Is a belief in god(s) Irrational?
Nothing so far really seems to indicate this. If you look at the way you're structuring yourself, the challenge is not about the acquisition, but the justification. There's a big difference there. I can come to believe something for irrational reasons, and then later on discover a rational explanation that supports that belief.
I've also been very clear that I'm discussing whether or not a belief in god is rational, and haven't talked about it being justified at all since a view acquired irrationally can't be justified (even if it's correct), it hasn't been relevant to discuss justification.
I'm arguing they're not, because the definition you've provided would include a lot of conspiracy theories that I consider irrational. the reason that conspiracy theories advance is mostly through exaggerating possibility into plausibility. Since your definition of rational includes ALL possibilities, that is sufficient.
I would rather have a definition of rational that includes some structure that addresses the plausibility side of things. I don't think that possibility is sufficient.
I would rather have a definition of rational that includes some structure that addresses the plausibility side of things. I don't think that possibility is sufficient.
I see 'rational' as doing the same job that 'Valid' does in deductive argument. Your conclusion may be incorrect but at least the reasoning behind it is not erroneous.
Actually, you've met the conditions for "irrational" or you haven't. I'm wanting to emphasize here that your definition is for "irrational" and not "rational."
I also need to point out a subtle but essential flaw in the definitions you put forth. It comes at the level of formal logic, and I thought glossing over it would be fine, but it's not.
I also need to point out a subtle but essential flaw in the definitions you put forth. It comes at the level of formal logic, and I thought glossing over it would be fine, but it's not.
You've defined "irrational belief" in the form "P and Q." If you negate this, you get "not P *OR* not Q" (DeMorgan's law). This means that rational beliefs only need to satisfy one of the two properties put forward. This specifically weakens your definition far more than you seem to understand.
I would argue that the person whose only knowledge consists of a joke that they've heard is unjustified in their belief. Let's change that justification slightly:
"I once heard a joke about black people, and so I believe X about black people."
Do you want to say that this person is justified in believing X? Are you sure?
I'm not rejecting that it's inductive. But as in the other post, you're bringing the wrong logic to the table. There is no formal deduction that can be made about blondes. There's basically nothing that can formally be derived about blondes from a logical point of view (other than perhaps their blonde-ness).
It's not different if you agree that science only deals with the natural, then there is a clear and very important difference. Science only works because of that difference. If you include the possibility of the supernatural existing, science becomes at best a limited and biased source of explanations, and at worst useless and unable to explain anything.
What evidence? I'm not merging them, I understand what they are. What use is something that is 'not sufficient to describe everything in the universe'? If you don't think science (using MN) is sufficient, then do you instead think that the theistic paradigm is sufficient?
If you really understood this, you wouldn't be confused as to why there are religious scientists.
Yes it does, but we're both just restating our assertions here and that's kinda redundant. I had hoped that through showing how the concepts on which science is based, none of which can be applied to the supernatural, and are therefore the only reason that science has been effective in providing Useful explanations, would convince you of why science rejects the supernatural.
I don't think you have, I think that you've sidestepped it. The simple reason that no mainstream scientific theories include supernatural elements is that science rejects the existence of the supernatural.
Think what you will, but the fact that you're being stubborn about the claim that science "rejects" the supernatural and your unwillingness to accept that science can be done by religious people (that you seem to have trouble understanding how it's possible), suggests that the problem is really on your end. There's a difference between "does not admit the supernatural" and "rejects" the supernatural in the same way as "does not believe in God" is different from "rejects the existence of God." You said you understood the difference between the latter phrasings. If you did, then you should be able to understand the difference between the former.
The concepts that are relevant to this conversation are those that define what science is and determine how it is practiced.
You can call those concepts whatever you like, I chose 'high level' but I don't mind what we use since we're agreed that children are not likely to be aware of them (re: your 'baby science' point).
I've been very clear on the difference between 'rational and 'justified' so I'm uncertain how that's not been clear. I agree that we can believe something irrationally and later discover new evidence, or think about it in a way that we come to have that belief rationally, and that changes nothing about examining whether or not a currently held belief has been acquired rationally.
I've also been very clear that I'm discussing whether or not a belief in god is rational, and haven't talked about it being justified at all since a view acquired irrationally can't be justified (even if it's correct), it hasn't been relevant to discuss justification.
I've also been very clear that I'm discussing whether or not a belief in god is rational, and haven't talked about it being justified at all since a view acquired irrationally can't be justified (even if it's correct), it hasn't been relevant to discuss justification.
You're going beyond whether or not a belief can be considered rational to whether or not it's actually correct.
I see 'rational' as doing the same job that 'Valid' does in deductive argument. Your conclusion may be incorrect but at least the reasoning behind it is not erroneous.
'Rational' is simply a property of a belief. The belief is rational, or it isn't. If it isn't, then it's irrational.
I understand what you're saying and it would be a problem except that I don't think it's possible to meet one condition and not have that mean that you are also meeting the other.
Well... by introducing the idea that the source of information is a 'joke', it's become ambiguous whether or not the person believes the information in the joke to be accurate, and not obviously intended to be parody or some other such mechanism of humour, and so not intended to be taken seriously. Justified' is a property of the belief itself, and on the basis of the information available to that person, their belief is both rationally acquired, and justified IF they think the information in the joke is real and to be taken seriously and it's all the information that they have by which to form a belief.
Well going off the actual meaning of irrational, which is to be illogical or unreasonable. I would say the answer is no, it is'nt irrational. With the growing evidence and general agreement among scientists who study such things, like evoultionary psychologists, that there is an evolutionary component to faith. It appears to be something that is just part of the majority of us as a species. The fact we can't answer the question why does'nt make it irrational.
[Moved from new thread titled: "is a disbelief in an intelligent designer irrational?" -OrP]
I would argue that it very clearly is.
I would argue that it very clearly is.
Evidence shows that complexity can naturally arise from simple structures (Evolution), so to call what we observe 'Design' is going beyond the available evidence and also failing to factor in available evidence, it fails on both counts. So the watchmaker argument isn't rational.
The belief in the watchmaker argument is rational, in that it follows the rules of logic. The fact that one of the premises is unproven, or incorrect, only makes it unsound. Lots of beliefs are based on faulty premises, but you wouldnt class them as irrational
I don't agree. Empiricism holds that beliefs are justified when they are connected by reasoning to evidence obtained through perception. And since our perception can be easily demonstrated to be unreliable, and since one of the major problems with Empiricism is that in order to form beliefs about the evidence that we're obtaining using perception, we must rely on beliefs that we already hold, and on beliefs that in turn support those beliefs, you won't find anyone capable of living up to the truly Empirical Ideal.
So, whilst science employs empiricism in that it only deals with the Physical (that which can be detected using the senses) it is far more than simply an empirical approach to gathering and understanding evidence. It employs a very specific set of criteria to make the evidence is gathers useful in a very specific way.
Science rejects the Supernatural because it's not Useful and the criteria that make something 'scientific' can't be applied to the supernatural. There are no mainstream scientific Theories that include a supernatural element and that is because the supernatural can't be; Corrective, Falsifiable, Predictive, Useful, Internally or Externally Consistent, Parsimonious, or Testable. I.e. there's literally nothing scientific about the supernatural, so science procedes on the assumption that the Natural is all that there is, and it's only because of that that it works and has been so successful in explaining what we observe.
So, whilst science employs empiricism in that it only deals with the Physical (that which can be detected using the senses) it is far more than simply an empirical approach to gathering and understanding evidence. It employs a very specific set of criteria to make the evidence is gathers useful in a very specific way.
Science rejects the Supernatural because it's not Useful and the criteria that make something 'scientific' can't be applied to the supernatural. There are no mainstream scientific Theories that include a supernatural element and that is because the supernatural can't be; Corrective, Falsifiable, Predictive, Useful, Internally or Externally Consistent, Parsimonious, or Testable. I.e. there's literally nothing scientific about the supernatural, so science procedes on the assumption that the Natural is all that there is, and it's only because of that that it works and has been so successful in explaining what we observe.
Methodological naturalism is NOT the rejection of the supernatural, it is in fact a term that has often been used to specifically to reject accusations that it did.
By claiming science rejects the supernatural, you are literally repeating creationist talking points. They love spreading such bogus claims which allows them to jump directly to the next chapter: "science hates your belief and your god, hurr durr".
But my beef with this is bigger than. Naturalism isn't needed in science. Phenomena doesn't need arbitrary distinctions for science to do its thing. I don't care if a fish is natural or supernatural. It can be studied just fine either way.
Evidence shows that complexity can naturally arise from simple structures (Evolution), so to call what we observe 'Design' is going beyond the available evidence and also failing to factor in available evidence, it fails on both counts. So the watchmaker argument isn't rational.
(Note: This isn't saying that the watchmaker argument is some sort of bullet-proof argument. But it's an argument that most people would generally consider to be rational even if they think it's wrong.)
What your argument here is demonstrating is that you've got very weak conceptions of things like "evidence" and it's undermining your ability to analyze arguments effectively.
The issue is that you're still way too deep into your own beliefs and understanding, and so you're stuck with a fairly myopic view of the world. This prevents you from understanding lots of things.
Here is a challenge that, if you took it seriously, would open your eyes to the real struggles you're having: Pretend you're a Christian and a scientist. Explain how it's possible for you to believe in God while still conducting scientific research. (Such people exist in reality, so we know it's possible.)
In order for you to succeed, you'll need to really peel back the layers of your "understanding" of science and your "understanding" of how religious people actually think about things. You may have to read a book like Francis Collin's "The Language of God" and several other things. You may actually need to get to know some Christians who happen to be scientists. It's not something that I can imagine you'll just be able to sit down and think through by yourself with no help.
You don't ultimately have to agree with what you're saying. Your goal is to be able to accurately express their thoughts and ideas about themselves. If you can actually get to that point, you should be able to understand many of the things that have caused you repeated and ongoing struggles in your posts.
It's so easy to stagnate in life by accepting the easy solution rather than challenging ourselves by genuinely adopting the opposing viewpoint and putting forth the effort to make the strongest case from that perspective. Because it is shifted more toward suffering rather than the opposite, reality operates in a way that rewards those of us that are willing to make that effort to look deeper than initial appearances and snap judgments. It's the only path toward meaning, I've found, while the alternative is either nihilism, delusion, or denial.
Our proclivity in this regard is exposed in how we interact with people or viewpoints that we disagree with. If we are not willing to make the strongest case we can for the opposing viewpoint regarding our beliefs, sacrificing our self preservation instinct in favor of truth, how can we expect ourselves to muster the necessary effort against the suffering that reality is capable of raining down on us? We would be sentencing ourselves to a future of bouncing between coping and uncontrollable bouts of nihilism, like a leaf in a tornado. All because we want things to be easy and simple.
Our proclivity in this regard is exposed in how we interact with people or viewpoints that we disagree with. If we are not willing to make the strongest case we can for the opposing viewpoint regarding our beliefs, sacrificing our self preservation instinct in favor of truth, how can we expect ourselves to muster the necessary effort against the suffering that reality is capable of raining down on us? We would be sentencing ourselves to a future of bouncing between coping and uncontrollable bouts of nihilism, like a leaf in a tornado. All because we want things to be easy and simple.
Indeed. What does the evidence tell you about this question?
Or it's so exactly on point that if you accepted this as being a valid understanding, you would have to abandon some of your beliefs, and you emotionally don't want to do that so you'll dismiss it out of hand.
Or it's so exactly on point that if you accepted this as being a valid understanding, you would have to abandon some of your beliefs, and you emotionally don't want to do that so you'll dismiss it out of hand.
Whether maths is man made or discovered is an interesting question, and not one I've thought about in great detail before. My very initial view is that it's not black and white.
No I'm not. Interesting though that you can 'severely' conflate things, presumably you can also conflate things just a little bit too?
MN is the application, through the scientific method, of Philosophical Naturalism which does reject the supernatural. Specifically, it makes a truth claim, that the natural world is all that there is. MN is applied, on that basis, by the majority of scientists.
By claiming science rejects the supernatural, you are literally repeating creationist talking points. They love spreading such bogus claims which allows them to jump directly to the next chapter: "science hates your belief and your god, hurr durr".
But my beef with this is bigger than. Naturalism isn't needed in science. Phenomena doesn't need arbitrary distinctions for science to do its thing. I don't care if a fish is natural or supernatural. It can be studied just fine either way.
If Creationists say that then they're correct, that is possible you know. And, Naturalism is not only 'needed' by modern science, but couldn't work without it. To be considered 'scientific', a hypothesis must be Corrective, Falsifiable, Predictive, Useful, Internally or Externally Consistent, Parsimonious, or Testable.
The job that those criteria are doing is to make such knowledge as can be obtained using the 'there is no supernatural' paradigm, actually Useful to us. None of those criteria can be applied to the supernatural. That's why it's rejected.
By claiming science rejects the supernatural, you are literally repeating creationist talking points. They love spreading such bogus claims which allows them to jump directly to the next chapter: "science hates your belief and your god, hurr durr".
But my beef with this is bigger than. Naturalism isn't needed in science. Phenomena doesn't need arbitrary distinctions for science to do its thing. I don't care if a fish is natural or supernatural. It can be studied just fine either way.
The job that those criteria are doing is to make such knowledge as can be obtained using the 'there is no supernatural' paradigm, actually Useful to us. None of those criteria can be applied to the supernatural. That's why it's rejected.
Correct, a wrong belief can still be held rationally. The watchmaker hypothesis is not rational if you're aware that not everything complex has to be 'designed'. So the way to show watchmaker believers that their belief is not justified is to show that there is evidence, that complexity can arise from simple origins through Evolution, that they haven't included in their assessment.
I'm not going to keep going in circles with you. You're simply wrong. There's even evidence to show that you're being irrational because there exist scientists who believe in God and have other aspects of their lives of spirituality and religiosity. So unless you're going to go as far as saying that those people aren't doing science, you're wrong. And if you go that far, you're also wrong.
Your point about there being scientists who have supernatural beliefs and either reject the strict version of MN because of them, or work with it anyway despite the apparent conflict, is something I've dealt with twice already ITT, so it's not a new criticism and still doesn't pose a problem for anything I've said. By their definition of what science is, they are 'doing science'. But what they're doing is useless since they can never know if there is in fact a supernatural explanation for what they're studying and their explanations fail to meet a single of the criteria that make knowledge acquired through the paradigm of Naturalism, actually useful to us.
Those scientists that believe in the supernatural are knowingly offering incomplete and limited explanations if they only use the Natural paradigm.
When you can show me a mainstream scientific theory that includes a supernatural element, or show that there is a general consensus among the world's scientists that any scientific explanation could or should include supernatural elements, you will for the first time have offered something that is difficult for me to explain in the context of my understanding.
Nope.
Think what you will, but the fact that you're being stubborn about the claim that science "rejects" the supernatural and your unwillingness to accept that science can be done by religious people (that you seem to have trouble understanding how it's possible), suggests that the problem is really on your end. There's a difference between "does not admit the supernatural" and "rejects" the supernatural in the same way as "does not believe in God" is different from "rejects the existence of God." You said you understood the difference between the latter phrasings. If you did, then you should be able to understand the difference between the former.
Well, if I said the same thing to you, how would you prove that I was wrong? I'm curious what evidence you would offer of "how science is practiced".
Nope. There exist conspiracy theories that are rational (according to your definition), but are irrational in my view. And not because they're wrong, but because the plausibility of the correctness is too small.
This is a bad way to look at rationality precisely because of how you've defined it. But you'll need to work through the problem of induction a bit further. You're being stubborn there, and so that's causing you problems here. You're no understanding that "reliable" doesn't mean 100% of the time.
This is a bad way to look at rationality precisely because of how you've defined it. But you'll need to work through the problem of induction a bit further. You're being stubborn there, and so that's causing you problems here. You're no understanding that "reliable" doesn't mean 100% of the time.
I disagree that 'rational' is a useful property of the belief itself and my reasons are that 'plausibility' is an impractical standard to hold a belief to before making a judgement about it being rational or not, and you've also made the concept of 'justified' redundant since it would mean the same thing but without the useful distinction of applying only to the belief, rather than the thinking. Where I can show that two contradictory beliefs were acquired rationally if we can see that both were based on the evidence available to those holding the beliefs (and then we can examine that evidence in the same way you would examine the premises of a deductive argument that has been shown to be valid in it's structure), you would have to decide which belief is more plausible. To do that, you yourself would have to acquire the belief and then we would in turn need to examine how you arrived at your decision that one belief is more plausible than the other belief, and so on...
In the context of belief acquisition, 'Plausible' makes 'rational' unworkable.
Since rational is a property of thinking, the nature of the evidence that the thinking is based on is crucial, and I don't know whether your example person took the joke seriously or not, because you didn't say. In my example, the belief holder did not know that the book was a joke and I made that clear when I said 'unknown to him'.
My reply was to your criticism that "the challenge is not about the acquisition, but the justification", so regardless of what I still have to learn, I've been very clear ITT on how I'm using the terms 'rational' and 'justified'. My use of those definitions has not meandered or deviated at all, and my focus has remained steadily on 'rational belief'. In that reply I also said "a view acquired irrationally can't be justified (even if it's correct)" which should further have reinforced that 'justified' is not the focus of the OP. I don't see references to what I still have to learn to be relevant.
We have evidence that complexity can arise from design. We see this in computers, cars, and other machines that we've created. I don't see how the design argument can go beyond the available evidence and fails to factor in available evidence unless you don't believe that those things are designed.
Here is a challenge that, if you took it seriously, would open your eyes to the real struggles you're having: Pretend you're a Christian and a scientist. Explain how it's possible for you to believe in God while still conducting scientific research. (Such people exist in reality, so we know it's possible.)
In order for you to succeed, you'll need to really peel back the layers of your "understanding" of science and your "understanding" of how religious people actually think about things. You may have to read a book like Francis Collin's "The Language of God" and several other things. You may actually need to get to know some Christians who happen to be scientists. It's not something that I can imagine you'll just be able to sit down and think through by yourself with no help.
You don't ultimately have to agree with what you're saying. Your goal is to be able to accurately express their thoughts and ideas about themselves. If you can actually get to that point, you should be able to understand many of the things that have caused you repeated and ongoing struggles in your posts.
Can you say the same?
Well going off the actual meaning of irrational, which is to be illogical or unreasonable. I would say the answer is no, it is'nt irrational. With the growing evidence and general agreement among scientists who study such things, like evoultionary psychologists, that there is an evolutionary component to faith. It appears to be something that is just part of the majority of us as a species. The fact we can't answer the question why does'nt make it irrational.
Probably some beliefs about the intelligence of religious people. Your presentation thus far in this thread has shown a lack of intellectual reflection on the matter similar to your lack of intellectual reflection on the philosophy of mathematics.
Good. So should be your views on many other things. If something as "objective" as mathematics appears to be can still be seen in shades of gray, how much more should other things be understood as being complex and not as straight-forward as they initially appear?
Whether maths is man made or discovered is an interesting question, and not one I've thought about in great detail before. My very initial view is that it's not black and white.
When you can show me a mainstream scientific theory that includes a supernatural element, or show that there is a general consensus among the world's scientists that any scientific explanation could or should include supernatural elements, you will for the first time have offered something that is difficult for me to explain in the context of my understanding.
Well, if I said the same thing to you, how would you prove that I was wrong? I'm curious what evidence you would offer of "how science is practiced".
Tame_deuces is spot on. It doesn't matter what your labels are (natural/supernatural).
There are many other problems with your presentation. But since you've already reached the point of going in circles, I'm not going to hit them up individually. Your struggles with some basic terminology and logic highlights that you still have much to learn.
Is it "illogical or unreasonable" to go beyond what the available evidence supports? I think so, so that specific element of the definition I used in the OP, not to go beyond the available evidence, still applies even when you use words like illogical or unreasonable and I think that a belief in god goes beyond the available evidence and in doing so, does not leave open possibilities not closed out by the evidence, i.e. that there is some other cause of the universe than god.
There are two ways looking at this and you seem to just lump them together. One is like I stated above where it is just a function of our evolution and in of itself is'nt irrational. Two, our implementation of those beliefs which when you are sacrificing virgins, burning witches, chopping peoples heads off over it, and close your mind to the possibilities science may present, then ya that is certainly unreasonable.
Unlike those who believe in god, my viewpoint is Corrective, Falsifiable, Predictive, Useful, Internally and Externally Consistent, Parsimonious, and Testable.
* Corrective: You're suffering from an unwillingness to be corrected when wrong. The data is against you, but you're not taking the new data and allowing it to change your perspectives. You're holding to the beliefs you've brought to the table.
* Falsifiable: Your philosophy of science is unfalsifiable. No matter how much I can show you about science and scientists and their perspective, you're going to continue to insist that methodological naturalism necessitates philosophical naturalism.
* Externally consistent: You're not consistent with the external world.
* Parsimonious: Your inability to explain how there are religious scientists out there can be understood in a much simpler way by changing your assumptions about science. But you refuse to do that, and instead create a much more complicated understanding by retaining unnecessary features.
Can you say the same?
Nobody said "requires." That's your word and a mischaracterization of the watchmaker argument. The watchmaker argument is not an argument of necessity, but of plausibility.
Probably some beliefs about the intelligence of religious people. Your presentation thus far in this thread has shown a lack of intellectual reflection on the matter similar to your lack of intellectual reflection on the philosophy of mathematics.
Good. So should be your views on many other things. If something as "objective" as mathematics appears to be can still be seen in shades of gray, how much more should other things be understood as being complex and not as straight-forward as they initially appear?
Good. So should be your views on many other things. If something as "objective" as mathematics appears to be can still be seen in shades of gray, how much more should other things be understood as being complex and not as straight-forward as they initially appear?
I wouldn't call mathematics objective, there are great swathes of it that are completely man made and therefore the rules are subjective.
I wouldn't call mathematics objective, there are great swathes of it that are completely man made and therefore the rules are subjective.
I think the watchmaker argument breaks down when applied to anything we observe in the natural world. Watches don't evolve, everything in the natural world does. The stronger the evidence for evolution, the weaker and less plausible the watchmaker argument as applied to the natural world becomes by comparison.
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