401. God: The Failed Hypothesis

Comment #24107 by Robert Maynard on March 4, 2007 at 8:53 pm

Mind Rebel.. seriously..
The existence of god or gods is a non-disprovable hypothesis. It is literally impossible to conclusively prove that a god does not exist. We can reduce the probability of its existence by explaining things we have attributed to divine intelligence by way of natural processes (which is what a large part of this interview is about), and reduce the question of a creators existence to an irrelevant proposition, but it is ultimately non-disprovable.
Where you got the idea that philosophers proved the non-existence of any deity, hundreds of years ago no less, I cannot fathom, and I can only assume you're mistaken (or simply putting too much stock in the abilities of 18th century philosophers)

Which philosophers are you talking about?

402. Senator calls for answer on creation of universe

Comment #23958 by Robert Maynard on March 3, 2007 at 6:38 pm

But Leo.. the proposition that the Universe suggests it has been intelligently designed by a creator, needs to be framed as a theory to begin being scientific. It needs to make predictions, based on the observation of facts, and it needs to be falsifiable.

The problem is, whenever we might try to make predictions about what to expect from an intelligently designed universe, we are confronted with the question "How can we formulate predictions about the motive and skill of a designer which is necessarily infinitely more intelligent than ourselves?"
We can't even begin to make predictions regarding the extent of a designers responsibility. Did it just set universal constants? Did it only kick start the Big Bang, or create all of the energy? Did it design the algorithmic evolutionary processes that produce complex things out of simple things? Did it hardwire the direct course of evolution? Or did it, in fact, create the Universe roughly as it exists right now, 6000 years ago, and create all modern animals as they exist today?
While evolution has been used to predict (by way of the fossil record) what kinds of animals we should expect to find in between two other kinds, and often has, what could we predict by way of intelligent design? What could we look for? Again, we can't say something like "If the world is intelligently designed, we should expect to find.." because we have no justification for why can expect certain things, because we have no inkling as to the motives or grand designs of the Designer. We can't expect everything to be perfect, because current observations already rule that out. So what's the criteria? About as good as we can get is the prediction, "In an intelligently designed world, things should be pretty awesome."
What's that? They are? Oh, great! So it's designed! ..R-right?

There's no way to pin something so impossible to comprehend, define, observe, or measure the effects of, down!! This is the root of the concepts unscientific nature.

When the properties of a Designer, existing outside of the Universe, are so vaguely defined, it can literally be used to explain away anything. It is not falsifiable, in other words there is no amount of evidence that could rule it out as a theory, so again, it's not a viable model for analysing facts.

For example, we cannot point to something as simple as our appendix (an evolutionary artifact which is absolutely, completely, utterly, irretrievably USELESS) and say "well, that's not intelligent"
The ID theorist might say, "Who are we to question the Purpose of the appendix. Just because it serves no biological purpose, and can get infected and kill you, doesn't mean it wasn't put there for a reason. You just don't know what it is, and you never will, because the Designer is.." - to quote that Hindu sage - "beyond all knowing." or the role of the designer could simple be retracted to a philosophical juncture: "The architect doesn't drive in all the nails. The Designer is responsible for the big picture. Don't waste our time with pithy details."

What would be necessary to rule out Intelligent Design? Can you think of anything? Again, even if we were working under the paradigm of a designed universe, and our astronomers found something in space that was somehow catastrophically silly (I can't even come up with an example), we couldn't use this to falsify it because again, the Designer is "beyond all knowing". We'd never be able to escape from the justification that "Designer knows best," so we'd never be able to rule it out as a theory.

I really have to say, you kinda shot yourself in the foot by saying Intelligent Design can be scientifically explored, and then quoting a proponent of the old design perspective basically saying "Yeah, you'll never understand it. It's beyond knowing."
To paraphrase the sage in another way: It is not something science (literally, disciplines of "knowing") can hope to explore. It's not a testable hypothesis, it's not a theory, it's not science, and it never will be.

403. Pope is warned of a green Antichrist

Comment #23954 by Robert Maynard on March 3, 2007 at 6:03 pm

Al Gore.. I KNEW IT!

404. The Silence That Kills

Comment #23796 by Robert Maynard on March 2, 2007 at 7:59 pm

kkant, religion doesn't really control science in America (at least not beyond the continued stranglehold on stem-cell research) - it's certainly trying to buy into scientific legitimacy, because the Western world values scientific discourse more than, say, the Middle East, but that hasn't been entirely successful, as one look at the Discovery Institute should show. :P

Secular scientific research is still being carried out by the journal-load, and it is relentless and (at least for now) unstoppable.

I can't really make an informed claim about the state of science in the Middle East, but I think it's fairly safe to assume America's got it a little easier.

405. Bishops must not sit in reformed House of Lords

Comment #23442 by Robert Maynard on February 28, 2007 at 5:20 pm

Best of luck, Britons. :D

406. James Cameron finds grave of Jesus & Son

Comment #23178 by Robert Maynard on February 26, 2007 at 4:03 pm

comments 9 and 14:
I agree that it's not really crucial to atheism that we find the coffin of Jesus, but that struck me just then as being like a funny reverse "NOMA" situation. "Whoah, hey, religion and archaeology are too separate things, they answer different questions. I don't think it's really important if that is Jesus (Christ) or not. ..but if it is.. WABAM!"

comment 34
Your points 1,4 and 5 assume that critical points of the gospel narratives are true (including his resurrection and ascension?). I'm not really of that opinion.. although it's worth pointing out that for the documentaries argument to work we must accept the gospels account of his family structure to be true.

As for #2, paleontologists recently discovered a 68 million year old T-Rex bone with soft tissue in the marrow cavity - complete with structures resembling blood vessels and blood cells. So anything's possible. :P
I realise there's a difference between soft tissue structures and actually retrieving DNA, but if it was impossible they wouldn't even have brought it up as forming part of the argument.

As for the claims of DNA analysis, I hear this was for establishing the relationships and family structure of the crypt. This becomes important because although all the names of the "The Holy Family" are quite common, a statistician in the documentary uses the DNA analysis to calculate that the chances of the family structure being such a precise analogue of the biblical family (Joseph and Mary being the parents - Jesus, Matthew and Jofa as their kids, and Mary and Jonah as wife and son of Jesus) is apparently 600:1.
I haven't seen it yet though, I don't know when it'll arrive to Australian cable.. it sounds entertaining at least.

407. Faith

Comment #23057 by Robert Maynard on February 26, 2007 at 4:33 am

"The core of most religions is not doctrinal. In non-western traditions and even some strands of western monotheism, the spiritual life is not a matter of subscribing to a set of propositions. Its heart is in practice, in ritual, observance and (sometimes) mystical experience.."

Here we go again..
This is exactly what folks like Sam Harris mean when they claim that liberal religion is inadvertently sheltering extremism, by essentially pretending that it is a cartoon-ish aberration of faith, which majoritively doesn't exist.

When children in America are being home-schooled to prevent exposure to Darwinism, this is not a matter of harmless practice, ritual, observance or mystical experience, this is the result of a doctrine.
When muslim clerics declare fatwa's on perceived enemies of Islam, or when thousands of Muslims riot, spitting oaths of murderous violence, this is a very different thing to the harmless ritual of facing Mecca and praying.

If moderates think atheists have got them all wrong, chances are it's because we're not talking about them. If everyone was as harmless as moderates can be, this would be a much milder and less urgent push for change.

Anyway, this was good journalism.

408. Ayaan Hirsi Ali on Islam

Comment #22944 by Robert Maynard on February 24, 2007 at 7:40 pm

Bill Maher.. I wish you were funnier.

..Where did he get the idea that OT God was less eager to kill non-believing foreigners than Muhammad? :|

At least his panels are better than CNN's. :P

409. Battle for Europe's secular values

Comment #22892 by Robert Maynard on February 23, 2007 at 9:41 pm

Dodged it? I'm not sure what you expected. He is, at the end of the day, a zoologist, not a cosmologist or an astro-physicist.
His answer was heavily flavoured with re-emphasising the plausibility of applying darwinian principles to cosmological questions (because - surprise! - that's his field), and basically admitting "Seriously folks, even the best physicists don't know for sure."
If we had a definite answer regarding the beginning of the universe, you wouldn't be hearing about it from a biologists lecture in Virginia. Glorifying our utter lack of certainty in this area of study as a final stronghold of God, however, is tired old god of the gaps.

Cosmology becomes so bizarre and difficult to grasp at the beginning of the universe, the diversity of theories about its beginning (or even if it has a beginning - because, let's face it - causality isn't a scientific law at all, it's a simplistic philosophical concept!) is so vast that it's going to remain a mystery for quite a while longer. Even when physicists do have an answer, it is likely to be so bizarre that it will take at least a generation of popular science writers to wrestle with developing a lucid way of describing it to layman readers.. and even longer for it to become common knowledge amongst people who.. don't read.

410. Battle for Europe's secular values

Comment #22772 by Robert Maynard on February 22, 2007 at 7:44 am

Bizarro,
It is an unenviable position to wage an argument on several fronts, so I'll keep to my turf and only reply to sections of your comment dealing with my arguments - frankly, you have responded to quite a few claims I find vaporous - and I won't waste time defending them (because, at the end of the day, this comment still responds to the majority of your continuing argument).

I suspected that pathological and handicapped persons would be the next step once I invoked the importance of experience, and I think it's the best place to start. I'm guessing that when you talk about someone who doesn't value themselves, and doesn't value other people likewise, you are thinking of an extreme example, with a pathological dysfunction, that could quite possibly lead to violent crimes. You basically ask, "doesn't this kind of person upset your whole equal value crap?"
Well, no. Everyone obviously has not only different conceptions of themselves, but varying levels of respect or admiration for their fellow man, (though, I defy you to produce any accurate and comparable form of measuring this value amongst a sample population - the fact is our self-respect and our respect for others are all quasi-rational and based on personality development). The fact of the matter is that social policy is about what's best for the group, while respecting the individual. It is, at the end of day, a matter of ought, rather than is. The ultimate goal, naturally, is to transform oughts into is's, through artificial selection (by minimising poverty, punishing crimes, providing free education, etc.) :P

I suppose I should emphasise that when I say there is an empirical basis for human worth, I am arguing that our oughts (humans are of equal value) are not arbitrary - not that everyone in society today actually does value each other equally, and affirm these rational reasons as the basis of this respect.
When you invoke pejorative criteria for assigning worth, like racism, sexism and all the other ills of human barbarism, and use them to say that I am ignoring the historical record, you're attacking the noble aims of our oughts with the ignoble past of our were's - embarrassing examples of cruelty shared by all of our ancestors (of which the majority were religious - to risk parroting the usual accusations).
The fact is, that like your "Jews are worthless" analogy, these are not rationally derived prejudices, which is why it is simply wrong to claim that the individuals ability to stereotype out-groups without evidence somehow trumps any modern social consensus that discrimination is bad, and indicates moral relativism gone mad.

There's simply no evidence for that attitude, or reason to imagine why the potential madness of individual subjectivity might ever beat out social consensus, in a rational, secular society.

Someone could at this point ironically point out that the rationally baseless discrimination of the Christian majority HAS hijacked social consensus in America. ...Well, exactly. America is currently not an altogether rational, secular society.

ONTO THE MENTALLY HANDICAPPED!
An important part of secular documents like the UN's declaration of human rights and this document is the rights of humans to develop to their full potential. Having your potential limited by a handicap does not limit your worth. It could certainly be argued it limits your worth to society, or to your genes, but does it limit your worth to your mother? (secretly: I endorse the speculative entitlement of the mother to euthanise a child whose handicap is so severe that it sets them both up for a life of mental and physical anguish)

The diversity of human mutation is vast, so generalisations at this point are very difficult to make, but I will repeat myself: it's primarily experiential faculties I am using in my argument to justify human worth. The ability to "think deeply" doesn't really enter into it, which is why I also think there are a great deal of animals with experiential faculties complex enough that it is unethical to kill them, imprison them in non-simulated environments; and for a few others, especially unethical to kill them in sight of their fellow animals. (secretly: I think a noble goal for genetic engineering or artificial selection is to breed for livestock with limited sensory apparatus - imagine how much more humane we'd be if our cows were blind, deaf, and couldn't even experience pain, just for starters)

So yeah, I hold that even if permanently saddled with cognitive abilities comparable to a child, most mentally handicapped humans absolutely have the same worth. They're certainly not inferior, and any prejudiced group in a rationally run society which called for their execution, for example, would need to seriously demonstrate that they cause harm to society, harm which overrules not only their right to a happy life, but their importance to their mothers, for example.

When you posed your hypothetical "Jews are worthless", I answered by basically saying you'd have to demonstrate them to be less than human in order to make them worth any less than other humans. To which you replied..
"What objective truth are you basing this claim on?"

Well, which claim? That Jews are humans? Well, they are. The burden of proof is on you (or rather, the hypothetical anti-semites) to demonstrate why they're not.
Our basis for the empathetic assumption that others have internal states comparable to our own is that we observe in others the same range of behaviours that we ourselves perform, and that predicting the behaviour of others is most easily done with the assumption that they are feeling, intentioned, and otherwise will react in a similar way to us. Given such evidence, the foolish (and biologically counter-intuitive) thing to assume is that others are somehow coincidentally sentient seeming automatons, while we ourselves are not.
So, if we're all practically the same, this paves the way for our understanding of 'ought' behaviours. In acknowledging that other sentient beings appear in a certain way to us, we reason that we ourselves appear the same in their eyes.
Under such circumstances, the dialogue of "The Golden Rule" takes place. I should treat others in a way comparable to how I would prefer to be treated, as failing to do so would cause the same distress and reactions from them as I would experience, and perhaps invite equally undesirable behaviour towards me. It's seriously that simple.

Here's the rub: we've argued that being human is itself, a term indicating value, a value we prescribe upon ourselves because of our empathy for others (which is, again, a result of our experiential faculties) an assertion which you've argued (wrongly, I think) is circular.

I've raised this somewhat jokingly before, but you seriously need to explain why it is circular reasoning for us to assert our own worth, but it is not circular reasoning for God to assert his own worth. If I may, I would answer for you that "There is nothing higher than God, thus His worth is self-evident."

Well, atheists say the same thing, only they don't believe in God, so the highest standard of excellence is humanity, whose excellence we describe in affectionate, but rational, non-supernatural terms. We as a race are progressively acknowledging our flaws (one of which we atheists happen to recognise as doctrines of baseless faith) and are striving to better ourselves. :)
I understand that a big part of your problem with secularism is that you DO perceive an entity higher than man, and you thus see our self-appraisal in his supposed presence as the height of vanity and arrogance.
If and when you realise that this is a problem manufactured by your own particular bias and prejudices, you'll realise why we don't consider it to be a strong argument.

411. 'God Is Not a Moderate'

Comment #22707 by Robert Maynard on February 21, 2007 at 4:38 am

I too have wrangled with the so-called contingencies science relies on to work, such as those briefly mentioned by Sullivan. Ultimately what it boils down to is that to believe in the strengths of science, you need to embrace a so-called faith where "shit makes sense, it follows rules, and it does so consistently."
Which is.. hardly irrational.

If our universe acted in inconsistent, contradictory ways (like.. say, reversing the effect of mass on the space-time gradient) then we would have very good reasons not simply to hypothesise the existence of the supernatural, but to suppose its potential malevolence - at least toward us.

I've actually once used one of the contingencies science relies on, as part of a thought experiment to attempt to appeal to a young-earth creationist (and old friend), to encourage an appreciation for conclusions drawn from observable facts, and attempt to foster the rejection of non-disprovable ideas. The bait involved asking him to disprove my hypothetical claim that the Universe is no older than 100 years, but that it was created as it appeared in 1907, full of people and false memories. After a bit of straight-faced nonsensical elaboration on my part, he intelligently identified that such a scenario would presume a deceitful creator. The argument extended from this to observable information about our planet and the universe, to try and get him to admit that acknowledging that a Universe appears old, but asserting it is fact not, is directly suggestive of a creator with a motive for active deceit. Unfortunately, as is often the case with instant-messaging, the conversation fizzled when one of us had to go, and I can assure you he remembers none of the lessons learnt from that exchange.

...ugh.

..where was I? Oh yeah, debating is sometimes frustrating. I'm enjoying this a lot.

412. Battle for Europe's secular values

Comment #22695 by Robert Maynard on February 20, 2007 at 11:22 pm

MelM: "An odd document full of loop holes."

It's not a legal document that will actually inform state policies, I presume, but I agree that it's perhaps a little sloppy. What's wrong with just re-affirming the UN's declaration of human rights?

413. Battle for Europe's secular values

Comment #22632 by Robert Maynard on February 20, 2007 at 3:58 am

Bizarro's (presumably hypothetical) challenge: "Fine. I am an intelligent entity, and I say that Jews are worthless and should be killed so we can have their resources. Prove me wrong."

One of the most basic precepts of documents like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights or this document is that all individual humans are equal in worth, and deserve to develop to their full potential.
In order for your value judgement to make any sense, you'd need to demonstrate that Jews differ in important and negative ways from normative standards in humans.

How? Well, you could try to demonstrate that Jewish people have fundamental physiological or psychological differences, and demonstrate these to be inferior differences. You'd need to demonstrate that they don't have the same capacities for physical and mental suffering as normal humans, that their mind is childishly primitive compared to other humans, to the degree that we could reasonably suppose their experience of consciousness is radically diminished in comparison to us, and so killing them would be as forgivable as whaling or hunting deer (which is pretty unethical as it is).

But, that simply isn't the case, so you would be wrong to say that.. and probably a racist to boot! :D

Returning to this accusation of circular reasoning you keep throwing out, I wonder if you find the anthropic principle to be circular reasoning, which can basically be expressed like so - "Our environment is well suited to our survival because if it wasn't then we wouldn't be able to observe it, because we would never have evolved - therefore it is not a miracle that our environment is so nice, but a matter of practical necessity."

To make the analogue more apparent, I rephrase and repeat how human worth is justified in a godless world -
"Humans are equal in worth because we possess a mind complex enough to recognise the rarity and beauty of our experiential faculties, in ourselves and each other - if we didn't, then we wouldn't be able to assert this worth, nor recognise it in our fellow man - therefore, we are important, and all of us are equally so."

I simply don't understand why you keep asserting that because there is no "objective" (bizarro speak for "externally endowed") standard of morality, that agreements on ethics can't possibly be reached based on rational principles of moral philosophy and science.

414. Battle for Europe's secular values

Comment #22619 by Robert Maynard on February 20, 2007 at 1:58 am

"You've still failed to address one of my central points. Does a diamond have value because it says it does?"

You've failed to address my comment, which addresses why things with complex minds are able to intrinsically define their experience as more deserving of preservation (worth) than inanimate objects they don't rely on, like ..diamonds? And if one of your central points involves a talking diamond, this dialogue has some problems..

415. Battle for Europe's secular values

Comment #22596 by Robert Maynard on February 19, 2007 at 6:48 pm

..hm, my comment came up before the comment I'm responding to - I think there's a problem with the sites clock references? :|

416. Battle for Europe's secular values

Comment #22594 by Robert Maynard on February 19, 2007 at 6:32 pm

"Worth is a meaningless concept unless there is a higher entity which exists to apply worth."

I see.. but this infinite regression of worth-ascribers doesn't apply to God? He can, necessarily, prescribe his own (infinite) worth, but we can't? Is he, to paraphrase Aquinas, "the unworthed worther"? :P
It's one thing to use circular reasoning, it's entirely another to simply cheat.

You make a very valid point about worth, Bizarro Dawkins, but it quickly loses its descriptive power when you leave the realm of inanimate objects, and unintelligent entities. If dogs had as advanced a concept of self as we do, I think it's pretty bloody obvious they would consider themselves "worth" more than something that didn't.
Human "worth" is only a quantification in the sense that we have something most other things don't - a mind advanced enough to, for example, quantify worth (beyond, say, subconscious cost/benefit routines). :P

417. Researchers find 6,000-year-old fossil evidence

Comment #22430 by Robert Maynard on February 17, 2007 at 7:09 am

I am curious to know how the museum curators at Liberty University in Virginia square THAT with their 6000-year-old dinosaur fossils...

418. Debate between Sam Harris and Reza Aslan

Comment #22300 by Robert Maynard on February 14, 2007 at 1:28 am

An interesting claim made by Aslan was the association of nationalism and political ideology with secularism, which struck a chord with me.

I sincerely hope that within 50 years, the notion that it is defensible and non-divisive to have dogmatic pride in the excellence of the arbitrary social units we call nations, will be as open and vulnerable to scrutiny as Dawkins and Harris want religion to be today. I personally have a hunch that environmental crises will expediate movements like this, along with globalisation.

Nationality is the last great social divider of modernity. When taken to extremes, it fosters conflict through youth indoctrination, irrationally glorifies sections of land and re-enforces the existence of its arbitrary boundaries.
Someday in the future there will be an intellectual of similar pedigree to Dawkins, saying something along the lines of "When people hear the phrase, 'British child' it should grate like fingernails on a chalkboard."

I'm not being sarcastic.

419. The God Delusion

Comment #21722 by Robert Maynard on February 10, 2007 at 7:23 pm

"Does anyone know what he's talking about here?"

I think Orr's referring to the way some people have found the Ultimate 747 argument unsatisfying, partly because it presupposes a naturalistic explanation for a god.
The analogy involves a creation event, with a prescribed improbability, which can be lazily dodged by saying that god is not a natural entity, and not the result of a creation event. Invoking the supernatural and infinite nature of a god is not really an "answer" to the analogy, but it does demonstrate that the analogy is on a completely different wavelength to most theological notions.

Other than that, I think Orr did a respectable job justifying his review to a titan like Dennett.

420. The questions science cannot answer

Comment #21547 by Robert Maynard on February 9, 2007 at 10:54 pm

I was under the impression Dawkins had covered his objections to scientists (let alone scientists writing twenty years ago) saying limp-wristed things like the quoted Medawar passages, as the whole non-overlapping-magisteria thing.
Neither Medawar or McGrath have specified why science can't answer these questions, or - to be more precise - why theologians like himself might be uniquely qualified to do so, in a way that precludes any thinker of sufficient faculty from participating in the discussion.

I suspect McGrath just has a chip on his shoulder, because a fellow Oxford professor is insinuating in a best-selling book that he and other theologians have literally wasted their professional lives studying a discipline which amounts to little more than semantic acrobatics and dubious pontificating.

421. Does Richard Dawkins exist?

Comment #21537 by Robert Maynard on February 9, 2007 at 10:00 pm

I guess Tommyrot has seen more YouTube videos of God presenting lectures to large audiences than I have.. or giving interviews to television programs. It would probably explain why comparing the existence of a corporeal human being to an incorporeal infinite force is a valid analogue.

Then there's all those signed copies of the Bible in circulation.

"Here's lookin' at you, My son,
Keep it real,
Jesus"

422. Sam Harris talks about 'The End of Faith'

Comment #21006 by Robert Maynard on February 7, 2007 at 8:57 am

An excellent orator. I get the feeling this generation will see a slew of articulate atheist champions rise to the fore. Would it be stretching a loose connection too far, to describe Harris as the Malcolm X of atheism? :P