Are you daft? Have you got a reading comprehension problem? Have you been selectively reading my posts?
I thought I was pretty clear when I wrote "[t]his is a criteria that was not in your definition" that I was referring specifically to your definition. If you've posted a modified definition, please post it again. I must have missed it among the traffic in this thread. Otherwise, I'd appreciate it if you would please refrain from personal attacks.
Probably three times now I've gone into an in depth explanation as to why non-existence is the default position in skepticism, and you're acting like it's something new I just brought up? That's either you being intellectually dishonest or intellectually lazy, and it's damn annoying for me, if not also anyone else reading your posts.
We were talking about whether you can come up with a definition to support your claim, not whether you can launch into a diatribe where you contrive various exceptions and special cases for the definition and then attack me when I point out that they weren't part of the definition. If you want to add exceptions or special cases, please do so to the actual definition so that we can see how useful the result is.
You're being intellectually dishonest by trying to define your question from an egocentric point of view, specifically to eliminate the evidence we have, but your handwaving away of the evidence we have does not mean that it does not exist.
I never said that the "evidence" (that intelligent life exists on Earth) doesn't exist. I simply disagree that you about the usefulness of any conclusions that can be drawn from it about the probability of the existence of intelligent
aliens. In short, the "evidence" tells us that it is
possible, but not
certain, that intelligent life exists outside of the solar system. In other words, it tells us that the probability is greater than 0% and less than 100%. There is no evidence that it is
probable that intelligent life exists outside of the solar system, therefore to hold such an opinion should not be "skeptical" according to the criteria you set forth.
In fact, you've mentioned the lack of evidence multiple times:
It is currently reasonable to hold either position - that there is intelligent life in the universe other than us, and that there isn't. This is because while we know there is a reasonable probability of there being other forms of intelligent life in the universe (as we are aware of the conditions under which at least one form of intelligent life can arrive - us), we don't have any evidence for the existence of these other life forms.
We won't have any evidence of that life until we actually send something off to check, but that doesn't make the hypothesis automatically unreasonable or unskeptical.
Our observations of the universe tell us a number of things. For one, they tell us that where we live in the universe is not special. Our position and situation is not unique.
I'm sorry, but it's not quite true that our position and situation is not unique. In fact, our situation
is unique unless you think it probable that there is another planet
exactly like ours. Our
position is certainly unique since there is no other planet that exists in our precise location in the universe. According to
Wikipedia, some scientists believe that our situation may have greatly increased the probability of intelligent life arising on our planet:
Another active research area in astrobiology is solar system formation. It has been suggested that the peculiarities of our solar system (for example, the presence of Jupiter as a protective 'shield' or the planetary collision which created the Moon) may have greatly increased the probability of intelligent life arising on our planet.[31][32] No firm conclusions have been reached so far.
It tells us that there are billions of planets orbiting billions of stars, and that there are probably quite a few of those planets inside the 'goldilocks zone' - not too hot and not too cold to develop life. Indeed, a few planets have been found that may fit the bill.
Unfortunately, we don't know what combination of heat, radiation, or other (possibly unknown) factors are important for the development of intelligent life since we don't know how intelligent life arises. Therefore, we can't narrow down the conditions beyond the fact that conditions on Earth were sufficient to allow intelligent life to arise. So unless you know that there is another planet with conditions and a history exactly like that of our planet, you don't know whether conditions necessary for intelligent life are or have been present elsewhere. Nor can we know whether conditions present elsewhere have actually given rise to intelligent life until we have evidence of it.
All we need to know is that at least one form of intelligent life exists, and then we know that it is possible for intelligent life to develop in such places.
I've already agreed with this statement, several times. The problem is, the "evidence" that we exist doesn't tell us much at all about the
probability of intelligent life existing elsewhere. The fact that is it
possible only tells us that the probability is greater than 0%. Just as the fact that it's not
certain tells us that the probability is less than 100%.
Actually, you said that the method was incomplete. You can change your arguments, but don't pretend that you didn't say what you said. I don't care if someone refines or changes their arguments in the face of criticism - that's what skepticism is about. I do care if they pretend they never advanced the faulty argument in the first place.
I know that I said the method was incomplete, and have never denied saying that.
What I
did say was that I could only have meant one thing by it: that the results are inconclusive with certain propositions for which the evidence is inconclusive. You cannot necessarily use the method to determine whether an opinion about a given proposition is skeptical or not. That's what I've been saying all along. I have not changed my argument.
Propositions are true or false, and skepticism is a method that can be used to determine the truth value of a given proposition.
No, this is where you're mistaken. The scientific method can be used to determine the truth value of a given proposition
when the proposition is testable. But the truth value of a proposition for which the evidence is inconclusive cannot be determined by skepticism nor any other known means until further evidence is acquired.
Nor does skepticism limit the opinions one may have about a given proposition for which the evidence is inconclusive.
That you've been touting it as a flaw of skepticism. Maybe things are different outside of Australia, but here we generally don't consider flaws to be good things.
No, I'm not saying that there is a flaw in skepticism. Skepticism is a tool that can be extremely useful for discovering truth of a claim by examination of evidence, but it has its limitations. In particular, you cannot examine evidence when none is available. There are also cases where there is some evidence, but the evidence is inconclusive.
You're getting things the wrong way round. Skepticism is the method that allows us to determine what is and what isn't a fact. Not only that, but skepticism tells us that there is no such thing as 100% certainty about any issue - though there are things that come close enough that they can be considered certain by skeptical standards. Skepticism tells us that we should accept as fact that which is supported by reason and evidence - but that we should always be prepared to change our facts should new evidence come to light.
I don't think skepticism tells us to consider something that isn't certain to be certain. Nor does it tell us to accept as fact something that isn't fact. Nor is there such thing as "changing our facts" -- we can only change our
beliefs based on the facts. Skepticism tells us to consider and weigh the available evidence, and to be willing to change our opinions when additional evidence comes to light. It tells us to see things as they
are, even if that sometimes means admitting that we don't have enough evidence to know. It does not give us some magical method for determining truth when the truth is unknown.
Notice how there is more in what I said than the simplified strawman you implied was my position?
I never implied that any simplified strawman was your opinion. What I
did say was that during your explanations, you failed to clearly answer my straightforward question about whether an opinion that P is true and an opinion that ~P is true can both be skeptical according to your definition. (Hint: the answer is "yes").
So what is your position? That we can't know anything? And again - please stop saying that a proposition can be skeptical. A proposition can be true or false - your paragraph doesn't actually make any sense.
I think you understand that when I say "a proposition can be skeptical" I mean "the opinion that a proposition is true can be skeptical." If I really have to type it all out I'll do so, but I think it was pretty clear what I meant and if it wasn't you know now.
To answer your question, no my position is
not that we can't know anything. My position is that we can
only know what the evidence tells us, and that we
cannot know something without evidence. And that there is plenty of "I don't know for sure but my opinion is..." in between.
Belief and
knowledge are two different things. Skepticism does not limit our opinions when evidence is inconclusive, but it does limit claims of knowledge when evidence is inconclusive.
-Bri
