richardbaxter Posted December 9, 2017 Posted December 9, 2017 Although I appreciate the video and the general thesis (the importance of respecting natural law), I have 5 criticisms of points made within 'The Truth About Untruth | Postmodernism Exposed'; 1. Nature being the dream of a deity is consistent with deism and is independent of mysticism/interventionism. 2. An awe of nature is independent of mysticism/interventionism. 3. Faith is not the rejection of evidence, it is simply a commitment to a response following a probability assessment based on data with no certain answer. For example, a lady walking on the beach of a deserted island picks up a beautiful gem stone. Perhaps they conducted a probability assessment in which there was a 70% chance it could have been artificially produced, and they therefore believed this to be the case. Perhaps they conducted a probability assessment in which there was only a 10% chance it could have been artificially produced. Here they might still respect the possibility of there being an artificial creator of the gem stone. They might even act with faith by not claiming it as their own. Likewise, we have faith in the existence of other minds (it is a deduction based on a number of assumptions; a) I think therefore I am, b) the association of mind with matter, c) human beings being materially alike). 4. Animism is not insanity, it is the default philosophy of a human being (child). Take a walk in an unknown forest at night for example, or stay in the wilderness over a windy night. We have a natural tendency to anthropomorphise (perceive agency). Likewise, there is no obvious reason why some objects (arbitrary subsets of energy in the universe) should have internal awareness associated with them and others should not. According to materialism, the universe would function perfectly fine without it. Hence the philosophical reconsideration of panpsychism. 5. Reason cannot be derived from consistencies in nature, because reason must be assumed true in order to analyse these consistencies.
Wuzzums Posted December 9, 2017 Posted December 9, 2017 3 hours ago, richardbaxter said: 3. Faith is not the rejection of evidence, it is simply a commitment to a response following a probability assessment based on data with no certain answer. For example, a lady walking on the beach of a deserted island picks up a beautiful gem stone. Perhaps they conducted a probability assessment in which there was a 70% chance it could have been artificially produced, and they therefore believed this to be the case. Perhaps they conducted a probability assessment in which there was only a 10% chance it could have been artificially produced. Here they might still respect the possibility of there being an artificial creator of the gem stone. They might even act with faith by not claiming it as their own. Likewise, we have faith in the existence of other minds (it is a deduction based on a number of assumptions; a) I think therefore I am, b) the association of mind with matter, c) human beings being materially alike). Faith has a clear definition and it does not apply whenever any sort of evidence is present. A probability of something being either/or is evidence therefore faith does not apply. Choosing one possibility over another is not called having faith, it's called taking a gamble.
richardbaxter Posted December 9, 2017 Author Posted December 9, 2017 I had a look at the dictionary definitions and I agree that they are very restricted. I wonder how many people claiming to have faith (or trust) in someone would admit to having a) absolutely no evidence (philosophical) for their working model, or b) absolute certainty in their conviction. People take gambles on things or events, but they have faith in persons. Some relationships (eg love) would be impossible without faith.
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