Huh.

[johncomic]

http://www.uoguelph.ca/news/2009/06/human_brain_stu_1.html

As I read this, I couldn't help noticing the unspoken assumption that only rational or empirical beliefs can be true... and how it furthermore sidesteps the fact that such a viewpoint is itself an article of faith.

In passing, however, I'd like it to be noted that Dr. Davis is one heckuva rockabilly guitarist.

Comments

[ginsu.livejournal.com]

the unspoken assumption that only rational or empirical beliefs can be true... and how it furthermore sidesteps the fact that such a viewpoint is itself an article of faith.

Well, I'm not so sure. The rational/empirical systems of thought are quantified, subject to revision on the basis of peer review, and so are constantly being updated.

Example: Newtonian mechanics, shown as a simplified and less accurate approximation of the Einsteinian mechanics that rolled along two hundred odd years later. The idea of science is always that it will never explain everything, but hopefully can become a closer and closer approximation.

In one case, the law of parity, experiments showed it was false, and that meant that scientists had to admit they had collectively been wrong about it for decades. Out went the supposed "law" into the garbage:

http://physics.nist.gov/GenInt/Parity/expt.html

This is quite different from faith-based systems of thought -- example: "I believe in ghosts" -- which are not quantified or verified in any way, or subject to systematic perpetual revision by experts over hundreds of years.

There are no predictions, no numbers, nothing to prove or disprove... you just believe or you don't.

[johncomic.livejournal.com]

But to suggest that quantifiable beliefs [Einsteinian mechanics] are implicitly truer than non-quantifiable ones [ghosts] is itself an axiomatic, faith-based position. Just because something is unprovable doesn't mean it's false.

[ginsu.livejournal.com]

Well, suppose you start with two ideas, X and Y. Then you hammer away at X looking for flaws (changing it whenever it seems wrong), but leave entirely Y alone... never testing or changing it.

It seems to me that over time X becomes more and more accurate, and is more likely to be true, than Y, unless Y was a lucky guess in the first place.

(It couldn't have been an educated guess, since that would make it X!)

[ginsu.livejournal.com]

I have kept pondering this and have concluded that my thinking doesn't always apply, though.

For instance, any time you have an extraordinarily complex, chaotic decision to make -- "Will marrying this person make me happier in the long run?" -- the empirical approach will not yield an answer at all, whether right or wrong. We just don't have, and probably never will have, any suitable tools to reduce that complexity and chaos.

So the only decision you can make will be intrinsically irrational and based on faith... right some of the time... and will yield a superior outcome, in that scenario, to the outcome of the non-answer you get via the rational approach.

[johncomic.livejournal.com]

Fair enough. For the record, I appreciate your ability to question yourself.

[johncomic.livejournal.com]

But your position here [I believe empiricism has a better batting average than unquestioned faith] is, I think, a far cry from Davis's position I was arguing against [Even the mention of a spiritual concept is a priori nothing but primitive delusion]. I'm less inclined to argue with the way you put it: I still say that his view -- which boils down, to among other things, anyone who isn't an atheist can't possibly be right -- is axiomatic and therefore faith-based.

[ginsu.livejournal.com]

Oh, I see "faith" as implying a much broader context in this article than "Christianity." He never mentions atheists and never uses the word faith at all.

I think he's talking about any process of making a decision, or coming to a conclusion, based not on the rational analysis of proven facts but... something else.

The article does mention conventional religion, but we also find references to other concepts -- astrology, fairies -- as well as the general idea of a divine plan of some sort that governs how everything happens (which denies free will and which might have been created in an infinite number of ways).

To me, the failure of astrology as a useful system of thought, or the nonexistence of ghosts, is so obvious as to be beyond debate. Conventional religion is far more complex, and still more complex would be faith in the everyday sense -- making huge decisions in spite of very few useful facts and very little analysis, which we are all forced to do (example: "What career should I choose?").

I think there is very little alternative to faith in such cases. So far from being a caveman's delusion, it's the only thing we have.

[johncomic.livejournal.com]

He never mentions atheists and never uses the word faith at all.

Granted, but he uses thanking God and believing that life has a purpose as examples of the delusional thinking that he says we need to abandon -- implying that there can be no truth or substance to such beliefs. Can we call it a subtext that I painted in primary colours here?

I think there is very little alternative to faith in such cases. So far from being a caveman's delusion, it's the only thing we have.

Just so. Any system of belief or thought, even math, derives from at least one axiom (usually more than one). And by definition, there is no way to deduce the truth of an axiom. You have to choose your starting point based on what boils down to faith.

To reject someone else's axioms on the basis of your own, is at the heart of intolerance, religious or otherwise.

[ginsu.livejournal.com]

Granted, but he uses thanking God and believing that life has a purpose as examples of the delusional thinking that he says we need to abandon -- implying that there can be no truth or substance to such beliefs

You could make another case about what he thinks, though... something like

"Since we haven't demonstrated Heaven exists through a rational analysis, we can't know there is such a place or state of being. So thanking Heaven is premature, though possibly correct."

This is somewhat different from, and more open-minded than,

"There is no Heaven. Therefore, thanking Heaven is meaningless."

But I think you're right, and he actually means the second.

[johncomic.livejournal.com]

Again, I'm less inclined to argue with the way you put it. This guy needs lessons from you... or maybe from Spock. ;P

[ginsu.livejournal.com]

If only they would portray Spock as a rational, consistent creature in the reimagined franchise...

That I could ever have thought they would, enough to plunk down seven bucks, was an act of faith.