Heaving Dead Cats: philosophy

Showing posts with label philosophy. Show all posts

Consensual Reality

I have heard from quite a number of people over the past couple of years, this idea that "you can't know anything" therefore it's all meaningless. Usually people throw that sort of concept out without ever explaining it. It sounds nihilistic, doesn't it? I've heard this from a philosophy professor, but also from normal people who don't seem to be able to explain what they are saying. Often it seems reactionary.

I've always had a problem with this school of thought, but I've never been able to really wrap my head around why, and what I thought was the more accurate way to look at the world.

But lately, I've formed this idea of reality that I thought I'd share with you. I've never taken a philosophy class, so excuse me if it sounds silly.

Ok, if I say "finger", most of us on the planet know what I am talking about. You can lift your finger triumphantly in the air and waggle it about. You can touch your keyboard with it. Even babies can learn what a finger is and how to use it to pick their noses and do other fun things.

Language helps us form a consensual reality. This reality is basically universal. For instance, I can say "love" and translate that into Japanese, and a Japanese person can get the general idea of what I am talking about. If I form a sentence, "I love my child", that other person on the other side of the planet can relate to that statement and agree or disagree.

Consensual reality has often been explained as "if enough people believe something, then it's real." This is not necessarily true. For instance, most people believe in a deity, but there is no evidence of anything supernatural, so most people are probably wrong. But just about everyone knows that water is wet, and they are correct.

Last night my friends and I were talking about ethics and morality and we sort of went in circles because we all seemed to have different ideas of what they were. Some expressed the idea that morals only come from religion so they avoided the word and used ethics instead.

Here is a concise explanation:

Morality is used to refer to what we would call moral standards and moral conduct while ethics is used to refer to the formal study of those standards and conduct. For this reason, the study of ethics is also often called "moral philosophy."

But in casual conversation the terms can be used interchangeably.

Morality:

(from the Latin moralitas "manner, character, proper behavior") is a sense of behavioral conduct that differentiates intentions, decisions, and actions between those that are good (or right) and bad (or wrong). A moral code is a system of morality (for example, according to a particular philosophy, religion, culture, etc.) and a moral is any one practice or teaching within a moral code. Immorality is the active opposition to morality, while amorality is variously defined as an unawareness of, indifference toward, or disbelief in any set of moral standards or principles.

Ethics (also known as moral philosophy) is the branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality.
The word 'ethics' is "commonly used interchangeably with 'morality' to mean the subject matter of this study; and sometimes it is used more narrowly to mean the moral principles of a particular tradition, group, or individual."

Ethics:

Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality — that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.

~

But on the subject of good and evil, I think they are definitely religious terms. I try to use words that describe what I'm expressing without the unhelpful loaded concepts. I use healthy and unhealthy, positive and negative, constructive and destructive. This reflects my worldview as a naturalist where there is no supernatural or gods running the show.

How do you get your morality? We all learn from our parents, role models and peers, but have you reevaluated your code of ethics as you've matured?

Thought Experiment 4

Let's do another Thought Experiment. I am skipping around in the book to find interesting ones. So this is only the second that I've done. If you have any that you'd like to share, please do so! Just email me.

Question 4

If you could spend one year in perfect happiness but afterward would remember nothing of the experience, would you do so? If not, why not?

Which is more important, actual experiences or the memories that remain after those experiences are over?

My Answer

So here's my first answer. I would say no, I wouldn't want to be blissfully happy for a year if I couldn't remember afterward. Because then I will have lost a year of my life.

But, if while I was blissfully happy other people would be around me and remember that time, then that's different. Because then I'm sure the goodness that would come of me being so happy would manifest in their lives in a myriad of ways and that would be totally worth it. Maybe I'd be so happy I'd invent something wonderful or come up with a world changing idea! If that were the case, then yes, I'd definitely do it!

So I guess it would just mean my life is basically a year shorter. But if there were positive benefits for others or the world in general then most definitely, yes! :)

I think actual experiences are important, but how you remember them is too. Memories are extremely malleable and changeable, so after things happen, the memory becomes all that is left. Except of course, the results of the actual experiences are also a huge factor, which is what I was saying, it's the only thing that would make it worth my while.

What about you? Would you do it? Why or why not?

From The Book of Questions by Gregory Stock, Ph.D.

Soul Searching For Godless Heathens

I was recently asked about my worldview. Specifically I was asked what I find lacking in it. What do I see as flawed with it?

I've thought about this. I think by its very nature, my worldview is ideal for me. I don't see any flaws at all. But first, let's define it.

Worldview: 1. The overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world. 2. A collection of beliefs about life and the universe held by an individual or a group.

So, it's a very comprehensive set of beliefs about the world. And I'm very happy with the worldview I've thoughtfully developed. I will say it was a process, though, which is ongoing and, like all critical thinking, open to new information that can alter it.

Mine is based on Naturalism - a scientific account of the world in terms of causes and natural forces that rejects all spiritual, supernatural, or teleological explanations; Humanism - a progressive philosophy of life that, without theism and other supernatural beliefs, affirms our ability and responsibility to lead ethical lives of personal fulfillment that aspire to the greater good of humanity; and Nature - nature is awesome and humans are responsible for taking care of the world to the best of our ability, and to be humane to other living creatures.

In those respects, science is very important to me because it's how we understand and progress. Through science the Universe gets to know itself (rough paraphrase from my hero, Carl Sagan), and we get to know our world and everything in it, including ourselves.

Science isn't everything though. There's also humanity and what we have developed*, such as consciousness and cognition, justice, beauty, love, humaneness, compassion, morality, genius, and on and on. (*note that there are animals that have some consciousness and self awareness, which is amazing and awesome. It shows that we are on the far end of the continuum, but still connected and an integral part of the animal kingdom!)

My worldview has been cultivated and formed over my life, but especially in the last 10 years since I've become an atheist. In other words, I've really thought about this, it isn't something told to me by anyone. And I think that's important for finding that it's complete and comfortable for me.

I thought I'd turn the question over to you. What is your worldview and do you feel yours has any flaws in it that bother you, that you find missing or less than fulfilling?

Starting To See Moral Relativism As Clearly Flawed

Most people don't think much about morality, in my observation. They are given their morals from their parents, pastors, teachers, and peers, etc. They don't need to know terms like "moral relativism". I have done just fine for 41 years without ever thinking about the definition of the term.

I think even once you eschew God and the bible, unless someone challenges you, you'll still rely on your basic moral code which you got when you were younger (and probably indoctrinated). A lot of that might evolve into what "feels" like the right thing to do, more than what the bible said.

Then there are those who think about this sort of thing all the time. I'm not one of those people, normally. I don't like philosophy very much. I prefer science and testable claims to pontificating about things that can't really ever be known. But as I venture on my Quest for Knowledge, lately I've run into philosophy more often.

I've even subjected you to it, such as the whole Free Will vs Determinism argument (which I still have plans to continue).

I think we are best served with examining our ethical code and reevaluating what's in there and why. I did that some time ago with my personal Principles. It was a challenging but rewarding exercise.

Side Note: The Rationally Speaking podcast recently interviewed Joshua Knobe about his new field of Experimental Philosophy (x-phi), which was fascinating. Joshua even made them (and me) gasp with the results of one study that was very surprising! Here's a link to the episode.

The book club I'm in, as I've mentioned, is going to be reading The Moral Landscape by Sam Harris. I lost interest in our current book, so I've started in on this one and so far Sam Harris is speaking my language, that science can determine values for conscious beings.

The following excerpt from the book shows what moral relativism basically is (the woman in it is definitely a moral relativist), and why it's clearly flawed. This is an anecdotal story from Sam. But I think it's quite important to share:

Excerpt from The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values by Sam Harris. - Highlight Location 765-83 (chapter 1)

We already have good reason to believe that certain cultures are less suited to maximizing well-being than others. I cited the ruthless misogyny and religious bamboozlement of the Taliban as an example of a worldview that seems less than perfectly conducive to human flourishing.

I just started reading The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values by Sam Harris for my local book club. I'm not very far into it. So far I'm just getting an idea of where he's coming from and what he proposes to convince me of as I read along.

Before I started reading, I listened to Professor Massimo Pigliucci and Julia Galef talk about the book on their podcast, Rationally Speaking episode 20, from 18:29 to 27:30. Both of them find fault in Sam Harris’ logic and principles.

Massimo also wrote a blog post back in April titled, About Sam Harris’ claim that science can answer moral questions. This article is based on the TED Talk that Harris gave back in February.

Massimo is a former scientist and is now a philosopher, so he is well equipped to address this subject.

I thought I'd share it and ask you, have you read the book? What do you think? Can science answer moral questions?

What I Stand For and What I Believe

One of my Facebook friends, Mark, wrote a note the other day about what he believes and what he stands for. He inspired me and I decided to do the same:

I don't believe in nothing. I believe in grand concepts like the pursuit of love and happiness. I believe in finding simple joys in everyday things.

I embrace knowledge and growth through learning as much as possible. I love science and the scientific method, which although flawed, is still the best tool we've got to understand our fantastic universe and our place in it. I am a citizen scientist.

I require evidence for claims and refuse to accept things on faith or authority. I am a skeptic.

But I am a true skeptic. Many times in the past I've changed my views based on evidence that showed that my old thinking was wrong. I constantly work on detaching my ego from my world view.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and since there is zero credible evidence for any gods or the supernatural, I don't believe in them. I don't believe in the supernatural in any sense. No gods, no heaven, no hell, no demons, no ghosts, no psychic powers. I am a skeptical atheist.

Recently, I wrote about Determinism and Free Will. It was basically an introduction and consisted of a transcript of the Reasonable Doubts guys. Well, this is the first half of their second episode on the subject. I decided to break it up into two posts because, as you can see, it's incredibly long. And it was taking me forever to transcribe it.

So in this part, the guys are talking about determinism again, especially in regards to how to deal with people who break the law or do something wrong. This is a very touchy subject but the guys explain it well, especially when they talk about parenting.

Here you go:

1:56 Dave (D): So in our previous episode, Free Willy vs the Determinator part 1, we talked some about determinism and free will, but we didn't get to the moral implications associated with a hardcore determinist world view like the three of us seem to share. And not all naturalists do.

Jeremy (J): No, we need to acknowledge that there is diversity amongst naturalists. I will say I don't feel bad going further in saying, though, I think they're wrong. I think they're demonstrably wrong. I think accepting determinism, unfortunately or not, is necessitated by a consistently naturalistic world view. But there are people who disagree.

D: But it's a very hard thing to do, and it took me a very long time to just decide that, "yes, in fact I'm going to follow the evidence", because you're giving up a lot of things, apparently.

J: You're giving up things you never had.

D: Well, yeah. But things that I thought I had.

Let's talk about Free Will versus Determinism. I first learned about this philosophical and practical debate while listening to the Reasonable Doubts podcast, which I've recommended to you in the past. They have done four episodes, plus one bonus interview with a christian apologist radio show that is too painful to sit through, on this topic. It is so interesting and important that I am going to transcribe the relevant sections of all four episodes for you. (I don't transcribe the other topics of the episode, and skip half thoughts, etc. I recommend listening to them in full)

They all build on each other. The first episode (below) was the hardest for me to grasp. I had never heard of Determinism before, and had always assumed we have free will. So if you're new to it, it seems harsh and unnatural. But stick with it. The following 3 episodes clear up a lot of the questions raised in this one. Unfortunately it takes quite some time to type them out so try to be patient with me.

Reasonable Doubts, Episode 29: Free Willy vs The Determinator

Starts at 21:16

Definition of Free Will (24:30): This is the definition that christian apologist and philosopher J.P. Moreland would take: He calls it Libertarian Agency. You are a free agent. Your actions do not have prior causes. You are the unmoved mover if you have free will. You choose to do something. You could have chosen otherwise. Not only can you initiate actions, you can also stop actions, or choose not to act. Basically we're all little gods, in a way.

26:25 Determinism in a nutshell is the opposite of that. There are external and internal forces that influence your behavior. Commonly people think of determinism as you couldn't have done otherwise. You're standing there with the gun pointed at somebody and you're forced to pull the trigger. But really it means simply that there are reasons for your behavior, forces and factors at play, external and internal prior causes. When you are making choices those choices are not uncaused. There is a chain of causes. Your choice is the effect of prior causes.

The following is an article by GMNightmare which follows up from a previous post titled Your god is Not Omnipotent:

To start out, the definition I am using for god is any given being that can supposedly create matter out of nothing, is omnipotent, and is unbound by physical spatial traits. Furthermore I derive that an omnipotent god constitutes as an unstoppable force or can be the causation of such. The existence of such a god forms my hypothesis (which I will regard as true for this proof); therefore the following mainly concerns itself with monotheistic brands of gods.

Using the above traits, the god from my hypothesis could create an object of infinite size and maximum density. This theoretical object would literally fill the entirety of the universe, with every small speck of space filled with matter. This rock constitutes as an immovable object as there is nowhere left to move the rock and thus it is incapable of movement. As an aside it happens that god can create an object so large that he cannot move it.

However the existence of an immovable object by definition means that an unstoppable force cannot also exist. Since that is a part of the definition of god outlined above, I therefore must reject the hypothesis and assert that such a god cannot and does not exist. In particular a god that can create matter unrestrained cannot also be omnipotent in all regards.

Simple, short, and sweet… but the devil is in the details (ha ha). Any god with boundaries and limitations obviously escapes the above, but from my experience that’s the last thing any monotheist will even begin to contemplate (god being the biggest baddest supernatural being that ever was—who also happened to create everything—just isn’t enough, seemingly god must also have limitless power and ability). So please qualify objections to the below considerations.

1) Can god create an object so large even he cannot move it?

I thought I'd share this. MIT Open Courseware Lecture Notes from Problems of Philosophy. Here are the topics covered and available (in pdf format):

Reason to Believe: Does God Exist?