Why couldn't he hold doubt about something which someone else claims to have experienced? Schizophraniacs claim to experience all sorts of things, and we often have good reason to doubt that what they are experiencing has anything to do with the truth. For instance, a patient in my mother's psyche hospital believes that he is building a spaceship in his stomach every time he consumes a piece of metal - he claims to be able to feel the "little people" in his stomach constructing the ship. You sincerely believe we should not doubt, and instead believe that what he says may be true since we have never experienced what it is like to have a spaceship built in our stomach?
We can most certainly believe that the person in question thinks he is experiencing a particular thing, and we can even believe that said person is experiencing something, but that does not mean we have to believe that said person is right about what he thinks he is experiencing. We can have doubt, and not only is there nothing wrong with that, we often have good reason to do so.
Here you go, once again, not distinguishing between faith and justified belief.
And, once again, I will have to tell you: They are not the same.
[jeeprs said:] "Nevertheless I am someone who has had spiritual and religious experiences, so I don't share the view that all religion is simply delusion."
I don't doubt for a moment that you have had religious experiences in the sense that you interpreted them as showing something about the truth of religion. But I do doubt that you have had religious experiences in the sense that they did show anything about the truth of religion. That distinction has to be carefully drawn.
Again: In the sense that in India it may be that religion is not placed in doubt as it is in the West, religion is better in India.
But, not in the sense that religion as practiced in India somehow confirms the truth of religion, since there are the very same doubts wherever religion is practiced, even if they are not raised in some places.
Why not? Whether LBP exists is an empirical question, isn't it? All statements of the form, " X exists" (with the exception, perhaps) of some mathematical statements, perhaps) are empirical statement. Certainly, all statements of that form are contingent statements. How else can we tell whether X exists or not (with the exception I made for mathematics and logic) if not empirically?
So, can science prove that God does not exist? (Very doubtful)
Do some people believe that they have evidence that God does exist? (Obviously they do.)
Are those who doubt or deny the existence of God going to change their minds based on the experience of others? (Doubtful)
Can scientific tests be devised to support the theory of cosmic strings? (Not yet, but we may know some day!)
Could scientific tests be devised to support the theory that a God with a specified set of properties exists? (Again, not at this time, but we have a while to find out, if we don't kill ourselves in the near future!)
Science depends on consensus. If you get cold fusion in your garage, and no one else sees it or can make it happen themselves, you will not be believed. Science is the democratization of truth. This is not by any means an exhaustive description, but objectivity and consensus are close indeed.
Not to pick on you but I can show you how your reasoning is sliced in such a way that you can't even notice when you make contradictions.
First you start off with this statement:
"So, can science prove that God does not exist? (Very doubtful)"
I want you to keep in mind your response to your own question. The "very doubtful" part because then you say:
"Could scientific tests be devised to support the theory that a God with a specified set of properties exists?"
However; this time you answer your question like this:
"(Again, not at this time, but we have a while to find out, if we don't kill ourselves in the near future!)"
Okay have you noticed your mistake yet? If not let me explain. Your first question is valid and a good question but like I said your response is the key point. Very doubtful meaning, more than likely science will never be able to disprove the existence of god. Yet later you make a similar question almost a reversal of the first. Can science devise a test that would be supportive of the theory of the properties of god? Well to know any traits you would first have to acknowledge that the object you are testing is testable or real. But the funny thing is your response to your question is more positive than your first response. You say not at this time, meaning you are optimistic that eventually we will be able to. In fact you solidify your optimism by saying if we don't kill ourselves implying that we will eventually given enough time.
Now how is it you can ask two similar question and provide two almost apposing responses? Because you have already decided the answers. You are saying science is incapable of disproving god but we can determine the traits of god. Therefore you are making an indirect claim that god exist, there is no way to disprove something because it exists, and all we need to do is find a solution to prove the traits of that god.
Why all the run around? Who are you trying to convince? Your motive is clear as that. Am I wrong? Did I miss something?
We can't? Why not? Unless science can exclude the existence of Santa, it ought to fund an expedition to the North Pole to find out whether or not Santa exists. (And take a look around for the helpers while about it, too).
My point is that you, on one hand, are saying that science cannot exclude the existence of Santa, but you agree that we should not bother mount an expedition in search of Santa. If you think the first, then why do you think the second?
Schizophrenics don't claim to experience all sorts of things, they do experience it, even though they may be the only ones who do. Does that make their experience any less real to them?
You don't have faith in your justified beliefs?
...
You don't have faith in your justified beliefs?
faith
-nounFaith | Define Faith at Dictionary.com
- Confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing.
- Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence. See Synonyms at belief, trust.
- Loyalty to a person or thing; allegiance: keeping faith with one's supporters.
- often Faith Christianity The theological virtue defined as secure belief in God and a trusting acceptance of God's will.
- The body of dogma of a religion: the Muslim faith.
- A set of principles or beliefs.
If one simply chooses, without regard to reason and evidence, why does one choose what one chooses? Why not choose the opposite? Or in matters of religion, if one chooses to be a Muslim, rather than a Christian or some other alternative, by faith, rather than with evidence, why choose those beliefs rather than any others? To see the need for evidence in matters of religion, one need only consider that the various religions all contradict each other, and, therefore, they cannot all be true. And why choose one religion rather than another? When a believer is attempting to convert others, what can be said to someone who claims faith in another religion? The believer can say that only his or her faith is faith in something true, but that is no evidence at all, and the prospective convert can make the same claim about his or her own religion. The religionist who advocates faith is, therefore, in a rather interesting position-he or she must also advocate rejecting faith. The reason for this is clear from the above remarks-one must reject all conflicting faiths if one is to embrace a particular faith. This may be obscured by the fact that people are often inconsistent (and consequently they are necessarily wrong no matter what the truth might be), but it does not alter the fact that, for example, it is impossible to fully embrace both Catholicism and Buddhism, or even Catholicism and Lutheranism. Anyone who is acquainted with the doctrines of each of these religions will be able to come up with examples of how the doctrine of each conflicts with that of the others. And, indeed, all different religions have conflicting doctrines, for, after all, if their doctrines were all the same, then they would not be different religions.
How can you possibly hold doubt about something in which you seem to have never experienced? I have never experienced Haley's comet, but I don't doubt it's existence, or even suggest that people who have experienced the Comet merely misinterpreted it as giving them some sort of truth to it.
Religion, as you are talking about it, doesn't seem to be religion as jeeprs has experienced. His experience of religion is obviously something that you haven't experienced, therefore, your argument against it has no ground. You can speculate all you wish, but those who have experienced religious truth all use the same words to describe it, which shows there is some level of transcendence involved with it.
The distinction to be drawn is between your idea of religious experience, and those that jeeprs mentions.
Of course I agree that the existence of God is not a scientific question, but comparisons between Santa and God are specious, however.
The God idea, right or wrong, is a principle foundation for the Western conceptions of ethics and society. The judeo-Christian ethos and the Ancient Greek conception of Deity are fundamental to many moral principles, the notion of the individual and the origin of many civil laws and other defining characteristics of Western civilization.
So the comparisons of the notion of deity with Santa, the tooth fairy, various fictional characters from television, and so forth, simply illustrate, to my mind, the complete lack of insight into the nature of the question of the meaning of 'deity' in the minds of those who make them.
I dunno, they're both generally reported as patriarchal paragons credited with the performance of impossible things and rewarding on the basis of good behaviour.
There's a difference of scale, perhaps.
I don't think Greek ethics has much to do with their gods. In fact their myths quite regularly depict the gods as being vindictive and jealous towards each other as well as their worshippers. Most polytheists construct a pantheon where gods tend to human faults and follies. The greek afterlife was pretty miserable for evildoers and good people alike, and many of their greatest heroes were seen as such because they defied the gods to some degree or other.
There's no difference really between someone who has a dream in which the monkey from the front of a cocopops box orders them to travel to Scotland and spread the good word of Kellogs and the mystical experiences reported by any believer.
It's every bit as tangible - it's just more "eccentric". If someone wants the monkey from the cocopops box to act as metaphore for what's ineffable to him or her - how is that different to a deity?
It takes real effort to be able to critique the worldview one has been acculturated into, because its perspective usually provide the spectacles through which everything else is seen.
And what is the difference between my having the hallucination of an oasis, which turns out to be a mirage, and my actually seeing an oasis, just in so far as the experiences go?
How do I tell which is the the mirage, and which is the veridical experience?
So then, is there a possibility of 'veridical religious experience'? That is, an experience of a religious nature, that actually corresponds with a reality, as distinct from either wishing for Santa, or clinging to dogma, or otherwise being delusional?
Or is that beyond the pale?
