Facts vs evidence

[mikkel_the_dane]

Of course we often use "is" in a broader sense than the narrow, formalized use it has in logic. What is the relevance?

We can often translate informal language into formal statements, as long as we understand what concepts are being communicated. When we do that, then "is" only has one meaning.

Well, yes. But in everyday language some people confuse the rock is of the color grey with 2 plus 2 is 4 with the meaning of life is ...

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I'm not sure I'm following what you're saying here. Can you rephrase it for dummies?

If we do cause and effect for a natural world, then subjectivity is a case of cause and effect happening in brains as in the caused by the replication of the fittest genes. It is natural/physical but not objective.

 

[Nakosis]

Well, I know nothing and I don't even know that. But that is just one version of understanding knowledge. But that is philosophy of science and even more generally philosophy as such.

Don't know if I told you but it is the basis of my pseudo-name.
nakosis means the psychosis of believing you know something.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Don't know if I told you but it is the basis of my pseudo-name.
nakosis means the psychosis of believing you know something.

Well the standard old school version of knowledge is justified true belief. That one doesn't hold up, so in a sense there is no knowledge in the strong sense of true or with proof.
Rather when I use know, I mean a state of mind that appears to work. But note appears.

 

[PureX]

Is it really evidence then or just a premise.

It's inconclusive evidence.

Even unimaged possibilities?

That's a moot concept.

I imagine there are possibilities I haven't imagined. How can I know what they are?

You can't. That's why it's a moot concept.

If imagination is everything and everything imaginable is possible, ...

No one is asserting that.

... then God existing and not existing are concurrent states that cannot logically exist as real at the same time.

Unless our concept of existence is incomplete. Which is very likely given that we already have determined that the universe was pre-determined and therefor is not the sum total of all that exists or can exist.

A possibility is not actual by default.

No one has claimed that it is.

What I have stated is that you don't appear to like science and seem to see all of it as scientism.

Scientism is the habit of presuming science to be the only valid method of determining or defending a proposed truth.

I believe God exists without evidence and your grasping at imaginary straws is not evidence for God.

God is an imagined conclusion. As are they all.

It is possible that my God and whatever it is you call God are not the actual God.

"Actuality" is about functionality, not truth.

All you are saying is that people that believe in God are not lying when they say they believe.

What we believe is irrelevant to anyone but ourselves. All belief is, is adopting a position of self-assumed righteousness. "I believe I am right". "I believe my reality is reality."

That is evidence for what people believe and not evidence for what they believe exists. How do you not get that?

Of course it is. How do you not get that "what exists" is an imagined belief?

I'm not an atheist and I can still see that most of what you are saying is purely imagination.

But what you can't see is that "reality" and "existence" are imaginary meta-concepts happening in our minds that are derived from a jumble of incoherent sensory input that we then sift through using logic and imagination to create. So when you claim "X" is imaginary as though there is anything that is NOT imaginary, you are revealing this blindness.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

It's inconclusive evidence.

That's a moot concept.

You can't. That's why it's a moot concept.



Unless our concept of existence is incomplete. Which is very likely given that we already have determined that the universe was pre-determined and therefor is not the sum total of all that exists or can exist.

No one has claimed that it is.

Scientism is the habit of presuming science to be the only valid method of determining or defending the truth.

God is an imagined conclusion. As are they all.

"Actuality" is about functionality, not truth.

What we believe is irrelevant to anyone but ourselves. All belief is, is adopting a position of self-assumed righteousness. "I believe I am right".

Of course it is. How do you not get that "what exists" is an imagined belief?

But what you can't see is that "reality" and "existence" are imaginary meta-concepts happening in our minds that are derived from a jumble of incoherent sensory input that we then sift through using logic and imagination to create. So when you claim "X" is imaginary as though there is anything that is NOT imaginary, you are revealing your blindness.

@Dan From Smithville
You can't point to the world just as you can't point to God.

In effect science is philosophy for what a given person accepts as axiomatic assumptions in their individual thinking.
There is a reason it is methodological naturalism and not philosophical naturalism. But that is not science. That is philosophy.

 

[PureX]

You can't point to the world just as you can't point to God.

... Unless you are pointing at your own mind.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

... Unless you are pointing at your own mind.

Yeah, but even that ends up as in effect as tautology or X is X. But that is not all of your experiences. It is just that X is X.

 

[osgart]

Evidence can tell conclusively and objectively a lot about physical behaviour, how physical things behave, identifying phenomena, and predicting physical outcomes. However beyond that what is inferred about evidence is philosophy.

To say there's no purposes in nature is philosophy and intuition. It's simply not ingrained in the evidence.

To say there is purposes in nature is also philosophy and intuition. That's the intuition I hold to. And at the end of the day it may bring more capability to humanity, but we'll see.

Sticking to evidence cannot tell you why things are as they are. It's interesting that people claim so absolute a truth with philosophy masquerading as evidence.

Philosophical argument may contain knowledge in it, but someone will always easily dismiss it, in favor of other philosophies.

So doing philosophy is an endless cycle of I'm right and you're wrong. Yet many people claim truth with it and call that science. Religion claims truth as well.

So a person may have truth objectively or subjectively and still there's no scientific way of concluding that truth. Truth being in accordance with facts, and also the way reality actually is.

 

[muhammad_isa]

So you believe humans are the intelligence behind nature..

No. They are one of the signs of G-d's greatness.

 

[Audie]

Evidence can tell conclusively and objectively a lot about physical behaviour, how physical things behave, identifying phenomena, and predicting physical outcomes. However beyond that what is inferred about evidence is philosophy.

To say there's no purposes in nature is philosophy and intuition. It's simply not ingrained in the evidence.

To say there is purposes in nature is also philosophy and intuition. That's the intuition I hold to. And at the end of the day it may bring more capability to humanity, but we'll see.

Sticking to evidence cannot tell you why things are as they are. It's interesting that people claim so absolute a truth with philosophy masquerading as evidence.

Philosophical argument may contain knowledge in it, but someone will always easily dismiss it, in favor of other philosophies.

So doing philosophy is an endless cycle of I'm right and you're wrong. Yet many people claim truth with it and call that science. Religion claims truth as well.

So a person may have truth objectively or subjectively and still there's no scientific way of concluding that truth. Truth being in accordance with facts, and also the way reality actually is.

I think Feynman summed the value of
philosophy very nicely with the "philosophical"
proof that it's impossible to know the inside of a brick.
For lo, if you break it to look inside, you just create a
new outside.

The utility of "philosophy" here
on RF is 99% for the religionists who have no factual
information to offer and whose " logic" only works
in the philosophical fantasy world where the inside
of a brick is forever unknowable.

" Metaphysics " works much the same way, but
has the advantage of requiring no intellectual discipline at all.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I think Feynman summed the value of
philosophy very nicely with the "philosophical"
proof that it's I possible to know the inside of a brick.
For lo, if you break it to look inside, you just create a
new outside.

The utility of "philosophy" here
on RF is 99% for the religionists who have no factual
information to offer and whose " logic" only works
in the philosophical fantasy world where the inside
of a brick is forever unknowable.

" Metaphysics " works much the same way, but
has the advantage of requiring no intellectual discipline at all.

Yeah, objective observable value. He took out his scientism value meter and according to the international scientism standard for objective value calibrated the instrument, got the predicted value according to the scientism theory of value.

 

[MikeF]

For me, logically possible means not yet proven impossible. Two kinds of things fit this definition - things that we know actually can happen like a life extinguishing asteroidal impact, or things that actually are impossible but we don't know that yet. Right now, the possibility of traveling back in time or through a wormhole can't be said to be impossible, but maybe they are and will be understood to be some day.

I would disagree with this position. If something is impossible then it cannot be logically possible. To my mind, logically possible means that within a specified abstract system, something is logically possible if it does not violate the defining elements, properties, and rules of that particular system. For example, we have the abstract system that corresponds to, or is synthetic to, realtiy, the real world, or the physical world, however you wish to label it. The boundaries, properties, and rules of this system are exactly those of the real world, by definition. This is the system in which we use the abstract tools of language and mathematics to communicate our thoughts and ideas related to the real, physical world. Beyond this system slaved to reality, we can create an infinite variety of abstracts sytems, from mathematics to the imagined world of Harry Potter, each with its own set of defining elements, properties, and rules.

Given all of that above, before the first airplane was built and flown, it would be correct to say that the idea of an airplane was logically possible, for although no such thing yet existed, it was possible within the rules and properties of the system to which the logic is being applies. Likewise, we can imagine an interaction between characters found in the Harry Potter book series that involved the use of magic, but was not an interaction that occurred within the book series. We can characterize the use of magic in our imagined interaction as logically possible based upon the rules and charateristics of magic in the fictional world established by the author J.K. Rowling.

The big hinderance in determining what is logically possible in our system synthetic to the real world is that we do not know all the defining elements, properties, and rules of acual reality, of what we want our "Real World" abstract system to remain synthetic to. Your position would have us freely put all that is infinitely impossible into the set of that which is possible, and I see that as a problem. First and foremost, it masks or obfuscates the reality that we do not know all the defining properties and rules of reality. In my opinion it is much better to say "The possibility is unknown as we have insufficient information upon which to make a determination." than it is to say "It is possible because it has yet to be proven impossible." The former speaks more clearly to the actual state of things.

 

[MikeF]

I'll have to think about that. Perhaps that may be so. Certainly, humans are the only source I'm aware of in the physical world. Even the books were written by people.

Of course, I have an issue with what many mean by inspired. I have never considered it to mean dictated, but I think many do.

If, after thinking about it you wish to discuss further, I am happy to do so.

I find your statement "Certainly, humans are the only source I'm aware of in the physical world." intriguing. Does specifically referencing "the physical world" mean to imply the existence of worlds other than our physical world of experience?

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

To say there's no purposes in nature is philosophy and intuition.

It's also a leap of faith. In my opinion, the proper way to phrase it is that there is no evidence that nature was created by an intelligence for a reason.

Yes, Baha'is believe in the God of Abraham, but that is different from saying we believe that everything in the Old Testament that is written about God is actually true. I cannot speak for all Baha'is but I do not believe in the stories in the Old Testament that turn God into a man.

I suppose that your criteria is what Baha'u'llah taught, and that you believe all of that without editing. It's interesting to consider how much of that Old Testament description of Yahweh can be disregarded and still consider it the same god, which is analogous to deciding how much of the New Testament description of Jesus can be disregarded and still call what's left a(n) historical Jesus. For example, if everything said about Jesus except the supernatural and miraculous happened, we could call that the New Testament character but embellished. But as one starts adding to the I-don't-believe list - for example, "I don't think he had apostles, or came from Nazareth, or gave the Sermon on the Mount" - at what point is it no longer that personage?

This is a variation of the sorites paradox, as when we ask how many hairs have to fall out of a head to call it bald, or what day did a bald person go from not bald to bald. When does the god of Abraham become the god of Baha'u'llah?

The big hinderance in determining what is logically possible in our system synthetic to the real world is that we do not know all the defining elements, properties, and rules of acual reality, of what we want our "Real World" abstract system to remain synthetic to.

It sounds to me that what you are referring to is the subset of logically possible that is actually possible. If so, I agree. We have no way to decide in many cases whether a proposition is actually possible or merely not yet known to be impossible.

If something is impossible then it cannot be logically possible.

Agreed. All claims of fact are one or the other - known to be impossible or not - that those not known to be impossible are by default logically possible, and that no claim is both or neither.

Your position would have us freely put all that is infinitely impossible into the set of that which is possible

I don't know what infinitely impossible means, but yes, I call things possible until they are known to be impossible. Suppose Maria died this morning. You were expecting to have lunch with her, and she is nowhere to be seen. You consider the list of possible reasons. Maybe she forgot or her car broke down. But these things were in fact impossible if she's dead. Is it wrong to call them possible before you know that they are in fact impossible? I say not. It is in this sense that we can use the word possible to refer to the impossible.

You mean that you do not understand the purpose.. It does not mean that there is no purpose.

No, it does not mean that he (and I) don't understand the purpose, which presupposes that there is one. It means that if an intelligent designer with a purpose exists, we don't have sufficient evidence of it to believe that at this time.

You can claim that the rain has no purpose, but many others would disagree, and see that it DOES have purpose.

Why would that matter? You likely make that claim, but it has no persuasive power without an accompanying sound, evidenced supporting argument.

Of course people can deny that there is a purpose

Once again, the proper claim is that there is no apparent purpose. That's different from denial, but very similar to the problem with the claim of so many theists that atheists say that there is no god when what agnostic atheists say is that there is insufficient evidence for one to justify belief. It's the same distinction.

If people think that life is just a game that ends with death, then they are in for a shock.

You don't know any more about what follows death than I or anybody else does. You believe by faith and so make unfalsifiable claims as if they are fact, but faith is not a path to truth. It's guessing. One believer guesses that one set of unfalsifiable claims are correct and another of a different faith guesses that a contradictory set are correct, both claiming to have truth and knowledge when neither has either.

I have plenty of evidence, but I can see that it is not worth discussing with a person who denies the significance of existence.

Your evidence doesn't support the conclusions you assign it.

"You find that people cooperate, you say, 'Yeah, that contributes to their genes' perpetuating.' You find that they fight, you say, ‘Sure, that's obvious, because it means that their genes perpetuate and not somebody else's. In fact, just about anything you find, you can make up some story for it."
- Noam Chomsky -

Can we assume that you understood Chomsky's flippant remark to mean that according to him, the theory of evolution has insufficient evidentiary support? If not, I don't know why you cited it. Chomsky sounds like a creationist there, and there's good reason for that. His pet theories on the evolution of the linguistic faculty were at odds with mainstream science. He appears to believe that evolution is not explanation enough for that, but I haven't seen his argument if he has one. You can read a bit about that conflict it here.

I know by experience that if people do not want to acknowledge truth, they will not.

I don't accept your definition of truth for myself. What you have is what I call fervently believed intuitions lacking sufficient evidentiary support to justify belief. You'll need to go down that second path to generate what I'd call truth. You should expect other kinds of arguments to be rejected.

Any intelligent person can understand that we have intelligence for a purpose.

Here's another of your unfalsifiable, fervently held beliefs that you offer as fact. A more intelligent person understands the limits of knowledge, both his own and that of others. I know that you are guessing even if you don't.

 

[MikeF]

You don't seem to understand that "reality" is an elaborate set of speculative conclusions created in or minds by the combination of logic and imagination. "Actuality", on the other hand, is just a flow of incoherent information coming into our brains through our body's sensory mechanisms. What's logically possible is where our "reality" begins. And this is why the existence of God being logically possible is a very significant bit of "evidence" for us.

First let me preface by saying that it is not my intent to change your opinion on things when I respond to your posts. I know that you are more than happy and content with your view of things and that is fine by me. My responses are to provide an alternate view to those reading along who may not have made up their mind on these things.

You characterize "reality" as an elaborate set of speculative conclusions created in our minds and distinguish it from what you label "Actuality". It is my assumption that you put these terms in quotes to signal your non-standard use of the terms. I like to use the label "reality" to point to all that exists whether or not there is any sentient creature to perceive it. This, I think, corresponds to your "Actuality". The first point I would make to those following along is that I completely disagree that the flow of information coming into our brains through our body's sensory mechanisms could be described as incoherent. This is not to say that this may be the case for individuals with specific types of mental illness or injury to the brain, but by and large for the rest of us, the information we receive is remarkably clear and demonstrably consistent. The physical world that we experience today is exactly the same physical world experienced by all life since life began. I would certainly agree that what is perceived by any living creature is limited to the range of perception of their respective sense organs, when those organs are unaided in any way, but what is being detected has been coherent and consistent. So to our dear readers I would emphasize that we *can* understand and know about things in the physical world around us, about reality.

Now to address your term "reality" and your characterization of it. I would say that your term "reality" corresponds to what I would call an individual's subjective beliefs. In this regard I certainly agree that any one particular individual holds an elaborative set of beliefs. These beliefs are determined and influenced by a wide variety of factors, from the expression of their specific set of genes, how the environment in which those genes develop into an individual influences and creates changes in the subsequent individual, through to the experiences of that organism through its life to include the socialization and indoctrination experienced by that organism. It is also important to emphasize that beliefs are by no means fixed once they are formed or adopted.

I also agree that of the elaborate set of beliefs that an individual can hold, some portion of those beliefs may be speculative but by no means all of them. Some beliefs may be imaginative, where the term imaginative includes false and fictional, in part or in whole, but by no means is every belief imaginative. I would also emphasize that speculative is not synonymous with imaginative.

As to what is logically possible, something can only be logically possible if it does not conflict with, or violate the defining principles, properties, and rules of the system or domain in which the logic is being applied. If that domain is "Actuality" as you have labeled, or reality, or physical world as I have described, then to be logically possible the conclusion must conform to this system, to be synthetic with reality. So what is logically possible does not begin with subjective beliefs, but begins and ends with a statement as to what system, domain, or framework within which one is appling that logic.

Since the statement, "And this is why the existence of God being logically possible is a very significant bit of "evidence" for us.", is based in a system not of "Actuality" but in the imagination of an individual's subjective belief, the readers would have to know the particulars of that purely abstract systems defining elements, properties, and rules in addition to the properties and characteristics of the subject "God" in order to evaluate whether "the existence of God" is logically possible in that particular and purely abstract system.

 

[muhammad_isa]

Can we assume that you understood Chomsky's flippant remark to mean that according to him, the theory of evolution has insufficient evidentiary support?

No. The theory of evolution is sound.
..but many want to claim that evolution is responsible for all, and is "mindless".

Evolutionary psychology is just one example of that.

 

[MikeF]

Your position would have us freely put all that is infinitely impossible into the set of that which is possible, and I see that as a problem.

I don't know what infinitely impossible means, but yes, I call things possible until they are known to be impossible. Suppose Maria died this morning. You were expecting to have lunch with her, and she is nowhere to be seen. You consider the list of possible reasons. Maybe she forgot or her car broke down. But these things were in fact impossible if she's dead. Is it wrong to call them possible before you know that they are in fact impossible? I say not. It is in this sense that we can use the word possible to refer to the impossible.

Abstraction in and of itself is boundless, infinite. Well, in a practical sense it is limited to the limits of our ability to think and communicate in abstraction. Since abstraction simply describes the means by which we communicate and think about things, in addition to thinking about real things, we have the capacity to imagine and think about impossible things, things that violate the rules and properties of nature. When I say infinitely impossible, I mean that we could theoretically imagine an infinite set of impossible things if the nature of abstraction was the only limiting factor.

I would say your example illustrates my comment that logically possible does not mean actually possible. Armed with only the fact that Mary is not at an expected location at an expected time, all of your listed reasons are indeed logically possible because they do not violate the laws of nature, all that defines reality. If we add to your list of possible reason that Mary has not arrived because gravity no longer applied to her and her alone and she has floated away, or that she instantaneously teleported to China in an unknown way, I think we would both agree that it is neither logically or actually possible given our understanding of the laws of nature. Since you seem to hold time travel firmly in the logically possible column simply because you do not think it to yet be proven impossible, in your opinion, is it valid to say that it is logically possible that a time traveler from the future intercepted and waylayed Mary, making her late for the lunch appointment?

Given that we acknowledge that there is not complete understanding of reality, I still maintain we can only consider logically possible, that which does not violate the rules and properties we currently understand, and outside of our understanding we can only say it is unknown and currently not possible to know. Otherwise, for some personality types at least, with such a permissive definition of logically possible, infinite impossibility becomes possible, becomes real.

 

[Subduction Zone]

There is reams and reams of evidence..
..but to the atheist, it is all about chance and mindless evolution.

"You find that people cooperate, you say, 'Yeah, that contributes to their genes' perpetuating.' You find that they fight, you say, ‘Sure, that's obvious, because it means that their genes perpetuate and not somebody else's. In fact, just about anything you find, you can make up some story for it."
- Noam Chomsky -

There are all sorts of evidence. What one needs to be able to do is to evaluate evidence properly. Now you may be on the wrong side of various arguments when it comes to evidence because the evidence that you rely on is probably not very reliable. That was shown by your evolution shot. Evolution is just a fact. Like gravity. Denying it tells others that the denier does not have a belief system strongly tied to reality.

For example some religious people will state that "Claims are evidence", such as the claims in their personal holy books. And they are right, Mere claims are evidence, but the evidence is so weak that it really does not help any rational argument. What can be very helpful is to separate evidence into objective and subjective evidence. Objective evidence applies across the board. There will still be dishonest people that deny it, but t if one can demonstrate that it is objective evidence that puts the burden of proof upon the denier. Subjective evidence varies from person to person. It may be very convincing to one person, but to others it may be laughable. For those wishing to have a rational discussion objective evidence is the way to go.

 

[MikeF]

I recognize limitations to science. Science can't be used to demonstrate a source of morality, but it can be used to compare two groups and point out the differences in their moralities. Edit: Or similaritie​

I would disagree here. I would argue that science can make a case that human beings are the source of the abstract concept labeled morality.

But not that we are the only source. Which is the conclusion that the "scientism" crowd jumps to.

I would first ask whether you are referring to the domain of "Actuality", commonly know as the real world, or to some specific abstract artificial construct of reality. (Not meant to be snide or sarcastic, though I know it can be taken that way. I simply want us to be very clear what we are talking about.)

If you are referring to the domain of "Actuality", I would be interested in what other sources of morality you might propose, for I can see none. If it is not the domain of "Actuality" that contains these other sources, then I am not interested.