Science is based on faith?

[TheBelgianGuy]

if you want it funny, a little crass, and not politically correct: http://youtu.be/HhGuXCuDb1U - tim minchin's the storm

That is possibly the most pretentious strawman I've ever seen.

 

[Bullfrog1983]

It is impossible for science to explain everything in the universe. Before scientists began questioning why things act the way they do, the same explanation was always given: "Because god wills it." So science has its roots in faith but at the same time has to question faith to prove itself, pretty much the basics of theory. However science is not omnipotent or infallible like the god/gods that people believe in today. It still fails to explain things and faith has much to do with creating anything or explaining anything because you always begins with theory.

 

[aattss]

If someone has a lot of faith in something with almost no almost evidence that has been disproven, he is frowned on by the scientific community. Religious people don't seek knowledge, they seek purity and goodness. It is wrong to say that science is faith in the same way Jackie Chan is not defined by how he's asian. Jackie Chan is a martial artist and film actor known for doing his own stunts (I think), while asia is a big country with a rich culture and history that, through many strifes and innovations, has gotten to where he is. Jakie Chan isn't awesome because he's Asian, and Asia isn't awesome just because everyone there is like Jakie Chan.

 

[CrystalShadow]

I consider Occam's razor to be largely a statement of faith when you think about it... But that's neither here nor there.

It really isn't though. Occam's Razor doesn't actually make a statement on validity. What it does is codify a rule of thumb, saying that "if two hypothesis are equal in all other respects, the one that makes the least number of assumptions is to be preferred". That's not so much faith based as it is simply logical.

In what sense is that logical? Two equivalent theories implies there's no meaningful difference between them. So why would there be a preference? It's a fairly arbitrary thing to do.

 

[Vegosiux]

I consider Occam's razor to be largely a statement of faith when you think about it... But that's neither here nor there.

It really isn't though. Occam's Razor doesn't actually make a statement on validity. What it does is codify a rule of thumb, saying that "if two hypothesis are equal in all other respects, the one that makes the least number of assumptions is to be preferred". That's not so much faith based as it is simply logical.

In what sense is that logical? Two equivalent theories implies there's no meaningful difference between them. So why would there be a preference? It's a fairly arbitrary thing to do.

In the sense that the one with the least number of assumptions runs a lower risk of any of said assumptions are wrong, and lower risk of mistakes since there's less inputs to process, I'd say.

 

[4RT1LL3RY]

If someone has a lot of faith in something with almost no almost evidence that has been disproven, he is frowned on by the scientific community. Religious people don't seek knowledge, they seek purity and goodness. It is wrong to say that science is faith in the same way Jackie Chan is not defined by how he's asian. Jackie Chan is a martial artist and film actor known for doing his own stunts (I think), while asia is a big country with a rich culture and history that, through many strifes and innovations, has gotten to where he is. Jakie Chan isn't awesome because he's Asian, and Asia isn't awesome just because everyone there is like Jakie Chan.

In the Scientific community you need to make certain assumptions whenever you do things. These assumptions, such as you are an impartial viewer to something, are not always true.

In science we constantly find things that are "true" situationally. Euclidean math works great, as long as you are working on a flat plan. A triangle's 3 angles will add up to 180 degrees, but not nessicarily if the triangle is on a curved plane.

Hisenburg's uncertainty principle is something that Einstein didn't believe in because he believed that probability didn't have a place in science.

Assumptions and faith have multiple things in common but mainly they allow you to break things down so it is simpler to understand. The Theory of Gravity, or more accurately General Relativity works well in the context that we have tested it in. However we cannot prove it correct or incorrect in many cases. At the levels of quantum mechanics and blackholes we run into issues with our systems. We have created systems that work well for 99.9-% of cases but if it isn't accurate for the edge cases that means we are missing something.

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? He is not omnipotent. Is he able but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both willing and able? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither willing nor able? Then why call him God?

But this gets into the questions of philosophy. What is evil? What it evil to some is right to others. No sane person goes and says "I am going to be evil" what people do is based on what they know and what they believe to be the best thing to do. Morals are a malleable concept that isn't the same for all people.

Who is to say that what we believe is 'right' is truly that?

An organization plans to cause global strife and conflict by increasing the standard of living and improving medicine so people live longer, but will cause overpopulation and the breakdown of multiple countries social security systems causing massive unrest and destabilizing the world's economy. Is that an evil organization?

That organization is a reference to Franken Fran.

 

[DracoSuave]

Because of all that we have to take some degree of faith into it to make many of our theories work at all. I just think people are frightened at the idea that science might not be entierly infallible, even though it's usually not a big deal when our facts turn out to be wrong. After all, if we knew everything, we wouldn't learn anything.

Not quite.

Faith is belief in absence of evidence.

Science intrinsicly enbraces fallibilism which is the idea that what you believe CAN be wrong.

Science tests EVERYTHING, then retests it, then tests it again. NOTHING is accepted on faith. Moreover, things are not simply decided upon and kept as sacred cows--even that which IS accepted is still subject to testing and scrutiny. Anyone who has studied ANY science brought forth in the past two centuries accepts this because scientific upheaval is something that occurs regularly.

There simply IS no faith in science--everything is doubted, everything is questioned, and then once doubts and questions are answered to, everything is then presented to others so THEY can doubt and question. And doubts and questions are not answered by guffaws--they too much be met with evidence and experimentation.

 

[Saxnot]

Yes. That is the definiton of unfalsifiable. Now read what i said again. Religion cannot be effectively debated in terms of proof because it cannot be falsified.

So... according to you any court case that can't be falsified, we should just throw out all the other evidence because we can't falsify it? Great -__-

I don't think any court case that can't be falsified has any evidence of such to begin with or enough evidence exists that falsifying it is blatantly wrong.

Can't say that was a very good analogy.

So you don't believe in situations where it is impossible to tell for sure what happened somewhere but do have evidence that suggests one thing?

Unfalsifiable means there is no possible situation in which we could know for sure whether this thing is true or not. So it might be hard for us to know if you killed someone on mars, but there is a situation possible in which we could be sure you did it. We could be present at the murder, for example.

There is no possible situation imaginable wherein the existance of god/the flying spaghetti monster/vishnu could definately and certainly be disproved, so these things are unfalsifiable.

 

[DracoSuave]

There is no possible situation imaginable wherein the existance of god/the flying spaghetti monster/vishnu could definately and certainly be disproved, so these things are unfalsifiable.

As much as I hate to say this, this is an argument from ignorance. We cannot imagine a method to test god-claims, and that is what makes them unfalsifiable. The ultimate impossibility to test god-claims is, itself, unfalsifiable and therefore carries the same validity as the god-claim itself.

The only difference between the supernatural and the natural is the explanation.

There may be a scientific model of the universe and the extraultiverse that actually includes the possibilities of extrauniversal beings with the ability to manipulate our universe, with abilities to test it. We simply don't know.

What we CAN say, however, is that because such a notion is currently untestable, that it is not of scientific interest. Current falsifiability cannot be confused with future falsifiability, especially given that we do not understand THIS universe enough to make ANY comment (positive or negative) on the existance of the extrauniversal.

 

[Piorn]

The whole discussion is solely based on people's different definition of "faith".
There seem to be people who equate faith with "religion" or "believing in things that don't exist", but it just means you have to "believe".
Do you "believe" your senses display the world as it really is? Because that's what science is based on.
Do you "believe" empirical evidence, or do you discard it in favor of some religion?

 

[Saxnot]

Yes. That is the definiton of unfalsifiable. Now read what i said again. Religion cannot be effectively debated in terms of proof because it cannot be falsified.

So... according to you any court case that can't be falsified, we should just throw out all the other evidence because we can't falsify it? Great -__-

I don't think any court case that can't be falsified has any evidence of such to begin with or enough evidence exists that falsifying it is blatantly wrong.

Can't say that was a very good analogy.

So you don't believe in situations where it is impossible to tell for sure what happened somewhere but do have evidence that suggests one thing?

Unfalsifiable means there is no possible situation in which we could know for sure whether this thing is true or not. So it might be hard for us to know if you killed someone on mars, but there is a situation possible in which we could be sure you did it. We could be present at the murder, for example.

There is no possible situation imaginable wherein the existance of god/the flying spaghetti monster/vishnu could definately and certainly be disproved, so these things are unfalsifiable.

Fair enough, but in all practicality, if you can give evidence in support of something or evidence against something then evidence is relevant. Maybe you can never falsify it, but if you see a flying spaghetti monster that's pretty good start in regards to evidence. If there's no evidence at all that's a pretty good start to saying it's not worth considering until that changes.

Well, that's a philosophical question. I see what you mean, but it seems to me, when discussing the fundamental elements of the universe, it's a bit of a copout to say 'i don't see any evidence, therefore it probably does't exist'. My position is that i have never seen anything convincing enough to draw me to believe in one particular god, but that does not mean they don't exist. I can therefore not be certain of any god's (non-)existence, and must be agnostic.

But that's just me.

 

[Saxnot]

There is no possible situation imaginable wherein the existance of god/the flying spaghetti monster/vishnu could definately and certainly be disproved, so these things are unfalsifiable.

As much as I hate to say this, this is an argument from ignorance. We cannot imagine a method to test god-claims, and that is what makes them unfalsifiable. The ultimate impossibility to test god-claims is, itself, unfalsifiable and therefore carries the same validity as the god-claim itself.

The only difference between the supernatural and the natural is the explanation.

There may be a scientific model of the universe and the extraultiverse that actually includes the possibilities of extrauniversal beings with the ability to manipulate our universe, with abilities to test it. We simply don't know.

What we CAN say, however, is that because such a notion is currently untestable, that it is not of scientific interest. Current falsifiability cannot be confused with future falsifiability, especially given that we do not understand THIS universe enough to make ANY comment (positive or negative) on the existance of the extrauniversal.

But the definite determination of the existence or nonexistence of the extrauniversal would not change anything. You would just be moving the goalposts.

If we determine for sure that god does not exist outside the universe, then a religious person could say he exists inside it, inside every person, or that science simply can't percieve him.

Or if we determine there is a christian god outside the universe, that would probably (ironically) lead to some denominations of the abrahamic faiths to reject his legitimacy, saying that if he is the god of the catholics, he can't be the god of the protestants/muslims/jews. This without even mentioning the nonabrahamic faiths.

God is unfalsifiable because he does not require a place to be or an existence outside our minds to be real to people.

 

[Saxnot]

Yes. That is the definiton of unfalsifiable. Now read what i said again. Religion cannot be effectively debated in terms of proof because it cannot be falsified.

So... according to you any court case that can't be falsified, we should just throw out all the other evidence because we can't falsify it? Great -__-

I don't think any court case that can't be falsified has any evidence of such to begin with or enough evidence exists that falsifying it is blatantly wrong.

Can't say that was a very good analogy.

So you don't believe in situations where it is impossible to tell for sure what happened somewhere but do have evidence that suggests one thing?

Unfalsifiable means there is no possible situation in which we could know for sure whether this thing is true or not. So it might be hard for us to know if you killed someone on mars, but there is a situation possible in which we could be sure you did it. We could be present at the murder, for example.

There is no possible situation imaginable wherein the existance of god/the flying spaghetti monster/vishnu could definately and certainly be disproved, so these things are unfalsifiable.

Fair enough, but in all practicality, if you can give evidence in support of something or evidence against something then evidence is relevant. Maybe you can never falsify it, but if you see a flying spaghetti monster that's pretty good start in regards to evidence. If there's no evidence at all that's a pretty good start to saying it's not worth considering until that changes.

Well, that's a philosophical question. I see what you mean, but it seems to me, when discussing the fundamental elements of the universe, it's a bit of a copout to say 'i don't see any evidence, therefore it probably does't exist'. My position is that i have never seen anything convincing enough to draw me to believe in one particular god, but that does not mean they don't exist. I can therefore not be certain of any god's (non-)existence, and must be agnostic.

But that's just me.

Whether is or is not a fundamental element of the universe is also in question. And it's no more a cop out than saying that I don't believe that my neighbor wrestled Putin and won. It's possible, but that's far from enough to make me even seriously consider it when there is no evidence whatsoever for it. I could argue that we can be certain about nothing but our own existence, but that's not enough to paralyze us from disbelieving in certain things and not others in other cases.

I point you towards David Hume 'I am nothing but a bundle of perceptions'. Even the existence of the self is in question. What are you? Can you really, fundamentally say you are doing anything apart from responding to stimuli right now? The input is this text, the output is the response you will (hopefully) write? And if that is all you are, is existence anyting but stuff happening?

To determine your ideas about what the self is and its place in the universe as you percieve it seems one of the most fundamental things there are to me. and part of that is how you stand on things you must be fundamentally uncertain of.

 

[Seanchaidh]

Occam's Razor is a guide for scientific inquiry that should never even enter into conversations about opinions or beliefs

How on earth do you define 'belief'?

 

[DracoSuave]

If we determine for sure that god does not exist outside the universe, then a religious person could say he exists inside it, inside every person, or that science simply can't percieve him.

That's a problem with the lack of definition of 'God.' More exact definitions can be tested.

The problem in this instance isn't the falsifiability of the claim--it's in the lack of a claim. Something that is so poorly defined that it the goalposts could be moved THAT MUCH is not actually a claim of belief. One cannot belief in 'whatever'.

Or if we determine there is a christian god outside the universe, that would probably (ironically) lead to some denominations of the abrahamic faiths to reject his legitimacy, saying that if he is the god of the catholics, he can't be the god of the protestants/muslims/jews. This without even mentioning the nonabrahamic faiths.

Who cares?

That's no different than how creationists don't like evolution--it doesn't make evolution any more or less valid based on the evidence.

By corollary, those same denominations can probably use the same tests to determine the specifics relative to their denominations.

Would there going to be people who don't like the results? Sure. Would people going to deny it in defiance of the evidence?
Absolutely.

But does that make the tests invalid? Of course not--that's an irrelevant argument.

God is unfalsifiable because he does not require a place to be or an existence outside our minds to be real to people.

Wrong.

If you happen to believe in a god named Thor and part of that belief is that he fights Jotun and creates thunder by tossing Mjolnir, you've made a testable claim. We can study thunder and its causes and see that there is no hammer or other malleistic source. We can do a study of humanoids and look for evidence of ice-giants within them. There's all sorts of tests-for-Thor we could create due to the nature of the claim.

As a result, Thor is a falsifiable claim.

Whether or not someone can hallucinate Thor is irrelevant to that.

Now that I've demonstrated that there exists a god-claim that is fallsifiable, I have also thus proven that god claims CAN be falsifiable. Now you can make a different god claim--or even a different claim about Thor, but that just means you're redefining Thor to be something else--it does not mean I have not falsified the Thor claim I was given. It only shows the god-claimant is arguing dishonestly.



In other words:

As there exists a God claim that can be falsified, it is therefore untrue that all god claims are unfalsifiable.

 

[dagens24]

I think that's a mischaracterization of the atheistic position. I know of no atheist who would claim that they know with 100% certainty there is no god, rather they would claim that it is HIGHLY unlikely.

I don't watch EC so I don't know the context in which they said that but science as science can never TRUELY be proven. We can be 99.99999999999 ad nauseum % sure but we can never be 100% sure.

Coincidentally, that is my main issue with the theist/athiest argument. Neither side can ever truly prove their side and eventually, when you dig far enough, both come down to "because that's what I think." But both sides claim evidence/lack of evidence as validation of 100% certainty. It's a nasty can of worms.

EDIT: In my haste to write this and be simple, it came out worded very badly and people are mistaking what I meant. Here is what I was trying to say only much more eloquently. haha

Before anyone jumps on this, it's worth pointing out that a Theory is the highest level of explanation in science and that no, a 'proven theory' does not become a 'Law'. The two are distinct concepts, the difference between which is perhaps best described thusly: Laws are observations, Theories are explanations for observations, which is why we have both the Law and Theory of Gravity. The former does not replace the latter, nor does the latter invalidate the former. It's also worth noting that contrary to popular usage, the word "Theory" in science is not used to describe uncertainty (on the contrary, a theory must be very well vetted with the available data to be described as such). Point of fact, the colloquial use of the word 'theory' better fits the scientific term 'hypothesis' than it does the scientific use of the word 'theory'.
That said, it is certainly true that everything in science adapts as new data becomes available. That's actually one of its greatest strengths. That's why the 'Plum Pudding' Atomic Model was replaced by the Rutherford Model, and the Rutherford Model replaced by the Bohr Model. While the Plum Pudding Model was an improvement over its predecessors, the Rutherford Model better explained the data than the Plum Pudding Model, and the Bohr Model ultimately improved upon the Rutherford Model. That's a bit that tends to get overlooked when people harp on how 'science changes'. The changes are not whimsical or random, they are made because the new explanation improves upon the prior model, typically in a way that hits much of the same explanations and expands upon them as the data dictates.

 

[Saxnot]

Yes. That is the definiton of unfalsifiable. Now read what i said again. Religion cannot be effectively debated in terms of proof because it cannot be falsified.

So... according to you any court case that can't be falsified, we should just throw out all the other evidence because we can't falsify it? Great -__-

I don't think any court case that can't be falsified has any evidence of such to begin with or enough evidence exists that falsifying it is blatantly wrong.

Can't say that was a very good analogy.

So you don't believe in situations where it is impossible to tell for sure what happened somewhere but do have evidence that suggests one thing?

Unfalsifiable means there is no possible situation in which we could know for sure whether this thing is true or not. So it might be hard for us to know if you killed someone on mars, but there is a situation possible in which we could be sure you did it. We could be present at the murder, for example.

There is no possible situation imaginable wherein the existance of god/the flying spaghetti monster/vishnu could definately and certainly be disproved, so these things are unfalsifiable.

Fair enough, but in all practicality, if you can give evidence in support of something or evidence against something then evidence is relevant. Maybe you can never falsify it, but if you see a flying spaghetti monster that's pretty good start in regards to evidence. If there's no evidence at all that's a pretty good start to saying it's not worth considering until that changes.

Well, that's a philosophical question. I see what you mean, but it seems to me, when discussing the fundamental elements of the universe, it's a bit of a copout to say 'i don't see any evidence, therefore it probably does't exist'. My position is that i have never seen anything convincing enough to draw me to believe in one particular god, but that does not mean they don't exist. I can therefore not be certain of any god's (non-)existence, and must be agnostic.

But that's just me.

Whether is or is not a fundamental element of the universe is also in question. And it's no more a cop out than saying that I don't believe that my neighbor wrestled Putin and won. It's possible, but that's far from enough to make me even seriously consider it when there is no evidence whatsoever for it. I could argue that we can be certain about nothing but our own existence, but that's not enough to paralyze us from disbelieving in certain things and not others in other cases.

I point you towards David Hume 'I am nothing but a bundle of perceptions'. Even the existence of the self is in question. What are you? Can you really, fundamentally say you are doing anything apart from responding to stimuli right now? The input is this text, the output is the response you will (hopefully) write? And if that is all you are, is existence anyting but stuff happening?

To determine your ideas about what the self is and its place in the universe as you percieve it seems one of the most fundamental things there are to me. and part of that is how you stand on things you must be fundamentally uncertain of.

Notice the word 'I'. Who is perceiving? Something exists to perceive. Whatever it is, define it as yourself. And I never said I did anything but respond to stimuli. I'd say that seems to be how humans work. And I see no problem with that being what I am.

As for things I must be uncertain of, well it depends. Situational. In regards to a deity, there is nothing at all to suggest one exists. Ergo, dismiss until evidence does appear. Just like an infinite amount of other possibilities. What else is there do with them? There are an infinite amount of contradicting possibilities that have no evidence.

So the thing that is I responds to mechanical stimuli? Then there is nothing to you but an elaborate machine? Then what is uncertainty? Lack of data?

As to lack of evidence means dismissal until evidence does appear, i agree with you. That sounds rather agnostic. Or do i misunderstand?

 

[Saxnot]

What we CAN say, however, is that because such a notion is currently untestable, that it is not of scientific interest. Current falsifiability cannot be confused with future falsifiability, especially given that we do not understand THIS universe enough to make ANY comment (positive or negative) on the existance of the extrauniversal.

But the definite determination of the existence or nonexistence of the extrauniversal would not change anything. You would just be moving the goalpost.

If we determine for sure that god does not exist outside the universe, then a religious person could say he exists inside it, inside every person, or that science simply can't percieve him.

That's a problem with the lack of definition of 'God.' More exact definitions can be tested.

The problem in this instance isn't the falsifiability of the claim--it's in the lack of a claim. Something that is so poorly defined that it the goalposts could be moved THAT MUCH is not actually a claim of belief. One cannot belief in 'whatever'.

Or if we determine there is a christian god outside the universe, that would probably (ironically) lead to some denominations of the abrahamic faiths to reject his legitimacy, saying that if he is the god of the catholics, he can't be the god of the protestants/muslims/jews. This without even mentioning the nonabrahamic faiths.

Who cares?

That's no different than how creationists don't like evolution--it doesn't make evolution any more or less valid based on the evidence.

By corollary, those same denominations can probably use the same tests to determine the specifics relative to their denominations.

Would there going to be people who don't like the results? Sure. Would people going to deny it in defiance of the evidence?
Absolutely.

But does that make the tests invalid? Of course not--that's an irrelevant argument.

God is unfalsifiable because he does not require a place to be or an existence outside our minds to be real to people.

Wrong.

If you happen to believe in a god named Thor and part of that belief is that he fights Jotun and creates thunder by tossing Mjolnir, you've made a testable claim. We can study thunder and its causes and see that there is no hammer or other malleistic source. We can do a study of humanoids and look for evidence of ice-giants within them. There's all sorts of tests-for-Thor we could create due to the nature of the claim.

As a result, Thor is a falsifiable claim.

Whether or not someone can hallucinate Thor is irrelevant to that.

Now that I've demonstrated that there exists a god-claim that is fallsifiable, I have also thus proven that god claims CAN be falsifiable. Now you can make a different god claim--or even a different claim about Thor, but that just means you're redefining Thor to be something else--it does not mean I have not falsified the Thor claim I was given. It only shows the god-claimant is arguing dishonestly.



In other words:

As there exists a God claim that can be falsified, it is therefore untrue that all god claims are unfalsifiable.

But that's the point. God claims can be redefined. Religion doesn't follow the same rules science does. It can move the goalposts because it's not playing the same game as science. The claim that God created eve from a rib of adam may at some time have been literally believed, but there are few christians who would still assert that is literally how it happened today, i think.

Religion can shift it's claims around because factual asserions being true is not nearly as essential to them as it is to science. Religious faith does not stem from factual accuracy. it stems from belief in something higher and/or the spiritual/moral message of a holy book. It happens a priori to the process of checking the facts. Belief in science happens a posteriori to checking the facts.

That is why god is unfalsifiable. Not because you can't make up terms of falsification by reading the holy books, but because those terms can be shifted to change their meaning without fundamentally damaging the underlying faith.

 

[Saxnot]

Yes. That is the definiton of unfalsifiable. Now read what i said again. Religion cannot be effectively debated in terms of proof because it cannot be falsified.

So... according to you any court case that can't be falsified, we should just throw out all the other evidence because we can't falsify it? Great -__-

I don't think any court case that can't be falsified has any evidence of such to begin with or enough evidence exists that falsifying it is blatantly wrong.

Can't say that was a very good analogy.

So you don't believe in situations where it is impossible to tell for sure what happened somewhere but do have evidence that suggests one thing?

Unfalsifiable means there is no possible situation in which we could know for sure whether this thing is true or not. So it might be hard for us to know if you killed someone on mars, but there is a situation possible in which we could be sure you did it. We could be present at the murder, for example.

There is no possible situation imaginable wherein the existance of god/the flying spaghetti monster/vishnu could definately and certainly be disproved, so these things are unfalsifiable.

Fair enough, but in all practicality, if you can give evidence in support of something or evidence against something then evidence is relevant. Maybe you can never falsify it, but if you see a flying spaghetti monster that's pretty good start in regards to evidence. If there's no evidence at all that's a pretty good start to saying it's not worth considering until that changes.

Well, that's a philosophical question. I see what you mean, but it seems to me, when discussing the fundamental elements of the universe, it's a bit of a copout to say 'i don't see any evidence, therefore it probably does't exist'. My position is that i have never seen anything convincing enough to draw me to believe in one particular god, but that does not mean they don't exist. I can therefore not be certain of any god's (non-)existence, and must be agnostic.

But that's just me.

Whether is or is not a fundamental element of the universe is also in question. And it's no more a cop out than saying that I don't believe that my neighbor wrestled Putin and won. It's possible, but that's far from enough to make me even seriously consider it when there is no evidence whatsoever for it. I could argue that we can be certain about nothing but our own existence, but that's not enough to paralyze us from disbelieving in certain things and not others in other cases.

I point you towards David Hume 'I am nothing but a bundle of perceptions'. Even the existence of the self is in question. What are you? Can you really, fundamentally say you are doing anything apart from responding to stimuli right now? The input is this text, the output is the response you will (hopefully) write? And if that is all you are, is existence anyting but stuff happening?

To determine your ideas about what the self is and its place in the universe as you percieve it seems one of the most fundamental things there are to me. and part of that is how you stand on things you must be fundamentally uncertain of.

Notice the word 'I'. Who is perceiving? Something exists to perceive. Whatever it is, define it as yourself. And I never said I did anything but respond to stimuli. I'd say that seems to be how humans work. And I see no problem with that being what I am.

As for things I must be uncertain of, well it depends. Situational. In regards to a deity, there is nothing at all to suggest one exists. Ergo, dismiss until evidence does appear. Just like an infinite amount of other possibilities. What else is there do with them? There are an infinite amount of contradicting possibilities that have no evidence.

So the thing that is I responds to mechanical stimuli? Then there is nothing to you but an elaborate machine? Then what is uncertainty? Lack of data?

As to lack of evidence means dismissal until evidence does appear, i agree with you. That sounds rather agnostic. Or do i misunderstand?

Yes, I'd say that is probably how people work. Given the exact same situation again the second time, shouldn't the same response be given? Do we ever really have a choice to pick another option when everything about us eventually summed up to tell us to pick the option we did? And what do you mean uncertainty? Its a state in and of itself, it's valid output, or perhaps some internal state.

But isn't that a meaningless claim? If everything is mechanically defined, that has the net effect of nil. It means there's just stuff. You can be part of stuff, but then the question becomes why you would want to be part of stuff?

I think you misunderstand how far I think it really ought to go. It's not just "I'm not sure", it's "Treating this as false until some new development comes up"

Again, that is functionally the same attitude, it seems to me, as agnosticism. The only difference is in how much room for doubt you describe having. Agnosticists are not sure, so they keep an open mind but act without particular attention to any god (or his/her commands). They therefore in practice act as if there is no god, which is what you seem to be doing.

 

[Shadow5]

I have worked and studied in the Biomedical field of science for a number of years and something that is obvious to me is that much of what many doctors and scientists accept as a major pillar of the field is not based in science itself. For example, a few decades ago a guy working out of a hospital in Perth, Australia isolated (accidently it must be said) a new form of bacteria from stomach ulcers and went on to prove that these bacteria cause the ulcers, not stress as was previously believed. The result of this was being barred from medical conferences and from publishing in journals. All because of a belief.

As a scientist I have a belief and faith that the foundations that I work on are correct and I check and evaluate those foundations to make sure.
But I am always aware that I am acting on the faith that someone else was right about something in the past.

So it is faith, but faith that can be proven & rationalised