Carl Sagan: Prophet of Scientism

[SUTG]

Clete,

It appears you have been reading Bahnsen and Van Till, or at least absorbing their Methods of Asserting Absolute Knowledge.

You may have fooled yourself into thinking that you have absolute knowledge, but you did so at a great price. Mighty Duck, Balder, or I could do the same thing. Once you assert your arbitrary "Ultimate Justifier" you have absolute knowledge. Of course, this is not how worldviews really work. Having a single presupposition is incoherent.

As far as logic, I am not too sure which type of logic you refer to. It seems to vary in the past several posts, and I may have added to the confusion. Didn't Boole, Frege, and those guys invent logic? If, by logic you mean (A^B)->B and those sort of propositions.

Try this worldview on for size: SUTG is omniscient. You may think I am joking, but this worldview, if examined, offers just as much as the (non biblical) transcendental arguments of Bahnsen and friends. You can really just assert anything whatsoever as the Ultimate Justifier and do just as well as the Christian Presuppositionalist. So much for all the magic.

 

[mighty_duck]

You are zero % certain! You don't even know for sure whether you exist in reality MD! How can you be at all certain of anything else?

I think you have demonstrated just how weak a grasp you have on knowldge theory right there.
You may have noticed that many things in the world are not black or white. So too is knowledge. The options aren't 100% certain or 0% certain. I can state that I am 99.999999% certain that I am sitting in front of a computer right now. I can state with a lower level of certainty that the CPU is a pentium 4. I still claim to know both things.
According to your standards, for something to be known, you require it to be "beyond a shadow of a doubt".
I require knowledge to be "beyond a reasonable doubt", but that certainly does not entail that I accept anything and everything as knowledge.

You may ridicule my worldview, but that still doesn't make you a winner of any debate. In this poker game, you have claimed that you have a royal flush - absolute knowledge.I have called your bluff and shown you my cards - relative knowldge that rests on axioms, with a level of certainty that is not 100%. For you to win, you now have to show your cards. Demonstrate that you have absolute knowledge, and you have won. The burden of proof is now squarely on you.
Lucky for you, I won't be holding you to your own standards. I don't require that you prove this in absolute terms, but only to my lower terms of "beyond a reasonable doubt". That should make things a lot easier.

So again:
1. Why do you think absolute certainty is required?
2. Do you have absolute certainty regarding ANYTHING? If so please let us know what, and how you achieved this certainty, And a follow up question: do you have absolute certainty regarding EVERYTHING? If not, then how do you make descisions in the face of uncertainty?
3. I'll add another one to make it clearer for you. Do you know what CPU your computer has?

 

[Clete]

Clete,

It appears you have been reading Bahnsen and Van Till, or at least absorbing their Methods of Asserting Absolute Knowledge.

To my knowledge I have never read more than a page or two of Van Til's published works and I know for certain that I have never read anything by Bahnsen although he was the first I had ever heard give the specific argument I have made in this thread. That being the case, however, I am NOT a Van Tillian presupositionalist. Van Til got much more wrong than he got right in his theology. Aside from the basics of the faith and portions of his apologetic I would almost certainly disagree with nearly everything the man said concerning what the Bible teaches. He was as hard core a Calvinist as you can get and in so being he blasphemed God almost every time he opened his mouth. I hold precisely zero affiliation with the man apart from Christ Himself and His grace which saved us both.

You may have fooled yourself into thinking that you have absolute knowledge, but you did so at a great price. Mighty Duck, Balder, or I could do the same thing. Once you assert your arbitrary "Ultimate Justifier" you have absolute knowledge. Of course, this is not how worldviews really work. Having a single presupposition is incoherent.

Who ever said that I hold only one presupposition? You assume too much and talk of things you know nothing about.

As far as logic, I am not too sure which type of logic you refer to. It seems to vary in the past several posts, and I may have added to the confusion. Didn't Boole, Frege, and those guys invent logic? If, by logic you mean (A^B)->B and those sort of propositions.

Any valid form of logic is impossible to account for outside a Biblical worldview. This point about various forms of logic is somewhat of a misguided argument anyway. All forms of rational discourse always follow the three laws of logic (mentioned earlier in the thread) in one form or another.

Try this worldview on for size: SUTG is omniscient. You may think I am joking, but this worldview, if examined, offers just as much as the (non biblical) transcendental arguments of Bahnsen and friends. You can really just assert anything whatsoever as the Ultimate Justifier and do just as well as the Christian Presuppositionalist. So much for all the magic.

:think:

What is my mothers maiden name?

Resting in Him,
Clete

 

[avatar382]

Hey Clete,

When you get a chance, please answer my post here: http://www.theologyonline.com/forums/showpost.php?p=953604&postcount=89

 

[avatar382]

Any valid form of logic is impossible to account for outside a Biblical worldview.

You keep asserting this, but have not yet given any reason WHY anyone should accept it?

If the laws of logic are axiomatic, why do you insist on "accounting for them" anyway? Don't you realize that doing so misses the point of an axiom entirely?

 

[Clete]

I think you have demonstrated just how weak a grasp you have on knowldge theory right there.

How do you know whether I even exist? Prove that this whole nightmarish disaster of a debate you are in isn't a figment of your depraved imagination? It's patently ridiculous for you to be talking to me about knowledge theory when by your own admission you can't even know if knowledge is a valid field of study.

You may have noticed that many things in the world are not black or white. So too is knowledge.

How can you not see that this statement is self-contradictory?! :hammer:
The statement that knowledge is not black and white is itself a black and white statement!

The options aren't 100% certain or 0% certain. I can state that I am 99.999999% certain that I am sitting in front of a computer right now. I can state with a lower level of certainty that the CPU is a pentium 4. I still claim to know both things.

It's that .000001% that makes you an idiot and calls into question absolutely every other thing that you think you might know regardless of how convinced you are that it is so.

According to your standards, for something to be known, you require it to be "beyond a shadow of a doubt".
I require knowledge to be "beyond a reasonable doubt", but that certainly does not entail that I accept anything and everything as knowledge.

Beyond a reasonable doubt? You're supposed to be an atheist but you present a worldview that is entirely based upon faith. You don't even know for sure that you exist and yet you want to pretend to base you life on reason. What a complete crack up! Your worldview is flawed at its very core. You rely on reason and then proclaim that nothing can be known. Well how do you know reason is real? Can you prove that reason isn't some silly aspect of a dream you're having because of a bad peace of cheese you ate for dinner? NO! You can't! By your own admission, there is at least a .000001% chance that this whole conversation never happened and the idea of two people having a intelligible conversation is a wispy dream that will end with your next fart.

You may ridicule my worldview, but that still doesn't make you a winner of any debate.

I am not ridiculing your worldview, you hardly have one. I am ridiculing you and power driving your so called worldview further into the proverbial ground every time you post more of your self-contradictory nonsense.

In this poker game, you have claimed that you have a royal flush - absolute knowledge. I have called your bluff and shown you my cards - relative knowldge that rests on axioms, with a level of certainty that is not 100%.

I've got 121 positive rep points for the first person who can point out for the duck man here how this statement is self-contradictory. (Not that 121 rep points is any big a deal at all, but its the best I can do )

For you to win, you now have to show your cards. Demonstrate that you have absolute knowledge, and you have won.

I already have, you just missed it! :chuckle:

Perhaps someone else would like some positive rep! This one might be a little more difficult if you're not familiar with the argument but perhaps someone can point out for our favorite duck how I know for certain that God exist and that I can therefore know that I exist and that logic really does work, etc. I've stated it directly more than once on this thread.

The burden of proof is now squarely on you.
Lucky for you, I won't be holding you to your own standards.

Hey! Don't forget about that .000001% chance that you will hold me to my own standard!

:chuckle: This is fun!

I don't require that you prove this in absolute terms, but only to my lower terms of "beyond a reasonable doubt". That should make things a lot easier.

But you not sure, right? It should make things easier but maybe not. What do you think, maybe about a .000001% chance of it being more difficult based on the lower standard?

So again:
1. Why do you think absolute certainty is required?

I've been demonstrating why ever since you started posting the idiotic notion that no knowledge is absolute. If your too dense to get it, I'm not going to explain it to you.

2. Do you have absolute certainty regarding ANYTHING?

Yes.

If so please let us know what, and how you achieved this certainty,

I already did that. You obviously missed it, but I'll bet someone caught it.

And a follow up question: do you have absolute certainty regarding EVERYTHING?

No.

If not, then how do you make descisions in the face of uncertainty?

The same way that you're 99.999999% sure that you do.

By the way, are you 100% sure that you're 99.99999% sure that you exist, or are you only 99.99999% sure of that as well? If so, that would mean, since the uncertainty is compounded, that you would really only be 99.999998% sure that you exist. But if you are only 99.999998% sure that you exist then you cannot be any more than 99.999998% certain that you're 99.999998% certain. That would mean that your really only 99.999996% certain that you exist! But, if you only 99.999996% certain….
And so on until that 99.999999% you started with is eroded to zero.

3. I'll add another one to make it clearer for you. Do you know what CPU your computer has?

Yes, I do.

Resting in Him,
Clete

 

[Clete]

You keep asserting this, but have not yet given any reason WHY anyone should accept it?

Yes I have. Read the thread again.

If the laws of logic are axiomatic, why do you insist on "accounting for them" anyway? Don't you realize that doing so misses the point of an axiom entirely?

It doesn't miss the point, all you've done is replace the word logic with axiom. Axioms are a result of logic and therefore do nothing to justify logics existence. Logic justifies the existence of axioms not the other way around and in a worldview which rejects faith and insists that truth be objectively verified via logic and reason one is left with an impossible conumdrum. You are left with accepting logic by pure blind faith or acknowledging that nothing can be known. The first of which falsifies your worldview and the other renders it incoherent.

Resting in Him,
Clete

 

[SUTG]

That being the case, however, I am NOT a Van Tillian presupositionalist. I hold precisely zero affiliation with the man apart from Christ Himself and His grace which saved us both.

Can you explain how your presuppositionalist argument (if you have one) differs from his?

Any valid form of logic is impossible to account for outside a Biblical worldview.

This is one of the things presuppositionalists always have difficulty explaining. What does "account for" mean in this case, and why should we even care about accounting for logic?

What is my mothers maiden name?

"Boyle", regardless of what you thought it was.

 

[Balder]

Hilston also asked me how I can prove I really exist, or that I'm not dreaming. This was my response to him:

"You have asked a number of times what "guarantee" I have that I'm not dreaming, or that I'm not a brain in a vat on some kind of mushroom trip, or maybe just Buddha's bad pizza nightmare. I have offered coherent answers, and I will be happy to offer more when I'm feeling better (and when I'm less cranky), but I would like you to offer your "Christian" answer up for examination, to put it to the same test. How do you know, for sure, that you are not dreaming or that the world is as you believe it is? You find "confirmation" of your present perspective in the Bible, but if you are dreaming or deluded, then the Bible too is an artifact of that dream and offers you nothing. It would be just as "imaginary" as the rest of the world you inhabit, and would offer nothing but "confirmation" of the delusion you are lost in. How does your belief in the Bible guarantee anything at all? Even if I granted the Biblical worldview were coherent and completely logical on all counts (and I don't really), isn't it possible for a "dream explanation" to be coherent? The explanations we receive in dreams often make a lot of sense to us even if they are incoherent, operating as they do on a different "logic" than the waking world; but you won't see that illogic until you actually wake up, if you ever do. All you have is the "promise" of a phantom book or a phantom feeling in your phantom head, and what guarantee is that of anything?

Please, if you don't mind, indulge me with two things: an explanation for how Chrisitianity provides you with an absolute guarantee that you aren't deluded or dreaming; and an explanation of how the Biblical worldview offers "sufficient" grounds to trust the inductive principle, with a coherent argument (if possible) for why you believe this grounding is superior to all other worldviews out there."

Best wishes,

Balder

 

[Redfin]

What is my mothers maiden name?

:darwinsm:

 

[Redfin]

"Boyle", regardless of what you thought it was.

You're sharp too! :chuckle:

 

[Redfin]

In this poker game, you have claimed that you have a royal flush - absolute knowledge. I have called your bluff and shown you my cards - relative knowldge that rests on axioms, with a level of certainty that is not 100%.

I've got 121 positive rep points for the first person who can point out for the duck man here how this statement is self-contradictory. (Not that 121 rep points is any big a deal at all, but its the best I can do )

I'll give it a shot. :think:

The flaw in duck's argument is that it is whenever you attempt to use something within the system to validate or base the system on, you are begging the question and thus incoherent (vicious circle).

Axioms are subsystems or products of logic, and thus cannot validate or be the foundation for logic.

God is extra-systemic (transcedent), and is thus a capable validator of logic, as well as many other things.

Am I close? :juggle:

 

[avatar382]

Yes I have. Read the thread again.

You have not.

You have not accounted for the possibility that the origin of nature, universe, logic, and all else is merely beyond human capacity to understand at this time, instead of necessarily supernatural.

It is my belief that religion and all appeals to the supernatural are but man's attempt to explain the unknown. It is clear that as science discovers the causes and mechanisms behind the nature that surrounds us, the need for supernatural explanations fall away.

Direct question: What makes you so sure that your own supernatural explaination, which you offer so readily, is not merely another example of man's arrogant attempts to explain away what he does not and probably cannot understand?

It doesn't miss the point, all you've done is replace the word logic with axiom. Axioms are a result of logic and therefore do nothing to justify logics existence. Logic justifies the existence of axioms not the other way around and in a worldview which rejects faith and insists that truth be objectively verified via logic and reason one is left with an impossible conumdrum. You are left with accepting logic by pure blind faith or acknowledging that nothing can be known. The first of which falsifies your worldview and the other renders it incoherent.

Resting in Him,
Clete

Definition: axiom - A self evident truth.

Direct question
Do you agree with this definition of the term "axiom?"

Think hard about what that means. Axioms are things so obvious that they require no proof, they require no validation. By looking for "justification" of axioms, you are needlessly complicating the simplest of concepts.

We (man) are in no position to attempt to "justify" logic. Any attempt to do so, or to disprove logic, must necessarily result in the use of logic itself.

If accepting logic without justification constitutes "blind faith" in your eyes, then so be it.

However - and read this carefully, this is vital - you are twisting the meaning of "faith" when you apply the term in this manner.

Direct question:
When you use your sense of sight, smell, touch to experience and interact with the world around you, how can you be sure that what your senses tell you reflects reality? Is it possible to verify that our senses are accurate?

Direct question:
Is it not true that any attempt to "verify" or "justify" what our 5 senses tell us about the world around us must necessarily use the very same senses?

Direct question:
Is it "blind faith" to trust our senses without first "verifying" them?

If so, then you must necessarily admit that everything you see and hear or otherwise experience must be taken on blind faith. If not, then I'd like you to explain to me why is its "blind faith" to accept the axioms of logic without justfication, but it's not "blind faith" to accept what your senses tell you without justification.

Faith is defined as belief in spite of a lack of evidence.

Direct question:
Do you agree with this definition of faith?

Direct question:
How can one hold belief in spite of a lack of evidence in axiom A, if axiom A, by definition, does not require evidence?

I appreciate in advance your direct answers to the questions I have posed.

 

[SUTG]

Demonstrate that you have absolute knowledge, and you have won.

I already have, you just missed it!

There was nothing to miss. This is where every preuppositionalist always has, and always will, run of of steam. They only assert absolute knowledge, which is trivial to do. It is like ending an argument by saying "I am right."

Moe: Are you sure the check is in the mail?
Homer: Yes, I sent is on Tuesday.
Moe: Are you absolutely certain?
Homer: Absolutely certain? How is that different from just being certain?
Moe: I mean, are you 100% sure?
Homer: Hmmmm...how is being 100% sure different from just being sure?
Moe: I mean are you sure you aren't mistaken?
Homer: I'm pretty sure I'm not mistaken. I did mail the check myself, you know!
Moe: So, you're absolutely, 100%, completely certain that the check is in the mail? There is no possible way that the check couldn't be in the mail?
Homer: Well, I guess the check could have been taken by aliens, or I could have been dreaming when I thought I mailed it, or...
Moe: Aha! I caught you! You're not completely certain!
Homer: I guess you're right. But, wait a minute, are you 100% certain that your statements are true?
Moe: I'll swear on my life!
Homer: How can you be 100% certain that you even have a life. I mean, you could be a brain in a vat, or you could be an animated character on a sitcom, or...
Moe: No. I have absolute knowledge! I am absolutely certain I am not an animated character!


As this dialog indicates, all that is required for someone to claim they have absolute knowledge that proposition P is true is that they believe that proposition P is true and they think they are right. However, the converse is not true. Someone may believe that proposition P is true, think they are right, yet not claim to have absolute knowledge. Whether P is true or False does not matter to this distinction. However, the one making the claim of absolute knowledge thinks that they have more knowledge than the one who does not. They are tying to say they believe that proposition P is true, they think they are right, and proposition P is true! But they can't just make P true by their assertion.

In the dialog above, let P be "Moe is not an animated character". Moe claims to have absolute knowledge that P is true. But Moe's claims of absolute knowledge do little to affect the truth value of P.

OFF TOPIC: You will have noticed that we can consider the world we inhabit and the world that Homer and Moe inhabit as analogous to two different systems of logic. We could even say that within the world that they inhabit, Moe isn't an animated character. He is alive and well, watching an episode where Itchy tells Scratchy he is absolutely certain he isn't an animated character. (Think of these systems of logic as those easter egg shaped Russian dolls where they all nest within each other.)

 

[mighty_duck]

Clete,
Because of your cynical use of my semantic concessions a few posts back, here and in other threads, I will revert to using the word "know" as I understand it (probabilistic), and will use "absolute knowledge" when referring to your use of the word. This may create some conflict with previous posts and this and future posts. I still won't be surprised to see your intellectually dishonest method saying "in the last post you said you didn't know you exist, and now you suddenly do??".

How do you know whether I even exist? Prove that ...

No matter how many times I explain it, you just don't get it. I know you exist because it is the most probable explanation for the fact that I am reading your posts. It is not absolute knowledge, but it is knowledge. You have yet to show that absolute knowledge is required for anything.

I have asked you several times to demonstrate why absolute knowledge is required. In your last post you say you already have, but ALL you have done is make the assertion that absolute knowledge is required. That is not a demonstration or an explanation, no matter how many times you assert it, or how many ad hominems you use . If you disagree, simply show us which post contained this amazing piece of information.

If anyone else would like to do this work for Clete, there is also a whopping 19 rep points in addition to Clete's rep. I'm no holding my breath though.

By the way, are you 100% sure that you're 99.99999% sure that you exist, or are you only 99.99999% sure of that as well? If so, that would mean, since the uncertainty is compounded, that you would really only be 99.999998% sure that you exist. But if you are only 99.999998% sure that you exist then you cannot be any more than 99.999998% certain that you're 99.999998% certain. That would mean that your really only 99.999996% certain that you exist! But, if you only 99.999996% certain….
And so on until that 99.999999% you started with is eroded to zero.

WOW! that is the first worthwhile objection you have made so far. For that alone this thread deserves to be in the hall of fame.

This is simply a case of priority. My cognitive process and logic are axioms, and therefore known. My existence is likewise a related axiom, and therefore known. End of story, I know I exist. I may not know I know I know I know I exist, but who cares? Before you go jumping all over this, lack of knowledge is different than knowledge of a negative.

How do you make decisions the face of uncertainty?

The same way that you're 99.999999% sure that you do

Hold the press! Clete just admitted that he makes decisions in the same way that I do, by using Occam's Razor! He therefore admits that absolute certainty is NOT a requirement. Thank you for annihilating your Argument from Ridicule.

Do you know what CPU your computer has?

Yes, I do.

Using Clete lingo, that means that you have 100% certain knowledge that your CPU is (for example) a Pentium. Now is it possible that the person who sold you the CPU actually replaced the processor with a different one to save costs, but put a sticker on it, and made the diagnostic information the same? Of course it's possible.
So either:
1. You concede that you don't have 100% certain knowledge of what your CPU you have, and are still able to claim you know what CPU you have.
2. You claim to know all popossibilitieshat could have changed CPU's on you are false. That would make you Omniscient, which is a pretty neat thing to have.

So which option is it?
[/QUOTE]

 

[Clete]

Hey Clete,

When you get a chance, please answer my post here: http://www.theologyonline.com/forums/showpost.php?p=953604&postcount=89

I missed this! Sorry! I'll respond as soon as time allows! Sundays are a bit more busy so bear with me.

 

[Redfin]

Faith is defined as belief in spite of a lack of evidence.

I would amend that to "a lack of proof."

What think you? :think:

 

[Turbo]

In this poker game, you have claimed that you have a royal flush - absolute knowledge. I have called your bluff and shown you my cards - relative knowldge that rests on axioms, with a level of certainty that is not 100%.

How can mighty_duck be certain that Clete is bluffing? :think:

:idea: He can't, according to his own worldview.

 

[kmoney]

...How can mighty_duck be certain that Clete is bluffing? :think:

:idea: He can't, according to his own worldview.

:think: If Clete is bluffing wouldn't that mean that he says there is absolute knowledge, but there actually isn't? Or at least Clete doesn't actually believe there is absolute knowledge, but he says there is?

 

[avatar382]

I would amend that to "a lack of proof."

What think you? :think:

Works for me!