religulous

Tripp. Using your logic would imply that people that do bit believe in werewolves are irrational.

Daniel put it best. There is no evidence for the existence of god (or werewolves) therefore there is no need to posit their existence.

I'd love for someone to argue that the question of the existence of werewolves is different from the question of the existence of god.

 

Of course it's different: Werewolves are said to be flesh-and-blood creatures. You become one by being bitten by one. It is a naturalist proposition which is testable: Capture one and see if it becomes a human again when the sun comes up.

The god hypothesis is by definition untestable: god is said to be outside the natural world, invisible and undetectable by any possible experiment. This makes belief in god far more irrational than belief in werewolves.

Furthermore, belief in god has done far more harm to society than has belief in werewolves. There has never been a war over the fine details of werewolf character. In modern society, believers in werewolves as a class, are not actively lobbying against human rights or pushing to have ceremonies in public schools to propitiate werewolves.

Thus belief in god is far more dangerous than is belief in werewolves. No comparison at all.

For the record, I do not believe in either.

 

Ah! But I misspoke. I was referring to the even more elusive asensical werewolf. It is asensical because it can not be perceived by any human sense organ or instrument. But I tell you. They are out there and more numerous than we think.

 

Werewolves bite. Being bitten hurts. Therefore werewolves by definition can be detected.

The werewolf is interesting, because in the American pantheon of monsters, he is the only one who retains his conscience, and so deeply regrets his own actions that he will intentionally seek his own destruction, committing suicide rather than continuing to kill once he understands what he has become.

 

Daniel already slew the werewolf so I won't bother with that one.

I agree that there is no definitive evidence for the existance of a god, but belief that there is no god also creates some (at the moment) insurmountable difficulties. They're two sides of the same coin and that's why I choose neither. Materialism really appears to break down on the issue of universal constants. It's failure to adequately explain them is a problem, both scientific and philosophical. Now, just because materialism fails at this point doesn't mean that there's some bloke up there throwing darts and playing with dice, but we're still tasked with devising an explanation. I think that it's pretty obvious that the universe wasn't created by a deterministic, know-it-all, but we've got more work to do before we can comment further.

I'd drink to that. You won't get an argument from me on that one.

 

I think Daniel was being facetious regarding the werewolf explanation. Take any other mythical figure like my asensical werewolf (which doesn't bite, btw) or the flying spaghetti monster. According to your logic you would call irrational people that would tell you with certainty these beings don't exist.

Regarding the universal constant argument. That argument comes from a misunderstanding of pre and post even probabilities. Consider the lottery. If your neighbor wins the lottery it is a highly unlikely even that no one would bet on. However, that someone will win the lottery is almost a certainty. Similarly, the constants of the universe seem amazing to us and improbably but is likely just a byproduct of chance that happened to be compatible with life.

Regardless, any explanation would be more likely than an intelligent being that can create the universe. Where did the intelligent being come from in the first place..

 

Werewolves bite. If something doesn't bite, it's not a werewolf. Werewolves become werewolves by being bitten. There's no other way. Thus a thing that doesn't bite could not propagate by biting, and since werewolves only propagate by biting, your undetectable creature is not a werewolf.

Now I know you are going to ask, if werewolves are only made by people getting bitten, where did the first werewolf come from? Well, the werewolf is proof of the steady-state universe.

It's a good thing I don't believe in werewolves. But still, to paraphrase Joseph Heller, the werewolves I don't believe in bite.

 

I don't know. He seems rather passionate about. As far as other mythical things... They could be out there... the probablities are quite small or zero if they do things that violate the laws of physics.

Actually, it's a pretty common occurance that nobody wins any given drawing.

Good question. I suppose you could answer that by determining the likelyhood of such a being vs the odds of the (6 or 7) constants all being just perfect. They're both highly improbable, which is where the multiverse theory comes from, I believe. To me, it is about as preposterous as christianity. There's probably a more satisfying answer but what it is is anybody's guess.

 

Wouldn't you include God with those mythical things? According to the bible he violates the laws of physics quite frequently.

But it is also common that someone does. The point is that it is fairly easy to predict someone will win the lottery but it is extremely improbable to predict who.

Universal constants are probably the same. We just happen to live in an universe that allows us.

 

Absolutely! We certainly don't disagree on this. I'm not sure how you got the impression that I though any differently.

Multiple universes then. That's another untestable leap. Nothing different to faith based religion... not that there's anything wrong with that, it's just not scientific... which is really my whole point. Atheism and theism are just two sides of the same coin.

 

Oh no. The multiverse idea has a theoretical physics foundation that does not violate known physical laws. The same can not be said of the God hypothesis.

 

It's also untestable so it's merely an idea. I have yet to read "The God Theory" but my understanding is that it also does not violate physical laws. Gotta check it out and read it to find out. None the less, the multiverse is just a leap of faith at this point. The fact that it doesn't violate anything doesn't change the fact it's completely unprovable.

 

The werewolf is my favorite movie monster. I like all sorts of monster movies, especially vampires and zombies. But the werewolf, as monster, is the most interesting. The vampire just wants to suck blood, and the zombie just wants to eat brains. But the werewolf is a three-dimensional character with feelings and intense emotional conflict.

No, not "anybody's guess," but rather a question yet to be resolved by science. It would not surprise me in the least if it turns out that the Grand Unified Field Theory answers the question of why the physical constants are what they are.

 

At this point it really is anybody's guess because no such theory exists. Hopefully we will progress, though if the scientific discoveries of the 20th century showed anything it's that the more answers we get the more questions we have. If we do achieve a grand unified theory it may still not answer the question "why?". However, if it does then we will, in my mind, have come full circle and science and philosophy will have been reunited after several hundred years as seperate entities. The last time they were married the church didn't like where it was all going. If Descartes hadn't saved us scientific knowledge could well be centuries behind where we are now.

 

There is no reason to believe philosophy other than science has something useful to say about the universe. All descriptions of the universe that have actually been tested or derived from math came from branches of physical science. Not philosophy.

This quote from Colin McGinn's blog best points out the problem of being concessive (I am looking at you Tripp .

http://www.colinmcginnblog.com/?entry=entry081020-135207

"My only serious objection to Maher is his insistence that we just don’t know the answers to the Big Questions, such as whether a god exists or where we go when we die. This is far too concessive. We certainly do know that Santa Klaus does not exist, or goblins, or three-legged giants who live in the fridge; it would be daft to be “agnostic” about such questions—and even dafter to remain “open-minded” about them. And we have every reason to believe that death is the end of the self, since we know that the mind depends on the brain. If you get brain damage a part of your mind goes out of existence; it would be absurd to think that it slides into an immortal limbo, waiting for the rest of your mind to join it when your brain goes totally kaput. Saying that such questions do not admit of rational answers simply invites the kind of superstitious nonsense Maher rightly ridicules. We indeed don’t know everything, but some things we know quite well—and the complete falsity of religious doctrine is one of them."

I would add non-materialistic philosophies as well.

 

Speaking of Santa Claus...how is it we can discuss some myths without losing our tempers, but not others? Flying reindeer, fat guys that squiggle down skinny chimneys without getting dirty, delivering presents to millions with no visible means of financial support - who in their right mind would take such concepts seriously? Yet merely saying I don't believe in god gets me PMs that ask "Why do you hate the Lord thy God?" Sheesh.

 

Kindergarden class is still in session.

 

And if it had not been for religion holding us back, we might very well have the Grand Unified Field Theory now.

For that matter, if religion had not been indoctrinating children against critical thinking skills since practically forever, we probably would not be in Iraq now, and we'd probably have honest politicians because the public would be able to see through all the crap.

The world is in the state it is because religion has killed most people's ability to think critically.

Belief in god and the afterlife is preposterous on the face of it. The only reason such beliefs can survive is because we grant a special exemption from criticism to "belief." We are supposed to "respect" other people's "beliefs," which actually means that if someone believes something that is utterly idiotic, they are exempted from the ridicule they deserve. We will never know everything, but when a church claims that its religion knows everything (and that it is the only church that has it right!) we are supposed to "respect" the "possibility" that they might be right. Bullshit!

 

Hard say. Humans are really quite good at treating each other quite poorly. Religion is often a tool for controlling people. There are a host of others that achieve the same end (race being the prime example).

I doubt it.

And yet there are plenty of critical thinkers. I don't think you can blame religion for this. It's a limitation of the species.

Actually, it makes a lot of sense. Humans are desperate to hold onto their consciousness and belief in a god/afterlife are a way of preserving that forever (or so the story goes). So while it doesn't make a lot of logical sense, it's something to give you some hope... particularly if you live in a world of shit...

And what of buddhists? They certainly aren't a nasty lot, though they haven't really be true to the Buddha's vision, what with all those gods and spirits they created... but that goes back to that curious need that people seem to have.

 

Not so fast. Untestable by any means we know of at present, but as we continue enlarging our understanding of physics, and developing ever more sophisticated technologies, the multiverse theory could become testable. I'm sure Relativity Theory appeared just as weird and untestable in its nascent years.

God could also become a testable. I think the principal impediment to being able to test for a god isn't that we'd be unable to figure out how, it's that there's no agreement on what exact specification actually defines a god. Without that definition, you've got nothing to test for.

Unfortunately, we're no nearer an acceptable definition of a god than we were 85,000 years ago, so the odds are against us in coming up with one anytime soon.

I think we'll be able to definitively prove or disprove, through testing, the multiverses theory long before we ever figure out how to define a god.