Tercel

Typhon,
In your response to me you complain several times that I have interpreted a point as being addressed specifically to me when it was really addressed to the audience of this message-board at large, and that I should understand that not everything in this thread is all about me.

Now to some extent I can accept that it is perhaps true that as the only theist participating on a thread I have a tendency to develop a me vs you mentality and that I might percieve that anti-theistic points are being directed at me when they are in reality, not. However, it is also my observation that both of the posts I responded too seemed to be specifically directed at me. Your first post (July 6) was directly addressed to me as “Tercel,” and your second post (July 8) began by quoting an extract from one of my posts and your first comment reffered to “theists like yourself”, by whom you presumably meant me again. Clearly both these posts were at least in some part directed straight at me. Perhaps only part of the post was directed at me, while the rest was to the masses and I failed to discern each of the parts? In such a case, the mistake would seem to be mine, however you may wish to consider clarifying your posts in future if they are targeted at multiple people in order to avoid misunderstandings such as this.

Your suggestion that I do not own this thread could be interpreted as having a suitable resolution by my starting a new thread on the subject. I can do that if you so wish, however I am perfectly satisfied with using this thread and I see no reason to take up board space with a new one unless others feel it warrented.

Tercel

Tercel

Pompous Bastard,
Okay, I really have to ask: Why the name? From what I’ve seen you’re a nice guy and I would rank you high on the list of posters who are worth responding to.

This would seem to me to raise two strands of questions. How do you determine that the data is consistent? And on that note: In what way are you meaning “consistent” and what appeals to other items of potentially doubtful value (ie memory etc) does this determination involve?
The other questions would regard the Thomas Reid argument discussed in another thread recently which IIRC you played a minor role in. Sikh’s orginal version of the Thomas Reid argument (as derived from <a href="http://www.geocities.com/meta_crock/experience/Reid.htm" target="_blank">Metacrock’s argument here</a>) had this as a premise. This solution would hence not seem to resolve the difficulties completely.

You are arguing/granting/agreeing that the apparent consistency of the world makes it a reliable representation of some world. At this point I have two questions which may turn out to be one and the same.
Firstly, there would seem a potential for the charge of inconsistency in application of beliefs. While believing that you cannot prove the world truly exists or is real, you act as if it does. How would you explain such this apparent inconsistency?
Secondly: Why it is that you think we should be concerned by whether or not the world is “a reliable representation of <strong>some</strong> world”.
Note, in asking these questions, I am not trying to imply your position is wrong, or that no legitimate answer can be given: Rather I am intrigued to see if you can produce a fully consistent system which destroys my argument in this area.

I would say that there is absolutely no difference (from our point of view anyway) and it doesn’t matter. God may have done the one or the other, both of which acheive the same end and are indistinguishable (in their implications I mean) from our perspective.

Under such a view, is not the view that all “reality” is a projection of your own sub-conscious mind more parsimonious?

If I may repeat an statement I read some monts ago on another philosophy board which amused me:
<strong>I can only prove one of three things.
1) I exist.
2) A being which imagines me and everything else exists.
3) You strange, strange people exist.
Funny thing is, number two makes the most sense. </strong>
While admitting that the logic isn’t quite all there in more ways than one, it raises the interesting point of what existences are more intuitively a priori probable.

I don’t really follow your reasoning here. I would agree that belief in my god alters our actions in a significant manner. However I am unsure in which way you mean it is not a “safe” assumption. (eg Pascal’s Wager would say we should make it because it is a “safe” assumption) In what way is belief in the reality of the world we perceive “safe” when belief in God isn’t?


I don’t really have any insightful comments to make on the rest of your post. I accept evolutionary explanations though I am not convinced they do a heck of a lot of explaining, and I believe anything could be explained via evolution just as you accuse the design claimants of using empty explanations (a charge which I would agree with). Consider for example if there was no such thing whatsoever as morality. Social evolutionists would explain that this is because each person is competiting solely to have their own genes replicated and hence they look out for themselves only. Or consider if it was the case that everyone was completely altruistic towards other humans. Social evolutionists would explain that this is because it is advantageous to the species to act as a cooperative group. I admit this latter case is a slightly weaker explanation and bow to you knowledge of the current status of evolutionary theory as exceeding mine. However, given the potential of evolution to be used as an explanation to explain completely opposite observations (and hence anything in between), I hope you can understand if I am not completely impressed at power of evolutionary explanations. Basically they are completely untestable. They might be true or not, but the fact that we can explain it via evolution doesn’t seem to me to demonstrate anything any more than you would be impressed by such an explanation if it came from Design. Don’t get me wrong - I don’t reject evolution or the explanations it provides. However I am concerned that the unfalsibility of these claimed explanations gives them in reality no useful explanatory power.

Tercel

[ June 12, 2002: Message edited by: Tercel ]</p>

Vorkosigan

It is stated by many atheists that morality can be derived and explained completely by evolution.

Tercel, I think you have this all wrong.

Evolution explains why people have moral impulses, but does not appear to explain the content of moral beliefs, at least not fully.


They believe there is not objective morality.

Some atheists argue for objective morals without god.

However they act as if objective morality exists. This is inconsistent.

No, you accused me of this, so I feel compelled to clear up your misunderstanding. I do not argue that my morals are objective, rather, I believe that the world would be a better place if they were universalized. 'Universal' and
'objective' do not mean the same thing. A moral belief can be universalized by convention among all humans, without it ever being demonstrated to hold objective independent existence.

Hope this clears up your confusion.

Vorkosigan

Wizardry

[b]Tercel[b]

Never let it be said that you aren’t good at coming up with interesting arguments. Let’s see what you’ve got here.

I’ve never been one for objective morality and don’t know that much about its secular variants, so I really couldn’t argue this effectively.

Moral systems seem to me to be very much like forms of government. There is no correct answer per se, but some ideas work better than others and result in a better functioning society. Many different paradigms come to the table, debate determines the best system and at the end of it, hopefully, a better system emerges.

Why would you say that. Does that mean that no event has meaning then? No event lasts forever, yet I know that meaning is attributed to them by theists. Christians, for example, interpret Jesus’ death to be meaningful, even though it was not permanent.

Also, what exactly do you mean by “meaning”? What is it? Where does it come from? What good is it?

Well, unless you can independently verify that meaning does in fact exist, not to mention confirm the argument above, I really don’t see how this affects Metaphysical Naturalism at all, since the above statement by itself doesn’t show any sort of contradiction.

This seems like an emotional appeal to me. You just don’t seem willing to accept a philosophical position that doesn’t make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. While I understand the sentiment, it personally doesn’t bother me if there’s no point to it all, I’m enjoying the ride just find.

It turns out that quite a few characterizations of atheists seem to miss me entirely. Perhaps I am just a freak?

I consider morality to be the solution to the problem “How exactly do you get a bunch of self-interested humans to live together in a productive society?” The answer is to compromise a bit of your self-interests and be nice to those around you. Why be moral? There are obvious benefits to living in a society that far outweigh any loss of personal freedom. Failure to cooperate with the group will result in punishment or lack of cooperation by others, hence the frequent rediscovery of the Golden Rule in the ancient world.

Who is it exactly that is behaving as if things are actually right or wrong? Why am I not allowed to apply my moral standards to the world around me? I do it with all my other opinions. Doesn’t change the fact that they are still my opinions. I realize that not everybody shares my moral opinions, although I do think that everyone should agree with me, but that’s nothing unusual.

Peace out.

Pomp

Tercel,

Thank you for your very graceful response re: your conduct in this thread.

I'll reply to your most recent post to me later tonight.

Synaesthesia

I think it's hard to deny that objective morality exists at least in some sense. By that I mean with respect to a given value system, it is objectively true that there are actions which will or won't tend to serve those values.

Pomp

Tercel,

I really meant to write this last night, but my brain wasn’t working properly. I’ve made a list of each of your questions and/or comments, to which I will now respond.

0. Why did I pick my somewhat unusual handle?

A now-good friend’s first impression of me was “what a pompous bastard.” (I do tend to have something of an arrogant streak.) The epithet amused me, so I used it as my handle in an online game, and it sort of stuck. It’s been my primary online handle for about four years now. I’ve been using it for so long that I tend to forget that it’s ostensibly an insult unless someone points it out.

1. What do I mean by “consistent?”

Good question. As a rough definition, I consider any data set to be consistent if it obeys predictable laws or, in other words, is non-randomly determined. In addition, I consider any such data set to be a (partial) description of a world. Although it is certainly possible for a randomly determined data set to appear to describe a world, the larger the set, the less likely such a false impression is.

For example, The Lord of the Rings serves as a (partial) description of Middle Earth because each element in the data set (that is, each statement in Tolkein’s work) was non-randomly determined by reference to the world that Tolkein imagined. A similar work that was created by a random text generator (say we use a database of all nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc. in Tolkein’s work and let the RTG construct sentences using them) is almost certain to be inconsistent in some fashion, although a shorter work, say a few sentences or paragraphs, could probably be generated randomly without revealing inconsistencies.

2. How do I know that the data I observe are consistent?

In general, because there seem to be predictable laws that govern the data that I become aware of, as described above.

The logical response to this is to raise the possibility that such apparent predictability is simply an artifact of the manner in which my brain presents the world to me. I grant that this, indeed, a possibility (and, IMO, very likely to be at least partially true) but don’t think that it matters for my purposes, as I have been very careful to define all the portions of myself that are not conscious as part of my “jar.” If the apparent predictability of the world is an artifact of my brain, then the data set that I become aware of is a representation of the “world” of my brain.

You specifically mentioned the unreliability of memory, an observation with which I agree. However, as may be implied from what I’ve said so far, the apparent consistency, or near consistency, of memory indicates that it is created in a non-random fashion and, thus, is a representation of some world, even if that world is the world of the brain.

3. What about the Reid argument?

The weakness of the Reid argument, IMO, is that it fails to distinguish between propositions that we must accept if we are to navigate the world we perceive at all and propositions that are, at least in principle, decidable within that world. We accept that the world we perceive is “real” in some sense because we have no choice. We have no way to step outside of our own perceptions and question them in a larger context because, by definition, we can perceive only what we can perceive. Religious experience, on the other hand, can be and is evaluated in the larger context of the totality of our experience.

I’ll expand a bit more when I address “safe” assumptions and Pascal’s Wager.

4. Am I being inconsistent when I grant that I cannot really know if the world I perceive is real yet behave as if it is?

I don’t think so. I call the reality of the world a “safe” assumption because my behavior would not change if it were demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that the world I perceive was real, or if it were demonstrated to be unreal. Either way, my experience of the world is certainly real, and that experience is, by definition, the only arena in which I can act.

This is the point I was driving at when I asked if you thought there would be any relevant difference between living in a real world and living in a “divine matrix.” You could be in the “divine matrix” but, as we agree, it doesn’t really make a difference. Even if we somehow knew we were in such a matrix our behavior would not change, would it?

5. Why am I concerned with whether or not my perceptions are a reliable representation of some world?

I don’t know. My intent was only to demonstrate that there are good reasons for believing that they are. To tell you the truth, I find it impossible to imagine what it would be like if our perceptions were not representations of a world, so I’m afraid I can’t answer this question completely.

6. Is there any difference between living in a “real” world and living in a “divine matrix?”

As noted above, I agree completely.

7. Under such a view, is not the view that all “reality” is a projection of your own sub-conscious mind more parsimonious?

In a sense, yes. I’m not sure exactly where to draw the line between “jars” here. Does it make more sense to consider the world that we assume to exist as a single physical jar? Or, does it make more sense to consider the subconscious mind to be a jar in itself, nested within the larger jar of the physical world (thus making The Matrix into a situation where the jars are nested three deep rather than two deep)? In the case of the latter, yes, it is more parsimonious to assume that all reality is the product of the subconscious mind. In the case of the former, there is no difference between the two views.

In either case, I experience the world as real, so it matters little to me if it really exists out there or is just a show put on by my mind for my benefit. It also occurs to me that, even if my subconscious is simulating all of this for me, a simulation of sufficient depth is indistinguishable from the real thing (once it gets deep enough it is, in fact, the real thing!), so the simulation itself is “real” in one sense.

8. Why is belief in a real world a “safe” assumption while belief in a god (as in Pascal’s Wager) is not?

As may be clearer after the rest of this post, I’m using “safe” in a somewhat unusual sense here. By “safe” assumption I mean an assumption that is epiphenomenal. The existence of the real world is a “safe” assumption because I would not change my behavior in any way if it were somehow shown to be false. Even if the world I perceive is ultimately false, acting as though it were real has certainly proved to be an effective way to manipulate the perceptions I experience. The existence of a god is not a “safe” assumption because such a belief is emphatically not epiphenomenal. My behavior would certainly change in a number of ways if a god could be shown to exist.

I apologize for any confusion created by my nonstandard use of the term “safe assumption.”

9. What about evolutionary explanations of morality?

While I grant that there are certain explanatory weaknesses in evolutionary theory, I don’t find them as telling as you apparently do. At any rate, I don’t really have anything exciting or new to say her. I’m much more interested in our other thread of discussion anyway.

Pomp

Synaesthesia,

I think it's hard to deny that objective morality exists at least in some sense. By that I mean with respect to a given value system, it is objectively true that there are actions which will or won't tend to serve those values.

I agree. In two sentences here, you've demolished the commonly repeated notion that a subjective morality is equivalent to no morality at all. No matter what I happen to subjectively value, there are objectively efficient and objectively poor means by which to pursue my ends. It is these means that are the proper subject, IMO, of morality.

Vorkosigan

7. Under such a view, is not the view that all “reality” is a projection of your own sub-conscious mind more parsimonious?

No. This explanation does not account for where my subconscious mind obtains the information necessary to build a world. Nor does it explain the consistency with which the world appears to operate, since my subconscious is known to err.

Vorkosigan

Tercel

PB,

Thanks for answering my questions clearly. Hopefully I'll be able to remember why I asked the questions in the first place...

<strong>Consistency</strong>
Okay you said that since the world is apparently consistent, it appears to be a reliable representation of some world. My concern here, I think, was really that you're just pushing the problem one level further back, since your observation of consistency most probably depends on an assumption of the reliability of memory.
Your explanation serves to demonstrate that we have the same understanding of the word "consistency".
On the subject of memory, you pointed to the consistency of memory itself as suggesting it is a reliable representation of some world. On which I would agree with you.

<strong>The Reid Argument</strong>
Now the Reid Argument seems to me to boil down to the idea that since we accept things as reliable representations when they are consistent, and religious experience is often consistent, that it thus should be accepted as a reliable representation.
You respond that:
I agree with what you say here, the argument makes no effort to distinguish the two. This obviously leads to the question of whether the two should be distinguished and why. Now it seems to me that the ability to navigate the world we perceive is fundamentally important for only one reason: That it is beneficial to us to be able to navigate -and hopefully have some degree of control over- the world of our perceptions. The apparent consistency of the world, ensures that we are capable of navigating the world depicted by our senses. Why bother to do so though, if we cannot be sure that the world depicted by our senses actually exists? The answer is, as far as I can see: Because it is beneficial to us.

Turning back to your two propositions on which you say the Reid argument fails, I am not sure I see any difference between the two. If you could prove absolutely there exists no God and that all religious experience is really false, then I would agree there is a difference. Assuming the definition of God isn't logically contradictory (and even then it might be still considered valid if God is believed to transcend logic), that can never be done: At best there can only ever be suggestive evidence for the negative case. And thus to me there seems to be no difference between the two propositions. To do something because it is beneficial (or its Expected Value is beneficial) seems to be an equally valid principle in both cases. Hence it would seem that if the individual finds it beneficial to believe in God or believe their religious experiences to be true, then I cannot see in what way they can be less justified in doing so than they can be in navigating their perceived world. Does your distinction provide a way out of this dilemma that I have missed?

Later on under section 7, you say:
I hope you can see how this corresponds to my argument: The key phrase here being "it matters little to me". If you thus agree that how much it matters to you is the important thing, then is there any way to escape the problem of assuming God if it's useful?

<strong>Is behaving as if the world exists, while not being sure it does so, inconsistent?</strong>
This was a bit of a trick question in a way, since exactly the same charge would apply to me. I feel that my system of doing that which is beneficial provides a sufficient answer to the charge, however I was intrigued to see if you could devise a solution which was different.
It is your answer to this question which most concerns me about your distinction between "safe" assumptions and non-safe ones. You say:
Later regarding "safe" assumptions, you say:
I do not agree with you here. Consider the movie The Matrix again. Did Neo's behaviour change when he discovered the world was not a real one? Of course it did. His behaviour changed to reflect the actions he felt were the most beneficial under the state of affairs he was now convinced existed.

You seem to think the situation is comparable with a "divine matrix" vs the standard world is real and created by God, however I must disagree. I'm not even convinced the two ideas actually represent different things. If God created the world then whether it actually exists floating out there somewhere (if indeed there exists anywhere or anything beyond the mind of God in which it could "float") or whether it is just something perceived by each and every person in it, give rise to no meaningful difference whatsoever as far as I can see. In recognising the world to be a creation of God and dependent on Him, we are in a way recognising the existence of the "divine matrix" even when we call the world "real". What it boils down to is that no behavioural change whatsoever would result from knowing which of these two possibilities was true (assuming we already know that one of them is true). However as Neo's behavioural changes in The Matrix demonstrate, our knowledge regarding the true existence of the world can and does affect our behaviour.

So to summarise this post, I have two points here:
1. I think your suggestion that the world is a "safe" assumption is false.
2. I would like to know how your system manages (if it does) to escape from the consequence of justifying the assumption of God assuming that making such an assumption was shown to be beneficial.

Tercel