In the vernacular ‘no’ means ‘a’.
I was kidding 
(Bolding by CP, for emphasis.)
Not sure why your dander is up. This is ALL I am trying to get you to agree with, so I am pleased you just came out and said it plainly:
“Falsifiablity is a scientific concept that isn’t valid in non-scientific contexts.”
Science does declare that make-believe is falsifiable where the make-believe is at odds with scientific axioms. If my Science Adviser Montie investigates how many people live in my house, I don’t let him count ghosts unless he can prove their existence in my house scientifically.
Without science, nothing is falsifiable. “Falsifiability” is an invalid concept outside of science, and so therefore it is trivial to say that myTooth Houri (or anyone else’s Houri) is “non-falsfiable.” Such as statement has absolutely no weight. It derives from a construct of epistemological nihilism because without science, there is no proof of any kind, for anything, whether scientific or otherwise.
At first glance, who cares?
What happens in practice, though, is that young men become reassured by said nonsense that Paradise awaits them with eternally excellent erections they can use to pleasure themselves with giant white hairless perineums for eternity. And the reason they believe is because they buy into a construct that “science cannot falsify” their fantasies, and therefore their Houris exist since their scriptures say they exist.
We are agreed (I think) that this is a dumbass conclusion, but I think this construct that “science cannot falsify X” is thrown around all the time without pointing out that falsification is a valid concept only within a scientific context.
You can have science, and falsification. You cannot have falsification outside of science, so using the term “non-falsifiable” for things that science falsifies is trite. Meaningless. Invalid.
As long as we agree that science falsifies imaginary creatures such as the Houri sisters, we can go back to arguing whether or not western education for science gets rid of religious superstition and relegates religion to holiday traditions.
PS: A word battle clarifying epistemologic constructs which pits the Pedant against Kimstu is a battle of the unarmed Pedant against a poster whose intelligence and articulateness leaves me feeling like the fly whose wings are getting pulled off by someone I have over-annoyed. 
But just to tackle Elves: I have no idea where you are getting this silly idea that there is a requirement to believe anything at all, although the world will be a better place if we can get young men to stop blowing themselves up for non-productive, faith-based beliefs in a pleasurable afterlife.
It is true that Sharia is not monolithic. But the place to look for the general themes is not Britain, where Sharia is heavily restrained by a completely different majority culture.
For a general theme of Sharia, look to Muslim majority nations.
Peek at the practical result (not the theoretical floofings) for:
- Treatment of women
- Freedom of expression and proselytization of non-Islamic views (think blasphemy laws)
- Punishments
Islam, in practice–and because of Sharia–absolutely sucks as a general construct under which to live unless you are a Qur’an-thumping male. In which case your potential is unlimited.
Islamic-majority countries are horrible to even live in unless you kowtow to “local culture” (read: Sharia-driven culture).
No I have not read much of the Qur’an.
But I am wondering if you are hoping to leave an implication here that the passage I quoted about the punishment for thieves is out of context in a discussion of Sharia law–or Islam.
If so, would you mind putting it in context for me to help me bend it better.
Blasphemy, next (probably another snippet with which I need help, having only perused “certain sites with a certain bent”:
مَّلۡـعُوۡنِيۡنَ ۛۚ اَيۡنَمَا ثُقِفُوۡۤا اُخِذُوۡا وَقُتِّلُوۡا تَقۡتِيۡلًا
(33:61) They shall be cursed from all around and they shall be ruthlessly killed wherever they are seized.
سُنَّةَ اللّٰهِ فِى الَّذِيۡنَ خَلَوۡا مِنۡ قَبۡلُۚ وَلَنۡ تَجِدَ لِسُنَّ اللّٰهِ تَبۡدِيۡلًا
(33:62) This has been Allah’s Way with those who have gone before, and you shall find no change in Allah’s Way.115
Meaning, from "Towards understanding the Qur’an:
115 That is, “This is a permanent law of Allah’s Shariah that in an Islamic society and state such mischief-mongers are never given an opportunity to flourish and prosper. Whenever the system of society and state is established on divine law, such people will be warned to mend their ways and if they still persisted in their evil ways they would be severely dealt with and exterminated.”
Perhaps then you would care to enlighten us about the passage on punishment for thievery?
There are sort of two things for any religion:
- What does their reference say (if they have a scripture)?, and
- What has been the practical result of cultures formed around adherents to the religion?
I’m not personally very interested in abstract discussions of what the Qur’an itself says, since it was written by an obviously deluded individual and reads like that. I will say that the passages I have read are pretty damn clear wrt to some of the nuttier and counter-productive things like women, thievery, treatment of those opposed to Islam, and so on. But by all means, put them in their proper bent!
But I can say that the Islamic-majority nations built by Muslims pretty much suck as places to live unless you are a Qur’an thumping, devout Muslim male.
So, to be clear, by your own admission here, you do not really know what you’re talking about.
Nope. By my own admission, I have not read much of the Qur’an. I have spent the better part of twenty years in an Islamic majority country, with many many close Muslim friends (including clerics).
I have read that passage (!) and I submit that it is unambiguous. I also submit that the text is plain, and that the (arabic) Qur’an is accepted as the plenary verbal dictation by Allah to Mohammed, not subject to an excuse that the writer misinterpreted the almighty. I submit that these passages are not contradicted elsewhere in the Qur’an, and that they are not quoted out of context wrt to their plain reading or interpretation. Moreover, I believe the vast majority of Islamic scholars, not to mention the practices of Islamic-majority nations (who have the power to enforce Sharia legislatively), interpret the Qur’anic passages I have quoted here as I have represented them. (This is not to say the national law is to chop off hands, but the national average sentiment is that the Qur’an allows for such punishments. And in the vast majority of Islamic-majority countries, open blasphemy against Islam–or even cartooning the prophet Mohammed–is more a less a zero-tolerance thing, with severe retribution either at the official or ad hoc level.
So the ball is in your court, Monty.
What would you like to bring to the table beyond snide and vapid remarks that try to leave an implication I do not know what I am talking about?
Got anything at all? Or just more silly thread-shitting one liners that desperately try to leave an implication I am somehow completely ignorant of the topic?
Go right ahead and start by teaching us what the Qur’an actually says about the punishment for thieves, the treatment of women as equal to men, and whether or not it’s just fine to proclaim that Islam is pure bullshit. Use verses where necessary, and where desperate, feel free to quote Islamic scholars whose work is influential enough to drive policy and culture in an Islamic-majority country.
Your turn.
Nothing snide, nothing vapid. You’ve already proven you don’t have a clue regarding science, in particular the scientific method. You’ve also proven you really don’t understand the Qur’an or the attendant hadiths.
And if you think I’m threadshitting, report it.
Well, maybe not threadshitting but definitely not encouraged, Monty. Calm down everyone.
Yes, I don’t think science should be in the business of promoting any kind of creed. Not even a pro-rationalist and pro-empiricist creed.
Science can operate just fine with a purely formalist approach to scientific premises. In other words, all we need is to say “Science only works on hypotheses that are empirically testable and rationally consistent, so science disregards all hypotheses that don’t fit those criteria as scientifically meaningless and irrelevant.”
[QUOTE=bldysabba]
The analogy is applicable in as much as there is no difference between Tolkien and Muhammed where science is concerned. If science can declare elves to be non-existent fantasy, and Allah to be the same, people are free to believe what they like in their personal lives.
[/quote]
Except that you have to qualify “non-existent” to mean “non-existent as defined by scientific criteria for existence”, since that’s the only context in which science can make any meaningful statement about the existence of non-scientific phenomena.
ISTM that using “non-existent fantasy” tout court as a synonym for the more accurate and descriptive “scientifically meaningless” comes across as a rather childishly provocative attempt to yank the chains of people who believe that some kind of supernatural entity or phenomenon does exist or may exist, in some kind of scientifically meaningless sense of “existence”.
And I think that kind of taunting “Nyah nyah, I’m going to insult your faith by calling the supernatural ‘nonexistent’ because I’m defining ‘nonexistent’ to mean ‘incompatible with scientific criteria for existence’, so you can’t get offended!” is sort of unworthy of the dignity of the scientific enterprise. It rather reminds me of the folks who seize every chance they get to describe stingy behavior as “niggardly”, hoping that somebody will misunderstand them and accuse them of using a racial slur, which they can then gleefully refute while feeling superior.
ISTM that science succeeds best by maintaining as neutral and broad-based an approach to its premises as possible, so that it can be shared as a common tool of rationality by as many people as possible, whatever their personal irrational nonscientific beliefs may happen to be. Science deliberately trying to piss off holders of personal irrational nonscientific beliefs by being as confrontational as possible about its stance on irrational nonscientific beliefs strikes me as non-constructive.
And in fact, your analogy is not applicable, because what you said was:
You weren’t comparing the concepts of deities and elves in terms of their scientific nonexistence; you were comparing the potential reactions of theists and Tolkien fans to being told that deities and elves, respectively, are scientifically nonexistent.
Since theists by definition do believe in some kind of existence of a deity, while Tolkien fans with no or very few exceptions do not believe in any kind of existence of elves, your analogy fails.
LOL. I have gone on record multiple times as not really caring what the mods think except to remind me of the rules. I don’t care if they think you are doing anything at all. And I don’t call mommy. I just reply to posts.
So…I’m calling you out to “advise” me, and one hopes with more success than I dragged any science advice out of you.
Begging for your help.
Please help me “understand” the passages from the Qur’an I’ve quoted above. Else I maintain your only approach (as with science), is to claim I don’t understand it, without a shred of explanation.
Whatcha got pal, on how to properly understand those verses?
Anything? Any. Single. Thing?
At all?
Beyond advising me my Tooth Houri just might exist?
Care to show where, exactly where, I said such a thing?
I’m the one who said the Tooth Houri might exist, and I gave a model for it that involves a greater than zero probability. Chief Pedant is not able to falsify the hypothesis.
(That means the hypothesis is “nonsense,” but it is not “false.”)
Chief Pendant was pretty emphatic about me saying it, so he should do the right thing and apologize. It would be nice if he could manage to do so without being snide but I’ll accept a simple apology.
Oh my God that is hysterical. You claim to have lived in a Muslim majority country nearly 20 years have friends who were Muslim clerics and yet you’re talking about how the Quran “was written by an obviously deluded individual”.
Ok, this is a jaw-dropping mistake to make for someone with your experience.
The Quran wasn’t written by one person but by multiple people as is known by anyone with even a modicum of knowledge the Quran.
Seriously, I nearly pissed myself laughing at that.
FWIW I wasn’t laughing at you just the shockingness of the situation.
It would be like if someone lived in Israel for more than 20 years, had several friends who were Rabbis and you thought David was Moses’ nephew.
Anyway, no offense but your friends must of have bee terribly good clerics.
What country was this and who were those morons?
You must’ve been laughing so hard you dropped an adverb! I think you meant to say: “…must not have been terrible good clerics”.
In the Tower Hamlets neighborhood of London, hostile Muslims have posted signs declaring the place to be a sharia zone, meaning infidels, particularly women and gays, are not welcome. When Stakelbeck asked British jihadist pest Anjem Choudary how sharia would change the park where they were speaking, Choudary replied that ALL women would have to burqa up. Of course. Islam is all about who’s on top, and it sure isn’t women or non-Muslims.
Why would anyone allow these barbarians to immigrate en masse to their country? A recent poll of Muslims residing in the United States found that 40 percent believe they should be judged by sharia law, not the US Constitution. As Stakelbeck noted later in the piece, there have been around 50 court cases in at least 23 states where sharia law was cited in some way, so creeping Islamism is here too.
Islamic Sharia Law Comes to Great Britain, CBN News, November 15, 2012
[ Replaced uncredited text with link to site. ]
Do you have a more credible source than Pat Robertson’s CBN? Robertson is a proven liar and con man who’s about as trustworthy as a pit full of scorpions.
I’ll actually be in Tower Hamlets this week. I’ll be sure to report back. Prepare to be underwhelmed 
D’oh! Yup.