General

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

JCFolsom — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 07:51:04 GMT

Thedesolateone:
Please, are you arguing that it makes more sense that something else popped into existence then created some stuff, then created you out of it, made you live, created the whole world, divinely revealed certain seemingly random things, intervened at seemingly random points, seeing as it set the events in their inevitable motion in the first place?

See, again, you are thinking of me as some sort of defined religionist. I don't necessarily believe that God revealed any word to anyone ever, and even if God did, how the F are we supposed to know who's sheaf of paper has the correct quote? I also don't think that God had an origin, but as a non-physical entity it doesn't necessarily need one. I'm not a determinist either. You've put a lot of words in my mouth, here.

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

laminustacitus — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 06:27:00 GMT

Alas, I was wrong in my complete and total rejection of metaphysics, yet I still hold that metaphysics is useless in the fied of physical sciences; consider the debate about the utility of metaphyiscs in phiosophy conceded..

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

Knight_of_BAAWA — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 01:36:53 GMT

Knight_of_BAAWA:
Category error.

laminustacitus:
Or you're just running from reason.

No. I just understand the differences in tenses here.

Knight_of_BAAWA:
I'm talking about such nonsense as the Forms and Geist.

laminustacitus:
My own use of metaphysics do not include them since the Forms is a theory about the nature of knowledge

And of reality. It is a metaphysical statement.

laminustacitus:
and the Geist is more or less a methodology of theorizing about history.

And it is a method of understanding the nature of reality in that we are not ourselves except expressed by the state. That the state is the march of god through time.

Knight_of_BAAWA:
Hint: just because you're a silly positivist means nothing.

laminustacitus:
With how I view the physical sciences some would definatly refer to me as a positivist, others would call me a hypothetico-deductivist, but since I base my own views primarilly off of those of Karl Popper (notice my heavy insistance of falsifiability) I prefer the latter.

Your words betray you as a positivist.

laminustacitus:
No, empirical experince supports the law principle of contradiction. A tree can only be a tree and not also a car. A house can only be a house and not also a flag pole. Your statement makes little sense.

Knight_of_BAAWA:
You just made metaphysical statements. ZOMG!

laminustacitus:
I did not make a metaphysical statement

Yeah, you did. You made a statement about the nature of reality.

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

Andrew — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 01:31:33 GMT

Has anybody else but 4 people attempted to answer this poster's question?

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

laminustacitus — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 01:30:57 GMT

Knight_of_BAAWA:
Category error.

Or you're just running from reason.

Knight_of_BAAWA:
I'm talking about such nonsense as the Forms and Geist.

My own use of metaphysics, in this thread, does not include them since the Forms is a theory about the nature of knowledge and the Geist is more or less a methodology of theorizing about history so I shan't critique them here.

Knight_of_BAAWA:
Hint: just because you're a silly positivist means nothing.

With how I view the physical sciences some would definatly refer to me as a positivist, others would call me a hypothetico-deductivist, but, since I base my own views primarilly off of those of Karl Popper (notice my heavy insistance of falsifiability), I prefer the latter.

Knight_of_BAAWA:
laminustacitus:
No, empirical experince supports the law principle of contradiction. A tree can only be a tree and not also a car. A house can only be a house and not also a flag pole. Your statement makes little sense.
You just made metaphysical statements. ZOMG!

I did not make a metaphysical statement; instead, I used empirical evidence to support a philosophical proposition to show its not merely metaphysics.

Jon Irenicus:
If you mean one requires constant empirical confirmation for one to be justified in holding to it, you're incorrect (because this confirmation is worthless and even impossible without it).

I would say that the empirical evidence merely shows that it is apart of reality (by that I mean the world as experienced by humanity), but I would also say that such laws are very much the nature of how the world is percieved (thus "confirmation is worthless and even impossible without it") by humanity and that it is impossible that perception not include either the law of noncontradiction or the law of identity. Also, to even become ever more ecentric, I do believe that one can tacticly avoid metaphysics by not assuming that philosophical statements are about existence itself, but that they are merely apart of the world as experienced by humanity.

Jon Irenicus:
You're using the word "metaphysical" in a way that is rather eccentric then, because again it is taken to subsume the law of identity and contradiction.

Keep in mind that I used metaphysics in a sense to critique an understanding of the world that could not be falsified and that ergo had no meaning in a scientific inquiry and that I have a heavy backround in physics but little in philosophy. Hopefully, I made my position more clear above, hopefully.....

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

Jon Irenicus — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 01:07:40 GMT

How are you using the word "empirical"? The law of contradiction is valid for all worlds and all times, and is a corollary of the law of identity, which you enunciated above. If you mean one requires constant empirical confirmation for one to be justified in holding to it, you're incorrect (because this confirmation is worthless and even impossible without it.) If you simply mean it captures some feature of this world, fine, but that's not the way the word is used typically in modern analytic philosophy. You're using the word "metaphysical" in a way that is rather eccentric then, because again it is taken to subsume the law of identity and contradiction.

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

Knight_of_BAAWA — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 01:04:06 GMT

Jon Irenicus:
Then out the window the law of contradiction goes, because it cannot be supported by empirical evidence itself.

laminustacitus:
No, empirical experince supports the law principle of contradiction. A tree can only be a tree and not also a car. A house can only be a house and not also a flag pole. Your statement makes little sense.

You just made metaphysical statements. ZOMG!

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

Knight_of_BAAWA — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 01:03:15 GMT

Knight_of_BAAWA:
All that is.

laminustacitus:
An unfalsifiable statement and ergo only metaphysics and therefore garbage.

Category error.

Knight_of_BAAWA:
If you think metaphysics has failed to contribute something there, you might want to understand it as a bulwark against the idiot multi-realmers.

laminustacitus:
The theory of multiple universes is

not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about such nonsense as the Forms and Geist.

Knight_of_BAAWA:
Let's scientifically enquire regarding 2 + 2 = 4.

laminustacitus:
Alright let us: mathematics is an a priori science ergo 2+2=4.

And thus, you fail at realizing the error of your categorical statements.

Hint: just because you're a silly positivist means nothing.

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

laminustacitus — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 01:00:54 GMT

Jon Irenicus:
Then out the window the law of contradiction goes, because it cannot be supported by empirical evidence itself.

No, empirical experince supports the law principle of contradiction. A tree can only be a tree and not also a car. A house can only be a house and not also a flag pole. Your statement makes little sense.

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

Jon Irenicus — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 00:56:32 GMT

Then out the window the law of contradiction goes, because it cannot be supported by empirical evidence itself.

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

laminustacitus — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 00:45:48 GMT

Jon Irenicus:
What do you think metaphysics is?

Metaphysics is a displine of the nature of the world that can only be supported on human reasons sans any empirical evidence. That is my definition.

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

laminustacitus — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 00:44:26 GMT

Knight_of_BAAWA:
All that is.

An unfalsifiable statement and ergo only metaphysics and therefore garbage.

Knight_of_BAAWA:
If you think metaphysics has failed to contribute something there, you might want to understand it as a bulwark against the idiot multi-realmers.

The theory of multiple universes is metaphysics. At least for physics, it is a theory that states the reason why quantum flucuations are undetectable in the macro scale is that the fluctuations bleed, excuse the loose terminology, into other universe and are therefore not seen in this one.

Knight_of_BAAWA:
Let's scientifically enquire regarding 2 + 2 = 4.

Alright let us: mathematics is an a priori science ergo 2+2=4. You fail at realizing something being "scientific" depends on the intrinsic nature of the science itself.

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

Jon Irenicus — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 00:35:17 GMT

Are both empirical statements about the world, that's no metaphysics.

What do you think metaphysics is? Statements about the structure of the world. The law of contradiction (and the law of identity from which it derives) certainly are such claims, and certainly are not testable in any sense in which the word "empirical" is normally deployed. Any empirical proof presupposes them from the get go.

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

Knight_of_BAAWA — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 00:29:30 GMT

laminustacitus:
What is existence?

All that is.

If you think metaphysics has failed to contribute something there, you might want to understand it as a bulwark against the idiot multi-realmers.

laminustacitus:
The existence of an overarching creator imposing order in the physical sciences is infalisfiable, and ergo impossible to truly know; ergo, that statement means absolutely nothing in the physical sciences.

Knight_of_BAAWA:
Was there a point to your statement?

laminustacitus:
Yes, that every single statement that you've been making is pure philosophy and cannot bear scientific inquiry.

Let's scientifically enquire regarding 2 + 2 = 4.

Do you understand your category error now?

Re: Evolution = Libertarianism and Creationism = Totalitarianism, and a question

laminustacitus — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 00:23:02 GMT

Jon Irenicus:
The law of identity and the law of contradiction are metaphysical postulates, without which no knowledge is even in principle possible.

Are both empirical statements about the world, that's no metaphysics.

Jon Irenicus:
Most of the present philosophy of the mind is metaphysics

And if it cannot be backed up by scientific inquiry, since it is about the physical world, it is absolutely useless.

Jon Irenicus:
If you're not a philosopher, don't presume yourself in a position to stridently deny the existence of an entire branch of philosophy.

Metaphysics has lead humanity down the wrong path of knowledge for over a mellenia, it is only since Newton's sucesses where Descartes failed that the chains of metaphysics have finally been cast off of the pursuit of knowledge. But I do not deny the fact that phiosophers can so often presume they can reason out what can never be reasoned by the limited power of the human mind.

Jon Irenicus:
How does one argue against existence, exactly? Solipsism? But even then you admit something exists...

From a scientific point of view, I ackowledge the world as it is is without the assumption that it is the surpreme existence.