Are all sceptics materialists?

[MikeG]

.....For more information on religious theory and the succession of the Masters read Aleister Crowley's books.

Rather than actually reading what the Qu'ran, or what Islamic scholars say on the subject? Yeah, righto, that makes a whole heap of sense.

 

[TheAdversary]

You may need to apply the following caveat: evidence has to be testable, verifiable, falsifiable and repeatable. Got that?

First and foremost you apply common sense. Pragmatism. This sounds like if you'd get kicked in the nuts you'd still ask for evidence about it.
That's nonsense. A society stabilized for so long that our society is actually dependent on is evidence enough for Islam.
Remember that evidence is _never_ certain, so we're required to be pragmatic, which is why I use the 'kick-in-the-nuts'-argument.
You're asking for some academically-approved version of evidence and dismiss it if it doesn't come from those channels. So if loaves
of bread fall out of the sky and one even falls on your head, you would not believe it because it wasn't 'peer-reviewed'?
Again, nonsense. Violation of common sense. Got that?

 

[AdamSK]

Why the heck has "Materialist" turned into such a dirty word, practically a slur, for Woo Slingers?

Philosophically, materialism includes the assumption that the material is all there is. It's a dirty word to the extent that it precludes finding the immaterial in principle.

I think most skeptics say they are not materialists in this way - they do not presuppose that the material is all there is. Instead they conclude the material is all we have reason to believe there is based on the evidence we have.

 

[JoeMorgue]

First and foremost you apply common sense.

It's amazing how often "common sense" seems to be used as a code word for "agree with me without question."

"Materialist" seems to have become a common code word for a growing in popularity argumentative tactic which seems to substitute assigning people to various philosophical fandoms in an effort to try and make "Doesn't reject reality" something we should apologize for.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Philosophically, materialism includes the assumption that the material is all there is.

So basically a "materialist" is someone that doesn't make stuff up.

Yeah I'm not gonna genuflect for that, sorry.

 

[John Nowak]

TheAdversary (as well as Malbec) have been asked to fix their formatting time after time. Refusal to do so suggests that the deliberate annoyance caused is part of their plan.

Nah, it's inability to learn. Notice how they both constantly regurgitate the same points?

 

[Dave Rogers]

They study it anthropologically. They don't take it seriously as a Theory of the Universe.

Which is perfectly appropriate given the evidence you yourself have posted: the ability of Islam to maintain the stability of a society, which is an anthropological phenomenon. As a Theory of the Universe, not only does Islam have no evidence supporting it, but it doesn't effectively even have a Theory of the Universe.

And that now has more evidence going for it than their own theories of the universe. They're more absurd, now. That's my point.

The fatal flaw with this argument is that the things you are claiming as "their own theories of the universe" are not theories of the universe, a point repeatedly made whose very existence you decline to acknowledge. Your actual argument is that there is more evidence that Islam can maintain a stable society than that two well-known postulates, known to be unproven, are true; to which the appropriate reply is, so what? The rest is all straw.

Dave

 

[AdamSK]

So basically a "materialist" is someone that doesn't make stuff up.

Rule of So.

No, a philosophical materialist is explicitly someone whose worldview discards even the possibility of the immaterial. Epistemically, only material causes are even postulated to account for observations.

That's a little more severe than "not making stuff up." It also means postulating an unknown material cause even if the facts did support an immaterial cause. It is, I think, an unnecessary and unwelcome restriction on empiricism. So while I am empirically materialist, I refuse to accept philosophical materialism.

 

[MikeG]

First and foremost you apply common sense. Pragmatism. This sounds like if you'd get kicked in the nuts you'd still ask for evidence about it.......

You're asking for some academically-approved version of evidence and dismiss it if it doesn't come from those channels. So if loaves
of bread fall out of the sky and one even falls on your head, you would not believe it because it wasn't 'peer-reviewed'?
Again, nonsense. Violation of common sense. Got that?

Tanking your own arguments...

If I got kicked in the nuts, I wouldn't be the one asking for evidence. In fact, it wouldn't even be a question for science, but setting that on one side.........were an independent 3rd party to ask for evidence that I had been kicked in the nuts, then they would be right to treat my assertion with caution until they had seen independent evidence of the resulting state of my kit. When they had the result of the medical examination, they could attempt to find fault with it, suggest alternative causes, or carry out their own study to see if the results could be replicated.

Again, loaves fall on my head.............no problem for me to accept what happened, but I wouldn't expect anyone else to believe me unless I were able to show possible cause, or, say, a video of the event (although that wouldn't be enough on its own).

Do you see the point? It isn't the witness that is of any interest to science: it is convincing the 3rd party non-witness of the case that you are making that is what counts, and the only successful way of doing that is the scientific method, which, however flawed, is a whole heap better than "it says so in this old book".

 

[TheAdversary]

Actually, the common sense argument isn't very good owing to the ambiguity in the word. The thing is you start with pragmatism out of necessity.
You have to survive, don't you? But to know anything about the Universe requires a mechanism of not deluding yourself, because the mind
has the tendency to come up with all sorts of stuff that doesn't match reality. And if you make the mechanism of requiring evidence rigorous enough,
you end up with Feynman's philosophy of science. What matters is what the experiment says. You should end up with a hierarchy of certainty. Quantum Mechanics
and Relativity have been tested rigorously to such a degree, and our technology couldn't work without them being correct, that they trump the observation that
one man, Mohammed, conquered and stabilized a society all by himself. But that occurrence, which as I've described it cannot be denied, as it really happened,
trumps Multiverse and associated theories because there is zero evidence for those. So if honest standards were applied, Islam should be more deeply studied
and not just in an anthropological way that views its claims of Divinity as a historical superstition. It's the claim of non-Materialism that has more evidence
going for it than the Materialistic theories. Simply due to the fact that Islam _worked_ and it's hard to explain how one man by himself could have done all that.
Not as evidence-based as QM, but more evidence based than Multiverses or Computer Simulations. And the fact that it doesn't have that standing shows
a bias towards Materialism that is unscientific.

 

[TheAdversary]

I think most skeptics say they are not materialists in this way - they do not presuppose that the material is all there is. Instead they conclude the
material is all we have reason to believe there is based on the evidence we have.

But there is evidence for non-materialism due to the fact that it's unlikely that one man could single handedly conquer the entire Middle East
and create a lasting society. And this has happened over and over throughout history. And you can still dismiss the non-materialistic conclusion but ...
Materialistic theories that are popular in academia nowadays fall much sooner when the same standard of rigour is applied.
So Islam's claim of Divinity should now be taken seriously if honest science ruled the academic world.

 

[MikeG]

........What matters is what the experiment says. You should end up with a hierarchy of certainty. Quantum Mechanics
and Relativity have been tested rigorously to such a degree, and our technology couldn't work without them being correct, that they trump the observation that
one man, Mohammed, conquered and stabilized a society all by himself. But that occurrence, which as I've described it cannot be denied, as it really happened,
trumps........

You're comparing apples with pears.

No you're not. You're comparing apples with fish. One part of the observation is fine (experiment, pragmatism etc), and is about science. The other part is fine too, but it's about societal norms, and is utterly disconnected with science. That your two observations have some credibility is irrelevant. The success of Islam has no bearing on whether science is right or wrong (and we all note you're inability to drop the multiverse/ computer simulation crap).

 

[Pterodactyl]

A society stabilized for so long that our society is actually dependent on is evidence enough for Islam.

There are other societies, ancient and arguably more stable today, and not based on Islam. How do they factor in?

 

[AdamSK]

Simply due to the fact that Islam _worked_ and it's hard to explain how one man by himself could have done all that.

One man, by himself, didn't.

As a demonstration of this - please provide a summary of what the Sunni and Shi'a primarily disagree about.

 

[BStrong]

This again?

If conquering lands and peoples is evidence of validity, I'll take Genghis Khan over Mohammed any day of the week - at least Ol' Genghis didn't feel the need to mandate religious ********.

 

[Darat]

Actually, the common sense argument isn't very good owing to the ambiguity in the word. The thing is you start with pragmatism out of necessity.
You have to survive, don't you? But to know anything about the Universe requires a mechanism of not deluding yourself, because the mind
has the tendency to come up with all sorts of stuff that doesn't match reality. And if you make the mechanism of requiring evidence rigorous enough,
you end up with Feynman's philosophy of science. What matters is what the experiment says. You should end up with a hierarchy of certainty. Quantum Mechanics
and Relativity have been tested rigorously to such a degree, and our technology couldn't work without them being correct, that they trump the observation that
one man, Mohammed, conquered and stabilized a society all by himself. But that occurrence, which as I've described it cannot be denied, as it really happened,
trumps Multiverse and associated theories because there is zero evidence for those. So if honest standards were applied, Islam should be more deeply studied
and not just in an anthropological way that views its claims of Divinity as a historical superstition. It's the claim of non-Materialism that has more evidence
going for it than the Materialistic theories. Simply due to the fact that Islam _worked_ and it's hard to explain how one man by himself could have done all that.
Not as evidence-based as QM, but more evidence based than Multiverses or Computer Simulations. And the fact that it doesn't have that standing shows
a bias towards Materialism that is unscientific.

Is this really how you want your posts to look?

 

[Darat]

...snip...

What does that have to do with "Are all sceptics materialists?"?

 

[Darat]

But there is evidence for non-materialism due to the fact that it's unlikely that one man could single handedly conquer the entire Middle East ...snip...

No "one man" has ever "single handedly conquer the entire Middle East" so the evidence you are claiming doesn't even exist.

 

[Steve001]

I have listened to every word of this thread so far and will continue to do so but I really have not yet gained the least idea of what the adversary thinks a sceptic materialist actually is.

One whom acknowledges science is the only way to truth, maybe?

 

[Kid Eager]

Yesterday, Crowley. Today, Islam. I think I'll wait 24 hours and see what else the tide brings in...