No. I’m tired of being the only one answering questions in this thread. I’ve laid out my views as clearly and honestly as I can, and I want you to hold up your end of the conversation and answer some questions.

arensb, you have not even begun to scratch the surface with justifying your epistemology. I don’t think you will be able to without begging the question. You came to this site with your comments (opinions) and you have yet to justify any of them.

while ignoring the fact that you apparently believe that a magic spell can turn a piece of bread into a magic man who somehow is also his own father.

Once again, you are making a sweeping and unwarranted accusation against me. I believe you are referring to the so-called “miracle of the mass” which I wrote a post about a week or so ago (which you linked to). If you would have actually read the post, you would have seen that the purpose of the post was to present the RCC’s belief and then Scripturally refute it. But I guess you stopped after the first few sentences and assumed that I held to this belief.

But natural selection can produce beings that care for each other.

This is making another assertion.

Please tell me what your standard is for discerning truth from error.

Whether a statement matches reality.

More begging the question. Is it your perceived reality? Because facts are mute. They are interpreted through one’s worldview.

I have already told you what I believe. Again:

Christ is the source of all wisdom and knowledge (Col. 2:3) and the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge (Prov. 1:7).

Therefore, only the Christian worldview can account for and provide the necessary preconditions of intelligible experience, logic, mathematics, science, and the uniformity of nature. God exists because of the impossibility of the contrary and for you to even argue against God, you have to first presuppose Him.

I have asked you to account for such things as immaterial laws in your worldview and you haven’t been able to aside from just saying that they just work.

I’m not sure why it showed up as spam.

Are you running Spam Karma, by any chance? I’ve seen it mark comments as spam when someone leaves too many comments, or on a thread that it considers too old, or based on criteria beyond my ken.

First, you need to account for logical laws in your worldview before I can answer this.

No. I’m tired of being the only one answering questions in this thread. I’ve laid out my views as clearly and honestly as I can, and I want you to hold up your end of the conversation and answer some questions.

You keep delving into epistemological sophistry, while ignoring the fact that you apparently believe that a magic spell can turn a piece of bread into a magic man who somehow is also his own father.

I haven’t found the theory of evolution and the process of nature selection to be too concerned about caring for one’s neighbor.

It isn’t. But natural selection can produce beings that care for each other. Adam Smith’s invisible hand doesn’t give a rat’s [filtered] about workers’ conditions either, but it can result in companies that offer decent salaries and health insurance plans.

Please tell me what your standard is for discerning truth from error.

Whether a statement matches reality.

Okay, your turn.

If I present you with an argument that you find convincing, why wouldn’t you agree with me?

First, you need to account for logical laws in your worldview before I can answer this.

And besides, “society” is just a bunch of people, really. All with different opinions and pulling the collective entity known as “society” in different directions.

Opinion or absolute statement?

you’ll have to deal with me defending myself, you’ll have to live with the guilt of what you’ve done

Does guilt exist? If so, what do you do with your guilt?

No, we care about people because we’re wired that way. Most likely by evolution.

Most likely? So you are taking a leap of faith here into the realm of uncertainty. By the way, I haven’t found the theory of evolution and the process of nature selection to be too concerned about caring for one’s neighbor.

Nothing can be known with absolute, 100% certainty.

Do you know with 100% absolute certainty that “Nothing can be known with absolute, 100% certainty”?

If so, you are contradicting yourself, and at some point, in order to be consistent, you’ll need to start being uncertain about your uncertainty.

And “divine revelation” doesn’t count, because how do you know that what you perceived as, say, the touch of the holy spirit, wasn’t just implanted by the mad scientist by messing with your brain?

In your materialistic worldview it doesn’t but in mine it does. You are just asserting that it doesn’t count. You’ll first need to prove why it doesn’t. But even then, you won’t allow it because of your presuppositions.

Which laws of logic are you referring to? Things like A ∧ B → A or A → A ∨ B? How can those possibly not be true?

I’m asking how you account for them. I’m glad to see that you believe they exist and are universal, but how do you account for these?

That’s just an ad farm. And I hope you didn’t mean proofthatgodexists.org, because I’d be disappointed if you couldn’t see the glaring errors at that trainwreck of a site (argument from biblical authority? Puh-leeze. And it seems as though every other page commits the fallacy of the excluded middle. To say nothing of the fact that the author keeps trying to tell me what I believe, and usually getting it wrong).

My mistake. I meant .org and not .com.

I find your comment to be a string of assertions. Please tell me what your standard is for discerning truth from error. Next, you appeal to the logical law of excluded middle, but you must first tell me how you can account for universal, invariant, and immaterial laws in your worldview.

Otherwise, your whole comment has been unjustified opinions at best.

I value humans so highly and respect and treat each one with dignity because every human being bears the image of God though it has all been terribly marred by sin.

That just raises further questions, like how do you know that humans “bear[] the image of God”? What does that even mean? Since chimps have all of the same organs and genes that humans do, do they also bear the image of God?

All social animals exhibit feelings toward each other. Does that mean that they all bear the image of their respective gods?

But more importantly, it’s a non sequitur. Destroying the twin towers was mass murder; should tearing up a photo of the twin towers be a misdemeanor?

What I’m getting it is that you said we should agree with you if you present us with convincing arguments, but you need to first explain why we should agree with your standard of moral judgment.

I’m not sure why you don’t understand this. If I present you with an argument that you find convincing, why wouldn’t you agree with me? Just to be contrarian?

Different people are convinced by different types of arguments. What persuades me might not persuade you, and vice-versa. So as I asked above, what sorts of argument persuade you? I’m sure you’ve changed your mind in the past; what made you reconsider your ideas? Tell me, and I’ll argue accordingly.

At any rate, you still haven’t provided a better way of figuring out what constitutes good and bad behavior. If you have one, then please provide it.

I have asked the moral reason why it is good for communities to flourish and how a society can make moral judgments for the good of the majority.

I don’t think anyone’s arguing that it’s automatically good for a society to flourish. I, for one, am glad that Nazi Germany and the USSR collapsed.

And besides, “society” is just a bunch of people, really. All with different opinions and pulling the collective entity known as “society” in different directions.

This doesn’t answer why, it just says that successful societies flourish. This is nothing but a tautology.

You misunderstood what I said above: “Societies that have what it takes to flourish, flourish; those that don’t, collapse.”

This is the same mistake creationists make when they say that “survival of the fittest” is a tautology. The USSR didn’t just collapse for no reason. It collapsed because it was spending too much, and not producing enough, among other reasons.

Low production, in turn, was because they had an economic system that didn’t reward people for producing more: whether you produced 200% over quota or just slacked off all month, you got paid the same, so there was no incentive to work harder. So that society didn’t have what it takes to flourish.

Who knows? If the USSR had switched to private enterprise but called it “Decentralized Communism” to make it more palatable, maybe it would still be around today.

If you cannot appeal to something object and transcendental outside of yourself, you are left in a pool of your own opinions. At the end of the day, I can punch you in the face and steal your brand new cd player and you may tell me I shouldn’t do that, but that would just be asserting your opinion. I can then respond that it is my opinion I should and walk away.

That’s true, but that’s not the whole picture: if you beat me up and steal my stuff, it’s not just my opinion you’ll have to deal with: you’ll have to deal with me defending myself, you’ll have to live with the guilt of what you’ve done, the disapproval of your family and friends once I tell them what you’ve done, not to mention the cops, the judge, and the prison guards. You’ll also have to deal with the kid down the street to whom you’ve just shown that it’s okay to punch people in the face and steal their stuff, and who might decide that it might be fun to assault you and steal your stuff.

Even if it’s only my opinion that assault and theft are bad, it’s a widely-held opinion: after all, none of us want it to happen to us. So if you do something that’s widely perceived as bad or antisocial, it shouldn’t be hard to get together a coalition to punish you.

Again, this is like saying, “We care about people because we care about people”

No, we care about people because we’re wired that way. Most likely by evolution.

[snip for brevity] To respond with, “they seem to work” is making yet another tautology and meaningless statement.

Do you solve crossword puzzles? When I do, I’m often very uncertain whether any given answer is correct (that’s why I do them in pencil). But when I’ve completed a puzzle, I’m much more certain that I’ve gotten the answers right, because they all fit together.

Life is like a crossword puzzle that way. Nothing can be known with absolute, 100% certainty. But lots of facts fit together and mutually reinforce each other. My sense of sight may be deceptive, so the pencil I see may not really be there. But if I try to pick it up, my sense of touch confirms what I perceived through sight. Now, maybe both my senses of sight and touch are lying. But if so, they’re telling me the same lie. I can also sniff and lick the pencil, and tap it on the table (which may or may not be there), so now I have five senses confirming each other. So either they’re all telling the truth, or they’re all somehow conspiring to tell the same lie. The more parsimonious explanation is that the pencil is really there.

Heck, I’ll even concede that I know (as well as anything can be known, anyway) that my senses are unreliable. Google “optical illusion” and you’ll find any number of examples of your eyes showing you things that aren’t there.

If you’re going to start asking questions like, how do I know I’m not in the Matrix, or the victim of a mad neuroscientist poking my brain to produce false sensations, thoughts, and memories, then I can turn that around and ask how you know anything either. And “divine revelation” doesn’t count, because how do you know that what you perceived as, say, the touch of the holy spirit, wasn’t just implanted by the mad scientist by messing with your brain?

Oh, and the one other thing that stuck out in your list was:

Are the laws of logic universal and unchanging? If so, how do you account for this in your worldview.

Which laws of logic are you referring to? Things like A ∧ B → A or A → A ∨ B? How can those possibly not be true?

If you want a better understanding of what I am getting at, please go to, http://www.proofthatgodexists.com

That’s just an ad farm. And I hope you didn’t mean proofthatgodexists.org, because I’d be disappointed if you couldn’t see the glaring errors at that trainwreck of a site (argument from biblical authority? Puh-leeze. And it seems as though every other page commits the fallacy of the excluded middle. To say nothing of the fact that the author keeps trying to tell me what I believe, and usually getting it wrong).

Okay, why do you value human beings more highly than broccoli? I wonder if it’s the same reason I do.

I value humans so highly and respect and treat each one with dignity because every human being bears the image of God though it has all been terribly marred by sin.

Yes, well, people who don’t play nice with others may eventually have to deal with other people’s opinion that it’d be a good idea to send in the cops, or invade their country, that sort of thing.

arensb, but are your “rules” of getting along and not “pissing off” others just your rules? My question is trying to get to the basis of why I should go by your rules.

Let’s say they are just my opinions. So what?

And obviously, you should agree with me if you’ve been presented with a convincing argument to do so (either by me or by someone else). What would you consider a convincing argument?

I should agree with you? Says who? Is this another opinion or is this another “ought?” If this is another opinion, then I can just sweep it aside and tell you that it’s my opinion that I should ignore your opinions. BUT, if you are telling me I ought to agree with you if you give me a convincing argument, please tell me why I ought? What standard are you appealing to?

Wait a sec. You’re describing a situation in which I proposed doing X, giving reasons A, B, and C. You agreed (if only to yourself) that all things considered, that A, B, C are good reasons to do X (otherwise, it wouldn’t be a convincing argument, would it?). But you don’t do X anyway. Why?

Actually, I don’t think the “why” matters much, since I don’t think this sort of thing happens very often. If someone presents you with what you think are good reasons for doing something, don’t you usually do that thing?

What I’m getting it is that you said we should agree with you if you present us with convincing arguments, but you need to first explain why we should agree with your standard of moral judgment.

“[Lucy:] the point is that an individual would not wish to live in a society where the execution of individuals was the norm.”

I’m not sure what you mean by this statement.

Would you want to live in a society where people just go around killing other people? I’m willing to bet that none of us would, if for no other reason than that if Joe Schmo down the street can be killed, then so can you.

But why is it right and good to have a flourishing community. I still want to know what standard you are using that says communities should flourish.

It’s not a matter of “should” or “ought”. Societies that have what it takes to flourish, flourish; those that don’t, collapse.

I think this has become off topic. I have asked the moral reason why it is good for communities to flourish and how a society can make moral judgments for the good of the majority. All I have heard is that no one would want to live in a society where there is torture and killing everywhere. And it’s not so much that societies ought to flourish, they just do. This doesn’t answer why, it just says that successful societies flourish. This is nothing but a tautology.

The question of what kind of society one would want to live in, is a separate matter.

And this is another matter not related to the discussion.

And so what if Lucy or I don’t appeal to any “higher standard” than our opinion?

If you cannot appeal to something object and transcendental outside of yourself, you are left in a pool of your own opinions. At the end of the day, I can punch you in the face and steal your brand new cd player and you may tell me I shouldn’t do that, but that would just be asserting your opinion. I can then respond that it is my opinion I should and walk away.

However, if you zoom in, people do matter to other people. Again, it’s not a matter of whether we ought to care about other people or not; we do. If your brother died, could you choose not to feel sad? I know I couldn’t. I might be able to keep my actions in check, but not my feelings.

Again, this is like saying, “We care about people because we care about people”

What is your moral reason for doing so instead of simply begging the question?

Finally,

can you tell me the color and weight of the law of identity, or how much the number 3 weighs? If you can’t use your senses to determine that mathematics exist, do you then not believe in them?

They seem to work.

This may seem glib, but it’s true. Put two 1-lb weights on one side of a set of scales, and a 2-lb weight on the other. Notice that the scales are balanced. This is prima facie evidence (not proof, but evidence) that 1+1 = 2

Even though you used an example of a logical law, that still doesn’t answer the question. How do you know that 1+1=2 and that will happen every time no matter where you are?

I don’t think you have begun to grapple with the weightier issues of epistemology. I want to know if you believe the laws of logic exist. If you are a materialist and empiricist like Lucy is:

1) Which of the 5 senses did you use to determine that they exist
2) Are the laws of logic universal and unchanging? If so, how do you account for this in your worldview.
3) Without begging the question, how do you know that tomorrow will be like the past? That the sun will rise from the East and not the West? That when you squeeze toothpaste onto your toothbrush this morning, the toothpaste will come out instead of shooting straight up into the air?

To respond with, “they seem to work” is making yet another tautology and meaningless statement.

I invite you and encourage you to grapple with some of these issues instead of brushing them aside and saying, I don’t care how I know things or what my justification is for making moral judgments, I just do. That itself is a gigantic, blind leap of faith.

If you want a better understanding of what I am getting at, please go to, http://www.proofthatgodexists.com

Blessings,
Danny

Lots of comments, so I hope I didn’t overlook any.

Same here. If I missed a point that someone cares about, remind me.

“[Lucy:] the point is that an individual would not wish to live in a society where the execution of individuals was the norm.”

I’m not sure what you mean by this statement.

Would you want to live in a society where people just go around killing other people? I’m willing to bet that none of us would, if for no other reason than that if Joe Schmo down the street can be killed, then so can you.

But why is it right and good to have a flourishing community. I still want to know what standard you are using that says communities should flourish.

It’s not a matter of “should” or “ought”. Societies that have what it takes to flourish, flourish; those that don’t, collapse.

The question of what kind of society one would want to live in, is a separate matter.

And so what if Lucy or I don’t appeal to any “higher standard” than our opinion? The fact of the matter is that most people want the same things: food, shelter, love, friendship, security, and so forth. It’s pointless to ask why we should want friendship, because we don’t really have a choice in the matter. (We can talk about that once we get close to being able to genetically engineer people who don’t care what happens to them, or who don’t want the approval of their peers, that sort of thing.)

And if we evolved from the same stuff, then what difference does it make what we do to each other?

Depends on your scale. If you look at the universe as a whole, the whole Earth could be wiped out by a gamma ray burst, and it wouldn’t make a lick of difference to the universe. You probably wouldn’t even see it happened, unless you were positioned just so and looking carefully.

However, if you zoom in, people do matter to other people. Again, it’s not a matter of whether we ought to care about other people or not; we do. If your brother died, could you choose not to feel sad? I know I couldn’t. I might be able to keep my actions in check, but not my feelings.

And if I feel this way, then probably most people do, too. So given the premise that most people care about each other, how do we proceed?

can you tell me the color and weight of the law of identity, or how much the number 3 weighs? If you can’t use your senses to determine that mathematics exist, do you then not believe in them?

<shrug> They seem to work.

This may seem glib, but it’s true. Put two 1-lb weights on one side of a set of scales, and a 2-lb weight on the other. Notice that the scales are balanced. This is prima facie evidence (not proof, but evidence) that 1+1 = 2.

Or consider Voyager 2’s flyby of Neptune. A craft like that doesn’t have enough fuel to make significant course corrections. So the fact that it made it to Neptune after being, in effect, thrown in a particular direction at a particular time with a particular velocity, is good evidence that yes, we have a good handle on how physics (and the underlying math) work.

Is being open-minded to the possibility of future evidence a form of faith? You are believing in current non-evidence that there will be future evidence. What evidence do you currently have for the possible future of evidence?

That’s not how I read what she said. As I understand Lucy, all she’s saying is “I believe certain things because of what I’ve seen so far. But I could turn out to be wrong.” Think of the story of doubting Thomas: he was skeptical because, come on, people don’t just come back from the dead. Jesus presented him with evidence (his wounds), and Thomas changed his mind.

Good for Thomas, I say.

the point is that an individual would not wish to live in a society where the execution of individuals was the norm.

I’m not sure what you mean by this statement.

You then said,

Forming a community would be completely impossible if every individual tortured, raped and murdered. Therefore, it is not the majority’s opinion that matters, but that which allows the Community to flourish.

But why is it right and good to have a flourishing community. I still want to know what standard you are using that says communities should flourish.

Evolution makes no comment on “should” or “ought” but is merely a process.

Exactly. And if we evolved from the same stuff, then what difference does it make what we do to each other? After all, it’s just the process of natural selection being worked out, even though it may be a gruesome and ugly process.

Finally (I think, I may have missed a question!), Am I a materialist, you ask. I would answer that I only believe in those things which are supported by evidence.

May I ask what evidence you used to determine that you should only believe in things supported by evidence? I assume you believe in the laws of logic, morality, and mathematics. If so, can you tell me the color and weight of the law of identity, or how much the number 3 weighs? If you can’t use your senses to determine that mathematics exist, do you then not believe in them?

Where there is no evidence I have no choice but to not believe - while remaining open-minded to the possibility of evidence being uncovered in the future. I’m afraid the concept of faith - believing in something despite the lack of evidence - is something I reject.

Is being open-minded to the possibility of future evidence a form of faith? You are believing in current non-evidence that there will be future evidence. What evidence do you currently have for the possible future of evidence?

Thanks for the comments,
Danny