything but your convoluted definition. Dogmas are not subject to change. (whup! I guess that's a dogma! who cares? it means nothing.)
It doesn't seem like this is the case, but you sure want it to be for some reason. What does it matter either way? Why are you getting so worked up about this hill of beans?
I have no idea what this means or what you're trying to say with it. If it is another analogy, then you're just getting more & more confusing.....unless this thread is talking about ghost phenomena now.
Conceptually, yes. Physically/concretely, no.
Now don't try and take this as saying that your "degrees of reality" idea holds water. You're crossing into the realm of imagination. We can imagine all sorts things that do not exist, but our flights of fancy hardly effect reality.
What do you mean by "perception of the sunflower"? Of course, I suppose, your perception is real, because if it weren't, then you wouldn't be perceiving it. Nevertheless, I don't see what point you're trying to make with all of this.: "The sunflower vs. a perception of the sunflower" -- reality doesn't change depending upon perception, so what is the aim of the question? I don't get what you're trying to prove.

If this is in anyway connected to the question "Is Christianity a reasonable worldview?" you're only making it feel less reasonable than it already was.

Abel Stable

I thought I’d post this since it has to do with perception. It's a quote from director Werner Herzog, while talking about shooting his documentary film The Flying Doctors of East Africa. Sure, it may be just anecdotal- but its interesting. I recently read it, so its on my mind:

Jinto

I can answer that question. It's a common theist tactic: pretending that all beliefs are equally irrational - that is, they try to show that you accept one or more of your beliefs a priori, and then use that to say that it is not irrational to hold an existential claim to be true a priori. It's bloody illogical, and at best would be a tu quoque, and that's IF their comparisons didn't rely on a great deal of equivication. In this case, he wants to equivicate on the definition of dogma, watering it down so that we can be called dogmatic, and then use this to tell us that we are dogmatic in the more traditional sense, so as to defend his own obvious dogmatism. Here's a quote from one of his earlier posts:

The second thing is that there is no thing as 'freethought', as indeed there is no thing as 'free love'. Thought, as love, implies commitment, to a dogma as to a dog. To think is not to grow out, but to trim back. It is man's attempt to define his knowledge, by limiting it, as he limits his marriage or his garden. Let us all put our dogmas on the table

Oddly, he never acknowledged my response to that. This is another common theist tactic: ignoring reponses to their points. It lets them repeat the same arguments over and over without ever bothering to think aobut whether they might be wrong. While I admit that there may be time constraints due to the number of responses, the least he could do is try to address the common elements of our arguments. But I have yet to see in this debate a specific response to any point.

<edit>Correction: I see that he did in fact acknowledge the semantic arguments of Bumble Bee Tuna. My mistake.</edit>

Oddly enough, I also realize that past the first couple of posts none of his posts have directly adressed the point, even in a roundabout way. Instead, we have been focusing on idiotic semantic arguments. This is theist tactic #3: misdirection. I would like to see him tell us why belief in some supernatural deity is in any way justified form the available evidence, but I expect him to continue attacking atheist beliefs and atheism itself. This is because if he adressed the actual issue, we would very quickly see that his posts are without content. Of course, we see that anyway, bgut this prevents him from having to admit defeat.

BTW, to avoid charges of ad hominem and/or ad logicam, I hereby diclaim that the contents of this post are in any way an argument either for atheism or against Christianity, but merely my observations of common mistakes employed by Christians and danielius in particular.

Biff the unclean

And yet Jinto, if you assume that Dan is not a complete idiot you have to wonder what he hopes to accomplish by doing all of this? He must know that misdirection isn't a convincing argument and that bogging himself down with semantics makes him look bad.

My only thought is maybe he knows that no one will listen to him. By arguing so poorly he can label the Atheists as being "closed minded" and then award himself an "A" for Effort. Hey, he tried; it's not his fault that we wouldn't listen.

Goliath

Danielius,

Wrong yet again. I hold to no dogma of any kind.

Sincerely,

Goliath

AJ113

Try this:

Good to see the 'freethinkers' are free from bias and assumption.

Or are you going to tell us that this comment is "less real" than sarcasm?

Firstly, your comment: 'I could be wrong' is the same as saying, 'this is my view, except it mightn't be!'

Strawman. We all know that this is not what was meant. Everyone except you, that is.

Daneilus, may I be so bold as to say what everyone else is probably thinking?

Why don't you cut out the pretentious shite and tell us exactly what evidence there is to support your faith? We can argue all night long about your pedantic semantics, but the longer it goes on, the more credibility you lose, and the weaker your position becomes.

Now please stop dancing a merry dance and explain exactly why christianity is a reasonable worldview.

keyser_soze

seconded. The issue on the floor is the POINT. Please support it, and stop sidetracking. You would have been MUCH better off if you had followed the advice to lurk for a while and get to know everyone so you would know how your arguments stand scrutiny. So far you have placed no arguments but are relying on misdirection and other such dubious tactics. You have not addressed the point at all. I find Jinto's synopsis fully supports the events to this point.

You must decide whether you want to become another magus, or if you are willing to learn to think concretely and logically. You cannot hope to get more than the title of "honorary obfuscator" at this rate. You must change your tack, or give it up, because your arguments heretofore are transparent, and easily shown to be flawed.