God is "dead"

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God is not dead, God will never die. All of us will die and our ideas will die and memories of us will die. But God, will always exist.
 
This is an ad hominem, Wynn. Try to refrain from arguments that rely solely on the character or feelings of others. While they may or may not be valid, they do not having bearing on the real philosophical issue, other than perhaps motive (which is a fallacy as well).

It's not a fallacious ad hom, though.

As long as we maintain that epistemology has to do with how one knows one knows, epistemology is personal.
It's always a particular person who knows, knows they know, or knows they don't know.
Knowing doesn't take place is some abstract, impersonal, depersonalized space.

So, fortunately or unfortunately, epistemological issues are linked with personal qualities, like humility, pride, envy, courage etc. etc.

This applies regardless whether we're talking about knowledge of mathematics, cooking, or "God."
 
That's ad-hominem, Wynn. You know that.

Your eagerness to expose and critique other people's imagined psychological weaknesses is a little hypocritical while you are doing everything that you can to avoid revealing anything about yourself. You've never told us what your own beliefs and motivations are.

I've told you and others several times, but you just don't read or don't remember or something.


But that stuff seems to me to be largely irrelevant. Launching into imaginative attacks on other people's personalities won't defeat their philosophical points. To do that, people need to make even better philosophical points.

See my reply above to Syne.


But that stuff seems to me to be largely irrelevant. Launching into imaginative attacks on other people's personalities won't defeat their philosophical points. To do that, people need to make even better philosophical points.

No, it doesn't work that way. These discussions are mostly battles of wills, not thoughts per se. We're not robots who would automatically change their mind as soon as a "better" or "truer" position made contact with our system.


Wouldn't that point be even more applicable to theists? They are the ones who are claiming that God exists. Presumably they think that the word means something.

So?


Atheism is kind of dependent on theism, in the sense that atheists aren't inventing concepts of God all on their own. They are just expressing their disbelief in the concepts that theists advance.

As long as any atheist proposes the supremacy of atheism, this long he or she is making himself or herself liable to justify that self-declared position of authority.

That's just how things work. Whenever someone claims to be better, to know better, then they should be ready to prove they indeed are better, know better.

Hic Rhodos, hic salta.
 
It's equally applicable to anyone advocating a for/against policy.

IOW for as long as people are towing a party line for hard atheism (IOW advocating principles based on god not existing) they are also held to the same criteria

Can you think of any issue/event/object involving for/against issues where it isn't?

Exactly.

Anyone making a claim to supremacy should be prepared to evidence this supremacy.

Including to little poo-flinging monkeys!

[Mod note: Ad hominems will not be tolerated.]

:p
 
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It's not a fallacious ad hom, though.

As long as we maintain that epistemology has to do with how one knows one knows, epistemology is personal.
It's always a particular person who knows, knows they know, or knows they don't know.
Knowing doesn't take place is some abstract, impersonal, depersonalized space.

So, fortunately or unfortunately, epistemological issues are linked with personal qualities, like humility, pride, envy, courage etc. etc.

This applies regardless whether we're talking about knowledge of mathematics, cooking, or "God."

I expect you to cite a credible reference on how "humility, pride, envy, courage etc." are central to epistemology, if you wish to use that argument. That way the debate can focus on a reference rather than the personalities of specific people, or groups, here. Regardless of whether the inference is valid, ad hominems are not an acceptable argument.
 
Theism, in the broadest sense, is the belief that at least one deity exists...

Atheism is rejection of theism in the broadest sense of theism; i.e. the rejection of belief that there is even one deity.
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theism

Do you reject the definition of atheism in that same link?

You also seem to be employing the no true Scotsman fallacy when defining theists, as well as seeming to have missed all the types of theism listed in your link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theism#Types And I have provided a definition of god several times:

God is often conceived as the Supreme Being ... Theologians have ascribed a variety of attributes ... Common among these are omniscience (infinite knowledge), omnipotence (unlimited power), omnipresence (present everywhere), omnibenevolence (perfect goodness), divine simplicity, and eternal and necessary existence. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God


So did you have a point about how many theists there are? Seems more an argument for theism.

LOL! I made my point. My scope on theism includes the vast majority of theists, not some minority sliver of the population that can't even define what they mean by God. And no, sheer numbers of believers is no an argument for the truth of a belief. That fallacy is known as argument ad populum.
 
I expect you to cite a credible reference on how "humility, pride, envy, courage etc." are central to epistemology, if you wish to use that argument. That way the debate can focus on a reference rather than the personalities of specific people, or groups, here. Regardless of whether the inference is valid, ad hominems are not an acceptable argument.

Not all ad hominems are fallacious. There are areas of knowledge where a person's personal qualifications make all the difference in what they can know or not know and whether they can be trusted or not. Religion and spirituality are notable examples of such areas of knowledge.
I recall we agreed on this at least once.


That personal qualities play a role in how one goes about knowing things seems self-evident to me.

But anyway:

Virtue epistemology is a contemporary philosophical approach to epistemology that stresses the importance of intellectual (epistemic) virtues. A distinguishing factor of virtue theories is that they use for the evaluation of knowledge the properties of the persons who hold beliefs in addition to or instead of the properties of propositions and beliefs. Some advocates of virtue epistemology claim to more closely follow what they see as important about virtue ethics, while others see only a looser analogy between virtue in ethics and virtue in epistemology.
Intellectual virtue has been a subject of philosophy since the works of Plato and Aristotle, but virtue epistemology is a development in the contemporary analytic tradition. It is characterized by efforts to solve problems of special concern to modern epistemology, such as justification and reliabilism, by directing attention on the knower as agent in a manner similar to the way virtue ethics focuses on moral agents rather than moral acts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtue_epistemology


Virtue epistemology from SEP:
Contemporary virtue epistemology (hereafter ‘VE’) is a diverse collection of approaches to epistemology. Two commitments unify them. First, epistemology is a normative discipline. Second, intellectual agents and communities are the primary source of epistemic value and the primary focus of epistemic evaluation.

This entry introduces you to many of the most important results of the contemporary VE research program. These include novel attempts to resolve longstanding disputes, solve perennial problems, and expand epistemology's horizons. In the process it reveals the diversity within VE. Beyond sharing the two unifying commitments mentioned above, its practitioners diverge over the nature of intellectual virtues, which questions to ask, and which methods to use.



My approach are line with virtue epistemology. I'm interested in "novel attempts to resolve longstanding disputes, solve perennial problems, and expand epistemology's horizons; to solve problems of special concern to modern epistemology, such as justification and reliabilism."



Virtue epistemology is nothing new. An emphasis on personal qualities as a prerequisite for knowing things (and acocmplishing things based on said knowledge) has a long standing traditon:

E.g. from the Bhagavad Gita:
O best among the Bhāratas, four kinds of pious men begin to render devotional service unto Me — the distressed, the desirer of wealth, the inquisitive, and he who is searching for knowledge of the Absolute.


Or from the Buddhists:

This is to be done by one skilled in aims
who wants to break through to the state of peace:
Be capable, upright, & straightforward,
easy to instruct, gentle, & not conceited,
content & easy to support,
with few duties, living lightly,
with peaceful faculties, masterful,
modest, & no greed for supporters.

Do not do the slightest thing
that the wise would later censure
.



Or from the Bible:
Matthew 18:3 (NIV)
3 And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
 
In fact, one can search any of the scriptures of the major religions by key terms for personal qualities (pride, conceit, humility, envy, diligence, etc. etc.) and many of them are in a context explaining an epistemological point.
 
Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven

Children are naïve, gullible, submissive, impulsive, and prone to fantasies. Why would anyone idealize them as role models?
 
God is often conceived as the Supreme Being ... Theologians have ascribed a variety of attributes ... Common among these are omniscience (infinite knowledge), omnipotence (unlimited power), omnipresence (present everywhere), omnibenevolence (perfect goodness), divine simplicity, and eternal and necessary existence. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God
LOL! I made my point. My scope on theism includes the vast majority of theists, not some minority sliver of the population that can't even define what they mean by God. And no, sheer numbers of believers is no an argument for the truth of a belief. That fallacy is known as argument ad populum.

And? I have already, and repeatedly, given you a definition of god and even said that the numbers would be an appeal to popularity. I have refuted your nonsense about how all theists believe in angels and demons, so as long as there are none making such a claim here, your arguments in that vein moot.
 
I have refuted your nonsense about how all theists believe in angels and demons,

Like I said, my reference to theists refers to the vast majority of them, not to some tiny irrelevant band of metaphysicalizing eggheads. So you stand refuted.
 
Like I said, my reference to theists refers to the vast majority of them, not to some tiny irrelevant band of metaphysicalizing eggheads. So you stand refuted.

Where? Give me link to the post. Or is this just a bare assertion?
 
Children are naïve, gullible, submissive, impulsive, and prone to fantasies. Why would anyone idealize them as role models?
Not to sure whether you are simply pretending to be stupid (and being very good at it) or if you really don't know the answer to this question

The special attributes of children which he would recommend are humility, unworldliness, simplicity, teachableness, - the direct contraries of self-seeking, worldliness, distrust, conceit.

http://biblehub.com/matthew/18-3.htm

[Warning: Ad hominems will not be tolerated.]
 
Not all ad hominems are fallacious. There are areas of knowledge where a person's personal qualifications make all the difference in what they can know or not know and whether they can be trusted or not. Religion and spirituality are notable examples of such areas of knowledge.
I recall we agreed on this at least once.


That personal qualities play a role in how one goes about knowing things seems self-evident to me.

While I agree that atheists typically seem to lack the capacity to fully appreciate/understand concepts of god, I do not see virtue epistemology as excusing ad hominems. Intellectual virtues are largely a matter of epistemic justification. IOW, once someone has asserted a proposition and doubt has been cast on it, it is that person's responsibility to justify their proposition. It is not the doubter's right to define the intellectual virtues, or lack thereof, employed as justification, any more than it is the atheist's right to define the specific concept of god a theist should justify.

So after much thought, I stand by my previous rebuke of ad hominems. You are free to justify your own epistemic position by asserting your own intellectual virtues, but you are not justified in assuming the virtues, or lack thereof, of another.


As to the general notion that "not all ad hominems are fallacious":
To construe evidentiary invalidation of the denial as evidentiary validation of the original claim is fallacious (on several different bases, including that of argumentum ad hominem) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem#Circumstantial

IOW, even if someone's intellectual virtue is not deemed sufficient epistemic justification, that does not itself refute their proposition. Hence the ad hominem is fallacious. Your primary responsibility is to justify your own propositions.
 
The special attributes of children which he would recommend are humility, unworldliness, simplicity, teachableness, - the direct contraries of self-seeking, worldliness, distrust, conceit.


I take it you've never seen a kid in a candy store or watched an older sibling plot the torment of a younger sibling.
 
Not to sure whether you are simply pretending to be stupid (and being very good at it) or if you really don't know the answer to this question

The special attributes of children which he would recommend are humility, unworldliness, simplicity, teachableness, - the direct contraries of self-seeking, worldliness, distrust, conceit.

http://biblehub.com/matthew/18-3.htm

[Warning: Ad hominems will not be tolerated.]
well when you read MR's interpretation of the idea of "being like children", can you clearly discern whether he is purposely pretending to be stupid (ie answering a question in an obvious incorrect manner to troll a discussion) or if he really thinks that is the purport of the verse?
 
I take it you've never seen a kid in a candy store
I don't read about it in the newspapers everyday, if that's what you mean

or watched an older sibling plot the torment of a younger sibling.
the fact that you usually have to wait till they reach adulthood before such an event generally becomes newsworthy would seem to suggest you are again grasping at straws
 
well when you read MR's interpretation of the idea of "being like children", can you clearly discern whether he is purposely pretending to be stupid (ie answering a question in an obvious incorrect manner to troll a discussion) or if he really thinks that is the purport of the verse?

There is no accounting for the limitations of a person's own experience, but a solely negative experience with children does not imply stupidity, pretense or not. One might also suppose that those, whose lifestyles do not lend themselves to procreation, may lack a natural affinity for children as well.

It would seem to reflect more on one's attitude towards children than the verse.
 
There is no accounting for the limitations of a person's own experience, but a solely negative experience with children does not imply stupidity, pretense or not. One might also suppose that those, whose lifestyles do not lend themselves to procreation, may lack a natural affinity for children as well.

It would seem to reflect more on one's attitude towards children than the verse.

But the notion has found itself into common english usage:

child·like (chldlk)
adj.
Like or befitting a child, as in innocence, trustfulness, or candor.


so you have to ask yourself whether this is an issue of literacy (they have really never encountered that usage of the word) or theatrical stupidity (ie trolling)
 
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