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DLW
Registered Member
Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 2457
| Posted 7/29/2003 10:19 AM (GMT -6) |   |  Hey RD, you're not by any chance "Legally Blonde too"?
dlw
ps, do check your email...
dlw
I-uh-scream-uh,
You-uh-scream-uh,
We-all-uh-sceam-uh for
Ice-uh-cream-uh!!!
Roberto Bernigni in
Down by Law.
I wish we didn't live in a world where buying and selling things (especially selling) seems to have become almost more important than either producing or using them.
C.S. Lewis | | Back to Top | | |
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ReasonableDoubt
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 655
| Posted 7/29/2003 12:47 PM (GMT -6) | | DLW- thanks for the compliment, but no, I am not Reese Witherspoon.
And I've already responded to your assertions that I only hold to my beliefs because of emotionalism, so there's not much more to say here. | | Back to Top | | |
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DLW
Registered Member
Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 2457
| Posted 7/29/2003 2:53 PM (GMT -6) | | well you could be more clear about why you hold to your beliefs.
You are not a Calvinist and so you can't appeal to tradition. You can't really appeal to empirical verification, since determinism ain't something falsifiable.
I don't know what else than my hypothesis does that leave us?
dlw
I-uh-scream-uh,
You-uh-scream-uh,
We-all-uh-sceam-uh for
Ice-uh-cream-uh!!!
Roberto Bernigni in
Down by Law.
I wish we didn't live in a world where buying and selling things (especially selling) seems to have become almost more important than either producing or using them.
C.S. Lewis | | Back to Top | | |
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ReasonableDoubt
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 655
| Posted 7/29/2003 5:07 PM (GMT -6) | | I can't go through all my reasons again, it's too time consuming, and I've already posted that here, months ago. So you can search some threads if you feel really inclined, to find them. Basically boiled down to, scientific evidence, yes, does seem to prove determinism, although not beyond a reasonable doubt :), and to me, logically, it seems more cohesive than a free will theory. Calvinism , per se, has nothing to do with it. Calvinism is a theological construct, while determinism is philosophical (and scientific).
I could say the same for you, holding to a radical libertarianism (not just Arminianism)- so you have no tradition behind you either, and neither can you "prove" it, so why do you believe it?
"Everyone who believes in God at all believes that He knows what you and I are going to do tomorrow." - C. S. Lewis | | Back to Top | | |
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DLW
Registered Member
Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 2457
| Posted 7/30/2003 4:40 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by ReasonableDoubt
I can't go through all my reasons again, it's too time consuming, and I've already posted that here, months ago. So you can search some threads if you feel really inclined, to find them. Basically boiled down to, scientific evidence, yes, does seem to prove determinism, although not beyond a reasonable doubt :), and to me, logically, it seems more cohesive than a free will theory. Calvinism , per se, has nothing to do with it. Calvinism is a theological construct, while determinism is philosophical (and scientific).
I could say the same for you, holding to a radical libertarianism (not just Arminianism)- so you have no tradition behind you either, and neither can you "prove" it, so why do you believe it?
The science argument is a mixed bag. As I'm sure Modes, who did his masters on the ontotheological viewpoints implicit in Physics, could affirm there are basic sciences that presume tychism, the reality of chance. As such, one cannot say determinism is scientific, since that would privilege some views of science and not others, which certainly isn't scientific.
I don't think saying it is philosophical gets you anywhere either since in the European tradition, the main difference between theology and philosophy has been that the first appealed to the authority of the Church as the basis for its Truth claims and the other didn't.
So either way, you are choosing the ontotheological constructs that you see the world with.
I am not a radical libertarian. I am a fallibilist but I am also a traditionalist and affirm the need for us to give authority over our lives to both secular and sacred institutions even if they may abuse that authority or make out their truths(things a group agree on) into Truths(absolutes).
The point of OVTheism is that, unlike process theologians, we do emphasize continuity with Christian tradition and we do elevate the word of God and the reality of Sin in our lives.
And so, if you reflect on it somemore, I'm sure you'll see that rather than concluding from the evidence that determinism is true, you've been selectively searching for reasons to hold on to your psychic balm of choice. But there is no reason you need to continue to do so. There are other ways of coping with the reality of how much suffering we inflict on ourselves and others.
dlw
I-uh-scream-uh,
You-uh-scream-uh,
We-all-uh-sceam-uh for
Ice-uh-cream-uh!!!
Roberto Bernigni in
Down by Law.
I wish we didn't live in a world where buying and selling things (especially selling) seems to have become almost more important than either producing or using them.
C.S. Lewis | | Back to Top | | |
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rossfadeinout
Registered Member
Date Joined Oct 2002
Total Posts : 428
| Posted 7/30/2003 4:47 AM (GMT -6) | | Hey RD,
Don't think that we've ever directly talked... I'm Ross, and I've been reading in on this post and thought that I might jump in. Hope that I'm not intruding. Back to Spinoza, well sort of... I was reading through Mere Christianity yesterday, and seeing that your quote is from C S Lewis, I thought that you might be interested in what he has to say. I believe that it is very relevant to Spinoza's deterministic view of reality... quote:
If you do not take the distinction between good and bad very seriously, then it is easy to say that anything you find in this workld is a part of God. But of course, if you think some things really bad, and God really good, then you cannot talk like that. You must believe that God is seperate from the world AND THAT SOME THINGS WE SEE IN IT ARE CONTRARY TO HIS WILL. Confronted with a cancer or a slum the Pantheist can say, "If you could only see it from the divine point of view, you would realize that this is also God." The Christian replies, "Don't talk damned nonsense." For Christianity is a fighting religion. It thinks God made the world... But it also thinks that a great many things have gone wong with the world that God made and that God insists, and insists very loudly, on our putting them right again.
I've got to agree with Lewis here... Contrary to Spinoza's exhortation to accept the way life is because "things cannot be other than they are", I see that God calls us to put on the armor of God and withstand the attacks of the enemy... What is your take?
"Let us remember how common the folly is of going from one faulty extreme into the opposite." -Thomas Reid | | Back to Top | | |
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ReasonableDoubt
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 655
| Posted 7/30/2003 5:03 AM (GMT -6) | | DLW- why are you so patronizing? YOu have your belief, I hav e mine - let's let it go, shall we?
"Everyone who believes in God at all believes that He knows what you and I are going to do tomorrow." - C. S. Lewis | | Back to Top | | |
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DLW
Registered Member
Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 2457
| Posted 7/30/2003 5:17 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by ReasonableDoubt
DLW- why are you so patronizing? YOu have your belief, I hav e mine - let's let it go, shall we?
"Everyone who believes in God at all believes that He knows what you and I are going to do tomorrow." - C. S. Lewis
Who is being patronizing? You are claiming that science supports determinism. I am saying that most sciences presume the reality of chance occurences.
These seem to be "objective" truths that go beyond differences in beliefs.
Why would we waste so much of our time at this board if such beliefs didn't matter?
dlw
I-uh-scream-uh,
You-uh-scream-uh,
We-all-uh-sceam-uh for
Ice-uh-cream-uh!!!
Roberto Bernigni in
Down by Law.
I wish we didn't live in a world where buying and selling things (especially selling) seems to have become almost more important than either producing or using them.
C.S. Lewis | | Back to Top | | |
|
ReasonableDoubt
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 655
| Posted 7/30/2003 6:02 AM (GMT -6) | | Look, just don't appreciate you insisting that I only believe things b/c of emotionalism - when plenty of scientists, theologians, and philosophers have the same beliefs as me. You don't know my mind - and it's getting tiresome having you insist in post after post that you do.
Ross - You're right, I do admire C.S. Lewis. But to him I would say, Why, if Christianity is a fighting religion, is it only up to us humans to fight? Where is God? Why isn't he fighting? Why is he allowing all of this sin and suffering, when he could easily stop at least some of it? And, you probably acknowledge that at times he DOES intervene - or else why do we pray- why do we thank God when good things happen or bad things are averted? So he must have a reason for choosing NOT to intervene when he doesn't.
If you try to say that God is not intervening b/c of human freedom, then I would say, well, he does intervene at some times, that 's taught in the Bible, so why does he then and not at other times? And if it is so good to have human freedom, then why should Christians be fighting at all? We don't want to infringe on anyone else's free will, why should we, when God doesn't?
That's why I think the most cogent answer is that of someone like Spinoza- that God's will IS perfect, he IS all powerful, and that therefore he is in charge, and things are going the way they are supposed to. Why is there all this evil, etc., then? I don't know, but I do know that it is part of the divine plan, and I take solace in that.
"Everyone who believes in God at all believes that He knows what you and I are going to do tomorrow." - C. S. Lewis | | Back to Top | | |
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DLW
Registered Member
Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 2457
| Posted 7/30/2003 6:15 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by ReasonableDoubt
Look, just don't appreciate you insisting that I only believe things b/c of emotionalism - when plenty of scientists, theologians, and philosophers have the same beliefs as me. You don't know my mind - and it's getting tiresome having you insist in post after post that you do.
I will cease to insist, but I am only compiling evidence. Its not like scientists and theologians don't need psychic balms too?
I have read enough of your posts to see some patterns and that is how I formulated my hypothesis.
quote:
If you try to say that God is not intervening b/c of human freedom, then I would say, well, he does intervene at some times, that 's taught in the Bible, so why does he then and not at other times? And if it is so good to have human freedom, then why should Christians be fighting at all? We don't want to infringe on anyone else's free will, why should we, when God doesn't?
Because he gave his church the keys to the kingdom of God and specified that we were to break down the gates of Hades. That is God's prerogative to give us the opportunity to help complete what he started.
quote:
That's why I think the most cogent answer is that of someone like Spinoza- that God's will IS perfect, he IS all powerful, and that therefore he is in charge, and things are going the way they are supposed to. Why is there all this evil, etc., then? I don't know, but I do know that it is part of the divine plan, and I take solace in that.
I think you are misinterpreting Spinoza. As a pantheist, there is no evil. The world and all that is in it is ultimately God.
God being in charge does not mean that at this exact point things are going exactly the way they are supposed to. Otherwise one has to teleologize the institutionalization of racism and anti-semitism in the Christian Church and its fall to ruins in Europe despite having held a place of honor their for so long. Or how social/religious conservatives in the US, have been poisoning the political process in the US by their refusal to take politics seriously and naive single-issue-voting. Now, I am sure one can surmise an explanation for all this, but why need we? A much simpler explanation would be to affirm the reality of evil and that it affects the fallible nature of how we in our ecclesiastical institutions decide to shine our light to the world.
dlw
I-uh-scream-uh,
You-uh-scream-uh,
We-all-uh-sceam-uh for
Ice-uh-cream-uh!!!
Roberto Bernigni in
Down by Law.
I wish we didn't live in a world where buying and selling things (especially selling) seems to have become almost more important than either producing or using them.
C.S. Lewis | | Back to Top | | |
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