CADRE Comments

[Note: the contents page for this series can be found here. The previous entry, the second for chapter 19, can be found here. ] [This entry concludes chapter 19, "The Theistic Argument from Active Reasoning".] 19.) I could sheerly assert, that the proposition 'actions can be produced by an ultimately reactive reality' is not self-contradictory. But what use is it to assert this? I can assert 'the moon is made of green cheese' or 'there is a God' just as easily. Why make that assertion? 20.) My mere say-so doesn't make the assertion true; it is not a necessary presumption for logical disputation, either. The vast bulk of evidence I find in Nature seems to lead to the conclusion that a reactively or non-rationally produced behavior is at least usually non-rational or reactive; further leading to the question of why my behaviors should be (or even can be ) considered rational or active instead; and this question cannot in principle be answered w...

[Note: the contents page for this series can be found here. The previous entry, the first for chapter 19, can be found here. ] [This entry continues chapter 19, "The Theistic Argument from Active Reasoning".] 15.) This leaves, on the atheism side, the proposition that a fully automatic system can produce behaviors which are themselves non-automatic. 16.) This proposition entails, that even though true action capability (such as what I must presume you and I have) exists now, it did not always exist. The reactive process has brought into existence (eventually, having gotten into the correct configurations) active abilities. Against a primary sceptical threat, which necessarily calls into formal question the presumption we make in favor of (at least) the possibility of our own rational competency, can this proposition be a defense? 17.) The attempt to justify the proposition breaks down on the same problem as proposing that no active ability whatsoever exists. To explain how r...

[Note: the contents page for this series can be found here. The previous entry, the last for chapter 18, can be found here. ] [This entry starts chapter 19, "The Theistic Argument from Active Reasoning".] My previous two chapters not only continued my line of argumentation, but also (in their own way) summarized, and illustrated through practical applications, the points of my argument, in an imaginary informal debate. Dialogues, however, although useful in some ways, are not formal arguments; and as these second-section chapters are perhaps the most critical in my entire book, I will take one more chapter to summarize and re-present the argument yet again, before continuing with my inferences. My argument can be developed from several directions, although the final result is the same in each case. As even now I am still not sure which 'beginning point' is best, I have presented slightly different variations for each run-through; and I will do this again here. I find...

[Note: the contents page for this series can be found here. The previous entry, the fifth for chapter 18, can be found here. ] [This entry concludes chapter 18, "Atheism and the Justification of Non-Justification Ability". It also concludes the fictional dialogue started in chp 17.] (Picking up from the end of the previous part...) Chase (the atheist): ... That doesn't mean I am active! Reed (the theist): No, not necessarily. But by denying it per hypothesis, you leave yourself no possible way to reach even merely probably reliable "perceptions of reality". Your perceptions of probability end up trapped in a formal limbo where no judgments of their relative worth--compared to other estimates of probability for instance--can be legitimately made. Those judgments which might possibly ratify the probability estimates, require active ability to exist on our part. If that ability is proposed not to exist, neither can those judgments effectively exist. Something lik...

[Note: the contents page for this series can be found here. The previous entry, the fourth for chapter 18, can be found here. ] [This entry continues chapter 18, "Atheism and the Justification of Non-Justification Ability". It also continues the fictional dialogue started in chp 17.] (Picking up from the end of the previous part...) Reed (the theist): Let me rephrase the question. Do you perceive yourself to be an alien who has lived a million centuries? Chase (the atheist): Your pitiful sense of humor seems to be reasserting itself... R: I am entirely serious; and I will continue asking the question until I get an answer. C: Fine. No, I do not perceive that I am any such thing. R: Do you have any inclination whatsoever to consider yourself anything other than a human like myself? C: No; and I have never said anything to that effect! I specifically said that this was a fictional example--! R: So mutation and natural selection have also equipped your brain with a consciousn...

[Note: the contents page for this series can be found here. The previous entry, the third for chapter 18, can be found here. ] [This entry continues chapter 18, "Atheism and the Justification of Non-Justification Ability". It also continues the fictional dialogue started in chp 17.] (Picking up from the end of the previous part...) Reed (the theist): I find myself curious to know... excuse me, "desiring to be told"... what types of usage this principle of behavior exhibited itself in, among us humans when we first developed. Chase (the atheist): When we first developed as a species per se, we had the legacy of billions of years of environmental conditioning and mutation from previous species, having honed our inherited instincts to such a pitch, that we were in a position to respond to certain types of stimuli, in such ways that we would consequently behave in fashions most probably suitable to succeed and survive. R: And we call this response today, or our reflect...

[Note: the contents page for this series can be found here. The previous entry, the second for chapter 18, can be found here. ] [This entry continues chapter 18, "Atheism and the Justification of Non-Justification Ability". It also continues the fictional dialogue started in chp 17.] (Picking up from the end of the previous part...) Reed (the theist): You understand, of course, that you've thereby surrendered any claim of accuracy for "atheism" per se. Chase (the atheist): What?! I've done no such thing! Atheism could still be the fact, or characteristic of ultimate reality. R: But that in itself would not have had a necessary effect on how your belief came about. C: As I said, whichever belief ends up as the most successful will very probably have been influenced by the actual state of reality; just as the most successful state of my belief about my bank account, will most probably have been influenced by my efficiency at detecting and responding to my ac...