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Posted by Steve on 12/20/07 17:08
"The Natural Philosopher" <a@b.c> wrote in message
news:1198162599.86045.0@demeter.uk.clara.net...
> Steve wrote:
>> "The Natural Philosopher" <a@b.c> wrote in message
>> news:1198154467.74006.0@iris.uk.clara.net...
>>> Steve wrote:
>>>> "Erwin Moller"
>>>> <Since_humans_read_this_I_am_spammed_too_much@spamyourself.com> wrote
>>>> in message news:4769595c$0$85795$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl...
>>>>> ???? ??? ?????? wrote:
>>>>>> Excuse me!!
>>>>>> Would you stop for a moment?!
>>>>>> O...man...Haven't you thought-one day- about yourself ?
>>>>>> Who has made it?
>>>>>> Have you seen a design which hasn't a designer ?!
>>>>> Good question, ???? ??? ??????!
>>>>> Who made your designer?
>>>>> .....
>>>>> Well??
>>>> well, obviously since nothing complex that we've every experienced has
>>>> begun as something more simple,
>>> Actually, science assumes the reverse is the case.
>>
>> i know, you're the second person that missed the sarcasm. i thought
>> begging the logical delimma after that statement would have made it clear
>> that i was being intentional. :)
>>
>
> Ah, Too subtle for a dull Thursday morning with caffiene levels at
> critical...
>
>>> That the total complexity of life is in fact based on simple rules.
>>>
>>> The way that a simple 5 lines of code can produce the mandelbrot set.
>>>
>>> God is probably just an amoeba.
>>
>> less...he is the pennacle of man's imagination and the apex of his
>> laziness.
>>
>
> Pennacle?
lol. yep...it's a dull, coffee-less thursday morning. :)
>>>> the most reasonable answer would be...something more complex than the
>>>> designer. begging the same question ad-nauseum of each increasingly
>>>> more complex creator.
>>
>> there's the indicator that i was being sarcastic.
>>
>>>> lest we forget, gawd is a 'special' case and being omni* does not
>>>> require something more complex to create him/her/it/them.
>>>>
>>> Well that's just a copout logically speaking.
>>
>> exactly. sad that people actually think that's a good answer.
>>
>>> I MUCH perfer the Buddhist lexcicon.
>>>
>>> The 'Tao is that which exists through itself'
>>
>> which is quite illogical speaking in descartian terms.
>
> Descartes was a fool. Plenty of non thinking things evidently exist. Most
> Xtians for a start.
i don't think you understand what descartes wrote. you have read this,
right?
it's about being able to verify, to know for sure, what is real and what is
not. the only thing - and this is completely on an introspective, individual
basis - that can be known for certain is that *i* exist. 'i think therefore
i am' is not enough of a reduction, and here's why. to get to this point,
descarte demonstrates how our perceptions of things are simply faulty and
unreliable. in order to establish what is real, or be more certain of its
'realness', we must have multiple observers with which we can share an
experience - yet, we cannot still be absolutely certain of the realness of
any observer but ourselves. thinking is an activity that requires more than
myself to observe since my senses may be off; whether from neurosis,
hormonal imbalance, or some environmental factor such as fog obscuring my
vision. thinking then, cannot be the final reason that i know i exist. it
must simply be that i am aware i exist because logically, if i was not aware
i'd not care to fuss about knowing if i did or did not exist.
as for 'plenty of non thinking things evidently exist[ing]', you missed the
point. descartes is demonstrating that you can only know that you exist. all
else may be illusionary. he would begin challenging your posit by simply
asking, "how do you know anything exists".
it is arrogant and foolhearty to call descartes a fool...unless you either
demonstrate yourself, in what ways he is a fool. you must first begin, then,
by knowing what descartes has said. and that, beyond a cursor glossing.
>>tao can only know that it exists (though NOT via 'thinking == am'), else
>>it wouldn't care to ask whether or not it did.
>
> Thats implying that the tao is a French philsopher. It isn't.
the saying of which you are so fond, personifies tao. according to
descartes, tao can know it exists. you, however, can only know that you
exist. logically, since both your and tao's senses can fail yourselves and
given that each is not certain that the other person (or object, whatever,
tao) is real, you are left to conclude that it is impossible to absolutely
know not only whether or not a thing exists, but also whether or not the
thing is existing through itself - which is wholly circular logic anyway and
should be thrown aside.
to me, it's just more religion mumbo-jumbo.
>> 'through' is an activity that requires 3rd party verification. it is
>> objective. and, since one cannot be certain that anything is real, beyond
>> the 'first case' - i exist - then one has no reliable means to verify
>> *how* one exists, i.e. 'through itself'.
>>
>
> Indeed. Its a nonsensical statement that is used to show how the logic of
> human thought cannot apply to the fundamentals aspects of things.
it's simply nonsensical because it is a self sustaining philosophy with no
possible means of falsification! the 'fundamentals aspects of things' are
subatomic particles. not only can humans conceive of such things, we've
objectively verified them. i reject both statements outright.
> Remember thats a translation from another language. The mneaiong miay be
> aking top a 'train that lays its own tracks'.
and in the real world, tao would be bound to the same laws of physics that
we are. it would leave evidences that could be observed. and at its best,
energy would be the most applicably analogous notion one could to affix to
tao - a self-sustained thing. enter entropy and the demise of whatever tao
is or may be.
> Its poetic statement also. Buddhism understands that not all thiungs can
> be described directly and logically.
i've read better poetry. again, tao is associated with the chinese via
taoism. buddhism is associated with the rest of asia and in particular,
japan. eitherway, buddhism understands NOTHING. men conceptualized buddhism.
men are all subject to great moments of clarity and at achieving it
sometimes through inference - non direct or overtly logical means. it
doesn't matter from where you hail. we are all capable of this. it need not
be an activity that you most closely associate with buddhism.
> "To (peer) behind (consciuousness) with (consciousness), that cannot be
> done"
says who? look at the field(s) of psychology. we not only have a great
understanding of the sub-conscious to include many different layers and have
been able to quantify and qualify what the responsibilities are for each.
this was done via theory (non-direct influence), observation, testing,
validation, etc.. apparently, science too, understands that not all things
can be described directly. we can however, fashion falsifiable theories to
prove things. this science is *western* in origin, btw.
i still don't see how that quote is demonstrative to the claim of buddism
understanding things being explained via analogy. it is non sequitor to
me...and, we all use analogy.
>> btw, afaikr, that's 'taoism' and has very little to do with buddhism. in
>> most cases, taoism and buddhism have very differing opinions on things.
>>
>
> well Taoiskm is proto buddhsim IIRC. Or is it the other way round?
i'll forgive you there as i can't rightly recall their origins either, at
present.
>>> No personalization, no worship, no god bothering: A nice simple
>>> philosophic statement of naming the unnameable..
>>
>> but equally subjective as any other religion.
>>
>
> Everything is ultimately subjective. I wouldn't call Buddhism or Taoism a
> religion either..its more a philosophy. And a practical guide to doing
> weird things to your head ;-)
oh, they are religions. they may lack a centralized god-head, however they
have all the ingredients.
>>> The confusion arises from the Western mindset,where causality is imbued
>>> in our language, and the way we interpret reality.
>>
>> same thing applies to eastern religions...perhaps moreso. asian peoples
>> are more comfortable mixing statements of reality and the metaphysical,
>> and speaking of them both at the same time as if all are objective
>> experiences. the confusion sets in because all religion is *subjective*.
>> not surprising since no religion can provide objective proof for it's
>> truthfulness.
>>
>
> No one can provide objective 'proof' for anything, actually. All we can do
> is construct as elegant and simple structures possible that seem to model
> the world(s) we seem to find ourselves in.
correct.
> My objection to God based ones, is that they sacrifice effectiveness for
> simplicity. Ultimately you can do anything with religion at all. "Just do
> what the Law says, and God will see you right, OK?"
effective at not answering hard questions, perhaps. nothing more. and, i
value truth over the search for simplicity...although they typically flock
together.
> Boring and useless.
useless, yes. historically boring, no. causes much uproar.
>>> Naturally that leads to a Prime Cause,. and the need to invent one.
>>
>> i don't think that's where it starts. i think man, being a toolmaker and
>> being highly inventive, saw from his beginning that each tool had a
>> purpose. he most logically extended that range of thought to all things
>> he observed. god is simply the ulitimate, eventual answer/notion for
>> people who didn't have the knowledge or means to learn how the natural
>> world works. plus, who wants to toil to survive and not get some kind of
>> reach-around after dying?
>>
>
> Who wanted to be born? I don't remember asking for it?
>
> I think you underestimate the intelligence of the primitive peoples.
>
> I think they actually were far more aware of the reality of life,
> untrammeled by too much thinking about it.
eventually...not all at once. the key being his great success with tools
leading to more free time. idle hands you know. :)
> My interpreation of Genesis,is that at some point Man started thinking
> about it, and forming concepts, and that took him from a state of blissful
> ignorance to a state of paranoid suspicion,where he was surrounded by
> things that MIGHT be.
ok.
>>> The answer is to reject Causalitu as a univverals principle, and simpley
>>> state in plain English.
>>>
>>> "Some things just ARE".
>>
>> good point. i love to hear people argue stats when it comes to
>> probability of things being the way they are. and, that if one single
>> tiny thing were different, the universe wouldn't exist as it is. it's
>> funny because the stem from the same assumption...that what we see has
>> all been an eventuality. the simple answer is, yes, if the universe were
>> different, the universe would be different. a moot point. :)
>
> The anthropic principal.
quite.
>>> At a stroke, the logical underpinnings such as they are of god bothering
>>> collapse and are seen for the house of carsds that they really are.
>>>
>>> "Entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity"
>>>
>>> There is no need to introduce any more supernatural entities than that
>>> one statement
>>>
>>> "Some things just ARE"
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> erwin, on the notion of irreducibly complex...has the proponent of that
>>>> argument *ever* been able to show something that was? and that's
>>>> forgiving the man-made, relative notions of complexity, order,
>>>> randomness, etc..
>>> The information contained in the universe has been shown to require a
>>> computer..as large as the universe..to hold it..
>>
>> good analogy. :)
>
> Apparently it is a fact, or as near a fact as anything else is.
>
> Whilst te laws of nature may be incrediubly simple. teh initial state of
> the data, so to speak, ciontains mosrt of te complexity.l
>
> I guess you could replace 'Big Bang, broken symmetry;' by 'Gods fart,. bad
> pizza'
>
> But somehow it isn't quite the same is it?>
no, but may get more attention in the press. :)
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