IMO, (certain tests) (are) far more useful to society as a criterion for disqualifying idiots from being allowed to squat in high places — 180 Proof

Admission tests to law school and graduate school. Pure IQ tests, to decide who gets in and who does not.

IQ tests are not predictive of anything useful to either the test taker or society. MENSA is merely a club for high aptitude underachievers. Big whup. — 180 Proof

IQ is a measure of a quality. Other qualities exist, which may enhance or diminish what success one with a high IQ may achieve. On the other hand, even the concept of "success" is at stake, or rather, a matter of individual preference, which is subjective, and is therefore not a good benchmark.

Some say success is the individual's ability at reproducing his or her own DNA in the largest number of replication. In this case, people with the highest success, and therefore the most intelligent, are Mick Jagger, Madonna (the singer / songwriter), several boxers and several basketball players. While the bottom of the totem pole of success are those with no DNA derivatives of their own; such are Hitler, Jesus Christ, most Catholic clergymen, and people who are born dead or are
eaten soon after they get born.

In this sense logic must be a prison that precludes us from seeing a lot of stuff around us. — FalseIdentity

This is true, and it's also true that we need not to see things we don't see.

Once the teacher is ready, the student appears.

The fight for survival, which renders logic to be a tool of survival, helps survival. No fight, no survival. So... those who give up the fight (logic included) perish.

Go ahead, make my day.

This is a real warning: when manipulating the universe around you - even if you do it successfully - you have not the slightest clue what you are really interacting with. — FalseIdentity

Try to live your life NOT manipulating anything. Then come back and write a report on that. Whether we know or not what we are interacting with, has no bearing on anything, until repercussions occur. Like burning fossil fuel and heating up the globe. HOWEVER. Manipulating the environment is a transferable skill, we can stop or reverse the global warming by further manipulating the environment.

This argument you present is true, but useless. It has no bearing on anything.

In my view, and I am the first to admit that this is not the only way to look at what philosophy is, is that philosophy is pre-science.

Philosophy is theory; drawing up theories based on evidence, but with less proof than what science needs to verify an event as science-discovered.

The theory of relativity is a perfect example. Einstein started with an assumption that the speed of light is the maximum attainable speed in the world. He then manipulated theoretical knowledge to describe the nature of matter as it approaches the speed of light. He was purely theorizing, and his theory involved math. He pointed at what could show that his theory is true, but he did not find this evidence. Other people found physical evidence that could neatly be explained by the Relativity theory. That's when his theory became science, scientific knowledge.

Another example would be the allegory of images on cave walls by Plato/Socrates in the Republic. The images and the conclusions drawn from the phenomena lead Socrates create the ideas of Forms and Ideals, things that are perfect, never change, last forever, and EXIST. This has not been shown to be a scientific fact, but Socrates pointed at the proof: we simply must discover the existing Forms.

The Relativity theory is science, but it started as philosophy. The theory of Ideals and Forms are philosophy, waiting to become science.

-------------------------

Philosophy deals mainly or only in subjects that can not be scientifically decided. One branch is tautologies: math, logic. The other branch applies to phenomena in our physical world, and it is what pre-science is. Theories that may be true, but no additional evidence exists to make them true aside from the original assumptions or premises the theory is based on. For instance, the existence of a creator, omniscient god. The theory is infallible; God created the world, and he knows all that happens there. That's the entire theory of a creator god. It is true, inasmuch it can't be proven wrong. But no additional evidence exists that was discovered after the theory had been created, such as "you will see Jesus return and judge all souls, living and dead." God belief is a very neat and compact theory, it is believable, but it is faith-based because it can't be shown yet that it is scientific.

-------------------------

Other unsolvable questions exist in philosophy: the classic ones deal with beauty, morals, and other elusive things, that can't be decided by logic or by evidence one way or another. What is beautiful to one person may be not to another; and neither is wrong or right, yet both will agree that beauty exist. So then what is beauty? The debate rages on.

-------------------------

One unsolvable question was "what is ethics, what makes an action moral or immoral or amoral." This question has been solved, in a philosophical manner, which unifies the ethics field and creates a useful tool to explain it; however, it is still not science, hard evidence has not been found to show it is true, outside the realm of thoughts, observations and experiments that have helped create the ethics-solving theory.

This theory may or may not be true, but I haven't read yet a refuting theory against which it can't be defended using arguments. In other words, no valid criticism exists in response to it.

The text of the theory can be found in two links on this website. One link is a long-hand explanation, with some repetition and some explanations that are too detailed to the trained philosophers' eyes; the other link points at a skeletonized description of ethics, in a very short but idea-dense text.

The long text can be found here:
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/10744/ethics-explained-to-smooth-out-all-wrinkles-in-current-debates-neo-darwinist-approach

The short, idea-rich text which is void of detailed explanation and of examples, can be found here:
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/10903/shortened-version-of-theory-of-morality-some-objected-to-the-conversational-style-of-my-paper

18. If there is a proposition then, that proposition is known

QED

Where does Fitch commit an error, make a boo boo? — TheMadFool

I explained it three times, I think. One gets tired of pointing out the same mistake. If you don't get my reasoning, and stick to your guns, it does not make Fitch's proof valid.

This is the point in reasoning when one would want an independent judge who is reasonable. Without that, it seems there is no way of convincing you of Fitch's error. And even the judgment of an independent thinker (who is not biased for you or for me) would not make a difference in your conviction. So why are we doing this? If someone makes an error in reasoning, and showing him his error makes no difference to anything in the world, then the debate is fucked. I tried to convince myself of that, and I stayed away for a while, but I get sucked in by incorrect reasoning and feel compelled to point out the mistake in it. Unfortunately nobody on this site is receptive to criticism, and if they can't fight it with logic, then they start to hate those who nailed them.

In this sense I am proud to be one of the most hated persons on this site.

That's another reason to quit here. No emotional support... yes, it is needed, if one encounters one failure after another of logically convincing others of the truth. It gets to you after a while, you feel like you are running in a ferret's wheel.

Enough if this already. It is really impossible to make you see your mistake, mad fool. And you are not the only one... all people who make propositions on this site are like you.

Enough of charging windmills. Enough of wasted brain cells. Enough of fanatic thinkers.

So you have complaints about the natural deduction rule simplification. Care to expand on that a bit.

1. The sun is hot & Grass is green.

Ergo,

2. The sun is hot. [1 Simplification]

Now,

3. Know p is true & Known p is unknown

Ergo,

4. Know p is true [3 Simplification] — TheMadFool

... but you claim in your parallel structure of the original argument, that the Grass is NOT green. That you can only claim because you drop the assumption that the grass is green.

6. Know p is true & Know p is unknown [possible if 3/5]

7. Know p is true [from 6 Simplification]

8. p is not an unknown truth [from 7]

9. p is an unknown truth & p is not an unknown truth [2, 8 Conj]

Ergo,

10. F is false = There are no unknown truths = All truths are known. [from 2 - 9 reductio ad absurdum] — TheMadFool

In this parallel example of the original argument, you drop the bold faced assumption in order to arrive at the bold-faced italics result. But you contradict your own assumption in this move, so the logic is ill, it is faulty. The fault with the logic is that in the simplification process you drop something that may not be dropped -- not allowed to be dropped.

If a proposition has an element that is essential to the proposition, you can't drop it. Yet you do that precisely.

Sorry, Mad Fool, this is the extent of my capability to explain your error. If you still don't understand my argument, that's fatal, because I can't provide a better one. So please don't ask for a better one.

6. Know p is true & Know p is unknown [possible if 3/5]

...

9. p is an unknown truth & p is not an unknown truth [2, 8 Conj]

Ergo,

10. F is false = There are no unknown truths = All truths are known. [from 2 - 9 reductio ad absurdum] — TheMadFool

This is what I meant. You drop an assumption that can't be dropped. If you don't drop the same assumption, then you can't arrive at 9 and at 10. Hence, your drop is invalid.

Let me give you an example which is not your ill-put together attempt at proof.

George is 6 feet tall, and George is a boy.
Know that George is 6 feet tall, and know that George is a boy.
Know that George is 6 feet tall. (By simplification.)
Therefore George is not a boy.

This what I wrote about George follows the same structure that you employed. Find the logical mistake in it, and you found the logical mistake in your argument.

6. Know p is true & Know p is unknown [possible if 3/5]

7. Know p is true [from 6 Simplification] — TheMadFool

7 is invalid reasoning, because you drop off an assumption that can't be dropped. You use the effect of this "drop" in the argument later. However, the knowledge that p is true, does not affect whatsoever the fact that p is not known. The two are independent. Not related, yet both apply. Therefore you can't drop one of the two (and you also can't drop both of them).

Incorrect assumption. Some truths are beyond the knowability by humans, by way of complexity or escaping detection.
— god must be atheist

Prove it! — TheMadFool

Funny.

This can only be proven by an example. And if I know the example, then it is impossible to use that example.

On the other hand, without proof it is acceptable, that the human mind is only capable of some complexity but not of all complexity. For instance, religionists will tell you that god is so complex, that we can't fathom his thoughts. This is an example which has no proof value, but enough creative force to make you see the point.

The escaping from detection is easier to see. We sense the world and create our thoughts based on our senses. For truth we have to rely on a model of the world which model we built relying on our senses. However, we can't trust our senses. Maybe they relate to use reality, maybe they don't. Thus, all the knowledge and truth we have accumulated about the world and its truhts, may be misguided, and completely off. Again, how does one prove this? It is completely unprovable but totally conceivable.

Start with a bit more modernity than Aristotle's 5 senses.

https://www.press.jhu.edu/news/blog/how-many-senses-do-we-have — unenlightened

Why not start with everything, and eliminate by a process of elimination all that is not sense, and proceed from there.

simplification of 7 is unallowable (Incorrect, wrong)

1. All truths are knowable. — TheMadFool

Incorrect assumption. Some truths are beyond the knowability by humans, by way of complexity or escaping detection.

The god theory includes that god is omnipotent.
Therefore he can do anything. Not anything he wants to do; but anything.

He does not have to do everything, but he must be capable of doing anything.

There are things that are impossible to do. And there are things that are very easy to do, but in combination with one or more easy thing to do, they form an impossible task.

If you read the above carefully, do you suppose there is any entity, such as god, that can perform impossible things? by way of performing possible things, which together form an impossible task.

There are other and sufficiently good explanations to man's outstanding intellect beside the god theory.

But if you want to believe the god theory, no philosopher ought to stand in your way, Original Poster.

However, you must not claim that the god theory is the only sufficiently good explanation of man's stellar superior intellect compared to other things' intellect in this world.

I counted precisely 17 things that can't be described in the English language. Here they are, with ordinal numbers designating their spots:

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
Unfortunately I forgot what 12 was.

Yes it is too much indeed. And that's why you can never have a fruitful discussion with a fanatic (both sides fanatic, theists or atheists). — dimosthenis9

Thank god you are not one of them, Dimosthenis9.

But what if the goal of a religion is not to be factually correct, but to give people moral guidance, thumos and social cohesion? — stoicHoneyBadger

That's science, too. Social science. Moral guidance and social cohesion are good survival tactics for societies. That's why people at universities conduct leading-edge, unbiassed research into these things.

The material universe is thought made visible. — EnPassant

You and TheMadFool have everything backwards. And you believe that that is how it is. That's how strong your faith is.

Put differently, natural phenomena follow mathematical laws. — TheMadFool

No, sir, the natural phenomena and their laws are described by humans using mathematics. The natural phenomena do NOT follow mathematical laws.

Mathematics does not even have laws. It has some basic rules of computation and relationships, and everything else in mathematics is a corollary to that. Laws don't exist in math. The basic rules of math are called axioms. They can't be proven, they must be accepted as they are stated, and then a system of more complicated relationships is built on that as a superstructure. Nature has nothing to do with that.

Of course there's a counter argument. I'm not a theist and I can see it. The fact that you are so smug in dismissing the possibility just shows you are captive to the Dawkinsist ideology. I decided not to go further with the discussion because it is not consistent with the original post. — T Clark

You are your own lord, you do what you wish.

If you are not a theist then I'm a discarded cigarette still burning.

Faith is independent of facts and of reason, and therefore no amount of facts or reason will shake anyone's faith (unless they give in to reason).
— god must be atheist

This is the "realist" lie about faith. Not that I think there is a need for "intelligent design" for life to begin and proliferate. This is probably off subject, so I won't take this any further here. — T Clark

There is no reason to go off topic. You said the realists' position on faith is a lie. I wish you would either retract it, or else support it with some reasonable explanation.

You are absolutely right in not going off in a tangent that has nothing to do with your claim. Stay with the topic, if I may ask you, and explain why you think the realists' position is a lie. The tangent you were going to go off on is the need or lack of need for intelligent design for life to start and propagate. Fine, don't go off on that tangent. Stay with the topic, and explain why you think the realists' position is a lie.

Since you used a false reason to retreat (to stay on topic, while introducing a topic nobody was touching, yet you made it as if that was the topic someone discussed, and was off-topic from the original post), you are no doubt in my mind are avoiding the topic because there is no legitimate argument you have against it.

But you don't have to stay just because I asked you. Go. Just go. If that's what you want. Except if you stay, then stay with the actual topic, and explain why you said the realists lie about faith.

If the universe contains beauty we can say that God knows and values beauty. — EnPassant

Sorry, EP, but we can't say that. Instead, we can say this:
If the universe contains beauty we can say that a God as we imagine him, knows and values beauty. But some of us deny that God is a real thing, so beauty may be a thing that human beings know and value, without any intervention of a supernatural bully.

One piece of evidence is the mathematical nature of the universe. — TheMadFool

Who told you this bobimeiser? The universe has no mathematical nature. Man's interpretation and description of the universe uses mathematics. The universe only uses mathematics (as far as we know) in the minds of humans. The universe, and nature, IS. It is not calculating itself via math formulas.

The real question is how do we interpret the evidence? — EnPassant

This is a good point. Do you know your god's attributes because of the evidence? No, you don't. The evidence does not let you trace back to the creator. There is nothing linking to the fact that the creator is good, bad, green, red, tall, short, omnipotent or partially potent, is everywhere or just in one place.

There is nothing in creation that points at any one quality of god. Maybe intelligence; maybe the ability to create. But there are alternative explanations about the universe that are supported by evidence and do not need the god image.

What I am driving at is that if you take the universe or parts of it as evidence that there is a creator, you still don't know anything about the creator OTHER THAN WHAT YOU FANTASIZE ABOUT HIM. You say it is necessary that he be the ultimate smart and intelligent person. But that is not NECESSARILY true. It could be true, or not, and looking at the universe you don't know, you can NOT know if your fantasy is true or not.

There is a thought that comes out of this: if you don't know ANY attributes of your god, then you don't know there is a god; you can have a faith. And since you don't know any of his attributes, you can't have faith on knowledge.

Hence, you can't have faith on facts. Or on theories.

Therefore faith does not depend on facts or on evidence, or on reason; it is completely removed from all that.

Therefore my initial opionion stands.

This is the "realist" lie about faith. Not that I think there is a need for "intelligent design" for life to begin and proliferate. This is probably off subject, so I won't take this any further here. — T Clark

You're right. There is no counter argument, so you elegantly avoid the discussion of it.

Quite. — 180 Proof

I refuse to stay quite! Who do you think you are to tell me that. (Indignantly refuses to believe the spell-checker, as it may be a device to check for spells and curses and other effects of faith.)

Lots of armchair athletes here — jgill

We are so strong as athletes, that we can lift the very armchair we sit on.

People claim to accept mental illness but then if a guy talks to a girl in the wrong way everyone calls him a creep. So much for accepting mental illness. We seem to have zero acceptance of stupidity or of evil, and often blame mental illness on those things so we can attack it without feeling guilty. — hope

I more-or-less agree, except that if someone is described that he did something wrong (morally or socially) because of mental disease, we tend to forgive him or her. If someone does something evil without the stigmatizing forgiveness that comes along with mental disease, then we are harsher on the perpetrator.

At least this is the case in my microcosmos of social milieu.

I'd rather say: not planned but happened, which might be slightly easier to digest. Just because stochastic processes and nonlinear dynamic systems, for instance, are "incomprehensible" to someone (e.g. children, scientific illiterates, 'philosophical suicides', cretins, etc) isn't grounds for woo-of-the-gaps that only begs the question of one mystery by attempting to explain it with a greater mystery. — 180 Proof

While (incomprehensible philosophical jargon) is incomprehensible, you're right, it is not grounds for woo-of-the-gaps. That is true, and nobody could argue that. But then again, nobody could argue that faith requires any grounds. It is FAITH, for crying out loud. It is a belief that needs no proof or reason, or reasoned explanation. There is not enough explanation in materialist theory that will take that away from the faithful. Faith is independent of facts and of reason, and therefore no amount of facts or reason will shake anyone's faith (unless they give in to reason).

Only thing you can do nowadays is to play the victim like everyone else. Otherwise you will be lynched as a "racist". — hope

In America you get lynched whether you are a racist, or a race.

I think Simone gets positive reviews because fighting mental illness, breast cancer, and childhood altarboy syndrome is "in". Fifty years ago or more, mental disease was swept under the carpet. But we created equal access, and that I applaud, along with trying to eradicate the stigma of mental unhealth. This is in line with the efforts of getting races into professions, and women into male professions. This is all good, because I am a leftist. There was some flack in the eighties, like stories circulating how much of idiots the minority professionals were, but these stories were highly of anecdotal nature, no statistics existed on showing the "inferiority" of black electricians or the superiority of Asian porn stars.

So... this is a trend now, much like lynching black people was a trend in the twenties. I like this present trend, but don't be fooled by it: come a turn in the economy, and people will point a scapegoat faster than you can say "meh-eh-eh-eh-eh". Trends are now predictable, we have enough statistics piled up on that. Some of us like a given trend, some of us hate a given trend.

Coming back to Simone: he or she (I follow sports so little I don't even know his or her gender, race, or citizenship) is mentally ill. She is a darling because she dared to quit; she would be a darling if she continued and she did not quit. She could make no mistake, she would be a darling if she won, lost, quit, or committed suicide. Her fame is not established on quitting. Her fame is established on her mental disease, and that's that. Everything else she does is only a footnote to her mental disease and to her courage to quit, to continue, to win, to lose, to laugh, to cry, to live, to love.

Keep on squeezing. :yum: Without squeezing there will be wheezing an sneezing. It's a little like the question-and-answer period in the Canadian parliament. The opposition asks the same question over and over again, and the ruling party avoids giving a straight-on honest answer to the question over and over and over again.

Except, inexplicably, once in a while a head will roll (in p-p-Parliament.) Not here. It's easier to withstand critical mass here than in front of tv cameras.

But what if life does not arise by chance? — EnPassant

Even materialists state that it arises because it is caused, and not due to random chance.

The difference between creationists and materialists is that creationists assume a very intelligent thing put it together, while materialist reason that chemical reactions are bound to happen in ways that create (carbon-based) life forms. Not because someone designed it that way, say the materialists, but because the chemical elements that form the basis of life have an affinity to combine in this way.

The creationists will say, "yes, but did not someone make these chemical elements to have affinity to be the way they are?" And that is the dividing line between creationists and materialists. Creationists will insist it has been planned that way by a higher power or by some intelligent creature; materialists will insist that the combination of elements is not planned, but caused.

This "not planned but caused" is a tough cookie to digest. To materialists, it is the bread and butter of their world view; to creationists it is incomprehensible.

One day one person will come up with an ultimate explanation that puts this debate to sleep, much like this debate puts me to sleep.

I case some argue the validity of some of the power types I listed above, pre modum scrutio ipse, I state:

"The power of poetry."

1. Mechanical power - human
2. Mechanical power married to electromagnetic power - human
3. Mechanical + electromagnetic + computing power - human
4. Mechanical + electromagnetic + computing power + psychic power - alien. — EnPassant

You left out fission or fusion power. Not a criticism, just a note.

You also left out the power of desire.

The power of power. (Political, social or personal. Bullying, expecting and taking privileges, exploiting workers, etc.)

The power of powerlessness. (relying on sympathy, empathy, pity, kindness.)

The power of love. ("Jimi wrote this song The Power Of Love..." on the Band of Gypsys live recording.)

The power of faith, hope, and prediction.

The power of stupidity.

The power of knowledge.

The power of moeny. (Also called Moneypower.)

Are we so primitive that we are the equivalent of tribal natives waiting being invaded by intergalactic conquistador? — SteveMinjares

I think there is a raging intergalactic pandemic and a moratorium has been put in place to keep physical distancing at 6 million light years between civilizations. Once the disease has been eliminated, that's when the flying saucers will come to eliminate us.

Unless, of course, we speed up the bullet and annihilate ourselves ourselves.

When I self-cultivate, I look out for two very important things: watering, and fertilization. Incredibly important. No seed will ever bud without these two. The self-cultivated mind must therefore be well provided for. The more watering, the more fertilizers, the bigger, stronger, surer the growth.

Big door, tiny window. — Cheshire

That's another symbolic that is lost on me.

I think that there is a danger in reading meanings into natural occurrences, especially how some people interpreted Aids as nature's vengeance against gay people — Jack Cummins

I also wonder if nature will find a way of solving the problem somehow, or of bringing balance. — Jack Cummins

Get your values straightened out. Either you believe Nature is a sentient, purposeful unit (which you verified you beleive in quote 1) or you don't. (Verified in quote two).

You can't play for both teams, Jack, and then have the audacity to explain things to me that everyone knows.

fine. I can't make you read that. If you told me which part, you'd have to read that part first, so this is a stalemate.

Can you read it without my making you to do so? And if not, then why not? this terseness is categorical surrender, because 1. You would have to read to know you don't want to read it 2. therefore you read it, and you don't want to deal with it 3. and that can only be so (from the tone that's given in "you can't make me read that") because it upsets you, or irritates you.

Being upset or irritable is not pleasant, and this site is basically purposed for entertainment, or for enjoyment for the users/ members. If you don't want to do something you don't enjoy, fine, but that in this instance you can only do that by aborting the dialogue. I will abide by your wishes.

First, I maintain that was a misinterpretation of Kant's work that was referenced in it's refutation. — Cheshire

Like other big-name philosophers, the ones

who enjoy household name status, Kant has several, more than two, camps of followers, who have widely differing interpretations of his works. It's a little bit like the Evangelist movement in this sense, that they categorically deny the truth in other interpretations in favour of their own. I now learned to reject those arguments that start with "those interpretations are wrong." To me (and only to me, as far as my claim goes) the claims of those philosophers are supported by their own interpretation, and that is a rather very subjective support of an argument; in other words, if an argument depends on rejecting alternative interpretations, then the argument is subjective, and lacks objectivity.

The fact people can rationalize an immoral act has zero bearing on whether it is an immoral act. — Cheshire

This is another contentious issue, which my paper covers and solves. Nothing has a bearing on an act whether it's moral or immoral, other than people's views. If the view is shaped by rationalization, then the verdict is the opinion still. You can't get an outside, objective judgment on morality; it is a people-generated and consensus-driven quality. I like to bring up the practice of cannibalism and the practice of backstabbing. In some cultures cannibalism is opined to be acceptable and is encouraged, in most cultures it is rejected and deemed immoral. In most cultures turning on your friends to gain advantages is horribly immoral; in the entertainment and movie industry it's the norm of accepted and actually expected behaviour.

makes me wonder if you are typing in a white room — Cheshire

This is, I suppose, a symbolic culture-driven reference which I don't get. A white paper in a white room by a white philosopher who is a white folk? I don't know what you could possibly mean.

I also wonder if nature will find a way of solving the problem somehow, or of bringing balance. — Jack Cummins

Covid was a feeble try by nature, if you want to look at it that way. (Not me.)