03.30.07.2097
Sorry, I forgot to reference my source for Dawkins “pwning” Collins. It was a TIME Magazine issue where they had a controlled debate. Dawkins clearly had the superior arguments… Collins seemed like he was jumping to conclusions and skipping necessary connections. His views on theism are erratic and confusing. Read the debate here.
Bah, these things are impossible. Dawkins isn’t being asked the questions, and isn’t giving the answers, that would satisfy the depth I’m after. On the one hand, I can destroy all the arguments he presented, but on the other, if he wasn’t presenting his case to the general public, I’m sure he’d be making better arguments!
Premise 1: All people are short.
Premise 2: Sally is a person.
Conclusion: Sally is short.
That is a deductively logical conclusion. The conclusion necessarily follows from the argument’s premises. You could make a deductive argument about pretty much anything if you describe your premises that broadly.
Maybe it should be:
Reilgion is produced by people.
People are naturally self-serving and self-delusional, particularly in large numbers.
So there you go.
If people are always self serving and self delusional then I ought to ignore what you are saying because so are you. Do people in large groups ever do anything good that individuals can’t?
Thanks. I’m reading it now. How do you think the debaters look in this exchange?
DAWKINS: What Francis was just saying about Genesis was, of course, a little private quarrel between him and his Fundamentalist colleagues …
COLLINS: It’s not so private. It’s rather public. [Laughs.]
DAWKINS: … It would be unseemly for me to enter in except to suggest that he’d save himself an awful lot of trouble if he just simply ceased to give them the time of day. Why bother with these clowns?
COLLINS: Richard, I think we don’t do a service to dialogue between science and faith to characterize sincere people by calling them names. That inspires an even more dug-in position. Atheists sometimes come across as a bit arrogant in this regard, and characterizing faith as something only an idiot would attach themselves to is not likely to help your case.
I haven’t listened to the Dawkins vs Collins debate. But if Dawkins did in fact destroy Collins, it is not surprising. Collins is not a philosopher, and as far as I am aware he has not philosophical or theological training. Alister McGrath (Prof Historical Theology, Oxford) has challenged Dawkins to a public debate several times, and as yet Dawkins has not replied.
Isn’t that an ad hominem? Why let Collins off the hook due to training: he’s an advocate for a certain position, and his arguments are bunkum. Even training as a fool does not give someone carte-blanch to get away with bullshit philosophy.
And to quote Dawkins in explantion of a refusal to debate every caller: “That would look great on your CV, not mine.” (That’s from memory from the God Delusion, which I read a few months ago, so apologies if it’s off. You get the gist)
How are Collins arguments bunkum? What about Dawkins’ arguments? If Dawkins proposes that God’s existence is improbable, has he proved that there is no necessary being with the attributes of God?
Carleas
It would be an ad hominem if phawkins were making a deductive argument, I don't see that he is. Dawkins won a philosophical debate against someone who wasn't a trained philosopher. I think that's a perfectly interesting thing to point out, depending on what phawkins wants to conclude.
So let's say Collins shouldn't be 'let off the hook'. What does that mean exactly? It seems it's already been conceded that Dawkins won the debate, what more are you after? What would we have to do or say about Collins in order to ensure that he hasn't 'gotten away' with something? Your point surely can't be that because Dawkins won the debate, that means Dawkins is [i]right[/i]- if that's the case, I could prove the existence of God right now by debating my turtle over it (though I'm pretty sure he's a Baptist).
No, of course not. He cannot prove that God does or does not exist, because according to virtually every believer in “God”, his/her/its existence cannot be either proved or disproved according to rational, scientific enquiry.
If that assertion is merely “according to virtually every believer”, why is Dawkins bound by it? If he can’t disprove it, how improbable does he prove God to be?
He can only attempt to disprove God within the context he is using. Dawkins does not believe, or at least makes the statement that he does not believe, in anything not backed up by rational argument. Therefore, if the concept of God is a concept not backed by rational argument/evidence then he does not believe in it. As simple as that.
I think you’re right that Dawkins would make that claim, jagermeister, and I think that’s the beginning of the fault in his reasoning. I don’t think rational argument is nearly as important, or as present, as many folks would suppose.
And there is the fundamental disagreement. And I don’t see any way of convincing you of the rightness of my claims, just as I don’t see any way of you convincing me of the rightness of your claims. And around and around we go.
jagermeister330
Oh, I think the notion that we should only believe what is grounded in rational argument is rather easy to disprove, actually. It’s a simple as this:
How many rational arguments have you actually participated? 500? Perhaps a thousand if you’re truly obsessed with the act? Now, how many things do you believe?
As for me, I believe in a ton of things that I’ve never had occaision to argue for, rationally or otherwise.
You’re misusing the term ‘belief’ in my opinion. I ‘believe’ that I will die if I no longer eat food or drink water. Do I understand fully the biological processes that make this so? No. I would like so, but I don’t. But there are rational reasons for why I would die if I didn’t eat and didn’t drink, and they exist regardless of whether I ‘believe’ in them or not. Just as ‘god’ exists or does not exist independent regardless of whether I ‘believe’ in his existence or not.
In essence, wishing does not make it so. Be it god or any other subject.
We can’t base our beliefs on rational reasons we don’t know about. Assuming we agree on that, I’m following your point. If I believe in God because Mommy told me so, and it just happens to be that there are very good, very rational reasons to believe in God, and further it just so happens that God exists, those reasons and that fact don’t justify my belief if I’m unaware of them, do they?
Sure. I’m just saying that we are bound to believe things even when the rationality of them are totally beyond us, and that that’s not a bad thing in all cases. I’m worried that this ‘rational argument’ criteria becomes rhetorical. A person’s beliefs can’t be justified by how good a debater they are.
I agree completely.
I would disagree, however, with the idea that we are bound to believe in things we have no rational basis for. I ‘believe’ in human perfectability; that man can accept only that which has a rational basis, and deny that which does not. I’m not perfect, and never claimed to be. However, I do accept the possibility that I will be perfect in this life. One who accepts that perfectability is impossible, and yet strives to obtain perfectability, commits a grave error.
To get back to Dawkins for a moment, I understand that he appeals to the idea of multiple universes to refute the so-called “fine tuning argument”. How probable is it that there are multiple universes? Is there any empirical evidence for multiple universes? Is there any way to prove them? What is the rational basis for them? Does the multiple universe hypothesis pass the ever popular Occam’s razor test?