Proof of Immortality III

[The Sparrow]

Jabba, do you assume the non existence of Vishnu?

Would it be fair of us to ask you to prove Vishnu does not exist?

 

[abaddon]

How many legs does the cat have?

One. It's a table with a monopod.

 

[MRC_Hans]

What both Jabba and Toontown do here is, deliberately or not, equivocating predictability and probability. A roll of dice, particular individual or mountain's existence is unpredictable. However, this has nothing to do with probability or plausibility. Even something as simple as a coin flip is entirely unpredictable, but neither of the two outcomes are improbable or implausible.

Hans

 

[Mojo]

- To repeat, Without that stipulation, however, OOFLam is simply claiming that the concept of an immaterial self is wishful thinking.

Nope, it simply has no need of that hypothesis.

 

[JayUtah]

Jabba, do you assume the non existence of Vishnu?

Would it be fair of us to ask you to prove Vishnu does not exist?

Or more to the point, if I claimed I could prove the existence of Vishnu, my critics would want to stipulate that it's possible Vishnu could exist. If they reject out of hand even the abstract possibility of Vishnu existing, then I would be wasting my time trying to prove anything to them.

It is important to realize that while rational skepticism does not believe in things for which there is no evidence, that is not tantamount to an assertion that such things do not or cannot exist. It is simply stating, as has Loss Leader, the agnosticism toward propositions that this-or-that exists when no evidence is forthcoming. And because of burden-of-proof issues, that boils down to a parsimonious presumption (not a belief or assertion) that things do not exist until they are shown to exist.

But that's different than being able to use the "possible" existence of Vishnu in any way as a prop in my argument. The null hypothesis I would have to overcome by my argument is "Vishnu doesn't exist." That's not an assertion of non-existence. It's simply the null hypothesis, what holds as a presumption until and unless I overcome it.

This is especially acute if I try to quantify that abstract possibility -- you know, the one we have to stipulate before it even makes sense to try to prove something -- as a probability and use it in some handwaving pseudo-statistical argument for why Vishnu "must" exist, i.e., because under that quantification it would be so very improbable for him not to exist.

 

[JoeMorgue]

It is important to realize that while rational skepticism does not believe in things for which there is no evidence, that is not tantamount to an assertion that such things do not or cannot exist.

Yeah but I'm sorta done being told by Woo Slingers and Woo Apologist that I "have" to acknowledge some unrealistic level of hypothetical, mathematical extreme levels of uncertainly because I'm not stupid I know how the game goes.

I'm not gonna be forced to make a token acknowledgement of some possible in a purely abstract sense, removed from all practical levels, level of uncertainty just to appease people who are obviously not arguing that level of esotericness.

Jabba isn't arguing for some extreme mathematical formula level of possibility, he obviously thinks it's not only possible but exists. I'm not giving someone who has already shown he argues the way he does another springboard to pretend there's some ambiguity he can cling to.

There's a classic crude, off color joke where a guy goes up to a woman and asks if she would sleep with him for a million dollars. The woman replies she would and the guy asks the woman if she would sleep with him for ten dollars and the woman gets offended and goes "What kind of woman do you think I am?" and the guy says "Well we've established what kind of woman you are now we're just haggling over the price." And what Woo Slingers and Woo Apologist love to do is a sort of intellectual version of that, arguing us down to a minimum level of ambiguity we are willing to acknowledge and shoving their Woo right in there the second we do.

And we don't have to do this. If someone asks is there a chair in the room we don't have to sit down and nearly cause nuclear fission splitting hairs and making token acknowledges about manufactured tiny barely finite mathematical chances that the chair is or isn't there. The chair either is or it isn't.

 

[JayUtah]

You just have to phrase carefully an expression of the willingness to be argued at and possibly convinced. Otherwise fringe proponents will equivocate your unwillingness to accept a poor argument or a farfetched proposition with an ideological entrenchment. The key is not to let them subtly redefine what it means to be open-minded. Part of the fringe rhetoric is the unspoken belief that skeptics are closed-minded, and they will pass up few opportunities to support that belief.

A jury is empaneled in a court case with the presumption that the defendant is not liable, but they are willing to be convinced that he is. That willingness is not itself a point of evidence that the plaintiff can use to suggest liability. Ditto skepticism. There's no problematic "duality" to contend with.

 

[The Sparrow]

Or more to the point, if I claimed I could prove the existence of Vishnu, my critics would want to stipulate that it's possible Vishnu could exist. If they reject out of hand even the abstract possibility of Vishnu existing, then I would be wasting my time trying to prove anything to them.

It is important to realize that while rational skepticism does not believe in things for which there is no evidence, that is not tantamount to an assertion that such things do not or cannot exist. It is simply stating, as has Loss Leader, the agnosticism toward propositions that this-or-that exists when no evidence is forthcoming. And because of burden-of-proof issues, that boils down to a parsimonious presumption (not a belief or assertion) that things do not exist until they are shown to exist.

But that's different than being able to use the "possible" existence of Vishnu in any way as a prop in my argument. The null hypothesis I would have to overcome by my argument is "Vishnu doesn't exist." That's not an assertion of non-existence. It's simply the null hypothesis, what holds as a presumption until and unless I overcome it.

This is especially acute if I try to quantify that abstract possibility -- you know, the one we have to stipulate before it even makes sense to try to prove something -- as a probability and use it in some handwaving pseudo-statistical argument for why Vishnu "must" exist, i.e., because under that quantification it would be so very improbable for him not to exist.

Well put as usual Jay.

 

[Mojo]

it would be stupid to be surprised that some member of a group of lottery winners has won a lottery, and that is why it is stupid to think I am surprised about that.

But it wouldn't be stupid to think that you are surprised that a member of the group "people who exist" exists?

 

[Jabba]

Dave,
- So the prior probability of ~H is zero?

That's not what I said.

- How about the prior probability of an immaterial self is zero?

Sure.

Dave,
- So, what would be your estimate of the prior probability of ~H?

 

[John Jones]

Dave,
- So, what would be your estimate of the prior probability of ~H?

-So, what is the prior probability that you will provide evidence for your claim?

 

[jsfisher]

Dave,
- So, what would be your estimate of the prior probability of ~H?

1 - P(H)

 

[Jabba]

1 - P(H)

js,
- What is the prior probability of H?

 

[jsfisher]

js,
- What is the prior probability of H?

Have you settled on a well-defined definition for H, yet?

 

[Jabba]

I assume there is no such thing as immaterial selves until I see evidence that there are.

Dave,
- If you look up Evidence for reincarnation, Evidence for life after death, Evidence for immortality, Evidence for ghosts, you'll find all sorts of studies that support the existence of immaterial selves. Look up consciousness...
- If you insist, I'll send you the studies and arguments that I find the most impressive, but that will make me even slower...
- And then, I claim that if one first accepts that there is a reasonable possibility (say a probability of .001) for immaterial selves, Bayesian statistics, itself, provides overwhelming indirect evidence for them.

 

[Jabba]

Have you settled on a well-defined definition for H, yet?

- "The theory that we each have only one, finite, life" isn't sufficient? What am I missing?

 

[jsfisher]

- "The theory that we each have only one, finite, life" isn't sufficient? What am I missing?

You are trying (probably not intentionally) to seek in soul via a colloquialism.

"Only one life" implies there is something more to it than just a (rather complex) biochemical process going on. There is nothing special that comes into existence at conception or birth, and there is nothing special that goes out of existence upon death.

This "one life" as you use the term is some sort of non-material entity that couples with a material person until death do they part.

Sorry, I cannot accept your definition for H. It makes nothing identifiable that there is only one of.

 

[John Jones]

Dave,
- If you look up Evidence for reincarnation, Evidence for life after death, Evidence for immortality, Evidence for ghosts, you'll find all sorts of studies that support the existence of immaterial selves.

How many credible ones?

 

[ferd burfle]

- "The theory that we each have only one, finite, life" isn't sufficient? What am I missing?

At a minimum, that "H" is not short for "theory".


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[HighRiser]

Dave,
- If you look up Evidence for reincarnation, Evidence for life after death, Evidence for immortality, Evidence for ghosts, you'll find all sorts of studies that support the existence of immaterial selves. Look up consciousness...
- If you insist, I'll send you the studies and arguments that I find the most impressive, but that will make me even slower...
- And then, I claim that if one first accepts that there is a reasonable possibility (say a probability of .001) for immaterial selves, Bayesian statistics, itself, provides overwhelming indirect evidence for them.

There is no reasonable possibility that anything supernatural exists because there is no objective evidence for anything supernatural existing. At least none that I am aware of.

Please do present objective evidence for the supernatural, though, because that will genuinely thrill me. I've been looking for such evidence for most of my lfe.

So far; nada. Nothing. Just nuts.