How atheists became the most colossally smug and annoying people on the planet

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Originally Posted by robert9712000

Where was slavery ever mandated by the bible?
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Slavery was something I picked off of the top of my head that I knew that was a product of some who practiced it premised upon the divine word that they could do whatever they wanted. And so to these enslavers, it was, in their view, moral. Is why I said it the way that I did. Both in theory and then in practice.
 
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Sola_Fide said:
Since it is impossible that sensation yields knowledge (since sensation must be universal for one to know something truly, or else they commit the fallacy of induction), the sensations provide the occasion that God reveals either true or false information to someone.

The purpose of the senses is to provide the occasion whereby God gives a person information. This is proved by your own example about the Bible. You read the Bible with your senses, yet you don't know the truth.
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Amazing. You truly don't realize how incredibly illogical this is. On the one hand, you say that the senses cannot yield knowledge. On the other, you say that God uses the senses to provide information (supposedly true). How many times will you contradict yourself before breakfast?

When you read the Bible, you claim that you are not receiving true knowledge. Yet you cite it as justification for your position. Why should anyone accept as a justification something that, under your assumptions, is not true knowledge?

The point is that if God wishes to reveal Truth to man via revelation, He doesn't need to use a book. He can simply send the message directly to one's brain (whether this would constitute another kind of sense perception is another matter). Of course, there would be no way one could ever convince someone else that this had really occurred, so it wouldn't be very persuasive in trying to get the other person to follow the Truth as it was supposedly revealed. But if reading the Bible is a fruitless way to obtain the Truth, it's not persuasive either. So what's left?
 
VIDEODROME said:
So what... do you strap the bible to your head and let the word sink into your brain through osmosis?
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That wouldn't work, either. One would have to know that what is strapped to one's head is the Bible, which isn't possible without looking at it, picking it up, and using sight and touch to strap it to one's head. No, if SF is correct, the Bible is useless as a means of obtaining knowledge.
 
Sonny Tufts said:
That wouldn't work, either. One would have to know that what is strapped to one's head is the Bible, which isn't possible without looking at it, picking it up, and using sight and touch to strap it to one's head. No, if SF is correct, the Bible is useless as a means of obtaining knowledge.
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No I don't really think that would work lol.
 
otherone said:
So morality can only be defined as being transcendent? Do you have a resource for this narrow definition?
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It's not a narrow definition. It's the normal definition that applies to the way we've been using the word throughout this whole discussion. Like all words, the word "morality" can mean any of several different things. But any meanings that don't involve something transcendent (such as, as a synonym for chastity) don't fit the context of this discussion.

Here's dictionary.com's definition of morality:
1.
conformity to the rules of right conduct; moral or virtuous conduct.
2.
moral quality or character.
3.
virtue in sexual matters; chastity.
4.
a doctrine or system of morals.
5.
moral instruction; a moral lesson, precept, discourse, or utterance.
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I'm working with the use of the word that has the first definition listed there. Clearly this involves something transcendent, thus the use of the word "right."
 
Some of this might depend on what any person means using the word Transcendent. I think this word has been borrowed for various Spiritual ideas and might be unintentionally confusing.

It kind of makes me think of Transcendental Meditation. In that case to Transcend is to Go Beyond. Maybe calling Morality Transcendent makes it sound like an active agent. Or in general it just seems vague.
 
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The problem with the English language, it's so....evasive...a lawyer like language, a lawyers dream language.
 
VIDEODROME said:
Some of this might depend on what any person means using the word Transcendent. I think this word has been borrowed for various Spiritual ideas and might be unintentionally confusing.

It kind of makes me think of Transcendental Meditation. In that case to Transcend is to Go Beyond. Maybe calling Morality Transcendent makes it sound like an active agent. Or in general it just seems vague.
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Yes, it means to go beyond.

For something to be "right" it can't be a matter of opinion.

2+2=4, not because we decided it does, but it does independently of us. It is transcendent.

If there is such a thing as moral "right," then it also has to be right independently of our thoughts about it. If not, and morality is merely what someone considers to be right, and nothing more, then it isn't really "right," in which case morality would be a fiction, not something that actually exists.
 
Is it just Beyond? Or is it Going Beyond?

If Morality is Going somewhere, it sounds like it's actively doing something.

I kind of think it would be simpler to say Morality, or Math, is just not Tangible.
 
erowe1 said:
2+2=4, not because we decided it does, but it does independently of us. It is transcendent.
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?????
Just because something is not mutable does not make it outside man's experience or perception (transcendent).
Red+Blue= Purple, too...does that mean color theory is transcendent? Language and mathematics were created as a symbolic system to interpret our environment and communicate with one another. In a locale uninhabited by people, both systems do not exist. Morality only exists in a human context. You don't need traffic lights where there are no cars....and it is impossible to prove otherwise, as all HUMAN thought is trapped in this system.
 
Some people like to philosophically debate whether Math was Discovered or Invented. Is Math just a human way of expressing something innate in the Universe, or just a way the human brain tries to fit the world in patterns that make sense.

In the end, it's about as useful as debating whether the Chicken or the Egg came first.

Also, I imagine there are different number systems that work differently, so maybe what Math is trying to measure is innate, but the our Language of Math is a human invention like Roman Numerals. Or Celsius Vs. Fahrenheit. Or hell just crossing over to Canada and switching to the Metric System.
 
otherone said:
?????
Just because something is not mutable does not make it outside man's experience or perception (transcendent).
Red+Blue= Purple, too...does that mean color theory is transcendent? Language and mathematics were created as a symbolic system to interpret our environment and communicate with one another. In a locale uninhabited by people, both systems do not exist. Morality only exists in a human context. You don't need traffic lights where there are no cars....and it is impossible to prove otherwise, as all HUMAN thought is trapped in this system.
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I'm not sure how you got to the topic of mutability. I never mentioned that.

You're wrong about mathematics, though. Man did not create the laws of mathematics, we discover them. They would be true if nobody ever thought about them.

Thus, they are transcendent. The same applies to morality. If its truth exists independently of our thoughts about it, it's transcendent. If not, then moral right isn't really "right."

Light and eyes are physical things. Math and morality are not.

Colors are dependent on our experience of them. They are not transcendent like math and morality (assuming the laws of math and morality exist at all). However, our experience of colors is caused by something outside of us. Similarly, you could say that our systems of describing morality and math are dependent on our own minds. But the truths that we are attempting to articulate are not.

I never said anything about taking morality out of a human context. I agree we can't do that. However, if no human anywhere acknowledged any moral laws, those laws would still exist, and be broken whenever people broke them. If this is not the case, then something thought to be morally right isn't really right. It's a fiction. The definition of morality demands that, for it to actually exist, it must be transcendent.
 
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Sonny Tufts said:
Whether math is transcendent or not is the subject of much debate in the philosophy of mathematics. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_mathematics

"God created the natural numbers, all else is the work of man." Leopold Kronecker, 19th century mathematician.
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Right. And I'm sure the same is true in philosophical discussion of morality.

But if either one is not transcendent, then it's a fiction. If the laws of morality and mathematics aren't really transcendent, then they aren't really real in the sense that "mathematical claim A" or "moral claim B" can ever be "right" or "wrong." It may be that we are deceiving ourselves when we believe in math and morality, and that the things we think these laws make "right" aren't really "right."

But unless that is the case, then we're back to them being transcendent.
 
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erowe1 said:
I'm not sure how you got to the topic of mutability. I never mentioned that.

You're wrong about mathematics, though. Man did not create the laws of mathematics, we discover them. They would be true if nobody ever thought about them.

Thus, they are transcendent. The same applies to morality. If its truth exists independently of our thoughts about it, it's transcendent. If not, then moral right isn't really "right."

Light and eyes are physical things. Math and morality are not.

Colors are dependent on our experience of them. They are not transcendent like math and morality (assuming the laws of math and morality exist at all). However, our experience of colors is caused by something outside of us. Similarly, you could say that our systems of describing morality and math are dependent on our own minds. But the truths that we are attempting to articulate are not.

I never said anything about taking morality out of a human context. I agree we can't do that. However, if no human anywhere acknowledged any moral laws, those laws would still exist, and be broken whenever people broke them. If this is not the case, then something thought to be morally right isn't really right. It's a fiction. The definition of morality demands that, for it to actually exist, it must be transcendent.
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Math is more of an adjective. It's our way of describing nature. Like any other language we give it rules.
 
KingRobbStark said:
Math is more of an adjective. It's our way of describing nature. Like any other language we give it rules.
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It's not just describing nature. In addition to things we can see in nature, it also describes things that don't exist in nature, or that nature only approximates. Often we find things in mathematics first, and then find expressions of those mathematical laws in nature later.

If nothing physical existed, the truth that we express when we say 2+2=4 would still be true. Its truthfulness doesn't depend on our belief in it or knowledge of it. No perfect circle exists physically, but it's still the case that the ratio of a perfect circle's circumference to its diameter is exactly pi. This is not a statement of a rule that we gave circles, it's a statement that was already true before anyone ever discovered it.

Could you have a view that this is wrong? Sure. But in that case, if math weren't transcendent, then mathematical claims could not really be right. And you will notice in that the word "right" is an important one in the definition of morality. It could be that there really is no such thing as moral "right." But if that is the case, then there really is no such thing as morality, by definition.
 
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erowe1 said:
No perfect circle exists physically, but it's still the case that the ratio of a perfect circle's circumference to its diameter is exactly pi. This is not a statement of a rule that we gave circles, it's a statement that was already true before anyone ever discovered it.
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As a theoretical system, math is internally consistent. That has nothing to do with transcendence. You are claiming something is transcendent based on it's existence as an idea. If nothing physical existed, the truth that we express when we say red+blue=purple would still be true.
 
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