What We Believe But Cannot Prove

[Pixel42]

Intelligent manipulation is a physical process.

I assumed punshhh meant conscious intent to be the significant difference between options (1) and (2). For instance intelligent design would be an example of (1) and evolution by natural selection an example of (2).

 

[Dinwar]

I was posting to point out that there are rational folk who arrive at the existence of creator Gods through reasoned consideration. As a response to a post suggesting that to do so is irrational.

I agree that belief in gods is irrational. The rational response is "I don't know". To replace "I don't know" with "Goddidit" is called The God of the Gaps, and it has a huge number of problems. First and foremost, the God of the Gaps hypothesis has failed the overwhelming majority of the time. Lightning used to be explained by gods, now it's electricity. Earthquakes were due to the gods, until we discovered plate techtonics (well, actually prior to that, but you get the idea). And so on.

Second, this is not really a hypothesis. Until someone offers up the nature of the god(s) in question, it's nothing more than "I don't know" wrapped in mysticism. There's nothing wrong with not knowing something, and while I'm not a fan of mysticism some people find value in it; it's the intellectual dishonesty in refusing to admit that you don't know something and inventing gods to mask one's ignorance that I find reprehensible (and note that here I'm talking again about intelligent conversation; in the distant past animism was justified because it was justifiable to assume that all things which acted had an intelligent agent driving that action; you believed that or died basically).

I tend towards 1, others towards 2. I see no way of denying one in favour of the other through reason, from our limited perspective.

Than you really don't understand my point about the null hypothesis, and you REALLY don't get Occam's Razor.

Option 1 requires an additional entity of enormous complexity. Yet the only evidence we have for it is A) all those times we say "I don't know", and B) the beginning of everything, which is a special case of A. You cannot justify treating the hypothesis "Something really really really special created EVERYTHING!" as on equal footing with the hypothesis "Things were, at least fundamentally, the same back then as they are today", because the first hypothesis has no real evidence backing it, while the second does (basically, all of the observations of science). Secondly, you can't simply say "Goddidit" as if that were an explanation. It's not--you need to DEFINE the god in question, and test whether that god exists or not. I bring it up fairly frequently, but there really is a lesson for theists in the whole continental drift fiasco: EVEN IF YOU ARE RIGHT rational people MUST reject your hypothesis, because you refuse to provide a mechanism. In the case of continental drift, it was some force which allowed continents to plow through oceanic crust (can't happen, which is why the theory was rejected). In the case of theism, it's the nature of the god(s) involved.

In short, until you prove something exists you cannot use it as an explanation for anything, and it's irrational to put a hypothesis based on the assumption of an entity which has never been proven on equal footing with an actual null hypothesis.

Ones approach is a personal choice.

No.

This whole null hypothesis thing is comperable to the concept of index fossils. Any fossil can be used as an index fossil--all species live for a finite range of time. And various scientists use various fossils as index fossils. Europe uses one set of land mammals, for example, while North America uses a different one (which makes for many fun conversations with non-paleontologist construction types....). However, there are requirements for what makes a good index fossil. It has to be common, it has to be wide-spread (not the same thing), it has to have a well-known start and end date, etc. Which fossils you use is a matter of personal choice--there's not a board who decides what is and isn't a good index fossil--but there are objective criteria required by the nature of the task by which we can judge the validity of the suite of index fossils any particular researcher uses.

Similarly, while any hypothesis can be called a null hypothesis, there are requirements. As I said, the whole bloody point of a null hypothesis is that one has to first prove that there's something to explain--which means that the null hypothesis is always some variant of "Nothing to see here, folks". "Goddidit" is NOT a variant on that. It's the proposition that some specific entity exists (even in the diestic version--if you believe god(s) did ANYTHING you are proposing that god(s) exist). This makes it a very bad null hypothesis. Which means that we're left with the other option: god(s) does not/do not exist. That's the only hypothesis that takes the form "Nothing to see here, folks", so it's the only hypothesis that fits the requirements of a null hypothesis.

 

[punshhh]

But if you choose (1) you're then faced with this question:

The existence of the intelligent manipulator came about, or always was, due to;

1, An intelligent manipulation,
or
2, physical processes.

and so on ad infinitum, or until you arbitrarily decide to choose (2) instead.

Are you happy with the idea of an infinite series of creator gods? If not it makes sense to avoid it altogether by choosing (2) immediately rather than arbitrarily deciding to terminate that series at the 2nd, 7th or 284746456th step.

I would say that intelligent manipulation is a physical process and physical processes can entail intelligent manipulation.

My position is more of an infinite sequence of physical processes, which include creative manipulators as a natural physical process.
We have evidence of intelligent creators emerging through natural processes, ie humanity.

 

[Dinwar]

But NO evidence for an original intelligent manipulator. So belief in one is still based on an error.

 

[punshhh]

Yes. However, one approach is valid and the other is not.

Well this null hypothesis is only interested in things which can be verified through scientific and logical testing.
The actual existence or not of gods is irrelevant to folk who adopt this position.

Well, sure, if they start with false information.

I am not proposing any kind of reasoned argument to prove the existence of gods. It cannot be any more than speculation.

Intelligent manipulation is a physical process.

I agree, thus creator gods may arise through physical processes.

And yet you posit entities for which you have no evidence.

I am not attempting to persuade others through reason. Only that I have done.

 

[punshhh]

gods are spelled with a small g.

Thanks I'll use a small g.

 

[Mashuna]

I would say that intelligent manipulation is a physical process and physical processes can entail intelligent manipulation.

My position is more of an infinite sequence of physical processes, which include creative manipulators as a natural physical process.
We have evidence of intelligent creators emerging through natural processes, ie humanity.

You might like to take a look at the "Time is fundamental, space is not" thread for some discussions on the start of time and causality.

 

[punshhh]

But NO evidence for an original intelligent manipulator. So belief in one is still based on an error.

I see no requirement for an original intelligent creator. I am considering an eternal existence with no beginning or end.

Like the chicken and the egg, which came first natural processes or intelligent creators.

If one considers the implications of an endless or infinite existence, many conundrums like this are encountered.

By the way, I don't have a belief in God, I do not use the word belief in discussion, it is problematic.
On balance, I subscribe to a philosophy which includes intelligent creators.

 

[punshhh]

You might like to take a look at the "Time is fundamental, space is not" thread for some discussions on the start of time and causality.

Thanks, I am following that thread and will post there, I am a bit short of time this week unfortunately.

 

[Dinwar]

Like the chicken and the egg, which came first natural processes or intelligent creators.

The egg came first, by a few hundred million years. This is a trivial bit of pseudo-intellectualism from people who have divorced reason from reality.

Well this null hypothesis is only interested in things which can be verified through scientific and logical testing.
The actual existence or not of gods is irrelevant to folk who adopt this position.

So you're saying that your god has no testable traits--meaning traits which are either detectable or consistent. Well, at least you're honest.

I am not proposing any kind of reasoned argument to prove the existence of gods. It cannot be any more than speculation.

Objectivist epistemology offers us some advice here: the arbitrary is to be dismissed. It's not to be countered, or argued; there's nothing TOO counter or argue, as you yourself have stated. You have nothing to base the idea off of. Therefore we should properly dismiss it without further consideration.

Thanks for playing. Please come back when you have a position that's actually worth talking about--meaning one that's not openly completely arbitrary.

 

[tsig]

I see no requirement for an original intelligent creator. I am considering an eternal existence with no beginning or end.

Like the chicken and the egg, which came first natural processes or intelligent creators.

If one considers the implications of an endless or infinite existence, many conundrums like this are encountered.

By the way, I don't have a belief in God, I do not use the word belief in discussion, it is problematic.
On balance, I subscribe to a philosophy which includes intelligent creators.

You are playing a word game.

 

[Beth]

While this is in fact true,

Thank you. I appreciate that acknowledgment.

it's not the entire truth.

I thought it was enough. I disagree with your premise below, which is one reason I did not include it.

The whole point of a null hypothesis is that one must demonstrate that there's something worth explaining prior to offering any explanation--you have to prove that there's something there before you talk about what that something is.

Here is where we disagree. There are many uses of a null hypothesis. It is not constrained to a single "whole" point. It is, however, constrained by our ability to define what we are interested in knowing and our ability to precisely measure the physical correlates we have constructed to answer that question.

This means that some null hypotheses are better than others.

Absolutely! It does not, however, mean that you and I will agree on which null hypothesis is better. That is a subjective personal decision. You can argue for the one you find better, but we are all free to choose for ourselves which one we will use on questions such as the existence of god.

For example, if I give you population curves over geologic time, a good null hypothesis is that they're driven by random chance, that all we're seeing is statistical noise. Once we demonstrate that it's NOT statistical noise, we can move on to discusing what is actually happening. A bad null hypothesis is that the population curves are driven by predation pressures.

That choice has to do with the information you are interested in knowing. On the other hand, if you were a manufacturer who was interested in determining whether a new facility produced a raw material at least as 'good' as the original plant, a null hypothesis that they are different would allow you to conclude the output of the second facility is equal at a specified confidence level.

It's not a common approach, but there is no requirement that the null be one defined one way or the other.

Using "God exists" as a null hypothesis is even worse than that, because it presumes the very hypothesis we're trying to determine the validity of.

This is the case for both possible null hypotheses. I can't help but notice that the one you feel should be the default for 'intelligent discussion' is also the one that presumes your basic philosophical approach. AFAIK, 'Science' does not require either one to be the null.

This is nothing short of begging the question.

Yes. Few people find evidence sufficient to reject their choice of assumption for the null, whichever they choose. Those that do have far more certainty of their beliefs. Conversions happen both directions.

And this shows why Beth is wrong. As soon as you say "The evidence supports my position" you are by definition NOT talking about a null hypothesis. You're arguing that the null hypothesis is wrong, and that your position is correct (two different arguments, but they are both assumed).

I quite agree with this. Why do you think that makes what I said wrong?

There's no belief involved. We can conclude that there are no gods because there has not been enough evidence presented, of sufficient quality, to cause us to reject the null hypothesis. This has nothing to do with belief; it's a simple matter of not begging the question.

Interesting. I, on the other hand, feel that concluding no gods exist when that was the null hypothesis you started with, is simply begging a different question.

But we also, from out humble perspective cannot deny an intelligent dustbin lid.

Of course not! There were some dustbin lids at Disneyworld that exhibited a fair approximation of intelligence. Intelligent dustbin lids might appear in our lifetimes. Why would any intelligent rational creature deny their possible existence?

The default in an intelligent conversation is a bit tricky. In the case of "Does X exist?" the default is always "No", unless evidence can be presented otherwise.

It seems to me that what you are saying is actually "I think the default should always be "No", unless evidence can be presented otherwise. "

Would you confirm if this is what you meant? If I'm not reading you correctly, could you please explain why your choice of default assumption is really the only possible one?

The default in intelligent discussions about the question of the existence of gods is that gods do not exist. Until someone can present evidence that they do, it's irrational to think that they do, just as it would be irrational to think that anything else exists without evidence.

See above. It seems to me that you are defining what you consider 'intelligent discussion' by specifying that assumption. I think that default assumptions for intelligent conversation is entirely at the discretion of the people engaging in the discussion. It is that way for any other topic of speculative discussion.

While you are certainly free to define 'intelligent discussion' in that matter, why should I or anyone else accept that limitation being imposed on the assumptions regarding the hypothesis of a creator god?

Further, when I observe the behavior of other human beings, it appears to me that the majority of human beings I am personally acquainted with do NOT hold that as their default assumption.

Yes I agree with your use of null hypothesis here, I have no issue with this approach to the existence of Gods.

Ones approach is a personal choice.

...
I tend towards 1, others towards 2. I see no way of denying one in favour of the other through reason, from our limited perspective.

Punshhh, I don't particularly tend towards 1 these days although it was my default assumption until I was in my teens I otherwise agree with you.

There's nothing wrong with not knowing something, and while I'm not a fan of mysticism some people find value in it; it's the intellectual dishonesty in refusing to admit that you don't know something and inventing gods to mask one's ignorance that I find reprehensible (and note that here I'm talking again about intelligent conversation;

I don't see it as anymore "intellectual dishonestly" than it is to accept the null hypothesis that no gods exist as your conclusion. Whichever null hypothesis that one has, if you cannot reject the null, your starting position = ending position.

Option 1 requires an additional entity of enormous complexity.

Do you realize that this is an assumption and may not be true?

Thanks for playing. Please come back when you have a position that's actually worth talking about--meaning one that's not openly completely arbitrary.

When compared to a position that is not open about being completely arbitrary, I'll choose the former. Thank you very much.

 

[Pixel42]

I see no requirement for an original intelligent creator. I am considering an eternal existence with no beginning or end.

Then you're unwise to use the term "creator gods" to describe your naturally evolved intelligent manipulators. For the vast majority of people, use of the word god implies belief in an original intelligent creator.

As for your intelligent manipulators - it is, of course, possible that highly evolved intelligent aliens have advanced to the point where they can interfere with the natural processes of the universe. But, as with gods, the existence of such beings is not required to explain the universe we see. So, once again, parsimony would make their non-existence the default assumption until and unless evidence is found for them.

 

[punshhh]

The egg came first, by a few hundred million years. This is a trivial bit of pseudo-intellectualism from people who have divorced reason from reality.

So you're saying that your god has no testable traits--meaning traits which are either detectable or consistent. Well, at least you're honest.

Objectivist epistemology offers us some advice here: the arbitrary is to be dismissed. It's not to be countered, or argued; there's nothing TOO counter or argue, as you yourself have stated. You have nothing to base the idea off of. Therefore we should properly dismiss it without further consideration.

Thanks for playing. Please come back when you have a position that's actually worth talking about--meaning one that's not openly completely arbitrary.

Lets say I provided you with a god, a living breathing god who created a universe and you were able to hold a conversation with him/her. I can't see any way of proving to you that this being were a creator God. You would have to take his/her word for it.

Your use of this null hypothesis assumes the non existence of anything which cannot be logically demonstrated.

You have adopted a position of wearing blinkers to address a question for which no one has provided an answer. There can only ever be speculation on this issue, nothing more.

Oh apart from personal experience of God, which some folk claim.

 

[DC]

Lets say I provided you with a god, a living breathing god who created a universe and you were able to hold a conversation with him/her. I can't see any way of proving to you that this being were a creator God. You would have to take his/her word for it.

Your use of this null hypothesis assumes the non existence of anything which cannot be logically demonstrated.

You have adopted a position of wearing blinkers to address a question for which no one has provided an answer. There can only ever be speculation on this issue, nothing more.

Oh apart from personal experience of God, which some folk claim.

so that god is not able to backup his claims? sounds pretty incompetent to me.

while you seem to think this "you cannot prove or dsisprove god" makes your god more plausible or less irrational. it makes your god actually even less rational or plausible. he is as plaisible as Harry Potter.

first you would have to present a god with a creation story that actually fits the collected evidence. Evolution big bang etc etc.
all creation stories have been debunked by evolution so far.

 

[Lamuella]

I could say the same thing about materialism: I fully accept that mind-independent matter/energy could exist, however I see no reason to assume it does exist.

or to rephrase what you just said, you fully accept that matter could be independent of mind, however you see no reason to dismiss your starting premise, that matter is dependent on mind.

Or to put it another way, you are starting with a positive belief and asking for it to be accepted as true until proven wrong.

 

[3point14]

See above. It seems to me that you are defining what you consider 'intelligent discussion' by specifying that assumption. I think that default assumptions for intelligent conversation is entirely at the discretion of the people engaging in the discussion. It is that way for any other topic of speculative discussion.

I think the 'default assumption' is not at the discretion of the arguer, if they want to maintain any credibility.

Try:

My default assumption is that an invisible dragon lives in my garage.

I have no evidence for said dragon, but as you cannot prove it doesn't exist, my default assumption is that it does. If there's no actual evidence for a thing, then the default assumption is that it doesn't exist. Unless you want to be able to just make stuff up, in which case there's no point talking about it.

 

[DC]

revelation #137 is clear evidence for the existence of said Dragon

 

[marplots]

I thought the absolute proof of the existence of a thing was the thing itself?

So, say I wished to prove the existence of the tree in my front yard. There it is. Is this not absolute, or not scientific, or something else?

 

[marplots]

I think the 'default assumption' is not at the discretion of the arguer, if they want to maintain any credibility.

Try:

My default assumption is that an invisible dragon lives in my garage.

I have no evidence for said dragon, but as you cannot prove it doesn't exist, my default assumption is that it does. If there's no actual evidence for a thing, then the default assumption is that it doesn't exist. Unless you want to be able to just make stuff up, in which case there's no point talking about it.

Your point about the default assumption is a good one and I agree. But it reminds me of a line of reasoning I find fault with.

When someone proposes what they see as a parallel by way of invisible unicorn, I already have some idea of what properties a unicorn should have to deserve the name, and that's what makes it dismissible, not the "no evidence" part.

Let us say I proposed that something exists in my garage, but I name it a mublarto. This is more akin to what is meant by God in that you would have to ask me what properties a mublarto had to test the idea and decide whether it exists or not.

A second point with these analogies is that I do not believe that the person bringing it up really believes there is an invisible unicorn or a flying spaghetti monster. So I cannot evaluate the claim based on how rational a human being they are otherwise. A critique on someone's perception of God existing is at least partially a critique on their ability to report on a real world. With the unicorn I cannot do that. I cannot link what someone knows to be false and states it just to make a point, with their honest beliefs.

Maybe a better way to go would be to pin them down on what it means to say God, or anything, exists. What things about the world would it explain and how well? In what ways could I interact with it? What is permitted and what is forbidden? How can I differentiate it from other things that exist? What would the world be like if it didn't exist -- would there be a hole?

And just so you know, there is a mublarto in my garage.