When I say all belief is incompletely justified, I’m referring to the problem of infinite regress, how you can keep asking for reasons to justify your reasons forever, until you give up on trying by either asserting a foundation on faith or writing everything off as unjustifiable. This shows the flaws of justification and motivates critical rationalism in its place: you don’t have to “completely” justify a belief as in answering that infinite regress, that’s impossible; instead believe whatever you want, but only tentatively, until it can be shown false, and then move on to a remaining option.

Sure, a neat answer.

you don’t have to “completely” justify a belief as in answering that infinite regress, that’s impossible; instead believe whatever you want, but only tentatively, until it can be shown false, and then move on to a remaining option. — Pfhorrest

Considering what must be the case, in order for one to doubt in this way. There must, for instance, be beliefs, however tentative. And I suppose there must be some sort of language in which this doubting may take place. Doubting such things would mean never getting started on this tournament of doubts.

SO there must be stuff that is beyond doubt.

Now, if there were a God, wouldn't it be that sort of thing?

I think this realization can be painful. It's the death of the usual spiritual comforts. One has to set sail on a dark ocean of personality and even embrace a permanent identity crisis. One becomes everyone and no one. For me the journey has been strange. It's lonely and yet the opposite of lonely, humble but proud. — jellyfish

It's painful and liberating, as you suggest. I am quite isolated where I live--there are absolutely no old leftie hippie intellectuals around these parts; I'm surrounded by devout, hypocritical christians. So I have indeed found in this forum a respite, a breather.

I really like your phrase, "permanent identity crisis": but this doesn't have to be a painful or uncomfortable constant: it can be seen simply as the evolution of oneself, one's philosophy.

Omnipresence. IF there were a god, wouldn't His presence be utterly overwhelming? This seems to be what many of the devout describe. — Banno

What the heck is "presence"? By the time I say "now" it's in the past. I'm afraid the presence of anything is not overwhelming. It's actually very difficult to affirm what it means to be present.

There are things that stand outside the tournament of justification, because they are needed in order for that tournament to take place. Isn't god just the sort of thing that would justify everything else? — Banno

I believe this is contradictory. Such a thing would be unjustifiable. And an unjustifiable thing cannot itself justify anything. Placing god in this contradictory category only makes the reality of god impossible. It would be an atheist definition. If we want to understand how a theist sees, apprehends, understands, or defines "God" an atheist definition is not helpful because clearly these two apprehend the meaning of that term in completely different ways.

SO there must be stuff that is beyond doubt. — Banno

I didn't think you were an idealist Banno, but that is the affirmation of an ideal. The only thing beyond doubt would be something perfectly well known, and such perfection is proper only to an ideal.

Now, if there were a God, wouldn't it be that sort of thing? — Banno

This may be the case, but I know you well enough to know that you will deny that the "stuff that is beyond doubt" is 'ideal'. You will claim that this "stuff" is some sort of foundational belief such as "this is a sentence of English", which is not an 'ideal' at all because it actually can be doubted. I can for instance doubt that it is a "sentence" because the "t" in "this" is not capitalized. and if that is not supposed to be the sentence referred to, what does "this" refer to? In fact, your example is a complete misrepresentation of what an ideal is supposed to be.

Try looking at mathematics, where each symbol is supposed to directly represent an object (mathematical object) instead of meaning something. When the symbol directly represents an object instead of having meaning, (such as the numeral "3" represents the number 3), there can be no doubt as to what the symbol means. Therefore we have ideal representation. Ideal representation is what is required to put an expression beyond the reach of doubt. The problem though, is that the whole system may be cast into doubt, by doubting the existence of such ideal objects.

I understand the desire to transcend that dichotomy. In some ways it reminds me of German philosophers who wanted to bring God down to this world. — jellyfish

The vision blends Christianity with technological progress. It's optimistic. It doesn't address the mortality of the species (God himself is mortal). Humanism is arguably the best thing we have. — jellyfish

Apparently, I have given you the wrong impression of Enformationism. It is not an attempt "to bring God down to this world". And it is not a Christology in any sense. It is instead an attempt to understand the traditional disputed dichotomies of Science, Philosophy, and Religion. As expressed in the heading of my BothAnd Blog : "Philosophical musings on Quanta & Qualia; Materialism & Spiritualism; Science & Religion; Pragmatism & Idealism, etc."

However, in view of my thesis, it might seem that the only reasonable religion for humans would be some form of man-made Humanism. Yet, I can't imagine that it would ever appeal to enough people (non-philosophers) to have any effect on the masses. So, I compromise on Deism as my religious philosophy : although I have no direct experience or knowledge of G*D, I have concluded that the evolving world seems to be organized by a Mind, instead of by random collisions of atoms, or by an infinite regression of materialistic Multiverses. And, since modern science has discovered that both Energy and Matter are forms of metaphysical Information, it follows that everything in the world is a piece of that Cosmic Mind. By that, I don't mean Panpsychism, but PanEnDeism. :cool:

Have you looked into Douglas_Hofstadter? — jellyfish

Yes. I was impressed, although at times mystified, by Hofstadter's books. I have quoted him in some of my essays on The Self. But I wouldn't mention that abstruse Strange Loop argument to non-scientists or non-philosophers, because it's so technical and abstract. :nerd:
.

What the heck is "presence"? By the time I say "now" it's in the past. I'm afraid the presence of anything is not overwhelming. It's actually very difficult to affirm what it means to be present. — Metaphysician Undercover

Apparently you've never been shot at.

The only thing beyond doubt would be something perfectly well known, and such perfection is proper only to an ideal. — Metaphysician Undercover

Talk to the Descartes.

And apparently you would doubt doubt. Where does that leave you?

It's painful and liberating, as you suggest. I am quite isolated where I live--there are absolutely no old leftie hippie intellectuals around these parts; I'm surrounded by devout, hypocritical christians. So I have indeed found in this forum a respite, a breather. — uncanni

Me too. And I know what you mean by hypocritical Christians. The leftist hippies are the true Christians, as I see it, as they continued with the implicit humanistic core of the Christian tradition.

I really like your phrase, "permanent identity crisis": but this doesn't have to be a painful or uncomfortable constant: it can be seen simply as the evolution of oneself, one's philosophy. — uncanni

I totally agree. I have found my ecstasy in this crisis. I live largely for this crisis. I suppose I chose those words to emphasize that it's the way of death and despair, too. Philosophy has opened up for me both new highs and new lows.

Apparently, I have given you the wrong impression of Enformationism. It is not an attempt "to bring God down to this world". And it is not a Christology in any sense. It is instead an attempt to understand the traditional disputed dichotomies of Science, Philosophy, and Religion. As expressed in the heading of my BothAnd Blog : "Philosophical musings on Quanta & Qualia; Materialism & Spiritualism; Science & Religion; Pragmatism & Idealism, etc." — Gnomon

Thanks. I am now seeing it as a metaphysical system that wants to resolve traditional confusions and overcome apparent dichotomies. This too is in Hegel, along with a religion element that you aren't concerned with.

I'm more with philosophers like Wittgenstein and Heidegger on this theme. To me the situation is far more organic and subconscious and ultimately 'uncurable' by an explicit system. We can't dominate the metalanguage, which is ordinary language. All explicit systems are little boats on the dark ocean of being-in-the-world, being-with-others, being-in-language. Explicit systems can be good for organizing explicit knowledge, but I think most of our knowledge is tacit.

Yes. I was impressed, although at times mystified, by Hofstadter's books. I have quoted him in some of my essays on The Self. But I wouldn't mention that abstruse Strange Loop argument to non-scientists or non-philosophers, because it's so technical and abstract — Gnomon

His books are indeed complex. I do think I am a Strange Loop is beautifully unpretentious given its depth and complexity. It's hard to imagine how he could have written it better.

I agree that it's hard to discuss with those not into that kind of complexity. Philosophy can be a lonely path, especially in this junk-food social-media age, where everything is bite-sized click-bait. Even the people I'm close to don't have the same appetite for the conceptual journey. And it's only that appetite that leads to enough reading to make Hofstadter digestible rather than mystifying.

that institutionalized religion, in my sweepingly generalized view, does everything in its power to make people not question their existence. This is the boulder of ideology that oppresses so many minds so easily. This kind of ideology relieves the individual of any requirement to think and question; the goal is obedience.

To confront the impasse, as I meant it, is to acknowledge the aporia: the problem of existence does not have an answer = the disproportion between explanation and action. — uncanni

I'm with you on confronting the aporia. But I also think this is a terrifying path ('condemned to be free') and that religion is also an opiate in demand: people want a master, a system. You nailed it with 'relieves the individual.' Of what? Of the permanent identity crisis that might otherwise drive them to despair and self-destruction.

As in Brave New World, the people are protected from their own depth and potential for madness. Heretics can be cast as enemies of the people, who would thrust them into a permanent revolution in the means of seduction (of self and others via flattering-comforting grand narratives.)

The problem with using any terms other than "being" after the term "perfect" is that any other term is "defined", that is, has boundaries, is limited. E.g. a perfect maggot is just that, a maggot; which is not commonly seen as a high being on the ontological scale. So unless you claim that a person is the highest species ontologically, then it automatically ranks our god definition lower than the highest level.

That said, since god as I have defined possesses all abilities that exist (or more), and since persons exist, then god must possess the ability of persons too. But as the perfect being, it is not limited to possessing the abilities of persons only.

I have found my ecstasy in this crisis. I live largely for this crisis. I suppose I chose those words to emphasize that it's the way of death and despair, too. — jellyfish

There's no way around crisis, death or despair for humans. The way I see it, we had best find the "healthiest" ways we can manage for dealing with them. I think a lot of people give up before they finish growing up, and I believe it takes a lifetime for humans to grow up. If we stop working on it, we're screwed; we've settled into mind-numbing stasis. Stasis and ecstasy derive from the same Greek word stasis--standing or stoppage. We will find the bits of ecstasy in moving forward.

I think a lot of people give up before they finish growing up, and I believe it takes a lifetime for humans to grow up. If we stop working on it, we're screwed ... — uncanni

Pearls before swine. :clap: :cool:

And apparently you would doubt doubt. Where does that leave you? — tim wood

It leaves me doubtful. Some people here at TPF claim it's impossible for me to doubt some of the things that I doubt, therefore my doubt of my doubt is warranted. Perhaps I'm misusing the word "doubt". This possibility warrants the doubt of doubt as well.

Do you think there's something wrong with claiming to doubt doubt? I think it's better than claiming to know that I know. There's an infinite regress implied here, and infinite regress is conducive of doubt. So there is nothing wrong with claiming to doubt doubt, while there is something wrong with claiming to know that I know.

Pearls before swine. — 180 Proof

Are you saying that I'm casting pearls before swine?

Pearls before swine.
— 180 Proof

Are you saying that I'm casting pearls before swine? — uncanni

I'll hazard to speak for more of us than just my lonesome, uncanni, when I say "Oink oink ..." Keep droppin' them pearls in our pen. :wink:

That said, since god as I have defined possesses all abilities that exist (or more), and since persons exist, then god must possess the ability of persons too. But as the perfect being, it is not limited to possessing the abilities of persons only. — Samuel Lacrampe

I agree. But, when god is labeled as "a perfect being", it's an Oxymoron. In our experience, no created or mortal beings are perfect. Because, given Life & Time, they have the potential for further development. That's why I try to avoid the confusion by labeling G*D as "BEING" : defined as the eternal-infinite power to exist. Since that includes all possibilities, it means that G*D has the potential for Personality. But only in the world of imperfect created beings is that opportunity actualized into reality. "Person" is a relative term, while "BEING" is an absolute concept.

There's no way around crisis, death or despair for humans. The way I see it, we had best find the "healthiest" ways we can manage for dealing with them. — uncanni

I must see it that way too, because I try to be kind.

Now I do think 'healthy' pretty much has to be ambiguous here. If we avoid 'ideological' stasis, then (seems to me) we haven't settled exactly on what the good life is, on exactly how to be grown up and virtuous. Another uncomfortable issue in my mind is the connection of 'sin' or irrationality or immaturity with great art. Even moral progress seems to require that the 'sinner' (moral revolutionary) violate today's norms in order to install tomorrow's. In other words, domination these days is likely to be justified in terms of public health, public safety. There's also the problem of whether violence is ever justified. Is antifa dealing with things in a healthy way, even if it gets them or others killed? Or perhaps we'll take a 'do no harm' approach. Even this passivity can be accused.

I'm not trying to be buzzkill but only articulate the complexity of not-stasis as I see it. I guess I find an ecstasy in this complexity -- at the cost of having anything like a solution for existence.

Bro. If you think I misunderstood your claim the first time, then repeating it in the exact same way does not help my understanding. If you are merely saying that, since a proof by definition gives certainty, then an argument that gives probability or reasonableness is not a proof, then yes, I agree; but that is merely a tautology.

With that said, faith, the beliefs supported by the probable or the reasonable, is quite necessary. Very few beliefs are supported by absolute proofs.

I'll hazard to speak for more of us than just my lonesome, uncanni, when I say "Oink oink — 180 Proof

We are all pigs in the same pen, then; I certainly don't consider myself grown up yet. Maybe the 70s will usher in more maturity...

I'm not trying to be buzzkill but only articulate the complexity of not-stasis as I see it. I guess I find an ecstasy in this complexity -- at the cost of having anything like a solution for existence. — jellyfish

I agree: I'm not seeking an easy resting place for my mind or my beliefs. Sometimes I think things would be a lot easier if I just knew that I was saved by Jesus, but then other times I think that everyone who has gotten "the good news" really knows, deep down inside, that it's bollocks. The restlessness of the negative dialectic keeps calling me...

I'm not seeking an easy resting place for my mind or my beliefs. Sometimes I think things would be a lot easier if I just knew that I was saved by Jesus, but then other times I think that everyone who has gotten "the good news" really knows, deep down inside, that it's bollocks. The restlessness of the negative dialectic keeps calling me... — uncanni

:point: :fire:

Sometimes I think things would be a lot easier if I just knew that I was saved by Jesus, but then other times I think that everyone who has gotten "the good news" really knows, deep down inside, that it's bollocks. The restlessness of the negative dialectic keeps calling me... — uncanni

Nice. Here's a passage that I think maybe you'll appreciate. To me it's about the glory of the negative what it tends toward.

The true content of romantic art is absolute inwardness, and its corresponding form is spiritual subjectivity with its grasp of its independence and freedom. This inherently infinite and absolutely universal content is the absolute negation of everything particular, the simple unity with itself which has dissipated all external relations, all processes of nature and their periodicity of birth, passing away, and rebirth, all the restrictedness in spiritual existence, and dissolved all particular gods into a pure and infinite self-identity. In this Pantheon all the gods are dethroned, the flame of subjectivity has destroyed them, and instead of plastic polytheism art knows now only one God, one spirit, one absolute independence which, as the absolute knowing and willing of itself, remains in free unity with itself and no longer falls apart into those particular characters and functions whose one and only cohesion was due to the compulsion of a dark necessity.[1] — Hegel

https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/ae/part2-section3.htm

This to me describes the 'infinity' of the godless/divine wanderer.

Faith is uncritical, unquestionable belief. — Pfhorrest

I understand. But I persist to say that your definition of religion is therefore too broad, because sportball would be a religion for Alice and Bob in the second alternate universe; but this is not how people commonly use the term "religion", is it?

"Ultimate reality" is a topic that non-religious studies like physics and (irreligious) philosophy also investigate. — Pfhorrest

Actually the study of reality is metaphysics, not physics; and indeed it is not strictly religious. But that is why another essential component to "religion" is the act. The mere study of topics even about gods would be called theology, for which the theologian who does not act in accordance to the findings from the theology is technically not religious.

Well technically, disbelieving P and believing not-P are not equivalent; if we write it in functional notation that becomes clear, the opposite of believe(P) is not-believe(P), which is not necessarily equivalent to believe(not-P) — Pfhorrest

We need to make the distinction between the terms "disbelief" and "non-belief". A rock is in a state of non-belief, for it can neither believe nor disbelieve in anything. On the other hand, the proposition "disbelief in p" is the opposite to "belief in p". As opposites, they are also mutually exclusive.

I was saying that the Thomists think that. That wasn't my opinion, that was my report of their opinions. — Pfhorrest

I understand that you discuss the Thomists' view, which is not necessarily your own view. But my point was that Thomists, who are somewhat competent at logic, would not make the simple error to believe that reason supports faith when, under the definition of faith you have given, reason destroys faith.

Anyways, to close this part of discussion about what Thomists believe, here is an extract about Aquinas: "The theologian Saint Thomas Aquinas did not hold that faith is mere opinion: on the contrary, he held that it represents a mean (understood in the Platonic sense) between excessive reliance on science (i.e. demonstration) and excessive reliance on opinion." - Source.

This to me describes the 'infinity' of the godless/divine wanderer. — jellyfish

I wasn't attracted to Hegel and read very little of him. I believe that for various German writers, it's a travesty to translate them to English; Martin Buber's work is practically unreadable in English.

What does he mean, "absolute inwardness"? Why does he keep using the word absolute over (4 times)? It makes me suspicious."A pure and infinite self-identity": does "infinite" acknowledge the différance of that self-identity? "Absolute independence"? "Free unity with itself"? I don't get it.

I'm uncomfortable. I don't think I understand or know his discourse at all, like the way I do Bakhtin, Freud, Lyotard and a few others that I read repeatedly to understand really well. I'm outside of Hegel, and I know I'd have to study him intensely to get him.

What strikes me about the passage is that it seems to contradict what you've written about our need for the monologician in our midst so that we remember not to transform our own dialogic notions into any kind of self-righteous, authoritarian or repressive take on other views. The float like a butterfly sting like a bee struggle against or dance around stasis (or hypostasis as Adorno called it), and certainly against the concept of a stable self-identity. Just as my philosophy continues transforming, so do myselves. Freud's ego has been dehisced like a seed pod into infinite selves of which we may or may not be conscious. Of course, some of these selves are completely unconscious, and it would take serious psychoanalysis to abreact them. Myselves are kind of infinite like the cosmos...

I prefer aspects of Modernism to Romanticism.

Sounds good to me. It seems to only be a matter of definition of the term "being". Using the scholastic definition, being is "that which is not nothing". As such, if God is not nothing, then he is a being. It sounds like you use the term "being" the way I would use the term "creature", that is, "that which is created, or begins to exist".

And an unjustifiable thing cannot itself justify anything. — Metaphysician Undercover

Why not?

I like vanilla. There's no reason that I like vanilla, I just do. It's unjustified. SO what? It explains my purchase, too often, of a vanilla milkshake. I don't wee anything untoward in this little story. Yet my unjustified predilection justifies my purchase.

Placing god in this contradictory category only makes the reality of god impossible. — Metaphysician Undercover

Yep. That's were I was headed.

In fact, your example is a complete misrepresentation of what an ideal is supposed to be. — Metaphysician Undercover

Yeah, well, so much for your accusation. I am not an idealist.

I like vanilla. There's no reopen that I like vanilla, I just do. It's unjustified. SO what? — Banno

I like using this kind of example to illustrate the argument for critical rationalism.

When it comes to why to do (or intend) something, it's pretty much accepted that everyone is free to do what they want just because they want to do it, unless there is some good reason not to do it. Nobody insists that everybody stop doing anything at all until they can justify from the ground up why they should do something, because it's clearly impossible: maybe you want to buy a car so you can get to work so you can earn money so you can buy vanilla ice cream so that you can eat vanilla ice cream so that you can enjoy the taste of it, but at some point you get to something like that where your only justification is that it sounds good to you, you just want it, and "so you have no good reason to do it then" doesn't count as a reason not to do it, at least not to any reasonable person.

But for some reason when it comes to beliefs, too many people are just that unreasonable. Sure you maybe believe P because Q because R because S but you believe S because you just look at the world around you and it just seems to be true, that's just how the world appears, that's just what you believe. Too many people would then say "so you have no good reason to believe it then" as though that's a reason for you not to believe it, but it's not. You're free, epistemically as in you're not committing any error of reasoning, to believe whatever you damn well please, whatever just seems true to you, until someone can show you a good reason not to believe it.

reopen — Banno

But the autocorrect here is becoming a real pain.