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Perhaps fundamentalism is on the extreme edge of the bell curve as a 'refuge for those who can't handle reality', but that covers most of us to varyin...

No worries. I thought it was a large jump and now I got where you're coming from.

But notice you shifted from atheists - what he wrote about - to scientific epistemology. yes, I agree and I would guess MU would agree that there is n...

That's an extremely different example from what you said below... I don't think that's the same context at all. I can see making a solid argument in f...

I have enountered this argument made by atheists. That current scientific knowledge precludes the possibility of a deity. I suppose we could try to fi...

Or any of a wide range of phenomena. Just as medicine does somatic conditions. It's natural, we work with our models. But if you are going to put your...

I guess my only sense in which I would think that life is important is if they had a chance of coming back. In this case we have something that is qua...

Yes, but if you think you have a parasite but get sent to a psychiatrist for having chemical imbalances leading to hypochondriacal symptoms, it ends u...

I think some of what gets classed as supernatural magic is real. I said 'classed as' since I think these phenomena are simply things that science has ...

Yeah, I think a universe devoid of life is worse. I am not sure how to prove that. But since whatever values go into 'merit' will be subjective also, ...

Oh, probably I would. I was talking about after the events I listed. After I had sufficient evidence, for myself, that I no longer needed to doubt. I ...

No, I would say that I have no good reason to doubt it. I wouldn't say it is beyond doubt for a number of reasons: 1) that is contextless. I could cer...

I don't disagree with this, but I am still working, from quite a ways back from the following....

I may be misunderstanding here, but here's my reaction to a possible distinction between the two. There is a difference between what I need to have no...

How are you, now, putting your state-proclaimed 'liberty' in danger? What is it you are hoping others will do?

Well, a big problem with this theory is that we know it is incorrect. There have been conspiracies. Huge ones. Effective ones. One could look at the a...

If you somehow know what you would be like if you grew up in a poor environment with all that entails in terms of parental stress and possible absence...

Does it? I would guess private schools would be at least as high on IQ. I think homeschooled children do at least as well on IQ as public school stude...

I guess I have a scattershot reaction. An antinatalist would, it seems, be against all procreation as consent violation. This entails a goal of preven...

sp. in other words could we hold all the ideas involved in an all encompassing model? I doubt it, but I think it's speculative either way.

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/61KIqb7ncbL._SL1000_.jpgI think Pilates machines can combine mild torture with making the criminals p...

Or money. Or good intentions...road to hell is paved and all that. Or someone lying to them. Or being in a hurry. or thinking you know better than oth...

1) So, deduction first, testing later? 2) So, we have the issue of what the mind can reason and deduce itself to in terms of conclusions. But then we ...

Well, yes. I suspect he or she is including science, but I think that facet has to be described/included, since I think this opens up more issues in d...

How does empiricism play a role in the above? IOW one might think you mean via deduction alone. I am guessing that is not what you mean, but then I th...

I think one could argue that, but not I am not going that far. I am saying that once you think everything is determined, you have to wonder if the rea...

There's no need to get into this kind of implicit insult. I have no problem with non-binary thinking or even seemingly paradoxical answers, but while ...

It's just talk in the sense that those with real power are not going to listen. But it is real talk in the sense that people in general do not support...

Well, sure. That's been the working assumption - one I do not make in general since I am agnostic regarding it - all through my discussion with Mad Fo...

Those intentions are not made by the supposed 'designer' intentions appear, determined past causes. The supposed 'designer' does not choose to intend,...

1) I don't think determinism precludes correctly recognizing order in the universe. Though if we believe in determinism, its seems to me there is alwa...

It certainly wouldn't preclude consciousness nor the ability to comprehend truths - (though as a side note, if one believes one is determined, one can...

I don't know if that argument holds. What I am saying is we are not designers if determinism holds for us. Stuff gets inevitably made, including the p...

I don't know what nationalist liberalism refers to. Or, I could come up with a meaning in the states, and perhaps one that would fit for Europe, which...

OK, that makes sense. But was this European liberalism or American?

Yes, that's a very literal or perhaps concrete interpretation of my quesitons. I was asking what part of character, which is not going to be a body pa...

Which part? What do I learn about someone's character from their color? What should I assume I know?

I can follow this as European liberalism not as American liberalism. Could confirm it's European. Do liberals on either side of the Atlantic really sa...

I agree that causation would be necessary for design. But then at the same time, determinism means, really, that things just unfold. Does a flower des...

Though he still manages to believe that beauty=knowledge=virtue. That death is not important. That people do evil out of ignorance. (and if he knows n...

Just to open it up even further...what do we think there is design at all? For example I think determinism fits poorly with design. Snowflake patterns...

It seems like something slid to something else here. The male, for example, who does not see sex/gender when hiring for a position traditionally held ...

I disagree. And I have a guess we have reached an impasse in our positions. Of course it would help if I could feel your feeling of hate, to know if w...

There were two things I said: 1) that it seemed to me he was saying he was a stranger here and that's he's not. We are not strangers here. We are part...

That's close, I think, to what I meant. I am still groping towards what my reaction was even in my own head. One way to put it is that S seems to be t...

I think my trying to understand the context between you two is beyond me. Though i do understand that you were also trying to help me understand the c...

He called them analogous, which isn't interchangeable. But given how he has been saying hate is not bad or wrong per se and that he feels it seems a f...

I judge too. I said nothing against judgments per se. But judging hate as like evil, is, as we both seemed to have argued here, off.

I guess I'd avoid using that analogy. Loving something or someone abusive can be bad. Hating something evil can be good. It's a bit too apples and bic...