Dragan Glas
Well-Known Member
Greetings,
I watched a couple of videos Aron posted on his FTB blog, Ace of Clades, and wanted to give my thoughts on them.
In this longer video, in which they discuss "presuppositional logic" of the Sye Ten Bruggencate variety, Matthew Steele (at 33 minutes onwards) and Ozymandias Ramses II (around 55 minutes onwards) make a number of very good points. Matthew also gives a key question to ask presuppositionalists:
There are two types, in my view:
1) "I was born with a absolute standard (of knowledge)", which begs the Bruggencate question; "How do you know?" - saying "I know that I know because I know" is circular, ergo *raspberry*;
2) "I had a revelation (after which I have a absolute standard)", means that before your "revelation" you didn't - ergo, you had no absolute standard by which to judge whether this experience was a delusion, hallucination, illusion or revelation.
In the latter case, if they claim that they had this "revelation" whilst reading the Bible - which, as Matthew pointed out, is a key concession that the Biblical God is their standard - and were "wooed" by the Holy Ghost, one could then ask Matthew's key question.
However, they are not just claiming a absolute standard of knowledge but absolute knowlege per se.
Not that they know everything right now - but they should *know* whether any statement is true or false.
You could point out that they should be able to tell whether any statement they see, read or hear is true or false. You could then make a statement - "I have a twin" - and if they can't tell whether that's true or false, then they clearly can't have a absolute standard of knowledge or absolute knowledge.
Kindest regards,
James
I watched a couple of videos Aron posted on his FTB blog, Ace of Clades, and wanted to give my thoughts on them.
- * Dr. Jones, around 16:30 onwards, makes the very good point that it would be better to have linguists argue the case against creationists' understanding of the Bible to show that the latter don't know what the words actually mean in context, rather than scientists arguing whether the Bible is scientifically correct or not.
* Aron refers to creationists as being "dishonest".
I would have to disagree with this, as it does not allow for those who genuinely believe what they are saying. Dr. Jones, around 44, tries several times to put forward this possibility in referring to the Koinē Greek word, pīstīs - which he interprets as "perspective", rather than "faith" as it's normally translated in modern times (although I've also seen it interpreted as "commitment").
As I've posted elsewhere, "When someone makes a false statement, only two possible explanations are possible: either the person doesn't know what they're talking about, which raises questions about their competence, or they are bearing false witness, which rasies questions about their integrity". In the case of the latter, it is correct to call them dishonest - but not the former, who can only be labelled misguided.
* Also, Dr. Jones takes issue with Chomsky about the idea that mathematics, for example, is a artificial construct, something which mankind has created because it works. Aron notes that it is a discovery.
I think that there's some confusion here.
There are two criteria involved here: an event (its existence) and a symbol.
There are, thus, four options:
1. Neither an event or symbol;
2. An event without an associated symbol;
This is where the event exists but we've yet to discover it (and assign it a symbol).
3. An event with a associated symbol;
This is where we've discovered the event and assigned it a symbol.
For example, π, the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter: we have the event (the existence of the ratio) and its associated symbol.
4. A symbol without an associated event.
In this category, there are two possibilities.
a) In scientific theories, predictions are made for which there are no evidence to date. For example, Einstein predicted gravitational lensing, which took decades for evidence to be observed. So, we have the symbol - "gravitational lensing" - without the event.
b) There's also the possibility of a symbol being assigned to a concept for which there's no counterpart in reality. For hard atheists, the concept of "God" falls into this category. One can also argue that failed explanations - failed hypotheses/theories in science - fall into this category.
Given the above, it's easy to see how there can be some confusion over whether mathematics - and other explanations - exist in reality or are mere "social constructs". Aspects of mathematics - inter-relationships in Nature - already exist, and remain to be discovered though the symbology for them is invented.
In this longer video, in which they discuss "presuppositional logic" of the Sye Ten Bruggencate variety, Matthew Steele (at 33 minutes onwards) and Ozymandias Ramses II (around 55 minutes onwards) make a number of very good points. Matthew also gives a key question to ask presuppositionalists:
Personally, I don't see why there's such a problem with these people.What justification do you provide that I or anyone else should accept the claim you're making that the God of the Bible is the only possible source of knowledge where we can be absolutely certain?
There are two types, in my view:
1) "I was born with a absolute standard (of knowledge)", which begs the Bruggencate question; "How do you know?" - saying "I know that I know because I know" is circular, ergo *raspberry*;
2) "I had a revelation (after which I have a absolute standard)", means that before your "revelation" you didn't - ergo, you had no absolute standard by which to judge whether this experience was a delusion, hallucination, illusion or revelation.
In the latter case, if they claim that they had this "revelation" whilst reading the Bible - which, as Matthew pointed out, is a key concession that the Biblical God is their standard - and were "wooed" by the Holy Ghost, one could then ask Matthew's key question.
However, they are not just claiming a absolute standard of knowledge but absolute knowlege per se.
Not that they know everything right now - but they should *know* whether any statement is true or false.
You could point out that they should be able to tell whether any statement they see, read or hear is true or false. You could then make a statement - "I have a twin" - and if they can't tell whether that's true or false, then they clearly can't have a absolute standard of knowledge or absolute knowledge.
Kindest regards,
James