Subject:
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Re: One of my issues (Warning: even wordier than usual)
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Fri, 16 Nov 2001 23:07:14 GMT
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Viewed:
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1307 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Dave Schuler writes:
> In lugnet.off-topic.debate, David Eaton writes:
> > I could try the turn-around on you:
> >
> > - Science is wrong, cuz it says the world is flat.
> > - That's not *real* science, that's been disproven
> > - Ok then, science is wrong because it professes the existance of ether.
> > - Well, that's not *real* science either because that's [also] been • disproven.
>
> But as you of all people konw, science doesn't declare truths; it's a
> system of explanation endlessly refined to fit more closely with
> observation. Christianity, by contrast, declares certain absolutes that
> remain absolute regardless of evolving comprehension.
Well, the similarity was insofar as by asking "How about this criterion? No
that's not the *real* Christian God", one assumedly is receding the Christian
beliefs, but only to a point. IE, accepting the answers as true results in a
clearer view of Christianity-- and that view (I don't think)
logically contradicts itself in James' view. In the above example, science
never claimed "ether definitely exists", it merely claimed (at one point) that
ether was *likely* to exist, given what we knew.
> > which experiences are unique to *you*? How do you decide which
> > experience relates to you, and which relates to a part of you? And provided
> > that, would another being be capable of sharing certain experiences? Or does
> > perspective matter? And if perspective matters, then we're presupposing an
> > existance of something to perspect to, hence circular reasoning. Ick!
>
> Well, if any two things exist, then each can be considered in relation to
> (from the perspective of) the other. Perspective results, at its most
> basic, from
> I would say an experience can be shared but can't be perfectly shared,
Did some text get cut here? Anyway, the problem is again the supposition of
"any two things exist". You can't use it in a definition of existance. Who's to
say where one thing starts and one stops? Where's the division point? Does
nothing exist? Does something exist? Does "everything" exist? How do we define
different things?
> > > I'm afraid that analogy fails because any comparision between an infinite
> > > God and any finite entity is invalid. However, I would still be "me"
> > > without a cell, but that cell would not still be "me."
> >
> > Ooo, I tried to make you avoid the trap, but you walked in. How many cells do
> > you need to lose before you're no longer you? Which cells? In what grouping?
>
> Heh. Not really a trap, though; "I" am that portion still able to assert
> that it is "I," most likely the part that retains sentience (such as it is).
> If by some malfunction of the transporter "I" am split in two, then each is
> able to call itself "I," but neither is the same "I" that "I" am.
Still a trap, I would argue. Let me put it another way. Would you be the same
you if you were permanently suspended in mid-air, and fed sensory inputs, with
no way of affecting your sensory input? Because the self is developmental, each
part of it is very much so a part of who "you" are. "You" are therefore not a
distinct entity, but a conglomeration of fuzziness, roughly distinguished by
the human mind so as to be something different than, say, Tinky-Winky. Taking
any part of "you" away results in a *different* you. Is the old you gone?
Technically, yeah. But the human mind still pieces you together as the same. It
gets tougher for the human mind when we see things like mitosis in action, etc.
Which cell is the parent and which is the child? When does it cease to be one
being and become two?
DaveE
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