Divine revelation

[Truthseeker]

I think you misunderstood what I meant by "relative". Different claims are going to have different probabilities. In that sense the probability is "relative". That is, relative to the claim in question.

It now seems as though I need to ask you what you mean by probability in this context.

[Truthseeker]

On what basis do you make this claim?

A thread is already started that may be more suitable for that question http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/sh...ll=1#post97662

I have put my reply there

[shunyadragon]

I don't understand. If one knows a bit of absolute truth, and a claim is made that can be compared to that bit, why not just say the claim is wrong (or right, as the case may be)? To me, "relative probability" makes sense only in statistical analysis of data or in judgment of likelihood (like betting on horse races).

To understand

you must have an absolute standard of truth by which to measure the relative probability of a given truth claim.

Check out presupositional apologetics here:

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presuppositional_apologetics

a belief that takes precedence over another and therefore serves as a criterion for another. An ultimate presupposition is a belief over which no other takes precedence. For a Christian, the content of Scripture must serve as his ultimate presupposition… This doctrine is merely the outworking of the lordship of God in the area of human thought. It merely applies the doctrine of scriptural infallibility to the realm of knowing.

© Copyright Original Source

[NormATive]

Really? How so?

Jewish folks worship Jesus' G-d. Christians worship Jesus. I would have thought such a smart man as you would know that.

I'm guessing you have an argument for this, and not just rhetoric?

No argument. It's just a fact. I base it on the Tanakh, which is the same scripture Jesus believed to be the Word of G-d. It needs no argument.

Please explain the difference(s) between my God and robrecht's God.

Well, for starters, G-d isn't a human like yours. And, let's talk only about YOUR God. Robrecht can speak for himself.

NORM

[shunyadragon]

Jewish folks worship Jesus' G-d. Christians worship Jesus. I would have thought such a smart man as you would know that.

More specific, Christians consider Jesus 'God incarnate,' and Jews consider this heresy.

[NormATive]

More specific, Christians consider Jesus 'God incarnate,' and Jews consider this heresy.

Not all Jews use the word heresy. Politeness dictates we refer to them as just "confused."

NORM

[shunyadragon]

Not all Jews use the word heresy. Politeness dictates we refer to them as just "confused."

NORM

Polite euphemisms aside, It is a heresy in Judaism. Also, Jews do not believe in the Fall nor original sin.

[Mr. Black]

shuny, sorry about the delay. The seasons are changing so things are getting really busy for me. I'm short on time, but will cover the important issues, and will attempt to avoid covering ground we've already been over.

Are you Vedic believer that our physical reality is an illusion? If so it is a radical change of religion.

No, I'm not. As with the case with the uniformity of nature, I hold to the reliability of the senses. I'm challenging your worldview's ability to give us any good reason to hold to any of the preconditions of intelligibility. You have no basis for them in your worldview as they're biblical principles. Because you have no basis for them, you borrow them from my worldview in order to use them to criticize my worldview. You have to depend on my worldview to even argue against it. A self-refuting and absurd thing to do.

Nonetheless, this question is a fallacy

No, it's not. It points out that you've left yourself with no basis for knowing anything----to any degree of probability. I believe this is why you're so desperate to avoid having to answer it: you can't bear to face up to the deficiencies that you've already admitted plague your absurd worldview.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies

Straw man fallacy again. Had you been paying attention you would have noticed that (1) the argument I'm using is transcendental and contains no premises, but (2) even if I did use premises this criticism wouldn't hold, as I'm not presenting an affirmative conclusion, but a negative one (you cannot know anything, as per your own admission).
If your reply here is to regurgitate your previous claim "One cannot prove the negative", then I must ask, on what basis do you make this claim (which, by the way, is itself a negative claim)?
If you attempt to prove it, then you show that you don't really believe it. If you could prove it true, then it would immediately be false, as it claims that you can't prove a negative, and yet the claim is itself a negative claim. So to prove it true would be to demonstrate its falsehood. Thus it's self-refuting. You could demand that we take in on blind faith, but blind faith claims have no place in rational discussions.

My question is fair and valid, and I suspect the reason you're willing to engage in grammatical acrobatics to keep avoiding it is because you know you've left yourself with no foundation for knowing anything. Your worldview, by your own admission, has certain no ontic base to ground the preconditions of intelligibility, nor an epistemology to make that base known.

Yes, you have provided this Transcendental argument, but it does not qualify as adequate "proof" of anything.

Either you don't understand how a transcendental argument works (and how to interact with them), or you think nothing of begging the question. The difference between a deductive argument and a transcendental argument is that deductive arguments utilize commonly accepted principles and, using those principles, erect premises, and then assert a conclusion atop those premises. So it starts with commonly accepted principles and builds up to a theorem. Transcendental arguments, on the other hand, work in the exact opposite direction, pointing out the necessity of a certain principle (or a set of principles), which is not commonly accepted, without which no theorem could be reasoned to at all. Therefore, the only way to refute a TAG (or even for the claim that a TA has is has not demonstrated its claim) is to show that knowledge can be had apart from the proposed starting point principle. You have not done that.

It is simply an assertion based on the claim that ancient literature is the absolute infallible word of God. Simply asserting this base on anecdotal evidence does not represent "proof," unless your primary goal is to convince yourself.

This another straw man fallacy. You may not like the TA I'm using, but dismissing without actually interacting with it is not rational, and assuming---rather than demonstrating---that knowledge is possible apart from the proposed starting point is dishonest.

Simply to know, and not know absolutely.

There's the problem right there. Think about this. Let's take a look at the differences between these two.
1.) To know.
2.) To know absolutely.

If you don't know anything absolutely (2nd sense above), then it follows that you cannot be sure that you know in the 1st sense above. When you say that you don't know anything absolutely, then you lose any basis for saying that have any kind of knowledge at all, including knowledge that's less than absolute.

We may know beyond a reasonable doubt.

If you can't know anything for sure, then how can you be sure (1) what reasonable doubt is, or (2) that you have it? Presenting naive answers like "the evidence" begs the question, as to answer with that already assumes that you have an absolute standard by which you can measure the respective probabilities of each assertion, so that you can say for sure what the concept of "evidence" even entails, let alone what particular things in reality qualify as evidence. Without that requisite standard of absolute certainty everything you say reduces to absurdity.

Source: https://www.google.com/#q=know+definition

Yes, let's consider this definition for a moment. How did you come across this definition? You studies up, no? That involves (1) the use of your sensory organs, (2) the use of your cognitive faculties to reason through what you've studied, (3) reliance upon your memory of your past studies as reliable, and not false memories, as well as (4) the uniformity of nature, since your memories rely on chemical reactions in the brain. You have assumed all of these when you appeal to definitions, and even suspiciously vague and simplistic answers like, "the evidence". And yet these things which you base all your answers on are the very things you've been asked to prove. You've been begging the question this whole time.
How do you know that your sensory organs are reliable, so that you can be sure that the "evidence" to which you wish to appeal is real and not illusion?
How do you know that your cognitive faculties are reliable, so that you can be sure that valid and sound reasoning even exist, let alone that yours---regarding the evidence or anything else---is valid and/or sound?
How do you know that your memories of past investigations are accurate and not false?

I know 'beyond a reasonable doubt' that our present knowledge of science describes our physical existence and its history accurately. I know 'beyond a reasonable doubt' that the ontic base of the physical evidence is consistently reliable without known exceptions.

Then you'll have no problem answering the 3 questions I just asked above. ;)

This remains as a fallacy unless your argument can go beyond this with a basis in the real world we live in

So it turns out that, not only do you not know how TAs work or how to interact with them, but you don't know how they're proved either. TAs are proved via reductio. Anything that that does not take into account the proposed starting point of a sound TA reduces to absurdity. You've provided a wonderful demonstration of this by (1) admitting that your worldview provides no basis for absolute certainty on anything---which means you can never be sure that you know anything with probability either, and (2) when you rebut, you appeal to your senses, memory, cognitive faculties, and the uniformity of nature as the bases of your rebuttals----all of which are the very things you're trying to prove.

Pretty much all of our society, science, law, and general practical use in the real world, except for questionable fringe beliefs.

This, too, assumes the reliability of your sensory organs, your cognitive faculties, and your memories regarding the past----the very things you've been asked to justify.

[quote[ How can you be sure of this?

Humans are capable of acquiring knowledge that is 'beyond a reasonable doubt.' [/QUOTE]

How so? If you can't know anything absolutely, then how can you be sure that you can know anything to any degree of certainty, let alone "beyond reasonable doubt"?

I have no reason to question the cognitive faculties of over a million scientists over a period of more then 100 years.

Two points here.
1.) Notice the question begging assumption here. How do you know that there's been over a million scientists over a period of more th[a]n 100 years? In order to say that you'd have to assume the reliability of your sensory organs, as well as the reliability of your cognitive faculties, so that you can be sure that you've reasoned through what you've experience via your senses properly. But those are the very things in question. You've not proven them, you've merely assumed them.
2.) You've committed the fallacy of irrelevant thesis here. Regardless of whether you think you have reason to question the reliability of your cognitive faculties, my question is, What reason do you have for affirming their reliability?

Mine work fine how about yours?

This is just the thing in question. How do you know that?

The question would apply both ways and by all,

How true. God made all things including man and his sensory organs (Proverbs 20:12), and gave man specific instructions to care for, and cultivate the land, and rule over all the creatures on the earth (Genesis 1:28; 2:15). That entails the reliability of our senses, memory and cognitive faculties. God also Created man with innate knowledge of Him, ourselves, and the world He created for us, in which we live (Romans 1:18-22).

which makes the question absolutely useless.

Not at all. It's precisely because I have a basis for the reliability of man's senses and memory that this question is quite useful.

Plantinga bases his argument on the assumption of human cognitive facilities functioning properly.

So, when one man does something fallacious, it's ok for everyone else to do it too?

What would be the reason you would give that your cognitive facilities are functioning better then mine or millions of scientists.

1.) When did I say that? As I recall, I noted that one's interpretation of evidence is determined by their worldview (not the other way around).
2.) and that I'm not skeptical of the reliability of one's senses. I'm challenging your worldview's ability to give man any good reason for holding to it.
3.) How do you know that "millions of scientists" exist, let alone what their conclusions or assumptions are? Through your senses, right? So you've have to appeal to your senses, memory of past experience, and cognitive faculties. But the reliability of those is just the thing in question.

Your hopelessly confused, your confusing ontic base with epistemology, The following article and definitions described the epistemology of science and it is not the evidence....The ontic base is the physical evidence

Not at all. Note the definition of evidence:

1. that which tends to prove or disprove something; ground for belief; proof.
2. something that makes plain or clear; an indication or sign:
3. Law. data presented to a court or jury in proof of the facts in issue and which may include the testimony of witnesses, records, documents, or objects.

Evidence is information about objects. Something that has existence in reality (the objects themselves) is an ontic base. If your claim above were the case, then since epistemology is precisely how you come to know what you know, you could never know anything based on evidence because itself would be the ontic base, and would not be epistemological.

'The intransitive objects of some specific, historically determinate, scientific investigation.' as per definition below

When did I say that objects don't serve as an ontic base? As I recall, I appealed to God (who is someone that exists---thus He has objectivity in the sense of existing in external reality). My point was that one's appraisal of scientific evidence presupposes the uniformity of nature, the basic reliability of one's senses, memory, and cognitive faculties. Thus the scientific evidence can only only be apprehended if one already has---prior to any scientific investigation---good reason for holding to them. Thus scientific evidence cannot ground the scientific method. Now, the truths which science seems to, at least in part, shed some light on, ground science, but since science depends on man having already known those truths to even get off the ground, one cannot appeal to scientific evidence to ground them, as that would entail that they started off arbitrarily assuming the rational basis for science, and then, after the fact, attempting to justify it. That's blind faith.
Furthermore, regardless of what's been observed scientifically in the past, no scientist (or group of scientists) have experienced all of reality, nor every moment in time. So what basis is there in your worldview for saying that the entire universe (or even the entire world) does, and has always, acted in a law-like fashion? And even if you could prove that, how do you know it will continue into the future? On your worldview, where there is no Creator and upholder of the created order promising regularity so that we can do science, who's to say that the laws of physics is not in a state of delayed flux?

I gave the definition previously from a reliable source

You're back to begging the question again. How do you know that the sources you sites are reliable? How do you know that anything is reliable? You've given nothing but but vague answers like, "the evidence", or "scientific findings"---all of which already assume the very things you've been asked to prove.

The ontic base of science is the 'physical evidence.'

How is the first blush appearance of uniformity in a tiny section of the universe, at one tiny blip in all of history, evidence of how every section of the universe behaves, and has behaved throughout all of history? You have not observed this, nor have you observed the future. Since science is observational by definition, you do not have scientific evidence that nature is uniform unless you've been everywhere, all throughout history (and the future), and have tested every single atom.

The epistemology of science is methodological naturalism.

Such an approach is arbitrary and irrational. Setting aside the fact that before science can get started it requires the justification of the claim that nature is uniform, which cannot be done without appeal to God, why should we dismiss the possibility of creation before any investigation of evidence? This is classic question-begging, and only serves to reinforce my point that one's approach to evidence is determined by their worldview, not the other way around. The notion makes even less sense for those who are convinced that God does exist. Why would a theist assume in practice the exact opposite of his or her conviction?

[Mr. Black]

It now seems as though I need to ask you what you mean by probability in this context.

Likelihood of being true, determined by various factors (physical and logical possibilities, behavior, or societal conditioning, etc. To give a simple exmple: two claims (1) John Smith has a pet tarantula in his house. (2) Billy Graham reads his Bible everyday.
If John Smith has acute arachnophobia, then it's less likely to be true, whereas claim #2 is far more likely to be true.

[Mr. Black]

To understand

Check out presupositional apologetics here:

I would caution people about things like this. Wikipedia (or blogs, for that matter) are not always the best place to become informed on people's views, unless its the views of the person who wrote the wikipedia article or blog. If you wanna know about presuppositionalism, check out some works by presuppositionalists. They're full of refutations of misunderstandings of presuppositionalism.
To start off I would recommend reading The Ultimate Proof of Creation, by Dr. Jason Lisle, or Van Til's Apologetic: Readings and Analysis, by Dr. Greg Bahsnen (or at least Bahnsen's standard work, Always Ready).

[Mr. Black]

Jewish folks worship Jesus' G-d. Christians worship Jesus. I would have thought such a smart man as you would know that.

God is truine. Jesus is the second person of the trinitarian Godhead. Thus Jesus is God. I would have thought such a smart man as you would know that.

No argument. It's just a fact. I base it on the Tanakh, which is the same scripture Jesus believed to be the Word of G-d. It needs no argument.

If you're gonna be as arbitrary as that, then I'll do the same until you start taking this convo seriously.

Jesus is God. It's just a fact. I base it on the the writings that God inspired Jesus' disciples to write down, and thus is the Word of God. It needs no argument.

Well, for starters, G-d isn't a human like yours.

The first Person of the Godhead (the Father) did not come down and add a human nature onto His divine nature, but the second Person of the Godhead (the Son) did.

[Mr. Black]

A thread is already started that may be more suitable for that question http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/sh...ll=1#post97662

I have put my reply there

What page and post # please?

[Truthseeker]

Likelihood of being true, determined by various factors (physical and logical possibilities, behavior, or societal conditioning, etc. To give a simple exmple: two claims (1) John Smith has a pet tarantula in his house. (2) Billy Graham reads his Bible everyday.
If John Smith has acute arachnophobia, then it's less likely to be true, whereas claim #2 is far more likely to be true.

I recognize two kinds of probability. One kind is established by statistical analysis of empirical data (including observations of nature without doing designed experiments); the other kind is estimating probabilities using one's "common sense" and experience. I think you mean the latter kind.

[Truthseeker]

What page and post # please?

Just click on the link
http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/sh...ll=1#post97662
A new window or tab will open up at the post in question. Bear in mind that after clinking, you will have two windows or tabs with TWeb in them.

[shunyadragon]

[QUOTE=Mr. Black;98461]shuny, sorry about the delay. The seasons are changing so things are getting really busy for me. I'm short on time, but will cover the important issues, and will attempt to avoid covering ground we've already been over. [quote]

There is nothing new in the discussion here. Your asserting a presuppositional argument precludes any serious debate because of its stone wall approach to any alternatice beliefs, There is basically nothing else to say.