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[Chesterton]

I dont see how. Theres nothing to indicate meaning preceded the presence of horses. Meaning or no meaning, the outcome would have been the same because humans found them useful.

It's my natural inclination to be a skeptic that leads me to certain ideas. I'm very skeptical about some coincidences being meaningless. You seem skeptical in the opposite way. Let him who has ears to hear...

Counterfactuals offer an important test. They can help us decide whether an outcome had to be a certain way or not.

Okay then tell me what had to be a certain way or not. (Apply it to horses or anything else.)

 

[durangodawood]

It's my natural inclination to be a skeptic that leads me to certain ideas. I'm very skeptical about some coincidences being meaningless. You seem skeptical in the opposite way. Let him who has ears to hear...

Skepticism ought to apply to positive claims that lack demonstrable evidence. The claim for meaning to precede an event is pretty huge, as it implies an intending will. The only evidence for this will operating in pre human events is faith, which is not really demonstrable. Its essentially subjective.

If you have demonstrable evidence for such a will acting in the world, then its reasonable to be skeptical that a particular event is meaningless coincidence. I'm not saying you are wrong. Just that you are not being reasonable, Thats fine. Reasonableness isnt everything. But it does help us guard against an epistemology based on desire.

Okay then tell me what had to be a certain way or not. (Apply it to horses or anything else.)

The counterfactual prompts us to think that the way things turned out is not the only possible story. Countless other stories could have arisen if conditions were different. Many of those diverse stories could include intelligent beings who marvel at "the amazing meaningful coincidences necessary for things to turn out just like this, so this exact arrangement must have been intended!"

I think conditions are sufficient to explain outcomes. We dont need intentions to explain outcomes - not until beings arise that have intentions. Then, obviously, we have to look at intentions to explain certain things they do.

 

[Chesterton]

Skepticism ought to apply to positive claims that lack demonstrable evidence.

Are you not making a positive claim that lacks demonstrable evidence?

The claim for meaning to precede an event is pretty huge, as it implies an intending will. The only evidence for this will operating in pre human events is faith, which is not really demonstrable. Its essentially subjective.

You're basically saying that a claim for God is huge. I think and feel the opposite. I think "something from nothing" is a preposterously huge claim.

If you have demonstrable evidence for such a will acting in the world, then its reasonable to be skeptical that a particular event is meaningless coincidence. I'm not saying you are wrong. Just that you are not being reasonable, Thats fine. Reasonableness isnt everything.

I agree that reasonableness isn't everything, and I'm not necessarily seeking to be reasonable. I'm seeking truth, and it could turn out that truth is unreasonable as the reality of quantum mechanics is unreasonable.

But it does help us guard against an epistemology based on desire.

Ouch. I detect a possible ad hom attack here. Why couldn't I equally accuse you of believing what you want to believe because of your desire? Trust me, there was a time earlier in my life when I didn't want there to be a God or meaning.

The counterfactual prompts us to think that the way things turned out is not the only possible story. Countless other stories could have arisen if conditions were different. Many of those diverse stories could include intelligent beings who marvel at "the amazing meaningful coincidences necessary for things to turn out just like this, so this exact arrangement must have been intended!"

I think conditions are sufficient to explain outcomes. We dont need intentions to explain outcomes - not until beings arise that have intentions. Then, obviously, we have to look at intentions to explain certain things they do.

Yes, and historians love playing "what if" games - "What if Nazi Germany had developed the A bomb first? What would our world look like?" But you said counterfactuals help us determine whether an outcome had to be a certain way or not. I asked you to provide an example and you didn't.

 

[durangodawood]

Are you not making a positive claim that lacks demonstrable evidence?

Which claim are you referring to?

You're basically saying that a claim for God is huge. I think and feel the opposite.

It is huge. Pretty much every believer out there thinks its huge. Of course a supreme creator being with a whole other realm of meaning that no one can demonstrate is a huge claim.

I think "something from nothing" is a preposterously huge claim.

I didnt make nor imply that claim. The world could be eternal and un-created. Believers claims thats possible for the divine realm. Theres no special reason why its not possible for the world as such. The preposterosity seems equal there - except that with the divine claim we have to account for a whole other non demonstrable world as well.

I agree that reasonableness isn't everything, and I'm not necessarily seeking to be reasonable. I'm seeking truth, and it could turn out that truth is unreasonable as the reality of quantum mechanics is unreasonable.

I agree with that. But Im also wary of de-valuing reason too much. People who do that fall victim to all kinds of destructive delusions. Still, it seems extremely presumptuous to think our human minds, evolved to manage the finite tasks of living, are capable of grasping every possible aspect of reality.

Ouch. I detect a possible ad hom attack here. Why couldn't I equally accuse you of believing what you want to believe because of your desire? Trust me, there was a time earlier in my life when I didn't want there to be a God or meaning.

I dont know your biography. But I do think a lot of people believe things in order to settle the restlessness of unanswered "whys". I do think the pointless life feels bad. Even more, it can be detrimental to the continuity of society, I think.

Yes, and historians love playing "what if" games - "What if Nazi Germany had developed the A bomb first? What would our world look like?" But you said counterfactuals help us determine whether an outcome had to be a certain way or not. I asked you to provide an example and you didn't.

Its not rigorous. Its just an appeal to our imaginations to realize that for any conceivable complex world, its development followed one particular path out of countless potential others. Its tempting but unjustified to conclude that world was chosen to be just that exceedingly particular way just because it wasnt something else.

 

[Chesterton]

Which claim are you referring to?

The claim that horses weren't meant to be ridden, or more generally, that there is no meaning or intention to the universe.

It is huge. Pretty much every believer out there thinks its huge. Of course a supreme creator being with a whole other realm of meaning that no one can demonstrate is a huge claim.

I think a supreme creator being is a small claim, just as if I see a cake, I don't assume a baker of the cake to be a huge claim.

I didnt make nor imply that claim. The world could be eternal and un-created. Believers claims thats possible for the divine realm. Theres no special reason why its not possible for the world as such. The preposterosity seems equal there - except that with the divine claim we have to account for a whole other non demonstrable world as well.

The science is against that. All the best evidence indicates that the world/universe is not eternal, not cyclical, but had a beginning.

I dont know your biography. But I do think a lot of people believe things in order to settle the restlessness of unanswered "whys". I do think the pointless life feels bad. Even more, it can be detrimental to the continuity of society, I think.

I agree, and I think a lot of people believe things in order to avoid the whys. And beliefs can be held for many other reasons, such as wanting to have lots of sex. This is Aldous Huxley being very honest in 1937:

“I had motives for not wanting the world to have a meaning; and consequently assumed that it had none, and was able without any difficulty to find satisfying reasons for this assumption. The philosopher who finds no meaning in the world is not concerned exclusively with a problem in pure metaphysics. He is also concerned to prove that there is no valid reason why he personally should not do as he wants to do. For myself, as no doubt for most of my friends, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation from a certain system of morality. We objected to the morality because it interfered with our sexual freedom. The supporters of this system claimed that it embodied the meaning - the Christian meaning, they insisted - of the world. There was one admirably simple method of confuting these people and justifying ourselves in our erotic revolt: we would deny that the world had any meaning whatever.”​

Its not rigorous. Its just an appeal to our imaginations to realize that for any conceivable complex world, its development followed one particular path out of countless potential others. Its tempting but unjustified to conclude that world was chosen to be just that exceedingly particular way just because it wasnt something else.

It's not rigorous? As a man of Science, I therefore reject it!

 

[durangodawood]

The claim that horses weren't meant to be ridden, or more generally, that there is no meaning or intention to the universe.

I didnt say the meaning you claim never existed. I said theres no evidence we can see for such a meaning: "Theres nothing to indicate meaning preceded the presence of horses."

In other words, horses may have been intended for humans to ride. But there's no rational necessity to come to that conclusion. My hunch is that humans like to project retroactive meaning all over everything because they quake at the notion of a world where they are the only meaning makers. Its an emotional need. But a pretty deep one. I see it in myself too. Doesnt make it real tho.

I think a supreme creator being is a small claim, just as if I see a cake, I don't assume a baker of the cake to be a huge claim.

We have exceedingly strong demonstrable evidence for how cakes get made. We have no demonstrable evidence for how "all this" originated. Some things dont appear to have a maker like a cake does. Heavier elements just needed H and He and gravity to get stars going, which made these elements, which prior to that didnt exist anywhere in the universe.

The science is against that. All the best evidence indicates that the world/universe is not eternal, not cyclical, but had a beginning.

Thats not true at all. We have the big bang that marks an inflection point and possibly a beginning for this universe. But we have no idea what greater reality that event may be embedded in. It may be in something we would call material. It may be in something we call divine.

I agree, and I think a lot of people believe things in order to avoid the whys. And beliefs can be held for many other reasons, such as wanting to have lots of sex. This is Aldous Huxley being very honest in 1937:

“I had motives for not wanting the world to have a meaning; and consequently assumed that it had none, and was able without any difficulty to find satisfying reasons for this assumption. The philosopher who finds no meaning in the world is not concerned exclusively with a problem in pure metaphysics. He is also concerned to prove that there is no valid reason why he personally should not do as he wants to do. For myself, as no doubt for most of my friends, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation from a certain system of morality. We objected to the morality because it interfered with our sexual freedom. The supporters of this system claimed that it embodied the meaning - the Christian meaning, they insisted - of the world. There was one admirably simple method of confuting these people and justifying ourselves in our erotic revolt: we would deny that the world had any meaning whatever.”​

Great quote. Thats almost too on the nose re what I called "an epistemology based on desire". I'm just wary of us making the same error for the sake of healthier desires - healthier for personal happiness and/or societal success. Those are great goals. But something in me rebels at having to fabricate truths for their sakes.

 

[Chesterton]

I didnt say the meaning you claim never existed. I said theres no evidence we can see for such a meaning: "Theres nothing to indicate meaning preceded the presence of horses."

In other words, horses may have been intended for humans to ride. But there's no rational necessity to come to that conclusion. My hunch is that humans like to project retroactive meaning all over everything because they quake at the notion of a world where they are the only meaning makers. Its an emotional need. But a pretty deep one. I see it in myself too. Doesnt make it real tho.

I'm not sure we all quake at the notion, because for years I argued about meaning with atheists on CF, and they seem very comfortable saying "we make our own meaning". I heard it so often it came to sound like a slogan. Something related to meaning is morality, and atheists will say that there is no objective morality because it varies over time and cultures. But I have this George Carlin comedy record, where he does a bit about "word combinations you'll never hear". One of the combinations is "Please saw my legs off". Another is "Do what you want to the girl, but leave me alone!" I submit that it's impossible to imagine a time or culture, on Earth or another planet even, where a cowardly man wishing to sacrifice "the girl" to save himself, is regarded as a hero. It'd be like trying to imagine a square circle. So we have values, and they must be rooted in underlying meaning, or else they wouldn't be values and we wouldn't perceive them as true.

So, we have to say the values are universal and absolute, therefore also eternal. We can't imagine a time in the past or the future where a coward would be lauded as a hero. I conclude that there is something real and meaningful going on in our reality.

We have exceedingly strong demonstrable evidence for how cakes get made. We have no demonstrable evidence for how "all this" originated. Some things dont appear to have a maker like a cake does. Heavier elements just needed H and He and gravity to get stars going, which made these elements, which prior to that didnt exist anywhere in the universe.

Saying they "just needed" H and He is a pretty big hand-waving dismissal of something completely unnecessary. Even taking the word "needed" as a metaphor, you're implying that stars were "meant" to be.

Thats not true at all. We have the big bang that marks an inflection point and possibly a beginning for this universe. But we have no idea what greater reality that event may be embedded in. It may be in something we would call material. It may be in something we call divine.

Well my exact words were "all the best evidence indicates..." And like in that other thread about AI, you want to step outside the evidence. I enjoy science fiction and fantasy too, but I don't rely on it to evade the actual evidence.

Great quote. Thats almost too on the nose re what I called "an epistemology based on desire". I'm just wary of us making the same error for the sake of healthier desires - healthier for personal happiness and/or societal success. Those are great goals. But something in me rebels at having to fabricate truths for their sakes.

I agree. A fabricated truth is a contradiction-in-terms, and I don't want that.

 

[durangodawood]

I'm not sure we all quake at the notion, because for years I argued about meaning with atheists on CF, and they seem very comfortable saying "we make our own meaning". I heard it so often it came to sound like a slogan. Something related to meaning is morality, and atheists will say that there is no objective morality because it varies over time and cultures. But I have this George Carlin comedy record, where he does a bit about "word combinations you'll never hear". One of the combinations is "Please saw my legs off". Another is "Do what you want to the girl, but leave me alone!" I submit that it's impossible to imagine a time or culture, on Earth or another planet even, where a cowardly man wishing to sacrifice "the girl" to save himself, is regarded as a hero. It'd be like trying to imagine a square circle. So we have values, and they must be rooted in underlying meaning, or else they wouldn't be values and we wouldn't perceive them as true.

I think you are right about "slogan" and "we make our own meaning" is more an argumentative trope than a well considered feeling. I think some people pull off conscious nihilism well. But most who claim it are just postponing a reckoning by staying busy or being pleased with one thing after another.

As for values, I'm quite satisfied with naturalistic explanations for many of the most important ones. Most people who survived to reproduce and raise children had to have a pretty strong resistance to getting their legs sawed, or gnawed, off. Indifference on that account is not likely to be passed along. Same with indifference to the fate of your offspring.

So, we have to say the values are universal and absolute, therefore also eternal. We can't imagine a time in the past or the future where a coward would be lauded as a hero. I conclude that there is something real and meaningful going on in our reality.

Universal? I can see how they apply to human beings. But whats the point of having them apply beyond that? Still, I would say we are given meaning by the forces that made us. Some say those forces are gods. Others say its our natural history.

Also, we clearly have some values that endure, while others are transient. I think this mirrors the human experience. Some aspects of our condition are quite durable, others are culturally contingent.

Saying they "just needed" H and He is a pretty big hand-waving dismissal of something completely unnecessary. Even taking the word "needed" as a metaphor, you're implying that stars were "meant" to be.

I say needed because there's no other known way for some of these elements to come about - until humans came along and fabricated them, that is. Strictly speaking, "needed" should be applied conditionally, pending the discovery of some other method of origin. But I think the science on this is quite well established.

Well my exact words were "all the best evidence indicates..." And like in that other thread about AI, you want to step outside the evidence. I enjoy science fiction and fantasy too, but I don't rely on it to evade the actual evidence.

Youre simply wrong about that. Youre trying to apply evidence re the big bang to bigger questions about what might have caused it. The evidence is totally silent on that. And so my conjectures are as good as yours, and neither of us can draw conclusions about what's necessary.

 

[Chesterton]

As for values, I'm quite satisfied with naturalistic explanations for many of the most important ones. Most people who survived to reproduce and raise children had to have a pretty strong resistance to getting their legs sawed, or gnawed, off. Indifference on that account is not likely to be passed along. Same with indifference to the fate of your offspring.

My example was "do what you want to the girl" (which could be daughter, wife, girlfriend, random stranger), not "do what you want to my offspring". But even if I did go with offspring, evolutionary psychology trying to explain love presupposes the thing it's trying to explain. I have no reason to have any practical interest in passing on my genes unless I already "care".

I always thought an interesting "compare and contrast" assignment would be comparing Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene with the novel/film Catch-22. I don't know if you're familiar with either of those works, but in Catch-22, the lead character has been drafted into WWII and is what we might call a coward, or at least very individualistic. He's tired of those Germans trying to kill him (who wouldn't be?) and he doesn't want to fight for his country. A fellow airman asks "what if everyone thought like you do?" He replies "then I'd be a fool to think any different".

I often find naturalistic explanations lacking.

Universal? I can see how they apply to human beings. But whats the point of having them apply beyond that? Still, I would say we are given meaning by the forces that made us. Some say those forces are gods. Others say its our natural history.

Also, we clearly have some values that endure, while others are transient. I think this mirrors the human experience. Some aspects of our condition are quite durable, others are culturally contingent.

I agree, some of them endure.

I say needed because there's no other known way for some of these elements to come about - until humans came along and fabricated them, that is. Strictly speaking, "needed" should be applied conditionally, pending the discovery of some other method of origin. But I think the science on this is quite well established.

I guess I don't understand you. I'm trying to meet you half-way by just hinting at teleology, but you seem to be asserting it outright.

Youre simply wrong about that. Youre trying to apply evidence re the big bang to bigger questions about what might have caused it. The evidence is totally silent on that. And so my conjectures are as good as yours, and neither of us can draw conclusions about what's necessary.

Okay fair enough. I guess it boils down to the eternality of matter and laws which govern the matter, versus the eternality of something like a creative Mind which could invent laws and matter. Since we have no evidence of matter and laws creating themselves, the latter seems more reasonable to me.

 

[durangodawood]

My example was "do what you want to the girl" (which could be daughter, wife, girlfriend, random stranger), not "do what you want to my offspring". But even if I did go with offspring, evolutionary psychology trying to explain love presupposes the thing it's trying to explain. I have no reason to have any practical interest in passing on my genes unless I already "care".

In the evolutionary psychology view, caring about your offspring (or the tribes offsping generally in a social species) precedes individual choice making or reasoning. Its hard wired into us. This seems pretty sensible, as beings with this strong instinct will naturally persist and replace those who are without it, or in whom its weak. Its extremely reasonable that we'd inherit this instinct, and thats how you already care.

I always thought an interesting "compare and contrast" assignment would be comparing Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene with the novel/film Catch-22. I don't know if you're familiar with either of those works, but in Catch-22, the lead character has been drafted into WWII and is what we might call a coward, or at least very individualistic. He's tired of those Germans trying to kill him (who wouldn't be?) and he doesn't want to fight for his country. A fellow airman asks "what if everyone thought like you do?" He replies "then I'd be a fool to think any different".

Rejection of cowardice in social groups is well accounted for in the evolutionary psychology pov. Its essential for the persistence of the tribe. Tribes that value courage will have a particular advantage over those which dont.

I often find naturalistic explanations lacking.

I do find a lot of them to be conjectural, but reasonable.

I guess I don't understand you. I'm trying to meet you half-way by just hinting at teleology, but you seem to be asserting it outright.

I was just pointing to the emergence of a new thing as not requiring a proximate maker in the way that we know a cake does. I do think certain objects absolutely do require a conscious maker. Like cakes and airplanes. We know directly how those come about.

Other things like whales and trees very evidently do not require a conscious maker to emerge over time from very rudimentary multicellular life. As for the journey from organic molecules to multicellular life, thats still somewhat up in the air, but the trend favors a naturalistic explanation, especially as we are finding physical explanations for the organic molecule ingredients.

Okay fair enough. I guess it boils down to the eternality of matter and laws which govern the matter, versus the eternality of something like a creative Mind which could invent laws and matter.

I'm not sure the laws have a reality on their own apart from human minds. Laws seem to be our description of what matter does. At bottom what does exist is matter doing what it does. Its not "obeying" laws or anything like that. An electron does what it does, end of story. Laws and properties are all conceptualizations that help us grasp the situation. But they should not necessarily be projected back onto the things as "real". I dont want to make too much of this tho. Its a bit of a side track, i think.

Since we have no evidence of matter and laws creating themselves, the latter seems more reasonable to me.

What I dont get it why you privilege one no-evidence proposition (divine realm) in favor of another no-evidence proposition (eternal matter and energy situation) in terms of reasonableness. On the basis of evidence (namely none thats objective) I find them equally reasonable. But the divine realm proposition has the severe disadvantage of also requiring a whole other kind of non-evidenced world in addition to the one thats apparent to us all.

But like I said earlier, reasonableness is not the same as truth. I'm only arguing about what reasonable. Your truth may end up correct even if I'm right and your truth is less reasonable by current evidence and rationality.

 

[Neogaia777]

@durangodawood

Did we "invent" math?

Or are we only "discovering or uncovering it", etc?

Or how does it come about on it's own, etc?

God Bless.

 

[Neogaia777]

@durangodawood

Did we "invent" math?

Or are we only "discovering or uncovering it", etc?

Or how does it come about on it's own, etc?

God Bless.

@durangodawood

Because it is very much law and order that very, very much does most certainly exist way, way "apart from us", etc.

To me, that indicates an inventor, and/or "design", etc.

If we were not, it still would be, and it still would be "way, way apart from us", etc.

"We" are "not required" for it still to be, and that is way, way apart from us, etc.

God Bless.

 

[durangodawood]

@durangodawood

Because it is very much law and order that very, very much does most certainly exist way, way "apart from us", etc.

To me, that indicates an inventor, and/or "design", etc.

If we were not, it still would be, and it still would be "way, way apart from us", etc.

"We" are "not required" for it still to be, and that is way, way apart from us, etc.

God Bless.

I tend toward we discovered it. But Im not sure.

But I dont think the properties of numbers imply a mind that created those properties. Its pretty much impossible to conceive of a mind that could have preceded numbers or their properties.

I also tend to think that reasoning about such situations is really beyond our capacities and that attempting to do so could lead to false conclusions.

 

[Neogaia777]

@durangodawood

Our understanding of mathematics is way, way infantile right now, but if it were not, or if it was just a little bit more advanced, we could use it to predict a lot of the future, even down to the level of the individual, or down to each one's individual choices, or each one individually, etc.

I think God gave us all of this as a "gift", in order for us to eventually come to know and understand much more like Him, etc.

And I most certainly think He invented it or designed it, and that it all originated/originates with Him, and all goes back to Him, etc.

I think He has given us the ability to see into the past (using mathematics) (or telescopes, or whatever) so that we might come to know and learn how to predict the future (using math).

A bit deceptive maybe, because it's often the largest things are the most easy to come and know and be able to predict (infantile math) but someday we are going to know a lot more about it, and might even be able to predict and know our own futures, etc, but that's still a ways off yet, as I'm sure we will make all kinds of "other discoveries" between now and then.

But, I see law and order based on mathematical laws and constructs, and to me, that indicates a "law and orderer", or indicates an on-purpose design, etc.

God Bless.

 

[Neogaia777]

I tend toward we discovered it. But Im not sure.

But I dont think the properties of numbers imply a mind that created those properties. Its pretty much impossible to conceive of a mind that could have preceded numbers or their properties.

I also tend to think that reasoning about such situations is really beyond our capacities and that attempting to do so could lead to false conclusions.

To each his or her own I guess.

I don't think it's really all that hard though, to at least theoretically conceive of a mind at least, that might have done, or may have caused, or might have made all of these things, etc.

And it's even a whole heck of a lot easier, for our minds at least, if you believe as I do, and that is that there is, was, and always has been, only one possibility to this universe, or all of these things.

God Bless.

 

[Neogaia777]

This post in another thread, and a couple right after it, might shed some light on this maybe?

Some of you might not be able to post there, but maybe you can at least view them maybe?

https://www.christianforums.com/threads/lets-have-another-go-can-god-be-good-yet-damn-the-majority.8242898/post-77435036

Oh, and it is of note when reading these posts that I believe God in the OT to not be the Highest God, but that I believe Jesus called him God the Holy Spirit, or God the Spirit.

God Bless.

 

[durangodawood]

.....
I don't think it's really all that hard though, to at least theoretically conceive of a mind at least, that might have done, or may have caused, or might have made all of these things, etc.
.....

I can say the words "a being created math" and fake that I have some notion about what that really means - because its a proper grammatical sentence.

But I'm pretty sure I cannot actually conceive of a "realm" - or whatever we call it - where there are no counting numbers. Its literally inconceivable to me. I dont know how to reason about it or talk about what a being there could or couldnt do. It is nonsense land.

 

[Neogaia777]

I can say the words "a being created math" and fake that I have some notion about what that really means.

But I'm pretty sure I cannot conceive of a "realm" - or whatever we call it - where there are no counting numbers. Its literally inconceivable to me. I dont know how to reason about it or talk about what a being there could or couldnt do. It is nonsense land.

To each his or her own I guess.

I see things going according to trajectories and angles colliding with other things spurring on at other trajectories and angles (and velocities, etc) that can or could only ever go or proceed only one way, becoming much more seemingly infinitely complex since the very beginning of course, but the same thing still happening with everything today, including us, etc, and I long for a day when we will very much more better understand it all more fully, etc, but only one way it can all go from beginning to end, and everything in-between, including us and all our so-called "choices", from the very beginning, etc.

And my God did it all, and made it all, and already caused and/or causes it all, and was the original cause of it all, etc, etc, etc, being fully able to predict and know how it would all happen/go from the very beginning, or from even before that, don't you know, etc.

God Bless.

 

[AlexB23]

First of all, I never said I was a honest upstanding individual, but I gave up on doing most things that are illegal or criminal a long, long time ago now, as I have already paid the price for it, etc.

Secondly, I think the only ones who should be keeping any kinds of tabs like that on individual people is only God and His Holy Angels secondly, because humans will always abuse it.

We start out keeping tabs on pedophiles, and other big-time criminals, and the like, but then it turns into anyone who won't accept the mark of the beast, or dares to voice or say anything against the state, or the current establishment, so it's a very slippery slope for us humans, etc.

So I would prefer us human beings keeping tabs like that on none, but don't have much choice in the matter, etc.

Either way, I will know the exact time and day to make or take my true right stand, and pay the price for it if I have to. Can you truly say the same?

But until then, I'd like to hold that as an ace up my sleeve, and not play that card until/unless it becomes absolutely necessary, etc.

God Bless.

We shouldn't keep tabs on everyone, but we should definitely keep tabs on creeps, bad actors/people with malicious intentions, politicians, corporations or people like this guy in a show that I started watching on October 1st, 2023. Luckily he only gets a few minutes on air for the 26 episode series:

 

[Chesterton]

In the evolutionary psychology view, caring about your offspring (or the tribes offsping generally in a social species) precedes individual choice making or reasoning. Its hard wired into us. This seems pretty sensible, as beings with this strong instinct will naturally persist and replace those who are without it, or in whom its weak. Its extremely reasonable that we'd inherit this instinct, and thats how you already care.

Rejection of cowardice in social groups is well accounted for in the evolutionary psychology pov. Its essential for the persistence of the tribe. Tribes that value courage will have a particular advantage over those which dont.

Persistence of the tribe is not essential. If you want to play atheist's advocate, do it right: nothing is essential. As I said, the tribe, just like a single celled organism, has to care before it will act caringly. IMO the Christian explanation is the best - God is the giver of life, and God is love. Getting love from molecules is absurd.

I was just pointing to the emergence of a new thing as not requiring a proximate maker in the way that we know a cake does. I do think certain objects absolutely do require a conscious maker. Like cakes and airplanes. We know directly how those come about.

Other things like whales and trees very evidently do not require a conscious maker to emerge over time from very rudimentary multicellular life. As for the journey from organic molecules to multicellular life, thats still somewhat up in the air, but the trend favors a naturalistic explanation, especially as we are finding physical explanations for the organic molecule ingredients.

I used to believe in macro-evolution up until a few years ago. I don't anymore, but I'd rather leave that for another thread.

I'm not sure the laws have a reality on their own apart from human minds. Laws seem to be our description of what matter does. At bottom what does exist is matter doing what it does. Its not "obeying" laws or anything like that. An electron does what it does, end of story. Laws and properties are all conceptualizations that help us grasp the situation. But they should not necessarily be projected back onto the things as "real". I dont want to make too much of this tho. Its a bit of a side track, i think.

I agree. "Law" is just a word for what things consistently and uniformly do. But it's interesting that there's no reason there should be consistency and uniformity, yet there is.

What I dont get it why you privilege one no-evidence proposition (divine realm) in favor of another no-evidence proposition (eternal matter and energy situation) in terms of reasonableness. On the basis of evidence (namely none thats objective) I find them equally reasonable. But the divine realm proposition has the severe disadvantage of also requiring a whole other kind of non-evidenced world in addition to the one thats apparent to us all.

But like I said earlier, reasonableness is not the same as truth. I'm only arguing about what reasonable. Your truth may end up correct even if I'm right and your truth is less reasonable by current evidence and rationality.

I think the eternal matter proposition also has the disadvantage of requiring a whole other kind of non-evidenced world, that being one that does the impossible and defies entropy. Have a look at Wiki's Ultimate Fate of the Universe article. You've got Big Freeze, Big Rip, Big Crunch, Big Bounce, Big Slurp (I get the feeling that whatever happens, it's going to be big ). The Crunch and the Bounce, the ones which could allow for an eternal universe are the ones most refuted by actual evidence. But hey, if you want to be a science denying cosmetician cosmologist, that's on you.