little_monkey
atheist
Note that the intent of that post #102 was -- it is unlikely that one would find a pig in a mosque -- I don't think any Muslim would find that offensive. Rather, they would be inclined to agree.
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Exploring Atheism
- Thread starter maro
- Start date
Note that the intent of that post #102 was -- it is unlikely that one would find a pig in a mosque -- I don't think any Muslim would find that offensive. Rather, they would be inclined to agree.
maro
muslimah
well ,a thought came to my mind ,i might be wrong about it ,but i want to share it with you..When i say the Iron is hard ? is that judgment objective ? subjective ? or both ? When i say the leaves are green..the honey is sweet...the glass is transparent while the wall is opaque..Are all those alleged characters objective ? subjective ? or both ? Are they Real ? or only meaningful in the eyes of the beholder ? (i mean in the nervous system of the beholder ) , I would say both...Actually the molecules of the iron which i claim to be hard are rarefacted and breakaway...and each molecule consists of rarefacted atoms...and each atom consists of rarefacted electrons and protons....It's just my nervous system translating that certain degree of approach as "Hard" . Also the green leaves are not really green..It's just my nervous system translating a certain wavelenght as "green"...There is no green or red colour..but only waves and vibrations..Also the sweetness of the honey is not an objective trait as it seems to be...they are only my taste buds making that decision..but still some other organism may think otherwise... When i say the wall is opaque...i guess i am only describing the disability of my sense of vision to see throught the rarefacted structure of the wall....IMHO ,it's very hard ,if not impossible to draw a clear line of discrimination between what is objective and what is subjective...becuase we can't percieve the world except by our nervous systems...which are not qualified to experience any objective fact without giving it a code of its own....You say ...9-10ths_Penguin said:
And this what really matters...that we share the same idea..be it objective or subjective...we all agree that butterflies are beautiful creatures..that Tom cruise is handsome...i agree it's hard to define the objective criteria that is being translated in our minds as "beautiful ", but that doesn't mean they don't exist..
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Gunfingers
Happiness Incarnate
One of my favorite quotes on that topic:
"I have this class," she said, "on Social Psychology. And the guy who teaches it, he said the amount of the universe a human can experience is statistically, like, zero percent. You've got this huge universe, trillions of trillions of miles of empty space between galaxies, and all a human can perceive is a little tunnel a few feet wide and a few feet long in front of our eyes. So he says we don't really live in the universe at all, we live inside our brains. All we can see is like a blurry little pinhole in a blindfold, and the rest is filled in by our imagination. So whatever we think of the world, whether you think the world is cruel or good or cold or hot or wet or dry or big or small, that comes entirely from inside your head and nowhere else."
From John Dies at the End.
"I have this class," she said, "on Social Psychology. And the guy who teaches it, he said the amount of the universe a human can experience is statistically, like, zero percent. You've got this huge universe, trillions of trillions of miles of empty space between galaxies, and all a human can perceive is a little tunnel a few feet wide and a few feet long in front of our eyes. So he says we don't really live in the universe at all, we live inside our brains. All we can see is like a blurry little pinhole in a blindfold, and the rest is filled in by our imagination. So whatever we think of the world, whether you think the world is cruel or good or cold or hot or wet or dry or big or small, that comes entirely from inside your head and nowhere else."
From John Dies at the End.
Magic Man
Reaper of Conversation
Um...Tom Cruise is not handsome to everyone, like me for instance. Iron is hard, relatively, although that is slightly subjective, but I don't know of anyone who would disagree with that statement. Leaves are green (unless it's autumn and they're gold or red...). Glass is transparent, and a wall is opaque. They are not value judgements or opinions. Beauty is subjective because it's not a set concept.
Don't you mean "unlike me for instance"?
Magic Man
Reaper of Conversation
Don't you mean "unlike me for instance"?
Well, yes, of course. I am the exception, though. I didn't want to bring that up here, but you are correct.
maro
muslimah
forget about Tom cruise..how about the pictures in post # 87 ?..don't we all agree they are beautiful ?
( Although i think Tom cruise is really handsome :flirt: )
Both, I think. You have your own meaning for "hard" that may or may not match mine, but at the same time, any given sample of iron (or any solid material) will have some value on something like the Rockwell hardness scale, which is an objective measure.
I'd say both as well. Each one of those has both an objective and subjective meaning.
It's not just your nervous system. Hardness is something that can be measured. The subjectivity comes in how hard or soft something has to be before you consider it to be "hard" or "soft".
I disagree. IMO, colours exist; they're defined by their wavelengths.
Sugar content is measureable. Whether you consider honey to have enough sugar for you to consider it "sweet" is subjective.
I don't think that's a case of subjectivity; I think that when we describe something as "opaque", we usually imply "within the normal spectrum of human vision". I don't recall ever hearing a blind person describe a window as "opaque" just because he couldn't see through it.
I suppose in one sense, you're right: there is no such thing as an objective perception, since everything we perceive is filtered through us.
But the fact that they're hard to define doesn't mean they do exist, either.
Also, "objective" implies universality. Commonality to a group of people or even to all people doesn't necessarily make a set of subjective criteria "objective".
Gunfingers
Happiness Incarnate
I file bugs, snakes, and fish in my "Ew, icky" folder. So no, in the case of a few of those i did not find them particularly beautiful.
Tom Cruise on the other hand...he's dreamy!
Autodidact
Intentionally Blank
Hi maro:
I'm going to try to to respond to your OP, not sure if I understand exactly what you are getting at. I'm thinking that your question has to do with how atheists think the universe came to be, and be the way it is, if it was not created by God. Is that right?
Of course, I only speak for myself.
First, I don't start from the position of "I know that Allah created the universe, now I'll look around to see how I know that," or anything like that. I try to start from scratch. Here I am, in the world, with the abilities and information that I have; what can I figure out about how it got here.
I hope you will agree that this stance is more likely to result in a correct answer than if you start with the answer and try to justify it.
Further, it seems to me from the get-go that I should try to set aside my childhood religious training, because it doesn't make sense to me that something is true in Peshawar but false in Salt Lake City. God is either God or He isn't, in Mumbai, Tokyo and New Orleans.
I try to start with the minimum assumptions necessary to explore the question, the assumptions that all of us use every day in every other part of our lives, such as the basic rules of logic, the idea that there is a real world out there that exists apart from me, that we share and can talk about, that I can learn about through my senses and the like.
Of course I don't assume that God either exists or doesn't, because that's the question I'm trying to answer.
With me so far?
I'm going to try to to respond to your OP, not sure if I understand exactly what you are getting at. I'm thinking that your question has to do with how atheists think the universe came to be, and be the way it is, if it was not created by God. Is that right?
Of course, I only speak for myself.
First, I don't start from the position of "I know that Allah created the universe, now I'll look around to see how I know that," or anything like that. I try to start from scratch. Here I am, in the world, with the abilities and information that I have; what can I figure out about how it got here.
I hope you will agree that this stance is more likely to result in a correct answer than if you start with the answer and try to justify it.
Further, it seems to me from the get-go that I should try to set aside my childhood religious training, because it doesn't make sense to me that something is true in Peshawar but false in Salt Lake City. God is either God or He isn't, in Mumbai, Tokyo and New Orleans.
I try to start with the minimum assumptions necessary to explore the question, the assumptions that all of us use every day in every other part of our lives, such as the basic rules of logic, the idea that there is a real world out there that exists apart from me, that we share and can talk about, that I can learn about through my senses and the like.
Of course I don't assume that God either exists or doesn't, because that's the question I'm trying to answer.
With me so far?