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What I read from your responses is that things that cannot be proven empirically can easily be assigned a cause without worry of being proven wrong.
Which religion are you referring to exactly?
My point is legislation on gun control is almost always missing teeth, and sometimes the entire dog is toothless.
What I read from your responses is that things that cannot be proven empirically can easily be assigned a cause without worry of being proven wrong.
Which religion are you referring to exactly?
Featherweight Slob
See the epistemic Venn diagram again. Facts/Truth and Knowledge is the realm of the empirical. Ex. Empirical fact: People die. Knowledge: People can die at 30 or 80. Belief: "I believe if we had the choice, we should save the 30 year old over the 80 year old." There's nothing empirical about the last statement. It's a moral argument. You can't "prove" that statement is empirically correct. Moral arguments come from a philosophical or religious framework. Science can't tell us anything about what the correct choice here is. And trying to find out what the correct choice should be by making different arguments from any number of philosophical, political, economic, or religious positions is anything but an empirical process. It's an entirely subjective process, whereas science is a "view from nowhere" objective process in testing hypotheses to discover facts about nature.
I think utilitarianism is actually becoming more prevalent, since a capitalist society demands a kind of sacrifice of the "weak" in order to maximize productivity, profit, progress, and thus "utility." Take the push toward automation, for example. Theory is that yes, unfortunately millions of workers will suffer job less (and all the problems that come with that), but eventually automation will lead to a "greater good" for society in terms of accelerated productivity and "progress." But we know many of history's most horrifying events have been argued to have been done in order to promote the "greater good."
One aspect I like about New Testament Christianity is that is places the value of life at the center of its framework. "All life is sacred." It doesn't care about "burden" or "productivity" of that life, like a utilitarian or social Darwinist philosophy might. That is also why it boggles my mind that Evangelical Christians can be such hardcore, cut throat capitalists. Makes zero sense to me.
I guess my main point is that we shouldn't be so quick to dismiss what religion has to teach just because it has a supernatural cosmology that is obviously unscientific. As I said, I find the moral framework of Christianity to be superior to many "secular" moral philosophies, like utilitarianism, relativism, Deontology, etc. I would say Christianity aligns best with Effective Altruism, which could be described as a compassionate moral philosophy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effective_altruism
Last edited by midnightpulp; 05-03-2020 at 08:22 PM.
The problem with Evangelical Christians is that they cherry pick the good parts of the Bible and ignore the evil.
At that point it just becomes what we've learned of morality on our own and we're ready to put the Bible in a viking boat and let it go
That's fine. No problem in focusing on the positives of anything. Problem is, they don't even abide by the "good parts" of the Bible.
I honestly don't think we've learned much about morality because of our devotion to capitalism. I'm not an anti-capitalist, but I think unrestrained capitalism naturally leads to immoral outcomes. I'm in favor of it being the "engine" but within restraints that direct it toward maximizing flourishing. Social Democracy is probably the best method for that.
sorry brah, missed this response before...
There's nothing subjective about it, and has nothing to do with what works for me. Objectively speaking, faith is simply wishful thinking that appeals to emotion. Either we conclusively know something or we do not. Faith is wishing something is a certain way, even though we don't know that to be true. As such, I don't particularly care if some people get warm and fuzzy based on a lie, it's still a lie. Religion doesn't give answers, it provides a rather obfuscated emotional/psychological framework, oftentimes based strictly in unproven claims, which we normally call lies.
Moral decision making has no place anywhere but your own house. Nobody wants to live with somebody else's moral standards, period. That's why we don't (or I should rather say, try not to) legislate morality.
The standard I was referring to is the scientific method: you make a claim, you have to back it up, and you have to provide means for it to be testable and reproducible. Then we'll conclude it's true, otherwise, it's rubbish. That would save a lot of time and hurt out there.
Anything based on faith simply doesn't work out with science, they just don't mix and match. Now, that doesn't mean we don't have a lot of scientists that also practice some sort of faith. I don't know how they can reconcile that, that's up to them. I can only think it takes a severe amounts of mental gymnastics.
But the reality is that as soon as you bring up an untestable claim (ie: god) into any scientific paper, it's baloney, and it won't pass muster. So that's where it ends, and that's what's great about the scientific standard.
And I'm going to disagree here, but rationalism and science both should take you as far away from religion/faith/emotional wishful thinking as possible. That's by design.
Hard enough to pass them as it is. That's, however, a political problem, not necessarily a legal one.
It doesn't. Do go ahead an explain how they do.
Science can tell you that the statement is bull . That's all you really need to know. Not knowing the answer to something is a perfectly logical and rational state.
The fact that (some) people "want to believe" because of existential/whatever-the-reason is immaterial.
Faith-based persons overwhelmingly put their faith in science.
There are non-faith based persons that put their faith in pseudo-science. I don't go around spouting ignorant decrees like you do cos of it.
People can believe whatever they want, that doesn't make them right, or scientists.
That was pretty clear when I wrote right after what you quoted:
But the reality is that as soon as you bring up an untestable claim (ie: god) into any scientific paper, it's baloney, and it won't pass muster. So that's where it ends, and that's what's great about the scientific standard.
You should read up about the "scientific method", should be a quick Google, and then you'll understand right away why faith and science don't mix.
I know about the scientific method, you condescending clown.
Even more baffling you would make that claim, then. Science isn't 'people', science is a very specific method and standard.
WTF are you talking about? You're going full re .
If you know anything about the scientific method, how can you claim faith mixes at all with science? Who's re ed here?
I'm not saying the scientific method is based on faith. You're still at full re .
THANK JESUS
What are you saying then? You responded talking about what people believe.. that's faith, not science.
I still don't think you understand where I'm coming from. For morality and existential questions (i.e. meaning of life), everything about it is subjective and "emotional." My response to DMC works here:
Yes, "faith" can be a rational response to questions and events that science can't provide answers to, and what "works" for someone in this regard is subjective. For example, for a Christian who lost their child in a tragic accident, "faith" in the afterlife is a completely rational response to that situation since other answers won't be able to provide any kind of comfort and meaning, i.e. an atheist would likely respond to that person with something like, "Well, they're gone now, but try to remember the good times you had with your daughter. It'll get better." For some, that might be a satisfactory way with which to cope. For others, it isn't.See the epistemic Venn diagram again. Facts/Truth and Knowledge is the realm of the empirical. Ex. Empirical fact: People die. Knowledge: People can die at 30 or 80. Belief: "I believe if we had the choice, we should save the 30 year old over the 80 year old." There's nothing empirical about the last statement. It's a moral argument. You can't "prove" that statement is empirically correct. Moral arguments come from a philosophical or religious framework. Science can't tell us anything about what the correct choice here is. And trying to find out what the correct choice should be by making different arguments from any number of philosophical, political, economic, or religious positions is anything but an empirical process. It's an entirely subjective process, whereas science is a "view from nowhere" objective process in testing hypotheses to discover facts about nature.
I really don't care if it's "mind candy" or "a coping mechanism." When we're dealing with subjective phenomena like this, outside of an empirical scientific framework, I judge rationality on not what is likely to be "objectively correct" (in this case, the parents will never see their child again), but what has the most efficacy in helping the situation. The most efficacy here, for these particular people, would be to believe in the afterlife, because the prospect of never seen a loved one again is too psychologically traumatizing. Believing in the afterlife is "pragmatic" in the William James's sense, and is thus a valid philosophical position.
This makes no sense. I don't think you'd be too fond of another family believing wanton murder is morally fine. I know the point you're probably getting it is that nobody outside of you should impose moral standards on you and yours on with regard to things like sexuality, pornography, abortion, and other "moral majority" concerns. But outside of those, yes, the government legislates morality all the time and you do live by someone else's moral standards. You can't murder, steal, rape, evade your taxes, commit libel, etc.Moral decision making has no place anywhere but your own house. Nobody wants to live with somebody else's moral standards, period. That's why we don't (or I should rather say, try not to) legislate morality.
The standard I was referring to is the scientific method: you make a claim, you have to back it up, and you have to provide means for it to be testable and reproducible. Then we'll conclude it's true, otherwise, it's rubbish. That would save a lot of time and hurt out there.
And I'll repeat. The scientific method can't determine anything about the value of morality. Return to my Venn diagram example. Determining the "value" of "beliefs" is often hashed out through philosophical and religious debate, usually argued from arbitrary philosophical and religious frameworks, i.e. "How would the utilitarian position answer the dilemma of having to choose between saving a 30 year old and 80 year old?" or "How would Christianity answer the dilemma?" "Is one answer "better" than the other? Why?" This is why after 5000 years of religion and philosophy, we still can't come to a consensus on certain moral dilemmas, like the Trolley Problem. Science only deals with what is, not what ought to be. If you start appealing to science to influence moral decision making, you'll eventually commit the naturalistic fallacy.
And currently, there's no neat answer to the dilemma of reopening the economy at the cost of more lives vs. staying shut down, which saves life in the short term but could potentially lead to a greater loss of life from the fallout.
Sure, if you're talking about discovering facts nature. But that's not what I'm talking about. I think I've been clear enough that what I'm talking about is moral and, for lack of a better term, existential value. Again, science can't "prove" to you what the correct choice is regarding a moral dilemma. Science can't tell you what the meaning of your life is. Religion or wild ideas like brain uploading have pragmatic value in providing psychological comfort in the face of mortality. There's nothing inherently "bad" about wishful thinking in this context. I'll refer back to James in his defining something as philosophically true if it "works" (and is thus "rational"). Note, we're talking about philosophically true and not empirically true.Anything based on faith simply doesn't work out with science, they just don't mix and match. Now, that doesn't mean we don't have a lot of scientists that also practice some sort of faith. I don't know how they can reconcile that, that's up to them. I can only think it takes a severe amounts of mental gymnastics.
But the reality is that as soon as you bring up an untestable claim (ie: god) into any scientific paper, it's baloney, and it won't pass muster. So that's where it ends, and that's what's great about the scientific standard.
And I'm going to disagree here, but rationalism and science both should take you as far away from religion/faith/emotional wishful thinking as possible. That's by design.
Ahh no. That's back to god of the gaps. It's a logical fallacy.
Science can't tell you anything about what is the correct choice in that 30 year old or 80 year old dilemma.
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