Superman music
2 days ago
Random thoughts on the blue highways.
You never know what you will find on the blue highways. Particularly when the choice at an intersection is controlled by the roll of a die. About the only rule is that highway onramps don't count as an intersection. You don't even have to roll the die. If one road looks interesting, go for it.
common sense alone says that most people wouldn't go to the trouble of asking if they didn't think it would work.
McAtheist
yet as we know, knowledge doesn't increase by becoming more and more vague, and ending up with a heap of improbable possibilities to pick and choose from for the sake of personal meaning.
F1fan
I'm interested to see you describe your heroes in terms of teaching you how to wrestle with the angel.
Blü
Show your evidence, not your belief.
F1fan
But faith, as such, is blind - not reasonably justified by evidence...
Clardan
I don't think that is true. Whilst there may be debate about the 'reasonably' bit of 'reasonably justified,' my faith (and I can only speak for my own) is not without evidence.
I fear you are misled by Richard Dawkins and his ilk. Faith, says Dawkins in The Selfish Gene, 'means blind trust, in the absence of evidence, even in the teeth of evidence.' He is mistaken.
Lavengro
Actually Lavengro, I thought this independently of Dawkins, but how is he mistaken? I take it you agree that it is not reasonable to believe in things independently of evidence, and that a belief can only be rationally justified by sufficient evidence. How then is your faith rationally justified ?Dawkins is mistaken by the common fundie mistake of assuming some=all. He compounds that by the common atheist mistake of refusing to consider personal evidence. If I am convinced I have had a (Kantian) transcendental experience, and have examined that experience dispassionately as the scientist I am and found evidence that it was indeed transcendent, there is no possibility of reproducing that evidence for another. It happened to me. It was based on the integration of all of the mental and psychological factors that make up my mind which cannot be imposed on another. But if you trust my judgment as a scientist why can you not trust my evaluation of my experience as transcendent. "
Clardan
So your optimism is based on how other people act that are in your local world. Is that a fair statement? So say you were ... would you be optimistic there,"The fact is that we choose our local world, at least by the time we grow up. Our choice will be heavily influenced by the world we grew up in. So say you were a fundie and lived in a Southern small town away from a cosmopolitan area. Would I be optimistic that you could learn to think for yourself about important areas of your life? A few years ago I probably would say no. But these days with mandatory email as a window to the world, it is all too easy to sneak a peek on the internet and be corrupted. You might have to worry about your parents as the common ad here suggests, but if you are really pessimistic about being anything about being a couch potato spending free time from that in church there is a way out. Don't get me wrong, it won't be easy, your determination to change your destiny must be strong, but these days it will be possible."
Godman
Who are your heroes? What makes them heroes to you?
Blü
science writers Chris Mooney and Sheril Kirshenbaum argue that America's future is deeply endangered by the scientific illiteracy of its citizens
Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded -- here and there, now and then -- are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty. This is known as "bad luck"
From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long,1973.
Two hundred million sperm lunged forward.Corrected version. Thanks Mary-Ella.
I won.
When looking at life in general, many things can be attributed to giving an individual purpose in life."I think purpose in life really boils down to make the people who are important to you happy. It starts of course with mom, but expands to family and the larger society of which you are a part. In general, happy friends means good things happen to you which is the selfish interest in having a purpose in life.
Stoic-sage
Philosophy is no more incompatible with science than it is with religion.
J'C
Agreed - but, as with religion, letting one's philosophy restrict what science one will accept as valid is not good for the science.
Abner1
15 BooksShare Here are the rules: Don't take too long to think about it. Fifteen books you've read that will always stick with you. They don't have to be the greatest books you've ever read, just the ones that stick with you. List the first fifteen you can recall in no more than 15 minutes
Elizabeth Black
After all, they [bible scribes] believed the creation was a series of magical events, and magical events aren't subject to time constraints.
Ken
Only you can decide what you do with your free will that God has given.
Toolestock
There is no limit to the good you can do if you don't care who gets the credit.
General George C. Marshall
Some people worry too much about ontological questions - to the point of despair. Realizing uncertainty can be depressing, but also liberating from endless speculation...
Clardan
If evolutionism is real then the human split has already begun.
For all who know and love Pachelbel's Greatest Hit, that means all who read this blog of course.
...we perceive the world causally because it is in our nature (material make up and our experience of consciousness) to perceive it causally.It may be time to take this part of our nature out from under the rug and see if it is still useful. The post hoc, propter hoc fallacy has probably caused more trouble in science, religion, and life than any other mistake we commonly make. Something happens and the first thing we ask is “Why?” Then we grab the first plausible why we can find and go back into our stupor thinking that we have the answer. When rocks, and spears were social mediators this probably made sense. But in a modern world where nuanced responses to stimuli are necessary the simple causal answer may not even be correct let alone useful. I have learned that jumping to conclusions is normally jumping into hot water, and that rational consideration is normally the best solution to any important decision. And that the initial causal response is usually incorrect.
Kwinters
Reason and rationality dictate that any contingent thing must (by necessity) have a cause for its being. Therefore in order for anything to exist, there must be something which does exist that requires no cause--and is the cause of everything that is by nature contingent. That is why we say that this non-contingent something has a super-nature or super-being. It is 'super' (beyond) because-unlike us---it does not necessitate a cause for its existence or being.
CaliberCadillac
Not just ... but ESP, are included in the 'wishes come true' category.
Blü
Can you please explain to me how it is possible to validate any empirical observation without employing such metaphysical axioms?Empirical observations are validated by consistency with other empirical observations which may be of a similar or relevant nature. If one for example makes the empirical observation that young children in learning how to separate self from other will frequently be unable to distinguish between living others, inanimate others such as toy animals, and mythical others like Santa Claus, or the Wizard of Oz. One can validate this observation by observing the child interacting with living others that hesh may not have met previously, a new inanimate toy, and a new myth like God. The fact that God is as real in the mind of the child as the living stranger validates the observation that until a certain age children have a concept of self and other, but the other may not be differentiated.
A is A, and A is not non-A.
Can you please explain to me how that purely metaphysical axiom is somehow untrue?