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Agnostics are Believers

watsup said:
Again, what non-physical things? Are you saying that we might be able to detect a God/Creator/Intelligent Designer? Really?
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Eventually maybe. We can’t predict what technology will be developed in the future.
 
devildavid said:
This isn’t about what people think or say, it is about reality and what is factually impossible. Technology makes things possible to do, but it doesn’t change physical reality.
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He simply doesn't get it ..everything has a physical basis and always will.

Something can't be created out of nothing ..the cold hard fact flies right over his head.
 
Questerr said:
And it’s possible that in the future we will find there is a non-physical reality. We can’t definitively say we never will any more than people 200 years ago were right when they definitively said we would never achieve space flight.
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Space flight and creating something out of nothing don't belong in the same sentence.
 
devildavid said:
Without a brain there is no consciousness is a fact, not fallacious. Consciousness is not something independent of sentient physical beings capable of thinking. You can’t think without a brain. The ability to think is what gives rise to consciousness. There is no hard problem of consciousness and the irony is that without use of the brain, inventing the concept of the hard problem of consciousness is not even possible. If not, how was this concept even invented?
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It speaks to the soul or spirit as separate from the brain, nothing could be further from the truth.
 
Questerr said:
A thousand years ago, we had no evidence of infrared radiation. Would it have been correct to dismiss the existence of infrared radiation and to say it could never be detected in the future?
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Nobody knew what infrared radiation was 1000 years ago. Why do you ask such stupid questions?
 
watsup said:
Nobody knew what infrared radiation was 1000 years ago. Why do you ask such stupid questions?
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And nobody knows what we might find in the future that meets the definition of a “god”.
 
watsup said:
Science is indeed fascinating, and that is why scientists continue to seek answers based in the realities of nature and the universe. Beyond that, it is pure conjecture, and plenty of humans have imagined a super-powerful entity that could actually just “create” this fascinating and mysterious universe. That’s fine, they can show me some evidence if they have it. Until then, I remain an atheist.
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I'm not telling you to believe otherwise. I'm simply pointing out that uncertainty is a part of life, and that people being uncertain about something doesn't mean they deviously hold secret views. They just haven't made up their minds, or don't think humans can access the relevant information.
 
Mithrae said:
Natural/supernatural isn't the same distinction as material/mental...
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"Dualism" refers to ontologies with two distinct types of substances or realms. In Cartesian Dualism, mental states dwell exclusively in the supernatural half.

Mithrae said:
So the potential scarcity of dualism or prevalence of monism among adults and cultural norms of some societies doesn't necessarily change anything.
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It's not about scarcity. It's that being either dualist or monist is not an inherent cognitive structure (like interpreting the world in 3 physical dimensions, or enhanced facial recognition skills). They're socially constructed beliefs.

Mithrae said:
Infants do develop some vague concept of their self at some point, do they not?
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Sure. But that doesn't mean that all humans are dualist by default.

Mithrae said:
There's credible evidence that among American children (from diverse ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds) aged 4-6 there's a strong tendency to suppose that the mental states of an anthropomorphized mouse eaten by an alligator in puppet show would continue....
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That doesn't mean human beings are dualist by default. After all, all sorts of cultural concepts are ingrained in children by age, such as gender roles or moral concepts.

You're likely interpreting this as "evidence for inherent dualism" because you grew up with, or were extensively exposed to, dualist societies. A child raised in a monist society, which marks no ontological distinction between physical and spiritual, would likely give the same answers. They, and the researchers, would just interpret the results via that monist mindset.

E.g. monist societies with ancestor worship fully understand that there's a difference between the dead and the living, and believe the deceased are taking an active role in the world of the living. They'd have no problems understanding what the kids are describing, and putting it into monist terms.

Mithrae said:
The upshot of all of that is that no matter how common and natural the notion of non-conscious 'material' stuff seems, it's not necessarily based on any sound empirical or logical grounds....
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It's not based on scientific research, but empiricism -- as in, knowledge gained via experience, rather than reasoning -- is much broader than science. Again, lots of people would claim that they directly witnessed what we'd call supernatural events, and thus claim they were using empirical methods to establish things that we reject today (e.g. humorism, confirmation of miracles etc).

Mithrae said:
Who said? As I noted to Watsup earlier, the reasoning "If brain then consciousness... no brain, therefore no consciousness" is wildly and obviously fallacious, known as denying the antecedant.
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No, it's just an assumption that if you have a mind, then it has some sort of substrate.

If you're going to execute computer code, you need a computer. It isn't going to run on thin air. Right...?

Or: If you believe we are all part of Brahma's dream, then "Brahma" still has to be a thing, right...?

Mithrae said:
Your assertion would imply that mental stuff could never even in theory be present in artificial or extra-terrestrial intelligences...
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I said nothing of the sort. I'm just saying that if you have mental activity, it has to have some kind of substrate. I see no reason why that substrate can't be silicon or some other physical substance.

Mithrae said:
which would make the hard problem of consciousness that much harder!
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Claiming that "minds need substrates" has no effect on that issue.
 
watsup said:
Why not on Earth?
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Because we’ve already mapped a large amount of it, including its forests.

It is possible that such creatures simply haven’t been detected, but unlikely.
 
Questerr said:
Because we’ve already mapped a large amount of it, including its forests.

It is possible that such creatures simply haven’t been detected, but unlikely.
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Why unlikely? What makes them any more unlikely than, say, a God/Creator/ID? That entity hasn’t been detected, so why is it likely that there is one? Or is it also unlikely?
 
watsup said:
Why unlikely? What makes them any more unlikely than, say, a God/Creator/ID? That entity hasn’t been detected, so why is it likely that there is one? Or is it also unlikely?
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Because as I said, we've mapped most of the non-ocean regions of the Earth. It's possible that "wood fairies" today are like the infrared radiation of a thousand years ago, IE we lack the technology to detect them, but its not likely.

Compared with mapping the Earth, we haven't mapped 1% of 1% of 1% of the universe and it's possible that something that could be called a "God/creator/etc" is in the parts we haven't seen. We don't know and can't definitively say either way.
 
Questerr said:
Because as I said, we've mapped most of the non-ocean regions of the Earth. It's possible that "wood fairies" today are like the infrared radiation of a thousand years ago, IE we lack the technology to detect them, but its not likely.

Compared with mapping the Earth, we haven't mapped 1% of 1% of 1% of the universe and it's possible that something that could be called a "God/creator/etc" is in the parts we haven't seen. We don't know and can't definitively say either way.
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You are wrong about wood fairies. They could indeed be INVISIBLE and thus, by your standards, could one day be detected using some sort of technology. For instance, how do we know that they are not the actual creators of “fairy rings”?
And do you really think that some sort of entity who was able to just “create” an entire universe is an actual “possibility”? That is just amazing to me. It’s the biggest fairy tale ever, and I see no reason whatsoever to accept it in any form.
 
watsup said:
You are wrong about wood fairies. They could indeed be INVISIBLE and thus, by your standards, could one day be detected using some sort of technology. For instance, how do we know that they are not the actual creators of “fairy rings”?
And do you really think that some sort of entity who was able to just “create” an entire universe is an actual “possibility”? That is just amazing to me. It’s the biggest fairy tale ever, and I see no reason whatsoever to accept it in any form.
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Just as it would have been amazing for someone to say that one day we would fly through space a couple centuries ago.
 
Questerr said:
Just as it would have been amazing for someone to say that one day we would fly through space a couple centuries ago.
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You do know that belief in some sort of powerful extra-natural entity has been around since the dawn of humanity and that not a bit of objective, reality-based evidence has ever been presented for its actuality, right? If you want to believe that an imaginary entity is “possible”, I suppose that it up to you, but as an atheist I find that to be a total waste of time.
 
watsup said:
You do know that belief in some sort of powerful extra-natural entity has been around since the dawn of humanity and that not a bit of objective, reality-based evidence has ever been presented for its actuality, right? If you want to believe that an imaginary entity is “possible”, I suppose that it up to you, but as an atheist I find that to be a total waste of time.
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Asserting that such an entity does not exist requires evidence. Do you have such evidence?
 
devildavid said:
Because one is physical and one is supernatural. Do you know what supernatural means?
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Yes, it’s a pointless term. How do you know that a god would have to be supernatural?
 
Questerr said:
Yes, it’s a pointless term. How do you know that a god would have to be supernatural?
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No, it isn’t. It is a word with a specific meaning. Why would you call something god? What does god mean? If anything, it is god that is a pointless term, as you put it. How do you know that there must be god and what exactly is it?
 
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