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@Stephen
I think we are all aware that radicalisation occurs. But somehow I think machine gunning ordinary muslims isn't the best way to counter it.
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@Yassine
- No, that involves an entirely different definition. Once you define FSM as the necessary singular transcendent & absolute being, it can not also be some spaghetti character, for that is decidedly not a necessary being, for it is contingent on space. Any thing which is contingent on space or time can not be a necessary being, by definition. This is called an equivocation fallacy.
That's a rotten piece of argumentation! If you define the FSM as the 'necessary singular transcendent & absolute being' then the FSM is neccessary by definition. To see that, check out the definition of the FSM just given!
I can apply that to anything. If I define Yhwh, Allah or Zeus as neccessary they become neccessary by definition! But that doesn't make them actually neccessary.
One can - using word games and chop logic - show that the origin of the universe was damn odd. But you can't prove its oddness was due to a god, even less can you prove it was the god of some preferred religion. That is matter of unprovable faith.
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@Stephen
No. But maybe i'm trying touild a bridge with you.
I take it you don't want to resolve the issue with a blood bath. You might even eventually come to the concusion real problem is tribalism and extremism of any and all stripes, not Islam.
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@Stronn
That's why an attempt defining it properly has been made.
I linked to the detailed 72 page report that explains the reasoning behind the definition in a previous post. You can't ban the word, so it does need a definition before it can be used in legislation etc.
I don' suppose the recommendaion will prevent the debate being dominated by emtional rhetoric, selective qutation and half-truths though.
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@Stephen
As an avowed secularist I have a lot of problems with Islam. Reigion is bad enough in the west, but it is even worse when it has real political power as it does in much of the Muslim world.
My problem with you, Stephen, is that I don't believe you when you claim your problem is only with Islam, not at all with Musims. You always present Islam was 'our' enremy, not the enemy of all mankind. You ask where the outrage is - well there's not a lot of outrage when a mosque is blown up in Basra or Karachi either. We are, as as a species, parochial and tribal in out outlook. Nationalsm, racism, islamophobia, even sexism are all sides of the same thing,
I don't care how many Christians have been killed by Muslims and vice versa. I think we should add the two numbers together to see how dumb tribalism is.
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By building bridges with the majority of Muslims that don't.
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@janesix
His technique is to present one side of the story as forcefully as possibly and ignore any serious consideration of other factors. Its not what he says, it's often what he doesn't say.
For example, he quotes the Naz Shah retweet without giving it context. but has Ste'phen said to go out and kill Muslims? No. He's dumb, but not that dumb!
Stephen has been quite strident in crticism of me - such as accusing me ofbeing an islamic apologist of all things. Because I am not a frothing at the mouth islamphobe he thinks I am pro-islam! I most certainly am not ptro-Iskam! I am against posting one-sided and hence misleading material from either source for any cause because its the easiest thing in the world to stoke up trouble, and the hardest thig in the world to put a lid on.
Low level islamophobia is - in my opinion - more normalised than anti-semitism or anti-black ever was. Things are said in casual coversation now that I don't think were acceptable 'in polite society' in the dark days of old-fashioned racism just a few decades ago. One can write a post about myuslims that would get you banned ifyou wrote it about jews or blacks.
I my view ecan't turn the clock back or build walls between us and the rest of the world. Somehow we have to find away to make it work and with Jihdists on one side and race-patriots like Stephen on the other egging us it ain't going to be easy.
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@secularmerlin
@Fallaneze
Can't it be put more simply? What a leaf in the wind does next depends only on the wind, but what a person does next depends not only on physical conditions but on that person's desires.
That desires are the consequence of 'physical cause and effect' is not a disproof of freewill - it is a consequence of assuming monistic physicalism.
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@Stephen
I can believe you've never done any physical violence. You don't have the balls. You just use lanuage designed to incite others to violence.
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@Stephen
Much the same as protestants and catholics throughut European history, I expect.
People divide themselves into factions - it is one of our species' less endearing qualities. If we don't don't fight over the name if our gods we fight over 'nation', or the football team we support. You give me the impression you think tribalism - by whatever name - is something to be proud of. I don't. I think it's dumb. It's dumb because, well, for one thing colour or nation would seem to put us on he same side, yet we have absolutely nothing in common! Where's the logic that would say we have common interests just because we both sunburn easily?
I'm not on your side, but that doesn't put me on the other side. I am your enemy because I think you are a hater, i don't like haters which ever side they claim to love or hate. You are not all that different from a Jihadist, and I am not not all that differnt from 99% of muslims.
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This “definition” was apparently decided upon after a six-month consultation with academics,(un-named), lawyers, (un-named), elected officials, ( un-named), activists,(un-named),campaigners, (un-named) and [muslim] communities (un-named) and Muslim organisations << speaks for itself
It seems the Labour party has formally adopted the definition of 'islamophobia' recommended by a cross-party parliamentary committee.
The lengthy and thorough report of that committee - which gives full details of the individuals and organisations involved in the consultation process - is here:
I will concede that a constant diet of news stories about terrorist atrocities and criminal activity committed by Muslims will have increased the natural xenophobia of some individuals to the point where they machine gun innocent people purely because they are Muslims. I don't see that a good thing.
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@Tradesecret
All we have to do is get Doctor Who to change the outcome of the Battle of the Milvian Bridge and see what difference it makes!
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@Fallaneze
SecMer is asking if you know what it feels like to be, say, a robot or a string puppet.
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@Fallaneze
I agree. Moreover a leaf blowing in the wind doesn't feel it is in control... but if we and leaves are just being pushed around by external forces, what is going on to create the difference, if there is one?
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@Analgesic.Spectre
I didn't attempt to answer every point. I answered the single point that i quoted.
These in-group bias feelings evolved;So did ebola.
My mind doesn't work on the same lines yours does. You seem to think in terms of groups and tribes but i think each of us is an individual. I am happy to be judged on my merits and faults - I don't want to be judged on the average of which ever group you want to place me in.
Being the same colour as Einstein doesn't make you super-smart!
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@secularmerlin
@Fallaneze
Your beliefs can't change and were determined during the Big Bang. You can't make rational statements, just automated responses determined by physics and chemistry.
Another chemical reaction.
it can get confusing if you write precisely what you don't think is happening, Fal!
People at least have the strong illusion that they have free choicesThat being the case If there is more to it it falls to you to demonstrate that.
it cannot be demonstrated - there is no way to know what it's like to be someone else. But I assume I am typical of human beings and it does feel as if I can make choices. I feel that I could decide to take a break from DA and watch TV and even choose what channel to watch if I did. I can't demonstrate that I feel I have power to make choices - I can only ask you to acknowledge the same feeling.
You may believe - at an intellectual level - that you do not make choices, but does it feel to you that you whether you answer this post or not was predetermined a billion years ago, and 'you' have no say in that 'choice'? Is that what it feels like?
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@IlDiavolo
In away your not totally wrong. Darwin didn't know about genes or mutation and got the mechanism of how traits are passed on in modified form completely wrong. Darwins idea of natural selection was combined with genetic ideas such as mutation only much later - in the early-mid 20th century - and later yet still more complication was discovered in terms of epigenetics and horizontal gene flow.
What hasn't changed is the role of natural selection to drive adaptation and the mechanical, 'non-intelligent' nature of the drivers of evolution.
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@IlDiavolo
@Discipulus_Didicit
If you watch the program "Ancient Alliens" in History Channel, you will determine this program is more believable than the stories scientists keep telling us about how species evolved out of nothing
I found this.
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@Discipulus_Didicit
Imagine how sad my life must be to have checked.
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@ludofl3x
Its pure zen - not what you expect nor what you don't expect...
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@Discipulus_Didicit
The math used to arrive at this figure for the percentage is (100 ÷ 5^20). If you wish I will gladly explain why this is the correct formula to calculate this particular probability but that isn't really relevant to my point.
I make the probability of 20 even digits to be
0.0000953674316%, based on 0.5^20.
That's 9 fewer zeros than your figure 0.000000000000095%!
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@Discipulus_Didicit
Have we stopped the street epistemolgy yet? i said it was rubbish.
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@ludofl3x
Whenever I read discussions between you guys, I can't help but imagine theremins playing in the background. I say it with love :).
Not sitars?
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@Swagnarok
Empires hae come and gone throughiut history.
Perhaps what has happend now is that real power is no longer with the politicians. Nowadays politicians go cap-in-hand to corporations begging them to build their factories in their patch. They even rely on the mega rich to gointo space for them.
Countries and nation loyalties mean nothing to the new power brokers - except to play them off against each other for profit.
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@Alec
You're allowed to kill for a religion.
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@Stephen
@Tradesecret
My reading of the scant hints in the bible is that the afterlife was originally imagined as a 'nicer' version of this life and would be on this earth. Heaven was where God and the angels lived - it wasn't where the good dead people went. The dead awaited a bodily ressurection to re-populate a soon-to-be paradise here on earth, ie on this world minus the pain, suffering and the unremitting struggle to survive.
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@IlDiavolo
I don't think you'd wait for an experiment that demonstrated macro-evolution directly to run its course! I don't know how many generations arereuired to achieve the level of body-form change you'd call macro-evolution to occur but its probably 'lots'! Time scales are enormous - do you reaise that early dinosaurs such as plateosaurus (c250 MYr ago) are more distant in time from tyrannosaurus rex (c. 70 MYr ago) than tyranosaurus rex is from us?But feel free to show me what I requested. That would put an end to this thread and I will go with the tail between the legs.
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The math used to arrive at this figure for the percentage is (100 ÷ 5^20). If you wish I will gladly explain why this is the correct formula to calculate this particular probability but that isn't really relevant to my point.
I make the probability of 20 even digits as
0.0000953674316%, based on 0.5^20.
That's 9 fewer zeros than your figure 0.000000000000095%!
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I don't know if was the books necessarily, but Christianity is big today because it was adopted by the Roman Empire and hence promoted across a vast swathe of the earth. The religion of Rome survived the downfall of its empire, so had not worship of Zeus and company been replaced by worship of the Christian trinity by imperial decree it could well be the olympian gods we argue over today.
Similarly islam was spread far and wide by the mohammedan empire. I think islam was invented to be a pan-imperial religion to promote unity in a very ethnically diverse empire. It happened to use variant of Judaism as its core , but maybe a differnt basis could have been chosen.
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@secularmerlin
Idle speculation doesn't. But maybe in the end that's all this is, I suppose.
Still, it's better than watching TV - unless Love Island is on.
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@secularmerlin
If you get a contradiction you know you're wrong, I suppose. One never really knows that one is right.
But if its hopeless trying to get closer to the truth, why discuss/debate at all?
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@ArgentTongue
it is clear conscious perception of options inherently constitutes free will.
It's not clear to me!
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@secularmerlin
I think its ok to go with a hunch. If its wrong a contradiction will get thrown up somewhere and you start over again.
If you never risk being wrong you never do anything.
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@secularmerlin
Why could we not have conciousness as an emergent quality of the physical universe as determined by cause and effect?
Because 'emergent' is an admission we don't understand what is going on. The flocking of birds is truly emergent - we understand it and can model it. Can't really say that about consciousness.
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@secularmerlin
There is no evidence for or against the idea of self I cannot maintain any belief under those circumstances.
Like I said, you are a natural fence-sitter! Not meant as a criticism.
I like to have a belief and subject it to destructive testing! Also ig you believe something you can build on it. If it hangs together prigress has been made and if it falls apart (which is the usual case) at least something can be ruled out! You seem wany certainly too much.
my guess is that neither of us seperately have a good conception of 'self'. Presumably collaboration would work better that having a binary 'for or againsts' mentality at the outset. But how often do you see forums use constructively? It never happens, unfortunately.
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@secularmerlin
You did your best to say that self is a possibly nonreal thing which you do not understand well.Am I misunderstanding any of the salient points?
I would alter
"You did your best to say that self is a possibly nonreal thing which you do not understand well." to
"You did your best to say that self is possibly a nonreal thing which you do not understand well."
By 'Possibly' I meant 'Seems most likely to me, but I only learned about brains and philosophy off the internet so wtf do I know".
Anyway, given that you are not a philosopher with his professional reputation to lose, do you think the self is real? You are a great one for fence-sitting. but it's ok to wrong, you know. It's not as if anybody cares what we say or think....!
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@secularmerlin
My current view is that the self is virtual (as I have tried andfailed to descrbe it!).
I don't say I won't ever change my mind about that, but that is what the best guess has seemed to me for a while now.
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@secularmerlin
The idea is that your next mind-state is the result of your freewill operating on your present mind state in away that cannot be reduced to physical cause and effect. That is to say your brain is subject to physical cause and effect but you mind is subject to am additional mental cause of its own making affecting itself.In your equation the figure F (whatever it is) must either be subject to cause and effect (whether the cause is material or immaterial) or its actiins/choices are indistinguishable from random. Please explain how calling this hypothetical unexplained unobserved non physical component (F=freewill) gets around this problem
My view is that does work 'in theory' but it requires giving credence to a dualistic world view where mind is a different order of stuff. It's a bit like the way people argue for god by ascribing to it whatever properties are required. 'Mindstuff' is stuff that is not subject to he limit of being etither subject to (physical) cause and effect or being random. Free being an illusion can explain 'apparent choice making' but so can real free will!
Bear in mind that I do not argue for freewill. My argument is that if freewill exists it has to be dualistic. That is enough to discount it if one is a doctrinaire physicalist, but physicalism has a heck of a problem explaining consciousness so perhaps being too doctrinaire is premature!
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@RationalMadman
i'd like to think that formal debating is for people who want hone/show off their advocacy skills and the forums are for open-ended discussion and co-operative exploration of topics, rather like brainstorming.
I don't do formal debates - its just not 'my thing' beause I don't want to be a lawyer or a politician etc. Forums are disappointing because they end up being polarised and adversarial. Indeed they often start out that way and get worse!
I'm not sure I've ever seen anyone change their mind or even admit to havng made a mistake or overlooked something. It's remarkable how every poster on internet forums is an infallible(*) expert on everything from evolution and economics to international relations and quantum physics!
(* or rather incorrigible!)
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@secularmerlin
What do you think the self is, or isn't?
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@Castin
I think it was euthanasia.
Sorry - that was cruel! It suppose it wasn't that bad as jokes go... could be a lot worse.
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@RationalMadman
I would have thought a champion debater is someone who can construct a good argument for something they don't believe in.
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@Castin
I think this is supposed to be like asking "What's the point of happiness?"
I tried happiness once - I didn't like it much. Grumpiness is much more satisfying and you can keep it up for years. They'd lock you up if you were happy all the time, and a good thing too.
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@Stephen
I am convinced there is another story, a fuller story beneath the surface of these gospel stories.
I'm curious what you think that "fuller story" is, but i'll ask instead, "What do you think happens in paradise?".
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@Stephen
If they wish to butcher one another over a ISLAMIC "religious" issue then who is the west to interfere.
One has to give in and relinquish an "religious" authority that is impossible to relinquish in the case of the secular conflict of Shites and Sunni
You seem amibivalent whether the sunni/shia conflict is religious or secular.
I suggest it is neither - it is tribal. Sunni and Shia, Christian and Muslim, Sharks and Jets are just sides. The NZ shooter didn't check on the theological position of his victims and Lee Rigby was not asked for his views on the trinity before he was murdered. The killed were 'on the other tside of an us/them divide' and that was all that was mattered.
It is rare I think AnalSpec has a point, but elsewere they wrote:
Humans aren't logical, in this regard. These in-group bias feelings evolved; they're not conscious thoughts.
I think you err in blaming Islam and verses in the koran for what is going on. What is going on is the exploitation of people's natural loyalty to their own group and anagonism to others. Ordinary people don't get anything out of it... yet they kill each other to do little more than exchange one ruling elite for another, often for the worse.
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@Analgesic.Spectre
So did ebola.These in-group bias feelings evolved;
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@secularmerlin
@Fallaneze
Let me suggest this:
The argument against free will is that your present 'brain state' (B) is the resut of physical law (P) acting on the prior brain state (B*).
ie, P(B*)->B. Likewise B* is the result of physical law acting on its prior state, B**, and so on, all the way back to the big bang.
Free will supporters might prefer to talk of mind-states (M) rather than brain states. if freewill exists then successive mind-states are not determined by physical law alone but by acombination of physical law plus 'free will' (F), or in symbols (P+F)(M*)->M, or maybe F(P(M*))->M.
Note than randomness does not appear anywhere iin there.
I hope tha's not too 'ebucy'!
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@TwoMan
Does the future exist? I think that's a tricky one...
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