Ep. 90: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[mitchellmckain]

This presumes an absolute separation between what is imagined and what is real. When I assert that there is an irreducibly subjective aspect to reality itself, I am calling that presumption into question, and in fact asserting that since imagination is necessarily part of reality, that such a separation is not absolute.

Okay... I understand what you mean when you say that, and I'm fine with it. I agree with it. But when I ask you if you believe Zeus was an actual, real person/god/being who existed outside the imaginations (the perceived subjective realities) of those who believed he did, I'm asking you if you think Zeus was as real a person/being as you or I are. Was there a being called Zeus who walked around on top of Mt. Olympus, even if not observed doing so, or not? Just because some (many?) ancient Greeks seemed to have believed so doesn't mean it was actually so. I understand that the answer is YES as regards their subjective perceptions and interpretations of their subjective realities, but the answer is NO as regards my own and probably (I hope) your own. So I'm not really asking about whether the Greek pantheon existed subjectively in the minds and experiences of those who believed it did, or even in your mind or mine; I'm asking your opinion on whether you think the Greek pantheon objectively existed outside of the subjective realities of those who believed it did. Do you have no opinion on that?

People believe and say things about perfect real people that are incorrect or only based on a small grain of truth. Some of the stories of gods in some cultures could very well have been based upon human rulers whose spirits were thought to hang around in some way until they were eventually thought to be gods (in fact, in Japanese culture they use the same word and there is no distinction between god and spirit). I think that is a far more likely possibility for many of these gods than that they were purely works of fiction. So I cannot even answer a question with regards to how much of their existence was part of this subjective aspect of reality and how much was a part of the objective apsect of reality. Are you asking if I believe that everything that was ever said of these gods could be true? Since I don't believe everything that was ever said of the Christian God that I believe in, then it is only natural for me to think that this is highly unlikely that everything that was said of the Greek gods is true of whatever was real in their case.

And if there is no such thing as an objective reality that exists independently of our subjective perceptions of it, then... Wow...........

There is a difference between saying that there is no objective reality and saying that reality has both subjective and objective aspects to it -- i.e. that reality is not PURELY objective. The point is that I reject this view of reality where what we want and choose is irrelevant, and that reality just is what it is. What we want and choose is not irrelevant but in fact one of the most important parts of reality. Nevertheless the experience of science that there is an objective reality out there, outside of our minds and perception of it, that IS independent of what we may want or believe to be the case, is ALSO something I consider undeniable. Thus I believe that reality has both aspects to it -- a part which is shared and has no regard for what we may want or believe and a part that is not shared and where what we want and choose is paramount.

1) Would it be fair to think of Mitch as sort of a postmodernist, at least as regards religion?

How and in what way since I don't actually agree with the vast majority of philosophers that are called postmodern? You seem to be using this as an epethetical label of some kind rather than any serious examination of what that set of philosophers are actually saying. My thinking certainly is not based on their ideas.

I don't claim to be a scholar, armchair or otherwise, of philosophy. I don't think that should prevent me from using a philosophical term within the limits of my general understanding and to the degree that I think other non-academics might comprehend. Your reply reminds me of Don Johnson's insistence that Emery shouldn't critique Christianity because he's not a theologian.

But there is no similarity at all. I am not saying you have to have a degree in philosophy in order to make a comment on this. But Don would be completely within his rights to ask Emery to give some concrete substantiation for any claims he made regarding Christianity. That was all that I was asking from you.

You seem to be using "reality" to mean either an individual's subjective picture of how the universe works

Incorrect.

or something which includes both the objective universe and the supernatural.

Well duh!!! I am a Christian therefore I believe in a spiritual aspect to reality. I simply think that this spiritual aspect to reality is to be largely found in the subjective rather than the purely objective.

So do you mean that two people's contradictory beliefs can both be correct because they can both be justified by each person's subjective experience, or because the supernatural can contain actual (and not just apparent) contradictions?

Yes I beleive that the spiritual aspect of reality is fundamentally a subjective one because there are no mathematical laws governing that part of reality. While physical things are what they are by the mathematical relationship they have to the whole physical universe, spiritual things are what they are by their own nature alone.

[Dave B]

Do do you mean that two people's contradictory beliefs can both be correct because they can both be justified by each person's subjective experience, or because the supernatural can contain actual (and not just apparent) contradictions?

Yes I beleive that the spiritual aspect of reality is fundamentally a subjective one because there are no mathematical laws governing that part of reality. While physical things are what they are by the mathematical relationship they have to the whole physical universe, spiritual things are what they are by their own nature alone.

If the supernatural can contain actual contradictions, why should an individual's beliefs about the supernatural be logically consistent?

[mitchellmckain]

Yes I beleive that the spiritual aspect of reality is fundamentally a subjective one because there are no mathematical laws governing that part of reality. While physical things are what they are by the mathematical relationship they have to the whole physical universe, spiritual things are what they are by their own nature alone.

If the supernatural can contain actual contradictions, why should an individual's beliefs about the supernatural be logically consistent?

What do you mean "contain contradictions"? I never said anything like this. I simply said that it does not have to be the same for everyone.

The point is that both the subjective aspect of reality and even ones experience of objective physical reality don't necessarily agree those of another person and thus the belief that people have from what they conclude from these things about reality need not agree with one another.

[Dave B]

Mitch,

Would it be fair to say that your position is that a person's supernatural beliefs are correct as long as they are internally consistent and tolerant, even if the supernatural entities that he believes in do not exist outside of his imagination?

[Pseudonym]

Yes, of course the concept nike existed, and could be reasoned about, but did the goddess Nike actually exist as a real being, not a concept, outside of the imaginations of those who believed she did? That is the question, Pseudo; it's not a question of whether the concept of victory exists or not, which of course it does. Do you see the difference?

Of course I do. We see the difference between the concept and the deity, but if you were to say nike or themis to an ancient Greek, you are referring to both things, wrapped up in one idea. When you ask "did Nike exist?", it seems to me that the only accurate answer is "yes and no". To say "yes" incorrectly implies that we still think of Nike as a literal goddess, and to say "no" incorrectly implies that "Nike" was only a deity figure.

Even today, we still sometimes refer to abstract concepts as if they were sentient deities who must be satisfied otherwise bad things will happen. The criminal must be punished because justice demands it. That public official must disclose certain information because good governance requires that they do. We all know that they are metaphors, but we still speak as if they were anthropomorphic deity figures. There is something going on here deep in our psychology.

[Moonwood the Hare]

humanguy said

Moonwood the Hare wrote:

Humanguy I don't have a problem with your claim that there have been many God's worshipped throughout history and that the Christian God is one of them. In answer to your question as to whether I think all other God's are invented then I would think probably not. But the process of how people came to believe in them is very obscure.

Okay, so you agree that at least some of them were probably invented by humans (and I can't come up with anyone else who would have been around to invent Gods), but that leaves at the very least one other God that wasn't invented by human beings.

So we have the Christian God and at least one other God that's now doing, well, God knows what!

So can we now say that would you agree that there are at least two real existing actual gods that were not invented by humans?

You are assuming that gods must have been either invented or be existent. I am saying there are processes other than invention by means of which someone could come to believe something was existent even if it was not. Tonight I saw a bag blowing in the wind that I thought for a second was a rat. There was no rat there but I did not invent the rat. Two people give contradictory accounts of the same event do we need to say one or both of them is inventing?

[mitchellmckain]

Would it be fair to say that your position is that a person's supernatural beliefs are correct as long as they are internally consistent and tolerant, even if the supernatural entities that he believes in do not exist outside of his imagination?

No that is not my position.

A person's spiritual beliefs may be incorrect even though they are consistent with logic and tolerance. I have never claimed that a person's religious beliefs are necessarily correct. I have only claimed that you cannot conclude that if the religious beliefs of two people contradict then one of them must be incorrect, because reality is not purely objective and the same for everyone.

However, I am highly dubious whether you can legitimately say that the spiritual beings, someone believes in, only exist in his imagination. Religious belief, imagination and experiencing things in a hallucination are three very different things. Religous belief seeks consistency with objective reality because they are part of an attempt to understand the whole of reality, imagination need not seek any such consistency because it may not be about reality at all, and hallucinations contradict objective reality with little awareness of the contradiction by the person experiencing them.

[Dave B]

Mitch,

Suppose person 1 believes proposition A, and person 2 believes proposition B, such that A and B together form a contradiction, but they are each internally consistent.

You're saying that it is possible for both person 1 and person 2 to be correct. This should mean that both A and B are both true. Yet you're also saying that if person 3 believes A and B, that person 3 is necessarily wrong. How is it that A is true and B is true, but A and B is not true? I don't understand how subjectivity resolves this issue.

[Pseudonym]

Suppose person 1 believes proposition A, and person 2 believes proposition B, such that A and B together form a contradiction, but they are each internally consistent.

You're saying that it is possible for both person 1 and person 2 to be correct. This should mean that both A and B are both true. Yet you're also saying that if person 3 believes A and B, that person 3 is necessarily wrong. How is it that A is true and B is true, but A and B is not true? I don't understand how subjectivity resolves this issue.

You don't even need two people to illustrate the problem.

Consider the "Paradox of the Forward". I write a book on some non-fiction topic. We can think of a non-fiction book as being a bunch of individual facts, which we will number A1, A2 and so on up to An. I believe two things about this book:

1. I believe that each individual fact in the book is correct, otherwise I wouldn't have put them in there. That is, I believe that A1 is true, and A2 is true, and everything up to An is true.

2. I believe that the book must have at least one mistake in it somewhere, because I'm not perfect, and all books do. That is, I believe that A1 is false, or A2 is false, or some other fact possibly including An are false.

So:

Point number 1 implies that I believe the conjunction A1 and A2 and ... and An, which we will denote A.

Point number 2 implies that I believe the disjunction not A1 or not A2 or ... or not An which under classical logic is the same as not (A1 and A2 and ... and An), that is, not A.

So I believe both A and not A. We have a paradox and therefore logically, I must believe everything, or my brain must explode.

The catch, of course, is that classical logic doesn't exist in nature. It is an abstract theory, which models some real-world applications and not others. Human belief is one of those things which it doesn't model, which is why it annoys me when people say "you believe X, therefore you must believe Y". In the real world, there is no law of nature which states that you must do anything of the sort.

Classical logic is only one logic out of many which mathematicians have developed for widely different purposes. There are logics to model natural language semantics, chemical or physical interactions, games and so on. The sheer diversity is proof that one size does not fit all.

[mitchellmckain]

Suppose person 1 believes proposition A, and person 2 believes proposition B, such that A and B together form a contradiction, but they are each internally consistent.

You're saying that it is possible for both person 1 and person 2 to be correct. This should mean that both A and B are both true. Yet you're also saying that if person 3 believes A and B, that person 3 is necessarily wrong.

Well no, the reason why you say person 3 is wrong has nothing to do with what I say. It is in fact you that are concluding this because you have asserted that A and B together form a contradiction, and so for person 3 to simply assert both A and B would be incoherent. However it is often possible for a third person to make additional assertions that can reconcile A and B as truths relative to something else such as in the case they are statements of two different people, and thus conclude that A and B are not true in an absolute sense but only relative to those that have asserted them.

Again I repeat, the point is that both the subjective aspect of reality and even ones experience of objective physical reality don't necessarily agree with those of another person and thus the belief that people have from what they conclude about reality from these things need not agree with one another. Can't you just seriously consider this and stop trying to fabricate an inconsistency?

Sometime I can really relate to Chesterton's claim (in "Orthodoxy") that insanity has more to do with an excessive rationality than a lack of rationality. Reason is just a tool for understanding things, not reality itself.

[humanguy]

humanguy said

Moonwood the Hare wrote:

Humanguy I don't have a problem with your claim that there have been many God's worshipped throughout history and that the Christian God is one of them. In answer to your question as to whether I think all other God's are invented then I would think probably not. But the process of how people came to believe in them is very obscure.

Okay, so you agree that at least some of them were probably invented by humans (and I can't come up with anyone else who would have been around to invent Gods), but that leaves at the very least one other God that wasn't invented by human beings.

So we have the Christian God and at least one other God that's now doing, well, God knows what!

So can we now say that would you agree that there are at least two real existing actual gods that were not invented by humans?

You are assuming that gods must have been either invented or be existent. I am saying there are processes other than invention by means of which someone could come to believe something was existent even if it was not. Tonight I saw a bag blowing in the wind that I thought for a second was a rat. There was no rat there but I did not invent the rat. Two people give contradictory accounts of the same event do we need to say one or both of them is inventing?

Are you serious? "There are processes other than invention by means of which someone could come to believe something was existent even if it was not."

I have learned from this discussion forum that Christians will not give straight answers to straight questions. That's not something to be proud of, you know. In fact it's rather dishonest.

[Dave B]

Mitchell,

So people can come to different conclusions based on their subjective experiences. I understand that. For example, my experience has led me to believe that there is no being corresponding to the Christian god. Your experience has presumably led you to the opposite conclusion (if this is a false assumption, can we at least agree that there are people who hold this belief and pretend I named one of them?). If I understand you correctly, both of our beliefs could be correct because they are consistent with our experience and with tolerance. But surely this being either exists or doesn't independently of our beliefs. Or are you suggesting that each of us lives in a different reality which overlaps in the physical world but has a possibly different supernatural realm?

Can't you just seriously consider this and stop trying to fabricate an inconsistency?

I understand your frustration with me trying to poke holes in the ideas you're presenting rather than trying to present them. I'm merely trying to understand your point of view, and while working through the ideas I keep running into apparent contradictions. I'm only asking you about these in order to clear up what your beliefs really are. I've never before spoken to someone before who believes as you do, and I'm having a hard time understanding your meaning.

[Dave B]

Pseudonym,

I understand that it's possible to believe both A and not A. I even understand that you could be justified in believing both A and not A. What I don't understand is how you could believe both A and not A and be correct in both beliefs.

[mitchellmckain]

Or are you suggesting that each of us lives in a different reality which overlaps in the physical world but has a possibly different supernatural realm?

YES! That is essentially what it means when I say that the spiritual aspect of reality is found in the subjective. The correctness of our beliefs really is only a matter of whether they continue to be supported by our experiences and thus the beliefs can indeed remain true for both theist and atheist, if the theist continues to experience God and the atheist continues to experience an existence without God. I don't use the words you have used because they are not precisely correct from my perspective but from your perspective that is perhaps close enough.

From my perspective the "spiritual realm" is the existence of spiritual entities and thus there really is only one spiritual "realm", but that "realm" isn't really a place, so the word "realm" is misleading. However spiritual entities, being what they are by their own nature rather than by relationships to some whole which they are a part of as is the case with physical things, are very much like seperate universes with their own rules. Connected to the physical universe, the mathematical laws of this world connect them together and thus they experience a shared objective reality. Without that connection, any relationships they have with things outside of themselves must come from within, because there is no external law in the spiritual realm to connect them together. Thus in your statement, what you have called different "supernatural realms" would be what I would call different spiritual entities or different spirits, and without anything connecting them to others they are indeed like seperate "realms" or different experiential realities.

[JustJim]

And if there is no such thing as an objective reality that exists independently of our subjective perceptions of it, then... Wow...........

There is a difference between saying that there is no objective reality and saying that reality has both subjective and objective aspects to it -- i.e. that reality is not PURELY objective. The point is that I reject this view of reality where what we want and choose is irrelevant, and that reality just is what it is. What we want and choose is not irrelevant but in fact one of the most important parts of reality. Nevertheless the experience of science that there is an objective reality out there, outside of our minds and perception of it, that IS independent of what we may want or believe to be the case, is ALSO something I consider undeniable. Thus I believe that reality has both aspects to it -- a part which is shared and has no regard for what we may want or believe and a part that is not shared and where what we want and choose is paramount.

Thanks, Mitch. I think I finally understand what you mean when you say reality has both subjective and objective aspects to it. Now I have to step back and play around with how I fit myself into that. Cool....

Jim

(P.S. In Japanese, kami is the 'generic' word for spirit or god, while kami-sama is used to denote God. It's a subtle but important distinction.)