• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Are all sceptics materialists?

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

Also, I would suspect that the number of people actively studying Islam exceeds the number actively studying multiverse theories, and I would almost claim absolute certainty that it vastly exceeds the number actively studying whether the universe is a simulation.

Still, it's hardly surprising that nonsensical reasoning from false premises produces absurd conclusions.

Dave
 
AdamSK said:
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.

Exactly. The thing is that I'm trying to show that it's happening right now. There are good reasons to assume an immaterial explanation for what happened
to Mohammed, but most present-day scientists will reject it anyway because of the bias towards Materialism.
 
There are good reasons to assume an immaterial explanation for what happened to Mohammed, but most present-day scientists will reject it anyway because of the bias towards Materialism.

I strongly disagree. The rise of Islam in that part of the world is can be well understood in terms of the cultural, political, and economic factors that existed at the time. As others have pointed out, it is no more miraculous than the rapid growth of other empires and cultural phenomena.
 
Darat said:
The question you posed in the title of the thread has been answered with a "no".

All I saw in this thread, were hardcore Materialists. Even AdamSK had to backtrack. Point me towards a real non-Materialistic sceptic, then.
Maybe I missed one?
 
Even AdamSK had to backtrack.

I don't think I backtracked anywhere on anything.

Point me towards a real non-Materialistic sceptic, then.

I don't see why my view, and the view of many skeptics who currently conclude materialism but do not assume it, doesn't qualify as a "non-materialist skeptic." I would say we do.
 
Darat said:
And if there is something on-topic in regards you bringing up an apparent "theory of the universe" in the Islamic religion could you please make it clear
what that is? (We are by the way still waiting for you to explain where this theory is actually stated in Islamic texts.)

In the same way that one cannot learn Quantum Mechanics from one singular book, since there are always gaps in one's knowledge that need to be filled
by knowledge in other books, one cannot pick up the Theory of the Universe from just me pointing at a single passage, in any book.
I've made efforts explaining a lot of things on this board, if you really want to know. But it would be better if you accept me as a Master
and devote yourself to study under my guidance. That's how it works, also in your schools.
But this is not the topic of this thread; That was simply to show the unscientific bias towards Materialism in present-day 'sceptics'.
 
In the same way that one cannot learn Quantum Mechanics from one singular book,

You can absolutely learn quantum mechanics from a singular book. Here it is.

Yes, there are additional facts about quantum mechanics that are not in this book. But with this book alone you will have a coherent and complete theory that you can use as a framework for further study. Mastering this book, you can be reasonably said to have "learned quantum mechanics."

So please give us the same courtesy - what text or texts set out and succeed in giving a thorough description that includes all of the framework and fundamentals for the theory you are claiming exists?
 
AdamSK said:
You can absolutely learn quantum mechanics from a singular book. Here it is.

What? Shankar? We agree on something. To be fair, I mainly studied the first chapter because it said that it would teach you all the math you would ever
need for QM. A lot of it was already known to me because I'm a graphics programmer, but that book is great.
There's an excellent exercise that has nothing to do with QM but with angular momentum to show how those techniques can be used to calculate
the principal axes. It's a good complement to Feynman's explanation who doesn't go into this any further in his Lectures.
 
Great, so we agree it's possible to cover the relevant basics and "learn quantum mechanics" with a single text.

So please give us the same courtesy - what text or texts set out and succeed in giving a thorough description that includes all of the framework and fundamentals for the theory you are claiming exists?
 
A very basic non sequitur.
"The creator of Islam was able to conquer a large part of the Middle East" does not lead to "...and therefore the metaphysical assumptions of his religion should be seen as correct".
 
In the same way that one cannot learn Quantum Mechanics from one singular book, since there are always gaps in one's knowledge that need to be filled
by knowledge in other books, one cannot pick up the Theory of the Universe from just me pointing at a single passage, in any book.
I've made efforts explaining a lot of things on this board, if you really want to know. But it would be better if you accept me as a Masterand devote yourself to study under my guidance. That's how it works, also in your schools.
But this is not the topic of this thread; That was simply to show the unscientific bias towards Materialism in present-day 'sceptics'.

I, for one, welcome our new adversarial overlord.
 
AdamSK said:
So please give us the same courtesy - what text or texts set out and succeed in giving a thorough description that includes all of the framework and
fundamentals for the theory you are claiming exists?

I'd say, if I have to pick one book, Liber 418 by Aleister Crowley does a good job. But I don't believe you can pick up anything worthwhile from just one book.
And approaching that book requires preliminary study. Magick in Theory and Practice, again by Crowley could serve as a starting point.
 
You do know that's not a real rule right?

And yet it really applies here. You started with "So" and continued with a statement that was completely removed from what I had actually said. You have no basis for complaint when you act in conformation with the rule.

Yes. I discard the possibility of things that don't exist existing.

Then stop acting like this is about evidence for you. If you a priori reject even the possibility of the immaterial, then evidence has nothing to do with it.
 
I'd say, if I have to pick one book, Liber 418 by Aleister Crowley does a good job.

Just to clarify - you are claiming that Liber 418 itself actually describes the system you are talking about, not just an unsupported claim that Crowley created or discovered such a system. Correct?
 
Many religions have successful provided stability, of a sort, to different cultures throughout the years. Catholicism in Europe, Orthodoxy in Byzantium and Russia, Judaism among Jews, Hindu among Indians, and so on. Islam did the same in the Middle East and beyond, but that hardly provides any evidence showing that the supernatural claims made by its founder are actually true.

The simple success of a doctrinal belief to be widely accepted does not establish that belief's factual truth, or even provide supporting evidence for it. By applying this logic, one must also argue that Christianity, Judaism, and other religions, as well as versions of atheism, also have "evidence" of their supernatural "truth" since they have provided cultural stability and proven to be widely successful, yet their doctrines are often mutually exclusive.

Also, string theory and computer simulations for understanding the universe are merely postulations put forth as possible theories for explaining aspects of the universe, not provable facts. No one here is claiming they are proven, or even currently provable, however, simply having unprovable postulates doesn't make science any more or less absurd. If that were the case, then no theory would ever be put forth, because most theories are at first unproven. In this case, there currently exists no test for these two theories, meaning that they must exist in a holding pattern until someone develops a test, if they ever can, or a different, mutual exclusive theory is confirmed. As skeptics, we won't accept either of these two theories as fact until valid evidence is put forth.
 
At the risk of wasting a post, may I ask for TheAdversary's working definition of Materialism?
 
Then stop acting like this is about evidence for you.

There is no "evidence for me." We don't all get our own individual kinds of evidence.

If you a priori reject even the possibility of the immaterial, then evidence has nothing to do with it.

That makes no sense. You can't just make up a concept removed from the very idea of evidence via definition, which is exactly what "immaterial" is, and then take me to take for rejecting evidence.

What exactly would be the evidence for something that is "immaterial" that isn't pure special pleading or other silly word games?
 
Last edited:

Back
Top Bottom