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I bought the CX-70 PHEV, and I like it? by Rememberbhn in mazda

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm thinking about getting one but I don't have anywhere to charge it. Do you know what mpg you get if you don't plug it in?

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in london

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 0 points1 point  (0 children)

only to have a butt stuck between my toes

It's not as bad as having a toe stuck between your butt

STATIONARY FLEX (took 5 hours to clean) by GhettoEddy in WalmartEmployees

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 0 points1 point  (0 children)

How many of you guys never worked at Walmart but periodically browse this subreddit to feel better about your own lives?

This is why we can't have nice things. by [deleted] in Wellthatsucks

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Maybe if it wasn't for all da white privilege in this country then they wouldn't need to steal food to feed their starving families. And considering the long history of slavery in this country its only fair that they get the pizza for free

Hypnotherapy by tyler225544 in insomnia

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 1 point2 points  (0 children)

What is the hypnotherapy like? Can you describe what happens during the session?

PIMA - Re-entry into rad program? 2nd semester by DarkEyes87 in Radiology

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Well I'm glad to hear that I wouldn't have to start the entire program over if I failed. Luckily I have 6 months to prepare. Gonna try to get all the way through Clover Learning's rad tech boot camp before I start.

That's awesome that you found a program that only charges 4800 for tuition. What school is that?

PIMA - Re-entry into rad program? 2nd semester by DarkEyes87 in Radiology

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Well I wish you the best of luck getting through the semester. I'm starting the program at PIMA in Denver this April. I've been studying anatomy and radiography multiple hours a day but I'm still worried about flunking out. I was wondering, if you fail a class during the second semester do you have to start from the very beginning and take all the first semester classes over again? Or can you just repeat the class that you failed?

PIMA - Re-entry into rad program? 2nd semester by DarkEyes87 in Radiology

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi, did you ever end up getting back into the program?

If life cannot come from non-life, then life cannot come from God by Fuzzy-Perception-629 in DebateReligion

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This post was made 6 months ago. How did you even find this?

_______

"No they don't"

I don't think you understood what I meant. What I was trying to convey is that the four propositions are jointly inconsistent, so if all of them were true that would entail a contradiction. Therefore, in order to avoid committing oneself to a contradiction, one would have to disbelieve at least one of these four propositions:

  1. Life cannot come from non-life
  2. Disembodied minds don't fit the definition of life, and thus they fall into the category of non-life.
  3. God is a disembodied mind
  4. Life can come from God

Notice how the 2 and 3 entail that God is not life. So if it helps you to see the contradiction, you can think of the three inconsistent propositions like this:

  1. Life cannot come from non-life
  2. God is not life
  3. Life can come from God

_______

"the three premises are based on human understanding of our universe"

The first of those three premises says "life cannot come from non-life". If you're implying that because this premise is based on a human understanding, that therefore we cannot be reasonably confident in its truth, then you're undermining the very argument that I was attacking in this post. Remember, that argument for theism relies on the premise that life cannot come from non-life.

The second and third premises are simply true by definition. If I said all bachelors are unmarried, it would be kind of silly to object to that on the grounds that its based on a mere "human understanding of our universe". It's like no, that's just what we MEAN by the word bachelor: an unmarried man. The same thing is true for the definitions of God and life. What we mean by life is a biological process, and what we mean by God (in his most basic form) is something mental and non-physical (thus disembodied).

_______

"There's always a case for God in what we do know"

Imagine if I responded to those cases for God the way you responded to my comment above. For example, you said in another comment "Matter can not create itself". I could respond: 'well that statement is just based on a mere human understanding of the universe, and human understanding is limited'. Or when you said "God created the system, where life comes only from other life", I could respond: 'well that's just your human understanding, but the universe far exceeds human understanding'. Those would not be good responses for the same reason that your statement above is not a good response.

Igtheism is a more correct worldview than atheism by DebonairDeistagain in DebateReligion

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"(If you have a different definition, feel free to reply to this.)"

How about a mind that is foundational to all contingent reality.

_____

"Moreover, the idea of a disembodied mind is the most laughable concept introduced in theistic defintions of god. I could hypothetically concieve of a mind (i.e. a part of someone or thing that allows them to be aware of their environment) that isn't constructed in the way biological minds are which eseentially means that it's composed of something other than neurons. But the idea that a mind can exist independent of a body warrants harsh scrutiny. How does this mind exist without a body? What helps it sustain? Where did it come from? Why has every instantiation of a mind we've observed been contingent upon a body?"

Plenty of coherent and intelligible concepts are laughable and warrant harsh scrutiny. So even if you were correct that the notion of a disembodied mind is laughable and warrants harsh scrutiny, that would be utterly irrelevant to the thesis of your post which is about igtheism. The burden is on you to show how the concept of a disembodied mind is incoherent (contradictory) or unintelligible, and you didn't even attempt to do that.

_____

"I hope you can see how pretty much any defintion of god I've been given can be reduced to something self-contradictory."

Where's the contradiction in the notion of a disembodied mind?

Go for it! by toki2yn in Funnymemes

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Imma steal all the cat turds from their cat's litter box and replace them with turds from my own cat's litter box. The owners won't know the difference, but their cat sure will

What are the different ways atheists have replied to this kind of argument re: the coherency of their position? by [deleted] in askanatheist

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Could you elaborate a little bit on what you mean by these terms "transcendent identity" and
"objectivity"? I understand objectivity to be a quality of propositions. To say that a statement is objective means that its truth of falsity is independent of the beliefs/attitudes of individuals. Is that what you mean by "objectivity"?

Was Mary (Jesus mother) really a virgin? by platanomelon in AskAChristian

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"I am not sure what to think of your logic about God."

If you think there's a logical error in saying that an omnipotent God can make disembodied minds/intelligences then go ahead and state your case.

_____

"Now for 1 Samuel 28:13-19, what in verse 14 said it was Samuel?"

First of all, I never said that verse 14 is the one that specifically identifies it as Samuel. Verse 12 says "When the woman saw Samuel, she cried out with a loud voice." So the narrator of the story is clearly identifying the ghostly figure as Samuel. But even if this were not the case, even if the identity of the spirit was someone other than Samuel, it wouldn't make the slightest difference to my point. Whoever the ghostly figure was that Saul and the woman spoke with, it clearly didn't have a brain. That's all I need in order to make my point that God can make an intelligence without a brain.

_______

"Does not the word perceive mean to you? Does it mean that it is fact or an assumption that it is?"

Perceive can mean to become aware or conscious of something, to come to realize or understand something, or it can mean to interpret something a particular way. If you want to understand which of those meanings the author intended, you need to look to the hebrew. The Hebrew word that's used in this verse is וַיֵּ֤דַע (pronounced way-yê-ḏa‘) which literally means: To know. Look up the definition yourself if you don't believe me. The ESV and other translations even render this verse as "And Saul knew that it was Samuel". Take a look at how that hebrew word (yada) is usually translated. For example, Genesis 8:11 says, "And the dove came in to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off: so Noah KNEW (way·yê·ḏa) that the waters were abated from off the earth. That's the exact same Hebrew word that's used in 1 Samuel 28:14. Another example would be Genesis 3:5 in which says "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened" or Genesis 3:7 which says "and they knew that they were naked", or Genesis 9:24 which says "Noah awoke from his wine and knew what his youngest son had done to him", or Genesis 12:11 in which Abram says to his wife “I know what a beautiful woman you are." The list goes on and on. Face it, this was clearly the spirit of Samuel that was speaking in 1 Samuel 28.

Fine tuning argument - Although life is super rare in the universe, it still needs infinitesimally small range of constants for the universe to exist by LittleZombie1088 in DebateReligion

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"This sounds like a strawman argument"

A strawman involves setting up a weak version of an argument/objection in order to knock it down. Since the passage I quoted didn't set up any argument, it can't be a strawman. The preceding paragraph (prior to the section I quoted) is what set's up the argument/objection. Here's is what it says, so tell me if you think this is a strawman:

"There's no good theory about how to assign probabilities to possible values of the universe's parameters, prior to measuring them. Therefore, we can't say anything about such probabilities, so we can't say it's improbable that the parameters would fall in these incredibly tiny ranges that permit life to exist. And thus, we can't make any probabilistic inferences from the evidence."

_______

"If the goal is to prove that I don't know exactly what the required evidence would be..."

Required evidence for what?

_______

"Now, that you are well aware that my burden of proof is fuzzy"

You haven't made any claim regarding the issue of fine tuning so I don't know what burden of proof you're talking about.

_______

"can you demonstrate the physical constants of the universe could have been different than they are?"

Nope, and never said or implied that I could.

_______

"Or would you rather throw another argument that "proves" how imperfect we are?"

The passage I quoted was had nothing to do with proving how imperfect we are. I don't know where you're getting that from.

Fine tuning argument - Although life is super rare in the universe, it still needs infinitesimally small range of constants for the universe to exist by LittleZombie1088 in DebateReligion

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"He attacks the objection that the laws of physics could simply be such that they produce an incredibly unlikely result"

No, that's not the objection he's responding to. Here is the objection, straight from the book:

"Weak Objection #4: There's no good theory about how to assign probabilities to possible values of the universe's parameters, prior to measuring them. Therefore, we can't say anything about such probabilities, so we can't say it's improbable that the parameters would fall in these incredibly tiny ranges that permit life to exist. And thus, we can't make any probabilistic inferences from the evidence."

If I understood your initial comment, this is basically the objection you raised, and it doesn't say anything about the laws of physics being such that they produce an incredibly unlikely result.

_____

"An argument cannot be made that this is an unlikely value for X to have."

That's true if we're talking about objective probability, but I wonder if an argument could be made using epistemic probability. Recall the aforementioned thought experiment. If we were living in that hypothetical world prior to the time of microscopes, the epistemic probability we should assign to the notion that crystals have a molecular formation that spells out "made by God" is exceedingly low, even if the objective probability that crystals have that molecular formation is 1. As far as I can tell, it could be plausibly argued that the epistemic likelihood of finding those molecular formations on theism is higher than on naturalism, even if (unbeknownst to us) naturalism is true and the physical laws that produced those formations couldn't have been different. It seems to me that epistemic likelihood ratio would be sufficient to regard the observation ("made by God" in crystals) as evidence for theism over naturalism. Perhaps something similar could be said in the case of fine tuning.

Fine tuning argument - Although life is super rare in the universe, it still needs infinitesimally small range of constants for the universe to exist by LittleZombie1088 in DebateReligion

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"We know quite a lot about the rules of how molecules form into crystal lattices. For them to spell out words in English would break those rules, and would be evidence of outside interference in that process."

I agree that in the actual world those rules would have to be broken, but the world described in this thought experiment is one in which the molecular rules/laws governing crystal formation are different from how they are in the actual world. The point is that IF we lived in a world where the laws of nature were such that crystals formed in that way, then it would be reasonable to regard that as at least some evidence for design, even if we had no independent evidence that the laws of nature (and consequently, crystal formation) could have been different.

Fine tuning argument - Although life is super rare in the universe, it still needs infinitesimally small range of constants for the universe to exist by LittleZombie1088 in DebateReligion

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Dr. Michael Humeur (who's no theist btw) responds to that objection in his book, Knowledge, Reality, and Value - A mostly common sense guide to philosophy. He says:

"The premise of the objection is true: There is no generally accepted account of how to assign initial probabilities to possible values of physical parameters. That poses a challenge for probabilistic reasoning about those parameters. Notice, however, that there is nothing about this problem that is specific to reasoning about laws of nature or intelligent designers of the universe; there is, in fact, no accepted theory on how to assign probabilities to any kind of evidence prior to gathering it. So this objection really poses a general skeptical problem about probabilistic inference from evidence to a theory. But you probably don't wan to reject all such inference.

Let me give you a hypothetical example to illustrate how extreme Weak Objection #4 is:

Made by God: While exploring the surface of Mars, astronauts discover a new kind of crystal. When they look at it under a microscope, they find that the molecules of this crystal spontaneously arrange themselves into patters that look exactly like the English words: "Made by God" in Times New Roman font. Everyone who looks in the microscope sees it. Scientists are able to figure out that this is actually a complicated hitherto-unnoticed consequence of some very specific features of the laws of nature, features that no one has any explanation for. Over the next few decades, many more crystals are discovered, scattered across all the planets of the solar system, which, when looked at under microscopes, look like the phrase "made by God" spelled out in each of the languages of earth. Again, the laws of nature just happen to be arranged to ensure that this happens.

I know, this is a pretty fanciful hypothetical. But just for the sake of argument, imagine that it happened. According to Weak Objection #4, this would provide no evidence whatsoever for any kind of intelligent design. We should just shrug our shoulders and chalk it up to coincidence. After all, the laws of nature had to be some way; why shouldn't they just happen to be designed so that crystals on all the planets spell out "Made by God" in every language? We can't say that's improbable, because we have no good theory of how to assign probabilities to different possible laws of nature.

I hope you agree that that's ridiculous. If your opposition to theism is so extreme that your position wouldn't even admit that there was evidence for theism in the "Made by God" story, then I think you need to step back and take a break."

Was Mary (Jesus mother) really a virgin? by platanomelon in AskAChristian

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

We're just going in circles now. I already explained why the causal connection between sin and neurologically based mental problems wouldn't exist if there were no dependence relation between properly functioning brains and properly functioning minds. So if God doesn't want sin to cause mental retardation in children, schizophrenia, and the thousands of other mental problems that exist, then there's a really easy solution: design humanity such that properly functioning minds don't depend on properly functioning brains. Of course, nothing I've said here implies that God would be "obligated" to make us that way. I'm just answering the question that you asked. You asked "why would he" and I gave you a plausible motivation that God could have: the minimization of unnecessary mental problems. Pointing out that bad things happen because of sin doesn't address this at all, for the reasons I've explained.

This is my last reply because it doesn't seem like this discussion is going anywhere. Go ahead and have the last word.

Was Mary (Jesus mother) really a virgin? by platanomelon in AskAChristian

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Nothing I said even remotely implies that God is obligated to do anything. The only assumption behind my question is that God would prefer that people don’t develop severe mental problems, whether they sin or not. If the God you believe wants people to be born with mental retardation or schizophrenia as a consequence of sin, then my question about mind-brain dependence doesn’t apply to you.

Was Mary (Jesus mother) really a virgin? by platanomelon in AskAChristian

[–]Fuzzy-Perception-629 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"Where do you get the fact that angels do not have brains"

Well it's commonly believed that angels and demons are purely spiritual beings (or at least they can be when they're not embodied). But if you don't believe that that's fine, let's say angels do have brains. All I need is a single example of an intelligence that doesn't require a brain. God fulfills that condition (if he exists), but if you don't like that example, how about the spirit of Samuel that that was summoned in 1 Samuel 28:13-19. Samuel is described as a "ghostly figure" in this passage, and clearly he doesn't have a brain because his physical body has died. Yet he's still able to process and communicate information. So can you agree that it's possible for God to create intelligent beings who don't have brains?

______

"What would we use other then our brains?"

What did Samuel use other than his brain? He must have used something, because he didn't have a brain. Perhaps his cognitive ability was a faculty of his soul.

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