Sure we can navigate the world pragmatically, but claiming true comprehension overlooks the potential complexities beneath our experiences. Our confidence in “understanding” as you say often rests on habits of thought and inference, not on direct access to reality’s underlying structure. Habit and comprehension would seem to be different things. — Tom Storm

It is obvious that we comprehend the world, both in an everyday sense and in the enormously complex web of coherent understanding we call science. Some of our understandings may turn out to be incomplete or even wrong, to be sure. Is that what you mean when you refer to "true comprehension"?

You mentioned "complexities beneath our experiences"; by that I take you to refer to things we cannot gain cognitive access to? If so, I would say those are merely imagined possibilities which cannot really mean much, if anything, to us except as perhaps enjoyable, stimulating or even inspiring exercises of the imagination.

So, when I say we obviously comprehend the world, I'm only speaking in an everyday sense, a sense in which I would include science as an augmentation of the everyday. "Direct access to reality's underlying structure" seems to me to be a kind of nonsense. It is impossible, or even if you believed we can have it, having it would be impossible to prove. Comprehension and habit are not unrelated as I see it; you cannot develop habits without any comprehension...think of language in this connection. Animals comprehend their environments through forming habits too. Habit is a sign of comprehension, in other words.

So you're a realist? I'd probably reserve judgment on this. We pragmatically engage a world of forces and sensations, but can we infer unmediated access to a noumenal reality beyond those experiential conditions? And at some level, sure, who gives a fuck? It works, so let's just intervene in the world. But isn't this just suppressing our metaphysical assumptions? — Tom Storm

Why do say I'm a realist? I really don't see myself as any kind of "ist". I merely accept the warmth on my skin from the sun, the feel of the wind, and the sense of acting upon and being acted upon, as ineliminable aspects of my life. I accept the explanation of cause as not merely correlation, but as exchange of energy or force, because it jibes with my bodily experience and comprehending phenomena that way has produced a vast and coherent body of understanding the world that I see no need to question as a whole. That doesn't mean I think it is some kind of timeless, absolute truth, but merely that it is the best we have so far in the way of understanding the nature of the world we find ourselves in. The point is that it is an understanding, and a vast, complex and coherent one at that. So we most definitely do comprehend the world.

I don't think we can infer unmediated access to a noumenal reality; I don't even really know what that could mean, and I certainly don't think it could be all that important. I don't know what you mean by "suppressing our metaphysical assumptions" ̶ did you mean "supposing"?

Anyway I really gotta go do something...I got sucked back in.

I'm not sure if that's quite the difference. Perhaps ↪Janus can clarify, but I thought his point could variously be:

A. That there is a common sense metaphysics that can just be assumed (your reading);

B. That what is called metaphysics can just be done as part of each individual science; or

C. That methodologically one does not need to begin from metaphysics.

I think all three are true to varying degrees. Metaphysics is prior to the other disciplines in the order of generality, but not in the order of knowing. Indeed, in general we know the concrete and particular better than the abstract and universal.

I think it should be uncontroversial that parts of what are generally deemed to be "metaphysics" come into play on the sciences at every turn. For example, one cannot discuss the "origin of species" in biology, or different "types" of atom or molecule without the notion that different concrete particulars can nonetheless be "the same sort of thing" (i.e., the notion of species, essences, and universals coming into play). — Count Timothy von Icarus

cosmological evidence that our space-time universe had a beginning in philosophical time — Gnomon

I can't make sense of the idea that the Universe had a beginning in time, and certainly not "philosophical time" (whatever that is meant to be). The beginning of the Universe was the beginning of time according to my understanding of the current theory.

Count T and I, in contrast, want to use "metaphysics" more broadly, to mean any framework that results in a philosophical position about "the world as we find it." On this usage, it looks impossible to do without metaphysics, since philosophy presupposes it. — J

It seems then that you are redefining metaphysics as philosophy and not as merely one domain of philosophy. If metaphysics is philosophy then of course you can't do philosophy without doing metaphysics; you have simply stipulated that by your definition. I'm not going to agree because I don't think philosophy is all, or even mostly, metaphysics.

There is clearly a difference between looking at the world as Wittgenstein does, and as, e.g., Ted Sider does. Is someone "doing metaphysics" here? Let's not worry about it. Instead, let's ask into what these two ways of looking consist of, and what they would entail. Perhaps, after this very difficult subject is thoroughly understood, we might then feel we had reason to circle back and offer a (now ameliorative) definition of "metaphysics" -- or perhaps not. — J

I'm not familiar with Sider. I performed a quick search and it seems he is a 'modal logic as metaphysics' kind of philosopher. I'm not that much up on modal logic, but what I have encountered of it has led me to think it is primarily about what we can coherently imagine. So I would see it as semantics, not metaphysics. I'm open to rethinking this, though, given my sketchy knowledge of the subject.

I'm not sure if that's quite the difference. Perhaps ↪Janus can clarify, but I thought his point could variously be:

A. That there is a common sense metaphysics that can just be assumed (your reading);

B. That what is called metaphysics can just be done as part of each individual science; or

C. That methodologically one does not need to begin from metaphysics. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I am not claiming 'A' because I don't think the commonsense understanding of the world is metaphysics, but is rather an evolved pragmatic practice.

I am not claiming 'B' because I don't think metaphysics needs to play any part if the sciences (although I agree that it may play a part, and that it has, historically speaking, played a part in shaping what we now call science).

I agree with 'C'. Methodologically we can in science do without metaphysics entirely.

Also I want to make a distinction between 'doing metaphysics' meaning holding one or another metaphysical standpoint, and speculating about ontological possibilities. The latter is an exercise in creative imagining which may feed into scientific theory to be sure. But I don't count speculating about what might exist as "doing metaphysics". To repeat, for me doing metaphysics means holding to a particular position regarding the fundamental nature or reality.

Indeed, in general we know the concrete and particular better than the abstract and universal.

I agree, but it's also true that most of our knowledge of particulars comes through generalizing, which I think amounts to recognizing regularities and patterns. I don't like the term 'universal' much because I think it's loaded with metaphysical baggage, and it really doesn't mean anything more that 'general'.

I think it should be uncontroversial that parts of what are generally deemed to be "metaphysics" come into play on the sciences at every turn. For example, one cannot discuss the "origin of species" in biology, or different "types" of atom or molecule without the notion that different concrete particulars can nonetheless be "the same sort of thing" (i.e., the notion of species, essences, and universals coming into play). Likewise, questions of emergence includes the relationship of parts to wholes, and shows up in physics, chemistry, biology, etc. Perhaps the most obvious example is causation.

Those "parts" may be deemed by some to be metaphysics, but I wouldn't deem them to be so. Different concrete particulars can be the same sorts of things on account of shred morphologies. We don't need essences for that ( if you mean the idea of unique essences as opposed to essential characteristics). And of course I don't see universals coming into play, but just a human capacity to generalize on account of the ability to recognize patterns and regularities, as I already noted above.

The relationships of parts to wholes are multifarious, and I think it is basically a sematic issue. Like the 'Ship of Theseus" or the supposed puzzle about what constitutes a heap, these are just open to different ways of framing, and are thus semantic possibilities. We can say the ship of Theseus is the same ship or not depending on how we want to define it. When it comes to heaps if a number of items jumbled together doesn't resemble the general pattern of a heap then we won't call it a heap. There is no precise cutoff point and it depends on the kinds of items jumbled together.

Doesn't science rest on metaphysical assumptions such as the world is comprehensible and that reason and observations are reliable and there's an external world and causality - those kinds of things? Or do hold a view that methodological naturalism (as opposed to metaphysical naturalism) is a default common sense foundation that requires no justification other than our continued demonstrations of its reliability in action? — Tom Storm

We find the world to be comprehensible, so I don't see a need for any assumptions in that matter. We comprehend it in terms of causation and it might be argued that causation is a metaphysical assumption, since it cannot be observed as Hume claimed. Hume says we arrive at the notion of causation by observing constant correlations between events. I think that's part of it, but even it was the whole of it I don't think it counts as a metaphysical assumption but as simply a matter of habit, which is what Hume thought too.

Even animals show by their behavior that they think causally. Where I think Hume only told part of the story is that failed to acknowledged that we all feel causation in our bodies. We feel the sunlight and wind on our skins. We feel the force when we throw objects or wield a hammer or strain to walk up a steep hill and in all our bodily activities. Of course animals feel these things too, so causation, acting upon and being acted upon, is a natural aspect of embodiment.

That's all I have time for right now.

My whole way of thinking about God and suffering includes thoughts of what is “sin” and what is free will, what is the heart, what is love, why did God become a man and die, on a cross….

Anyone who might decide there must be no God because they think they understand the syllogism, had a shallow understanding of “God” or “all-good” or “suffering” or all of the above.

This forum, to me, is not really the place to account for God and suffering, as that would take Bible quotes and histories of saints and in the end, we will only be able to answer how God allows suffering by asking God, so if there is no God to you, there is not only no need to ask the question, but no need to think there would be an answer discoverable through our own reason. — Fire Ologist

It seems we think very differently. I cannot make sense of libertarian free will ̶ the kind of free will Christians posit when they claim that we are 100% responsible for our actions and will be judged for them, as to whether we will receive eternal reward or eternal punishment or, according to some accounts, a spell in purgatory.

There is no point saying that people have a shallow understanding of "all-good" ̶ that's a cop out in the context of philosophy because it dispenses with human reason. I for one do not say there must be no God, but I do say, and have said, that the human notions of perfect goodness and justice (which are the only ones we have access to) do not jibe with the world we live in, so something has to give.

You're just doing the usual religious apologist thing when they have no answer to the critique and saying what amounts to "God moves in mysterious ways". If God is beyond human knowing then why believe in God at all?

I agree with you that this forum is not really the place for theology. I think the faithful should find themselves content with their faith ̶ there seems to be no point asking questions of it which cannot be answered by human reason, and then turning the back on human reason. Better to turn the back on it from the start ̶ at least that would be consistent with faith.

Consistency consists in simply not saying things that are logically incompatible, mostly not saying things which contradict one another. No intuition required; it's as simple as 'yes' and 'no'. If you say both yes and no about the same subject you are contradicting yourself.

The reason consistency is better than inconsistency is that if you allow the latter you can say whatever you like and all sayings would become equal what you mean would become inscrutable. The reason truth is to be preferred over error is that basically it is a matter of survival; if you constantly believed what was false you would not survive for long.

The authority of reason itself rests on intuition and understanding — Count Timothy von Icarus

This cannot be true. The validity ("authority" makes no sense) of reasoning rests on consistency. In any case any authority is either imposed by force or else is normative. Intuition is subjective. There are common understandings but it is individuals that understand or fail to understand. Also many things may be understood, while remaining consonant with reason in various ways.

It seems we can do philosophy without bothering about metaphysics. We don't need metaphysics to do ethics, aesthetics, philosophy of language, history of ideas or phenomenology as far as I can tell.

We don't need to make assumptions, in the sense of holding some metaphysical view or other, to do science, and I count science as part of philosophy. We don't even have to make assumptions in order to critically examine metaphysical assumptions.

To frame it simply naive realism thinks that the eyes are windows onto a world; we look out through them and see exactly what is out there. Indirect realism says we see mental models assembled form sense data and that we don't see objects as they are. Direct realism can admit that we don't see objects just as they are in all their ways of being (colours for example are not inherent in objects, even though the property of reflecting particular wavelengths is) but we do actually see objects not mental models. It has a lot to do with linguistic framing though. So I would say that mental models of objects just are seeing the objects, rather than saying that we see mental models.

Yes, epistemology strictly speaking, but isn't epistemology a sub-inquiry under metaphysics? Is it possible to frame a question about what we can know, without an explicit or assumed metaphysical framework? I don't think so. — J

We can know all kinds of basic things, like whether it is raining or not, for example. We know things because we see them. I know I am looking at a tree for example. Now you could object and say "how do you know it is really a tree?" or "how do you know you are not being tricked by a demon?" or "Does the tree exist apart form its being perceived?", and so on. Those are metaphysical questions, and I consider them to be pointless in one way, simply because there cannot be any way of answering them if they have no empirical or logical solution.

So, I see accepting that basic human situation, accepting the world as we find it, as eschewing metaphysical speculation not as assuming any metaphysical framework. I am not opposed to metaphysical speculation, though, as I've said on these threads many times; I think it can be a great exercise of the creative imagination. I just don't take it very seriously or expect any answers from it. New ways of thinking? Sure...

Ah, but which ones are the fly-bottles? :wink: Problem is, to ask "Should all metaphysical questions be dissolved rather than (if possible) resolved?" is to ask a very metaphysical question. Witt's answers, whatever their merit, also depend on evident metaphysical premises. — J

Would that not be more an epistemological question? Why must we make any metaphysical assumptions at all? Surely we can just accept the world as it appears to us without worrying about what might be "behind it"?

Where do we go next, with this insight? Should we conclude that the answers to such questions will never be forthcoming? Or simply never forthcoming within rational philosophy? — J

I can't believe that pure rationality (speculative reasoning) can have anything more after nearly three millennia to offer apart from thinking about fresh material that has come from science. I mean I think it has nothing more to offer that derives purely from itself. It's come to look like "pouring from the empty into the void".

I also think we don't so much find answers as new ways of looking at and thinking about things. If the purpose of philosophy is to come to terms with our lives and live them the best way we can, and if this entails radical acceptance of our condition, then it would seem the task is not so much trying to find answers to abstruse metaphysical questions, but rather coming to understand and work on ourselves.

As to ego as impediment: certainly true in my ethical life. Probably in my intellectual life as well, since like anyone else I enjoy being correct about things, and get seduced by this pleasure into believing that there is no end to the topics about which I could be correct . . . see above. — J

Yes, we all suffer from that particular affliction to one degree or another. I used to think analytic philosophy was useless, dry "logic-chopping", and pedantic concern about being correct, but I have changed my view on that. What I have come to like about analytic philosophy is its ability to free us from conceptual confusions. That may not give us wisdom per se, but I think it can help clear the way to seeing our condition more clearly.

All that wriggling and to-ing and fro-ing just to admit that the usual conception of a loving, personal God does not jibe with the reality of the world we find ourselves living in!

But I wonder why I sense an underlying, lingering "and yet..." in your words? Something you find hard to let go of?

complaining about the God they don't believe in doing things they don't believe God ought to do. :roll:
— Wayfarer

Essentially, my whole way of thinking about the problem of evil. :100:

The argument concludes the premises on which this conclusion was based make no sense, so why would anything concluded based on those premises be able to be held soundly? — Fire Ologist

That's a poor characterization of the critique of what merely amounts to two ideas which are inconsistent with one another. It's a lame attempt to dismiss the critique by attempting to explain it away psychologically, as though those pointing out the inconsistency are merely whiners.

It's very shallow indeed if that's your "whole way of thinking about the problem of evil".

No I tend more towards direct realism than indirect. That said I also think their differences are largely on account of linguistic framing.

I've often thought that some personalities are drawn to narratives of enchantment — Tom Storm

I'm attracted to narratives of enchantment, science being in my view the most potent narrative of enchantment there is. So, I don't see as science disenchants the world. I also like the old magical narratives of enchantment, but I no longer take them to be anything more than enjoyable fantasies.

I believe the real reason behind the claim that science disenchants the world is that it seems to foreclose on the idea of any kind of afterlife. People say science is dehumanizing and I can only think that the dispelling of the fantasy of an afterlife must be what they mean.

To be sure some technologies can be dehumanizing in real ways and the consumer culture our contemporary world so depends on can be too, but those are not inevitable outcomes of science.

Yes, the "I can't imagine it being otherwise, therefore that's the way it must be" is indeed a powerfully seductive thought for some.

Again, opinion, but the opposite opinion is to posit the existence of something (a preferred moment in time) for which there is no empirical evidence, only intuition, and I rank intuition extremely low on my list of viable references. — noAxioms

Well we agree there when it comes to questioning which of our resources is most likely to lead us to understanding the nature of things.

You also seem to agree that there are things independent of minds. In which case you would appear to be one the "anybodies" who support mind-independent reality.
Except for the 'reality' part, sure. Mind-independent, sure. Relation-independent, no. I think in terms of relations, but I don't necessarily assert it to be so. I proposed other models that are not relational and yet are entirely mind-independent. See OP.

Why must something be "relation-independent" in order to count as real? Is anything relation-independent? I would say probably not.

We have no relation to such worlds

Sure we do. It's just a different relation than 'part of the causal history of system state X', more like a cousin relation instead of a grandparent relation. The grandparent is an ancestor. The cousin is not. The cousin world is necessary to explain things like the fine tuning of this world, even if the cousin world has no direct causal impact on us.

We have no physical relation to such worlds. If we did they would be counted as of this world. The fine-tuning argument has never done it for me. I don't believe we can accurately calculate odds when the sample is but one. Even if we could the outcome is still not a zero possibility. That said I'm not against the 'Multiple Universes' idea. It does seem to be impossible to test. though.

How could we ever demonstrate that consciousness collapses the wave function

That interpretation can be shown to lead to solipsism, which isn't a falsification, but it was enough to have its author (Wigner) abandon support of the interpretation.

I'll take your word for it.

or that there really are hidden variables?

By definition, those can neither be demonstrated nor falsified.
They have proven that certain phenomena cannot be explained by any local hidden variable theory, but that just means that hidden variable proposals are necessarily non-local.

So it would seem.

The impulse isn't deep; it’s a confusion of category. — Banno

It seems to be a deeply imbedded psychological impulse in some. Metaphysicians, to quote Nietzsche: "They muddy the waters to make them seem deep".

I'm not sure now whether you are referring to what I would characterize as relational realism as weak, or whether you mean naive realism is weak. I wouldn't call sophisticated realism 'weak". I think naive realism is weak realism, because it allows only how we perceive things to be real.

Are you referring to naive realism which, as it is commonly characterized, thinks that the things of the world are just exactly as we perceive them to be? Do you think anyone who had done even a little intelligent reflection and critical thinking would hold such a view? There is a reason it is called naive realism.

Maybe one could say perceptual differences reflect the fact we see different parts of the same reality, obtaining different partial information about actual physical events, but animals with different cones or more resolution of vision are just detecting more stuff or different stuff than we are. I guess this again is a very weak realism still. — Apustimelogist

I don't understand why you say this is a "weak realism". Are perceptual organs and the experiences they enable not as real as that which they sense and that which is experienced?

Our intuitions are not universal and unchanging. They are influenced by experience, exposure to ideas (from science, but also from history, philosophy, religion), socioeconomic conditions, moral attitudes... That's not to say that there is some fixed asymptote towards which our collective metaphysical intuitions are inevitably converging. They may well diverge, swing and meander this way and that forevermore. — SophistiCat

Right, I haven't said or implied that our intuitions are universal and changing. They are conditioned by culture and tradition. My point was just that the idea of intellectual intuition as source of metaphysical truth is the idea of revelation or of some pure insight which is beyond the relativistic mediations of culture.

I think it is arguable that most of the remodeling of our metaphysical intuitions since the Middle Ages has come form science. It seems reasonable to think that if it hadn't been for science there would have been no really new data. When it comes to mystical intuitions as they are presented to us in the literature there is a base commonality across traditions and cultures, and it is only science which has thrown a spanner in the works, so to speak.

Are questions considered to be data? It looks to me like the questions that philosophy poses keep changing, era to era and tradition to tradition. And yes, the data that philosophers then appeal to in order to answer those questions tend to be more or less the same -- with a big exception for current advances in cognitive science. — J

As I say above, I think many if not most of the new questions have come on account of science, and as you note, especially cognitive science.

That said, I have some sympathy for those, like Wittgenstein, who want to use (a version of) philosophy to free us from metaphysical fly-bottles. — J

I do too, and I think the thrust of that project was to show that such questions are to be dissolved rather than resolved.

I'm not crazy about the "purity" theme, but this certainly sets out the problem concisely: What sort of person must I be, or become, in order to pass across that threshold? We all know the usual suspects: "I must become intellectually accomplished (good at philosophy)." "I must become ethically good." "I must make a certain profession of belief in an avatar." "There is no threshold; shut up and calculate."

In part it's a self-reflexive problem: If we knew how to choose among those standard answers, we would presumably also be demonstrating, in so choosing, why our answer is true or wise. Can that be done without going in circles? — J

I think you've hit on something important here. When it comes to how to live, which in my book is what philosophy is (or should be) really about, we do better the freer we are of concern about the self. I think it is arguable that we see our lives and others with greater clarity the more relaxed, the more at peace with ourselves we are.

It is the state of radical acceptance that I see as being the essence of enlightenment, and not imagined knowings of the answers to the great questions, which have never been, and I think arguably never can be, answered definitively. So "crossing the threshold" for me is a metaphor for a radical shift in our total disposition to life.

you can want something, but also will not to want it, and turn that will into reality. — flannel jesus

Yes, but that's just another will you can't will. The stronger will will win.

So, something you can't explain then?

Why not?

Your questions are confused. — flannel jesus

How can questions be confused? Perhaps you meant confusing? Did you not understand them? The questions are designed to find out if your position is confused...I'm not claiming anything at this stage.

Are you experiencing that shit as it is? Is the fly? — flannel jesus

Is it not part of the piece of shit being what it is to be attractive to the fly and disgusting to you, or to provide a suitable environment for egg-laying for the fly and be such as to make you sick if you ate it? Are those not all real attributes of the piece of shit and its relations with you and the fly?

A very poor response that assumes I don't understand what indirect realists propose, which of course I do. I want to know what you think in your own words. I'm not interested in trying to discuss with someone who hides behind labels. The ball's in your court. Do you have anything interesting or informative to say?

Because that question that you asked makes me think you're completely confused about what indirect realists mean when they say we don't "experience reality as it is". — flannel jesus

Do neuroscientists observe brain processes as they are according to you? If our experiences are real then why should we say we are not experiencing reality as it is? Are you simply saying that we don't experience those aspects of reality which we cannot experience? If so, that would be a tautology, no?

Or perhaps I should have just asked what you think indirect realists mean when they say we don't experience reality as it is.

That's not an answer. I understand the difference between direct realism and indirect realism well enough.

So our brain processes and hence our experiences are parts of reality then?

I don't mind if you respond and of course it's up to you...but I cannot imagine any argument that God's opinion matters more than human opinion or even that anyone could know God's opinion could be convincing, or that revelation could be demonstrated to be more than a human production or even that God actually can be rationally, logically, empirically or some other way, demonstrated to exist.

I'm not trying to be difficult or inflammatory...and I've spent many, many years examining all the arguments, so I doubt you can present anything I haven't already encountered.

So our brain processes are not real according to you...not a part of reality? Experiences are not real events?

If you say you can make free choices then I will ask whether you believe it is reasonable to think your choices are preceded by neural activity that leads to, gives rise to, the choices?

If you think it is reasonable to think that, then I will ask whether you were aware of that neural activity, and whether you somehow engineered it.

Also, it depends on what you mean by "free choice". Are your choices free if you are under no external constraints that prevent you from acting according to your nature? We don't create our own natures. As Schopenhauer observed: "A man can do what he wills, but not will what he wills,"

That's a really good question. The only answer I can offer to support a claim that such demonstration has not only been impossible in the past, just as it is now, but that it inevitably will be so in the future, would be that when it comes to introspected intuitions we always will be working with the same data, that is the human mind, that we have always been working with.

In science we may be working with previously unknown data, newly discovered phenomena, and I think this has clearly happened in the history of science. But when it comes to the purely speculative metaphysical ideas, unless we admit science into the equation and don't rely solely on intuitions (which has certainly happened in some metaphysical quarters) there would seem to be no new data to work with. And nothing in science itself apart from accurate observations are definitively demonstrably true in any case. Metaphysical ideas seem to be, to repeat loosely something I remember reading somewhere that Hegel said: "the same old stew reheated". I would add to that and say "the same old ancient stew reheated".

Perhaps the reason metaphysics hasn't been given up is on account of, as Kant pointed out, the human inability to let go of such questions, despite the impossibility of definitely answering them. I also think there is much inspiration and joy to be found in such imaginings, especially for the creative type of person. I think speculative fiction is great: just don't imagine that any of it is literally true. We don't need to imagine that in order for it to have poetic value and meaning.

What if this world was not created as an instant Paradise, but as an experiment in Cosmic Creation*1, similar to Whitehead's evolutionary Process — Gnomon

Sure, it's a speculative possibility, and is not inconsistent with a creator God that is either not all-knowing and/ or not all-good, and/ or not all-powerful. Whitehead's God was understood to be evolving along with its creation. I never quite got the need for, or understood the place of, God in Whitehead's system, though.

What we experience is part of what actually happens, no? Even our imagining of stuff actually happens, although what we imagine might not. What other cogent definition of real as distinct from imaginary is there? So, is all you are saying that there are some parts of what actually happens that we cannot access, or are you saying something else? Do you really believe that the things we see have no reality apart from our seeing of them?

A fair distinction. The individual who claims to have made such a discovery may be in the position of indeed having done so, but being faced with the impossibility of ever demonstrating it. (I still don't think anything here is obvious, but no matter. :smile: ) — J

So, you don't think it is obviously impossible to demonstrate that a speculative metaphysical claim (purportedly) based on reliable intuition is just that rather than something merely imagined? If you believe that one might ask then why such has not already been demonstrated such that no impartial person could reasonably question its veracity.

Well, yes. But then philosophy is in direct competition with religion - or, maybe, religion is a species of philosophy for those who don't grasp the point, or importance, of reason.
What people don't seem to face up to that even asking that question presupposes a complex conceptual structure which needs to be in place to enable potential answers to be articulated and evaluated.
I also have serious difficulty that our problem is in any way articulated as a list of options on a menu, from which we choose. Who writes the menu? Perhaps we live as we must and the only question is how far we can mitigate the down-sides that turn up in every item on on the menu. — Ludwig V

Sure, people find their answers where they are capable of looking. As I've said all along I am not at all against people believing whatever they might be capable of believing that gets them through the night and day, whatever provides them emotional sustenance and existential comfort, provided they don't try to force it down others' throats. I have more respect for those who simply hold to their groundless faith without feeling a need to convince others that their faith is the one truth and that it is rationally demonstrable to boot. That's just nonsense; the very fact that such believes can be rationally questioned shows that there are no demonstrable absolute truths.

Then, from Gods perspective it might be good when people suffer. And since his opinion is the only one that matters, — goremand

We've reached the end of our conversation, because it has circled back to the point where you are saying the opposite of what I said earlier which was that it is only human opinions which matter. No one knows God, so there can be only human opinions as to what God's opinion is. To say that God's opinion trumps human opinions is to abandon rationality altogether and rely on a completely groundless faith that revelation shows the absolute truth. I'm not prepared to waste my time arguing against anyone who believes that. As Mark Twain said: "Never argue with a fool, they will drag you down to their level, and beat you with experience".

Would you say that what we see is a part of reality? Would reality "as it is" for you equate to what exists unseen or beyond or beneath what is seen?

Good. And starting with Kant, and the relation of metaphysics to human knowledge, would be a sensible program. We could take a sounding on what is indeed possible, both to know and/or to verify. My only quibble: If the conclusion here is obvious, as you say, one wonders why the debate has nonetheless gone on with vigor for so long -- i.e., you may be right, but not obviously right. — J

Note that i haven't said that the discovery of universal metaphysical truths via intellectual intuition is obviously impossible, but that it is obviously impossible to demonstrate that what has been purportedly discovered is truly a discovery and not simply an imagining. I wonder how, and hence if, we could ever go about demonstrating such a thing. As far as I can tell it remains, and always will remain, a matter of faith. I'm always ready to be corrected on that.

So, the Bang must have had the potential for purpose. — Gnomon

That would only seem to hold if you take the so-called laws of nature to be fixed and immutable from the beginning. Peirce didn't think that, and as far as I remember from studying Whitehead quite long ago, nor did he.

Misery cannot but be bad according to <the human conception of goodness>.
— Janus

I take this to be saying that humanity has a single agreed-upon definition of goodness, and that misery is bad according to that definition. I think that is obviously false. For example, there are people who think that it is good for sinners to suffer. They think this not because they are irrational, but because they have a different idea of goodness than you do. — goremand

A weak response. You continue to ignore context and try to shift the blame for your poor comprehension onto a purported lack of clarity. I haven't said that no one ever thinks it is good for someone else to suffer. Of course they may think that but that only strengthens my argument: they think it is good for the evil or hated person to suffer as punishment, because they understand that suffering is bad for the one who deserves punishment.

I have always been talking about good and suffering per se. The fact that suffering to some degree might be good for the athlete; "no pain, no gain" does not weaken my argument because this, as well as punishment thought of as reformatory is always already in the context of the world that contains suffering we find ourselves in.

The theological notions of heaven and hell also demonstrate my point. Heaven is the desirable place of no suffering and hell the most feared place of endless suffering. Buddhism too, has as its aim the ending of all suffering for all beings. Religions in general have as their aim in one form or another salvation from suffering; which only goes to show that suffering, misery is universally considered to be, as such, bad.

So, the idea of a perfectly good and loving, all-knowing and all powerful being as the creator of this world is incompatible with the realities of this world, as it follows logically that he could have created a perfect world of no suffering for his creatures for the start. That has been the thrust of my whole argument and your strawmanning and throwing in of red herrings has done nothing to weaken it.

It depends what you call philosophy and what you call religion. Boethius (and many others in his time) certainly thought that philosophy could provide consolation. How would you classify his attempt? Ancient philosophers seem mostly to have been confident that philosophy can help us to cope with suffering. But since the scientific revolution, that project seems to have been more or less abandoned and so left to religion (where humanism would count as a religion).

I do want to high-light the difference between two projects, but I don't want to over-simiplify it.
Consoling someone in distress is not the same project as someone analysing the causes of that distress, even though the two projects play into each other.

This is not something I have thought through, but something I am working out. — Ludwig V

I take philosophy to be primarily about how best to live. I guess the question is as to whether we need consolation or whether we need to come to terms with our condition. Would coming to terms with our condition, in the sense of being able to be at peace with it without expecting anything greater to be on offer to count as consolation? Or should we consider only a promise in some form or other, of some more perfect life to come, as we find in the various religions, to count as consolation?

Perhaps the problem here turns on the difference between recognizing suffering and coming to terms with it. Philosophy emphasizes recognizing it; religion is primarily concerned with coming to terms with it. — Ludwig V

Are you suggesting that it is (only?) through religion, and not through philosophy that we can come to terms with suffering?

If there are moral facts, how do we determine what they are? People can obviously disagree about which principles are moral facts. On the one hand there is near-universal agreement that murder, rape, theft and other serious crimes are morally wrong. It is arguably a fact that if those major crimes were not illegal within communities then those communities would fall apart.

This is not so with issues like sex before marriage and homosexuality, they seem fairly clearly to come down to cultural preferences. In another thread you claimed homosexuality is wrong, not just for you but per se, and you will probably claim that is a moral fact. And yet the majority today probably disagree with you. Facts are demonstrable, how are you going to demonstrate that homosexuality is objectively morally wrong?

I’ve met some Catholics, particularly among the Missionaries of Charity, who seemed to believe that misery is a sign of special blessing from God. They wouldn’t say that suffering is good in itself, but they regarded it as a form of grace and they do venerate it. Possibly a sign that the miserable are active participants in the suffering of Jesus. — Tom Storm

Right, given that we already find ourselves thrown into a world of potential suffering, then actually encountering suffering may be considered to be the only way to learn to come to terms with it. Of course they also presume reward in the afterlife for the pious.

At first I thought you were saying that "suffering is bad" is a priori true. Then I thought you were saying "suffering is bad" is a universally held belief. Now it seems you saying "most people think suffering is bad" which is a trivial and irrelevant claim. — goremand

If you had understood what I've been saying you would have seen that the fact that most people consider suffering to be bad is not irrelevant to the argument against the Churches' traditional conception of God, and the God presented in the Old Testament. I'm not going to spoon-feed you further. If you want to critique what I've said then go back and read it, quote what I've said and say precisely where you think it's wrong if you disagree.

Again, this might be true. But whether it's true is a philosophical question. It seems to me that discussing that question is neither apologetics nor phenomenology, but plain old epistemology, wouldn't you say? As such, shouldn't it be a respectable activity for a philosopher?

Perhaps what you're saying is that you believe you have independent and solid grounds for insisting that only propositional truths can be helpful in metaphysics -- and moreover, that religious discourse can't supply them. I bet you can guess what I'm going to say next! :smile: : This may be true, but whether it's true requires . . . more philosophy. — J

I agree that all of what you cited are fitting problems for philosophy. But I also think that ever since Kant, Hegel notwithstanding, it has been obvious that the traditional idea that one could arrive at metaphysical truths via intellectual intuition is, if not impossible, at least impossible to verify.

That third "omni" is the problem. — Gnomon

Yes the three Omni-God is inconsistent with human ideas of goodness and justice, ened of story. So something has to give. Either God would have liked to create a perfect world free of suffering but was unable to do so, or didn't realize what he had done in creating the world, or else such a god simply does not exist in which case there is no "problem of Suffering".

The three-in-one Christian god-head is still popular among the masses, but waning with the intelligentsia, who are more impressed by rational evidence than by emotional myths. That's why I think A.N. Whitehead's update of Spinoza's nature-god is more appropriate for the 21st century. Spinoza referred to his Ultimate Substance as "God", and Whitehead used the same term for his Ultimate Principle of Progressive "Concretion" (evolution). — Gnomon

Sure but Spinoza, probably out of not wishing to offend the religious authorities even further than he already had and out of his belief that the masses need a personal conception of God anyway, spoke in terms of "Deus sive Natura", where he could have simply spoken of natura. An impersonal God offers no comfort, and Spinoza did not believe in any afterlife.

I'm not making claims about humanity but about most people.All I can think if you really believe many people think it is good to be miserable is that you live your life with eyes closed.

If God is fine with human misery then he is not good according to the human conception of goodness. Misery cannot but be bad according to that conception.
— Janus

Exceedingly narrowminded, in my opinion. "Suffering is good" is perhaps a strange and disturbing claim but I wouldn't say it's a literal contradiction in terms. Maybe it is a contradiction under your conception of goodness, but that's all it is: your conception. — goremand

I think the idea that misery is bad is universal, or almost universal. Do you really believe anyone thinks it is good to be miserable? I doubt there are any or at least many. It seems it is your assertion that misery could be considered good, that is out of step and is merely "your conception".

As it happens, I agree with you about the rational arguments. I believe religion begins where philosophy ends. And theology, that halfway house, has never interested me much. But let me push back a little on your final sentence, or at least the "fitting" part. Whether it is true -- whether it's fitting for philosophy to examine rational apologetics -- is itself a philosophical question. The arguments themselves may or may not fit comfortably within philosophical practice. But that too is a philosophical question.

I'm pointing out this peculiarity of philosophy: To consider whether something should be ruled in or out of philosophy is . . . to do more philosophy! And I'm sure you're not saying that the meta-question itself is inappropriate. — J

I agree religion begins where philosophy ends. I once was interested in and read a good bit of theology but I found it all very arbitrary and vacuously speculative, ultimately a waste of time.

When I said religion has no place in philosophy I meant religious apologetics and theology. From a phenomenological perspective religion certainly has a place, it is an important aspect of human life. Faith itself is a powerful and important part of the human condition, and since it can be transformative, whole-life altering, it deserves a place in philosophy. Such experiences do not have a place in metaphysics as I see it, because we cannot tell what they really mean or even if they mean anything at all, beyond what they mean to the individual having the experience.

People experience powerful altered states and they cannot help interpreting them to indicate some metaphysical truth or other according to their cultural predispositions. While this process may indeed be of phenomenological interest, it cannot be held to yield any propositional truth, and so could be of no help for metaphysics.

1. There is a way the world ought to be only if there is a God.
2. There is a way the world ought to be, even though the world is not the way it ought to be.
3. Therefore, there is a God.

Interested in your thoughts. — NotAristotle

We think there is a way the world ought to be because it is far from being the way we would like it to be, so I don't see how God comes into it. If there is a way the world ought to be and if there is a God who could have made it that way, then why didn't he?

2. is kind of a redundant expression: if the world was the way it ought to be, then the world would be as it ought to be, so if there is a way the world ought to be and it is not, then that the world is not as it ought to be is a given.

3. I can't see any way in which "therefore there is a God" follows, unless it is simply stipulated in the first premise, in which case it is a circular argument. Also are we talking about the human world or the natural world or both?

The idea that Gods will necessarily aligns with what is good is one of "our" notions of goodness, people just don't necessarily get that it implies that God is fine with human misery. When you do get there you can choose to reject the notion that "God is good" or the notion that "misery is bad", but I wouldn't say either choice makes you irrational. — goremand

If God is fine with human misery then he is not good according to the human conception of goodness. Misery cannot but be bad according to that conception. The simple solution is there is no reason to believe in such a God.

Completely agree. Traditional Christian theology is primitive, in this area. But I think we can "expand the circle of compassion" without necessarily moving out of the Abrahamic traditions entirely. (FWIW, I've been an animal-rights advocate -- and vegan -- for decades.) — J

That's a step in the right direction. I just don't see why we need God. I don't personally see any reason to believe in God...I think it all comes down to upbringings and personal conviction. I cannot criticize someone else's personal convictions in this matter because I cannot inhabit their experience.

What I can criticize are rational arguments for the existence of God, and weak apologetics...I've examined them all and none of them work. If you are a believer why not accept that, simply believe on the strength of feeling alone. like Kierkegaard's arational "leap of faith" and leave others to their own feelings in the matter? For many reasons I don't think it is an interesting or fitting topic for philosophical discussion.

When you {plural} use the word "God" are you referring to A) the triune God of Christianity, one aspect of whom is a person capable of empathizing with human suffering? Which may be an attempt to reconcile the "notion of justice" with an omniscient abstract God, incapable of suffering . Or B) to the omnipotent (necessary & sufficient) God of Spinoza, which is the non-personal force of Nature, that is no respecter of persons, hence dispenser of impartial natural justice (it is what it is)? — Gnomon

I was referring to the three omnis: omniscient, omnipotent and omnibenevolent. The Chrisitan conception of God is of a loving personal God, one who cares for all his creatures. The nature of His creation (assuming just for the sake of argument that there were such a creator God) belies the conception that God could be all-good, all-knowing and all-powerful. It a pretty easy to understand inconsistency which keeps getting glossed over by believers.

Spinoza's critique of that conception of God can be found in his Tractatus Theologico-Politicus and a trenchant critique it is. His own conception of God grew out of that critique. Needless to say, Spinoza's God has no concern for humanity or anything else.

The problem with this esoteric (and sometimes apophatic) version of God is that it's so hard to get people interested in it. Why would they care? Theistic personalism seems to have more vitality. — Tom Storm

This is exactly the problem. There is no more comfort to be found in such a God than there is in nature itself as we find it.

Human concepts are the basis of rationality. Positing a purported goodness that is not good according to our understanding of goodness or a purported justice that is not just according to our conception of justice is irrational. Doing this leaves behind the only measures we have. All ratio is lost.