Posts Tagged ‘argument from ignorance’

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Who Hijacked Reality / #582 I am so sick of this appeal to ignorance argument from the faithful so let’s put it in its place.

Tuesday, October 4th, 2011

 

 

Journal Entry #582

October 4th, 2011

I keep hearing this argument over and over as the final stand in one form or another and they lean on it like it is the ultimate reason to prove their god or any other delusion. Sorry not buying it for one minute.

It basically goes like this; well you can’t prove god is not real so until you do I will believe because you can’t absolutely dispute it.

If I come over to your house and take all your stuff and then use this argument what will you say?

If I come over and punch you in the face and then use this argument what will you say?

There is a good reason we have the 5 senses we do to figure out what is true and what is not. These senses bring the information into our minds so we can make good sound decisions in life. To not trust them to help you in this quest is asinine.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rB2jmuZAJtw

Argumentum ad Ignorantiam (Argument from Ignorance) and Weak Analogy
Fallacies

Here is the intellectual version;

Gary @ What would you consider to be a reasonable and rational argument for the existence of the supernatural?

    MY
answer was no argument or else I would accept it as true……..

 

That we who are natural, will not blanket accept that everything that we can relate to with our senses is all that there is.

Yesterday I risked a short bible quote; “Faith that is seen is not faith”, the author, in context, here is accepting the natural world as not being all that there is.

 I do understand why this “unseen” is not provable – you can’t ‘see’ it!

We are never as easy difficult as we appear, and are if there is any;
the best proof that there is something more.

 Just don’t ask a person to prove it because they cannot.

          

What a pile if shit. If you can’t prove it guess what it probably isn’t real, if all the other evidence that refutes your  god is screaming at you saying, buddy god is probably not real and you ignore it your are acting like an idiot would.

My response which was
completely ignored;

Gary David Currie …..Ok let me be perfectly clear on this. I get it  and all. You keep saying that it is impossible to prove it and I agree. I get that but that should be the first clue for you to not to believe it. I will push the point of “BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT” here.

Think of all the things you do not believe in and why you do not believe in them and then apply the same process of reasoning to what you do believe in.

 The reasoning you have been using to justify why you do believe will not hold water on applying it to all you do not believe in.

I think you are having a hard time accepting a base point for reality that does not fit in with your beliefs and yet you will apply the same base point I use on so many other things in life until it does not support your personal speculation.

Sorry to say but this is intellectual dishonesty..

 

Think of all the things you accept that the scientific method has proven beyond a reasonable doubt, now think why you accept science there but then dispel it when it falsifies you beliefs of the unknown as true.

 

Tell me why you do not believe in Odin, Zeus, pixies or the flying spaghetti monster. Now take away your personal experience on your belief and apply the same reasoning and testing method to the conclusion. Verification must be independent of personal experience as best we can.

 

We must abide by the laws and rules of the universe and trying to change them will not make what you believe to be true no matter how bad you want it.

 

Unfucking believable lack of rational thinking is the source for so much delusional thinking..

 

Seek the truth always

Gary David Currie

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Who Hijacked Reality / #567 Rarely do we want to hear the truth.

Sunday, September 18th, 2011

 

 

Journal Entry #567

September 18th, 2011

·         Gary David Currie

 

I am constantly amazed at the arguments I hear from people on any number of topics. I am sure I will probably sound arrogant here but people just don’t seem to want to accept the truth on most matters, issues or topics. I have stated this before but many things are just plain obvious and still people refuse to accept them. The latest argument I keep hearing is just another version of the same argument I keep hearing, “The argument from ignorance.”

An example;

The problem is that you don’t know anything is true. You have a working hypothesis (that everything you experience is true, except for the stuff you think isn’t true) and you seem content to live with that.

Interestingly, those who believe in God hold a similar position. They experience God every day and seem quite happy with that.

You defined truth as: ‘all that is, all that is real, all that is factual, all that is reality.’

For the religiously inclined, God is real and factual, and present in reality. Your position and theirs is basically the same.

But you do the same thing. You use logic and reason in most areas of your life, but you accept without question that what your perceptions are real. It’s exactly the same thing.

Your claim that those who believe they are living in the presence of a creator are mistaken is matched by your claim that your perceptions are correct, which is equally as flawed.

Faith is simply the expression of the inability to provide verifiable proof. The same verifiable proof is missing when it comes to our experiences of the world. The world you believe to be real may be as illusory as the God believed in by the faithful.

 

An example of my response and if you need more the few previous blog posts I have covered this;

 I do not accept without question, I question all the time. Look this game can go on forever and I have made my case which you are actually proving by continuing to engage in speculation.

You are playing the “what if” game and in this game there is no end and no beginning, If you read my article I covered this well. There can always be an objection but I believe at some point we must reach a conclusion or we just will continue to dwell in fantasy. That is really all there is. We can keep talking fantasy or accept a reasonable shared definition of reality.

I cannot prove a negative and anything in the unknown is a negative. Again it is probabilities or best guess. You sound like you want absolutes and guarantees which do not happen.

I see this argument over and over and really I answered all your questions in my article, your choice to accept or not. It will not change what is true as I am either right or I am wrong on this matter.

 

We all seem to think we have got it right, that we know what is best but the truth is that most of us don’t know what is best and we are listening to the wrong people, I know what I am writing here and have been writing about in my recent posts will seem trivial and boring to most and many will disagree but as of yet not one person has proven me wrong on this.  

I keep asking this fundamental question and people keep going off into speculation land to disagree with it by saying that you can never prove anything  for sure or you don’t really know, You can’t prove that god doesn’t exist. You can’t prove you are absolutely right, for all you know reality could be what I think it is, reality is different for me than it is for you, you have faith just like everyone else in something.

I am fully aware I will not be popular, people will not listen to me and very few if any will agree but I do believe that what I present is grounded in its reason and logic, I have carefully thought this through trying to falsify it myself many times and have made several adjustments along the way but at this point this simplistic message I present is solid.

Here it is once again;

Truth- all that is, all that is real, all that is part of reality and all that is factual.

How we determine what is true based on a shared accepted point of reference we call reality. – Verification through the method of the scientific process, reason and logic.

I believe that we cannot verify anything 100% as doubt can always be cast however small so we work on a system of probabilities, best guess and beyond reasonable doubt to say that we know something is true.

We should never believe anything in the unknown to be true until it is verified as known. We can speculate, imagine and engage in fantasy thinking but must always come back to our base of reality. The unknown should not be used as an argument to dispute the known or another unknown as this is just pure speculation.

For every question there can only be one answer that is true.

Once something is known it is no longer up for debate there is only acceptance or ignorance.

There is only truth based on my definition.

The truth will remain the truth no matter what we think our try and do to it, we are powerless over it and yet it is what gives us our power.

Something is either true or it is not even if we do not know if it is true or not.

This is the simple, well maybe not simple message I keep repeating in various forms and people just don’t want to hear it. I am a person who sees things in true or false as to me the grey area can be broken down to this as well. My breakdown of things is offensive to many as it challenges long held ideals and challenges comfort zones in many. Very few have actually taken the time to truly understand what I present before they knee jerk their reaction. The only arguments I have seen so far against this all rely on the unknown to confirm them and to me this is no argument at all. Does this mean I am absolutely right? The answer is obvious if you take the time to understand what I have proposed.

I think what I have offered here and I am probably not the only one is vital to humanities understanding of what truth is and as I have said the truth is all we have. To deny what is true is insanity and yet it happens all the time.  This is fundamental, vital and important for humanity but I fear that it will just be the way I see things and stay that way. If I am right it will prevail eventually as it must for it will be true.

You know if I could just get people to listen before they jumped to conclusions and we started off with all the things we can find that we agree on we would see that the methods we use really are not that different after all and only diverge when it comes to something that must circumvent the methods of science or else it will be falsified.  If we could just apply logic and reason to those beliefs as well we could actually arrive at the truth.

THERE IS ONLY TRUTH

Seek the truth always

Gary David Currie

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Who Hijacked Reality / #476 Creationism was created to fulfill a basic need in humanity and nothing more.

Sunday, June 19th, 2011

 

Journal Entry #476

June 19th, 2011

Creationism or as it is referred to now as Intelligent Design was created by humanity to fulfill a basic need and that need is to feel important, to be valued. Sure it was designed to answer the questions we feel are so important. Why we are here, who are we and what our purpose in life is and at the time it was created with the available understanding of life it fulfilled its purpose but now we know better.

Science has proven that biblical or any other Creation story fostered from religious doctrine is simply not true. We have answered many of the questions with more verified answers and refuted the answers it provides so it is time we acknowledged this.  I realize that Evolution does not fill the need of feeling valued the way being the chosen creation of a god will but evolution is the truth. We have learned to see our value in other ways.

Our answers above all should be based on what is true not what we want to be true and Evolution is a fact based on what we do know. I am not going to get into the silly unverified arguments that have been presented form the Creationist position because if you truly value truth you can seek them out for yourself. You can look into what Evolution demonstrates and get the facts before you refute it. If you are to look at the information from an unbiased position with the truth as your goal Evolution will prevail. I fully admit there are many questions we do not know the answers to and that is the journey. We don’t know the answer to the big questions such as where did everything come from but to fill in the blank with what you want it to be without verification is simply the argument from ignorance.

Let me just ask some simple questions to challenge the concept of design. I could certainly come up with a better design if I had cart blanch to design the universe. I am referring to the design of this planet and humanity and really who am I. That will be for another post.

My questions if we are designed;

- When someone designs something they test it out and are constantly improving the faults of their design, either God is not bothering to continue this process, he made a bad design which means he is not god or he likes the design the way it is with all the flaws of the design. Which is it?

- Why do we get zits?

- Why do we breathe through the same hole we  eat through when the possibility to choke to death exists. Is this not a terrible design?

- What purpose does male pattern baldness serve?

- Why do we get diseases?

- What is the purpose of dying horribly?

- Why do we hurt or kill each other?

- Why don’t we have eyes in the back of our head as well?

- Why do our bodies break down so easily?

- Why do we get fat?

- Why do we need to eat? Could he not have devised a better system of obtaining energy?

- Why are some things prey and others predator?

- Why can’t we breathe underwater?

-  Why do most species not survive and go extinct if we are designed so perfectly?

- Why is there evidence for Evolution everywhere but none for Creation?

- Why was I created to be able to deny god?

- Why can’t we fly it sure would be easier to get around?

Just a few simple questions that are not answered by Creation with any rationality an yet the answers are found through science. Why is that? I know because Science works and Evolution is true while creation or ID is not.

So really Creationism is all about our need to feel important, to be valued and a god provides this initially but then the system of rules lead to other problems. Once you see the reasoning for the Creation stories, why the myth was created which was believed to be true at the time it was created one can see that in this modern world there is no place for it as being true.

Creationism does not belong in the science classroom. It does not belong as being valued as true. It belongs in the realm of mythology and eventually all gods end up there so let’s just give this one a little boost of reason and put it where it belongs.

Our need to be valued no longer needs to be filled by a belief that god created us as we have other ways to fulfill the need.  Let’s stop this silliness of building Creation Museums and replicas of Noah’s Ark and anything else associated with pushing this agenda that simply is not true. Back up and take a look at the facts and stop following the “If it`s good enough for Jesus it`s good enough for me” method of thinking.

It is not good enough for me and Jesus has no say in the matter. It really shouldn’t be good enough for you either especially if you value the idea of truth as I do.

Seek the truth always

Gary David Currie

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Who Hijacked Reality / #429 Religion always boils down to one argument.

Monday, May 2nd, 2011

 

 

Journal Entry #429

May 2nd, 2011

After looking at all the evidence for gods existence be it Allah, the Christian god or any deity that is claimed by humanity there really is no verifiable evidence that is strong enough to support the claim. It always reverts to one basic argument and this is the argument from ignorance or faith.

I have at one time or another refuted all the basic arguments for gods existence and so have many others who have done a much better job than I have but still people will eventually fall back to this position in defence of their personal god of choice.

The position is this;

You cannot prove god does not exist so until you do I will believe it to be true, I will have faith in my god. That`s it there really is nothing more to it. This is absolutely the worst reason to take something as true and yet billions of people do it. Once the delusion is accepted then from there it is about legitimizing the faith. There is no talking or convincing someone who want to believe until they are willing to listen to reason. Once they are willing to listen to reason and accept reality then there is no reason to believe in what is probably not true.

There are several desires that fuel the belief depending on the chosen god and none of them are based in reality. It gets crazy as the delusion deepens and the layers of the onion get thicker and thicker.

The evidence is very weak for the existence of any god and the obvious proof of this is that one has to have faith in the first place. If there really was credible evidence faith would not be a requirement. What I have just said is very important and probably the most profound statement I can make.

Think of all the millions if not gazillions of things we cannot proof or disprove and then tell me how many of them you take as true. So if you are a believer why don`t you take those things as true? What propels you to think that despite no verifiable evidence (and please don’t tell me that there is credible evidence because even though you think there is there is not) what you believe is true. No, I am not being arrogant even though you may think I am and I am sure you as a believer will deny what I am saying as long as it can be reasonably refuted you have not met the burden of proof for your claim so it is probably not true. Yet still people will believe.

I am certainly not naive in any way to think that I can change a believers mind but that will not change what is true. Based on the fact that the burden of proof has not been met for the claim of god it is probably not true and that is a very high degree of probability.

Faith in the sense in believing something to be true despite any credible evidence is ridiculous. So I urge people to stop basing their life on false desires.

Until people are willing to use reason and science as a grounding for reality they will continue to fall back on the argument from ignorance no matter what I or anyone else says. That is reality.

If you scan through my blog posts that I have spent the last year writing you will find a common theme and I do believe every argument presented for god refuted. If you have a new argument to offer I am more than willing to listen but I will warn you that my bullshit meter is finely tuned so make it a good one. I have spent the last year promoting truth and positive solutions for the problems I believe delusional thinking leads to.  I also realize I am in the minority and in many cases will be hated for my view but that is fine as I believe I am in good company.

The truth is that faith in god is grounded in ignorance.

Seek the truth always

Gary David Currie

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Who Hijacked Reality / #417 Your world is very depressing and that is why I believe in god.

Wednesday, April 20th, 2011

 

 

Journal Entry #417

April 20th, 2011

Once again I realize that the consistent argument I see from many is the argument from ignorance. In the example below the person is saying I don’t like reality so I will create a fantasy and call it reality because it makes me feel more secure in my life.

Christian……Gary, I respect where you’re coming from but I would hate to live in your world. It’s so limited. Your faith is completely in man’s intelligence and it has proven itself to be flawed time and time again. If this is all there is to life (meaning us as human beings) then that’s very depressing.

Gary David Currie ……..I will agree with you that mans intelligence has proven itself to be flawed as it has created gods. My world is your world. Please enlighten my how it is limited as I can imagine just as much as the next person. Reality is actually fantastic. I am sorry that it is depressing to you but that will still not change it. We are born we live and we die just the way it is. What we do with that life is the fantastic journey. Having faith in a life beyond has nothing to do with this life as you will only know this when you are dead.

To ignore the world we live in just because it is harsh at times and may be depressing will not change the reality of the world. There is so much beauty and wonder in the world and I will stay away from defining it as the natural world as opposed to the world of god because really there is only just one world one reality.

Yes life certainly sucks at times but suck it up butter cup, that’s life. You can pretend all you want to that it is something else or that you are going to a better place but that is probably what it will be just pretend.

If one cannot see all the fantastic experiences that life has to offer then I actually feel sorry for them. The list is endless what the universe holds to be discovered and the human experience that we engage in.

Classic example of the argument from ignorance;

CHRISTIAN;

Here is a great example of how my God works: I just got my car out of the shop with a bill that wiped out my savings. This morning I checked my financial aid status and I had been awarded an amount that, after paying for my classes, left me with $20 over what my car cost to fix. Brush it off as coincidence if you want to, but I choose to believe my God is taking care of me.

The most important statement here is this “I choose to believe my God is taking care of me.” This person is actually aware that they are probably fooling themselves but still had made the conscious choice to engage in doing so. I mean there are so many other explanations that are more plausible than Jesus yet they have decided to ignore all of those and instead of saying “I don’t know”  they have chosen what they would like it to be. There is absolutely no evidence for this to be attributed to Jesus but that does not stop them. Now if I posted the rest of the strain many people jumped on the boat of ignoring reality and relaying their stories of miracles. This only fuels the delusion for all.

As the conversation progressed and I offered my observations which were not the norm I ran into the usual scenario where my beliefs became the topic in question. Because I did not share their belief system I could not possibly understand;

Christian #1……..There is power in faith, something I wouldn’t expect you to understand, Gary. The fact that I CHOOSE to believe is what honours God. I don’t believe God is a puppet master, but His Word says that He causes all things to work together for good for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose. Our choices affect what happens in our lives (and is also what causes evil in the world), but God can use those consequences to bring about good things for us who have faith in Him, where this would not happen for the person without faith.

Christian #2….. It’s no surprise that Gary thinks of it as a coincidence, or his beliefs would require total re-adjustment. Within what Gary requires as measurement, miracles and “good” things cannot exist, they’re not on his “speedometer”.

I think this will not only sum up my beliefs but certainly show again people indulging in the argument from ignorance;

People are constantly calling my belief system flawed. My beliefs fall in line with people like Gandhi, Mandela & the Dalai Lama. The flaw they are referring to is that I do not assign what I believe to an imaginary god and that is where they think it is flawed. I actually like to take credit for being what I consider a good human being.

Why do people just like to make shit up and then once they believe it is true they continue to build on the delusion until it takes on epic proportions.  They need to just stop near the beginning and say I don’t know and leave it at that.

Seek the truth always

Gary David Currie

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