Can theists be rational?

[Bri]

It means there are 6 equally likely total possible outcomes, and just one possible target (successful) outcome.

Does a die exist where there are 6 equally likely possible outcomes?

And the argument is circular. The premise includes the assumption that God exists. If you don't know that, then you can't possible determine the probabilities of a life-supporting universe with a god or without a god.

It is possible to come up with a probability for the existence of something without knowing that it exists. And if you DID know that it exists, it would be impossible to come up with any probability other than 1.

You can argue that there isn't enough information to come up with a valid probability that isn't speculative, but that's just a rejection of the premise. It is not an example of Begging the Question.

It is not the same as Drake's equation at all. Assigning a value for any factor assumes the existence of that factor.

Does an argument based on Drake's equation assume the existence of aliens?

It is meaningful, for example, to say that as the probability of finding planets in a certain orbit goes up, so does the probability of finding ET intelligent life.

Not if no aliens exist. According to your reasoning, if no aliens exist, it doesn't matter how many planets you add, there will still be no aliens. By your reasoning, Drake's equation assumes the existence of aliens.

-Bri

 

[Beth]

Yes, there are. The entire multi-billion dollar gaming industry is based on these facts.

I've never come across a perfectly fair die. Back when I taught an Intro stats course, I used to have my students do an experiment with rolling dice, recording the numbers, and checking if they meet the expectations of a 'fair' die. Even the fancy Vegas casino dice I had showed distinct variation and were off from the expected value using a 95% level of confidence. The multi-billion dollar gaming industry is based on the fact that their manufactured dice are sufficiently close to 'fair' that it doesn't affect their profits, not because they are perfect and provide an exact 1/6 chance of each number coming up.

 

[Ivor the Engineer]

<snip>

...Drake's equation assumes the existence of aliens.

-Bri

Drake's equation assumes intelligent life exists in the universe. Do you disagree with this assumption?

 

[Ivor the Engineer]

I've never come across of perfectly fair die. Back when I taught an Intro stats course, I used to have my students do an experiment with rolling dice, recording the numbers, and checking if they meet the expectations of a 'fair' die. Even the fancy Vegas casino dice I had showed distinct variation and were off from the expected value using a 95% level of confidence. The multi-billion dollar gaming industry is based on the fact that their manufactured dice are sufficiently close to 'fair' that it doesn't affect their profits, not because they are perfect and provide an exact 1/6 chance of each number coming up.

How many tosses did it take to establish at a 95% level of confidence the dice were not fair?

 

[Bri]

Drake's equation assumes intelligent life exists in the universe. Do you disagree with this assumption?

Intelligent life in the universe is not the same as extra-terrestrial intelligent life.

Drake's equation is very similar to an example I proposed in an earlier post about the Purple Puffing. No doubt birds exist, but the Purple Puffing?

I don't think that Drake's equation assumes the existence of aliens, nor do I think the above statement assumes the existence of the Purple Puffing, nor do I think the argument cj proposed assumes the existence of a god.

-Bri

 

[Malerin]

Entirely incorrect. Establishing the possibility precisely means establishing that god's existence cannot be ruled out. It says absolutely nothing of probability (at least not technically, but I'd rather not get into that minutia).

Right, the argument is supposed to prove that God's (universe-builder/fine-tuner) existence moves from the realm of possible to probable (greater than .5).

"The universe is fine-tuned" is a positive statement about the actual nature of the universe, not a probabilistic statement.
That assumes not merely establishing that it can't be ruled out, and not even merely establishing that it's probable, but rather, actual full acceptance of the notion.

You have to think in terms of epistemic probabilites. "The universe appears to be fine-tuned" is a claim about the universe that can be assigned an epistemic belief value. There's a whole seperate argument for whether this claim should be given a high degree of belief or low degree. If it's given a high degree of belief, it confirms the hypothesis "A fine-tuner exists".

"Fine-tuned" necessarily implies "tuning", which necessarily implies that a subject has, with intent, adjusted parameters to accomplish a particular purpose; i.e., teleological intent.

And that more precise formulation is also fallacious. Consider: "The mountain appears to be shaped like an old man. Therefore, it is probable to assume that said old man existed at one time."

No, the claim would be more like: "Mount Rushmore appears to have 4 faces carved on it". It is extremely unlikely this happened through naturalistic processes. Therefore, it is probable to assume someone carved it.

This is different because we already know watch-makers make watches. You don't already know that gods make universes. You don't already know that old men turn into mountains.

Universe creators are possible. That's all the argument is trying to prove in the first stage: It's probable that a universe-creator (fine-tuner) created the universe.

You're a bit over-zealous in this formulation. It takes argumentation to demonstrate that there's an objective or at least mutually agreed, at least relatively crisp, concept of God before you can even speak of there being a probability that a particular fine tuner is or is not a god. Furthermore, you have to reach this point to come to the conclusion that you just made--namely, that "it takes further argumentation to prove there's a high probability that the fine-tuner is God"--unless you can prove the weaker, which is that necessarily the term "God" would not apply to all fine-tuners--however, you still have to get agreement here before you can say that there's even a thing to prove.

I didn't say God. I said "fine-tuner". Call it a universe-builder if you want. The point of the argument is that it is more reasonable to believe the universe was made by something that favors life than occurred through naturalistic processes.

 

[The Atheist]

It's really just math obscuring issues surrounding the anthropic principle, so it's a fancy waste of time.

Amen to that.

I've never come across a perfectly fair die. Back when I taught an Intro stats course, I used to have my students do an experiment with rolling dice, recording the numbers, and checking if they meet the expectations of a 'fair' die. Even the fancy Vegas casino dice I had showed distinct variation and were off from the expected value using a 95% level of confidence. The multi-billion dollar gaming industry is based on the fact that their manufactured dice are sufficiently close to 'fair' that it doesn't affect their profits, not because they are perfect and provide an exact 1/6 chance of each number coming up.

I'd be very interested to know how many rolls were done with the dice, because gaming-quality dice should be extremely accurate and I doubt that a serious study would find any that were not. If you rolled the dice a few dozen times and didn't 1:6, that would be an argument in favour of probability being correct.

Plus, the argument that dice aren't truly 1:6 is a stupid argument, because the fact remains that it is theoretically possible to have a fair die, just that our machining tolerances aren't quite as accurate as absolute certainty demands. Try the example of using six playing cards instead, where you will find the odds exactly 1:6 and without needing to worry that one card might be a few molecules heavier than another.

Your approach is all red and it's a herring.

Do any of you dice people go to TAM? I have dollar signs in my eyes like Bugs Bunny right now.

 

[Ivor the Engineer]

<snip>

Try the example of using six playing cards instead, where you will find the odds exactly 1:6 and without needing to worry that one card might be a few molecules heavier than another.

<snip>

Could you describe this method please?

 

[Beth]

Amen to that.

I'd be very interested to know how many rolls were done with the dice, because gaming-quality dice should be extremely accurate and I doubt that a serious study would find any that were not. If you rolled the dice a few dozen times and didn't 1:6, that would be an argument in favour of probability being correct.

I can't recall exactly now, but I think it took samples of between one and two hundred throws to establish a statistically significant difference from the theoretical expected value. However, that doesn't mean they were not 'extremely accurate'. It simply means that it was possible to establish that the deviation from the expected value was not due to random chance. The actual deviation was quite small.

Plus, the argument that dice aren't truly 1:6 is a stupid argument, because the fact remains that it is theoretically possible to have a fair die, just that our machining tolerances aren't quite as accurate as absolute certainty demands.

Right. Only god could create a perfectly fair die. We humans will have to settle for within the capabilities of our manufacturing facilities.

 

[articulett]

Nope. Your argument is:
"God is possible. I claim the universe is fine tuned without one shred of evidence and based on my ignorance of science therefore I make the blanket claim that god is probable."

I think of the argument of more like an argument from credulity...

"I can't understand how this universe seems to fit everything so perfectly, therefore there must be a reason-- God (or other self aggrandizing woo) MUST be the reason!" They use the manufactured explanation as "evidence". But you could insert any "woo" into the reason--and all religions do. Imaginary entities and forces can have any qualities you can dream up.

It's Douglas Adams' puddle analogy.

Or a Frank and Ernest comic that showed one of those "you are here" signs pointing to an "X" on a map labled CIA Department or something. And one of the characters exclaims, "wow, they really do know where we are"-- or something recursive like that.

If my dog could think in abstract, she would, no doubt conclude that the world was "designed" to bring forther her. Every life form would. I recall my son at 2 not being able to "compute" that there was a world before his existence. I think it's a privelege to understand why we think that way... AND why it's backwards.

 

[The Atheist]

Could you describe this method please?

Six cards, pick one.

I can't recall exactly now, but I think it took samples of between one and two hundred throws to establish a statistically significant difference from the theoretical expected value. However, that doesn't mean they were not 'extremely accurate'. It simply means that it was possible to establish that the deviation from the expected value was not due to random chance. The actual deviation was quite small.

Couple of hundred throws is verging on irrelevant.

Thought so. Nothing like proposing experiments you know will give you the desired result.

Right. Only god could create a perfectly fair die. We humans will have to settle for within the capabilities of our manufacturing facilities.

What else would you like? You talk of a "perfectly fair" die. You know that manufacturers don't work in units small enough to avoid any bias, and I agree, dice can never be "perfectly fair", but that is an irrelevancy based on physicality. The maths is true, even if the dice aren't.

 

[fls]

I'm afraid I don't understand what you mean. I think you're just saying that any number given in the premise would be speculation, which I agree with. But again that's just a rejection of the premise.

ETA: I would actually say that the main problem with the argument cj posted is with premise 2 rather than premise 1 though. I don't think we have much of a clue as to the probabilities of the universe supporting life, with or without a god.

The argument that cj posted provided the probabilities as premises. You can reject those probabilities as speculation (thereby rejecting the premise). But given the missing probabilities as a premise of your die example would yield similar results as the argument cj posted.

-Bri

There's no particular need to confine consideration of the argument to one specific probability. The problem isn't that a specific number is wrong, it's that millions of choices would be wrong, despite our efforts to get rid of some of the wrong choices in advance. For example, for my second die example, we could get rid of those number choices that wouldn't legibly fit on the side of a reasonably sized die.

Linda

 

[blobru]

We (humans) have a very strong tendency to think that the more details added to the story, the more likely it is to be true, when of course it's the other way around. The multitude of claims actually makes it easier to rationalize, not harder.

Linda

I've always felt the verb should be "irrationalize".

H = Hypothesis

D = Observed data.

P(H|D) = Probability of H given D.

Bayes Rule:

P(H|D) = P(D|H).P(H) / [P(D|H).P(H) + P(D|H').P(H')]

For the hypothesis, H = God exists:

The specific D to use is pulled from one's ass.

P(H) is pulled from one's ass.

P(H') is pulled from one's ass.

P(D|H) is pulled from one's ass.

P(D|H') is pulled from one's ass. ...

Sounds more like Bayes Stool*


*= Bayes Rule applied to theology; therefore, theology = ??? (left as an exercise for the reader)

 

[Beth]

Double Post

 

[Beth]

Couple of hundred throws is verging on irrelevant.

It was enough to establish a statistically significant difference at the 95% confidence level.

Thought so. Nothing like proposing experiments you know will give you the desired result.

I'm not sure what your point it here. I wasn't proposing an experiment, I was giving the results of experiments I've run in the past on the question at hand. Whether they were the same or different didn't make any difference to my classroom exercise. The point was to teach how to compute theoretical expected values and testing whether or not actual physical systems matched those theoretical results.

What else would you like?

I'm perfectly happy with the ones I have thank you. They suit my needs just fine (typically playing monopoly, risk, etc. as I'm no longer teaching).

 

[Darat]

...snip..

I don't think we have much of a clue as to the probabilities of the universe supporting life, with or without a god.

...snip...

Really?

 

[Bri]

Really?

Heh...nice. Don't you know you should read what I meant, not what I wrote?

-Bri

 

[Bri]

There's no particular need to confine consideration of the argument to one specific probability. The problem isn't that a specific number is wrong, it's that millions of choices would be wrong, despite our efforts to get rid of some of the wrong choices in advance. For example, for my second die example, we could get rid of those number choices that wouldn't legibly fit on the side of a reasonably sized die.

If I'm understanding you (and I'm not sure that I am) I agree with you. You seem to be saying that any probabilities assigned are speculative (which I happen to agree with). You're rejecting the premise but not the argument itself.

-Bri

 

[fls]

If I'm understanding you (and I'm not sure that I am) I agree with you. You seem to be saying that any probabilities assigned are speculative (which I happen to agree with). You're rejecting the premise but not the argument itself.

-Bri

I'm saying the argument is useless - useful knowledge cannot be gleaned from it.

Linda

 

[Bri]

I can agree with that. Garbage in, garbage out. In this case, any specific values assigned to the probabilities are speculative at best.

Same could be said of other similar arguments though, such as those based on the Drake equation. Some of the values given to the variables are speculative.

So the question of relevance to this thread becomes is it irrational to use such arguments to support a belief for which there is little or no other evidence?

-Bri