How did any of you arrive at your conclusion?

I've already stated why I believe in spirituality: It makes me happier than I ever have been, and is more believable than "Heroism is always onesided" stuff that Christianity has; Spirituality goes both ways. It's a balance.

I enjoy balance a lot.

I will not respond to anything you say to me. If you want me to prove it, I would like you to disprove it.

Humans are not capable of figuring the truth out. Thusly, arguing is moot, and we should accept each others' opinions.
 
Of course, it's not like I'm not skeptical of the experiences myself and just accept that all such miracles/supernatural events in my life were simply related to my beliefs and looked at them in such other ways. It's not like I haven't put together a model of the world and how things would work without "a God". The biggest flaw I find in such models is that they often lack meaning and purpose.

Meaning is not a metaphysical requirement and neither is purpose. Furthermore, God does not give meaning, nor does it give purpose. God adds one perspective to the mix and that's it.

No matter what kind of justification one can give against nihilism, the point is mankind is way too limited and silly to ever break out of the eternal cycle that entraps them. I believe that it is religion's purpose to break man out of this cycle, to empower them, to get them to behave.

Cool. I don't see it working.

Christianity is pretty much the only religion that offers the concept that it is love that empowers people and makes the world go around.

If you read selectively, yes, as many people do for all kinds of purposes. But have you read extensively about Islam? Buddhism? Hinduism? Taoism? Zoroastrianism? What if a gem is hidden in these religions' texts that would make you change your mind?

Perhaps it's also the fact that I am empowered by my God rather than restricted, that I believe there are concepts that are far greater than any human made systems that overcomes them all. While it is far fetched, it is a far better, and more meaningful life than any athestic worldview will bring you.

How do you know? You are no atheist. I could say that I feel empowered by the sheer magnitude of possibilities and by the freedom that I have to marvel at them without the nagging pressure of belief and as a matter of fact, I do. Atheism makes me completely free to choose what I want to do with my life, spares me from any arbitrary contraints or direction, makes it mean what I want it to mean.

I don't like belief and I see it as a necessary evil, but an evil nonetheless. Why would I believe anything that I am not required to believe? Why can't I let my mind wander, "this is cool", "this is a strange but amusing idea", "maybe this is reality", "or maybe this is reality", without ever committing to believing anything? I would be blissfully neutral, marveling at all the raindrops that fall upon the Earth without caring which one is the true raindrop, without searching for it, because I know it's a pointless, tiring and -yes!- contrary exercise. I believe in things because I have to - but if I was some poor disabled chap, never to perceive anything again, alone in my head, I would not believe anything. And that would be an amazing feeling.

I'm embellishing a little, but you started it ;)

I'm not citing this you as "evidence", I'm literally telling you why I picked Christianity over alternatives, and the purpose that I have derived behind it. I don't care what contemporary Christians act like or how they are - we are all pitiful humans who constantly try to improve ourselves and thus judging the followers do not judge the concept itself.

It sort of does because it shows that only you see it, which strongly suggests that your views are in great part personal and uncorrelated with what the religion actually says. Basically, that your beliefs mostly come from yourself, but that you attributed them to an external source, the case in point being that most people are not in agreement. Basically, given the range of interpretations that have been made of the Bible, it is presumptuous for you to claim that your interpretation is better. Essentially, the Bible is a blank text. You do what you want with it and your interpretation is much more telling of you than it is of Christianity.

You always seem to enjoy using this argument like it's the end all argument and of course I'll agree with you on your points... except can you really really argue that everything else is indeed equal between what the models will explain? The second you claim that a model without God/supernatural can explain everything much better than a model with such elements, then immediately you miss the point of Religion - the idea is that we as humans are limited and cannot explain all the forces in the world perfectly, no matter how hard we try. How can you claim that all else is indeed equal?

Okay, so we cannot explain all the forces in the world perfectly. I agree. Cool. Now what? The point is, it pretty much ends there. Our knowledge is approximate, okay, it is important to be aware of that, but do you think I need religion to know this? I am perfectly aware of the limitations and their fuzzy extent, but that's it, really. The world is part known and part unknown. The unknown part is, well, it's... unknown! There may be a God but maybe there isn't. There might be an unknown teapot, or maybe there isn't. There might also be absolutely nothing that's unknown. I exclude no possibility, but I do not favor any either - in the absence of evidence, I suspend belief and I'm content with that. Why you go a step further is beyond me.

Look: "we as humans are limited and cannot explain all the forces in the world perfectly, no matter how hard we try". I suspect this (though it is presumptuous to state it as fact - many systems exist which would allow their "inhabitants" to infer their exact functioning from within the system, though these inhabitants could never be absolutely certain that they did). But as I read it, your wording pretty much precludes religion, as religion would be, quite precisely, an attempt to "explain" the unknown. Admittedly, it does not actually explain anything, but that's not a feature.

So this is just saying "haha my bias is better than your bias"? I would argue that it's hardly arbitrary and saying that anyone believes in something "arbitrarily" is simply insulting more than anything.

Yes and no. The fact is, you have the same bias at large: simpler is more probable. This is an extremely widespread heuristic, one which is usually taken as self-evident, as no one discusses it if they even realize that's what they are doing. What I am pointing out is, essentially, an additional bias on your part - special pleading, basically.

I'm not too sure what you have against my concept of a God anyway.

As far as I can remember, my main gripe is that your God is not actually a deity and that your usage of word is immensely confusing.

Nonsense. Let's say I have a set of data regarding wage and education. I have strong believes that wage has a positive correlation with education, without even considering anything, as an "a prior" (pretend that it is this way since this is just a simple example).

No. You are misinterpreting the domain of the prior. I am talking about a prior over a single random variable, i.e. a universal process. Other examples are irrelevant.

I run the data, and I find that there is no correlation between education and wage. I have just tested my hypothesis, something I have believed, according to you. All a priori are hypothesis that I want to test. How the hell can you claim taht they are not testable? Why should they all be "rationally and pragmatically derived"? Why can't I just look at a bunch of numbers, tinker with it a bit, and believe something, and try to prove it (only to find that I can't or I find a counter example, or I do manage to prove it)? This is ridiculous.

Look this is not a prior you're talking about. A prior might be P(wage): how probable is a certain wage? You don't know about education, you don't know about the job, you don't know about the currency, you have no examples of wages, you know nothing. That is the prior and you can't test it because that's not the point, it is a tool for inference and nothing more. In this case, you would probably choose a uniform prior. Any wage is equally probable in the absence of any evidence whatsoever, which is logical. The only effective criterion to choose a prior is effectiveness.

Basically: a hypothesis is not a prior and the correlation you are set out to determine is the choice of the likelihood P(education|wage), which you may combine with P(wage) in order to determine the posterior P(wage|education). A strange prior that would give undue importance to wage 100,000 would skew the posterior. I'm talking about Bayesian inference essentially.

The point is that the very CONCEPT of a God surpasses human experience and likely isn't simply limited to how people can think or comprehend, so why do people bother requiring evidence for it?

Because there are no free passes. It's not because a concept deems itself incomprehensible that I won't hold it to the same criteria as any other concept. It is also debatable whether this is in fact a contradiction in terms: a concept is a mental structure, it can't surpass human experience. Furthermore, several concepts, such as a square circle, cannot exist because they are nonsense, and the same kind of test needs to be applied to the concept of God: does it mean anything, or is it nonsense?

If the concept of God is incomprehensible, there is a fundamental identification problem. Chiefly, proper identification of an object entails that the object may be comprehended. Thus, should God be beyond human comprehension, given an object or a process, it is impossible to determine whether it is God or something else. You essentially end up lumping together every single incomprehensible concept as "God" because it is only through comprehension that you could tell them apart. This obfuscates the fact that there is an infinity of radically different incomprehensible processes.

Basically, take God and isolate the part of him which is irreducibly beyond human comprehension (for example if we contend that God is sentient and that he is good, we partly comprehend what he is and we may set these things apart until what remains of his modus operandi is beyond us). My contention is that there is no criterion which would allow you to tell God apart from a source of randomness, for such a criterion would entail that you partly comprehend God. it is a subtle argument, but it is essentially true that any irreducibly incomprehensible thing would look random to us, regardless of whether it is actually random or not, and by corollary, any concept we might put forward which we deem beyond our comprehension would be the concept of randomness in disguise, because we couldn't cognize it differently.

In a nutshell: God, at the core, is incomprehensible, randomness is incomprehensible, now tell me how I can tell them apart with comprehensible criteria.

The point is - you can believe it or not - it does not matter. But calling belief in a god irrational because we don't have evidence for it? Why does evidence even matter anyway since you can likely explain ANY sort of evidence by calling it a mental disease or some weird phenomenon or anything like that?

That's a plausible and falsifiable hypothesis and you've got to admit it's compelling. If we can conclusively determine that there is no likely process that explains your train of thought then we'll talk.

Considering everytime you bring up the "if god came down from heaven and just showed himself to us and hung out with us" is complete nonsense since you apparently have this image of what God is supposed to be (you want evidence that confirms your view of god). You say you can't communicate with God, and I'll say you can't communicate because of your bias.

Look what the fuck am I supposed to think God is? X says God is A, Y says God is B, or maybe it's C or maybe it's Love, I mean, fuck, why is there no agreement on something so fundamental? I'll make it simple: God is some dude in the sky who created all the shit there is. It is a childish, anthropomorphic concept. Now, whatever it is you are talking about, please, don't call it God and then wonder why I am confused. God. Is. A. Dude. Just leave him to the kids. What you are talking about is Tangerinum. Now tell me what Tangerinum is, and please, for my sake, do me a favor and call it Tangerinum, because I am fed up of being confused.

I don't understand your point since you seem to assume that the a priori will simply make more and more complicated assumptions for no reasons and not simply try to adjust the theory as they observe. I start with "always display red", and if it changes (after a period of time), I test another theory that it changes after a given period of time, and so on and so on. I don't see why you claim that I will start gambling instead of looking back and trying a time series or any other example - it's pretty insulting that you think i'm gambling lol.

You are reading more into this than what I meant to say. What I meant is that if the screen is to stay red for a couple hours and "always show red" doesn't work, I will start trying random shit. It's better than idling. It's not gambling in a pejorative sense, anyone would do this in the absence of better ideas. Sorry for the confusion, I was just being logical with the fact the task tells you when you're wrong :(

Nice strawman I guess - you assume that people who start with a priori are idiots apparently, rather than being able to comprehend data just like the "agnostics". Suppose that it takes 1000 observations to get the screen simulation properly - what makes you think that the person with the a priori is going to just be gambling the entire time around and not consider the entire thing at once? Why can the agnostic do it, but no the person with the a priori? That's ridiculous and you're completely limiting the thinking capabilities of one side (you're making them retarded or something) while saying "hey this agnostic guy will do it faster heh" when they have access to the same data simply because one person (the person with the apriori) tries out more approaches than the other.

I don't think you get it at all. Nobody tries out more approaches than the other and both of them "gamble" when the alternative is to waste time. The problem with the pointed prior guy is that he will try more contrived approaches in general because his prior is basically injecting information in his tries redundantly over time. The number of tries is perhaps identical but each try is longer because of that piece of information that the prior guy disciplined himself to insert. Whereas the "agnostic" approach is to go for the simplest option, the other approach is to go for the simplest option which satisfies some criterion that was determined a priori with no evidence - and that option is necessarily longer and potentially harmful since the options might be significantly limited by the requirements.

Basically what I mean is that there's a problem when your prior is skewed to the point that the explanations you put forward for what you see contains parts which are both non-trivial and unconditional to what you observe. And note that, as I stated, I do not think that you are doing this.
 
Lack of belief in religion does not lead to belief in nothing, as secular ethics can fill the void. Even though it is "weak" (in the sense it often requires nothing more than "do no harm"), it can still pinpoint right and wrong; theology is simply not required for this purpose. IMO, the only real difference between the two is that one involves loyalty to a body of principles, whilst another involves loyalty to a supreme being. Conveniently, this also deals with your assertion that a person without faith recognises no power other than man's. Also on that point, one is not freed from the "dictates of more powerful men" just because one happens to be religious, and if steadfastness in values can overcome this, adherence to secular ethics can do the same job as adherence to a religion. Hence, I would not rely these "purpose of life" arguments to justify religion.

And what if those secular ethics include eugenics, religious persecution, and genocide? What makes the Third Reich or Stalinist Russia or Maoist China wrong if their secular ethics dictate that all humankind is a collective that must strive to meet their specific goals of "racial purity" or alternatively, "worker's paradise?" "Secular ethics" are a ship without a rudder. They can mean anything, they are flexible, and they are subject to internal influence. The most solid religions judge themselves and their individual members by consistency over time. Intergenerational periods of time. The morality does not change, it is merely applied to whatever newfangled monstrosity man comes up with. The dignity of human life and the immortality of the human soul do not change as moral foundations just because man has invented ways of say, killing children in the womb or "letting die" the old and infirm by cutting off basic necessities at the stroke of a doctor's pen. Modern "secular ethics" has condemned neither of the preceding as immoral and in fact, often views the latter as a form of mercy. "Secular ethics" is a paint-by-number patchwork of philosophies that sound appetizing, so you select them off the buffet and apply them to life in whatever order you can to force some level of internal coherence.

Even further, you can point to past violations of the religions morality by its own leaders. Even if they are the clergy, they are not exempt from the moral principles of the faith, no matter how much secular power they wield, no matter what the temporal conditions were at the time. Everyone is judged by a single basic standard that is applied to complex issues, consistently, through vast swaths of time.

Also, I fail to see how valuing "nothing but the temporal" or "ephemeral" is a bad thing. Valuing the temporal can be a driving force to allow one to live life to the fullest. In fact, I think it's probably worse not to focus on the ephemeral, because that is where one serves God and bear witness to non-believers, and it is impossible to do the latter from beyond the grave. (Incidentally, I am a Christian, believe it or not).

This reminds me of the earlier post where someone argued that if they didn't spend any time on religion in their life, they would have a whole year where they could live life how they wanted. This intrigued me because religious believers tend to live longer. Such that the person would actually lose 5 years of their life for that 1 year of their life they didn't "waste" on religion.

The reason living for the ephemeral is bad is because by definition it is myopic. It sees only the short term and adjusts only to the newest inputs, the fashions of the day, to materialism, hypersexualization, and hedonism in this particular age, and to say, endless war, conquest, and bloodbath were you born in Sparta in Greco-Roman times.
 
That is a very wide proposition to make. What you are describing covers not just coercion and indoctrination, but also education and persuasion. Hell, even raising a child to to become an upright, responsible citizen is "attempting to influence someone else's life". While indoctrination and arguably coercion are intolerable, the other three clearly are not.

In fact, I'd say persuasion (ie. "trying to influence someone else's life") is required in any good discussion. If forces all parties involved to evaluate the beliefs that they hold, and maybe (shock, horror) change how they lead their lives! There is no harm done, and hence no reason to "not condone" such behaviour.

Hence, I do not believe that there is any harm in proselytising, which is what you seem to be implying.

I suppose I should have worded it differently. A better way of saying it would be: "So long as an action does not negatively affect someone else, it is perfectly acceptable." This is obviously assuming that everyone will be reasonable about what is negatively affecting them or not.

I do not think that education or persuasion are necessarily always bad. If someone is only being taught one side to an issue or incorrect information, then it is most certainly a bad thing. Educating a person while taking a neutral stance on all opinionated subjects (this can include reasonably explaining both sides to an issue) is the best way to teach. This allows the person who is being educated to form their own opinions about a topic while understanding all factual based information surrounding the subject. Persuasion, on the other hand, is a bit different. If the person is willing to listen to others and take new information into consideration, then having a discussion about a controversial topic can be quite educational and interesting for all. However, if someone is set in their opinion and will not change it regardless of new information presented, there is truly no point in attempting to persuade them. There is a line that you must carefully avoid crossing when you are attempting to persuade someone. If at any point you begin to displease them in any way, you have crossed the line. Hopefully the person you are speaking to is reasonable enough and will listen to what you have to say, but there are some people who simply don't want to hear any other side to an argument. As long as they too are not trying to force their opinion on others, this is perfectly acceptable as well.
 
As far as I can remember, my main gripe is that your God is not actually a deity and that your usage of word is immensely confusing.
Look what the fuck am I supposed to think God is? X says God is A, Y says God is B, or maybe it's C or maybe it's Love, I mean, fuck, why is there no agreement on something so fundamental? I'll make it simple: God is some dude in the sky who created all the shit there is. It is a childish, anthropomorphic concept. Now, whatever it is you are talking about, please, don't call it God and then wonder why I am confused. God. Is. A. Dude. Just leave him to the kids. What you are talking about is Tangerinum. Now tell me what Tangerinum is, and please, for my sake, do me a favor and call it Tangerinum, because I am fed up of being confused.
The issue is that with such a concept of "God", you're literally throwing a giant fucking strawman towards religion. I don't think anyone other than 6 year olds who are told that so they can better understand it actually believe that God is a "dude in the sky" who created all the shit there is (in terms of people who are Christian).

This is exactly what I mean by your presuppositions blocking you from ever getting further in the subject. If you have this image of God and you are trying to conform God into this childish mold you have, of course nothing is going to happen.

Meaning is not a metaphysical requirement and neither is purpose. Furthermore, God does not give meaning, nor does it give purpose. God adds one perspective to the mix and that's it.
Sure, but you find your meaning/purpose in God.

If you read selectively, yes, as many people do for all kinds of purposes. But have you read extensively about Islam? Buddhism? Hinduism? Taoism? Zoroastrianism? What if a gem is hidden in these religions' texts that would make you change your mind?
It's not like I'm not planning on reading about them.... in the future after I get a better understanding out of Christianity first.

How do you know? You are no atheist. I could say that I feel empowered by the sheer magnitude of possibilities and by the freedom that I have to marvel at them without the nagging pressure of belief and as a matter of fact, I do. Atheism makes me completely free to choose what I want to do with my life, spares me from any arbitrary contraints or direction, makes it mean what I want it to mean.
I'm pretty sure it's a lot easier to understand atheism than Christianity. I've considered it.

I don't like belief and I see it as a necessary evil, but an evil nonetheless. Why would I believe anything that I am not required to believe? Why can't I let my mind wander, "this is cool", "this is a strange but amusing idea", "maybe this is reality", "or maybe this is reality", without ever committing to believing anything? I would be blissfully neutral, marveling at all the raindrops that fall upon the Earth without caring which one is the true raindrop, without searching for it, because I know it's a pointless, tiring and -yes!- contrary exercise. I believe in things because I have to - but if I was some poor disabled chap, never to perceive anything again, alone in my head, I would not believe anything. And that would be an amazing feeling.
What makes you think that you cannot do that with Christianity?

It sort of does because it shows that only you see it, which strongly suggests that your views are in great part personal and uncorrelated with what the religion actually says. Basically, that your beliefs mostly come from yourself, but that you attributed them to an external source, the case in point being that most people are not in agreement. Basically, given the range of interpretations that have been made of the Bible, it is presumptuous for you to claim that your interpretation is better. Essentially, the Bible is a blank text. You do what you want with it and your interpretation is much more telling of you than it is of Christianity.
Not quite a blank text since there are central undeniable tenets that bind the entire bible together.

I don't think I ever claimed that my interpretation is "better".

But as I read it, your wording pretty much precludes religion, as religion would be, quite precisely, an attempt to "explain" the unknown. Admittedly, it does not actually explain anything, but that's not a feature.
Nonsense. It does not preclude religion, religion is likely the fuzziest of all, and that's why it requires you bashing it against anything you can find.

No. You are misinterpreting the domain of the prior. I am talking about a prior over a single random variable, i.e. a universal process. Other examples are irrelevant.
Sure, the point is that the prior allows you to stick in a variable, or not include it. That's why I gave you that example.

Look this is not a prior you're talking about. A prior might be P(wage): how probable is a certain wage? You don't know about education, you don't know about the job, you don't know about the currency, you have no examples of wages, you know nothing. That is the prior and you can't test it because that's not the point, it is a tool for inference and nothing more. In this case, you would probably choose a uniform prior. Any wage is equally probable in the absence of any evidence whatsoever, which is logical. The only effective criterion to choose a prior is effectiveness.

Basically: a hypothesis is not a prior and the correlation you are set out to determine is the choice of the likelihood P(education|wage), which you may combine with P(wage) in order to determine the posterior P(wage|education). A strange prior that would give undue importance to wage 100,000 would skew the posterior. I'm talking about Bayesian inference essentially.
How is that not testable? You can easily check for statistical significance to see how good your "prior" was. Since when can't we check basic statistics?

Secondly, how do you decide the relationship between wage/education? You decide it by regressing. I've been implying that you constantly regress with different variables to find a model that explains the variables the best. It has nothing to do with Bayesian Inference, but testing the relationship between the two variables. This is because we constantly regress and "guess" at a relationship between two (or more) variables to try and figure out how things work. You can throw in the christian God as a variable, or you cannot. If the Christian God is significant, then not including it will lead to a bias. If it isn't, then all it does is add a little more variance to the model and the model will tell me if it is significant or not. It is fairly simple. This is how I believe people approach information, and this is why I don't find your monitor story a good one
 
The issue is that with such a concept of "God", you're literally throwing a giant fucking strawman towards religion. I don't think anyone other than 6 year olds who are told that so they can better understand it actually believe that God is a "dude in the sky" who created all the shit there is (in terms of people who are Christian).

Oh, please. The vast majority of people hold a concept of God which is unbelievably stupid and define it in self-inconsistent ways. You are giving your peers much more credit than they deserve. I have seen God concepts. They are fucking terrible. Trust me, "dude in the sky" is sometimes much better than the drivel the mainstream spouts.

This is exactly what I mean by your presuppositions blocking you from ever getting further in the subject. If you have this image of God and you are trying to conform God into this childish mold you have, of course nothing is going to happen.

I thought I was being clear, but apparently not. There is not just one concept of God. The mainstream concepts of God are childish bullshit. When you say "God", when anyone says "God", I have no idea what you or anyone means because there is no consensus and I am conditioned to think that it's something dumb, because it usually is. Whatever you tell me about God will be corrupted by your peers when they tell me about God. I have asked, as a favor, as something that will help me to not be confused, in a distinctively bear with me way to use another fucking word and I have suggested one to this purpose: Tangerinum. I was and still am 100% serious. Use it. It would help. If your concept is sound it doesn't matter what name you use, so can you please use one that's a blank slate in my mind? Cut me some slack FFS.

Sure, but you find your meaning/purpose in God.

Yeah, I cannot comprehend that.

It's not like I'm not planning on reading about them.... in the future after I get a better understanding out of Christianity first.

Fair enough.

What makes you think that you cannot do that with Christianity?

Isn't it a belief?

Not quite a blank text since there are central undeniable tenets that bind the entire bible together.

I am skeptical that any tenets can really bind the Bible together, but I don't know much about it so I'll accept your assessment on face value.

I don't think I ever claimed that my interpretation is "better".

Fair enough. I don't really think you do, but I cut corners. I should rather put it this way: I think many people implicitly reject the central "undeniable" tenets that you ascribe to Christianity and this is what makes me skeptical that they exist.

Nonsense. It does not preclude religion, religion is likely the fuzziest of all, and that's why it requires you bashing it against anything you can find.

Not really, no. It really does not seem as if I assume any more than you do, and in fact it seems that any assumption you tell me I have, I don't actually have. This paints religion as extraneous, because as far as I can tell it cannot make me assume any less than I already do. It seems as if you are understanding my lack of commitment for an assumption, although it is quite the opposite.

I only believe something if there is evidence for it. Am I right to say that what I believe through these means, you will also believe? If there is evidence for X, I will believe X is the case, and so will you. Conversely, if Y contradicts evidence, I will believe that Y is not the case, and so will you. Is this a fair assessment? If so, good. Now, the "fuzziness" of a worldview is proportional to the uncertainty you have. As long as something does not contradict evidence, I acknowledge that it is possible, but I suspend belief. So whatever beliefs your religion entails, I assume that even though they might not be supported by evidence, they do not contradict it either. It ensues that I acknowledge that they may be true. But since, unlike you, I suspend belief, it ensues that my worldview is fuzzier than yours.

Let's put it this way: evidence is the only method I use to acquire beliefs. If you also use evidence to acquire beliefs, and then other methods, then there is absolutely no way your belief system is fuzzier than mine. If you think that evidence-based methods are not the only way to acquire beliefs, good for you. But it does not matter what one thinks about these methods, what matters is whether one uses them or not. I only use one method and if you use other methods, the fact is that I do not and that whatever these methods tell you translate into uncertainty in my system. If you ask me about concepts that have no evidence but are not falsified either, I will tell you "fuck if I know". How can you get fuzzier or more uncertain than that? A knowledge acquirement method that is not based on evidence can't make anything fuzzier, that's nonsense.

Here:
* I only believe in evidenced concepts, hence the set of what I believe is arguably minimal.
* I acknowledge the possibility of anything which is orthogonal to evidence, but I suspend belief, for I am maximally uncertain as to what the truth values of these things are.
* I have no opinion on how well my worldview corresponds to reality. I may assume that both may correspond to any extent imaginable. Hence I am also uncertain about my certainty.
* I have no opinion on whether there exist knowledge acquisition methods that are superior to the ones I use or what they would be (though I can imagine possibilities). I stick to what has been proven useful to me.

How is religion fuzzier than that? You believe that part of reality is beyond human comprehension, I acknowledge that this is possible but not necessary. Basically, you estimate the extent of your uncertainty, but the truth is that this is still more than I assume. Your religion makes you feel more uncertain, but don't be fooled, my uncertainty about my uncertainty is fuzzier than your certainty about your uncertainty.

Sure, the point is that the prior allows you to stick in a variable, or not include it. That's why I gave you that example.

No it does not :( The prior on a variable is a measure of how "inherently likely" it is. Basically any belief system has an unfalsifiable part or base assumptions that it is built upon. The prior is a formalization of that and it is required for proper inference.

How is that not testable? You can easily check for statistical significance to see how good your "prior" was. Since when can't we check basic statistics?

The prior is a base assumption. It is outside of the realm of inquiry because it is essentially a formalization of metaphysical preference. Let me put it this way: does X depend on Y? If it does then the prior for X must ignore Y. Repeat for all variables you can imagine. The prior is what you are left with and it will be most likely flat because if it is not then it means some values are inherently more likely than some others regardless of any evidence whatsoever. You don't typically change the prior because of evidence because a prior is marginal to it, it's the part of the inference pipeline that is outside of inquiry, and such a part is required. I don't care much what you do, but if you can test something then it's probably not a prior.

Secondly, how do you decide the relationship between wage/education? You decide it by regressing. I've been implying that you constantly regress with different variables to find a model that explains the variables the best. It has nothing to do with Bayesian Inference, but testing the relationship between the two variables. This is because we constantly regress and "guess" at a relationship between two (or more) variables to try and figure out how things work.

Cool. Picture a bunch of (wage, education) points on a graph. Say they look like a line. You will probably claim that the relationship is linear and find a line that's the closest to the points. But I could tell you that's nonsense and find a strange curve that somehow intersects every single point on the graph - or I could claim that the relationship is linear plus a very small sinus (which we could never rule out). If I gave you the points (1, 0), (2, 0), (3, 0), ... you would say there is no correlation. But I could tell you that's nonsense and say that the relationship is y = sin(x/2pi). Is there any reason to inherently prefer your solutions to mine? The answer is no.

Welcome to base assumptions. Welcome to priors. Regression does not operate magically, there are solutions which you inherently prefer to others. This is the prior that everybody has and that I am talking about. It is mostly related to methodology and utility - sometimes you can evaluate it simply by evaluating how often you are wrong at guessing relationships between variables (but against what?), sometimes you can't evaluate it at all because there exist many theories that have no testable difference between them.
 
'Thou shalt not sell thy daughter unto her rapist' (the opposite is commanded)
'Thou shalt not kill thy children for speaking back to thee' (the opposite is commanded)

This site and story explain Exodus 21:7-11 which I assume you are referring to.
In the days of the Old Testament, when a man sold his daughter as a servant, he allowed her entrance into a marriage covenant in which she approved. A man or his family typically initiated the sequence of steps leading to marriage. The Old Testament custom included the new husband or his family offering a bride price to the father of the bride. Not always a monetary payment, this may have taken the form of a gift of something considered valuable. The above passage does not merely offer applicable niceties, but provides laws protecting women who enter into marriage in this manner.

As an example of a family that included servant brides, let us consider the household of Jacob. Jacob had twelve sons whose descendants gave rise to the Twelve Tribes of Israel: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Joseph, and Benjamin.35 Jacob fell in love with Rachel and desired to marry her. Jacob then met with her father Laban and arranged to become a slave in the household for seven years, in order to earn Rachel’s hand in marriage. Unfortunately for Jacob, the custom in Laban’s country assumed the firstborn should enter into marriage first. After seven years had elapsed, Jacob was given Leah in marriage instead of Rachel, which angered him. Laban agreed to allow Jacob to marry Rachel after Leah’s bridal week had passed, in return for another seven years of labor. Severely smitten, Jacob continued as Laban’s slave for another seven years to win the hand of his beloved Rachel. So Jacob and Rachel also married and expanded the family Jacob had already started with Leah. Both Leah and Rachel were given maidservants who also joined Jacob’s family. These maidservants, Zilpah and Bilhah, became servant wives to Jacob by their mutual agreement with Leah and Rachel. While Leah bore Jacob six sons, each of his other three wives bore him two sons. Leah also bore a daughter, Dinah. We find this account in Genesis 29 and 30. Jacob treated his wives, Leah and Rachel, and his servant wives, Zilpah and Bilhah, fairly and equitably. Jacob, his wives and their children lived and traveled together as a family unit after Jacob had finished his contract with Laban.


Also about the killing of your children I think you are referring to Deuteronomy and this is a pretty good explanation of it too.

This teenager would have to be guilty of ALL these things - AND be characterized as "rebellious" (which involves more than passive, stubborn disobedience - but rather an overt, defiant rebellion in the family).

We are NOT talking about simple teenage unruliness here. This is a case of hardcore, angry juvenile delinquency - a situation that the parents can neither control nor contain.

In such a situation, the parents themselves are NOT permitted to take justice into their own hands. They are NOT allowed to decide unilaterally whether their son lives or dies. Were they to take their son's own life, they would be held accountable for murder. Instead, they must bring their son before the elders of the city. A community trial.
 
I suppose I should have worded it differently. A better way of saying it would be: "So long as an action does not negatively affect someone else, it is perfectly acceptable." This is obviously assuming that everyone will be reasonable about what is negatively affecting them or not.

you have a very weird and malleable definition of 'negatively affect[ing]'. i think it's safe to say that making someone potentially ignorant and prejudiced against certain types of people/ideas is definitely negatively affecting them.

of course there are several things i am ignorant of, but if someone were to attempt to correct that i wouldn't say 'LEAVE ME THE FUCK ALONE NOT UNDERSTANDING ECONOMICS ISNT NEGATIVELY AFFECTING ME'
 
you have a very weird and malleable definition of 'negatively affect[ing]'. i think it's safe to say that making someone potentially ignorant and prejudiced against certain types of people/ideas is definitely negatively affecting them.

of course there are several things i am ignorant of, but if someone were to attempt to correct that i wouldn't say 'LEAVE ME THE FUCK ALONE NOT UNDERSTANDING ECONOMICS ISNT NEGATIVELY AFFECTING ME'

I don't really understand what you're saying here. Are you trying to come up with examples of things that I didn't mention that could be considered negative? I think I said something about teaching others things that are incorrect (i.e. prejudice) being a bad thing.

In reference to your second statement, I would hope you wouldn't be spouting off about economics if you didn't understand it. Also, if this person is simply giving you new information, you have no reason to be upset. If they're trying to force an opinion upon you, then you have a very good reason to be upset. I don't consider teaching someone something factual a bad thing >_>
 
right, so is telling a fundamentalist that dinosaurs didn't exist a couple thousand years ago 'meddling'?

No, it's not 'meddling' because it's a fact. If you were to attempt to convert them to whatever belief system you hold then I would probably consider it 'meddling' depeding on the manner in which you did it, but if you are simply telling them something I wouldn't really consider that to be a bad thing. Again, you have to be reasonable when you consider what is negative and what is not.
 
This site and story explain Exodus 21:7-11 which I assume you are referring to. *Explanation*

I have read the Bible before, and I find your explanation to be poor. The Bible is rather clear about what to do to rape victims. If the woman screams, she must marry the rapist. The rapist pays 50 shekels of silver to the woman's father. If the woman does not scream, she and the man are considered adulterers and are stoned to death.

We are NOT talking about simple teenage unruliness here. This is a case of hardcore, angry juvenile delinquency - a situation that the parents can neither control nor contain.

In such a situation, the parents themselves are NOT permitted to take justice into their own hands. They are NOT allowed to decide unilaterally whether their son lives or dies. Were they to take their son's own life, they would be held accountable for murder. Instead, they must bring their son before the elders of the city. A community trial.

You honestly find that to be acceptable? I do not care how unruly the child is. The death penalty is still not justified. Murder is murder no matter who the victim is.

Sorry, but your explanations don't really cut it for me. I do not find murder to be a justifiable punishment for rape, being raped, or severe childhood disobedience.
 
Either way, it looks like the Bible supports rape.

The rapist either gets a wife, or gets the woman killed, which would be viable revenge for getting himself killed.

The whole "unruly child" thing seems to be fear of an anarchy. Nip the problem in the bud, and it can't grow.
 
I settled on Catholicism because not only did I grow up with it, it makes the most sense to me out of the rest. Personally, though, I'm really not that religious at all.
 
The idea of a divine lord, all powerful god or creator never made sense to me , intuitively, since childhood, so I am atheist. I really enjoy learning about other religions though, the culture is fascinating. The only thing I can't stand is when my religious friends assume that people who are unkind to them cannot be of their religion, as if only nice people are in that religion, and that they site that spending a weekend away with families from their religion is guaranteed to be more friendly than with say, my family. But I try to stay out of the whole superiorism debate as much as I can.

It seems to me that all religions are just ways of spreading good morals and life codes throughout people of a certain culture.
 
Oh, please. The vast majority of people hold a concept of God which is unbelievably stupid and define it in self-inconsistent ways. You are giving your peers much more credit than they deserve. I have seen God concepts. They are fucking terrible. Trust me, "dude in the sky" is sometimes much better than the drivel the mainstream spouts.

To most people who never learn to think for themselves and are spoonfed their faith the entire time of their lives, maybe.

To most people who actually think about this stuff? I honestly doubt it. You are looking at the lowest common denominator and using that as an argument against a concept.

I thought I was being clear, but apparently not. There is not just one concept of God. The mainstream concepts of God are childish bullshit. When you say "God", when anyone says "God", I have no idea what you or anyone means because there is no consensus and I am conditioned to think that it's something dumb, because it usually is. Whatever you tell me about God will be corrupted by your peers when they tell me about God. I have asked, as a favor, as something that will help me to not be confused, in a distinctively bear with me way to use another fucking word and I have suggested one to this purpose: Tangerinum. I was and still am 100% serious. Use it. It would help. If your concept is sound it doesn't matter what name you use, so can you please use one that's a blank slate in my mind? Cut me some slack FFS.

So you're asking me to commit borderline blasphemy? =(

I don't understand why you would be so confused over this and why you can't separate them.

Yeah, I cannot comprehend that.

I mean, if your definition of God is childish nonsense... of course you can't. No one is defending such childish concepts of God here.

Isn't it a belief?
Sure, but it's a very loose framework. Believing in a religion doesn't automatically give you all the truths and automatically let you understand the sciences or just tell you "this is how the world works" with a bold period.

I am skeptical that any tenets can really bind the Bible together, but I don't know much about it so I'll accept your assessment on face value.

John 3:16?

If you're going to start saying "well in the old testament...", I don't actually believe the God then and God of the new testament is any different. One of the biggest reasons why God can say that he loves us (after Jesus died) is precisely because he died for your sin. He didn't have the justification to say that in the old testament days.

Why did he wait until 3 AD to send Jesus? Beats me - but likely has to do with the fact that he isn't constrained by time and we are (time is an illusion, etc)

How is religion fuzzier than that? You believe that part of reality is beyond human comprehension, I acknowledge that this is possible but not necessary. Basically, you estimate the extent of your uncertainty, but the truth is that this is still more than I assume. Your religion makes you feel more uncertain, but don't be fooled, my uncertainty about my uncertainty is fuzzier than your certainty about your uncertainty.

Fair enough.

Cool. Picture a bunch of (wage, education) points on a graph. Say they look like a line. You will probably claim that the relationship is linear and find a line that's the closest to the points. But I could tell you that's nonsense and find a strange curve that somehow intersects every single point on the graph - or I could claim that the relationship is linear plus a very small sinus (which we could never rule out). If I gave you the points (1, 0), (2, 0), (3, 0), ... you would say there is no correlation. But I could tell you that's nonsense and say that the relationship is y = sin(x/2pi). Is there any reason to inherently prefer your solutions to mine? The answer is no.

You're assuming that the prior affects the RESULTS. This is not what I am talking about. I'm saying the prior simply affects the VARIABLES you test.

Let X be the "world" equation, an equation of how the world works. I will include a variable g in X, and you will not. I have this extra variable, because of my prior assumption.

Now, we both regress. What do we get? Either my model is "better" than yours (g is significant, your variables are biased) or my model is "worse" than yours (g is not significant, my results have much more variance, or it attributes something to g when it should not have). You are saying that the a priori will affect my INTERPRETATION of the results of regression and that is patently false - by saying that you are simply just claiming "people who believe that the variable g is significant will bend models to suit their claims", when it is closer to i'm just seeing if g is significant or not.

Of course, I'm not just going to assume that the relationship is anything BUT linear unless I have good evidence for it (you would too, since simpler is better), but you are saying that I will assume linear no matter what? That's like saying I won't go through the error terms and see what's wrong with it and see if I can find a better model or a different method of regression.

I hope that clarifies things better.
 
And what if those secular ethics include eugenics, religious persecution, and genocide? What makes the Third Reich or Stalinist Russia or Maoist China wrong if their secular ethics dictate that all humankind is a collective that must strive to meet their specific goals of "racial purity" or alternatively, "worker's paradise?"

Any external set of principles can be used to judge a particular ethical system, and any secular system that doesn't share the same values will condemn them.

"Secular ethics" are a ship without a rudder. They can mean anything, they are flexible, and they are subject to internal influence. The most solid religions judge themselves and their individual members by consistency over time. Intergenerational periods of time. The morality does not change, it is merely applied to whatever newfangled monstrosity man comes up with.

Most principles, religious or not, are inherently flexible. Besides, principles that isn't flexible isn't easily adaptable to new situations, by definition. This means that one has to essentially adjust existing principles, or give preference to one principle over another. At this point, it is debatable whether you're merely applying the principles or inventing new ones altogether.

Even if they are the clergy, they are not exempt from the moral principles of the faith, no matter how much secular power they wield, no matter what the temporal conditions were at the time. Everyone is judged by a single basic standard that is applied to complex issues, consistently, through vast swaths of time.

This is simply the rule of law, which is a secular construct. It is concerned with enforcing a code of ethics rather than determining guilt, so it can be tied into any system, secular or religious.

The reason living for the ephemeral is bad is because by definition it is myopic. It sees only the short term and adjusts only to the newest inputs, the fashions of the day, to materialism, hypersexualization, and hedonism in this particular age, and to say, endless war, conquest, and bloodbath were you born in Sparta in Greco-Roman times.

You've changed the definition of ephemeral. In your first post, you treated it as synonymous with "temporal" which includes everything during the course of a person's lifetime. It is also absurd to suggest that religion is the only way out to avoid following the "fashions of the day", or that said fashions are necessarily a "bad" thing. Most fashions are concerned with choice of food, music, or clothing etc, which are at best tangentially related to questions of ethics and morality.
 
To most people who never learn to think for themselves and are spoonfed their faith the entire time of their lives, maybe.

To most people who actually think about this stuff? I honestly doubt it. You are looking at the lowest common denominator and using that as an argument against a concept.

What I am saying is that the lowest common denominator is a majority and that people who actually think about this stuff are rare and not really talking about the same thing, if they even agree with each other. I guess we can just ignore the masses, I won't complain. There's a lot of them though.

So you're asking me to commit borderline blasphemy? =(

It's blasphemy? :(

I don't understand why you would be so confused over this and why you can't separate them.

Put yourself in my place. I don't really care what "God" means, if somebody tells me it means something, then it means that, I am not difficult. It's just a word. But there is a problem when I cannot use the usual definitions I am given are am supposed to swap them out for a concept which will be useless to me when I am talking to someone else. What I am saying is that when I am talking to a run of the mill layman Christian, the word "God" will not mean the same thing in conversation as it does when I am talking to you. Since I frankly couldn't care less what "God" means, I don't want to quibble about definitions and thus I am forced to shift the operative definition I use depending on who I am talking to, and this is bothersome. I want a clear definition of God, a list of the properties it requires, I don't know, something.

Say you have persons A and B. A defines God as X and B defines God as Y. For A, B's God is nonsense, and vice versa. When A and B argue, they will argue about what God is. Good for them. But when I argue with either A or B, I will not argue about what God is, I will accept how they define God and I will argue against that. So what do you think happens when I argue with A and then I argue with B? If I use A's God concept when talking about B, thinking that it's the same (wouldn't that make sense?), he will say that I misrepresent what God is, that my concept is nonsense. Ok. I don't care. But this means I have to shift the meaning of "God" from GodA to GodB. And when I talk to A I need to shift back. A and B have it easy, they know what they mean when they talk about God. I don't. What I see, from my perspective, are two different things with the same name. And that's why I am confused. That shift is a mental sore and I have trouble doing it.

I mean, if your definition of God is childish nonsense... of course you can't. No one is defending such childish concepts of God here.

I don't think it depends on how I define it. I doubt your definition of God is actually intelligible to me, so it seems unlikely I could derive meaning or purpose from it.

John 3:16?

If you're going to start saying "well in the old testament...", I don't actually believe the God then and God of the new testament is any different. One of the biggest reasons why God can say that he loves us (after Jesus died) is precisely because he died for your sin. He didn't have the justification to say that in the old testament days.

I don't think it makes any sense for someone to die for someone else's sin. At all. In fact, to be perfectly honest, I think it is the dumbest part of Christianity :(, in a "this is so retarded that it insults my intelligence" way. Just being honest here. I can concede that the event may be seen as inspirational in a good way, but in that case it is not love, it is manipulation.

Why did he wait until 3 AD to send Jesus? Beats me - but likely has to do with the fact that he isn't constrained by time and we are (time is an illusion, etc)

That's... kind of a rubbish explanation. Maybe "he sent Jesus at that time because it was the optimal time to send him, according to some objective". But then what is the objective? Regardless, you have just told me that God is something that can "love" us and can "send" people on Earth. The way I see it, "love" is a human emotion and that God may "love" reeks of anthropomorphism and that he loves us reeks of anthropocentrism. I know that "dude in the sky" is a childish concept but you are not helping.

"Not being constrained by time" is also something that's barely intelligible. First, time is not a constraint: without passing time, your brain would stand still, it would not think anything. Even if you want to time travel, you still want the time inside your brain to flow normally. In general, it is the passing of time that makes systems interesting and non-trivial. Second, the class of objects that do not depend on time are the class of static objects, like still images. Third, any action (such as "to send" or "to create") implies a time constraint on the source of the action. Indeed, in the absence of a change of state in the source at the moment of the action, no causal link can be said to exist between them. All these issues may of course be solved by supposing that God is evolving in his own dimension of time and is a dynamical system outside of the universe. I think this is what makes the most sense.

You're assuming that the prior affects the RESULTS. This is not what I am talking about. I'm saying the prior simply affects the VARIABLES you test.

Of course it affects the results. If you pick different "variables" you get different results, and the normal way to go about this would be to hypothesize that you consider all variables. The choice is a practical consideration, but you are the one supposing there's a choice. What I am trying to tell you is that if you have evidence and you consider every single variable, this is insufficient to discriminate. The maths tell you that something is amiss, if I can put it like that. The prior is the filter that allows you to go from "this model fits the evidence" to "this model is the best fit", and you need it because for any evidence an infinity of models fit equally well and also because some models that fit better may be seen as inferior to some models that have a worse fit.

Let X be the "world" equation, an equation of how the world works. I will include a variable g in X, and you will not. I have this extra variable, because of my prior assumption.

Not related to what I'm saying - nonetheless, suppose we're on a budget. We can't consider all possible variables (obviously - there's an infinity of them). Say we can consider 10 variables. You'd want your prior to give you the 10 most useful variables. If you deem g useful, good for you. But I don't see it giving results. By ignoring g I free up a spot for another variable and am thus more efficient with the same resources. Look, there's an infinity of variables to pick from. Your variable g, I can make up thousands of them every day, the point is, I don't want to waste time with variables of dubious utility.

As a matter of fact, maybe I do consider g. For five or ten seconds, perhaps. I just don't see what I would need it for or where it could possibly fit. If I am to spend hours on a variable I'd rather pick one that I think has potential. All the time you spend on g is time I spend elsewhere. You're entitled to spend time on g if you want, mind you - but from my perspective it's pretty much a waste.

Now, we both regress. What do we get? Either my model is "better" than yours (g is significant, your variables are biased) or my model is "worse" than yours (g is not significant, my results have much more variance, or it attributes something to g when it should not have). You are saying that the a priori will affect my INTERPRETATION of the results of regression and that is patently false - by saying that you are simply just claiming "people who believe that the variable g is significant will bend models to suit their claims", when it is closer to i'm just seeing if g is significant or not.

The bold part is what I see happening.

Of course, I'm not just going to assume that the relationship is anything BUT linear unless I have good evidence for it (you would too, since simpler is better), but you are saying that I will assume linear no matter what? That's like saying I won't go through the error terms and see what's wrong with it and see if I can find a better model or a different method of regression.

No, I am not saying that. In case you did not notice, what I was saying is that there is no inherent reason that the "best" way to interpret points lying on a line is a line, no matter what the situation is. This has nothing to do with good or bad evidence for anything. This has to do with the fact that for any evidence there exists an infinity of models that fit the evidence and that any criterion to pick one model from that infinity is somewhat arbitrary. "Simpler is better" is a prior which we all have. I am just showing it to you explicitly because you don't seem to know you are using it. As I said, it is not something you test, it is not something you usually think about, and this whole discussion is pretty good proof of that.

It's also quite off-topic now, but I am assuming that's ok.
 
There is a line that you must carefully avoid crossing when you are attempting to persuade someone. If at any point you begin to displease them in any way, you have crossed the line. Hopefully the person you are speaking to is reasonable enough and will listen to what you have to say, but there are some people who simply don't want to hear any other side to an argument. As long as they too are not trying to force their opinion on others, this is perfectly acceptable as well.

If they're trying to force an opinion upon you, then you have a very good reason to be upset. I don't consider teaching someone something factual a bad thing >_>

That's a curious juxtaposition of principles. If the distinction for appropriateness of persuasion is between fact and opinion, why the need for the strict "do not displease them" principle? I agree with you when you refer to the need to "be reasonable", but I think it's too restricting to draw the line at the first sign of displeasure.
 
That's a curious juxtaposition of principles. If the distinction for appropriateness of persuasion is between fact and opinion, why the need for the strict "do not displease them" principle? I agree with you when you refer to the need to "be reasonable", but I think it's too restricting to draw the line at the first sign of displeasure.

I suppose I was assuming that someone would not become upset if you simply gave them some new information. I certainly could be wrong though, so you are correct. The displeasure principle isn't necessarily relevant to this case, but is just one of my general life principals (if an action will knowingly cause harm or another kind of displeasure to an individual, don't do it).
 
I don't think it depends on how I define it. I doubt your definition of God is actually intelligible to me, so it seems unlikely I could derive meaning or purpose from it.

If I could make it any more intelligible, I would... but honestly my write up before (which you have read) is pretty much the best explanation for it.

I will try and explain it again. I will just say g-- instead of saying "god"

First, everyone has a theory about the world they live in. Their worlds can be small (a small village) to encompass the known universe. Within these theories, there are central tenets that we find that "drives" the system.

One example I will give in this, is money. Given society where we try to maximize our profits, many of us only consider money when we try to optimize our well being, rather than many other variables (hence, we have externalities and inefficiency due to the lack of a market on other variables). Money, then to these people are a "g--", since people believe that if they have money, they'd be "happy". The world they live in has a g-- called "money". One consequence of this, is that every person, "has a g--". There is no feasible way for anyone to not have some set of variables that they find to be at the "core" of the world. To many people, they themselves are a g-- in their world. Of course, most of these people are the masses who often have childish perspectives, so we ignore them.

So, the Christian concept of "G--", is simply the G-- who has "created the world" ("laid foundations with wisdom" - it does not have to be literal especially since I interpret it as designed the mechanisms that hold this world together). Now, there are a few possibilities - either the world is just pure random, in which G-- might as well not exist, or there is a sense of order in the world, in which G-- is responsible for it, and understands it. The key difference is that to you is that "G--" might as well be completely and utterly random since there is no strict evidence other wise and assume so, but I believe otherwise. That is all there is to it - G-- is the figure responsible for this specific iteration of reality, and it either exists (not random) or it does not (random). We both continually test (regress) with the given variables, and if you find some experience where you just can't explain without considering G-- significant, then you convert, and add the variable (and vice versa, this explains why people convert back and forth all the time)

You may argue that it only attributes something that doesn't exist to G--, but we can say the same thing - you will put something that does exist as "randomness" and try and explain it through some other variables (aka pretend other variables have a slight bit more effect). Through this method you BIAS the effects of variables (which obviously you built with evidence). This does not happen when you simply add an insignificant variable (the expected value is that it is insignificant on AVERAGE - I put in that "it may attribute something to g" because only the expected value is insignificant).

This means the following. You hold the variable as insignificant, you risk biasing your results (and you'll never think of adding the variable unless you have some significant experience), but if you hold the variable as significant, then you only risk higher variance, and that SOME events (but on average, it evens out) are attributed to G-- when it shouldn't have (assuming G-- is insignificant)

No, I am not saying that. In case you did not notice, what I was saying is that there is no inherent reason that the "best" way to interpret points lying on a line is a line, no matter what the situation is. This has nothing to do with good or bad evidence for anything. This has to do with the fact that for any evidence there exists an infinity of models that fit the evidence and that any criterion to pick one model from that infinity is somewhat arbitrary. "Simpler is better" is a prior which we all have. I am just showing it to you explicitly because you don't seem to know you are using it. As I said, it is not something you test, it is not something you usually think about, and this whole discussion is pretty good proof of that.

I made it pretty clear that we start with linear models because it is the simplest. Of course I think about it. However, I don't assume simplest models are the "best", that is nonsense. Simplest models are excellent for getting some basic textbook knowledge, but you'll find that the models we use further and further on are extremely complicated and we honestly don't have good reasons why we use a lot of the models. We don't judge models on simplicity, we judge models on the explaining power they have.

I understand that when it comes to ANALYZING relationships, simpler is better. But when it comes to models you are testing? Simpler isn't inherently better.

I don't think it makes any sense for someone to die for someone else's sin. At all. In fact, to be perfectly honest, I think it is the dumbest part of Christianity :(, in a "this is so retarded that it insults my intelligence" way. Just being honest here. I can concede that the event may be seen as inspirational in a good way, but in that case it is not love, it is manipulation.
Really?

Say that you love someone. You're not willing to die to save them?

I'm not saying I understand it completely either - but you're not the first one to call this central tenet of Christianity "absurd". In fact, we often call christ's love "absurd" even today.

So why did G-- do it, other than love? I don't know. I can give you a really far fetched answer that's purely a theory, but in the end, it's only a really far fetched theory that's beyond what we can actually know.

That's... kind of a rubbish explanation. Maybe "he sent Jesus at that time because it was the optimal time to send him, according to some objective". But then what is the objective? Regardless, you have just told me that God is something that can "love" us and can "send" people on Earth. The way I see it, "love" is a human emotion and that God may "love" reeks of anthropomorphism and that he loves us reeks of anthropocentrism. I know that "dude in the sky" is a childish concept but you are not helping.

I fully understand it is rubbish. I never said this was a good one (i was just simply addressing a point you would have had if I just told you and just pointing out I don't have a better answer than that at this point)
 
Any external set of principles can be used to judge a particular ethical system, and any secular system that doesn't share the same values will condemn them.

But separate secular systems have no right to condemn other systems, other than they "feel wrong" to that other secular system. They are weak in principle and therefore require force, which brings us back to the ultimate ethic of secularism being "might makes right." Both acknowledge humanity as the sole determiner of moral principle, the only difference is one can dominate the other.

Most principles, religious or not, are inherently flexible. Besides, principles that isn't flexible isn't easily adaptable to new situations, by definition. This means that one has to essentially adjust existing principles, or give preference to one principle over another. At this point, it is debatable whether you're merely applying the principles or inventing new ones altogether.

Universal principles, which is what religion deals with, are inflexible principles that can be used in complex situations. There is nothing new on this earth, only new iterations of past evils. They violate the same principle and thus are subject to its scrutiny.

This is simply the rule of law, which is a secular construct. It is concerned with enforcing a code of ethics rather than determining guilt, so it can be tied into any system, secular or religious.

The rule of law is completely separated from violations of moral principle. Religious principle, followed properly, does not change. The rule of law depends on the law, which is secular, and therefore inherently subject to change. The indulgences the Catholic clergy sold centuries ago were entirely legal, and in no way violated any secular "rule of law." They were however, directly against the core principles of the Catholic faith, explicitly that you are saved by grace alone and cannot simply "buy off" absolution. Absolution is freely given and freely received. Morality does not set up a separate, religious version of the "rule of law" because it is not subject to committee vote or singular dictate, the ways men operate.

You've changed the definition of ephemeral. In your first post, you treated it as synonymous with "temporal" which includes everything during the course of a person's lifetime. It is also absurd to suggest that religion is the only way out to avoid following the "fashions of the day", or that said fashions are necessarily a "bad" thing. Most fashions are concerned with choice of food, music, or clothing etc, which are at best tangentially related to questions of ethics and morality.

Philosophies are very important and go in and out of vogue in the same regularity as frivolous matters. Even the most cursory reading of my previous statement would indicate I was focusing on human life on earth, which is indeed temporary, especially as compared to eternity. Outcome in eternity is derived based on actions in the temporal life, but if you are focusing on morality you will often conflict with what is popular or accepted in the temporal world. Human life on earth is ephemeral.

Religion is the bulwark against secular tyranny. Why do you think organized religion was and is the target of so very many tyrants, especially in the 20th century. Why is the secular media always surprised when they find out every newly elected Pope is, in fact, Catholic, and therefore will not be that one Pope who will "get with the times" and support whatever the secular values of the day are? Are there religious tyrannies? Of course there are, a large portion of them exist in the Middle East, where religion becomes the secular law and is thus corrupted by secularism's feckless indecisiveness and moral weakness. Religions should not be handling the matter of exactly how many steps a woman must walk behind a man in a public place. That is not a moral principle, it is a personal edict.

Secularism and religion have to work together. A religiously informed, moral secularism was the basic foundation of the United States of America, and it is difficult to argue with the success. Religion alone leads to fanaticism and Secularism alone leads to tyranny. Ultimately, a just society must acknowledge that there is a higher law protecting intrinsic human worth and inalienable human rights. Secularism is by definition incapable of doing that, since its ultimate reference for knowledge and authority is internal to humanity.

"The government grants you rights" is secularism's calling card. No wonder it devolves to tyranny everywhere it is not reinforced by religious principles (or those principles are actively attacked by agents of the secular state.) Principles that turn government's role into adjudicator of violations rather than arbiter of the rights themselves. Now it need not be Christianity that provides this fundamental backing, I just happen to find Catholicism to be the most morally consistent and theologically comprehensive. If I were raised Muslim or Hindu, I might believe the exact same thing, replacing whatever the religion be with that other one.

God exists as the source of timeless morals that no human being has the right to violate. Now suppose as you might argue, which God possesses the right morals, e.g. religious vs. religious discussions. The easiest determinant is applying their God's principles to their own people. If their God is one of war, war with them to eradicate it. Such a God does not consider human rights inviolable and is therefore no better than any secular government.

End point is, these values need to have the quality of timelessness and human worth to them. They need to be above mankind, above secular law, carried and enforced through the heart and soul of every human being. That requires a religion to safeguard and bring consistency to them, since religions should be formed around godly principles, not cult leaders. Without God, man is just another animal. Government does not have the power to temper men's souls and elevate their spirits, because love is not conducive to government control. Secular governments can only inspire hatred and shackle with servitude, because their only power is coercion.
 
Really?

Say that you love someone. You're not willing to die to save them?

I'm not saying I understand it completely either - but you're not the first one to call this central tenet of Christianity "absurd". In fact, we often call christ's love "absurd" even today.

So why did G-- do it, other than love? I don't know. I can give you a really far fetched answer that's purely a theory, but in the end, it's only a really far fetched theory that's beyond what we can actually know.
I can understand why Jesus would be willing to die for people, what I can't understand is why him dying would suddenly make all their sins right.

Why is it that a man can live a completely immoral life but because he is aware of the death and resurrection of Jesus all his sins are suddenly OK and forgivable, yet a man that lives a great life but makes a few mistakes and is unaware of the death/resurrection of Jesus is unforgivable and so disgusts God that he must be thrown into the pits of hell?
 
I have read the Bible before, and I find your explanation to be poor. The Bible is rather clear about what to do to rape victims. If the woman screams, she must marry the rapist. The rapist pays 50 shekels of silver to the woman's father. If the woman does not scream, she and the man are considered adulterers and are stoned to death.



Ok, this is true and can be found in the Bible, there is a new covenant and an old covenant. The old testament is part of the old covenant which shows that sin is more powerful than the law.
“Think not that I am come to destroy the Law and the Prophets (the Old Covenant): I am not come to DESTROY, but to FULFILL (NOT TO INSTITUTE). For verily I say unto you, Till earth and heaven pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the Law, till all be FULFILLED (Matt. 5:17-18; see Lk. 24:37-44-46)

Also this covenant only applied to the Jewish people not the Gentiles. This showed that even though the law told you not to sin peole did anyway so there was a need for Jesus someone to destroy sin. Also, the old testament laws except for the 10 commandments do not apply for today's world

Now about the rape.

Now the bible has some cultural component to it as well just remember that. In those days women had to be pure virgins to be married. A woman that is not a virgin would be viewed as committing adultery etc.... So to make it fair, in that old world view, if you taste the apple you have to buy it type of punishment.However, this also protected the young woman from a life of poverty by having a man to support her since her chance of getting married were slimmed because she was no longer a virgin. Women had not right to own property or earn their own way in life. They needed a man to support them. Marriage provided the security blanket that women needed back in the days after living her father's house. So if a man violated her or tasted her and took away her virginity, he was punished by making him marry her.

If she did not scream, that means it was mutual so they were both fornicators.( I"m sure they would understand if she were knocked out or something) If she did scream the above rule applies because she wouldn't be able to get married.
 
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