What's a soul?

[jewpinthethird]

All humans have a soul.

All flammable products contain phlogiston.

[devonin]

I really do love the entire concept of Phlogiston. it is right up there with spontaneous generation.

The fact that at the time, by the technology available, they seemed like such reasonable explanations, and yet now we consider them to be completely absurd really makes me wonder just how well we think we know things, just because we know them "better" than we used to.

[Kilroy_x]

Originally Posted by devonin

I wonder what Pascal would say to this....*ponder*

I wonder what criticisms there are of Pascal. Actually I don't, I could recite most from memory.

Also yes, the human soul is just like Phlogiston. Following the proof of Phlogistons existence, you can prove the souls existence by the fact that a human being weighs less immediately as soon as they die. XD

[devonin]

Well, the "At least with science you have the -intent- to gain 100% proof for a premise, instead of religion which skipped to an answer and will hold it in the fact of even directly countering evidence" line of thought is an interesting counter-argument to Pascal, even though Pascal would presumably say "Even if, I'm still better off" since Pascal was less concerned about being -right- and more concerned about being safe *grin*

[Kilroy_x]

That's not the problem. One of the bigger problems with Pascal's wager is that it presents the issue as if there is only one religion and only one God in contention. Given all the world's religions, the wager becomes quite another gamble. That's just the beginning of the problems though.

[devonin]

Well, it seems that in this forum virtually all religious discussion is done within the context of christianity in some form.

Bear in mind also, that the terms of the wager are generally parsed as being a choice between believeing the Christian God or believeing in no God at all. Not just "A god or not"

[Master_of_the_Faster]

You really can't counter 100% truth or the intent of gaining 100% truth unless all you want to do is manipulate people.

[devonin]

Er...sure you can. "You are trying to find 100% truth, haven't yet, and we believe we have"

It isn't an especially -good- counter to it, but it is a counter to it. Also "Trying to gain 100% truth is a waste of time, because 100% truth is inherantly impossible for humans, because we have too many fallible means of measuring evidence"

[Master_of_the_Faster]

Originally Posted by devonin

Er...sure you can. "You are trying to find 100% truth, haven't yet, and we believe we have"

This is indeed a counter to what I said. I can see the faults in what I said, but science will resolve anything that is said to be false.

Originally Posted by devonin

It isn't an especially -good- counter to it, but it is a counter to it. Also "Trying to gain 100% truth is a waste of time, because 100% truth is inherantly impossible for humans, because we have too many fallible means of measuring evidence"

As for this idea of countering what I said, it is best to just leave these thoughts on the left side of your chart (even if they aren't provable). There is no need to be one sided or have a chance of being wrong on issues that aren't provable at all. These are matters that humans should probably not be concerned with if it really is the case that an idea is inherantly impossible for humans to gain 100% truth with.

[devonin]

Well, carry that through to its logical conclusion: If there are things that it is impossible to know 100% truth about, how is that a logic against religious belief?

You've been pointing out a lot that simply because science is willing to consider contrary evidence more commonly than religion, that science is simply superior in terms of knowing the truth of the word, when by any reasonable standard, they are completing theories.

Religious people, in general, are prepared to accept that a higher power is capable of directly communicating truth to humans...and that such a power does possess 100% knowledge on the subjects of which it has passed down truths to humans.

Scientific people, in general, are prepared to accept that the only path to truth is through experimentation, testing of theories, discarding ones with evidence against them that can't be explained, and working towards what they assume will eventually be 100% truth to humans.

Along the same line as Pascal's Wager, time will out on whether Science will one day disprove all the tenets of religion, or whether science will eventually simply prove its say to what many religious people have believed all along.

[Master_of_the_Faster]

So what would you ultimately say about the chart that you posted on science and religion, where do you stand on that chart/ what are your views, and why do you say what you would say?

Edit: Knowing that humans may die out one day (assuming that living for ever isn't possible), it's safe to assume that science would only get so far and that religion seems to go way beyond where science lays now. The problem is that no one knows if religion is right, but it can't seem to be proven. I would personally trust a scientist more because they have actually worked hard to created the world that we live in now. Humans aren't proven to have had any truth communicated directly from a higher power at the time being, but the things that science creates are definatly proven to be creations of scientists.

[devonin]

Things scientists "create" are proven to be creations of science.
Things priests "create" are proven to be creations of religion.

I'm not seeing where you have a basis to just -dismiss- one as being outright inferior in all respects.

I prefer logic and science and searching for evidence more than I prefer faith to concepts that I have no particular way to prove, but then, from science I am called upon to believe all manner of things for which -I- have no proof.

Here's a question for you: If a scientist tells you of a "scientific fact" but the proof the scientist has is too far over your head for you to understand, how is believing them simply because "science is all about proof" any different from believing a priest who tells you that some things are simply not for man to have the proof of?

[Kilroy_x]

Science doesn't have facts. Science has models. That's why Science improves, because it leaves room for improvement.

Also for crying out loud, I don't care how a notion is generally parsed if the parsing is wrong. Why the hell would you care? It's distressing.

[devonin]

The point I was trying to make is: When a scientist explains the "proof" they have for something, if that proof is completely above your level of comprehension, yet you believe their statement to be true, you are exercising -faith- in the veracity of the scientist and what they told you.

[Kilroy_x]

True. Accepting any statement purely on authority or on the basis of character or any other such nonsensical thing is problematic no matter what form of authority or what position is occupied. I only take issue with you drawing your comparison between science and religion farther than it can actually go.

[devonin]

Once again, I wasn't trying to take it further than it could go, I was demonstrating in a more extreme way to make the point clear, that many people who are vehemantly on the side of science versus religion seem to either not notice, or refuse to acknowledge that in many cases, they are guilty of the offense for which they look so snootily down on the religious for.

[Master_of_the_Faster]

Ok, I get where you are coming from. Obviously if you don't have proof that a scientist made an item or can't comprehend it, you can't believe that the scientist made the item or that how he/she made it is right. The thing is that if there is sufficient proof for one to know that a certain scientist made an item, then you would know that the scientist made that item. If you could learn about science then maybe you could possibly be on the same page as a scientist who makes items. Perhaps God made the scientist that created that item, but can you say that God made a certain item with seemingly no ways to find if that claim is right? I believe that it is more possible to see the evidence of a scientist than a religious person. Atleast if a scientist is wrong, someone would know and someone could correct his/her ways in making an item, but no one really would know if a religious person is on to anything.

[Kilroy_x]

If an entire mode of thought is foreign to you then it doesn't matter whether or not debate occurs within it, you still won't be able to understand it and make informed decisions on the subject.

As for God vs. Scientist as creators, while it may be true God can't be proven to exist and a scientist can, using this to attribute the existence of any given thing to the scientist is just replacing a completely baseless inference with one based on the fallacious tendency to note things in proximity with one another and infer a connection.

That being said, contextualizing the scientist as firstly or largely a creator seems very odd at best. Unless of course concepts, models etc. = items

[Ground_Breaker]

Originally Posted by ledwix

Scientifically, if a theory is 100.0% true, science is flawed, because it allows for no replacement of ideas or revision of theories, which is the core law by which science was founded, right?

I stopped reading through the thread there, so I don't know if this has already been addressed.

If a theory is 100% true, does it not become a law? (i.e. Law of gravity?)

You all appear to be extremely intelligent, based on what I've read so far in this thread, and I'd like to join the discussion if I can. I may be wrong, I don't profess to know everything, but I'll comment on what I know about life from my personal experiences.

[Master_of_the_Faster]

Honestly, I don't think those inferences about the world being flat deserve to be considered a theory. I don't even think that anyone followed the steps as outlined on Devonin's chart to prove that any of those flawed inferences about the Earth's shape were even true. If a theory is proven to not really be a theory, it's just a flawed idea to me and never was a theory. How can a theory even be a theory if science, testing, or the acknowledgement of countradicting evidence weren't even involved in the making of the theory?