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doormouse11
Daedalian Member
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 Posted: Wed Aug 24, 2005 3:28 am Post subject: 161 |
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thanks, that was beautiful.
I particularly like how you pointed out that eventually having to stagnate or start over is not better or much different from death.
I liked the last quote, too. I know I don't want to live forever. But like it says, I just don't want to die. Too bad we can't have one without the other. |
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Lauritz Melchior
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Wed Aug 24, 2005 4:27 am Post subject: 162 |
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Yeah, that was amazing!
One of my great fears is that I'll not accomplish anything that people will remember me for after I've died. I have to continually remind myself that that doesn't matter.
_________________
2500th member give or take 3 |
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jja
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Thu Aug 25, 2005 4:47 am Post subject: 163 |
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Thanks. %?)
| doormouse11 wrote: |
| I know I don't want to live forever. But like it says, I just don't want to die. Too bad we can't have one without the other. |
I have a feeling that humanity is going to keep working on this problem and eventually solve it, to its immense relief, turmoil and distress. Those will be interesting times indeed. Perhaps, after a lot of pain, we will find some sort of compromise... I think it certain that solving death will bring down another host of thorny issues.
I think the tendency of modern corporations to assume the 'rights' of individuals, and perpetuate their power over 'intellectual property', is a hint at how grim a future it might be... Imagine patents that last for thousands of years and copyrights that span centuries, and the effect this might have on human intellectual progress. If Shakespeare had never died, would he still be asserting control over his ancient works today?
| Lauritz Melchior wrote: |
| One of my great fears is that I'll not accomplish anything that people will remember me for after I've died. I have to continually remind myself that that doesn't matter. |
Kudos. A similar fear got me motivated several years ago... I woke up at one point and said to myself, "In fifteen years, you'll be 50 years old. Will you have done anything by then that you'll be proud to have done?" I realized that at the rate I was going, the answer would eventually be 'no.' I started then to make changes in my life so that the answer could eventually be 'yes.'
If I had eternal life, I would lack this impetus, so it may be that the best benefit of death from our POV is that it gets us moving. (I also like Walt Kelly's suggestion that death is like a punchline - it provides a recognizable ending).
Here's a rough formula I just made up, to the best of my knowledge... There are three desiderada: pleasing yourself, pleasing others, and making life easier for humanity in general. If what you do satisfies two of those three conditions, you're doing very well, IMO.
_________________
JJA
"Sancte," inquit, "quare, quaeso, rapis arborem festam?" |
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Mackay
Saviour of Spiders
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| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 9:06 am Post subject: 164 |
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What you have written so far, jja, is one of the best explanations/motivations for atheism that I have read. But if I can butt in? (hope you don't mind, this has all been rather peaceful so far with all the belief systems keeping to their own threads, and I do intend for it to remain that way). But I wanted to say something about the following excerpt:
| jja wrote: |
| I think that most people haven't thought through what it would actually mean to exist forever. What would you really do with all that time? Would you accomplish new things, or would you keep doing what you're doing now? Would you try to do a bit of everything that's possible in the universe? If you accomplished this, what would be left for you to do for the rest of infinity? Your brain can't keep growing with new knowledge; there's not enough energy or matter in the universe. So you could stagnate in your old dogma, locking yourself into the same old patterns for eternity, or you could periodically forget everything and start over. And what's the difference between that last condition and dying? |
This is all true, if you assume that there is no God (an understandable assumption, for this thread). But I do not think it can be considered an argument against theistic beliefs in general. Where one does believe in a God, this God is bound to have infinite knowledge. And where one believes in a supernatural, there are bound to be so many more (probably also infinite) facets of existence which, while we are human and "alive", we would not at all be able to comprehend. There would be an infinite number of things for us to discover and learn, and rather than 'stagnating' in our old dogma, the point would be, rather, to refine it as we continue to gain more and more knowledge.
The Christian idea of death/salvation/eternity does not include hanging around in ethereal form for the rest of time - when we die, we die. Or, as they put it, we "sleep". We rest, unconscious, until the very end of time, and that is when we are resurrected. At that stage, there is no time, we're merely outside of it, along with God (the C.S. Lewis analogy helps me here - where time is represented as a line drawn on a piece of paper, God is the piece of paper). I like what you have written, but if it is intended as an argument against Christianity, or any other faith with a similar belief, you are misrepresenting the idea of eternal life. |
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jja
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 11:51 pm Post subject: 165 |
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| Mackay wrote: |
| What you have written so far, jja, is one of the best explanations/motivations for atheism that I have read. |
Thanks. It took a lot of thinking, reading and debating to get to this point...
| Quote: |
| But if I can butt in? (hope you don't mind, this has all been rather peaceful so far with all the belief systems keeping to their own threads, and I do intend for it to remain that way). |
This is an 'Ask About X' thread, so your response is on topic, and I appear to be qualified to attempt an answer, so I don't mind at all. (I was about to jump in on Ask About Christianity; you've beaten me to it... %?)
| Quote: |
But I wanted to say something about the following excerpt:
| jja wrote: |
| I think that most people haven't thought through what it would actually mean to exist forever. What would you really do with all that time? Would you accomplish new things, or would you keep doing what you're doing now? Would you try to do a bit of everything that's possible in the universe? If you accomplished this, what would be left for you to do for the rest of infinity? Your brain can't keep growing with new knowledge; there's not enough energy or matter in the universe. So you could stagnate in your old dogma, locking yourself into the same old patterns for eternity, or you could periodically forget everything and start over. And what's the difference between that last condition and dying? |
This is all true, if you assume that there is no God (an understandable assumption, for this thread). But I do not think it can be considered an argument against theistic beliefs in general. |
In that paragraph, I was addressing doormouse's question (how atheists deal with the knowledge that they will eventually cease to exist) and not the issue of whether gods exist. But I don't mind changing the subject to theology, or atheology... %?)
| Quote: |
| Where one does believe in a God, this God is bound to have infinite knowledge. |
I'm not sure that 'infinite knowledge' is a well defined term... I'm going to assume for now that you mean it literally - that with infinite knowledge, in addition to knowing all the laws that regulate the universe and whatever may be beyond, you know every event that has ever happened, from the intersection of galaxies to all the thoughts that any sentient being has ever had to the changes in energy states of all electrons that have ever existed or will exist... You can correct me if I'm off base here.
Still, I must ask: Is it really necessary for a god to have infinite knowlege in this sense? Could not a being be powerful and skillful enough to create a universe and set it in motion, without knowing every single atomic event that will ever happen in it? A set of simple rules can lead to far reaching consequences (in the same way that the movements of the planets can be basically described in three elegant sentences) and I don't see why micromanagement would be necessary or desirable for such a project as a universe... And if the universe isn't being micromanaged, why would a creator need to know all that detail?
| Quote: |
| And where one believes in a supernatural, there are bound to be so many more (probably also infinite) facets of existence which, while we are human and "alive", we would not at all be able to comprehend. There would be an infinite number of things for us to discover and learn, and rather than 'stagnating' in our old dogma, the point would be, rather, to refine it as we continue to gain more and more knowledge. |
I based my statement that infinite knowledge was not possible within this universe upon known physical laws of this universe: it takes energy to run a brain, and a hypothetical brain that knew the positions and relative velocities of every particle in the universe (the which is intrinsically impossible, as far as we know) would de facto have to be much larger than the universe and require correspondingly more energy to drive it.
All of this, of course, is irrelevant as long as we can use the standard theistic handwaving of "god can do anything, so he can have infinite knowledge, and logic and physics don't apply to him, and anyway he's outside the universe and we can't see him." I don't think this approach has much value for learning anything about universes and hypothetical entities that may have created them. Your paragraph looks to me like supposition based on doctrine; not specific enough to be amenable to proof or disproof, and with no basis for believing it other than tradition and a desire that it be true.
When I thought over and wrote my earlier response to doormouse, I didn't have such an easy out. I don't have the liberty to patch holes in my philosophy by saying that the Flying Spaghetti Monster made everything and we needn't try to understand it. I try to base what I believe on reality to the degree to which I am able. Postulating invisible entities with 'infinite power' and 'infinite knowledge' does not seem to me to be useful in this endeavor, and I think it's likely to get in the way of an honest search for truth.
| Quote: |
| The Christian idea of death/salvation/eternity does not include hanging around in ethereal form for the rest of time - when we die, we die. Or, as they put it, we "sleep". We rest, unconscious, until the very end of time, and that is when we are resurrected. At that stage, there is no time, we're merely outside of it, along with God (the C.S. Lewis analogy helps me here - where time is represented as a line drawn on a piece of paper, God is the piece of paper). I like what you have written, but if it is intended as an argument against Christianity, or any other faith with a similar belief, you are misrepresenting the idea of eternal life. |
Do the majority of Christians hold this concept of an afterlife? I thought the afterlife model varied greatly between sects.
In any case, in my reply to doormouse, I was not arguing against any particular concept of eternal life; I only meant to address how atheists get along without such concepts. I consider most schemes of 'eternal life,' including the one you mention, to be too divorced from reality to admit to meaningful discussion about whether they are valid or actual, though I can enjoy a theological or philosophical debate about them on its own merits.
I'll pause here to take a breath and give you a chance to respond. %?) In the meantime, just for fun, here's my favorite definition of philosophy:
Philo (from philo, "love");
Sophy (from sophistry, "deliberately obfuscated and fallacious reasoning")
_________________
JJA
"Sancte," inquit, "quare, quaeso, rapis arborem festam?" |
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Mackay
Saviour of Spiders
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| Posted: Sun Aug 28, 2005 4:00 am Post subject: 166 |
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| (no deep meaningful post here. Just a reminder to myself to post here when I am simultaneously available and not exhausted from being exploited by work, or about to leave for work.) (It is the length of the post I struggle with as much as the content, heh. I want to devote hours to this thing.) |
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Coyote
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 1:08 am Post subject: 167 |
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I'm moving my reply to Celt from 'Proof that God Exists' over to this thread because interest in the subject is starting up again, and I don't want to derail the other thread now that it looks like canuckfish might be returning to the other discussion.
| Celt wrote: |
| Coyote wrote: |
| Your response to the 'No' option was simply to say 'does not compute'. |
Actually it says, "Does not compute. Please explain logic". |
True, and I didn't intend to misrepresent you. But I was interpreting the first sentence as your response and the second sentence as saying "complete this branch of the chart on your own", which didn't strike me as a very convincing means of tying up that particular loose end.
| Quote: |
| You then went on to explain your logic and that was my intention when posting the chart (i.e. To find out how an atheist deals with the apparent paradox). |
I doubt I'm representative of atheists in general--I'm not even sure I qualify for the term, though I think it comes close to the mark. It might be more accurate to say that while I choose to be a Deist, I recognize that I have no logically defensible reasons for such a belief. I choose to believe simply to satisfy my own sense of aesthetics. But I admit there is no evidence to support that viewpoint.
-------------------------------------------------------
As long as I'm here, I'd like to go back to something casinopete said a couple of pages back. I didn't bother pursuing the matter at the time because cp was already dealing with several other more competent debaters and I didn't want to be a distraction. But now that the debate has been long abandoned maybe I can bring it up again, either for cp himself, or anyone else interested in the question of 'meaningfulness of existence'.
| Coyote wrote: |
| You might also ask why those human endeavors and accomplishments that are meaningless when set in a finite frame suddenly become meaningful and validated when placed in an infinite frame. Isn't it conceivable that an infinite life could also be devoid of meaning? And who would wish for such a thing? |
| casinopete wrote: |
If our sun went supernova tomorrow, what would be the meaning of anything we had ever done? Nothing left in the universe could ever know of any of it. There wouldn't even be anything left about which some other intelligence could even wonder, "What did this mean?"
If something is eternal, though, it will continue affecting the universe endlessly (and perhaps more importantly, will continue to be effected by the universe endlessly). Anything that happens within this eternal being's view is also instantly rendered immortal, simply by having an effect on that which is immortal.
That may or may not make things more "meaningful," but it certainly makes them a helluva lot more significant. |
This seems to be begging the question. Eternal things can't really be said to have an 'effect' on the eternal world-view, because those effects are themselves eternal things. Anything that 'happens' in an eternal being's view is a fly caught in amber: it has always happened, it is always happening, it always will happen. This does not automatically make such things meaningful, unless you're saying things have meaning simply by virtue of existing, in which case I'd have to say you haven't really demonstrated that point yet.
As for your closing statement, I'm not sure what distinction you're drawing between 'meaningful' and 'significant'. In what sense could something meaningless have significance? |
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casinopete
Emergency Backup Antrax
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 10:54 am Post subject: 168 |
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| Coyote wrote: |
| This seems to be begging the question. Eternal things can't really be said to have an 'effect' on the eternal world-view, because those effects are themselves eternal things. Anything that 'happens' in an eternal being's view is a fly caught in amber: it has always happened, it is always happening, it always will happen. |
I think you are talking about determinism more than anything else, and if you accept that, it applies to temporal beings as well as eternal. If what I eat for breakfast tomorrow is decided, then it has always happened, too, whether or not I am eternal.
If you are instead talking about differences between an eternal perspective and our more limited perspective, I can only ask why you would think an eternal being's consciousness wouldn't experience time in the same manner as ours - sequentially.
And, even if that being did not experience time in the way we do, our discussion about effects must certainly still be based on our own perspective rather than His/its perspective. However we define effects, from our perspective, affecting the eternal is a bigger effect than affecting the temporal.
| Coyote wrote: |
| As for your closing statement, I'm not sure what distinction you're drawing between 'meaningful' and 'significant'. In what sense could something meaningless have significance? |
I was drawing some distinction between 'meaningful' and 'significant' exactly to avoid saying effects = meaningful, because I don't know quite what people mean when they use the word 'meaningful,' but thought I could get away with using 'significant' as a rather simpler concept of... effectuality.
This does make part of my point a bit of a tautology, saying effect = effectual, but I'm adding to that, saying that infinite effect = more effectual, and suggesting that similarly, eternally remembered meaning is going to be more meaningful than soon-forgotten meaning... whatever meaning happens to mean.  |
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Coyote
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 1:44 pm Post subject: 169 |
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Determinism does seem to be a problem that crops up whenever discussing omniscient and eternal beings, but it's a can of worms I'd prefer not opening if it can be helped, so I'll grant the notion that such a being can experience events sequentially. As I see it, we can take this in two directions:
1. Isolated events or chains of events can in fact have a meaning by themselves, but they gain a far greater meaning by being eternally regarded.
2. Isolated events or chains of events do not by themselves have meaning. They can only gain meaning by virtue of being part of the eternally regarded whole of existence.
The latter interpretation is the one I've often seen put forward, and that's the one I'd meant to challenge. It looks like you're going with the former interpretation, and while I think it's a more reasonable stance, I see a problem with it too.
Since we've granted an eternal being who experiences things sequentially, then there's no particular point where we can say that things have reached their full potential of meaningfulness. That point will always be in the infinitely distant future.
But then, in what sense has an eternal being gained more meaning than a transitory being? In either case, one has only gained the meaning inherent in the events themselves, and what extra meaning is gained by regarding them for a finite length of time. Now it could be argued that full meaning is granted by the knowledge that events will in fact never stop being regarded, but this seems to revert to the other viewpoint, i.e. that things are only truly meaningful by virtue of being eternal, not through any meaning of their own. |
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casinopete
Emergency Backup Antrax
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| Posted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 8:28 pm Post subject: 170 |
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This is a very hard conversation to have without a definition of 'meaning' on the table. I cannot even tell you whether I would defend 1. or 2. My previous comments avoided deciding whether there was an initial degree of meaning, and focused only on eternal regard increasing whatever meaning was there. That much I thought I could do, even with 'meaning' left vague.
Now I am not so sure I can do that.
I do not know how to discuss the phrase "full potential of meaningfulness," though I think I would react by wondering why meaning would necessarily grow with time.
I also do not know how to discuss "meaning inherent in the events themselves," as I consider the regard of conscious observers necessary for an event to have meaning.
So... I'm a bit stymied. |
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jja
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Sun Mar 18, 2007 4:25 pm Post subject: 171 |
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| Mackay wrote: |
| (no deep meaningful post here. Just a reminder to myself to post here when I am simultaneously available and not exhausted from being exploited by work, or about to leave for work.) (It is the length of the post I struggle with as much as the content, heh. I want to devote hours to this thing.) |
Just wanted to inquire if you've given any consideration to your reply. I was enjoying this discussion!
_________________
JJA
"Sancte," inquit, "quare, quaeso, rapis arborem festam?" |
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Mackay
Saviour of Spiders
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| Posted: Thu Apr 19, 2007 12:05 pm Post subject: 172 |
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Not really, as I was taking a break from the GL for several months, and was then rendered computerless for several more months shortly after I attempted to reintegrate. vv
I'll see what I can do to rekindle the discussion next time I have a reasonable amount of spare time, but I know what a procrastinator I am and therefore make no promises.
Shoutouts to Navigator - thanks for the heads-up, I'd forgotten all about this discussion. |
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Jack_Ian
Big Endian
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| Posted: Thu Apr 19, 2007 8:11 pm Post subject: 173 |
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| Is an atheist in a coffin, all dressed up with no place to go? |
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Victoria Silverwolf
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Fri Apr 20, 2007 7:28 am Post subject: 174 |
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| Jack_Ian wrote: |
| Is an atheist in a coffin, all dressed up with no place to go? |
That's cute. 
It does raise the issue of what we atheists wish to have done with our mortal remains. I'm sure you would get many different answers. Personally, I would prefer to have as much of myself as possible recycled into other people, or used for scientific purposes. Of course, I won't be able to care about anything after I am dead, but this preference makes me feel better now. After I'm gone, you might as well use my body for dog food or Soylent Green; I won't be there to know.
_________________
Reality is a crutch for people who can't face up to science fiction |
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Samadhi
+1
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| Posted: Fri Apr 20, 2007 9:19 am Post subject: 175 |
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| Quote: |
| It does raise the issue of what we atheists wish to have done with our mortal remains. |
I've thought about that too. As you say, I won't be there, so my interests aren't paramount. Instead I should try to arrange for a ceremony that is best for those that will grieve over my death. But how can I plan for that?
If I died today, it would be up to my friends and families to decide how to deal with my body. Unfortunately that's a burden. But, it's not up to me to decide how those close to me should deal with my death. |
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Lepton
1:41+ Arse Scratcher
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| Posted: Fri Apr 20, 2007 9:36 am Post subject: 176 |
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| It's win-win for undertakers. |
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Samadhi
+1
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| Posted: Fri Apr 20, 2007 9:44 am Post subject: 177 |
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I had an asterisk but removed it:
I don't like the idea that when I die, I'm gone. Frankly, I like being alive and the notion that I will at some point no longer exist appalls me. It frightens me. And when a loved one dies, it's not very comforting to know that they're gone. That makes the pain absolute.
I would love to believe that I would live on in some form after my death. I would love to believe that those I've loved have continued on in more than just my memories and that some day I might be reunited with them.
But I can't. No matter how I've tried, no matter how comforting it would be, I can't. With all my heart I hope it's so, but I don't believe it. |
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Lepton
1:41+ Arse Scratcher
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| Posted: Fri Apr 20, 2007 1:17 pm Post subject: 178 |
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| An agnostic is someone who hasn't accepted that, imho. |
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Jack_Ian
Big Endian
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| Posted: Fri Apr 20, 2007 2:31 pm Post subject: 179 |
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| Samadhi wrote: |
| I don't like the idea that when I die, I'm gone. |
Just to place my cards on the table, I guess agnostic best describes me.
As for existence after death, you might like to read I Am a Strange Loop by Douglas Hofstadter, which is a refinement of his thoughts as expressed in his book Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid, or GEB for short.
I very much enjoyed GEB, and its themes on connections and existence were very much in line with my own feelings on the subject. From what I understand, his book, "I Am a Strange Loop" was prompted by the loss of his wife and his feeling that she lives on in some way through him and their children and the others she had touched in her life.
I haven't read it, as it seems to cover points already covered in GEB, but you might find it enlightening and I think it will appeal to your scientific mind. |
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jja
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2007 4:36 am Post subject: 180 |
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| Samadhi wrote: |
I had an asterisk but removed it:
I don't like the idea that when I die, I'm gone. Frankly, I like being alive and the notion that I will at some point no longer exist appalls me. It frightens me. And when a loved one dies, it's not very comforting to know that they're gone. That makes the pain absolute.
I would love to believe that I would live on in some form after my death. I would love to believe that those I've loved have continued on in more than just my memories and that some day I might be reunited with them.
But I can't. No matter how I've tried, no matter how comforting it would be, I can't. With all my heart I hope it's so, but I don't believe it. |
Most of what I have to say about this is in my earlier posts in this thread. It's a deep problem with no simple solution. Perhaps, as Ionesco suggested. the best strategy is to try not to take it seriously. We are of nature, and things of nature are ephemeral.
Some people think that life is only meaningful if it's infinite in duration. My reply is: Does a hot dog need to be of infinite length before you can properly enjoy it?
I wrote a parable on this topic a while back that has its best effect when read in columnar format, IMO, so here's a link:
http://www.jja.org/parallel.html
_________________
JJA
"Sancte," inquit, "quare, quaeso, rapis arborem festam?" |
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casinopete
Emergency Backup Antrax
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| Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2007 9:15 am Post subject: 181 |
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Your parable is interesting regarding the comparison between "soul" and speed.
Your parable is deeply condescending when it ends with "I can't see the soul -> therefore God," as though all, or even a majority of believers in deity must be total fucking morons with no respect for reason.
You press forward with your condescension in the first comment in your comments section, when your response strongly implies to someone that they believe in God because of their "drive to believe things that aren't true."
You do so again in your response to the second comment, when you declare that people only postulize the existence of a "soul" because "it fits with something [they] really want to believe." |
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jja
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Sun Apr 22, 2007 3:39 am Post subject: 182 |
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| casinopete wrote: |
Your parable is interesting regarding the comparison between "soul" and speed.
Your parable is deeply condescending when it ends with "I can't see the soul -> therefore God," as though all, or even a majority of believers in deity must be total fucking morons with no respect for reason.
You press forward with your condescension in the first comment in your comments section, when your response strongly implies to someone that they believe in God because of their "drive to believe things that aren't true."
You do so again in your response to the second comment, when you declare that people only postulize the existence of a "soul" because "it fits with something [they] really want to believe." |
My parable is of course meant to have a point, and to state that point succinctly, but I think you are reading too much into it if you call it condescending, or tar me with intending such words as 'total morons'.
The parable's main point is that that which most people call 'soul' is as inseparable a part of a person as the heart or brain, and that to ask where the 'soul' went after the body died is like asking where the light went after the lightbulb burned out. It didn't 'go' anywhere, it just stopped. I do not hold that the soul is an eternal thing that can be separated from the material body and preserved, and I think I said so quite plainly. You may gain some benefit from asking yourself just why this upset you so much.
I am an atheist. I do in fact think that the reason why most people embrace religions is because the religions promise survival of bodily death and overlay a comprehensible structure of meaning on the universe. When people pursue such beliefs, they are doing that which I ontologically consider to be irrational, but to tag them as morons for so doing would be quite unjust. All human beings are subject to wanting things to be true that aren't true, or which they can't possibly prove to be true, and this includes atheists.
If the idea is that I should refrain from stating my beliefs because theists may find them offensive - I am sorry, but that is not acceptable. Atheism has never been a popular world view, but asking it to keep its mouth shut and stand in the corner lest it disturb the other ontologies is going rather too far. I have as much a right to breathe and speak my mind as you do.
_________________
JJA
"Sancte," inquit, "quare, quaeso, rapis arborem festam?" |
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casinopete
Emergency Backup Antrax
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| Posted: Sun Apr 22, 2007 5:26 am Post subject: 183 |
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| jja wrote: |
| My parable is of course meant to have a point, and to state that point succinctly |
The purpose of a parable is to make a point by comparison. Until the last paragraph, your story is laying out such a comparison, a very interesting one.
The last paragraph breaks the parable form, because it makes its "point" with no regard toward the comparison. It stands on its own. The comparison to the car story is completely irrelevant, because it doesn't make the point about the poor logic any better or clearer or more profound.
| jja wrote: |
| but I think you are reading too much into it if you call it condescending, or tar me with intending such words as 'total morons'. |
| the parable wrote: |
| "Since the love and life and laughter is not here, it must have gone somewhere else. I postulate that there is a mystic entity — perhaps the creator of all things — that took the love and life and laughter away when she died, and now preserves the love and life and laughter in a special place where there is nothing material — where pure soul exists forever and ever!" |
This is straightforwardly moronic. There is no Reason in it. The postulate does not in any sense follow from the observation. You agree with my conclusions about this - the nonsense of this argument is the "point" of the end of your story.
I am not reading too much into it when I say you are providing an example of totally moronic thought.
I may be reading too much into it when I react as though you are painting most theists with this brush, an intent that would definitely be condescending - it is possible you are referring to a specific person rather than theists in general.
| jja wrote: |
| The parable's main point is that that which most people call 'soul' is as inseparable a part of a person as the heart or brain, and that to ask where the 'soul' went after the body died is like asking where the light went after the lightbulb burned out. It didn't 'go' anywhere, it just stopped. I do not hold that the soul is an eternal thing that can be separated from the material body and preserved, and I think I said so quite plainly. You may gain some benefit from asking yourself just why this upset you so much. |
And you may gain some benefit from noticing that it is not the idea that upsets me - I made it pretty clear that I find the comparison interesting. I am not reacting to your opinion about the "soul." It is the end of your story, the putting very stupid words into your opponents' mouths and then ridiculing them that I find objectionable. Strawmanning is always deeply dishonest tactics.
| jja wrote: |
| I am an atheist. I do in fact think that the reason why most people embrace religions is because the religions promise survival of bodily death and overlay a comprehensible structure of meaning on the universe. When people pursue such beliefs, they are doing that which I ontologically consider to be irrational, but to tag them as morons for so doing would be quite unjust. All human beings are subject to wanting things to be true that aren't true, or which they can't possibly prove to be true, and this includes atheists. |
It is amusing to me that you are trying to push the tagging people as morons off onto me. Reread the paragraph I quoted. There is no question that the words are moronic. Not light and goofy, not misunderstood, not based on different values, the words are just plain stupid. And you are putting them into someone else's mouth and mocking them.
| jja wrote: |
| If the idea is that I should refrain from stating my beliefs because theists may find them offensive - I am sorry, but that is not acceptable. Atheism has never been a popular world view, but asking it to keep its mouth shut and stand in the corner lest it disturb the other ontologies is going rather too far. I have as much a right to breathe and speak my mind as you do. |
Yes, of course, I am persecuting you so horrifically. My pointing out that you are using a straw man is clearly actually a facet of my participation in a worldwide conspiracy to oppress Athiests.
I did not tell you to refrain from stating your beliefs. I don't find your opinions about God and the "soul" the least bit offensive, and I don't care if most theists would. I did not ask you to keep your mouth shut or stand in the corner. I did not in any way suggest you don't have a right to breath and speak your mind. Your implication that I have done any of these things is dishonest.
I pointed out that the words you put in your example theist's mouth were fucking moronic, and it is condescending to do that. That is all. |
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extro...*
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| Posted: Sun Apr 22, 2007 2:46 pm Post subject: 184 |
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| casinopete wrote: |
| I pointed out that the words you put in your example theist's mouth were fucking moronic, and it is condescending to do that. That is all. |
It's such a common ploy though. They may come back with something that amounts to "but it's not 'fucking moronic' that you're not as enlightened as me". But it is. It really is. |
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extro...*
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| Posted: Sun Apr 22, 2007 3:02 pm Post subject: 185 |
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| jja wrote: |
| I do in fact think that the reason why most people embrace religions is because the religions promise survival of bodily death and overlay a comprehensible structure of meaning on the universe. When people pursue such beliefs, they are doing that which I ontologically consider to be irrational, but to tag them as morons for so doing would be quite unjust. |
Such people as think that way would be morons. Furthermore, asking "why most people embrace religion" may be like asking why most people embrace the theory of evolution. Most people who embrace the theory of evolution, for instance, don't understand it. It is ridiculous to try to investigate whether there is truth in something by looking at why "most people" believe it. Anyone who does that is also a moron. |
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jja
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Sun Apr 22, 2007 8:18 pm Post subject: 186 |
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| extro...* wrote: |
| It is ridiculous to try to investigate whether there is truth in something by looking at why "most people" believe it. |
I agree. When I made the statement you referred to, I was trying to explain what I felt, not why I felt that way
Your reasons for pursuing religious beliefs are your own, and I am not trying to tell you or anyone what you should believe, or assert that I know the reasons why anyone in particular is a believer. I do maintain that the reasons I stated are much of the driving force behind the beliefs of most theists, as they are among the largest carrots that religions have to offer. (The sticks can wait for another discussion.)
In any case, this is an 'Ask about...' thread. If you want to know the motivations behind my statements and my beliefs, you could just ask me. It might start a more productive discussion than the 'X implied that Y is a moron' comments. I think it's best to keep things civil.
_________________
JJA
"Sancte," inquit, "quare, quaeso, rapis arborem festam?" |
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extro...*
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| Posted: Sun Apr 22, 2007 10:03 pm Post subject: 187 |
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Two questions for atheists:
1) Do you believe in free will, or are our actions determined by physical laws, perhaps combined with some pure random influences?
2) What is the basis for moral values? I understand atheists have them. But what, for instance, would be better about an action which perpetuates human life, versus, for instance, one which would bring about the end of mankind? There is no purpose to our being in the universe, right? Would it matter if we all stopped procreating? (OK, maybe that's more than two - reduction to two left as an exercise) |
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Antrax
ESL Student
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| Posted: Sun Apr 22, 2007 10:19 pm Post subject: 188 |
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1) Free will.
2) There's no basis. Nothing inherent to the world means that ending all human existence is wrong. It's just a sort of thing we accept because we like the outcome better than the alternative.
_________________
After years of disappointment with get rich quick schemes, I know I'm gonna get rich with this scheme. And quick! |
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Chuck
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Sun Apr 22, 2007 11:14 pm Post subject: 189 |
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| If free will doesn't depend on the laws of physics then how does it work? If my decisions are caused by some nonphysical soul or instructions from God then how is that any freer? They're just caused by something other than the physics that we know. If I'm free to accept or reject God's guidance then what mechanism causes my decision? No matter what, if my decisions have causes then they're no freer than if they were caused by the laws of physics. But if my decisions don't have causes then how are they my decisions? Without cause, a decision is something that happens to me, not something that's my responsibility. How can will be free and still be called mine? |
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extro...*
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| Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 12:41 am Post subject: 190 |
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Einstein said he didn't believe in free will. He said it (the understanding that there is no free will) often helped him not get upset at other people when they did things that would otherwise be upsetting. (for what it's worth)
For those atheists that believe in free will: Is there any more rational reason for that belief than the belief in God? |
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Chuck
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 12:56 am Post subject: 191 |
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| I don't think free will is clearly defined . That's why debates about it rage all over The Internet and drag on for many pages. They're discussing a term that has no meaning. |
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jja
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 1:07 am Post subject: 192 |
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| extro...* wrote: |
Two questions for atheists:
1) Do you believe in free will, or are our actions determined by physical laws, perhaps combined with some pure random influences? |
I agree with Chuck. I don't think that 'free will' is a well-defined term, and I suspect that if it were rigorously and unambiguously defined, it would lose most of its mystique and perhaps reduce itself to a truism.
| extro...* wrote: |
| 2) What is the basis for moral values? I understand atheists have them. |
The basis of the fundamental moral values (respect your elders, don't murder, don't steal, etc.) is derivable from game theory and evolutionary theory. See my post here:
http://www.greylabyrinth.com/discussion/viewtopic.php?p=406407&highlight=#406407
The basis of more extenuated moral values (such as those that lead people to cover the sexual areas of naked statues, or refer to legs as 'limbs') is probably an example of cruft creeping into religious thought over time. My favorite example is a joke in which God is delivering version 1.0 of the ten commandments to Moses on the mountaintop:
God: "...and thou shalt not boil a kid in its mother's milk. Do you understand?"
Moses: "Perfectly, Lord! You mean that we should never eat meat and cheese in the same meal!"
God: "Moses, I said, thou shalt not boil a kid in its mother's milk!"
Moses: "Of course! You mean that we should keep separate sets of dishes, one for meat and one for dairy..."
God: "Moses! Listen to me! Thou shalt not..."
Moses: "...and if any plate gets cross contaminated, we should bury it for three days to purify it..."
God: "...you know what, Moses...? Whatever makes you happy."
| extro...* wrote: |
| But what, for instance, would be better about an action which perpetuates human life, versus, for instance, one which would bring about the end of mankind? There is no purpose to our being in the universe, right? |
Unsurprisingly, as a species we want to be alive. (Were this desire weak in us, we would not be here.) On an objective, grand-scale cosmic view, we may not be very important to the continued functioning of the universe. But whether we survive is extremely important to us...
I don't know whether there is a 'purpose' to our existence, if only because our collective thermodynamic properties make it a bit easier for the universe to function, or if we are part of a means by which universes can become self aware... But if we were born of no purpose, we can take heart, since we are able as a species to create a purpose for ourselves.
| extro...* wrote: |
| Would it matter if we all stopped procreating? (OK, maybe that's more than two - reduction to two left as an exercise) |
It matters to us, and so it doesn't particularly have to matter to anyone or anything else.
_________________
JJA
"Sancte," inquit, "quare, quaeso, rapis arborem festam?" |
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extro...*
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| Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 2:46 am Post subject: 193 |
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| Chuck wrote: |
| I don't think free will is clearly defined . That's why debates about it rage all over The Internet and drag on for many pages. They're discussing a term that has no meaning. |
I think we can at least say that it's something other than some combination of determinism and randomness. True, it's hard to conceive what else there could be from a physical point of view. But awareness (consciousness) has the same qualities. I think of consciousness and free will as like input to and output from the non-physical mind. We (each conscious individual) know(s) consciousness exists (actually, there are famous thinkers who deny even that), but there is no objective evidence of it, nor any imaginable physical explanation for it (unlike anything else, which even if unexplained, is at least imaginably physically explainable). One possibility is that consciousness is some sort of "epiphenomena" that arises from out brains, but does not in any way affect it. If consciousness does affect the physical (brain), it would have to be non-deterministically, and non-randomly, because otherwise, if it arises from the physical deterministically and/or randomly, and affects the physical deterministically and/or randomly, it could be explained away as just a deterministic and/or random physical-to-physical interaction, describable by a law. If it can be simply explained away as such, then there is no evidence that it exists, or has an effect. Of course, again, we know it exists. So let's consider that it has no effect. I consider it remarkably fortuitous, given that our subjective experiences have no effect on anything, that they are as they are. What would the universe be like without subjective experiences? No different than if it didn't exist at all. So the alternative is that it has some effect. Something not deterministic, and not random. This makes sense to me as free will.
Furthermore, there is truly zero evidence that conscious experience (consciousness, awareness) is associated any more exclusively with living things than with anything else. This is hard to realize or accept, but I have become convinced it is true. The reason we associate consciousness (such as we have) is rooted in ancient ignorance of what is now basic science. There are two sorts of 'awareness' - one our personal awareness of our subjective experiences, the other being something we attribute to certain kinds of observable behavior, as when living things behave as if they are aware. The two have become confused because they were both at one time attributed to a "vital force" or "soul". Each individual was conscious of its own subjective experiences but not of subjective experiences of others. Each conscious individual knows with correct certainty that this latter form of awareness, or consciousness of subjective experiences which can't be meaningfully described, does indeed exist (at least in him/herself, but that is sufficient). We also observed that only animals, and moreso higher animals, moreso still humans, display this former kind of awareness, which is evidenced by responses which seem appropriate to ones surroundings. We saw no evidence of either of these kinds of awareness in inanimate objects or simple machines, so we believed they were the same thing - that the sort of 'awareness' as observed in behavior was brought about by the unobservable awareness we know by being. But not so. We can now build machines which behave as if they were 'aware', but don't have reason to expect they actually are. So, do we have reason to believe anything is not aware? Not behaving as if it were doesn't seem to be a reason. So personally, (a) I know awareness exists, (b) it seems to be either remarkably fortuitous (beyond all likelihood), or more likely the input corresponding to the output of free will, and furthermore (c) I have no rational, scientific or other reason to believe awareness or free will are anything other than present always and everywhere in the universe. (d) That seems a lot like there being a God. But I can easily imagine how, without thinking about anything, one could imagine there is no God. |
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extro...*
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| Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 2:57 am Post subject: 194 |
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| jja wrote: |
| The basis of the fundamental moral values (respect your elders, don't murder, don't steal, etc.) is derivable from game theory and evolutionary theory. |
Game theory assumes some pre-existing notion of win and lose, so we can toss that aside.
Evolution makes us what we are, and if what I am is someone that mugs (or murders) little old ladies, then that's as 'good' as anything else. |
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jja
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 3:33 am Post subject: 195 |
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| extro...* wrote: |
| Game theory assumes some pre-existing notion of win and lose, so we can toss that aside. |
Not at all. A 'win' is a greater likelihood of the propagation of a gene or a cultural meme, and a 'loss' is a lesser likelihood. These are immanent conditions of the case in question (natural development of social behaviors) and are not tacked on arbitrarily.
| extro...* wrote: |
| Evolution makes us what we are, and if what I am is someone that mugs (or murders) little old ladies, then that's as 'good' as anything else. |
In point of fact, murder of the elderly would only have a 'good' effect (in terms of genetic and social propagation) in times of famine, when food should be going primarily towards the children, the fertile and the protective elements. Even during such a time, the loss of knowledge and the weakening of the murder taboos (If you can murder little old ladies within your clan without penalty, why not murder anyone else who is weak or sick?) would make the behavior counterproductive for the clan in the long term.
Many people think that 'survival of the fittest' necessitates some sort of Highlanderesque ruthlessness that permits no cooperative or altruistic behaviors among genes, individuals or societies. This is a common caricature of natural selection. Behaviors that successfully propagate more genes than other behaviors will be selected for over time. Social structures that encourage such successful behaviors will likewise be favored by cultural evolution. If cooperative and altruistic behaviors increase the survival chances of a 'selfish' individual gene, it is to the gene's advantage to encourage that behavior.
_________________
JJA
"Sancte," inquit, "quare, quaeso, rapis arborem festam?" |
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extro...*
Guest
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| Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 3:58 am Post subject: 196 |
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| jja wrote: |
| extro...* wrote: |
| Game theory assumes some pre-existing notion of win and lose, so we can toss that aside. |
Not at all. A 'win' is a greater likelihood of the propagation of a gene or a cultural meme, and a 'loss' is a lesser likelihood. |
And those propagations are meaningful .... why?
| jja wrote: |
| extro...* wrote: |
| Evolution makes us what we are, and if what I am is someone that mugs (or murders) little old ladies, then that's as 'good' as anything else. |
In point of fact, murder of the elderly would only have a 'good' effect (in terms of genetic and social propagation) in times of famine ... |
But I meant 'good' in a moral sense, and am asking for the basis of such morality. So why wouldn't it be 'good' for me to kill whoever I meet? Anything 'good' about genetic and social propagation?
| Quote: |
| ... , when food should be going primarily towards the children, the fertile and the protective elements. Even during such a time, the loss of knowledge and the weakening of the murder taboos (If you can murder little old ladies within your clan without penalty, why not murder anyone else who is weak or sick?) would make the behavior counterproductive for the clan in the long term. |
Fuck the clan. I'm out to wreak havoc on everything and all of it. Anything 'wrong' with that?
| Quote: |
| Many people think that 'survival of the fittest' necessitates some sort of Highlanderesque ruthlessness that permits no cooperative or altruistic behaviors among genes, individuals or societies. |
But I'm not one of those people. I understand how altruism can be selected for naturally - how it promotes survival of one's genes (given they're likely many of the same genes in those in the neighborhood). I'm asking if there's anything 'good' about promoting survival, or anything 'bad' about seeking to destroy mankind. |
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Victoria Silverwolf
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 4:08 am Post subject: 197 |
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| extro...* wrote: |
Two questions for atheists:
1) Do you believe in free will, or are our actions determined by physical laws, perhaps combined with some pure random influences? |
Short answer: Yes.
Long answer: It is clear that human beings (and, to some extent, certain animals) make choices freely. There are, of course, physical and emotional limitations which prevent us from having absolute free will. I can't sprout wings and fly; I may be so scared of asking someone out on a date that I can't, no matter how much I want to.
However, within these limitations, people clearly have free will. The question to ask is how does this come about. Scientists and philosophers have discussed this topic for millenia, and I am not about to count myself among them. For whatever it might be worth, here are my simple-minded thoughts.
Consciousness is a function of the brain; it is a phenomenon which emerges when a sufficiently complex system which reacts to its own actions (a key point) reaches a certain level. Thus, free will, and all other functions of the brain, are a result of deterministic physical laws (classical Newtonian physics) and genuinely random, non-deterministic events (modern physics) and, perhaps most importantly, the fact that the phenomenon of consciousness is able -- in fact, must -- interact with itself.
| Quote: |
| 2) What is the basis for moral values? I understand atheists have them. But what, for instance, would be better about an action which perpetuates human life, versus, for instance, one which would bring about the end of mankind? There is no purpose to our being in the universe, right? Would it matter if we all stopped procreating? (OK, maybe that's more than two - reduction to two left as an exercise) |
Because I am a biological organism, I am able to experience suffering. Because I was lucky enough to be raised in a way which gave me at least a tiny amount of empathy, the suffering of others causes me to suffer. Again, because I am a biological organism, I prefer to avoid suffering. (Obviously one sometimes endures one form suffering in order to avoid worse suffering. For example, I accept the pain of an injection to avoid getting a disease.)
One might ask at this point why suffering is "bad" and not suffering is "good." I can only say that this seems axiomatic. One could as easily say, given the reality of any particular deity, why obeying that deity is "good" and not obeying that deity is "bad." If you say that the deity is, by definition, "good", then that is also an axiom. If you say that the deity will inflict eternal punishment in the afterlife, then we are back to asking why suffering is "bad" and not suffering is "good." To put it another way, why is going to Hell "bad" and going to Heaven "good"? This may seem obvious; I can only say that it is equally obvious to me that suffering is "bad."
Given the axiom that suffering is "bad," and the observable fact that the suffering of others causes me to suffer, I offer the following corollary as the basis of my ethical system.
The degree to which something should be regarded as an object of ethical consideration is directly proportional to its ability to experience suffering.
Non-living things, micro-organisms, plants, and the dead cannot suffer, so they cannot be objects of ethical consideration; at least some animals can suffer, so they should be objects of ethical consideration, directly proportional to their ability to suffer; human beings have a profound ability to suffer, so they should be very highly regarded as objects of ethical consideration. If sentient life is ever found on other worlds, or if artificial intelligence capable of suffering is ever created, it would also have to be regarded as an object of ethical consideration.
Of course, reasonable people can disagree on exactly how far one should go to regard various animals, what the best way to reduce suffering might be, and so on. This is why ethics is not a perfect science.
So what will this all matter a trillion years from now? In the most literal sense, it doesn't matter at all. However, it matters now. In addition to that, how we act now will have an effect on others act for a very long time. Not forever, no; but we are still strongly influenced by the actions of people who have been dead for millenia.
Humanity doesn't have a "purpose" in any real sense; it just is. And since human beings can suffer, and can empathize with the sufferings of others, it is only natural that they should act to minimize suffering. This may be all meaningless after the human species is extinct, but it has a vital meaning now.
_________________
Reality is a crutch for people who can't face up to science fiction |
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Victoria Silverwolf
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 4:30 am Post subject: 198 |
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| Quote: |
| We can now build machines which behave as if they were 'aware', but don't have reason to expect they actually are. |
I'm not clear what you mean here. Computers and robots and such that seem to react to stimuli in conscious ways? I would contend that this is simply an illusion. We do not have any machines which react to the environment in a way which is evenly remotely similar to a genuinely conscious being. The machine which can beat the master chessplayer cannot offer an opinion on a poem; the computer program which can trick you into thinking it is having a meaningful conversation with you reveals itself as an illusion as soon as you have anything but the simplest sort of chat with it.
Perhaps someday we will be able to build machines that truly react to stimuli in genuinely sentient ways; these machines will be aware.
| Quote: |
| So, do we have reason to believe anything is not aware? |
I'm sorry, this is a HUGE leap of logic. It seems to be something like this:
1. Some living things are aware. (I fully agree.)
2. Some machines "act" as if they are aware. (I don't full agree, but let's grant this point for now.)
I really don't see how you can get to:
3. Everything is aware.
Sorry, but it seems very clear to me that non-living things cannot be aware. That, in fact, the vast majority of living things are not aware. (Without trying to pin things down too definitely, I'd hazard to guess that an oyster is not aware in any meaningful way. Certainly this would be true of bacteria, etc.)
If it were true that everything were aware, this would indeed be strong evidence of something supernatural in the universe. I see no reason whatsoever to believe that everything is aware; I would, indeed, suggest that hardly anything is aware.
_________________
Reality is a crutch for people who can't face up to science fiction |
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Chuck
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 4:43 am Post subject: 199 |
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Why state that there is no imaginable physical explanation for consciousness? Even if no one alive today can imagine a possible explanation it doesn't mean no one ever will. Consciousness and its apparent effects on our behaviors could both be the product of some other physical process that we'll discover in the future. If consciousness is really just our memory of the decision making process then they'd be closely correlated.
There is evidence that other people are conscious. They act much like I do and I can detect my own consciousness. Experience tells me that things that act like each other often have similar basic properties. It's not proof that anyone else is consciousness, but it is evidence. Higher animals act less like I do than other people, but far more like I do than inanimate objects. I have no evidence for or against inanimate consciousness. Is there any reason for me to suspect that it exists? Lack of proof of nonexistence doesn't seem like a very good reason. There are lots of things that I can't prove don't exist. Should I believe in all of them? If not, then I'd need reason to choose one but not another.
A machine that acted as though it were conscious might have some sort of consciousness, just not human consciousness. All I have to go on is construction and behavior. For other humans I have both as evidence. For our current machines I would have only behavior. That's still better evidence than a rock presents. I would have some reason to think that a machine with suitable behavior might have some form of consciousness. That would not give me reason to think that a rock is conscious. The question of consciousness might not be yes or no for any one object. There might be be degrees of consciousness and multiple types of consciousness. Future generations might know more. |
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jja
Daedalian Member
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| Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 4:59 am Post subject: 200 |
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| extro...* wrote: |
| jja wrote: |
| Not at all. A 'win' is a greater likelihood of the propagation of a gene or a cultural meme, and a 'loss' is a lesser likelihood. |
And those propagations are meaningful .... why? |
The successful propagations are what exist, or what are most common, in the human genome and human cultures. The unsuccessful ones either went out of existence or constitute genetic diseases, or rare or discouraged behaviors. In between are a wide range of genes / memes that are just getting by, or which tied their existence to that of the successful, or which are both beneficial and harmful, but are just enough more beneficial than harmful to keep a foothold.
Regardless, it is all only 'meaningful' to beings that both possess cognition and care whether humans exist. It is still significant from an objective standpoint, since the tiny portion of the universe we occupy has changed in accordance with these wins / losses.
| extro...* wrote: |
| jja wrote: |
| In point of fact, murder of the elderly would only have a 'good' effect (in terms of genetic and social propagation) in times of famine ... |
But I meant 'good' in a moral sense, and am asking for the basis of such morality. So why wouldn't it be 'good' for me to kill whoever I meet? Anything 'good' about genetic and social propagation? |
It's my contention that your perception of what 'good' means in a moral sense has been shaped by natural selection, as described above. If, as is the case with some insects, multiple human babies had to kill and eat each other in the womb before one could emerge alive to carry on the species, we would look upon fratricide and abortion in a very different light than we do. Good and Evil are concepts that relate to the human condition, and any human application of these concepts beyond humanity itself likely stems from empathy, which is itself a useful tool for natural selection.
| extro...* wrote: |
| Fuck the clan. I'm out to wreak havoc on everything and all of it. Anything 'wrong' with that? |
From my standpoint (and I presume yours as well), as an organism shaped by the concerns of natural selection as expressed through societal norms, it's utterly abhorrent. From the standpoint of natural selection, it's an inferior evolutionary strategy, since the clan would either toss you out to starve on your own (the survival chances of solitary organisms are much reduced), or take more drastic and direct measures to keep you from wreaking havoc on them (survival chances close to zero).
| extro...* wrote: |
| I understand how altruism can be selected for naturally - how it promotes survival of one's genes (given they're likely many of the same genes in those in the neighborhood). I'm asking if there's anything 'good' about promoting survival, or anything 'bad' about seeking to destroy mankind. |
Promoting survival is good (read: works to propagate genes) from the standpoint of natural selection, and destroying all humans is bad (read: doesn't work to propagate genes). By what I do not regard as coincidence, we humans, gene-driven and hagridden by our struggles to find some safe and stable form, think that promoting survival is good and destroying all humans is bad. I regard this as being more than sufficient support for stating that promoting survival is 'good' and destroying all humans is 'bad'.
No supernatural entities were consulted in coming to this conclusion. %?)
_________________
JJA
"Sancte," inquit, "quare, quaeso, rapis arborem festam?" |
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