What is Philosophy?
Is it “unintelligible answers to insoluble problems”? (Henry Adams)
Is a philosopher “a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat that isn’t there”? (Lord Bowen)
Is philosophy “a route of many roads leading from nowhere to nothing”? (Ambrose Bierce)
In a recent post a comment was made about how nice it was to have three trained philosophers engaged in making comments.
But is anyone else even paying attention? Does what these trained philosophers say even matter?
Isn’t it true that:
“There is only one thing a philosopher can be relied on to do, and that is to contradict other philosophers.” (William James)
“one cannot conceive of anything so strange and so unbelievable that it has not been said by one philosopher or another.” (Rene Descartes)
“The point of philosophy is to start with something so simple as to seem not worth stating, and to end with something so paradoxical that no one will believe it.” (Bertrand Russell)
Philosopher: “someone who doesn’t know what he is talking about but makes it sound like it’s your fault.”
Can any of our trained philosophers even offer a defense of philosophy beyond “it pays the bills”?
More specifically, what is the value of philosophy for an atheist?
[Changed Ambrose Pierce to Ambrose Bierce. HT: keiths]
A street corner somewhere is missing a couple of preachers.
Besides, Paul was a major league asshole. He inclines me to root for the other team, if there is one. A couple of nice letters — out of character — can’t make me like him. The letters are probably misattributed.
That makes you and millions of others eyewitnesses does it? You watched it on TV and so you were really there! An eyewitness! Every movie and TV show you’ve ever watched you were there as an eyewitness.
Brain glitches are not evidence of what?
Come on petrushka do a little research this line of thinking was refuted long ago
check it out
http://cdn.theologicalstudies.net/54/54.1/54.1.1.pdf
peace
You know all this from independent evidence do you?
Once upon a time over at UD, I landed into a debate with some other guy over empirical evidence for miracles. I said (and I say now) that miracles have no empirical evidence by definition.
For example, Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead. Would you be able to determine that Lazarus was raised from the dead by medical examination after the fact? In my view, never. What you would find by such examination would be a normal, perhaps reasonably healthy man. There would be no trace that he had been dead – that’s precisely what the miracle consisted in, didn’t it?
This means that the only way to “prove” miracles to those who didn’t witness them is by eyewitness testimony. That’s the only way.
And “Intelligent Design”, whatever it means or is, is the same kind – it leaves no empirical traces behind by definition, and cannot be demonstrated empirically.
FIASCO or whatever current acronym you employ for your empirical characteristic of ID, is a fundamental mistake of logic and will never become relevant to science. Nobody can ever demonstrate empirically that a specific sand castle or a watch on the beach was made by something called “design”. The best that you can have is to yell that sand castles and watches don’t create themselves – but this is a claim about artifacts in general, not about a measurable empirical characteristic of the specific artifact.
You all seem intent on deflecting my request for evidence.
Brain glitches are evidence that one can become abolutely convinced of something that is rubbish.
Have you even read the accounts of Jesus’ post resurrection appearance to Paul? how anyone can call it a brain glitch is beyond me?
It involved more people than Paul and it involved a dialogue with specific information that Paul would have not known ahead of time
peace
Probably not the first time you were wrong, nor the last.
What’s missing here is your definition of a miracle and your definition of empirical evidence and your argument that the two are mutually exclusive along with your case that eyewitness testimony is not empirical.
However, up next in the Is Religious Belief Natural thread is the argument from miracles. Keep an eye out there.
Is this supposed to an offer of an explanation for atheism?
The story is not evidence that the story is true.
Insults just demonstrate that your argument cannot stan on evidence.
I must have misunderstood your original post.
Brain glitches are more likely to occur in religious believers than in atheists because there are more religious believers than atheists.
Therefore:
Brain glitches are evidence that one can become abolutely convinced of something that is rubbish.
Excluding atheists. Their brains are immune to rubbish.
You have yet to say what you would consider evidence.
You keep asking for it
We keep giving it
Then you say it does not count for one reason or another.
Talk about the no true Scotsman fallacy. You keep redefining “evidence” till noting whatsoever will qualify.
Almost everything you believe is based on testimony of some sort. You don’t applied this hyper-skeptical standard to anything else you believe. Why the inconsistency?
Also keep in mind that the eyewitness testimony is just one line of evidence of the truth of this stuff.
If you want evidence it’s out there and not difficult to find.
I get the distinct impression that you don’t really want evidence.
In fact I seem to recall you saying this stuff does not even interest you
peace
You seem intent on changing the subject to “brain glitches” to which atheists are miraculously immune.
What exactly are you asking for evidence of? Miracles? Did you miss the two volume set that I provided a link to?
That has to hurt.
Mung,
It’s not religion, it’s the eye-witness testimony of 501 people that is confirmed by an inerrant book and my “expert”, authoritative, “scholarly” studies and word, and even if it were religion it’s irrefutably based on specific, empirical evidence, going by your and fifthmonarchyman’s and other religionists’ standard of “evidence”, and what does time and popularity have to do with it? Why don’t you just faithfully and obediently believe me? Do I have to tell you about the eternal punishment you’ll suffer if you don’t, as described in the Book of Creation and Other Stuff by We Are I?
Are you saying that a religion is only true if it’s 2000 years old and popular and that it must be true because it is 2000 years old and popular? Doesn’t that apply to your religion, such as when your imaginary lord god was allegedly first preaching it 2000 years ago, and doesn’t that mean, by your standard, that Christianity was and is less and less true the farther back “we” go toward 2000 years ago, and doesn’t that mean that before 2000 years ago anything that has to do with Christianity wasn’t and isn’t true at all? How old and popular does a religion have to be to be true, and how does that apply to every version of every religion?
I’ll revise my earlier statement: ALL you religionists have is appeals to nonsense, alleged authority, popularity, length of time that people like you have believed in and preached nonsense, and desperately ridiculous diversions.
A religion that’s not a religion! Fantastic! And the number of believers in your religion that is not a religion is…?
My mistake. Your religion that is not a religion is more properly compared to last Thursdayism. Get back to me next Thursday.
My argument presupposes that we have the same definitions. To be clear, a miracle is a supernatural event, an effect that could not have come about by ordinary natural means. Empirical evidence is everything objectively determinable by impartial observers.
There’s the story that Lazarus was raised from the dead by Jesus. This would clearly be a miracle, wouldn’t it? But after the fact, what empirical evidence is there aside from the story itself? On ID theory, the empirical evidence would be FIASCO, so compute it.
Eyewitness testimony is just a matter of belief. When a woman enters the police department and says she was raped by such-and-such guy, the police sure enough will write up the story, but this by itself doesn’t count as evidence against such-and-such guy. There must be specific physical marks on the woman’s body traceable to such-and-such guy, otherwise she has no case. The story by itself is not empirical evidence. The physical marks on the body are.
What’s missing here is in what way and by what definition I am wrong. Be at least as specific as I am.
Mung,
Your certainty that what I said is a religion shows that, in your opinion, anything that includes ridiculous reports and claims of supernatural beings, an inerrant book, creation, special creation, death and resurrection, etc., is a religion, and that puts your religion in the same category of ridiculousness.
If the guy you religionists call Jesus actually existed and preached Christianity 2000 years ago, that’s likely what a lot of people said to him at the time, and apparently, according to you, they were justified in doing so, and people were also justified in saying “Get back to me next Thursday” to Christianity up to when it hit the 2000 year old mark.
Are you absolutely sure that Christianity is at least that old now? The Jesus guy was allegedly born 2015 years ago this coming December 25th. How old was he when he started preaching Christianity, who and how many people heard him, and what specific, empirical evidence can you provide to verify those things?
The consensus seems to be rather that Jesus (or some itinerant preacher) existed, and his story was mostly created after the fact.
That has to hurt.
Lift up a stone, everyone!
walto,
I mention the stone proof because I split some wood the other day and just found more wood. The stone proof was much more convincing in my book.
Nice! Mung might rightly pout about theists rejecting his precious IDism. But, hey, (according to radical ‘skeptics’) Mung doesn’t exist either! 😉
Then there is the controversy about whether Paul created Christianity, defeating early Christians who wanted to preserve more of Judaism. Instead, Paul made Christianity more palatable* and less painful** for adult converts in Rome and elsewhere, thereby winning the battle for the nature of Christianity in the court of public opinion.
Of course, Paul may have been divinely inspired to do so, so this says nothing in particular about the truth of Christianity.
———————–
* more palatable = no dietary laws
** less painful = no adult circumcision for male converts
fifthmonarchyman,
I find it interesting that theists manage to understand the meanings of common words until those very same words are used to question their most cherished beliefs.
I already explained what I mean by that term:
Speaking of your “Jesus is lord” claim, you have yet to address my questions about that:
Once you have defined your terms with a bit of operational rigor, the kind of objective, empirical evidence for the historicity of the Jesus you claim existed (which I suspect has more attributes than “An itinerant first century rabbi.”) could include contemporary reports from impartial observers, Roman records, or physical artifacts. For extra credit you could address all the problems with Luke’s claims about a census at the time of Jesus’ supposed birth.
If it helps, think of what you would put in front of a jury charged with deciding whether or not the person with the attributes you claim (miracle worker, etc.) actually existed. What, specifically, could you lay on the table to make your case?
Don’t bring facts to a feel-fight, Patrick.
Richardthughes,
I wish someone would!
Patrick,
Is it to difficult for you to provide “objective empirical evidence” for the things I asked about so that I can get an idea of what you are looking for?
Simply repeating yourself is not a lot of help.
if you could provide “objective empirical evidence” for anything at all it would be helpful to me
What sort of artifacts would count as evidence? Would an inscription on an ossuary count?
Who would count as an contemporary impartial observer? Would a first-century Romano-Jewish scholar, historian and hagiographer, who was born in Jerusalem count?
In order to count would this sort have to be accepted by folks you agree with?
As far as Roman records go do you have any objective empirical evidence that there ever were any such records for the time and place that Jesus lived?
peace
🙂
Hopefully you didn’t get any in your eye.
There’s no requirement that observers be impartial.
Do you have any objective, empirical evidence to the contrary? Perhaps an operational definition of observer?
I just love the vision I get of a dedicated scientist setting up a complex experiment and not giving a rats ass what the results are. Is that what you mean by impartial?
Is the testimony of scientists who are not impartial somehow weakened by that fact?
/OldMung
The definition of lord at it’ lowest level is
So a minimum entailment would be that I make an effort to do what he says.
There are many other entailments as I said before I expect to continue to explore and uncover these for the rest of my life.
But as you said earlier that there is “no” evidence at all for my beliefs this one entailment should suffice to test that claim.
That is unless you want to modify your original challenge
peace
fifthmonarchyman,
This isn’t my first rodeo, cowboy. I’m not going to play the game where you refuse to support your claims while constantly asking questions back to confuse the issue.
Objective, empirical evidence is a straightforward concept. As I noted before, if you’re really having trouble with it, think about how you would convince a jury of your claims. What would you put on the table?
For another example, consider a peer-reviewed journal like Nature or Science. Look at how those papers are structured and follow their lead.
If that ossuary could be tied to the particular person you are claiming as the Jesus you worship, it would indicate that someone with that name died. Carbon dating could set a time period. Unless there was a lot more detail in the inscription, more supporting evidence would be needed.
The words “contemporary” and “impartial” have standard meanings. Your continued questions along these lines might lead one to suspect that you can’t support your claims without redefining them.
To answer your question, documents from the same time as the alleged events (contemporary) recorded by someone with no fiscal, social, or theological benefit to be potentially gained (impartial) would be evidence that some non-believers considered the events to have occurred. The weight to give that evidence would depend on the reliability of other reports by the same person and on corroborating reports by other impartial observers.
Third hand accounts years or decades after the supposed events don’t make the grade.
Ideally it would be information that I could inspect personally to arrive at my own conclusions. That’s the whole “objective” part of the requirement.
If Jesus lived at that time and did the things your holy book claims, it would be odd that none of it was recorded by the civil authorities. Zombies, for one example already discussed in this thread, would be expected to be worthy of mention.
fifthmonarchyman,
That’s an entailment of your belief. It is not an entailment that can be used to determine if a particular being is a “lord”.
You snipped the rest of my questions: What, exactly, do you mean when you say “Jesus is lord”? What characteristics do you ascribed to your concept of Jesus that distinguish it from a not-lord?
If you can’t provide that level of operational definition, it won’t be possible to determine if any evidence supports the existence of such an entity.
Well, for the little doubters here at TAZ, this topic was raised before. If I remember correctly, Elizabeth Liddle believes in the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth. Squawk all you want at your fellow atheist host then too.
As for the OP topic, there are few lovers of wisdom here at TAZ, even the philosopher-teachers here are ‘skeptic’ philosophists. A rather sad state of affairs. 🙁
Elizabeth’s belief or non- belief is not evidence. Logic and reason have left the room.
So, while in the choir and not a church member, apparently decades ago, did you actually sing the words to Be Thou My Vision and other hymns, or just hum along?
It’s a delicate topic when people sing things they don’t believe. One wonders why they do it, if they were forced, just to make money, to feel accepted, to not disappoint someone they know, etc. Or if they ever had the smallest amount of faith in anything beyond their own existence, to mouth words without soul.
Beautiful music though, nice choice petrushka! 😉
I sang. I have no more trouble singing hymns than any other performer has reciting fiction. Lyrics can be beautiful poetry.
Does Genesis bother you when you recite it? Do you believe it?
I didn’t, thanks. A mote may have gotten in though. 🙂
once again at minimum a lord would have authority over his subjects I am his subject so Jesus would have authority over me. If he was not lord he would not
Is that the sort of thing you are looking for?
peace
PS
Here is something about that ossuary
check it out
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Ossuary
fifthmonarchyman,
That’s still about you.
What characteristics would an entity have to possess for you to characterize that entity as a “lord”? In this specific case, what characteristics does your concept of Jesus have that cause you to refer to it as a lord rather than some other term?
fifthmonarchyman,
Forgeries are not evidence.
Why not? I’m not sure I follow you. Patrick
You are the one who said I have no evidence for my belief that Jesus is lord
Surely my obeying Jesus would count as evidence that Jesus is my lord
quote:
“Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you?
(Luk 6:46)
end quote:
You are not trying to move the goalposts are you
peace
Crimity, Patrick. This was just explained to you. If Fifthmonarchyman treats something with authority (i.e., as his lord) that MAKES THAT THING A LORD. Capice?
He treats the rebellious rabbi Jesus with authority. And not just a little authority, I’m guessing. More than he ever gave his parents, never mind his third grade teacher Mrs. Hofenbrau.
Therefore Jesus is Lord. (QED)
Everything has to be explained so many goshdoln times around here. Wake the hell up, Patrick!! X>{
I should not have to tell you this, but, evidence for the existence of Zombies is not evidence for the existence of Jesus.
Sure they are. And they appear in front of juries. As evidence.
fifthmonarchyman,
Your assertion, for which you claimed to have objective, empirical evidence, was “Jesus is lord.” Not “your lord”, simply “lord”. If you meant to say “I treat my concept of Jesus as if he were an historical figure as described in the New Testament by acting as though he is my lord.”, that’s . . . uninteresting.
If you meant what you wrote as you wrote it, my questions stand.
Mung,
Evidence for the dead walking as described in the New Testament would certainly make the other claims more worth researching, though.