On 13/01/2021 19:07, Jim H wrote:
> On Wed, 13 Jan 2021 13:35:34 +0000, in ,
> The Natural Philosopher  wrote:
>
>> On 12/01/2021 21:38, TimS wrote:
>>> And that what appears to be the case is likely actually the case, and not
just
>>> made to appear so as an almighty joke played on us saps by an Almighty
trying
>>> to be witty.
>>
>> That of course is why you need to really understand the Matrix proposition.
>>
>> That what appears to be the case could actually be utterly and
>> completely wrong.
>>
>> And that is why Einstein smashed materialism unwittingly. He came up
>> with an equivalent narrative that was utterly different from Newtonian
>> metaphysics.
>
> Utterly different in terms of the mathematics, but the result for
> objects observable by Newton is essentially unchanged. It's only at
> the infinitesimally small and incredibly massive scale that Newton,
> Einstein, and Quantum theory differ.
>

But that is not the point, you have changed ground Jim. Which is *true*?
Flast space and time and forces, or bent space and relative tine?


>> Which was true? They couldn't *both* be true. And that shattered the
>> assumption of materialism, that the world in facts was pretty much the
>> way it appeared to be, with all the secrete hidden Laws swept up into a
>> tidy bundle of linear differential equations..we kept the linear
>> differential equations, but we traded in absolute time and absolute flat
>> space for accuracy of prediction.
>>
>> And now with quantum physics, we are trading in strict Causality as well.
>>
>> And that is why philosophers of science have retreated from the position
>> that you espouse, to a more useful working relationship with science,
>> not as revealing facts, but as the construction of efficient models that
>> work and give accurate predictions
>>
>> God theories work, but not to give accurate predictions. They work to
>> bring meaning to peoples lives and to regulate the behaviour of societies.
>
> But assertions about God are essentially infinitely less provable than
> scientific assertions about physical objects.

No assertion is provably true. That is the problem of induction. The dog
that didn't bark in the night didn't bark because.,...

...it was in another dimension at the time
...it was drugged and asleep
...it was gagged and tied up out of earshot
...pixies had stolen its bark
...it barked and there was no one there to hear it.
...it had a sore throat.
...it didn't like the horse (which had kicked it once, and because it
was actually a hyper intelligent denizen of Xaragon V, it let the horse
get what was coming to it.

...etc.
Occam instructs us to pick the simplest not because its true, but
because since we cannot know which one is true,  we can at least be lazy
and pick the easiest one to handle

Popper made the point. *Scientific* propositions must be provable to be
*false*, potentially.

We start with effects, we posit causes, if the posited causes cannot
provide the required effects, we bin them, if they cannot be tested to
see if they provide the required effects, they are metaphysical and not
science. If they can be tested and don't fail the tests, they are science.

God theories cannot be tested. They are not science.

>
>> Once you abandon the idea that science or materialism and its underlying
>> assumptions, its 'a-prioris',  are the One True Stick, and see them just
>> as another set of assumptions that need to be made to achieve certain
>> things then you realised religion is no different except in its purpose.
>
> I think you've stepped squarely into the arena of sophistry with this.
>

That just means you haven't understood it.

>> Neither has any monopoly on the Truth. Both are in the end inductive
>> hypotheses - working from effects to causes -  and therefore subject to
>> the Problem of Induction', namely that given an effect, the here and now
>> experience of your life, you cannot unequivocally say what *causes* it,
>> and indeed the notion that *something must have*, is another unwarranted
>> assumption that you are making.
>>
>> That the material world, space time,  and our normal reasonable
>> assumptions of cause and effect *work*, especially in physics (though
>> less well in politics) is, in the end *not* 'strong evidence' that they
>> are *correct*. Newton could have said the same about his forces, Neo
>> about the Matrix.  Galileo did say that about his heliocentrism, and yet
>> all of them proved to be only limited approximate *models*. Which is
>> precisely what the Catholic church tried to tell Galileo.
>
> The Catholic church wasn't dealing in anything but belief and a fear
> that an unprovable religious view would be proven incorrect whether or
> not the view held by Galileo was perfect. It was close enough to
> throughly disprove the view of the church and thus Galileo had to be
> silenced.

No that isn't what happened. The church was perfectly happy that Galileo
teach the method as a way of calculating planetary orbits.  What thy
objected to was his insistence that it was 'true'

>
> It would be best if science left the unprovable beliefs of religion
> alone simply because belief by definition is unprovable one way or
> another.  And for religion to leave the views of science that
> accurately describe the world we can observe alone... especially when
> they're thoroughly provable.

But they are *not* provable.

>
>> To say more than that is to claim certainty where none exists, We appear
>> to be beings that do not have unlimited computing power at our disposal,
>> and the approximation of a 'real solid objective world out there,
>> comprised mostly of 'things' we can ignore because 'they don't eat us
>> and we can't eat them'' is a *useful* way to handle it. A good ad hoc
>> working *model*. And if you can't handle the loneliness, and absolute
>> lack of any hint as to what you ought to be doing about it,  by all
>> means shove an omniscient-creator-that-gives-a-shit in there, if it gets
>> you through the night.
>
> No problem, but don't shove him down the throat of those who don't
> care to believe... unless one can provide the same level of proof for
> the existence of such a supreme being as science can provide for its
> assertions.
>
>> Religion and science have their place. But neither is demonstrably true
>> or indeed can be said to have any decidable truth content.
>
> Sophistry.

that's just your hand wavey way of being in denial. I am sad.

>
>> My argument is to dethrone *both*, and see them for what they are.
>> Useful *models* that in their own way work, but neither of which should
>> ever be held up to the the One and Only True Stick.
>
> I know someone who is deeply religious and too often pushes his
> beliefs well past the point of being annoying. When I get tired of it
> I ask him to "prove it" at which point he goes off on a well prepared
> and rehearsed tangent involving the nature of absolute truth. I ask
> him to define some of the words he uses. The end result is that he
> goes in circles and can't prove anything... doesn't even try to prove
> anything just goes on about the nature of absolute truth... all of
> which doesn't mean that a God absolutely doesn't exist, but that it
> can't be proven and should be left in the realm of belief and those
> who don't believe should be spared from having it shoved down their
> throats. Science is built on demonstrably provable things with more
> recent theorys being subject to acceptable proof before being widely
> accepted.

Science is not built on 'demonstrably provable things'. It is a set of
consistent models that work, that's all.

Your insistence that they are provable is your sophistry, your One True
Stick.
>
> Science and religion should stay out of each others arena despite the
> interesting and amusing debates that arise when they don't.
>
They are in the same arena. Both are areas of human knowledge, they have
different attributes and purposes but like all knowledge, neither are
demonstrably 'true' and only people who act on faith and belief would
claim that either was.


--
There’s a mighty big difference between good, sound reasons and reasons
that sound good.

Burton Hillis (William Vaughn, American columnist)

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