Can theists be rational?

[RandFan]

I'm sorry to disappoint you, but the argument cj posted has to do with the existence of a god.

I'm sorry to disapoint you but "god" is defined as the creator of the universe.

What created the universe? God.
How do we know that? The fine tuning of the universe.

A fine-tuner is a being which has the power to set the fundamental constants of the universe to relatively specific values that would allow life to develop and exist.

In other words, the creator of the universe.

Not any moreso than any other definition.

If you define "god" as an entitity that didn't create the universe then that would not be circular. But then you are back to the problem of how the universe was created.

You can't escape the consequences of your logic.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

I can play that game too. If it's irrational to posit the existence of a fine-tuner, then it's also irrational to posit the existence of aliens for the same reason.

And, has been pointed out to you again and again, it's not necessary to "posit the existence of aliens".

Everything that is a factor in the Drake Equation are things that are known to exist with 100% certainty. The result of the Drake Equation is the number of intelligences in the galaxy (or universe, depending on how you run it).

Nope--no one is positing the existence of aliens.

Positing the existence of a fine-tuner (a dishonest term for "God"), and then "proving" that a fine-tuner (a dishonest term for "God") exists is indeed circular.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

By the way, Bri, if anyone says that they know for sure that ET intelligences exist, they're wrong.

We don't know. And the Drake Equation is not meant as support for the proposition that we do know that they must exist. If someone is trying to use it that way, I'd be interested in seeing how. I suspect they're not being reasonable.

 

[RandFan]

I'm saying that the two arguments are equivalent in some important ways. Specifically, I think if one is considered to be an anthopomorphic argument, so must the other.

No.

If you find bacteria in a pond of water and there is another pond of water with similar variables then infering that there is bacteria in that pond isn't an anthropomorphic argument.

To posit ET inteligent life doesn't require appeals to magic or entities that we have never observed. Inteligent life has existed. It's us. Human beings. Magical fine tuners that can create 100,000,000,000 x 300,000,000,000 stars and associated planets HAS NEVER BEEN OBSERVED.

There is an assumption that ordered states may be created by an intelligence. Do you disagree with that assumption?

The assumption is overly simplistic and misleading. "May"? Yes but that does not give you licence to then state snowflakes are built by tiny people.

There exist creator beings on our planet. We know the requirements for creating other entities of various types. We know that some creators beings have created other entities that reproduce and evolve in their created universes. We are simply trying to determine, based on what we know, the likelihood of creator beings outside of our universe having created this universe.

This is the anthropic principle and it is a fallacy.

We know nothing of alien intelligences. There is nothing for us to falsify or test.

We are at this moment studying the universe looking for ET inteligent life. Are you saying that it is impossible to find it?

Your argument that one is rational and the other not seems to me to be based on nothing more than "Because I say so."

No. One is based on what we know (that inteligent life exists). The other is based on ignorance. BTW: Creator beings on Earth are a far cry from magical creatures that transend the laws of physics. Positing ET inteligent life on other planets outside of our solar system doesn't require anything that we don't allready know is consistent with the laws of physics.

 

[Bri]

I'm sorry to disapoint you but "god" is defined as the creator of the universe.

No it's not.

What created the universe? God.
How do we know that? The fine tuning of the universe.

The argument cj posted begins with a premise which specifies a prior probability that a god exists, a probability of a fine-tuned universe if there is a god, and a probability of a fine-tuned universe if there is no god. These three numbers are plugged into Bayes theorem to obtain a posterior probability that a god exists if the universe is in fact fine-tuned.

-Bri

 

[articulett]

Michael Shermer notes that smart people just fool themselves in smarter ways... I think they do it through the analogies (and metaphors) they use and the analogies (and metaphors) they avoid.

That's why it always feels like a semantics game. Theists can be rational with other things... and they juggle such analogies to act in lieu of what they are trying to prove to themselves.

They want to believe that positing a god is akin to positing intelligent life elsewhere... but it's more akin to positing a sun mover or star maker... an invisible unmeasurable fine tuner that they never have to define except by belief and appeals to ignorance.

A shall call the mover of the sun god and use the sun's "movement" as proof of this god.

That's what their argument boils down to to me. But they keep wanting to see it as akin to positing intelligent life on another planet. My how people are clever in the lies they tell themselves.

Positing life on another planet is akin to positing another "earth like" planet somewhere in the cosmos. It's not like positing a sun mover. But positing a fine tuner is very much like positing a sun mover.

 

[articulett]

No it's not.



The argument cj posted begins with a premise which specifies a prior probability that a god exists, a probability of a fine-tuned universe if there is a god, and a probability of a fine-tuned universe if there is no god. These three numbers are plugged into Bayes theorem to obtain a posterior probability that a god exists if the universe is in fact fine-tuned.

-Bri

But the universe would HAVE to appear fine tuned for any life that evolved anywhere in it provided that life could consider such things.

Your gut is fine tuned for e-coli.

Dead things are fine tuned for fungus.

 

[Paulhoff]

It is so simple, if a universe can support life it does, if it can’t support life, there will be no stupid so-called god stuff on the forum.

Paul

 

[Malerin]

You've got 1 and 5 in there twice. That doesn't make any sense. There are 1,000,000 balls numbered 1 through 1,000,000

I misread what you said. Assume there are a million balls and for any ball, it has a value between one and a million (in other words, it's possible for multiple balls to have the same number).

You draw out 9 balls and get 314159265. You're really going to think that was just chance?

Or, to use your original exmaple, you draw out 100 balls, and get 123456789101112.... all the way to 100, in that order. The odds of that happening by chance would probbaly take up half the screen. What would be reasonable to conclude if you got such a result?

You are not making any sense. I don't understand your point.

It's the same point I made with repsect to poker: you're not going to play with a dealer who deals himself royal flush after royal flush, even though the odds of a junk hand and a royal flush are the same. some results are more significant than others.

Are you saying that the events that we know that have the probability of 1 are in fact an impossibility?

 

[articulett]

My heart is so finely tuned to fit in my body...

My floor is so finely tuned to fit in my house...

My keyboard is so finely tuned to my computer... it happens to be able to type all the letters I use and speak the language I speak...

The internet is so fine tuned for this forum...

The thing about emerging properties and natural selection is that to human minds this creates the illusion of purposeful design... it's not due to any design or fine tuning... but rather to the egotistical way in which we cannot help but view the world.

Suppose the fine tuning argument for god was exactly akin to my above statements--how would you know? Would you want to know? Are the above "rational" statements? Are they "true"? Are they evidence of a fine tuner or designer?

 

[Paulhoff]

Or, to use your original exmaple, you draw out 100 balls, and get 123456789101112.... all the way to 100, in that order. The odds of that happening by chance would probbaly take up half the screen. What would be reasonable to conclude if you got such a result?

The chance for any order of balls is the same.

Paul

 

[Bri]

And, has been pointed out to you again and again, it's not necessary to "posit the existence of aliens".

So you have evidence that the existence of extra terrestrial intelligent life is probable?

Everything that is a factor in the Drake Equation are things that are known to exist with 100% certainty.

Are you saying that extra terrestrial intelligent life is known to exist with 100% certainty? Or are you saying that the values assigned to the terms are known with 100% certainty? Either way you'd be mistaken.

Nope--no one is positing the existence of aliens.

Drake's equation isn't an argument, but any argument based on Drake's equation that concludes that the existence of aliens is probable would indeed posit the existence of aliens.

Positing the existence of a fine-tuner (a dishonest term for "God"), and then "proving" that a fine-tuner (a dishonest term for "God") exists is indeed circular.

If the argument were assuming the existence of a fine-tuner and then concluding that a fine-tuner exists, it might be circular. But that's your own straw man, not the argument cj posted. The argument we've actually been discussing doesn't assume the existence of a fine-tuner, nor does it conclude that a fine-tuner exists.

By the way, Bri, if anyone says that they know for sure that ET intelligences exist, they're wrong.

I agree, and I don't think anyone has mentioned knowing for sure that ET intelligence exists. A belief in extra-terrestrial intelligent life would more likely be a belief that it is probable, not necessarily of its definite existence.

We don't know. And the Drake Equation is not meant as support for the proposition that we do know that they must exist. If someone is trying to use it that way, I'd be interested in seeing how. I suspect they're not being reasonable.

Nobody has indicated that anyone used it that way. What I said is that people use arguments based on Drake's equation to support a belief that extra terrestrial intelligent life exists.

-Bri

 

[RandFan]

No it's not.

Yes, yes it is.

The argument cj posted begins with a premise which specifies a prior probability that a god exists, a probability of a fine-tuned universe if there is a god, and a probability of a fine-tuned universe if there is no god. These three numbers are plugged into Bayes theorem to obtain a posterior probability that a god exists if the universe is in fact fine-tuned.

? So what? It is of no consequence if god didn't create the universe.

 

[Paulhoff]

And we are not fine-tuned to the earth, there are so many places on the earth that one would die in no time without protection, and without a water and food supple.\

Paul

 

[Malerin]

The chance for any order of balls it the same.

Paul

We should play poker sometime. I'll cheat like crazy and deal myself nothing but straight flushes, four-of-a-kinds, and full-houses. And you'll continue to play because a royal flush is just as likely as any other hand, right?

 

[RandFan]

I misread what you said. Assume there are a million balls and for any ball, it has a value between one and a million (in other words, it's possible for multiple balls to have the same number).

You draw out 9 balls and get 314159265. You're really going to think that was just chance?

You are not making any sense. Couldn't we just stick with my hypothetical?

Or, to use your original exmaple, you draw out 100 balls, and get 123456789101112.... all the way to 100, in that order. The odds of that happening by chance would probbaly take up half the screen. What would be reasonable to conclude if you got such a result?

Why should we assume that fine tuning is equivelant to drawing this combination?

It's the same point I made with repsect to poker: you're not going to play with a dealer who deals himself royal flush after royal flush, even though the odds of a junk hand and a royal flush are the same. some results are more significant than others.

And I ask you again, how many instances of the universe do we have?

BTW: How do you know that the universe hasn't expanded and colapsed an infinite number of times, each time resulting in different variables. How do you know that there aren't an infinite number of universes?

 

[RandFan]

We should play poker sometime. I'll cheat like crazy and deal myself nothing but straight flushes, four-of-a-kinds, and full-houses. And you'll continue to play because a royal flush is just as likely as any other hand, right?

You are commiting a fallacy. One that Paulos deals in his book Innumeracy. It is when you decide ahead of time the order that it becomes improbable. A royal flush is an arbitrary, ahead of time order.

 

[Paulhoff]

We should play poker sometime. I'll cheat like crazy and deal myself nothing but straight flushes, four-of-a-kinds, and full-houses. And you'll continue to play because a royal flush is just as likely as any other hand, right?

The chances of getting any hand that you predetermine to get is the same. In poker you then pick which cards to keep, that changes all the odds. Plus you said nothing before about cards, you were talking numbers, where there are no pairs, four of a kind etc.

Paul

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

So you have evidence that the existence of extra terrestrial intelligent life is probable?

No, and I never claimed I did. Why do you ask?

Are you saying that extra terrestrial intelligent life is known to exist with 100% certainty? Or are you saying that the values assigned to the terms are known with 100% certainty? Either way you'd be mistaken.

No, and I never claimed I did. Why do you ask that? I don't think you're reading my posts again.

Drake's equation isn't an argument, but any argument based on Drake's equation that concludes that the existence of aliens is probable would indeed posit the existence of aliens.

Yes, I agree. The Drake Equation is not evidence one way or the other for the existence of ET intelligence. (I have gone over all this before.) Even Drake would agree that one's conclusion about the likelihood of ET intelligences should be based on the evidence. As Sagan noted (in the quote I provided), we simply don't have that evidence. Anyone who asserts a probability for the existence of ET intelligence is just pulling a number out of the air. It's meaningless, and it assume knowledge we simply don't possess.

If the argument were assuming the existence of a fine-tuner and then concluding that a fine-tuner exists, it would be circular. But that's your own straw man, not the argument cj posted.

WHAT? When I asked how you get premise number two without assuming the conclusion (the existence of God), you answered that this was based on the finer-tuner argument. I most certainly did NOT raise the subject of finer-tuner.

Nobody has indicated that anyone used it that way. What I said is that people use arguments based on Drake's equation to support a belief that extra terrestrial intelligent life exists.

IF they do, they're misusing Drake's Equation. As I said, even Drake would agree that the question can only be answered by the evidence, and to date, we have no evidence of ET intelligent life.

Now, I would use the Drake Equation (or something like it) to point out that we also don't have the information we'd need to make the assertion that Makaya is making in that other thread (to whit: that we are unique in the universe or, in other words, the assertion that no ET intelligence exists in the universe). There the equation is helpful in pointing out the information we would need to make that assertion.

 

[Malerin]

You are not making any sense. Couldn't we just stick with my hypothetical?

Why should we assume that fine tuning is equivelant to drawing this combination?

Drawing 1-100 is a significant result because it is more likely that someone rigged the game than it is that the result came about by chance. In the same way, the physical constants coming together in just the right way to permit life is more indicative of something "rigging the universe" than having the result just come about by chance.

And I ask you again, how many instances of the universe do we have?

Already answered that. If the odds are long enough, one instance is all you need.

BTW: How do you know that the universe hasn't expanded and colapsed an infinite number of times, each time resulting in different variables. How do you know that there aren't an infinite number of universes?

That would defeat the fine-tuning argument.