Knock! Knock! O’ Ye Believers…

[Star]

I think you've picked up an air of i'm-sooooo-much-more-intelligent-than-you-dumbass's, Sam..that ppl find it a bit off-putting

combined with a tendancy for waffling (but in this thread you're not alone in that)..

which from a personal point of view it means i just read the opening paragraph and the closing lines..


Pity..because i would've liked to have run some of your ideas through my mind.

nevermind - i don't think i have been deprived

[jodyraye]

Originally posted by SamuraiShaz
I never laughed so hard after reading some of the above posts as I did just now.

Only I, on the other hand, tried to remain calm, consistent and show you my reasons to ‘why denying something’; I never denied anything out of the blue, did I? I always showed my reasons

And why do you people have to get so personal with everything I have to say. Just because I happen not to support your beliefs doesn’t mean I’m your worst enemy. I’m here to understand, not to fight, your beliefs. If you hate my views (ie. my guts, in a sense) so much, stop replying then. Don’t make me reply to your orthodox views and a weird style of reasoning. You see, I don’t have the privilege to kill my time so much by posting big replies to you all, and I can not help it either, for you just keep on misinterpreting and misunderstanding me again and again. When I deny something and reason with it, I am stubborn, obnoxious, unreasonable, silly, and what not but when you guys, who happen to believe in the existence of God, reason, you just have to be right all the time and you’d call yourselves reasonable (how interesting!). Thank you for being so much appreciative guys. “Life is not fair”, my grandma used to say. Guess what she was damn right. Although some of you tried to pull all of my limbs out of my body showing so much HATRED & RAGE, I’d like to thank you anyway because you only made me realize how much valid my doubts really are. So thank you all. Hope you all have a good life.


[Edited by SamuraiShaz on 16th February 2004 at 13:22]

Here again you demonstrate such a well defined disparity in your stated reaction to our posts that it gives us a clear example of your own claim of internal confusion. In the beginning of your post you write that you laughed so hard at our reply--as if to imply light heartedness--then in the last paragraph (as well as in you heading) you introduce the words "HATRED & RAGE" and reveal your own mental images of "pull all of my limbs out of my body".
I see NO evidence of any of us demonstrating any such attitude or emotional response to you. Can you give us an example? I would think (speaking of someone taking their valuable time for someone) you would THANK Jefftown for taking his limited time to walk you through the mental construct of analogies so you do not make a fool of yourself in the future by misinterpreting another analogy (for example in one of your classes). I thought he was patient and clearly accurately instructive with you (and all for free). He would have been paid a tutor's fee for such work in that field!
Jefftown was also accurate in advising you to listen, "actually listen to what other people have to say." For example, you wrote "...then you try to defend God through logic." Once before I wrote that I NEVER defended God using logic. I used the mathamatical set theory to define God in relation to logic--there's a big difference. Your complaints of being confused would be significantly lessened if you did listen to others. Do you think our advice was meant to "pull" all of your limbs out of your body? No, we respond to you with clear directions as to how to untangle some of the knots of confusion that exist in your own mind.
Many times, if there is no evidence to support someone's claim as is your case, the person alleging that someone is confronting him with "HATRED & RAGE" is really projecting their own emotions on the other people or person.
What you feel in you own heart and how you see things in your own mind is projected onto someone else. Really, this reaction was created by you.
You are old enough to now take responsibility for your creation. This is what I mean by saying "the flaw is in your own mind."
Whether you believe in God or not we are all; burns, jefftown, and I, not judging you as a person, but going through these responses and dialogues with you so we can RELATE with you.
I hope this clears up some of the confusion that brought you to this site. If not then I'd say you relish confusion and want to resist learning which really goes against your premise that you WANT to learn (which would be in keeping with your modus operandi of having disparate or polarized perspectives for everything).
Hope you have a good week! Love, Jody

[Jefftown]

Sorry, Shaz, but it's impossible to have a philosophical discussion with you when you are being this stubborn. The irony is that you, who are ostensibly the most outspoken proponent of logic and reason on this board, are probably violating logical principles the most (well, besides Mahbuba). A common fallacy in your posts is the "straw person" fallacy, of which you should be aware, having taken logic classes. But for others who might be involved in this discussion, it's when you put words into other people's mouths that they didn't necessarily say, and then proceed to argue against them.

For example, you said to me, "you have already made up your mind to believe. So you are bound not to find irrationalities, I understand that. Jeff- for your kind information, I did show you how your counterclaim doesn’t fit. You were just too blind by faith to see it."

But I have remained rather neutral on what my beliefs are. Just because I am opposing a view that claims that God cannot exist does not necessarily mean I am "blinded by faith." Like I said, that's you using the straw person fallacy. It's kind of common for those who are really stubborn or desperate in their arguments.

"you introduce the ‘law of non-contradiction’"

I didn't introduce this. Aristotle did. This is not some logical mumbo jumbo that I just cooked up.

"Up to this point I had no problems but irrationalities begin to arise when you assume that Godself is indestructible out of the blue."

I concluded that God was indestructable from the assumption that God was eternal. I assumed that God was eternal (as did you in your initial post) to show that IF God was eternal, it would not necessarily contradict God also being omnipotent. I was not stating, "I think God IS indestructable." I do not know if God really is or not. I do not KNOW for sure if God exists or not.

"By the way, Godself is also not a word"

True, it's not a word in the dictionary. Nevertheless, it is a term used by philosophers and theologians who realize that "Himself" is a much less accurate pronoun for such an entity as God.

" For more information, ‘omnipotence’ by its very definition means ‘unlimited power’, which means, it is not bound by some logic that was presumably created with the universe if God indeed is the creator."

Like I said before, logic is a human construction. To reiterate once again, saying that God cannot do contradictory things like making a square circle does not take anything away from God's omnipotence. It's like saying God cannot do dafdsahsfdgdsasf ...it's just meaningless babble. A "square circle" has no reflection on reality. You cannot even conceptualize one.

"how exactly- by defining the term ‘possible’ and changing the meaning of ‘omnipotence’?"

I offered a definition of "possible" that I thought accorded with reason, namely, "physically possible." It can also be defined as "actually possible." Also, I did not change the meaning of omnipotence. You're right, it does mean, unlimited power, which applies to all the things that an entity can possibly have power over.

"What reasons- that eternality is possible but omnipotence isn’t. How can you possibly show ‘God’s omnipotence is limited’ by showing ‘square circles’ are illogical things to create?"

What in the world? YOU'RE the one who offered the argument that omnipotence isn't possible. MY claim was that OMNIPOTENCE IS CONSISTENT WITH BEING ETERNAL. My claim is that the two properties are not contradictions. I do not have to SHOW that square circles are illogical "things" (because they're not really things) to create...they just are, by their very definition.

"‘impossible’ in who’s insight, yours or God’s?"

Well, since we are using "omnipotent" in our sense of the word, we should use "impossible" in our sense too. Unless, that is, you know what "impossible" in God's insight is. Which I don't think you do, for some odd reason...

"Surely you don’t understand the word ‘sanity’ either (I believe) ie. common sense, in case you are wondering."

Actually, sanity does not mean common sense, in case you are wondering.

"In who’s understanding – yours or God’s? Why don’t you claim yourself to be God since you understand God's mind so much better than anybody else?"

Like I said before, since we don't know God's sense of any of these terms (since we don't even KNOW for sure if God exists), all we have to rely on are our senses of them.

"My reply to you was never personal but it seems you made it so."

Straw person, again.

"And, I don’t have to take a class from you on analogies. Jody’s analogy is false because it is inconsistent NOT because of the RELATION between reality and humans but because of the practicality of the terms in relation to each other, they are not simply congruous enough."

This makes little sense. Perhaps you do not need to take a class from me on analogies, but you should take a class from someone. OK, here it is again, in a nutshell...In an analogy, you have two realms of discussion: the analogy, and the reality to which it applies. You have two or more concepts in the analogy that relate to each other (in Jody's example, humans and light) and then you have two or more concepts in reality (humans and knowledge). The analogy works because the relation between the two or more analogical concepts parallels the relation between the two or more real things. The relation in question is not the relation between "reality and humans" but the relation between EACH relation...the analogical one and the real one. What do you even mean by "the practicality of the terms in relation to each other, they are not simply congruous enough."?? Do you mean that they are NOT practical? Which terms, specifically? The analogical ones or the real ones? Or all of them? How are they not congruous enough? In philosophical discussions, it's good to articulate just what you mean when you string words together like that. Please read a summary of the Allegory of the Cave...you can find the very same analogy that Jody makes.

"Right and wrong depends only in perspectives"

This seems to belie the relevance of logic and reason. If right and wrong depend only on perspectives, then there is no objective knowledge, only subjective. In that case I could just claim that the syllogism (All A are B, All B are C, therefore All A are C) is wrong, because I perceive it to be wrong. Are you sure you wanted to say this?

[SamuraiShaz]

Jody, what’s wrong with you? Are you suffering from “I don’t like SamuraiShaz at all” disease? Are you gonna take anything (means anything at all) and throw it right on my face now? When the heck did I demonstrate “such a well defined disparity”? I was being sarcastic. Now do I have to relate to you “English grammar” too? This fight is simply meaningless. I said you were RAGED not me, read it again plzzzzz, that’s why it was funny- “your meaningless anger” towards me, got it now? (sigh)

“I see NO evidence of any of us demonstrating any such attitude or emotional response to you. Can you give us an example?”- Read your and jeff’s previous replies plzzzz. Even if you tell me that you didn’t mean it that way; it was certainly there (subconsciously then). And paying jeff for being helpful, what on earth are you talking about? I’m now starting to think you are being extra supportive to jeff, I wonder why is that? Fyi, somehow I don’t feel welcome to jeff’s world.

"I used the mathamatical set theory to define God in relation to logic--there's a big difference.” So anything related to logic isn’t logic, is that what you tried to mean? Isn’t set theory- logic? I’m really confused here, where exactly is the difference? And NO, your advices (?) weren’t but your attitudes certainly were condescending.

“Many times, if there is no evidence to support someone's claim as is your case, the person alleging that someone is confronting him with "HATRED & RAGE" is really projecting their own emotions on the other people or person. What you feel in you own heart and how you see things in your own mind is projected onto someone else. Really, this reaction was created by you.” Where the hell did you come up with that? Now are you supposed to be a psychologist too? And I don’t remember claiming to be flawless. Why are you trying to get back at me with anything you can dig up in my writings? Still, I can feel the resentments against me in your posts. Why is that? And, weren’t you the one who said that I seemed eager to learn and appeared to have an open mind or something like it, then why are you slashing at me for being a little bit critical. Does having an open mind bind me ‘not to be critical’?

And jeff, you are doing the same mistake like jody- ‘trying to get back at me with anything POSSIBLE’ from my posts. I already said we were having an open discussion; I never set any terms to debate. It just piled up as so. Confusions rise when misunderstandings take place. That’s what happened here, I see. If I indeed wanted a logical fight then why the hell coming here. I just wanted to converse but one thing led to another and the ‘logical fight’ began to take shape, and I simply tried to cope up with it. Now first of all, I already said I was a student and I never did claim I am the ”most outspoken proponent of logic and reason on this board”- another example of straw person fallacy, you see. And if I did appear to be, then ok I guess it was my mistake to communicate properly. And to avoid misunderstandings later, I’d say, there’s still much to learn about the zigzag of logic that I don’t know about yet. And everytime I did used the verb ‘assume’ (where you found the fallacy), didn’t I? If I mistakenly forgot it somewhere, then again my fault totally. For example, you said to me, "you have already made up your mind to believe. So you are bound not to find irrationalities, I understand that. Jeff- for your kind information, I did show you how your counterclaim doesn’t fit. You were just too blind by faith to see it."
But I have remained rather neutral on what my beliefs are. Just because I am opposing a view that claims that God cannot exist does not necessarily mean I am "blinded by faith." Like I said, that's you using the straw person fallacy.” - okay understood your point. But ”It's kind of common for those who are really stubborn or desperate in their arguments.” is just like trying to poke me in the eye; it’s too much bcuz you were vague on this, you should have cleared out your mind to avoid the misunderstanding, don’t you think? But your attitude NOW is understandable cuz I won’t deny I (somehow, probably subconsciously) did try to come back at you. But I shouldn’t have. Sorry.

"you introduce the ‘law of non-contradiction’" I didn't introduce this. Aristotle did. This is not some logical mumbo jumbo that I just cooked up. I never meant you did, I meant you included it in your idea, again misinterpretation- probably my fault, should have been more aware to relate it with appropriate verbs.

"Up to this point I had no problems but irrationalities begin to arise when you assume that Godself is indestructible out of the blue." I concluded that God was indestructable from the assumption that God was eternal. I assumed that God was eternal (as did you in your initial post) to show that IF God was eternal, it would not necessarily contradict God also being omnipotent. I was not stating, "I think God IS indestructable." I do not know if God really is or not. I do not KNOW for sure if God exists or not.”- okay, got it then, since God is eternal, He is indestructible by the very definition of “eternality” ie. having no end. Moreover, you are saying God is omnipotent too but not in a sense that the atheists were assuming ie. all-powerful (by the way, the ‘illogical God’ is not my idea, only the counterclaim is mine). So the absurdity of things capable of being created comes in here and limits God’s ‘ultimate power’. So, in your words, saying God can not create ‘meaningless babble’, doesn’t necessarily limit God’s omnipotence. But you see it does, right here. Because by the very definition of Godself, He is bound to be omnipotence with ‘ultimate power’ that is, not incapable of creating meaningless babble. They are meaningless because we can not understand them. Our knowledge of understanding these things are somehow limited but should it be God’s too? Do you get me now? ”YOU'RE the one who offered the argument that omnipotence isn't possible. MY claim was that OMNIPOTENCE IS CONSISTENT WITH BEING ETERNAL. My claim is that the two properties are not contradictions. I do not have to SHOW that square circles are illogical "things" (because they're not really things) to create...they just are, by their very definition.”- First, for the love of logic, I didn’t offer ‘illogical God’; I just tried to counterclaim the idea. Never mind. But you see, your idea is actually contradicting the idea of an ‘omnipotent God’, not the idea of ‘illogical God’ from the atheists. And ‘omnipotence’ by the very meaning of the word-”… mean, unlimited power, which applies to all the things that an entity can possibly have power over.”- so you agree then. By the way, ‘sanity’ means ‘being sane’ and ‘sane’ simply means ‘able to make sound judgments’ and finally that only means having ‘common sense’ doesn’t it?

Okay now the jody’s ‘real world analogy’ issue. Again the analogy is false bcuz the relationship here is invalid. And I don’t know how it was originally put forth by Plato, so had to take jody’s analogy in place of plato’s. I’ll try to read ‘Allegory of the Cave’ if I find time. Now plz goto jody’s original post and read it with more attention. She equated sun with knowledge and sunlight with logic/reason but sun is not gained from sunlight (as was claimed by her), instead, sun produces sunlight. And neither knowledge nor logic is the producer of one another rather they are the production of each-other, they are interrelated, they can not be separated from each other by throwing an analogy at them. That’s why the analogy wasn’t congruous bcuz the relation u-jeff, talked about isn’t valid here. I hope, this clears things up now.

And finally, the ‘right & wrong’ thing: "Right and wrong depends only in perspectives" This seems to belie the relevance of logic and reason. If right and wrong depend only on perspectives, then there is no objective knowledge, only subjective. In that case I could just claim that the syllogism (All A are B, All B are C, therefore All A are C) is wrong, because I perceive it to be wrong. Are you sure you wanted to say this?”- NO, I didn’t mean ‘logical right and wrong’ depended on perspectives rather I simply pointed to ‘personal opinions’, you again were about to make the straw person fallacy right here.

Meanwhile, plz try writing smaller posts and ask short questions for/to me cuz I can not cut out time to check either my emails or the posts here, bcuz my midterms begin the first week of march (have loads of things to study and do) and also bcuz I am having some problems with my internet connection (one crappy ISP I got) and I am not so-much a cyber-café fan either.

[jodyraye]

[i]Originally posted by jodyraye


I will make one more analogy--it is a real world analogy. I will equate light with knowledge or enlightenment (light=knowledge/enlightenment). The sun is our chief source of light and most of what we see is a result of that source of light, so I'd equate our sun with the knowledge gained from logic or reason (sunlight=logic/reason). This would include moonlight and light achieved through the energy from our sun--which is our chief source of energy. But not all the light that reaches earth comes from our sun. We are receiving light from other suns in our Milky Way, and from other galaxies. The light from other galaxies is shifted and curved. We never really knew it was shifted till after about the 1900's. So I would equate the light from other suns with knowledge or enlightenment outside the realm of reason (extra solar system light=enlightenment beyond logic). It is all real. Before we had proof that spacetime was curved some of us would have said that that concept went beyond reason. It was something that could not have been proven, in part, before we experienced a total solar eclipse in 1919. Yet some scientists speculated it to be true. They admitted they could not prove it to be true. Nonetheless, it WAS true! It was always true, even before they could prove it with empirical data.
So there may be the existance of many truths that we have yet to PROVE to be true. Our knowledge of reality is just beginning to dawn. Because we haven't proven things, or because it doesn't fit our rules of logic, doesn't mean it isn't true.

I'm glad you, as you have stated, have an open mind. You seem very bright and eager to learn.

Love, Jody [/b]

You have requested that our replies be short due to your time crunch so I'll limit my response to 2 basic points.


Regarding your selection of emotional content that is being projected on Jefftown and me, you wrote "I said you were RAGED not me...it was certainly there (subconsciously then)." And twice you have said that we are "trying to get back at me..." You also preempted one of your RAGE statement with the word sarcastic. Perhaps that word was inserted to enable you to retract your statement if needed but since you repeatedly use the words RAGE and anger I assume you are serious about your projection. Jefftown and I have never used those words and you cannot project them onto us unless you have more than your "feeling" about it to go on. I can't speak for Jefftown--he may have given up on you for all I know--but I know for sure that I have no feelings towards you on the level of anger, rage, hatred or being against you. I think I have been firm with you because your debating techniques are undisciplined. For example, you DO inject feelings, words, and thought patterns that were never initiated by us into the argument and then claim they were our points.

Since you have had repeated trouble understanding my analogy regarding light and knowledge, and it is a clear demonstration of how you distort what I have written (Jefftown has gone through analogies with you twice) I'll go through it briefly now.
You wrote, "She equated sun with knowledge and sunlight with logic/reason but sun is not gained from sunlight (as was claimed by her), instead, sun produces sunlight. And neither knowledge nor logic is the producer of one another...That's why the analogy wasn't congruous."

The analogy as I wrote it is above. Where did I "claim" that sun is GAINED from sunlight?? Where did I discuss which was the PRODUCER of one or the other??
I wrote that I equated light with knowledge or enlightenment (light=knowledge/enlightenment). I equated our sun with the KNOWLEDGE GAINED FROM LOGIC OR REASON (sunlight=logic/reason). This included light reflected from our moon and other light received from energy originally from our sun.
I wrote that not all the light that we recieve originates from our sun, thus not all of our knowledge (remember light=knowledge/enlightenment)is gained from logic or reason. Some light/knowledge is extra solar system/outside logic and reason.
I added that many learned people did not understand light beyond our solar system. There were speculations regarding how light from other galaxies arrived to us. There was no proof that light from other galaxies was different from light from light from our sun in that it was shifted (the red shift) or that light folows a curved path. The truth about light was eventually proven in part when we experienced a total solar eclipse of the sun in 1919 and we documented that light around our own sun was curved or bent.
My point was that truths existed before they could be proven. Some of those truths were considered beyond logic and reason at the time. What we think cannot be proven now may well be able to be proven in the future, and what we consider to be beyond our logic and reason now may fit very well into logic and reason in the future.
My analogy never even ventured into whether sun is gained from sunlight.
If you still don't understand it Shaz I suggest we drop it.
Good luck with your studies. I have to say that your interaction with Jefftown and I should at least be considered an excercise or practice in logical thinking.
Still with love, Jody

[hac]

Originally posted by SamuraiShaz
[B} Doesn't faith have as much to do with believeing in God as logic has?

[/b][/i]
Not really. Nevertheless, please elaborate your point further.
[/b][/quote]

I found your response quite confusing - you don't accept my point, yet you wish for me to elaborate; what would be the point? Logic (I know you're a big fan) would dictate that you tell us why you reject the assertion so that I may either accept your explanation or in turn reject it - then, perhaps it would be useful for me to elaborate...

If I were to ignore your dismissal of a point that you ask for more information on I would say;

If God cannot be proven through logic, how can one rely on logic alone to do just that?

or:

Logic => proof

whereas:

logic + faith = belief - does this make sense?

[jodyraye]

Dear Shaz,
Just to let you know; once you finally take responsibility for the way you distort information that either gets into your brain, or is selctively rejected by your brain your confusion WILL disappear. In other words if you can just listen to what others tell you--submit yourself to listening--then learning will become easier. Your exam grades will go up--although I don't mean to imply that they aren't pretty good already. But I can guarantee you that once you stop distorting information much of your confusion will be gone and learning will become much easier.
I say this not to attack you with "HATRED & RAGE"--you words, your thoughts--I say this because you are worth it. Its hard to find someone who will tell you the truth, but when you do find that someone it would be good for yourself if you could listen to the person. (It has nothing to do with me. For once this is something legitimately about you! )
Its an excercise that takes time, and has to become a habit eventually, but it IS worth it.
I only suggest this because I resect you.
Love, Jody