Agnostics, what would make you believe in God?

Great Debates
161

Gyan,

Well there is Truth and there is truth.

Let us accept that there is Truth, some absolute reality, outside of any human belief system, and that there are truths that exist within human belief systems. Human truths are always interpretations of Truths based on the utility of those beliefs.

Within the framework of religion God is truth; outside of that framework God may be a possible truth or not.

Other,

Sorry if I seemed to quibble over terms, but someone who says that only having their brain reprogrammed, that essentially only removing his free will, would convince him seems pretty set in belief of no god.

Measure,

Yeah … Gotta admit I don’t get your criterae. Blockbusters I understand, but why the bit on consciousness being a function of organization of the system rather than of what is being organized? How does that set up God for you?

162

Is that the Truth or the truth? :wink:

My point was the notion of God could be rejected by an atheist even if it is admittedly psychologically useful.

163

Truth is a property of statements. Reality as a whole has neither truth nor falsehood.

The utility of a belief has no fixed relation to its truth.

164

Unfortunately I don’t have time to respond point by point. However, your overall argument seems to be as follows:

(1) Belief in God is not arrived at by logic.
(2) So far as we know, the universe can be fully explained without assuming the existence of God.
(3) There is no evidence that anything could possibly have the properties of God, and in fact, for something to have those properties would violate the laws of physics
(4) Belief in God violates Ockham’s razor.

For these reasons, you conclude that belief in God is illogical. (Or at least, you seem to conclude that non-belief in God is more logical. If all you’re saying is that logic doesn’t compel one to believe in God, then I agree.) But I would respond to these points as follows:

(1) I’d say that deductive logic can neither lead you to belief in God nor disbelief in God. Neither conclusion is arrived at by deductive logic. You could argue that your conclusion is arrived at by inductive logic, but I’d argue that that induction isn’t valid in this case. (see below)

(2) For the most part, I’ll concede this point. I’m personally not convinced that my having consciousness (as opposed to merely the appearance of consciousness) can be fully explained without at least assuming that something exists beyond the physical world. One could argue that consciousness is an illusion, but if so, who is experiencing the illusion? However, this is a secondary argument not essential to my overall point.

(3) There is no evidence that something could have the proposed properties of God, but the only evidence that it couldn’t is inductive evidence. E.g., of all the things we ever obeserved, none had the properties of God. Of all the things we ever observed, they all obeyed the laws of physics, whereas God couldn’t be constrained by physics. Etc. Again, I’d argue that that that’s not a valid induction, for the reasons given below.

(4) If I concede point 2 (which for the most part I do), then I must also concede that belief in God violates Ockham’s razor. However, Ockham’s razor is also an inductive conclusion. We believe that the simplest explanation is usually correct, because in our experience this is generally true.

So in essence the argument that non-belief in God is more logical than belief in God rests on the assumption that we can use inductive reasoning to draw conclusions about whether or not God exists. I would say that this assumption is false. Our ability to form valid inductive inferences about something is dependent on that thing belonging to a set of objects for which we have knowledge about a representative subset. I can say “the sun will rise tomorrow” based on the assumption that tomorrow is part of the set of all days, and that the previous days I’ve observed were representative of that set. However, I can’t inductively conclude that “all the life in the universe is located on this planet” based on the fact that all the life I ever observed is on this planet. You can’t assume life on Earth is representative of life in the universe with regard to its location. To do so presupposes that all life in the universe is located on Earth. Likewise, you can’t use induction to conclude that nothing outside the physical universe exists, because to do so assumes that things in the physical universe are representative of all things with regard to whether or not they’re in the physical universe. In other words, it presupposes that nothing outside the physical universe exists.)

(Aside: I’m not sure if I’m using the word “valid” in the technically correct sense. I know a precise technical meaning for the term when it comes to deductive arguements, but I don’t know if such a precise meaning exists with inductive arguments. At any rate, regardless of whether or not I’ve made the correct choice of words, hopefully my meaning is clear by the examples in the above paragraph.)

On a mostly unrelated note, you claim not to believe that ideas have any physical reality beyond their existence as a physical state of the human brain. I assume the extends to mathematical concepts. But numbers are a mathematical concept – the idea of something called “seven” that can be represented by seven apples, seven hats, etc. is an idea that exists in the human mind. Yet surely even if every human on Earth dropped dead, there would still be an intrinsic similarity between a group of seven apples and a group of seven hats. And surely, even if everyone forgot the meaning of the mathematical operation “plus”, you could still combine something that met the formerly existing human-defined definition of “one hat” to something that met the formerly existing human-defined category of “six hats”, you’d get something belonging to the formerly existing human-defined category of “seven hats”. Concepts like the concept of “one plus six equals seven” don’t cease to give a meaningful description of the physical world just because there no longer exist people who can articulate those concepts, or whose brains contain a physical configuration corresponding to that concept. it’s an idea with an intrinsic, representation-independent meaning.

165

Admittedly, my framework is mostly directed at the empirical agnostic/ atheist divide, rather than the EA/theist divider.

Underlying assumption: if you care about the truth-value of a given proposition (e.g God exists) and you believe that current knowledge is inadequate to form a decent conclusion, the proper stance is to withhold judgement.

Here, I describe God as a nonhuman consciousness that exerts influence on the world in the past, present and/or future. This is a minimalist description I grant you; it arguably covers my neighbor’s pet.

The point: until I get a handle on what consciousness is, I can’t adequately address the God question.

I’m willing to hypothesize that if God exists, he likes automation and isn’t too keen on direct and obvious material intervention, but that’s another matter.

A system-type model of consciousness would not necessarily prove the existance of God; it would merely enable me to think about the question. Further research (I claim) could plausibly provide evidence for God or not.

166

I’m good: it was mostly a wisecrack.

I don’t think the cliche citation is crap though. Xtian beliefs are somewhat demanding: that’s what makes them meaningful. Loving your enemy can be a challenge.

(In this case though, nobody was calling the theists, “assholes, etc”, so my admonition (if that’s what it was) was a general one, applying to all camps.)

Oh, and I suspected that I might get tripped up by assuming that you had a Christian background. Point yours, (whether or not you are indeed Xtian).

Regards,

M4M

167

Roger Penrose, in The Road to Reality : A Complete Guide to the Laws of the Universe characterizes mathematical reality as a “Platonic Mathematical World”, existing separate from (but linked to) the Physical World and Mental World.

The existence of the Platonic Mathematical World poses a challenge to my working materialist paradigm. Oh well.

168

Spontaneous, worldwide comprehension of an infinite existence.

169

Indeed it can. But I try not to have enemies. But Christians are as human as anyone else, so I don’t think they should be held to a “higher standard” or whatever.

I sort of am. Point yours as well, and truce if there wasn’t one already. :slight_smile:

170

Measure,

Interesting. A past thread (distant past) involved assuming that consciousness was a system organization property, perhaps similar to as propsoed by Hofsteader and others since - a function of complex nested self-referential (or “strange”) loops in which an information system included itself as a member of its analytic set. One possible result of such a framework, given the nature of complex nonlinear systems to be self-similar at different scales of analysis (see fractals in Chaos theory) is that society itself may replicate the self-same self-referential organizational principles and that we could very well individually be as-if neurons in a meta-consciousness operating at a societal level, functioning at a scale and time course beyond our individual perception and comprehension.

Would this count as God?

171

I’ve imagined something like that. Neural structures may also exist on the astronomical level.

------ Would this count as God?

Plausibly yes (and plausibly no). If the super-consciousness acted in ways that were observable and salient for the smaller consciousnesses (eg you and I), then perhaps the super-consciousness would have God-like characteristics. Or it might lack free will, in which case it might be compared to a huge radio or phonograph, as it were. (Or we might lack free will and the super-consciousness is the puppet master. etc. etc.)

For the moment, we are left with speculation. Perhaps I could tackle this problem in my next lifetime. :wink:

172

This God would be a product of physical laws, rather than the other way around. Besides, this definition just gets into an infinite regress: all the organelles give rise to neuronal consciousness, which give rise to organic consciousness which give rise to “meta-consciousness” and then whatever gestalt identity is formed by the aggregate of meta-consciousnesses and so on. If you’re redefining the relationship, though, such that God subdivides itself into meta-consciousnesses, which subdivide into organic consciousnesses…etc, then you are close to the Hindu framework. Typically free will exists at a singular level in the hierarchy (does it make sense for neurons and the brain to both have “free will”?). It’s weird calling such a framework ‘theistic’.

173

Well, we get back to defining what individuals mean by “god” don’t we? To me the concept of a greater consciousness in the universe with its own goals that are beyond my understanding or comprehension and the concept that my actions and everyone elses actions may be serving those goals in ways that I cannot understand, seems pretty much a theistic concept.

Free will? In short if it is an illusion it is a necessary one. Neurons make decisions of sorts: they integrate a variety of inputs and process them in fairly complex ways and then decide to fire or not and at what rate or maybe even to retrograde transmit in some circumstances. All those neurons acting together organized in some particular sort of system gives rise to my consciousness (unless you are a believer in the ghost in the machine). As an individual I am presented with inputs and process them in complex ways and produce an output to other individuals thereby altering the state of the system as a whole in subltle ways. I may (or may not) be acting with individual free will and yet still serving the processing needs of a greater information processing system with a consciousness and free will of its own. No puppet master required any more than I direct the actions of individual neurons in my brain.

Need the components of such an information processing system be biological or could information be organized as Measure suggests, on a cosmological scale, and thereby be part of the fabric of spacetime itself? Certainly some out-there physicists propose that matter is an illusion of the essence of the universe which is information itself. In such a case the great consciousness and the universe have both always been as much as time has existed itself.

I don’t know, but I do wonder if any of these questions are tractable. Are there ways to falsify these sorts of hypotheses or are they forever relegated to nonevidentiary questions of faith?

174

Truth is not the finally product we seek, as Bertrand Russell said (at some point), but rather Certainty.

Intractrable questions are often so because the tools or methods used to ‘answer’ them are inappropriate or the question itself is inappropriately posed. The old ‘Can God make a rock so heavy He can’t lift it’, for example, isn’t a question about God, but about logic (or rather nonsense posing as logic).

Aristolean or traditional logic is only going to take you so far when dealing with transcendental questions before it gets violated (ala Godel). I believe (in that I haven’t the means to prove it) that at best logic can be the finger pointing at the moon, so to speak, when such questions are involved.

As an example, I would follow Spinoza when he asserts that things are real in proportion to the attributes they share with God. Additionally, if we posit God as the ground of all being, to assert that God must exist or not exist as mutually exclusive choices is to miss the ‘essential’ point that God is not subject to the principle of excluded middles. Reality or existence derives from God, and as such renders His existence moot.

If we follow the assertions of Christian (and other) theologians that God has 5 essential attributes of atemporality, aspatiality, omnipotence, omniscience and all beneficient (the last I feel is an ad hoc feel-goodism - I don’t undertand it’s necessity) you are going to end up with an entity that is beyond logical limits. For the materialist crowd (e.g. scientists), the atemporality and aspatiality alone puts God’s existence out of consideration as there is nothing to measure. For the theologians however this is essential for God is Uncreate (lack of tense intentional) in His nature. I find this symmetry of Uncreate-Creation satisfying, whether it is True or not, I don’t know - nor is it important that it be true or certain - only that it is satisfying.

Cheers,

Steve

175

How did you reason that out? :dubious:

But the basis to posit these attributes is logic. Why must God be omnipotent, in order to be God? If they are not a result of logical contemplation, then they’re all “feel-goodisms”, unless you’re claiming “revelation” as the source.

Agreed, but only in the sense that your description thematically parallels a theistic deity in some aspects.

Those anthropocentric verbs are a figure of speech. I haven’t read any neuroscience journal article that literally assigns sentience or free will to any neural substrate.

Your saying so, doesn’t make it so. The materialist would say that you are an emergence i.e. you are the product, not the process, and hence not really an actor.

176

I must be poorly explaining the analogy. No, I do or not ascribe free will to neurons, just complex processing of inputs to result in outputs. And as an information processing unit “I” do the same thing on a different scale. Whether or not I have free will is moot. I can do my thing unaware of any greater purpose served, and a meta-consciousness can chug along emergent from all of us doing that and yet no more controlling our individual actions than I am controlling the actions of individual neurons.

177

Well, forever is a long time.

Renaissance medicine lacked (among other things) the germ theory of disease, as well as knowledge of the cell. Lacking these models, there were practical limits to their understanding.

Until we have a theory of consciousness, I don’t see how we can discuss God (other than to note the lack of clear and direct evidence for such a being). I withhold judgment.

(There are also some ontological issues to consider related to the observations on mathematics noted above. I’m guessing that these concerns are currently tractable to others, though not to myself. That is, the problem is capable of being formulated in a meaningful way.)

I think we can discuss free will, but a theory of consciousness would be useful here as well.

178

[QUOTE=II Gyan II]
How did you reason that out? :dubious:

To be honest, I didn’t, Spinoza did (he was pretty good at it). I only accepted it as making sense. His postulates didn’t sit so well with the fellows of his congregation (synagogue, I believe) and he was excommunicated for pantheism (although I would further qualify or distinguish it as panentheism - a distinction I’m not sure they had). And as usually happens when one can no longer answer criticisms, there were faults found in his thesis by those using further developments in the theory of reason. In his time, however, he was without parallel.

No, I don’t claim revelation. Nor am I claiming that it is a logical necessity for God to be omnipotent, I was using a particular theological argument as an example of how an inquiry can become extra-logical and that there are limits to logic (as explained in meta-logics). Why those particular assertions are used by theologians is outside the scope of the question at hand - namely what would it take (to your satisfaction) to produce a belief in God. Those who assert such a possibility, nearly to the person, cite an extra-logical event. Suits me - as I believe that to be a necessity towards understanding the nature of God (as beyond logic).

Spinoza’s assertions are not to be taken as proofs of God’s existence – given the ‘rules’ of logic that would be question begging. But by inverting the metaphysical inquiry - the question of God’s existence disappears in a sensible manner.

Since logicians of most stripes detest infinite regress, they commonly accept some premises as axiomatic. Some of them, like Euclid’s fifth postulate, turn out to be less than iron-clad. Some logics have paradoxes, also - Liar’s paradox, Russell’s paradox of the class of all classes, Zeno’s paradoxes of motion, etc… Some of them get solved, usually by meta-logical changes or new logical developments - such as Newton’s instantaneous rates of change. The only point I was really trying to make is that insisting on a logical explanation of God’s existence is/maybe… well illogical.

If one assumes there is a ground of being (some call this God), then of necessity any logical system would be inadequate to describe/explain that ground of being. Pragmatically there isn’t logical explanation for a mathematical point. Is it real – who cares as long as it works? Is quantum mechanics ‘real’? As long as it works, it is real enough. When the whole concept of reality is dependent on something other - you’re gonna have difficulties. If in the final analysis Reality is of a reflexive nature (Thou art that, for example) then you’re sorta stuck with a panentheistic view, but only definitionally - you can always choose a different approach. What makes logic the final arbiter anyway? That it creates consistant systems? What if (and I’m only partially tongue in cheek here) Reality isn’t consistent? Damn.

Thanks for the questions.

Cheers,

Steve

179

How are these limits derived?

So, it’s not established that God is beyond logic, but that you believe so.

Elaborate this. Are you saying that, by assuming God exists and then contemplating its properties, the question of existence is moot?

Insistence may be illogical, but the boundaries of logic haven’t been fixed. In the last few decades, paraconsistent logics have appeared where contradictions are acceptable.

This necessity isn’t clear, at all. How?

Logic is the embodiment of the analysis of patterns of experience. It’s not an a priori platonic tool selected at random. Whatever is parsimonious should be considered as ‘logic’.

180

If this is not a funny way to put it, I think my atheism would be challenged if I did not live in a world filled with human beings whose problems magically go away when they invent gods for themselves. E.g. the problem of death (with God, no problem at all, without God, big damn problem…)