Ch. 13: Faith

Interbane · Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 11:17 am Post subject:

Robert: "Well, with the greatest of due respect, Burton is wrong. Evolution is absolutely 100% certain."

Unfortunately it's not. I believe it with absolute certainty, but that is my belief. You believe the same I see. The reality is, we must maintain that there is for example, one in a billion to the billionth power that there is a chance that we've missed something that will throw a wrench in the theoretical gears. If you can prove absolutely that we aren't merely avatars in the video game of advanced aliens, you'd reduce that fraction by a small amount, but it would still not be an absolute certainty.

Robert Tulip · Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 6:41 pm Post subject:

DWill · Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 9:16 pm Post subject:

Interbane · Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 9:59 pm Post subject:

DWill: "Does knowledge have to be understood as absolute knowledge anyway, in order to be useful to us?"

That's a good rhetorical question, and I agree with the answer.

Robert: "...Hume's stupid idea that maybe the sun will not rise tomorrow."

What's so stupid about that?

Robert: "...that faith should be in science not in superstition."

I had a debate a few years ago on this forum with MadArchitect about faith. After many pages, we agreed that there should be a distinction with regards to defining faith. There is "simple faith", which is our faith in our senses, and faith in those things that are almost utter certainties(the sun will come up tomorrow). Simple faith should be had at all times to avoid entering that endless deconstructionist nihilism.

Then there's "complex faith", which is a faith in an ideology, theology, person, etc. In this sense, faith alone is useless. A foundation of reasoning, evidence, facts, etc. must first be built. Since this foundation alone lacks absolute certainty, faith is the glue that we have to hold it together. The whole that is created allows us to trust, and allows us to have confidence.

If there are foundational gaps too large, or there isn't enough of a foundation, faith is again useless. I see a gaping chasm in religion, but since the central tenet of religion is faith, it's pushed down peoples throats so mush that they build a bridge with it to span the chasm.

Robert: "The stakes are too high to accept that maybe science is wrong."

Are you assuming a dichotomy, where science is either right or wrong? Perhaps some of the conclusions we arrive at via the scientific method may be wrong, but the fact that we have advanced technology says that at the very least, the scientific method is successful at coming within close proximity to the truth by eliminating what is false. The truth of science could be thought of as being on a sliding scale rather than simply a dichotomy. I'll add that I think it's bumping elbows with the truth end of that scale based on its results.

Robert Tulip · Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 12:12 am Post subject:

Interbane · Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 1:07 am Post subject:

Robert: "Leaving open a sophistical chink of doubt may seem logical but it gives a moral room to believers in superstition which I feel is unwarranted."

It seems you're indirectly admitting absolute truth isn't attainable, yet we should overlook this admission to circumvent superstitious proposals. Knowing something yet believing differently doesn't fly for me.

Robert: "What I am advocating is an evolution of scientific thought away from total skepticism towards a recognition that science connects us to the absolute."

Science proves nothing absolutely true, no matter how much you might wish it. It only proves things wrong. What is left of any given target of experimentation is then a fair approximation of the truth. The workings of the scientific method may appear skeptical in nature, but on closer examination it's little more than trial and error. If something fails, document it as false and try something else. If the results of an experiment finally correspond exactly to the hypothesis, the resulting theory still isn't considered absolutely true. It's considered "as of yet not able to be disproven". There is a huge difference.

"The way I interpret this in scientific terms is that Christ is like an artery connecting human existence to absolute truth, ie to the nature of the universe."

You used scientific terms, but the sentence as a whole pulls those terms out of context via analogy, and the sentence remains entirely religious. You're coming very close to abusing the meaning of science in an attempt at a marriage between science and religion.

Robert Tulip · Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 4:39 am Post subject: Falsifying Popper

Penelope · Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 3:25 pm Post subject:

Robert...I want to post something here to support your very erudite argument towards faith.

And maybe...someone will read this and rejoice.....

You are obviously a very educated, and thinking, feeling person.

There are those on this forum..who are thinking...but ignoring the feeling..

I have, honestly learned a lot on here....I have learned to take more into account 'facts'....I have learned to reject preconceived notions.

But, none-the-less....there is something more about us than flesh and blood, more than the five senses.....
We are something more....

DWill · Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 4:00 pm Post subject: Re: Falsifying Popper

Robert Tulip · Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 5:50 pm Post subject: Re: Falsifying Popper

Interbane · Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 5:58 pm Post subject:

EDIT - Your post you just made about altering the definition. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analytic_proposition

Robert: “Positivist disciples of Hume and Popper say they “know” that it is possible that all human history is an alien dream. I argue such “knowledge” is absurd.”

The alien dream is an explanatory hypothetical belief to undermine attempts at absolute knowledge by showing that there is an alternative to perceived reality. The problem is the claimed knowledge of these disciples requires the same overextended leap of faith used by deists. It is absurd, and I disagree with this following my prior logic; the leap of faith should only be had after it has a proper foundation. It is, however, useful as an analogy that if you cannot disprove it, there will always have an infinitesimally small chance it is true.

Robert: “The fact that I cannot “prove” that our planet exists to your exalted standards of positivist faith indicates that I am suggesting different standards for knowledge. “

The presumption that our knowledge is absolute seems arrogant to me. It leaves us vulnerable to overlook flaws in our theories. I think it’s healthy to maintain our knowledge with a degree of separation from absolute so that we never close the doors on potential revisions that make them better, or incorporate them into higher level theories.

Robert: “There is a good discussion of related issues in Martin Heidegger’s Being and Time, where he argues that human ‘being in the world’ is a necessary assumption for thought and so is unproveable without a leap into circular reasoning.”

It is a necessary assumption, I agree. That is why we must make the leap of ‘simple faith'(read assumption). As an assumption, it is still not absolute, but we can maintain it as certain for all practical purposes with a small bridge of simple faith.

Robert: “I am arguing that the axiom that absolute truth is attainable is similarly useful, including as a strategy to circumvent superstitious proposals, in your felicitous phrase.”

Thanks, but my words aren't feline. I think superstitious proposals should be met head on instead of ignoring what is true in an attempt to circumvent them. That is my opinion, and circumventing such idiocy would make me smile. Question: What else is the idea that [absolute truth is attainable] good for?

Robert: “I think Popper’s theory is crap. What about the successes of science?”

Yeah, Popper was incredibly stupid. Anyways, the successes are all around us, just a glimpse at our technological lives show this. Being 99.99999% true is, although not absolute, enough for me. Also, even though not absolute, they are still successes. With regards to that itty bitty bit of uncertainty, I’ll make a small leap of faith and never mention it again until it becomes relevant to mention, such as in this thread.

Robert: “Sorry, but science has found that planets travel in ellipses, and used this knowledge to send probes to the far reaches of the solar system. If the knowledge was false we would not have close up pictures of Saturn. Case closed.“

Let me reopen that case. We could be within one meter of our target, and there’d still be room for an error in the theory. For example, consider the Pioneer Anomalies.

Robert: “Sure, we don’t know everything, but what we do know is true. If we are not sure it is not knowledge. If it is true it cannot be falsified.“

That’s assuming a rigid dichotomy. I fear you’ve ignored my last post. Rather than being falsified, almost every theory we have today has been shown to need minor changes to come closer to the truth at some point in it’s history. It isn’t falsification, but neither are the theories absolutely true. Versions or parts or the structuring of theories are shown to be false, so modifications are made then the theories are retested.

Robert: “If we know we know. You are arguing there is no such thing as knowledge. That is silly.”

Don’t put words into my mouth. I’m saying there’s no such thing as absolute knowledge. We can make the minor leap of faith to “be sure” of the knowledge we have, but that doesn’t make it absolute.

Robert: ““The meaning of science” deserves abuse if dogmatic Popperians use it to claim there is no certainty in the world.”

Or you could be wrong and are abusing it undeservingly.

Robert: “My God, you aren’t even sure that the earth goes around the sun!!”

Again, don’t put words into my mouth. I am sure the earth goes around the sun.

Robert: “…what is now required is a synthetic integration between faith and reason.

Yes, since after the foundation that reasoning assists in constructing, we use faith as the glue. But it is simple faith and not complex faith.

What you're proposing is starting to become repetetive with the reasoning you're using, and it seems to be even less reasonable the more you attempt to explain it. Instead of attempting to brow beat me into agreeing with you, convince your fingers to spit out stronger reasoning. Also, please stop putting words in my mouth.

Robert Tulip · Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2008 8:31 am Post subject:

I’ve just read Burton’s interview with Scientific American (thanks!) and the comments there. One I agree with is


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