"Mormon Doctrine" Elders Peterson & McConkie, Expertise and Interpretation- Ben Spackman

[mfbukowski]

3 hours ago, Calm said:

We can give lists of what we don’t understand. And we don’t understand because we lack knowledge...so there are implications of gaps in knowledge in such lists. 
 

For example, before dark matter was theorized, we had no knowledge of even the possibility it existed. Now we have knowledge of certain physical data that some theorize means dark matter exists. So we now know of the possibility, but what that possibility is we do not know in detail....we do not understand what dark matter is means the same as we do not know much about dark matter, even if it exists.  So why not say it as we don’t know about dark matter? 
 

And Smac was answering the question what laws don’t we understand anyway.   

This whole line of thinking to me is an error.

In my studies over the last 50 years, I have gone along with paradigms which say there is no "WHAT we understand"- there are only theories we can construct to explain some of our other theories about perceptions we have- INCLUDING this theory itself.

To me, this makes all of human knowledge a kind of "religion" which we accept on faith because we have found that that BELIEF works- it turns all of human knowledge into the way Alma 32 sees reality. Religion is not an anomaly - it is the perfect model of the only reality we can know.  We test our beliefs and if they bear fruit, we accept them as "true".  To me this IS "true" science.

NO ONE in the history of philosophy - in my opinion- has come up with anything better to explain "WHAT" we know about "what exists" outside of our perceptions.

I always carefully construct anything I say about "laws of nature" having any metaphysical existence because I do not believe they do.  If anything, I only speak those words so that the sentences will be intelligible to people who do not see things as I do.

In one of these posts @stemelbow brought up what he thought was an inconsistency in the way I spoke about "natural law" but he did not read what I said carefully.  I hope he brings it up again because I cannot find the quote of what I allegedly said.

I see my beliefs as a consistent and fully religious way of seeing the world capsulized in the sentence "Now we see through a glass darkly".   It is scriptural in nature and I think a well-developed point of view..  

  Pretend for a while there is no "WHAT" to be understood- there are only explanations and constructions.   And yes I know that the belief that there are "only explanations and constructions" can be se

How long have I been repeating this?  

Pretend I am an investigator and perhaps it might be helpful to at least TRY to speak my language and then perhaps we can understand each other better.

Quote

" To say that the world is out there, that it is not our creation, is to say, with common sense, that most things in space and time are the effects of causes which do not include human mental states.  To say that truth is not out there is simply to say that where there are no sentences, there is no truth, that sentences are elements of human languages, and that human languages are human creations.

   Therefore anything expressed in a human language is a human creation.   Period.  And God is a Human.  The Bible is a human creation.  All the standard works are human creations. All of science is human creations.  Everything we read, write or say is a human creation because it is a human INTERPRETATION of our direct sensory inputs which are beyond language.

One cannot describe the color red to a blind person who has never seen it. And that applies to all human conceptions-they are INTERPRETATIONS of direct experience which itself is literally "beyond words",like the experience of red.

Quote

So why not say it as we don’t know about dark matter? 
 

Because it goes beyond that.   There IS no "dark matter" to NOT know about.

There are human explanations created by humans to solve the mysteries of certain observations- we have not yet created a THING called "dark matter"

We observe what we think are CAUSES of the observations but we do not yet have a full explanation that "dark matter" is explainable fully- and therefore it doesn't "exist" even as a full theory.  

We are too busy creating dark matter to worry about if it will ever exist as an explainable force.

But I am not a physicist so I might be wrong about how complete the paradigms are yet.

Edited November 11, 2020 by mfbukowski

[mfbukowski]

15 hours ago, stemelbow said:

I understand you think science is religion and that miracles aren't really miracles.  But, on both counts you are simply making assumptions.  What laws of nature are there that we do not understand?  

Please go back and look at what I actually said

Quote

Logically we LDS really ARE literally "secular humanists" because we reject the supernatural- even spirit is matter, and God Himself is human.  Miracles are not "supernatural"- we see them as following the laws of nature that we do not yet understand-, like perhaps a television in the middle ages would be seen as a "miracle"

I was speaking in ordinary English instead of my customary philosophical langage- because it seems no one understands me otherwise.  

I really should have added quotes about the words so that people would know that I was not speaking about "real laws that exist outside of human minds" because I do not believe in such things

I should have said 

Quote

Logically we LDS really ARE literally "secular humanists" because we reject the supernatural- even spirit is matter, and God Himself is human.  Miracles are not "supernatural"- we see them "AS following the 'laws of nature' "that we do not yet understand-, like perhaps a television in the middle ages would be seen as a "miracle"

The punctuation is everything the point was that LDS people see miracles AS laws of nature- not that I personally believed in laws of nature.

And didn't I post a link to prove that point?

I guess not- but found another.   Dallin Oaks- will he do?   https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/2001/06/miracles?lang=eng

Quote

 

When I was a college student, almost 50 years ago, Elder Matthew Cowley (1897–1953) of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles spoke to a BYU audience about miracles. That devotional message had a great impact on me, and I have felt to revisit its subject. Like Elder Cowley, I will seek to provide an answer to the prophet Mormon’s question “Has the day of miracles ceased?” (Moro. 7:35). In fact, many miracles happen every day in the work of our Church and in the lives of our members. Many of you have witnessed miracles, perhaps more than you realize.

A miracle has been defined as “a beneficial event brought about through divine power that mortals do not understand and of themselves cannot duplicate.”1 The idea that events are brought about through divine power is rejected by most irreligious people and even by some who are religious. All of us have known people who have what Elder Neal A. Maxwell of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles once called “the anti-miracle mind-set.”2 This rejection of miracles in the last days was prophesied. The prophet Nephi foretold that the Gentiles would “put down the power and miracles of God, and preach up unto themselves their own wisdom and their own learning, that they may get gain” (2 Ne. 26:20). He also prophesied that churches would be built up in which persons would teach with their learning, deny the power of God, and tell the people that if someone should “say there is a miracle wrought by the hand of the Lord, believe it not; for this day he is not a God of miracles” (2 Ne. 28:6).

Some people reject the possibility of miracles because they have not experienced them or cannot understand them. In contrast, President Howard W. Hunter declared, “To deny the reality of miracles on the ground that the results and manifestations must be fictitious simply because we cannot comprehend the means by which they have happened is arrogant on the face of it.”3

 

Brigham Young and others:

https://wheatandtares.org/2011/02/27/miracles-and-natural-law/

 

Quote

Yet I will say with regard to miracles, there is no such thing save to the ignorant — that is, there never was a result wrought out by God or by any of His creatures without there being a cause for it. There may be results, the causes of which we do not see or understand, and what we call miracles are no more than this — they are the results or effects of causes hidden from our understandings. [Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, vol. 13, pg. 140-p.141 (11 Jul 1869)]

Talmadge

Quote

Miracles are commonly regarded as occurrences in opposition to the laws of nature. Such a conception is plainly erroneous, for the laws of nature are inviolable. However, as human understanding of these laws is at best but imperfect, events strictly in accordance with natural law may appear contrary thereto. The entire constitution of nature is founded on system and order. [James E. Talmage, The Articles of Faith, 1966, p. 220]

So this is the common way the question of miracles have been solved in LDS culture and I was repeating that that was the way "we see them".

Edited November 11, 2020 by mfbukowski

[Calm]

3 hours ago, smac97 said:

https://www.fastcompany.com/3062239/the-bicycle-is-still-a-scientific-mystery-heres-why

Quote

At the heart of the puzzle is something we’ve all observed. If you push a riderless bicycle, it balances itself, steering automatically to correct for any wobbles, until it slows down and finally falls flat on its side.

Not any bicycle I remember pushing or observing, the wheel twists around all the time.  But they are likely meaning ones that are balanced to start off.

[stemelbow]

8 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Please go back and look at what I actually said

I was speaking in ordinary English instead of my customary philosophical langage- because it seems no one understands me otherwise.  

I really should have added quotes about the words so that people would know that I was not speaking about "real laws that exist outside of human minds" because I do not believe in such things

I should have said 

The punctuation is everything the point was that LDS people see miracles AS laws of nature- not that I personally believed in laws of nature.

And didn't I post a link to prove that point?

I guess not- but found another.   Dallin Oaks- will he do?   https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/2001/06/miracles?lang=eng

Brigham Young and others:

https://wheatandtares.org/2011/02/27/miracles-and-natural-law/

 

Talmadge

So this is the common way the question of miracles have been solved in LDS culture and I was repeating that that was the way "we see them".

Well contradictions not withstanding, one must wonder then when Jesus put some spit mixed with dirt on a blind man's eyes what natural law transpired to fix the blindness?  Or what natural law occurred when Jesus told Lazarus to not be dead any longer and he got up and walked around.  You can say, "well there must be some natural law wherein spit and dirt or a special kind of dirt or a certain mix of human spit and dirt really does cure blindness".  Or you can say, "well if someone dies and we really really want that person to live and we say it, then naturally he'll come back to life".  If say, there are natural laws involved in these events, why has neither happened again outside fantabulous sounding hearsay (as if these two incidents aren't hearsay themselves)?  

Also one must wonder, then, what natural law takes places when someone puts a small droplet of olive oil on a sick person's head and after prayer that person can supposedly be healed?  And it only works if the person putting the dose of olive oil and the person praying over the person has been given special self-proclaimed authority from an unknown and unknowable being?  

All you seem to be doing, when you say it's all natural, is suggesting when God interferes and fixes or unfixes whatever happens in the world, it is nature and not really God.  Such a proposition dismisses that there is a God at all.  God is not, it is simply all nature and its laws.  Of course as we can see, claiming God does something, and claiming it's all accomplished by natural law is a direct contradiction.  

I mean, I like that you have attempted to think these things through, but its either you are redefining words in a game of bait and switch, as if God's interference can't possibly be seen as a miracle or magic, or you have nothing but a confused contradicted self-defeating position.  

If God is some unseen force called nature, then you have a point.  BUt the religion teaches God is not that, but is an exalted man sitting in yonder heavens looking upon us through unfathomable means, reading billions of minds' thoughts simultaneously, sending vibes of comfort and peace, or hate and anger, as punishment apparently, telekinetically.  You'd have to say it's all just natural law playing out.  If so, then there is no God at all.  

With that, I say, welcome to reality.  

Edited November 11, 2020 by stemelbow

[mfbukowski]

5 hours ago, stemelbow said:

Well contradictions not withstanding, one must wonder then when Jesus put some spit mixed with dirt on a blind man's eyes what natural law transpired to fix the blindness?  Or what natural law occurred when Jesus told Lazarus to not be dead any longer and he got up and walked around.  You can say, "well there must be some natural law wherein spit and dirt or a special kind of dirt or a certain mix of human spit and dirt really does cure blindness".  Or you can say, "well if someone dies and we really really want that person to live and we say it, then naturally he'll come back to life".  If say, there are natural laws involved in these events, why has neither happened again outside fantabulous sounding hearsay (as if these two incidents aren't hearsay themselves)?  

Also one must wonder, then, what natural law takes places when someone puts a small droplet of olive oil on a sick person's head and after prayer that person can supposedly be healed?  And it only works if the person putting the dose of olive oil and the person praying over the person has been given special self-proclaimed authority from an unknown and unknowable being?  

All you seem to be doing, when you say it's all natural, is suggesting when God interferes and fixes or unfixes whatever happens in the world, it is nature and not really God.  Such a proposition dismisses that there is a God at all.  God is not, it is simply all nature and its laws.  Of course as we can see, claiming God does something, and claiming it's all accomplished by natural law is a direct contradiction.  

I mean, I like that you have attempted to think these things through, but its either you are redefining words in a game of bait and switch, as if God's interference can't possibly be seen as a miracle or magic, or you have nothing but a confused contradicted self-defeating position.  

If God is some unseen force called nature, then you have a point.  BUt the religion teaches God is not that, but is an exalted man sitting in yonder heavens looking upon us through unfathomable means, reading billions of minds' thoughts simultaneously, sending vibes of comfort and peace, or hate and anger, as punishment apparently, telekinetically.  You'd have to say it's all just natural law playing out.  If so, then there is no God at all.  

With that, I say, welcome to reality.  

I guess you did not read, or at least comprehend my last post to you.

I, mfbukowski did not say these things, leaders of the LDS movement said them.  

I do not believe that "natural laws" - or for that matter that anything "exists" outside of the human mind- and that all that we CAN "know" is limited by our primate , human, brain that has the potential to become much more.

Every single bloomin time I quote Rorty from my siggy- which to me is with every post I make, I am affirming these truths which I regard as self evident.

We can only know what we can know.   We make up stories about our perceptions about "things" outside our perceptions to account for the causes of our perceptions.

But I know that miracles do in fact occur because I have experienced them, both as a priesthood holder blessing people, and in being blessed myself.  I would not still be alive if it were not for miracles, but I do not speak of such things.  There is no point, in speaking to those who cannot hear

You seem to be someone who is still reachable to see a different point of view, but never ever, it seems can I get you to even comprehend the Rorty quotes below which to me are the most direct statement of these ideas which can be made.

All any of us can can know is what we have experienced and then accepting or not accepting the stories we have created to explain the phenomenal "causes" that we make up to know about.

The best story we have available to rationalize our LDS theory about the nature of God is to see him as a glorified human being, not unlike ourselves.

In order for such a theory to make logical sense, we must conclude- if Jesus of Nazareth, presumably a real human being who historically lived on this earth, that He is a God who is immanent and subject to the same regularities we expect of matter, the best guesses about which are made by combined theories we call "physics"

In making a unified theory about God, and that Jesus- a human- WAS actually God, we need to postulate such things OR be stuck with the logic and physics of medieval times - which you clearly understand and still use to think about these issues and then use your false impression of these medieval explanations to apply to today's best theories about God.  

It is like saying that we should not believe in today's medicine because leaches have been proven to not remove disease.  But just as contemporary theories about medicine do not accept those medieval theories, contemporary theology has also moved beyond medieval theories about God.

And believe it or not, LDS views of religion are perfectly compatible with contemporary philosophy and theology if we but look at these views.   And that is why I am here.

BUT the bottomline is, as I have said, that we LDS must believe that God is immanent and not transcendent for all our theories about God to make logical sense.   In theology, for something to have a body, automatically makes it "immanent" and not "transcendent" 

Simply saying that should make it clear that God must then be like us and subject to the constraints of living in this universe

I tried to explain that by using the term "natural law", which is a more medieval explanation than I would have liked but I thought it would be more understandable than the way Rorty - as the best  poster boy I know of to explain these theories-  would explain it, but when using it I hedged it with the phrase "we believe that God is subject to natural law"  NOT that God IS subject to natural laws- just that we believe in using that "language game"

You said

Quote

 

All you seem to be doing, when you say it's all natural, is suggesting when God interferes and fixes or unfixes whatever happens in the world, it is nature and not really God.  Such a proposition dismisses that there is a God at all.  God is not, it is simply all nature and its laws.  Of course as we can see, claiming God does something, and claiming it's all accomplished by natural law is a direct contradiction.  

I mean, I like that you have attempted to think these things through, but its either you are redefining words in a game of bait and switch, as if God's interference can't possibly be seen as a miracle or magic, or you have nothing but a confused contradicted self-defeating position.  

 

This is a very good point, and I see how you got that impression.  It's actually one of the best arguments against my position I have seen on this board.

BUT it still does not seem to comprehend what I am trying to say, repeatedly.

Saying "it is nature and not really God at all" is bifurcating the universe into two substances- 1- God and 2- Nature.

That is essentially Cartesian dualism under a new guise!  It separates US and thoughts and the phenomena we experience FROM "nature".   It falsely asserts that "t here is what is perceived and then there is reality", and is really a circular argument.  From the beginning your assumption is that God must be SEPARATE from nature 

You said

"Of course as we can see, claiming God does something, and claiming it's all accomplished by natural law is a direct contradiction. "

That could only be true if God is something SEPARATE from natural law- that is already a distinction in your mind so firmly that you cannot see that GOD IS IMMANENT and part of the workings of the universe which HE runs/organizes etc.  You create the separation assumption in your mind- "God cannot BE nature"- which to me is an inadequate use of language- so therefore you begin with the assumption that God is NOT "natural law"

So then IS God "natural law"?

No- that is a misleading assertion, but in a sense I suppose it could be seen as true.   It's like saying "God is love" which is also true, but requires an explanation to fully make sense, which of course is another topic.

Remember we are speaking here and words do not "represent" reality- they are INTERPRETATIONS.  We are talking about verbal theories/paradigms/stories/linguistic models ABOUT our CONCEPT of God and not "God himself" here.

So yes, God can be SAID to be an "occupant of the universe" or "voluntarily subject to his own designs" just as one can live in a house he has organized or designed.  But the Designer is not the house.  You might say that his design is "him".

We hear that language all the time - "OH that dress is so YOU"    That is a joke but there is truth in it. What makes you YOU is the bundle of your thoughts deeds, preferences, and separates you from everyone else on the planet.  YOU are what you eat.

You have two possible designers and organizers in your view - God OR nature.  ""Of course as we can see, claiming God does something, and claiming it's all accomplished by natural law is a direct contradiction. "  TWO forces/do-ers/designers/theories.   I am saying there is only ONE do-er/designer/theory- a personal God who organizes how we see everything we can see

You are postulating two forces, where my theory only postulates one and therefore makes compatible what you see as incompatible

Remember Pragmatism UNIFIES reality AND perception- there is no divide between what we see, feel touch etc and "reality".   Pragmatism erases the separation between "reality and appearances" and does away with Cartesian Dualism.

And that is more than enough for now- but thanks for your point and thoughts.

[stemelbow]

17 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

I guess you did not read, or at least comprehend my last post to you.

I, mfbukowski did not say these things, leaders of the LDS movement said them.  

I do not believe that "natural laws" - or for that matter that anything "exists" outside of the human mind- and that all that we CAN "know" is limited by our primate , human, brain that has the potential to become much more.

Every single bloomin time I quote Rorty from my siggy- which to me is with every post I make, I am affirming these truths which I regard as self evident.

We can only know what we can know.   We make up stories about our perceptions about "things" outside our perceptions to account for the causes of our perceptions.

But I know that miracles do in fact occur because I have experienced them, both as a priesthood holder blessing people, and in being blessed myself.  I would not still be alive if it were not for miracles, but I do not speak of such things.  There is no point, in speaking to those who cannot hear

You seem to be someone who is still reachable to see a different point of view, but never ever, it seems can I get you to even comprehend the Rorty quotes below which to me are the most direct statement of these ideas which can be made.

All any of us can can know is what we have experienced and then accepting or not accepting the stories we have created to explain the phenomenal "causes" that we make up to know about.

The best story we have available to rationalize our LDS theory about the nature of God is to see him as a glorified human being, not unlike ourselves.

In order for such a theory to make logical sense, we must conclude- if Jesus of Nazareth, presumably a real human being who historically lived on this earth, that He is a God who is immanent and subject to the same regularities we expect of matter, the best guesses about which are made by combined theories we call "physics"

In making a unified theory about God, and that Jesus- a human- WAS actually God, we need to postulate such things OR be stuck with the logic and physics of medieval times - which you clearly understand and still use to think about these issues and then use your false impression of these medieval explanations to apply to today's best theories about God.  

It is like saying that we should not believe in today's medicine because leaches have been proven to not remove disease.  But just as contemporary theories about medicine do not accept those medieval theories, contemporary theology has also moved beyond medieval theories about God.

And believe it or not, LDS views of religion are perfectly compatible with contemporary philosophy and theology if we but look at these views.   And that is why I am here.

BUT the bottomline is, as I have said, that we LDS must believe that God is immanent and not transcendent for all our theories about God to make logical sense.   In theology, for something to have a body, automatically makes it "immanent" and not "transcendent" 

Simply saying that should make it clear that God must then be like us and subject to the constraints of living in this universe

I tried to explain that by using the term "natural law", which is a more medieval explanation than I would have liked but I thought it would be more understandable than the way Rorty - as the best  poster boy I know of to explain these theories-  would explain it, but when using it I hedged it with the phrase "we believe that God is subject to natural law"  NOT that God IS subject to natural laws- just that we believe in using that "language game"

Alright my first note is I really enjoy it, sincerely, whenever discussion emerges with you and within a back and forth into it you conclude something along the lines of "you can't possibly comprehend as much as I" type of response.  I was waiting for it, and although you already showed signs of it coming, I felt like the timing here was perfect.

As I see it, it's not that I don't understand Rorty.  It's that he doesn't hold the secret you think he does.  He's simply not pointing out anything like Jesus' miracle of spitting on a blind guy to cure his blindness is really just some natural event wherein spit and dirt mixed together can cure blindness.  His contention that truth, as a concept, is wholly dependent on human language which is wholly a human creation has no bearing on whether there are miracles occurring.  But it's odd you concede that there are miracles while arguing there are no miracles.   

Quote

You said

This is a very good point, and I see how you got that impression.  It's actually one of the best arguments against my position I have seen on this board.

BUT it still does not seem to comprehend what I am trying to say, repeatedly.

Saying "it is nature and not really God at all" is bifurcating the universe into two substances- 1- God and 2- Nature.

That is essentially Cartesian dualism under a new guise!  It separates US and thoughts and the phenomena we experience FROM "nature".   It falsely asserts that "t here is what is perceived and then there is reality", and is really a circular argument.  From the beginning your assumption is that God must be SEPARATE from nature 

You said

"Of course as we can see, claiming God does something, and claiming it's all accomplished by natural law is a direct contradiction. "

That could only be true if God is something SEPARATE from natural law- that is already a distinction in your mind so firmly that you cannot see that GOD IS IMMANENT and part of the workings of the universe which HE runs/organizes etc.  You create the separation assumption in your mind- "God cannot BE nature"- which to me is an inadequate use of language- so therefore you begin with the assumption that God is NOT "natural law"

So then IS God "natural law"?

No- that is a misleading assertion, but in a sense I suppose it could be seen as true.   It's like saying "God is love" which is also true, but requires an explanation to fully make sense, which of course is another topic.

Remember we are speaking here and words do not "represent" reality- they are INTERPRETATIONS.  We are talking about verbal theories/paradigms/stories/linguistic models ABOUT our CONCEPT of God and not "God himself" here.

So yes, God can be SAID to be an "occupant of the universe" or "voluntarily subject to his own designs" just as one can live in a house he has organized or designed.  But the Designer is not the house.  You might say that his design is "him".

We hear that language all the time - "OH that dress is so YOU"    That is a joke but there is truth in it. What makes you YOU is the bundle of your thoughts deeds, preferences, and separates you from everyone else on the planet.  YOU are what you eat.

You have two possible designers and organizers in your view - God OR nature.  ""Of course as we can see, claiming God does something, and claiming it's all accomplished by natural law is a direct contradiction. "  TWO forces/do-ers/designers/theories.   I am saying there is only ONE do-er/designer/theory- a personal God who organizes how we see everything we can see

You are postulating two forces, where my theory only postulates one and therefore makes compatible what you see as incompatible

Remember Pragmatism UNIFIES reality AND perception- there is no divide between what we see, feel touch etc and "reality".   Pragmatism erases the separation between "reality and appearances" and does away with Cartesian Dualism.

And that is more than enough for now- but thanks for your point and thoughts.

...and that's my point. YOu have simply redefined the terms and spoken a language that does not comport with the way anyone else is using these terms.  Or rather you have simply assumed God and any sort of language discussion about God can't possibly consider no God and therefore any no God proposed thought is simply not understanding that God is just everything or anything.  It feels to me like you are using Rorty and this particular thought as some Trump card that enables any inane claim.  I'll agree "truth" only exists in the context of human minds conceiving of such things. 

Edited November 12, 2020 by stemelbow

[mfbukowski]

On 11/10/2020 at 5:47 PM, Calm said:

We can give lists of what we don’t understand. And we don’t understand because we lack knowledge...so there are implications of gaps in knowledge in such lists. 
 

For example, before dark matter was theorized, we had no knowledge of even the possibility it existed. Now we have knowledge of certain physical data that some theorize means dark matter exists. So we now know of the possibility, but what that possibility is we do not know in detail....we do not understand what dark matter is means the same as we do not know much about dark matter, even if it exists.  So why not say it as we don’t know about dark matter? 
 

And Smac was answering the question what laws don’t we understand anyway.   

I think of new species never before "discovered" that we do not yet know about.

How about a list of those?

A frog with three eyes?   Imagine whatever you like and put it on the list! 

[mfbukowski]

4 hours ago, stemelbow said:

Alright my first note is I really enjoy it, sincerely, whenever discussion emerges with you and within a back and forth into it you conclude something along the lines of "you can't possibly comprehend as much as I" type of response.  I was waiting for it, and although you already showed signs of it coming, I felt like the timing here was perfect.

Great stuff, thanks for pointing that out.

I certainly don't mean to convey that attitude but it seems folks do not respond to show me that they DO understand my position and then show me where I went wrong.   So I just conclude that they do not understand or think I am a crazy old man and they have no clue what I am talking about

So out comes the siggy - worst of all- out comes the video which I just repeat until someone acknowledges, as philosophers do, that Rorty was "right" or "wrong" because..... and then bring up something worth discussing.   Usually they come up with a literal statement from the bible which does not even apply and so I drop the discussion because honestly in my heart I do not want to be seen as "mean" or "prideful" because honestly, I am neither of those.    I am just looking for someone to talk to about issues that I find important, and typically that does happen.   Not always, just typically.

But I cannot find anyone- philosophers or not- who has refuted Rorty's anti-realism or how he understands the world.   And for me, that POV and the way he expresses it could "save" religion in a world of skepticism.

So I just wanted to dash this off- thanks, gotta run right now but I'll be back after I get to the meat of your post.

[Ahab]

17 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

I think of new species never before "discovered" that we do not yet know about.

How about a list of those?

You're suggesting we make lists of things we don't know about by using our imaginations?  What if what we imagine doesn't really exist?  That would mean the things on the list are not true/real things, but rather only what we imagined or thought might be real.

17 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

A frog with three eyes?   Imagine whatever you like and put it on the list! 

A totally pointless exercise.  We would have no idea if the list had things on it that were real or not. Why waste time imagining things when we don't know whether or not they are true/real things?

[mfbukowski]

39 minutes ago, Ahab said:

You're suggesting we make lists of things we don't know about by using our imaginations?  What if what we imagine doesn't really exist?  That would mean the things on the list are not true/real things, but rather only what we imagined or thought might be real.

A totally pointless exercise.  We would have no idea if the list had things on it that were real or not. Why waste time imagining things when we don't know whether or not they are true/real things?

You have not read the full discussion which starts with a comment up thread.

[Ahab]

On 11/10/2020 at 9:33 PM, mfbukowski said:

One cannot describe the color red to a blind person who has never seen it. And that applies to all human conceptions-they are INTERPRETATIONS of direct experience which itself is literally "beyond words", like the experience of red.

Actually, in reality/truth, one can describe the color red to a blind person who has never seen it even though the blind person will likely not understand or accept the description until he can somehow see it.

And our interpretations and descriptions do not actually create reality or what is "out there".  The things that are out there are out there even if we can't see them or understand or describe what they or we are. 

Rorty was not always right about what he understood of reality.

Edited November 12, 2020 by Ahab

[mfbukowski]

7 hours ago, stemelbow said:

As I see it, it's not that I don't understand Rorty.  It's that he doesn't hold the secret you think he does.  He's simply not pointing out anything like Jesus' miracle of spitting on a blind guy to cure his blindness is really just some natural event wherein spit and dirt mixed together can cure blindness.  His contention that truth, as a concept, is wholly dependent on human language which is wholly a human creation has no bearing on whether there are miracles occurring.  But it's odd you concede that there are miracles while arguing there are no miracles.   

Au contraire, mon ami!

 " He's simply not pointing out anything like Jesus' miracle of spitting on a blind guy to cure his blindness is really just some natural event wherein spit and dirt mixed together can cure blindness."

No, you are right, he is not saying that.  But that comment is not really relevant.  What he is NOT saying is not relevant to the argument.

You are not understanding that I am speaking about different paradigms and comparing and contrasting PARADIGMS- which are different kinds of stories we tell ourselves about how the world works. 

PARADIGM ONE Rorty

Rorty understands that all we have are paradigms about how the world works.  Another word might be "theories" which ultimately CANNOT be "proven" in a Caetesian, positivistic sense,  because we cannot perceive "reality as it is" to see whether or not our observations correspond to that invisible world which we cannot sense at all or technically that it even exists. 

All we have in our language are stories and theories and paradigms we construct to explain our "perceptions" AS IF these descriptions are "real"- but it cannot be determined if they correspond to the CAUSES of perception.  We cannot see atoms and yet we postulate that they exist because that is the best explanation that COHERES with other made-up explanations that can change our perceptions.

PARADIGM TWO - miracles and the church

Our explanations for curing blindness do not exist in the stories we tell ourselves about how the world works.  And yet we as a church believe that all things are material to the extend that God has a body.  That makes even God immanent and part of the universe

Premise: IF God has a body and even spirit is some kind of matter- we live in a materialistic universe therefore science can tell us "truth".  In principle there are no SUPER natural events. If there is an unscientific event it is not because it is SUPER natural, it just reflects a scientific event in principle, it's jsut that we do not yet have a paradigm/story/theory to explain it.

Quote

...and that's my point. YOu have simply redefined the terms and spoken a language that does not comport with the way anyone else is using these terms.  Or rather you have simply assumed God and any sort of language discussion about God can't possibly consider no God and therefore any no God proposed thought is simply not understanding that God is just everything or anything.  It feels to me like you are using Rorty and this particular thought as some Trump card that enables any inane claim.  I'll agree "truth" only exists in the context of human minds conceiving of such things. 

So perhaps, IF your claim here is valid- and I don't feel like going back to figure it out- if it is importnt to you please do so yourself- I think it might have been that in a sentence of some set of sentences, it appears that I was mixing the two DIFFERENT paradigms I was discussing at the same time.

My professional editor only works on Wednesdays, so perhaps that was the problem.  😜

But I am usually VERY conscious of mixing metaphors usually.

So my position is that events we see as "miracles" ARE perceptions of events that are perceived, and the individual has no paradigm to explain them.   I really don't care about what paradigm they choose.

I myself have experienced such events- such as giving a priesthood blessing and then having the person make a repeat visit to a doctor and the doctor not being able to find the supposed original anomaly.

I don't know what caused that or if the original diagnosis was in error or whatever paradigm to explain it you like.   That's my position, and would be Rorty's position on such an event, and if you want to hear Rorty's view we can go into it as a study of Rorty.   But the bottom line for me is that perhaps it was my error or perhaps it was yours- it really doesn't matter now, but it is good to discuss and clarify.

Rorty's paradigm is not the church's paradigm but can be used to explain both paradigms as compatible WITHIN Rorty's theory as one bigger theory that explains both phenomena.

Quote

" He's simply not pointing out anything like Jesus' miracle of spitting on a blind guy to cure his blindness is really just some natural event wherein spit and dirt mixed together can cure blindness."

Speaking of a "real natural event" is something Rorty would never say- in the context which you are using it-  so yes you are right because he CANNOT elven use such language consistently with his paradigm which you assert you understand

Yet- yes, the church or at least church representatives MIGHT say that spitting and rubbing mud on a blind man's eyes could be a scientific event performed by science yet unknown.

I would never knowingly say such a silly thing as you attribute to me

 

Edited November 12, 2020 by mfbukowski

[Calm]

2 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

I think of new species never before "discovered" that we do not yet know about.

How about a list of those?

A frog with three eyes?   Imagine whatever you like and put it on the list! 

You are misreading my comment if you think I suggested there was any knowledge of things we were not aware of at all, instead of where there was at least a partial understanding even if really off (such as the Luminiferous Ether theory of space)

Edited November 12, 2020 by Calm

[mfbukowski]

1 hour ago, Calm said:

You are misreading my comment if you think I suggested there was any knowledge of things we were not aware of at all, instead of where there was at least a partial understanding even if really off (such as the Luminiferous Ether theory of space)

Not sure if I understand what you mean.

You said:

Quote

We can give lists of what we don’t understand.

I might put what I think you are saying in a different way.   I would see it as "holes" in a given paradigm- a lack in a paradigm for the phenomena waiting to be explained.   I make no assumptions that there IS such a "thing" that will fill the hole- something yet to be discovered- I see it more as a loophole for seeing the paradigm as incomplete and therefore subject to total revision at any time.   One theoretical problem unexplained can blow up the whole paradigm.

I do not see it as a "WHAT" that we don't see, or using your word "understand" assuming that there IS a "what" that will eventually fill the hole- I see it as an incomplete assertion which is purely imaginary until a complete paradigm can be created which takes the loophole into account.   "We don't know this yet because we lack data on....."---- well maybe that alleged data cannot be supplied, and if it can't be supplied the paradigm is useless.   That does not mean that we have a moral imperative to not seek the data- it just presents a different attitude toward what does work in the paradigm.

The fact that we refer to a series of equations that don't make sense does not mean that there is a named "thing" like "Dark Matter" out there "existing" as "real"- what there IS is a paradigm that doesn't yet fully work.

I don't know if that helps or not.

[mfbukowski]

7 hours ago, Calm said:

You are misreading my comment if you think I suggested there was any knowledge of things we were not aware of at all, instead of where there was at least a partial understanding even if really off (such as the Luminiferous Ether theory of space)

I think I have a better analogy than I gave before regarding whether we can have knowledge of things of which we are not aware

It seems to me - and of course I could very well be highly wrong, that say, regarding a full "Theory of Everything" you see what we have as a "partial understanding" of the science,  like the poverbial  glass being half empty- we have some information but it is not complete

It might be said that science sees the glass as half full- we are well on the way to a full glass of knowledge about a theory of everything, and it's only a matter of time until we figure it all out.

I am saying that not only is the glass NOT half full NOR half empty- there is no glass!

There IS nothing to "know" except a story that science creates that may allow us to do some things better, but it will not help us to know anything about "reality"

[stemelbow]

15 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Au contraire, mon ami!

 " He's simply not pointing out anything like Jesus' miracle of spitting on a blind guy to cure his blindness is really just some natural event wherein spit and dirt mixed together can cure blindness."

No, you are right, he is not saying that.  But that comment is not really relevant.  What he is NOT saying is not relevant to the argument.

You are not understanding that I am speaking about different paradigms and comparing and contrasting PARADIGMS- which are different kinds of stories we tell ourselves about how the world works. 

PARADIGM ONE Rorty

Rorty understands that all we have are paradigms about how the world works.  Another word might be "theories" which ultimately CANNOT be "proven" in a Caetesian, positivistic sense,  because we cannot perceive "reality as it is" to see whether or not our observations correspond to that invisible world which we cannot sense at all or technically that it even exists. 

All we have in our language are stories and theories and paradigms we construct to explain our "perceptions" AS IF these descriptions are "real"- but it cannot be determined if they correspond to the CAUSES of perception.  We cannot see atoms and yet we postulate that they exist because that is the best explanation that COHERES with other made-up explanations that can change our perceptions.

PARADIGM TWO - miracles and the church

Our explanations for curing blindness do not exist in the stories we tell ourselves about how the world works.  And yet we as a church believe that all things are material to the extend that God has a body.  That makes even God immanent and part of the universe

Premise: IF God has a body and even spirit is some kind of matter- we live in a materialistic universe therefore science can tell us "truth".  In principle there are no SUPER natural events. If there is an unscientific event it is not because it is SUPER natural, it just reflects a scientific event in principle, it's jsut that we do not yet have a paradigm/story/theory to explain it.

So perhaps, IF your claim here is valid- and I don't feel like going back to figure it out- if it is importnt to you please do so yourself- I think it might have been that in a sentence of some set of sentences, it appears that I was mixing the two DIFFERENT paradigms I was discussing at the same time.

My professional editor only works on Wednesdays, so perhaps that was the problem.  😜

But I am usually VERY conscious of mixing metaphors usually.

So my position is that events we see as "miracles" ARE perceptions of events that are perceived, and the individual has no paradigm to explain them.   I really don't care about what paradigm they choose.

I myself have experienced such events- such as giving a priesthood blessing and then having the person make a repeat visit to a doctor and the doctor not being able to find the supposed original anomaly.

I don't know what caused that or if the original diagnosis was in error or whatever paradigm to explain it you like.   That's my position, and would be Rorty's position on such an event, and if you want to hear Rorty's view we can go into it as a study of Rorty.   But the bottom line for me is that perhaps it was my error or perhaps it was yours- it really doesn't matter now, but it is good to discuss and clarify.

Rorty's paradigm is not the church's paradigm but can be used to explain both paradigms as compatible WITHIN Rorty's theory as one bigger theory that explains both phenomena.

Speaking of a "real natural event" is something Rorty would never say- in the context which you are using it-  so yes you are right because he CANNOT elven use such language consistently with his paradigm which you assert you understand

Yet- yes, the church or at least church representatives MIGHT say that spitting and rubbing mud on a blind man's eyes could be a scientific event performed by science yet unknown.

I would never knowingly say such a silly thing as you attribute to me

 

I'm not saying yours is not a reasonable position.  The only issue I have with it is it carries far too many assumptions.  The first of which being there's a God. 

On the position that God is wholly natural and is to be found in our natural world, the burden of proof only becomes that much more burdensome.   And mix in "miracles" (Put in scare quotes because I get we're assuming they aren't really supernatural)  the burden only grows again.  Miracles as you see them, then aren't really miracles.  It'd have to be, somehow, when Jesus heeled the blind man, it wasn't the dirt and spit that did anything.  That was mere show of some sort of ritual.  What was happening though, behind the scenes, was molecular structures were restored and that mysterious birth defect of non sight was corrected.  The mechanics behind such a thing I wouldn't know.  But how would movement in the smallest particles we know about today, how would those energy fields find the solution without a command from some other unseen force?  As it is, I can't imagine how your theory works at all.  Is it voice from one of us, advanced so far that voice actually has the natural cause for fixing things on that quantum level?  How could that possibly be considered a natural law? The voice pushes the forces which causes a line of effect, from the voice origin to the actual quantum particles that do the repairing?  Your theory carries assumption after assumption.  It takes the assumptions so far there's no place, it seems to me, to even start applying the burden initially accepted (when the propositions are made).  What we end up with, perhaps, is an even more spooky and mysterious world then we do with the traditional God theory.  

[mfbukowski]

5 hours ago, stemelbow said:

I'm not saying yours is not a reasonable position.  The only issue I have with it is it carries far too many assumptions.  The first of which being there's a God. 

On the position that God is wholly natural and is to be found in our natural world, the burden of proof only becomes that much more burdensome.   And mix in "miracles" (Put in scare quotes because I get we're assuming they aren't really supernatural)  the burden only grows again.  Miracles as you see them, then aren't really miracles.  It'd have to be, somehow, when Jesus heeled the blind man, it wasn't the dirt and spit that did anything.  That was mere show of some sort of ritual.  What was happening though, behind the scenes, was molecular structures were restored and that mysterious birth defect of non sight was corrected.  The mechanics behind such a thing I wouldn't know.  But how would movement in the smallest particles we know about today, how would those energy fields find the solution without a command from some other unseen force?  As it is, I can't imagine how your theory works at all.  Is it voice from one of us, advanced so far that voice actually has the natural cause for fixing things on that quantum level?  How could that possibly be considered a natural law? The voice pushes the forces which causes a line of effect, from the voice origin to the actual quantum particles that do the repairing?  Your theory carries assumption after assumption.  It takes the assumptions so far there's no place, it seems to me, to even start applying the burden initially accepted (when the propositions are made).  What we end up with, perhaps, is an even more spooky and mysterious world then we do with the traditional God theory.  

I am responding because I said I would, but we obviously have a communication problem.

The only "assumption" I make is that we only know what we can know- we can only know the world as WE individually can know it.  To me that is a self-evident statement and not an "assumption"

I make no assumption that there is a God any more than I make an assumption that there is a "Stemelbow" - who is a real person presumably using a fictitious name- because I talk with Him and He responds.  It is direct experience, not n assumption.

Miracles "as I see them" are neither natural nor supernatural because both of those words DO make assumptions bifurcating the natural from the supernatural.  Yes unexpected perceptions do occur.  I have seen- in direct experience- people recover instantly from physical problems after a priesthood blessing.   I have seen it and experienced it, and I can only know the world as i personally have experienced it.  I did not expect that event\ perception and cannot explain it, so to me THAT sort of phenomenon is correctly described as a "miracle".   That is simply the English usage of a word according to its definition- it takes no position on the cause, if any, of surprising perceptions/phenomena

AS I mentioned in the previous post, I was distinguishing between paradigms and not subscribing to them either way.   

I have no understanding of what you are trying to say past the second sentence- the whole post does not make sense to me, sorry.

I said nothing about force fields etc.

[mfbukowski]

On 11/12/2020 at 12:07 PM, mfbukowski said:

We can give lists of what we don’t understand. And we don’t understand because we lack knowledge...so there are implications of gaps in knowledge in such lists. 
 

I hope it was clear what I was saying about there being no glass in my analogy above.

Your above statement would refer to a partially completed paradigm/story about how the world outside works, as a glass half full or half empty depending on how you want to see it.

The idea that we make lists of what we don't understand because we lack knowledge seems to me to be circular logic.   If I substituted a synonym for "know" maybe it would be clearer

Suppose we use the word "understand" for the word "know".   To me that seems like a synonym 

That gives us the statement:

"We can give lists of what we don't understand.  And we don't understand because we lack understanding... so there are implications of gaps in understanding in such lists"

To me that seems like a very circular assertion.  Substituting the word "know" throughout the statement does not help, I think

So the list cannot even be made because we don't KNOW the things to put ON the list of what we "don't know"

That is what I meant when I said the glass was neither half full nor half empty- there was no glass at all.

I think this also relates to an article that  @OGHoosier discussed and gave us a link- regarding the question of whether or not non-LDS cultural spiritual experiences provide what seems to be stronger evidence for the accuracy or correctness of the content of LDS spiritual experiences precisely because such experiences were not tainted by previous cultural connections with LDS doctrine.  

I think that would be an interesting conversation to carry on