Good Arguments (Certainty vs. Probability)

[JAG]

JAG Writes:

An alternative title for this thread: Good Arguments (Certainty vs. Plausibility)

My view is (and has always been) that with regard to arguments that deal with
the spiritual unseen world and with moral values and with the supernatural, that
there are no arguments that can rise to the certainty-level of 5 + 5 = 10, and
that the very best anyone can ever hope to establish is probability, not certainty.

What I just said deals with showing Christianity to be true as opposed to knowing
Christianity to be true. William Lane Craig makes this point in his book Reasonable
Faith.

What that means is we Christians hold that we can know Christianity to be true
based upon the inner witness of the Holy Spirit that lives in us and tells us that
Christianity is true. It is utterly impossible for us to prove this to be true with
intellectual arguments that rise to the certainty-level of 2 + 2 + 4.

_________________


So I admit (as does William Lane Craig) that we can not demonstrate with logical
arguments that Christianity is true, with proof that rises to the certainty-level of
the following syllogism:

All men are mortal.
Socrates was a man.
Therefore Socrates was mortal.


So?

So it is impossible to establish certainty (as noted above).

We have to be satisfied with establishing probability.
But when we attempt to establish probability, we immediately enter the realm
of the subjective and that is where the constant bickering and arguing back and
forth occurs, because one man's probability is another man's improbability.

For example, the Teleological Argument for the existence of God seeks to establish
probability based on the obvious order, design, and complexity that we see in the
natural world, in the human body, in the Hubble Deep Field, and for that matter on the
shelves of Walmart and Sam's Club --- all evidence of endless variety of products made
from endless varieties of raw materials. Intelligent Design.

The very best anyone can do with the Teleological Argument is to establish probability,
and thereby enter into the world of the subjective. Most Christians find the evidence
for Intelligent Design to enjoy high probability. It ought to be safe to say that all atheists,
by definition of atheism, will find the Argument from Intelligent Design to be improbable.

________________


Certainty vs. Probability In Argumentation.

Says William Lane Craig:
"The Christian apologist may employ both deductive and inductive arguments in defense
of Christian theism. In order for the arguments to be good ones, the premises need to have
a particular epistemic status for us. But what sort of status is that? Certainty is an unrealistic
and unattainable goal. Were we to require that we have certainty of the truth of an argument's
premises, the result for us would be skepticism. What we're looking for is a comparative
criterion: the premises in a good argument will have greater plausibility than their respective
denials."___William Lane Craig
__________

Then Craig makes this statement:
"Plausibility is to a great extent a person-dependent notion.
Some people may find a premise plausible while others do not.
Accordingly some people will agree that a particular argument is a good one, while
others will say that it is a bad argument. Given our diverse backgrounds and biases,
we should expect such disagreements. Obviously, the most persuasive arguments will
be those which are based on premises which enjoy the support of widely accepted
evidence or seem intuitively to be true." ___William Lane Craig,

All quotes above are from Reasonable Faith, Third Edition, by William Lane Craig, page 55
`
__________


Definitions of what I mean when I use the following words in the Opening Post:

Plausibility - the quality of seeming reasonable
Probability - the likelihood of something happening
Epistemic - relating to knowledge or to the degree of its validation

JAG

[Minimalist]

Either Jesus arose from the dead or He didn't. If he did, then Christianity becomes plausible; if He did not, then it is sheer nonsense.

H. L. Mencken

That's the hump that both you and Craig have to get over.

[SYZ]

The belief in gods and miracles—or supernatural entities and paranormal phenomena—is merely
a figment of ignorant, fearful, or superstitious men's fertile imaginations.    In all of our recorded
history, there has never been one iota of empirical evidence supporting the notion of the supernatural.

And William L Craig is nothing more than a figure of fun to atheists.    Sorry.

[brewerb]

[Dom]

Well, I consider the creation you describe improbable.

Evolution, however, makes a ton of sense. It is logical. It accounts for diversity, specificity to environment, and everything that comes along with that.

All religion has to offer is magic.

[Dānu]

What does the phrase, "Christianity is true," mean?

[Peebothuhlu]

At work.

Hello Mr JAG, we meet again.  * Absently strokes large white Persian kitty*

   

 Sorry, couldn't resist. 

 For my two cents I'll just add;

 "Argumemts and reason don't create anything. They are simply mental/intellectual 'Tools' we poke at things in reality with.......Most times just to see what happens."

   

[Szuchow]

You lost me at spiritual unseen world. If you could show evidence for existence of it it would be a good start.

[airportkid]

... we Christians hold that we can know Christianity to be true based upon the inner witness of the Holy Spirit that lives in us and tells us that Christianity is true ...

If subjective interpretation of experience leads you believing aliens are responsible it is because you're too ignorant make a competent evaluation of the experience.  I say that not as a pejorative but as plain fact.  ALL of us, the vast majority of the time, are too ignorant to make a competent evaluation of novel experience because competent evaluation requires a great deal of knowledge.  The best any of us is capable of is depth of knowledge in the merest slivers of all there is to know; our chosen specialties, usually.  We've only got three pounds of neurons and 90 years to evaluate the universe with.  We rely on people who have made a specialty of study to make the competent assessment for us of something involving that specialty.  Virtually everything we know was something some credible agent told us; very little of our understanding was reached by our own lights.  A lifetime is much too brief for it to be any other way.

Most telling is that at no time in all human history has any competent credible specialist concluded an investigation with "a god did this - further investigation would be fruitless".  Every time, a natural explanation emerges from the study.  EVERY time, except for the times the study states "additional study necessary".  On that historic basis it is the height of lazy ignorance to conclude that something you personally can't explain in natural terms must therefore be the product of a god.  Get off your ass and do some research; most of the time you'll find what you experienced is absolutely natural and profoundly understood, with no trace of anything supernatural or goddish about it.

... the Teleological Argument for the existence of God seeks to establish probability based on the obvious order, design, and complexity that we see in the natural world ...

This is the finding a pocketwatch argument - if we find a pocketwatch on the ground we know it did not occur naturally but is the product of an intelligent agent.  We immediately compare a human brain to the pocketwatch and on the basis of the brain being somewhat more complicated than the pocketwatch conclude the human brain must also be the product of intelligent agency.

But this argument fails because it misses what it is that tells us the pocketwatch is the product of intelligence.  It's not the intricacy or the complexity of the mechanism.  It is that the mechanism is comprised of UNIFORM components.  THAT's what identifies it as made rather than evolved.  Its gear teeth are all precisely the same, its gears are all perfectly circular, all the gears have even thickness throughout, and, most important, another pocketwatch (and all of them) are exact clones of each other, the only variation limited to superficial tool marks and the scratches of use.  That REGULARITY of uniformity is the proof of intelligent manufacture, NOT that it is complex in its composition or features compound workings.

Biological entities can attain complexities far outreaching the most complex thing we have yet produced (our own brains, for instance), but NONE of them is uniform, all are unique, with considerable variation.  That irregularity of duplication is because the process that produced it does NOT follow a design.  Evolution has demonstrated, especially across millions of years, that extremely complex entities emerge from that process without any guidance, only the constant nudges of environmental pressures.  No god is necessary.

[TonyAnkle]

I've only got one type of spirit in me. And it isn't holy.

I hope WLC has taken the advice of the lord, and given away all the profits made from his book sales.

[Bcat]

There is a good article on Live Science called The Origins of Religion: How Supernatural Beliefs Evolved.  I think you may find it insightful.  Another good article is Richard Carrier's Kooks and Quacks of the Roman Empire.  Jesus wasn't the only one with "magical" abilities.  Magic was part of the culture at that time.  Both of these articles are available online. I also recommend Bart Ehrman's The Bible: A Historical and Literary Introducton and picking up a book on all of the gods and goddesses of the world's religions (many magical deities came way, way before Jesus, i.e. Egyptian, Sumerian).  Also, read the entire Bible if you haven't already.  Within it's pages, a woman is made from rib, a man from clay, there is a talking snake and a talking donkey (both standard literary devices at that time), the earth and universe and life were created in 6 literal days, a woman gets turned into a pillar of salt, etc. etc. etc.  There is also no evidence for the Exodus, etc. etc.  When picked apart and looked at via scientific, archaeological, historical, literary points of view, the probability of a magical being is nil.  

Additionally, looking at the story of Jesus itself does not make sense.  An all powerful being sacrificed himself to himself to save his creations. Huh? And, of course if you decide not to believe and worship this magical being, immense torture will be waiting for you.  I will also add that there is no Hell the way Christians know it in the Old Testament. It came from a Zoroastrian belief that early Christians adopted.  (See the documentary History of the Devil).  

I think you have to be careful with feelings when it comes to using that as a basis for belief.  Feelings are not fact and our brains often interpret external stimuli incorrectly via false pattern making, etc.  I would recommend Guy P. Harrison's books 50 Reasons People Give for Believing in a God and 50 Simple Questions for Every Christian.

[Bucky Ball]

JAG Writes:

An alternative title for this thread: Good Arguments (Certainty vs. Plausibility)

My view is (and has always been) that with regard to arguments that deal with
the spiritual unseen world and with moral values and with the supernatural, that
there are no arguments that can rise to the certainty-level of 5 + 5 = 10, and
that the very best anyone can ever hope to establish is probability, not certainty.

What I just said deals with showing Christianity to be true as opposed to knowing
Christianity to be true. William Lane Craig makes this point in his book Reasonable
Faith.

What that means is we Christians hold that we can know Christianity to be true
based upon the inner witness of the Holy Spirit that lives in us and tells us that
Christianity is true. It is utterly impossible for us to prove this to be true with
intellectual arguments that rise to the certainty-level of 2 + 2 + 4.

_________________


So I admit (as does William Lane Craig) that we can not demonstrate with logical
arguments that Christianity is true, with proof that rises to the certainty-level of
the following syllogism:

All men are mortal.
Socrates was a man.
Therefore Socrates was mortal.


So?

So it is impossible to establish certainty (as noted above).

We have to be satisfied with establishing probability.
But when we attempt to establish probability, we immediately enter the realm
of the subjective and that is where the constant bickering and arguing back and
forth occurs, because one man's probability is another man's improbability.

For example, the Teleological Argument for the existence of God seeks to establish
probability based on the obvious order, design, and complexity that we see in the
natural world, in the human body, in the Hubble Deep Field, and for that matter on the
shelves of Walmart and Sam's Club --- all evidence of endless variety of products made
from endless varieties of raw materials. Intelligent Design.

The very best anyone can do with the Teleological Argument is to establish probability,
and thereby enter into the world of the subjective. Most Christians find the evidence
for Intelligent Design to enjoy high probability. It ought to be safe to say that all atheists,
by definition of atheism, will find the Argument from Intelligent Design to be improbable.

________________


Certainty vs. Probability In Argumentation.

Says William Lane Craig:
"The Christian apologist may employ both deductive and inductive arguments in defense
of Christian theism. In order for the arguments to be good ones, the premises need to have
a particular epistemic status for us. But what sort of status is that? Certainty is an unrealistic
and unattainable goal. Were we to require that we have certainty of the truth of an argument's
premises, the result for us would be skepticism. What we're looking for is a comparative
criterion: the premises in a good argument will have greater plausibility than their respective
denials."___William Lane Craig
__________

Then Craig makes this statement:
"Plausibility is to a great extent a person-dependent notion.
Some people may find a premise plausible while others do not.
Accordingly some people will agree that a particular argument is a good one, while
others will say that it is a bad argument. Given our diverse backgrounds and biases,
we should expect such disagreements. Obviously, the most persuasive arguments will
be those which are based on premises which enjoy the support of widely accepted
evidence or seem intuitively to be true." ___William Lane Craig,

All quotes above are from Reasonable Faith, Third Edition, by William Lane Craig, page 55
`
__________


Definitions of what I mean when I use the following words in the Opening Post:

Plausibility - the quality of seeming reasonable
Probability - the likelihood of something happening
Epistemic - relating to knowledge or to the degree of its validation

JAG

That's the bizarre error, in general a part of American Fundamentalism, that WLC constantly makes. It's wrong, theologically, and logically. 
Craig is a business. He charges a great deal for his bullshit, and sells it to Fundamentalists who think .. "Ooooh, he's so smart". 
He may be financially saavy, but that's it. Google "The Bad Faith of William L. Craig". He confesses what he believes and why, and it has nothing to do with logic and "reasonableness". 

First of all, no one has ever demonstrated that whatever logicical system they're using, ((and there are many, .... (and WLC does not name his system) ... including some totally internally consistent and correct ones that, in fact, do not obtain, in reality)) Logic alone is not sufficient. One needs evidence. 
There is no reason AT ALL to make the assumption that a logical system found to be useful and applicable in this universe, and to what is observed in this (local) universe, has ANY applicability to a set of conditions which we know abolutely nothing about, (what would have been *external to this universe). So ... Craig and his ilk have built a system on a basic fundamental flaw.
Further, whatever system he's using, has insufficient information. 95 % of this universe is Dark Energy and Dark Matter, and we have know clue how it works, or what logic would be applicable to it. Knowing a few things about 5  % of this universe is insufficient to make any predictions. Sean Carroll, (from Cal Tech) schools Craig about his fatally flawed assumption in their debate, (available on YouTube). 

Secondly, in Christian theology, faith is fundamentally one of the "gifts of the spirit". It's not "arrived at" by logic. 
Ephesians 2:8-9 "For it is by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing. It is the gift of God, not a result of works,  so that no one may boast." 

Probability and logic that are applicable in a small part of this universe, until DEMONSTRATED to apply to condition which are external to it, have nothing at all to say to us about any subject.
Doing this makes an unfounded assumption, which is 100 % invalid.

Chaos Theory does away with the teleological argument. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory
And if it doesn't, innocent infants getting cancer ought to do the trick.

Christianity is (obviously) invalidated by it's origins. The role of a messiah in Hebrew culture was never to "save frim sin". They (Christians) made up the "salvation" thing.
The annointed one was supposed to reestablish the Kingdonm of Israel. He didn't.
For most of it's history, there was no concept of "immortality" in Hebrew culure, until late. All dead souls (shades) went to Sheol, and that's not where Yahweh lived (who... by the way was one of the sons of the chief Babylonian god, El Elyon, and that's where they got him, and adopted him, as he was the God of the Armies ... the War God, and they wanted help with their battles).

[TheGentlemanBastard]

Yeah, it's Ham, not WLC. Point is, you can put any of the religious hucksters on the right and it's just as true.

[mordant]

Plausibility is highly subjective and personal. I find nothing you consider plausible, to BE plausible. Probably because I use an entirely different epistemology to investigate reality, than you do.

Personally, after some 30 years of giving it a more than fair shake, I found the epistemology called "religious faith" to be a failed epistemology that was not only wrong, but generally 180 degrees wrong. It did not explain or predict experienced reality. And I do not like surprises.

The scientific method is not perfect either, but far more accurate. I don't find myself having to explain nearly so many failures; indeed, the methodology doesn't even oblige me to. It's okay to say "I don't know" in response to questions that there is insufficient data concerning, pending further study and information gathering. It's also okay to acknowledge limits to what is knowable to begin with.

Indeed, religion in general is the demand for everything to have an explanation, however unsubstantiated / unsubstantiatable / fantastical it may be.

[Minimalist]

What does the phrase, "Christianity is true," mean?

Generally it means whatever sect the "True Xtian" who is asking happens to be.

In Bart Ehrman's book "The Lost Christianities" he spells out what early jesus freaks thought in the 2d and 3d centuries.  (It doesn't seem that there were any jesus freaks in the first century which is another major problem they have.)

The wide diversity of early Christianity may be seen above all in the theological
beliefs embraced by people who understood themselves to be followers of
Jesus. In the second and third centuries there were, of course, Christians who
believed in one God. But there were others who insisted that there were two.
Some said there were thirty. Others claimed there were 365.

In the second and third centuries there were Christians who believed that
God had created the world. But others believed that this world had been created
by a subordinate, ignorant divinity. (Why else would the world be filled
with such misery and hardship?) Yet other Christians thought it was worse than
that, that this world was a cosmic mistake created by a malevolent divinity as a
place of imprisonment, to trap humans and subject them to pain and suffering.
In the second and third centuries there were Christians who believed that
the Jewish Scripture (the Christian “Old Testament”) was inspired by the one
true God. Others believed it was inspired by the God of the Jews, who was not
the one true God. Others believed it was inspired by an evil deity. Others believed
it was not inspired.

In the second and third centuries there were Christians who believed that
Jesus was both divine and human, God and man. There were other Christians
who argued that he was completely divine and not human at all. (For them,
divinity and humanity were incommensurate entities: God can no more be a
man than a man can be a rock.) There were others who insisted that Jesus was
a full flesh-and-blood human, adopted by God to be his son but not himself
divine. There were yet other Christians who claimed that Jesus Christ was two
things: a full flesh-and-blood human, Jesus, and a fully divine being, Christ,
who had temporarily inhabited Jesus’ body during his ministry and left him
prior to his death, inspiring his teachings and miracles but avoiding the suffering
in its aftermath.

In the second and third centuries there were Christians who believed that
Jesus’ death brought about the salvation of the world. There were other Christians
who thought that Jesus’ death had nothing to do with the salvation of the
world. There were yet other Christians who said that Jesus never died.

Pg 2.

So I have to laugh when xtians claim that jesusism grew in leaps and bounds.  What seems to have grown were the varieties of what passed for xtianity but this was composed of isolated groups each with their own vision of what their godboy was.  It led to lots of problems later on but when the Romans finally noticed them in the late 2d century we get this from the philosopher Celsus c 180.



The myth of a universal church which was the font of all wisdom came much later.

[Minimalist]

Thanks for giving me the opportunity to post this again.

[Cavebear]

Either Jesus arose from the dead or He didn't. If he did, then Christianity becomes plausible; if He did not, then it is sheer nonsense.

H. L. Mencken

That's the hump that both you and Craig have to get over.

Yeah, up to them to prove their claim. And I seriously doubt they can.

[Cavebear]

Well, I consider the creation you describe improbable.

Evolution, however, makes a ton of sense. It is logical. It accounts for diversity, specificity to environment, and everything that comes along with that.

All religion has to offer is magic.

Evolution touches on so many subjects that trouble the modern world. Racism, ethnic divisions, assumptions of mental illnesses, etc.

I've been arguing that for a decade at least, that urban crime is not a matter of race or ethnicity, but mostly a result of poverty. Waves of immigrants from all over the world have washed up on our promising shores. The first place they land is in cities and they group among themselves. Who wouldn't? There is common language, culture, food, and they get jobs, make friends, and work to advance. That's why they came here.

But the offspring of poverty is crime. Desperate people do desperate things to succeed. The history of criminal gangs in the US matches the waves of immigration. I am NOT saying that immigrants are naturally criminal, just that immigrants are usually more poverty-stricken and more desperate to survive.

Who would not commit a small crime to feed their children? Who would not steal bread for the same purpose?

AFAIK, every wave of immigrants have been a major part of gangs and criminals. But their children aren't. The children adapt, advance in society, make "good". Become doctors and teachers, etc.

And yah, some stay criminals. There are people who just can't live legit. But that is never a racial or ethnic tendency. Old original European descendants have some criminals in their family tree too.

To go back on topic a bit, too many people ignore common mutual and shared evolution and depend on racism or ethnic blame to explain the world. They are wrong. We are all the same. Poverty causes most of our differences and the sonner we get back to some degree of "general middle class" with opportunities to advance, the better off we will be!

[SYZ]

What does the phrase, "Christianity is true," mean?

Good question. Apart from its grammatical clumsiness, the word "true" in this context is meaningless.

It should at least read that Christian dogma is true.

Simply saying Christianity is "true" is like saying chocolate cake is true, Ford cars are true, or cold weather is true.

[Peebothuhlu]

At work.

Well, yes. The truth of chocolate cake is self evident, after all.

   

[Cavebear]

What does the phrase, "Christianity is true," mean?

Good question.  Apart from its grammatical clumsiness, the word "true" in this context is meaningless.

It should at least read that Christian dogma is true.

Simply saying Christianity is "true" is like saying chocolate cake is true, Ford cars are true, or cold weather is true.

C'mon, saying "Christianity is true" is a statement that declares it to be factual and real. Chocolate cake is neither true or false it just IS. There is a difference.

[Cheerful Charlie]

If God is essentially omniscient, knowing the future, and creates the world, any Universe God creates must start with God's chosen initial state of creation. From that point the Universe is hard determined, and all is dependnet of that chosen initial state of creation. we have no free will. all acts of moral evil happen because God decides God wants that to happen. If there is a Hitler, a Stalin, Mongols, ISIS, God designed and created that.

God then is not as the Bible tells us, good, merciful, just, fair and God's judgments are not righteous. God knowing creates all moral evil and is thus evil.

Then we have the nonsense of the Bible. Two contradictory tall tales of Genesis and creation. Tower of babel. Magic trees, and talking snakes. Noah's ark. And ten thousand contradictions. Obviously then, this Bible is not a trustworthy revelation from God.
The Bible has no truth value then.

[Cavebear]

If God is essentially omniscient, knowing the future, and creates the world, any Universe God creates must start with God's chosen initial state of creation.  From that point the Universe is hard determined, and all is dependnet of that chosen initial state of creation.  we have no free will.  all acts of moral evil happen because God decides God wants that to happen.  If there is a Hitler, a Stalin, Mongols, ISIS, God designed and created that.

God then is not as the Bible tells us, good, merciful, just, fair and God's judgments are not righteous.  God knowing creates all moral evil and is thus evil.

Then we have the nonsense of the Bible.  Two contradictory tall tales of Genesis and creation.  Tower of babel.  Magic trees, and talking snakes.  Noah's ark.  And ten thousand contradictions.  Obviously then, this Bible is not a trustworthy revelation from God.
The Bible has no truth value then.

That IS the essential nonsense of all religions...

[brewerb]

I'm getting the impression that JAG will spend most of his time talking at us (preaching) than to us.

JAG: I don't care that you believe but I don't want to hear your rationalization/justification for the belief. I'll never validate a supernatural belief as rational.

[GenesisNemesis]

My view is (and has always been) that with regard to arguments that deal with
the spiritual unseen world and with moral values and with the supernatural, that
there are no arguments that can rise to the certainty-level of 5 + 5 = 10, and
that the very best anyone can ever hope to establish is probability, not certainty.

Do you believe Jesus can feed 5,000 people with five loaves of bread and two fish? Because the numbers certainly don't add up there. What is the probability that that story is true?