Nothing is as it seems. An orange is an orange because it appears so. What makes an orange appear? What gives the orange its taste and smell? Where did the orange come from? A myriad of similar questions goes into understanding of the phrase: nothing is as it seems. It could, by appearance, be a juicy, healthy, satisfying orange, until one peels it and finds out there is a worm in it, then, POOF, it becomes something else. See, by accepting what is place before us as it seems, we blind ourselves to what it could be. You could each day pass the next Einstein on the street, but until he revealed himself, then he wouldn't be. Perhaps it adds a sense of fantasy to the mundane world, who wouldn't want that?
Once again, this is all meaningless ruminating that serves no purpose. As I said before, if knowledge were truly so loose weave you would not be typing this message on a website. After-all, using your logic how do you know that the message you are typing will appear on the screen, be sent over the internet, arrive to me so that I could read it and respond to it.
I argue that you are the one denying what the orange actually is, preferring instead to ruminate on what it is not. Here's a simple test: if you peeled an orange what would you
predict to find inside it? Here's another test: Look at an orange and describe it, then have a friend look at the same orange and describe it and see how closely your descriptions match. Here's another test: Ask an orange farmer how often an orange he has grown has ever "become something else" before his very eyes. You can verify the existence of oranges in any number of ways and I guarantee you will almost always reach the exact same consensus.
You're just denying reality. An orange is an orange, and your postulation on what an orange "COULD" be is meaningless. You are completely ignoring all logic, reason and deduction for no purpose whatsoever.
You are speaking from a scientific stance. If you want physical proof for everything, then many r/s matters will disappoint you.
Science does not deal with proof, it deals with evidence.
And why is it unreasonable to require evidence of something before I accept it as being true? What's more, what is reasonable about accepting something as being true without evidence? Where is your logic?
Nothing is certain. Can you prove to me that I will not die tomorrow? Can you prove that a plane won't land on my house? Can you prove that a tear in the space-time continuum won't open up beneath my feet while I'm in the bathroom?
You haven't answered my questions. Of course, I cannot "prove" anything like these things to you - but the question is this:
Do you think that there is a reasonable chance of any of these things occurring? Do you or do you not live in fear of a hole in the space-time continuum will open beneath your feet? Are these things worth devoting reasonable thought to, or are they astronomically unlikely to occur?
This is what I'm talking about when I use the phrase "degrees of certainty". You seem to think you can ignore all degrees of certainty and thus suggest that any suggestion is perfectly valid just by the fact of it being suggested. And yet, for all your postulating on the uncertainty of the universe, when have you ever bitten into an orange and have it turn into something else? When have you ever stepped from your bed gripped with the fear of the impending fall into a black hole? When have you ever cried yourself to sleep waiting for the inevitable airplane to fall on your house? Never - because you know, to a healthy degree, that these things are astronomically unlikely to occur.
Seriously, if you do not do any of the above things - hell, even if you walk so much as a single step expecting the floor to meet your feet on the way down - then you have no basis on which to claim that reality is so subject to the whim of some magical, unknowable random force. If you express any degree of certainty in anything (which you already have by assuming that the air you breathe is not poison), then your argument has nowhere to go since you admit to having some degree of rational certainty about the world.
I know that there are different degrees of certainty, but one cannot be 100% certain of anything. We expect to see the sun rise because it always has, and we have a model to base it from that has not failed us, but that is not to say it will always be so. So why expect somethings to continue to produce results simply because they have? Why expect somethings to fail because they have never succeeded?
Because that's how logic works.
What is the purpose in screaming and crying at the top of your lungs that the sun will never rise again when it has risen every day for the last 1.4 billion years?
Let me ask you honestly: Is more reasonable to assume that the sun will rise in the morning than it is to believe that the sun will magically transform into a flock of flying elephants?
Change is always around. And our understanding of the universe changes as well. I do not seek to ignore physics, nor do I seek to disprove any scientific theory. I keep an open mind as nothing is lasting, and nothing remains the same. That doesn't mean I walk on the ceiling and swim through rock.
None of this changes the fact that your ruminations do not lead to anything, nor question anything, nor do they answer anything.
I know you'll have a field trip with this, but: nothing is pointless. I think very rationally, just not along the same lines as you. It is arrogant to assume that all must think and rationalize the same.
I never said that. I just think it's pointless to throw rationality out of the window and assert that everything is entirely subjective and that there is no means by which you can assert any degree of certainty about the universe because, as I have said a dozen times before, it neither makes sense, answers anything, provides any basis or expands any minds. It's entirely useless.
Ah, now we have the climax. I never stated that the scientific community does not go through years of compiling and research. I simply illustrated that in my opinion you lashed all r/s in to a group who took something as it seemed to be presented to them without their own research; that they were sheep. My response was that there are many who spend years searching for the truth, questioning, testing, researching, observing, etc., who have humility to admit they do not know what it is.
I am only refuting your argument that it is
easier to study the real world - I have demonstrated that your statement was false. Can you show otherwise?
Science, to you, benefits mankind.
Not just "to me".
That computer you're using? Science.
The food you eat? Science.
The home you live in? Science.
The clothes you wear? Science.
The medicine that allows you to live? Science.
Science does benefit mankind, that is not merely opinion. Nearly every luxury you enjoy every day owes itself to the advancement of science.
R/S, to me, enlightens mankind. Which is more important is just as personal of an opinion.
Your post still seems attacking, imo, or at least VERY opinionated. Try to tone it down, eh? It does not do well for continuing discussion.
Why should I tone it down? I have every right to express my opinion by any means I see fit, and I have not once personally attacked you or sent any insults in your direction.
