Peanut Gallery

His shameless self promoting makes me think he is doing some kind of spamming.Rather than explain anything he just says go to this website and search for my paper. He doesn't even link to the paper, itself, so it seems like he might be getting something out of it.But I dunno.

I thought one of the big points was that science's conclusions aren't being proposed as the truth. Even with the always accepted amount of tentativety, they still don't go so far as to say that they are, in fact, the correct answers.I've always argued that them working is enough. It doesn't matter if they really are real or not.But I would say that them being proclaimed as the truth is, actually, logically invalid. I don't see how whittling this down to being "more likely to be valid" is an escape from this.

That's not what I am arguing.The theory: "All swans are white" is not making a claim that there are no black swans out there.Right?Now, let me just re-spell this all out as this was from, like, two weeks ago. My Message 502:

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In your much vaunted logic exercise you say that the Strong Atheist position (as defined by you) i.e. the conclusion that the non-occurrance of this is more likely is a "logically invalid position".

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As near as I can tell - RAZD is arguing that science is logically invalid. Since it builds theories and defines facts based on 'some' that state 'all' and suffers from all the problems of induction that RAZD demands science should actually be silent on.

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I thought one of the big points was that science's conclusions aren't being proposed as the truth. Even with the always accepted amount of tentativety, they still don't go so far as to say that they are, in fact, the correct answers.

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I've always argued that them working is enough. It doesn't matter if they really are real or not.

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But I would say that them being proclaimed as the truth is, actually, logically invalid. I don't see how whittling this down to being "more likely to be valid" is an escape from this.

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So, someone taking the position that there are no black swans as being more likely to be valid than not, based on the theory that all swans are white, would be taking a logically invalid position, no?

Wait... how so? I don't think its the same thing. How would, say, finding your fingerprint on a murder weapon be making a logically invalid induction like that of using the theory that all swans are white to conclude that there probably aren't any black swans out there? I'm still not seeing this as what he's saying. And I'm not agreeing with it if he is. I'm not seeing all other scientific theories as making the same logically invalid conclusion. Maybe I'm all mixed up here...I thought the A-1 point was supporting a strong atheist position of there being no god(s). That the theory that all gods come from human imagination suggests that there probably aren't any gods out there. And thus, its a rational evidence supported conclusion as opposed to an opinion.Do I need to re-read?

Nope, not with this one. You can be confident that they are (and be wrong), but you can't really determine the likelihood and/or make that conclusion. There's insufficient evidence here.Sure, for mundane things like gravity operating, our confidence can be so high that it is simply unreasonable to consider it unlikely to stop.But it doesn't matter how many people you show that can't fly or can't turn invisible, you're still not showing that there aren't any superpowered superheroes. Just like all the observed swans being white isn't saying that there isn't a black one out there.Without evidence to the contrary, you can be confident in your theory that they are all figments of the human imagination, and as long as its working then bravo, but you're not actually having an impact on the liklihood of a superpowered superhero existing. Your inductive probability may make it seem like you are, but that is not rational.With all the unseen evidence that will presumably come to light, I don't think its reasonable to be so confident as to consider most likely these theories that don't follow from actual evidence but instead rely on inductive probability.You never know when you're going to be shown to be wrong, here's a list of people with superpowers:Page Not Found

No -ish(gnostic is about knowledge and has no place here but I think I get what you're asking, but then, gawsh what a stupid question!) No, it would be. You're talking about something else... I'm talking about claims about ALL-things with generalities. Like "All superpowers are figments of imagination". Something specific like "I can fart rainbows" is different. It has better evidence against it and doesn't require inductive probability.

Actually, that there doesn't sound all that reasonable to me. There's a lot more to it to conclude that gravity will continue to operate in a consistant manner than simply the observation that it has in the past. Pssh Your observation is, like, totally wrong:’ How shallow and pedantic...Besides, I didn't actually say the observation said anything:

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Just like all the observed swans being white isn't saying that there isn't a black one out there.

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What does that have to do with what I actually said?I was typing about theories that don't follow from actual evidence but instead rely on inductive probability. And not all inductive reasoning has to follow from actual evidence. Oh what possibly could you be talking about!? What the hell are you going on about? How could you even think that I think that from the words that I actually typed?I'd appreciate it if you put effort into understanding what I'm actually trying to say rather than simply trying to shoehorn faults into my position to disagree with.

Math. Lots of math. More theory. More observations. Then more math.It didn't go: Hey look, the apple fell from the tree, ergo universal gravitational constant. Oh. Yeah, we can totally close our eyes to everything else and then inductively conclude all kinds of terribly wrong shit. Obviously, there's a lot more to science than just that. Ugh. Semantic irrelevancies Oh thank you, oh wise Dr. Pedantry.Let me know when you're interested in what my point on this topic really is and then we'll go from there. I was paraphrasing you. My god! Have you never debated on a forum before?.. wait. No, I get it. I'm totally being trolled, aren't I? Bravo sir, you really got me. I thought you were serious.

Well first let me ask: How many light bulbs did you cram up your ass? Lemme break it down...1) You can fart rainbows.2) All superpowers are figments of imagination.For 1), I know you can't fart rainbows because farts are made of gas and not light. We could find the physical evidence that you are unable to do it.For 2), you'd take that we know people can imagine these things and that we don't have evidence of (genuine) superpowers, and then use inductive probability to say that the liklihood of a superpower not being from imagination is very low and then conclude the claim.I'd say that you can use what you know to raise your confidence in 2), but that the inductive probability doesn't actually give you a real liklihood and that you shouldn't make a conclusion based on it.Or something like that.

Not necessarily. It could just be an axiom. I don't mind invoking liklihoods or calling it that.What I think is irrational, is making a conclusion based on a liklihood that came from an inductive probability.Like the argument that people can make up gods and none have been observed so its more likly that they are made up ergo gods don't exist. Beliefs with varying degrees of confidence.

"Human concepts about what supernature is are figments of human imagination."Why is the point of the theory only being about our concepts of things as stemming from our imagination? Isn't that obvious and somewhat tautological?Didn't it come about as a way to support the disbelief in god? If its not saying anything about the actual god, then how does it have anything to do with what it stemmed from?

Nope. Your mom told me that she had a supernatural experience. It was a source that I neither experienced nor imagined.

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I don't see what all the confusion is over...No, we don't have evidence of supernaturals. Fine, don't believe in them.Or you could remain agnostic.Or you could claim that there is evidence that there are no supernatural beings. Okay, lets see it.That is the point. Show the evidence that they don't exist.

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I do disagree with RAZD on there being supernatural beings that have been shown to not exist. It seems to be a more "technical" disagreement.

Sure it does. I didn't experience it and I didn't imagine it, yet I have a source for it. Sure the have. Bluegenes claims that he has plenty of evidence that, they don't exist because, the only known source of supernatural beings is imagination. Yeah, I don't why someone would think they could take it that far.

If any actual source other than imagination became known, then it wouldn't be supernatural so the hypothesis is unfalsifiable.

Or they heard it from somewhere else...Or maybe they experienced a little and imagined a lot, or visa versa.I'm still seeing a false dichotomy. Have you been reading the Great Debate thread? RAZD outlined his claims very thoroughly. I can't sum it all up in one quote, but this is as close as it gets:From Message 167:

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"All supernatural beings are figments of the human imagination".

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This is a high level of confidence theory.

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How can you have a theory without evidence? Sure, but the theory that that is all there is, is unfalsifiable. Too, if a supernatural source could be shown, then it wouldn't supernatural.At the end of the day, its a non-theory.