The Faith & Religion mega Thread

Originally Posted by SigTerm Please, define yourself. If you can't, then by your logic I'll have to assume that you do not exist.

I am the specific member of species homo sapiens that is typing this message.

See? Easy.

Originally Posted by SigTerm Please, define yourself. If you can't, then by your logic I'll have to assume that you do not exist.

I am an account on LinuxQuestions.org.

Originally Posted by SL00b I am the specific member of species homo sapiens that is typing this message. See? Easy.

False. Message has been posted and nobody's typing it. "Nobody" is incapable of typing a message, and by definition "nobody" is not a homo sapiens, so there's at least one contradiction. Also I have no idea what "specific" means.

Originally Posted by dugan I am an account on LinuxQuestions.org.

False. Account is a database record that is incapable of creating messages on its own because of forum programming.

bash-4.1$ whoami
brian
bash-4.1$

Originally Posted by dugan I am an account on LinuxQuestions.org.

Negative, I am a meat popsicle.

Originally Posted by SigTerm False. Message has been posted and nobody's typing it. "Nobody" is incapable of typing a message, and by definition "nobody" is not a homo sapiens, so there's at least one contradiction. Also I have no idea what "specific" means.

Specific = individual member of the species.

I assume by saying the "message has been posted and nobody's typing it", you mean at the time you are reading it, he is no longer typing it. That and everything that follows is just playing games with semantics, it's not a real argument.

Trying to trip people up because it is difficult to accurately define things is not being genuine. For Sloob to define himself as a member of the species homo sapiens is not false. It is also obviously not the whole story. But we could list defining attributes of what qualifies as homo sapiens and support how we know those attributes. Which is the key difference between humans or other material things, and gods, ghosts, and souls. Do you have any doubt that you could talk about homo sapiens with any scientist, or person pretty much, on the planet and know you are discussing the same thing, have broad agreement over what it is? Know the general form, the usual number of limbs, etc? Now get a few theologians together from different traditions and see how much they agree on the nature of the soul.

bash-4.1$ whoelseami
GOD
bash-4.1$

Originally Posted by SigTerm False. Message has been posted and nobody's typing it. "Nobody" is incapable of typing a message, and by definition "nobody" is not a homo sapiens, so there's at least one contradiction. Also I have no idea what "specific" means. False. Account is a database record that is incapable of creating messages on its own because of forum programming.

Wow. Yet another poorly constructed argument. And you wonder why this has been a waste of time.

1) "Message has been posted and nobody's typing it."

At the time the statement was made, it was completely true, rendering this premise false, and thus rendering any conclusions derived from the false premise false.

2) Also I have no idea what "specific" means.

The lesson here is, don't argue against an argument before you even know what it means.

Originally Posted by reed9 Do you have any doubt that you could talk about homo sapiens with any scientist, or person pretty much, on the planet and know you are discussing the same thing, have broad agreement over what it is?

Yes I do. I'm pretty sure there are people that are not aware of the term or will try to argue about it. Many people don't understand meaning of "evolution", for example.

Originally Posted by SL00b The lesson here is, don't argue against an argument before you even know what it means.

The lesson here is that:

1. to make a proper definition, you need to define "specific", since "specific" is ambiguous.
2. defining something is not as easy as you think.

The two professions that deal with definition on daily basis are OOP programmers and lawyers. If you want to use "definitions" in argument I'd suggest you to get a few years of experience in either profession. Excessive programming should also seriously boost your logical skill.

Originally Posted by SigTerm The lesson here is that: to make a proper definition, you need to define "specific", since "specific" is ambiguous. defining something is not as easy as you think. The two professions that deal with definition on daily basis are OOP programmers and lawyers. If you want to use "definitions" in argument I'd suggest you to get a few years of experience in either profession. Excessive programming should also seriously boost your logical skill.

Oh, I see. The purpose of this exercise is to perform a reductio ad absurdum campaign by pretending words cannot be defined.

Obviously nothing can ever be defined, that's why communications between humans and between machines is impossible, am I right?

Your arguments are defined by their declining quality.

Do you have any doubt that you could talk about homo sapiens with any scientist, or person pretty much, on the planet and know you are discussing the same thing, have broad agreement over what it is?

Yes I do.

* puts Sigterm on ignore list

Originally Posted by SigTerm Incorrect, and your logic is flawed. You claimed that "there is no soul", so burden of proof is placed upon you. It is fairly simple: By default truth is unknown. If I claim that soul exists, burden of proof is placed upon me. However, if you claim that soul does not exist, the burden of proof is placed on you. However, if I failed to prove existence of soul, it does not mean that soul does not exist, and if you fail to prove non-existence of soul, it does not mean that soul exists. Failure to prove statement does not mean that opposite is true, because there may be more than one way to prove statement. Failure to prove statement would indicate that opposite is true ONLY if there were only one and only way to prove or disprove something (existence of soul in this example). If neither side can provide proof, then truth remains unknown and argument remains unsettled. If you don't "get" it, then (IMO) you should read "Symbolic Logic" written by Lewis Carol. It doesn't deal with unknown, but it has few quite good graphical illustrations of situations when "truth" is in "A or B" state, and need to be "pushed" into either direction.

I see you added this after I responded, so here goes:

1) Is the claim "there is no soul" a positive claim, or a negative one?

2) In the conventions regarding burden of proof, is the burden on the positive claimant, or the negative one?

3) How many thousands of years and how many millions of failed attempts to prove a positive claim are required before the negative claim merit consideration?

Originally Posted by SigTerm Yes I do. I'm pretty sure there are people that are not aware of the term or will try to argue about it. Many people don't understand meaning of "evolution", for example.

But there is a meaning there to be had. Can the same be said of the soul or God?

A coherent definition of God, or the soul, is necessary to have a meaningful discussion about it. But, if the definition is unfalsifiable, if we cannot know anything about the properties attributed to God or the soul, then it still renders the term meaningless. And this is the position I'm more and more leaning towards, theological noncognitivism.

Originally Posted by dugan * puts Sigterm on ignore list

Read entire sentence next time.

Originally Posted by SL00b 1) Is the claim "there is no soul" a positive claim, or a negative one?

Positive/negative is a matter of a single "NOT" operation.

Originally Posted by SL00b 2) In the conventions regarding burden of proof, is the burden on the positive claimant, or the negative one?

On whoever claims to know the truth. If you claim that there's no soul, then you're expected to have the proof and the definition of soul.

Originally Posted by SL00b 3) How many thousands of years and how many millions of failed attempts to prove a positive claim are required before the negative claim merit consideration?

And why bother with that at all? If neither side can prove their point, use "unknown" value.

Originally Posted by SigTerm Read entire sentence next time. And why bother with that at all? If neither side can prove their point, use "unknown" value.

Because "unknown", while technically true, doesn't convey the massive improbability of some unfalsifiable, unprovable statements.