Ok, granted - I have been lazy (and not just intellectually) at various points in this thread.

Your contribution so far, however, has been to jump on any fact I may have got wrong (material or otherwise), accuse me of hypocrisy (sometimes rightly, sometimes not), debate the minutiae of definitions, and stating that some unfalsifiable proposition you dreamed up can't be "proved" (I mean, who are you kidding with that). It strains the bounds of credulity that you do not understand the core point that is being made, so the only conclusion I can draw from this is that you are being disingenuous and purposely avoiding addressing the crux of the argument.

Depends how you define "origin of life".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller...rey_experiment

Yes. I've done all these things.

(1) I pointed out factual errors in your presentation that undermine your basic assertions.
(2) I pointed out that you've not been even-handed in applying your justifications.
(3) I've responded to the highly non-standard definitions you've given me to work with
(4) I've pointed out the inherent flaw in someone else's use of "absolute truth" in the context of scientism.

That you think that this is somehow a problematic approach really underlines the weakness of your understanding of what you think you're talking about.

It might be true that this is the only conclusion that you can draw. But that's more of a reflection of your own limits and not a statement about reality.

If you have a "core point" to make, it ought to be rationally supported by argumentation and true statements. You've failed to do this. I'll return to a few of my earliest observations of your posting in this thread:

Post #8:

Post #10:

Welcome to your own version of religious fundamentalism.

OP: "Religious guy, you can't logic."

Religious guy:

I have to admit, the strategy of producing exclusively inculpatory evidence in your defense is a masterstroke I had failed to anticipate. Gg me, I guess.

Here are some more samples of ways that you've tried to approach the conversation at various points.

I clarified my definitions in response to another poster as -

- Religion: The Abrahamic religions. When I refer to "religious people" I mean those who believe in god as an omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent creator. What is so non-standard about this?

- Logic: Loosely speaking, the scientific method. As others have also pointed out, simply formulating a syllogistically valid statement is not a high bar to clear, as you can start with whatever precepts you want. So yeah, if you take god's existence to be axiomatic, you are technically capable of "logic". But that's not the point, and you are fully aware of this.

Notwithstanding the above, the OP made it clear that I was referring to the vast majority of religious people, not a select few religious intellectuals. I was making a general statement that religion as a whole values faith and appeal to authority over critical thinking, and as a result this group of people as a whole are much less able to use "logic" in the sense of the term in which it is commonly used in conversation (sound reasoning, rationality, reason over emotion and intuition etc.). You still have not responded in any meaningful way to this.

By the way, I like how you refer to belief in science as "scientism". That's cute.

Whether I was right or wrong about various historical figures being religious, atheists, or closet atheists is an interesting sidebar but it's not material to the point I was making which was about the vast majority of religious masses. This much was clear in my OP. You have seized on this as a pivotal point, but it really isn't in context.

It's non-standard because there are wide ranges of other religious beliefs that do not fit that description. If you consider the many ways religion is expressed in India or China, you would usually fail to find these specific features. There are folk religions that don't adhere to this description.

As noted, conflating logic and the scientific method is an extremely unhelpful structure to be using. They aren't the same thing. What you think of as "logic" isn't what most people think of as "logic."

At a formal level, logic is a very strict structure of reasoning. It is a pattern of deductive conclusions based on assumptions.

The scientific method has many formulations, but none of them are purely deductive in nature. They all follow a for more inductive pattern of thought. (Generalization of patterns of observations.)

In other words, you want to choose to ignore pertinent details that undermine your claim. You want to make broad generalizations based on poorly thought-out reasoning. It's a huge error, especially as the means through which the people you wish to impugn are not doing anything different than what you're doing.

There isn't much to say in response. You're clearly wrong. That you want to pretend you're right doesn't actually make you right.

Also, I'll repeat my assertion that the failures of "logic" that you think they're making are precisely the types of failures you're making. In this thread, you've made up facts, you've tried to discount scientific literature that disproves your claims, and you've demonstrated an unwillingness to intellectually engage in rational discourse.

It's like you didn't even bother to look up scientism. It's not like I'm going to point to an article put forth on the webpage of the American Association for the Advancement of Science or anything like that. Oh wait, yes I am.

https://www.aaas.org/page/what-scientism

Any time you choose to say something stupid, I'll be here to point it out. Don't worry, bro!

Yes, the unjustified generalization is quite clear. But you've never let the facts deter you in the past, so there's no reason to expect that they will deter you in the present.

I'll point out that you've simply made no argument to support the claim of the general failure of religious people to reason effectively. You've maybe tried to point to a couple specific examples, but by that same logic I can point to you and claim that atheists are terrible at logic.

It really just points to the general failure of your posting.

Edit: Also, while it may not be pivotal to your argument, the way that you responded to having this error pointed out does serve to support my various claims about the parallels between how you're responding to information and how religious people respond to information. I think I've been quite successful at showing that the gap between you and them is much smaller than you realize, which lends strength to the argument that this really isn't a religious thing at all.

.

I don't believe that I made any semantic declarations about the definition of religion in this thread until after you declared your definition of religion in post #209. You're free to point to something if think that this statement is in error.

In the absence of that evidence, to argue that you did that because I was already debating semantics is a disingenuous reconstruction of the conversation. And that would be the second time you've done it in this thread.

You will not find that even in lay usage that "logic" equates with "the scientific method." This is particularly true because it's really hard to find that many people who have a lay concept for the scientific method. Most descriptions of that are somewhat technical (almost uniformly requiring some sort of testing and verification process -- which is again quite far from what one usually considers to be "logic").

There is no substance to your argument. That's kind of the point that I've been trying to make with you. You literally don't have an argument. You have an assertion. And in order for you to support that assertion, you've done the following:

1) Generated your own alternative facts
2) Generated your own alternative definitions
3) Generated your own alternative narrative of the trajectory of the conversation

Upon consideration, there seems to be no correlation with my position in this thread and the true Scotsman fallacy. At no time have I declared a definition for a category, have an example presented to me that I disagreed with, and then adapted my definition to exclude that example.

You may not think it's true, but I've cited three specific behaviors that are exhibited by both fundamentalists and by you. I think I've actually made a pretty apt comparison on that basis.

I'm bothering with it because I understand that this is fundamentally an emotional argument for you. And by doing this, I am able to effectively keep you pigeonholed in that one spot. My goal is to draw on that emotional piece for a while so that you would keep repeating the same errors that you've already been making.

Indeed. The prosecution has failed to present a successful argument. The defense has pointed this out in many different ways, including making a case that the prosecution failed to present an argument at all after conceding to the facts of the case. The defense has also addressed evidence that shows that the prosecution has made factually incorrect statements. At this point, there's literally nothing left for me to do.

There's little to account for your rebuttals. So far, what I've mostly seen are concessions that I've been right about things. But you've not actually advanced anything new as a substantive replacement to those claims.

If this is the point you want to actually debate, then begin by presenting an argument. Nothing you've presented so far has been successful.

It seems to me that facts are not your strong suit.

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...1&postcount=46

Without going into a excruciating and mostly unnecessary detail, I will concede you are right on 90%+ of what you've said here.

That having been said, what exactly is your point? Is it that my position is wrong, and religious people are just as capable of rational thinking as atheists (on average), or is it something else? I mean, demonstrating that I personally failed to make a persuasive argument doesn't change the truth or falsity of my proposition, only my own ability (or lack thereof) to argue it.

Edit:

Other posters in the thread have made the various parts of the point I was trying to make a lot better than I did. Maybe you should try and respond to the various points that have been made by them - people like "Original Position", "well named", "tame deuces", "dynamite22" and, I hate to say it, Sklansky, have done a better job representing my position in various posts than I could ever hope to have.

My primary point is that you've failed to advance a successful argument.

The secondary point is that you seem to be mistaken in your underlying position. In other words, I affirm that "religious people are just as capable of rational thinking as atheists (on average)."

This is true. But insofar as the argumentation is concerned, there is no burden of proof for me to prove you're wrong. All I need to do is to demonstrate that your argument does not succeed.

Edit: I should note that there's no stated underlying principle by which I should adopt the belief that there is an inherent asymmetry in the logical capacity of religious and irreligious people. Therefore, it's most reasonable to believe that the capacity is the same and that the difference in conclusions lies at the level of presuppositions that have been developed in the lives of the different people in question, as those are things that mitigate how people hold (or don't hold) various conclusions.

I'm not even sure that this is true. Several of those posters seemed to be affirming my position, so I have no reason to reply with counter-argumentation to them. Most of them also seem to be trying to move the conversation to something that's far more narrow than your original claims.

So... I don't know. At this point, since you've conceded the failure of your argument, I don't have much more to say with regards to the topic.

But I'll leave with one very pointed observation:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/13...l#post52151849

Of all the things you said, this is probably the most damning in terms of whether anything you say should be taken seriously. If you want to throw stuff out and see what sticks, and then hide behind "oh, but these people make my point for me better" as a means of avoiding actually engaging in a discussion in which you learn something new, you are doing yourself zero favors. From the outside, it's not even clear that you know what you're saying, and you just seem to be latching on to whatever people around you are saying that you think you agree with.

To quote someone who you think is making your argument for you:

If you don't want to be like the fundamentalist religious person, then don't behave like the fundamentalist religious person.

I would definite not argue that religious people are less capable of rational thought than atheists, and probably not even that (on average) they exercise their capacity for rational thought less than atheists.

I would probably argue that the majority of Christian religious institutions encourage their members to suspend rational thinking on matters related to core religious beliefs, and many of those institutions, at least in the U.S., encourage an unwarranted skepticism towards science, and a generally anti-intellectual stance.

Most of those arguments could probably be extended to non-Christian religious institutions (I think certainly of Islam) but I have less experience there.

It really is a shame that you lend your not inconsiderable intellect to a cause that is deleterious to humanity as a whole. Call me some sort of "fundamentalist" for that statement, if you will.

I wish you would be more specific for there are a plethora of Roman
Catholic Universities in the USA which bring the lie to your statement. I'l speak to Georgetown, Notre Dame , Loyola, Boston College, Villanova, and others who have rich intellectual climates and are not skeptical toward science as you state.

If you're going to generalize about these matters it offers nothing and is self serving.

Now, getting to the heart of your statements many are skeptical of science and its consequences , and for good reason. You have made it some type of imprimatur where it appears to be "sinful" or at ;east not bright to be skeptical of science and its claims to hegemony.

No one suspends thinking but peoples across all walks of life do have principled beliefs, rightly or wrongly but one thing that butts its ugly head is the dogmatic whether in science or religion.

Religion-"dogma of revelation", of course not all practitioners.

Science- "dogma of experience", of course not all practitioners.

If you want to discuss these matters then start a thread instead of dismissing just a goodly amount of the populations. There are houses of worship of many varieties in this land and there are many who carry their religious within to which your branding of peoples is of no account.

FFS. Science is not a "dogma". When will you people understand this???

If you choose to join the ranks, that's a decision you make for yourself.

It's the fundamentalists that make the unscientific claims. I hope that you can do better.

That should be in your signature, that way you'll always be reminded to not troll before you post! I understand that will be a tough task for somebody like you though. Peace out bro!

That is not a claim that I have made. I said that many Christian institutions in the U.S. encourage an unwarranted anti-intellectual skepticism towards science, but certainly not all. I didn't particularly have in mind Catholic intellectuals. Coincidentally, one of my favorite theologians was a Catholic priest and academic. I wouldn't accuse of him anti-intellectualism.

I think you are reducing the question to a false dichotomy. I suggested that many religious institutions encourage an unwarranted skepticism of science. That does not imply that any skepticism of scientific methods, conclusions, or institutions is "sinful". Nor is it some absolute defense of the primacy of scientific epistemology.

Doubt, skepticism, what you might call "epistemic humility" *should* be centrally important to any humanistic ethos that takes science seriously, and I wouldn't argue otherwise. Of course, that isn't always the case in practice, which is certainly a point that goes back to the first two assertions I made, i.e that I don't think religious people are uniquely irrational.

However, not all skepticism is equally reasonable, and it's clear that most religious opposition to theories of evolution and cosmology (for example) are not reasonable or intellectually sustainable. The phrase "anti-intellectual" describes the process by which people arrive at negative attitudes towards certain scientific ideas or institutions, not just the mere fact that they are skeptical.

Would you agree that the process of coming to believe and accept the core tenets of Christianity is mostly or strictly faith-based?

Probably not in the terms you're thinking of. I believe that the "coming to believe" process of religion is similar to many other identity-forming "coming to believe" processes. Whether you want to call it "faith-based" or "built on the summation of reflection upon personal experiences" is just semantics.

I agree with your point with respect to similarity.

What I mostly mean by "faith-based" is 'not based on skeptical thinking'.
I think the need or desire to believe is inherent in (most of) humanity. I think most people believe because they have been brought up in a religion, because of fear of death, craving for meaning, etc., rather than as a result of reading a particular holy book and thinking 'hey this all makes sense'.

You are clearly more knowledgeable about the bible than I am but I would argue that what I have earlier called the "supernatural" parts (miracles, divine interventions, the resurrection) are lacking in evidential support. To me, in order to accept and believe in these elements, one has to (willfully) suspend skeptical thinking.

I wouldn't be quite so specific about the types of thinking involved ("fear of death" is often cited by I see no particular evidence that this in particular is a major driver of religion/religious beliefs), but I would affirm that being raised in a religion makes it significantly more likely that one would adopt that religion. There are similar statements about political perspectives, general philosophical outlooks on life, and many other things like that.

The way I would put it is that if you were them instead of you, with all of their life experiences and whatever else went into making them who they are, it's very likely you would believe like them. This speaks nothing to the truth or falsity of whatever they believe about the world. It just points to the fact that there's so much more that goes into belief than just some sort of mental assent to a collection of claims.

Yes, there is a level of suspension of skeptical thought, but it's not in a way that's unique to religion. It's true that there is not a lot of direct evidence for a lot of the claims in the Bible. At best, there's indirect evidence. And I would assert that the lack of direct evidence for a statement is not, in and of itself, sufficient to reject statements out of hand. If we did that consistently across all domains of our lives, we would probably be very dysfunctional humans. There are simply too many things that we deal for which we lack direct evidence to be able to deny that information by default. (It's also not at all representative of what we know about how humans think.)

But you do see a lot of similar types of suspension of skeptical thinking in all sorts of areas of life. Politics in particular is strongly prone to this type of thinking. My best understanding is because both politics and religion are narrative driven aspects of human life. That is, we don't talk about politics or religion as an abstract collection of individual factual claims*, but about the narrative that connects those factual claims together. (*Or at least, perceived factual claims.)

This is different from a "scientifically methodological" outlook where it really is about individual claims that can be teased apart to its simplest components to be studied and understood individually.

Both types of thinking are useful and important. I think a common error is to overvalue one or the other (and this applies in both directions).