Don't Need Philosophy To Defeat Absurdity

[Ouroboros]

Dude...C'mon, who pee'd in your Wheaties today? Why would an Atheist like me be against 'Free Speech'. All I did was argue a different position and you've gone completely ape over it.

Whatever.

 

Perhaps it's because I like philosophy and I took your post personally?

 

So okay. Sorry.

 

(And to answer your earlier question, yes, I'm considering a minor in Philosophy.)

[NotBlinded]

Wouldn't mathematics itself be seen through the eyes of philosophy? Numbers don't really exist in reality. No one has ever seen 3 laying around. Mathematics deals with entities that may not exist in reality. It is deduced from principles, not reality. It's a tool to measure the seemingly constant patterns of reality, yet numbers have no existence of their own. And, didn't it take wonderment about reality to use the tool of math to begin with?

 

I don't know, but what good is math when one can't wonder what a mathematical object is and what is the relationship between mathematical objects and material reality?

[Deva]

(And to answer your earlier question, yes, I'm considering a minor in Philosophy.)

 

I would just like to say that I think you would do very well in it.

[Ouroboros]

Wouldn't mathematics itself be seen through the eyes of philosophy? Numbers don't really exist in reality. No one has ever seen 3 laying around. Mathematics deals with entities that may not exist in reality. It is deduced from principles, not reality. It's a tool to measure the seemingly constant patterns of reality, yet numbers have no existence of their own. And, didn't it take wonderment about reality to use the tool of math to begin with?

 

I don't know, but what good is math when one can't wonder what a mathematical object is and what is the relationship between mathematical objects and material reality?

I think so.

 

The foundation for arithmetic is logic. Identities, proof, deductive steps, etc. The basics of math and philosophy of politics, moral, and rhetoric started in ancient Greek, mostly inspired by Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.

 

But RationalOkie is right about that some of Philosophy is junk and extraneous. Especially the arguments for God's existence. They're emotional arguments cloaked as rational. They circumvent problems by hiding them in fancy terminology. I looked at some of Craig's books and he use very flowery diction and superfluous grammar to make his points. The more double meaning you can introduce, the easier it is to prove whatever you want.

[Ouroboros]

I would just like to say that I think you would do very well in it.

I haven't failed one class yet.

 

I still have to take a whole bunch of history classes. I'm not sure I'll like them as much...

[NotBlinded]

But RationalOkie is right about that some of Philosophy is junk and extraneous. Especially the arguments for God's existence. They're emotional arguments cloaked as rational. They circumvent problems by hiding them in fancy terminology. I looked at some of Craig's books and he use very flowery diction and superfluous grammar to make his points. The more double meaning you can introduce, the easier it is to prove whatever you want.

A frikin' snake oil salesman masquerading in philosophical clothing. I bet he makes a lot of money selling his strawberry flavored vomit too. Sickening...

[NotBlinded]

I would just like to say that I think you would do very well in it.

I haven't failed one class yet.

 

I still have to take a whole bunch of history classes. I'm not sure I'll like them as much...

History sucks! But, try to find a link in there with your other classes. This startled me when I was in college. The same name, idea or understanding kept showing up in classes where I wouldn't have imagined. Such as Marx in sociology, economy, and I can't remember where else. It's pretty cool that way.

[RationalOkie]

To anyone who was offended by my original post, I apologize. I was, indeed, to general with my rationalizations and a lot was left up to the imagination as to whom I was picking on. I assure you, it is not my intention to limit anyone’s freedom of speech or even their mindless and incoherent drivel that they call speech . There was some sarcasm in my original post, and subsequent posts, that did not translate and I apologize for the dust up. Especially you Hans, If I loose you as a friend I will be down to just 1 Maggie {check out my profile}. Therefore, one post will have cost me 50% of my friends.

[Ouroboros]

To anyone who was offended by my original post, I apologize. I was, indeed, to general with my rationalizations and a lot was left up to the imagination as to whom I was picking on. I assure you, it is not my intention to limit anyone’s freedom of speech or even their mindless and incoherent drivel that they call speech . There was some sarcasm in my original post, and subsequent posts, that did not translate and I apologize for the dust up. Especially you Hans, If I loose you as a friend I will be down to just 1 Maggie {check out my profile}. Therefore, one post will have cost me 50% of my friends.

No problem. And I'm sorry I bit your head off.

 

How should I explain this... hmm...

 

I'm a tall, blond, blue-eyed guy with (most likely) viking blood in my veins. One thing you have to understand about my kind of temper is... let me exemplify it: I and my childhood best friend fought a lot. We could tear the hair of each other's head, but we were still the best of friends. Some friendships starts as a huge argument and some scars. I don't consider you a less friend because we have difference of opinion.

 

My family is loud, fights a lot, argues for minor things, and sometimes people think we're going to kill each other, but the love is there.

 

Over the years I have cooled down and I'm in a much better control over my temper; however, sometimes I get worked up when I feel something attacks my actions, or that I perceive it as an attack on my rights to act a certain way. You didn't mean it to be like this, so I'm sorry that I misunderstood you. I think it's part that I've seen similar posts in the past when "Philosophy" is painted as the bad guy. The subject is far to wide to be categorized as something similar to religion. And I do believe Philosophy brought our world out from the dark ages and into the enlightenment, and later the new society we enjoy today. Philosophy (or large part of it) killed religion, but of course there are less attractive sides to it too. Incessant discussions that never lead to anything fruitful, for instance. So you're not completely wrong in that view. Some debates never ends, and no one can know the answer, so why bother.

[NotBlinded]

To anyone who was offended by my original post, I apologize. I was, indeed, to general with my rationalizations and a lot was left up to the imagination as to whom I was picking on. I assure you, it is not my intention to limit anyone’s freedom of speech or even their mindless and incoherent drivel that they call speech . There was some sarcasm in my original post, and subsequent posts, that did not translate and I apologize for the dust up. Especially you Hans, If I loose you as a friend I will be down to just 1 Maggie {check out my profile}. Therefore, one post will have cost me 50% of my friends.

Oh, that is so not right. You are a fellow okie...you must accept my offer of friendship from a mindless, incoherent philosophy whore.

[Ouroboros]

History sucks! But, try to find a link in there with your other classes. This startled me when I was in college. The same name, idea or understanding kept showing up in classes where I wouldn't have imagined. Such as Marx in sociology, economy, and I can't remember where else. It's pretty cool that way.

The three categories that have changed my view most radically are, philosophy, psychology, and sociology. They fit extremely well together.

[NotBlinded]

History sucks! But, try to find a link in there with your other classes. This startled me when I was in college. The same name, idea or understanding kept showing up in classes where I wouldn't have imagined. Such as Marx in sociology, economy, and I can't remember where else. It's pretty cool that way.

The three categories that have changed my view most radically are, philosophy, psychology, and sociology. They fit extremely well together.

Unity baby, unity! Gotta love it.

[RationalOkie]

To anyone who was offended by my original post, I apologize. I was, indeed, to general with my rationalizations and a lot was left up to the imagination as to whom I was picking on. I assure you, it is not my intention to limit anyone’s freedom of speech or even their mindless and incoherent drivel that they call speech . There was some sarcasm in my original post, and subsequent posts, that did not translate and I apologize for the dust up. Especially you Hans, If I loose you as a friend I will be down to just 1 Maggie {check out my profile}. Therefore, one post will have cost me 50% of my friends.

 

O.K., 33% of my friends. I just accepted RiverDale as a friend. Keep'em coming folks pretty soon I wont even remember Hans.

[Ouroboros]

O.K., 33% of my friends. I just accepted RiverDale as a friend. Keep'em coming folks pretty soon I wont even remember Hans.

I'm pretty much forgettable anyway.

[RationalOkie]

Oh, that is so not right. You are a fellow okie...you must accept my offer of friendship from a mindless, incoherent philosophy whore.

 

Alright, just don't start singing 'Boomer Sooner' to me and we'll get along just fine. What the hell are we doing in Oklahoma? Our I.Q's are at least 10 points lower by just living here.

[florduh]

I feel a couple of verses of Kumbaya coming on.

 

Or perhaps this old favorite:

 

The Philosopher's Drinking Song

 

Immanuel Kant was a real pissant

Who was very rarely stable.

 

Heidegger, Heidegger was a boozy beggar

Who could think you under the table.

 

David Hume could out-consume

Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel,

 

And Wittgenstein was a beery swine

Who was just as schloshed as Schlegel.

 

There's nothing Nietzsche couldn't teach ya

'Bout the raising of the wrist.

Socrates, himself, was permanently pissed.

 

John Stuart Mill, of his own free will,

On half a pint of shandy was particularly ill.

 

Plato, they say, could stick it away--

Half a crate of whisky every day.

 

Aristotle, Aristotle was a bugger for the bottle.

Hobbes was fond of his dram,

 

And René Descartes was a drunken fart.

'I drink, therefore I am.'

 

Yes, Socrates, himself, is particularly missed,

A lovely little thinker,

But a bugger when he's pissed.

- Monty Python

[NotBlinded]

Oh, that is so not right. You are a fellow okie...you must accept my offer of friendship from a mindless, incoherent philosophy whore.

 

Alright, just don't start singing 'Boomer Sooner' to me and we'll get along just fine. What the hell are we doing in Oklahoma? Our I.Q's are at least 10 points lower by just living here.

HA! When I sing that song, it usually goes something like this, "Sooner losers, sooner losers..." I just do it to get on my family's nerves. I'm bad.

 

I try to avoid thinking about the "backwoods" mentality here. It gets under my skin, but for the most part people are pretty nice. What bothers me is watching the news and noticing that the people they pick to interview usually don't have very many teeth and talk like they dropped out of school at 6. Sheesh!

[NotBlinded]

I feel a couple of verses of Kumbaya coming on.

 

Or perhaps this old favorite:

 

The Philosopher's Drinking Song

 

Immanuel Kant was a real pissant

Who was very rarely stable.

 

Heidegger, Heidegger was a boozy beggar

Who could think you under the table.

 

David Hume could out-consume

Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel,

 

And Wittgenstein was a beery swine

Who was just as schloshed as Schlegel.

 

There's nothing Nietzsche couldn't teach ya

'Bout the raising of the wrist.

Socrates, himself, was permanently pissed.

 

John Stuart Mill, of his own free will,

On half a pint of shandy was particularly ill.

 

Plato, they say, could stick it away--

Half a crate of whisky every day.

 

Aristotle, Aristotle was a bugger for the bottle.

Hobbes was fond of his dram,

 

And René Descartes was a drunken fart.

'I drink, therefore I am.'

 

Yes, Socrates, himself, is particularly missed,

A lovely little thinker,

But a bugger when he's pissed.

- Monty Python

That's funny! Did Monty Python really do that? It seems out of character for him to actually be funny!

[florduh]

the people they pick to interview usually don't have very many teeth and talk like they dropped out of school at 6.

 

You'd feel quite comfortable here in Florida.

[NotBlinded]

the people they pick to interview usually don't have very many teeth and talk like they dropped out of school at 6.

 

You'd feel quite comfortable here in Florida.

Nooooo...say it isn't so. I mean why put them on TV? Can't they pick another bystander?

[RationalOkie]

The guy that I converted, and to this day he is the only one that I'm aware of, was one of the most brilliant Data Architects in my field {Data Warehousing}. Yet, he was wrapped up in this cult in Tulsa born out of the Rhema Bible college. Basically they are AOG’ers who believe in speaking in tongues and interpretations and all kinds of ‘Amaaaaazing’ displays of faith. I mean, this group is reaaaaaally into the displaying of faith, if ya no what I mean…wink…wink…nudge…nudge…say no more! O.K., I apologize for that last Python reference but I couldn’t help myself.

 

Anywho……he took the approach of how could I be moral and an Atheist. He worked with me everyday for over 4 years. He and I were really good friends and I never once ate a baby or clubbed a seal in front of him, so I could understand his confusion. We argued for years over morality, irreducible complexity, and pretty much everything that I’ve seen on this site. He would visit an apologist’s site and get loaded up for our discussions in the hotel that night for whatever project we were on. One evening we were working a project in Arkansas and I stumbled onto the technique that I mentioned in post #1. I said, you are one of the most intelligent people in our field how can you believe that a donkey talked? I listed all of the things that I knew were absolutely absurd to a rational non-theist and I just kept putting him on the spot to look me in the eye and tell me that he reeeeeally believed it. After a while he got pretty quiet. He went back to his room and I thought, “Oh shit. Just lost ANOTHER friend.” The next day he was telling me that he wasn’t upset with me but the relationship was different. We didn’t talk much for a while and I gave him his space. It really upset me though. I missed the conversations to be honest.

 

It was four or five months after we finished that project that he finally called me out of the blue. He told me that he had ‘re-assessed’ his stance on bible miracles. Later he actually told me that he had a lot of questions that weren’t being answered by his church. It took about a full year before he finally told me that he left the church and that he ‘wasn’t sure anymore’ as to what he believed.

 

Sorry this is so long but here’s the point: I asked him what finally did it for him. He said, that it was our conversation that night. He claimed that when I kept pointing out all of the things he claimed he believed in it just kept piling up. At one point he just kind of realized how ridiculous it all was. I later found out that the ONE thing that bothered him the most was the story of Jesus walking on the water and how only his disciples saw this event. He had never even thought of being suspicious of that story until I had pointed that out.

 

It didn’t happen instantly, but it happened only after I changed my tactic with him. He’s no longer a fundie and he told me that he’s pretty embarrassed of how he acted towards me for all of those years. I reminded him that I was an AOG’er once myself. I might mention also that this tactic has lost me way…way…way more friends than it’s netted me. That’s the price of being enlightened.

[Shyone]

I'm no philosopher, but I like the approach that examines things for consistency with reality and rejects those things that are, to the best of our current knowledge, impossible.

 

It would be so easy to defeat a Christian in debate by saying, "Dead people don't come back to life."

 

Res ipsi loquitur.

 

Somehow, when that doesn't work, we wind up examining philosophy.

[RationalOkie]

I'm no philosopher, but I like the approach that examines things for consistency with reality and rejects those things that are, to the best of our current knowledge, impossible.

 

It would be so easy to defeat a Christian in debate by saying, "Dead people don't come back to life."

 

Res ipsi loquitur.

 

Somehow, when that doesn't work, we wind up examining philosophy.

 

I guess I'm too rational. I asked my father in law the other day, "Where did all of the miracles go?" Do you know what his response was? "They're happening right now all over the world." You can guess what I responded, "Show me one." He gave me a guy in their church who had brain cancer and was 'healed' after they prayed over him as a church. Oh yeah...the chemo treatments had nothing to do with it I'm sure. This guy's cancer is in remission it's not gone. Same AOG church that a couple of months ago they buried the pastors wife who died of cervical cancer. Mysterious ways I tell ya....

[Shyone]

I'm no philosopher, but I like the approach that examines things for consistency with reality and rejects those things that are, to the best of our current knowledge, impossible.

 

It would be so easy to defeat a Christian in debate by saying, "Dead people don't come back to life."

 

Res ipsi loquitur.

 

Somehow, when that doesn't work, we wind up examining philosophy.

 

I guess I'm too rational.

 

Individually, lots of people are convinced by very common sense arguments, but it's still as hard as proving the king has no clothes. "Just because I can't see them doesn't mean they aren't there! Everyone else sees them!"

 

It's hard to step out of the nonsense and even realize it's nonsense. You are to be applauded for arriving where you are on the basis of logic and reason.

[Antlerman]

I'll of course toss out a challenge here. I would actually challenge that someone's conversions or deconversions are solely due to reason and logic. In fact, reason and logic is in great plenitude in people of religious faith. Do you think you suddenly learned a new skill set and that resulted in deconversion? Or that when you were religious you were not using logic and reason? There's an old saying I particularly like, "A man convinced against his will, remains of same opinion still".

 

I would argue that reason and logic do not create the desire for change or understanding, that comes from somewhere not dependent on those. Reason and logic will serve the individual in helping navigate the waters of change into a new functional space. I will argue that though your friend said it was you hitting him with the 'absurdity' of the stories, those are just the surface "logic" thoughts about what happened, but that change was already well under way, long before 'reason' shinned it's light. Jesus walking on water, is perfectly logical to someone who believes in a supernatural God. It is logically consistent with an all-power, miracle working deity. Logic. It's just not a logical conclusion within the context of a scientific philosophy. Your 'matter of fact' arguments worked only because of his willingness to change to a different system with different systems of thought, but they did not create that willingness.

 

Now to me personally, the more convincing argument is one that reaches far beyond logic and reason to where people live. Beliefs that create conflicts of spirit in relations to the world, to their fellow man, to their own potentials, are a hell of a place to shift focus to instead of arguing endlessly over unwinnable logic arguments. To me it's not about winning the argument, but communicating the human truth and need, and why their system fails to do that - despite how tight as a drum they make their arguments to support their chosen system. And that's key - it's a chosen system, and we look for support, to justify our choice .

 

Here's a good example of what I mean. You can claim the power of reason and science to dissect and cut apart every detail of the natural world, and prove how decisively more powerful at doing this it is than using a book with stories of talking donkey's and snakes. And as true and convincing as that can be made, it doesn't say a damned thing to them about how they see the world through the eyes of faith. And faith in that case, is not just blind belief in the absurd use of myth as a tool of science, but a worldview that attaches all sorts of existential meaning, values, hope, love, etc (those non-empirical little 'touchy' things that aren't accessed and experienced via logic and reason) to the language that were expressed in the myth systems along with everything else.

 

It confronts them with a choice of either being 'rational' and accepting the scientifically verifiable world, or having 'faith' and embracing the inner world of the non-rational, existential life wrapped in the symbolic world of their religion. To offer and choice of one versus the other (since 'Truth' is singular and is impossible to be both, after all ), creates a conflict that leads to irrationality. Yet, despite rejecting the 'obvious' such as well established scientific evidences, the choice to choose faith instead for them, is in fact a rational choice. It is a rational choice to not loose something they see important to them, even though its symbols are not literal facts.

 

I take it from there and build off that premise. All of this by the way, is philosophical, I'll add. Just as the philsophy of confronting with hard facts is the path to greater enlightment.