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[Count Lucanor]

Not everything has a grey area. If my words seemed to convey that meaning, that's my mistake. But I do believe it's correct to observe that we often treat spectrums as binary, when they really are spectrums. And it is this latter that I object to. We are too quick to fall back on easy, binary, thinking, IMO.

Noted. It should be noted also that some are too quick to fall back on easy “grey area” thinking, and that it is my understanding that most of the objections to my points in this thread make use of that “grey area fallacy”. When pressed hard, the grey area didn’t show up.

[Sy Borg]

Not everything has a grey area. If my words seemed to convey that meaning, that's my mistake. But I do believe it's correct to observe that we often treat spectrums as binary, when they really are spectrums. And it is this latter that I object to. We are too quick to fall back on easy, binary, thinking, IMO.

Noted. It should be noted also that some are too quick to fall back on easy “grey area” thinking, and that it is my understanding that most of the objections to my points in this thread make use of that “grey area fallacy”. When pressed hard, the grey area didn’t show up.

You lied. Again.

The grey area not only showed up but it pointed out that your binary thinking in regard to people's beliefs are out of touch with reality.

In a scale between 1 and 7, Count loudly proclaims that a score of 6 is not a grey area but exists at the pole, that 6 is an extremity in a scale of 7.

Clearly 7 is the extremity, and 6 is close to that.

If we replace numbers with shades, 1 is white, 7 is black. Thus, 6 would be charcoal and 1 would be off-white. Are black and charcoal the same? Are white and off-white the same? Clearly no.

Are they similar? Yes. Does "similar" mean "the same"? No.

QED. Now let's hear no more of this. Philosophy forum users should not have to wade through repetitive trivia just because Marxists can't admit being wrong and keep trying to save face. Yours is a simplistic good v bad view of the world. Science good, religion bad. Left good, right bad. Oppressed good, oppressor bad. Your approach is childish, and ignores nuance, that is, shades of grey.

The ability to see reason - the absolute essence of philosophy - requires that one abandon polar thinking and embrace intermediates.

[Count Lucanor]

Not everything has a grey area. If my words seemed to convey that meaning, that's my mistake. But I do believe it's correct to observe that we often treat spectrums as binary, when they really are spectrums. And it is this latter that I object to. We are too quick to fall back on easy, binary, thinking, IMO.

Noted. It should be noted also that some are too quick to fall back on easy “grey area” thinking, and that it is my understanding that most of the objections to my points in this thread make use of that “grey area fallacy”. When pressed hard, the grey area didn’t show up.

You lied. Again.

The grey area not only showed up but it pointed out that your binary thinking in regard to people's beliefs are out of touch with reality.

In a scale between 1 and 7, Count loudly proclaims that a score of 6 is not a grey area but exists at the pole, that 6 is an extremity in a scale of 7.

Nope. Once again, we can see here sophistry in action, making use, among other cheap but handy resources, of the straw man machine.

Let’s note again how this sophistry works: first, my statements about discrete states of things that make use of the logical analytic distinction (instead of the synthetic one) and the principle of no contradiction, are twisted, deformed, transposed to a epistemological domain to make them look as something else. An eukaryotic cell is not a prokaryotic cell, a married man is not an unmarried man, a natural world is not an unnatural world, a material world is not an immaterial world, and so on. But they are now put into the Dawkins scale of levels of certainty and boom…all of the sudden you have in-betweens of all these things, a supposedly more sophisticated spectrum between the married man and the unmarried one, and so on, notwithstanding that Dawkins himself does not support such view:

From this, as we shall see, they often make the illogical deduction that the hypothesis of God’s existence, and the hypothesis of his non-existence, have exactly equal probability of being right. The view that I shall defend is very different: agnosticism about the existence of God belongs firmly in the temporary or TAP category. Either he exists or he doesn’t. It is a scientific question; one day we may know the answer, and meanwhile we can say something pretty strong about the probability.

Whatever the exact status of Comte’s astronomical agnosticism, this cautionary tale suggests, at the very least, that we should hesitate before proclaiming the eternal verity of agnosticism too loudly.

Or course, no one in their right senses would call Dawkins a childish, unreasonable, simplistic, binary thinker, out of touch with reality, just because he’s not accommodating shades of God among his beliefs. It’s just sophistry.

Then the next sophistry move is to claim that levels of the Dawkins scale can represent what the mid-ground is, even though it has been demonstrated that bringing up the scale as relevant to the case is a fallacy in itself. In any case, such supposed “middle ground” does not entail that for Dawkins there’s a “grey area” in the real existence of God, or the existence of anything. He clearly states: it either exists or it doesn’t.

Clearly 7 is the extremity, and 6 is close to that.

If we replace numbers with shades, 1 is white, 7 is black. Thus, 6 would be charcoal and 1 would be off-white. Are black and charcoal the same? Are white and off-white the same? Clearly no.

Are they similar? Yes. Does "similar" mean "the same"? No. [/b]

The scale is mirrored, both extremes represent full level of certainty, and so 2 mirrors the 6, 3 mirrors the 5, 4 is the only one not mirroring (which shows that’s the real neutral point). What you’re so stubbornly defending is the view that charcoal and off-white are similar and go together in the same space, a so-called middle ground, and that a de facto theist (2) shares the same ground (the middle ground) with a de facto atheist (6), even with the 6.9 atheist named Dawkins. Nonsense!!

Of course one can play with the numbers and come up arbitrarily with anything you want. One could take 1 to 3 as one side of the scale, 4 as the center and 5 to 7 as the other extreme of the scale, then say that 6 falls in one of the extremes. Actually, the scale has a theist side and an atheist one, and if we take from the neutral point (4) towards the atheism side, each degree represents 25%, therefore 6 represents 75%, 3/4 of the atheism side. How about a 6.9? Doesn’t look much like a middle ground in atheism just because it is not the absolute extreme. But isn’t that fun?

[Belindi]

Cultural relativism isn't like ontological idealism, because cultural relativism is framed within , and bounded by, physical environment and biology. People can shape their environments, "transforming nature", only to a limited extent.
This is not cultural determinism, it is cultural relativity which is not the same as cultural determinism.
I recommend you think what they build territorial identity in the process of transforming nature. implies. It's thinly disguised right wing rhetoric .

I didn’t use the terms “cultural relativism” and “cultural determinism” so I don’t quite get your point on my post.

You did write "natural determinism of Malthusian origins", which is hard to understand. I introduced 'cultural determinism ' and 'cultural relativity' because these terms , if not exactly common knowledge, are easy to Google if you are not already familiar with them.
Cultural determinism can and sometimes does lead to unethical actions and ideas, as for instance does zionism and other forms of extreme nationalism.

There is a lot of devious nobbling going on by the extreme right and their nasty ideas trickle even into media such as this little forum.

I’m aware of what cultural relativism and cultural determinism entail, but I still don’t get how they relate to my point in whatever point you are trying to make. I suspect that you interpreted my reference to “territorial identity” as a reference to national identity, but these are different things, or at least meant to point to different things.

Hitler Nazis claimed they were culturally determined because their blood was northern European i.e.Nordic. The Nordic "race " was born of the soil and the climate of northern Europe. That is an example of cultural determinism in political action. Cultural relativism poses no such danger.

[Count Lucanor]

I didn’t use the terms “cultural relativism” and “cultural determinism” so I don’t quite get your point on my post.

You did write "natural determinism of Malthusian origins", which is hard to understand. I introduced 'cultural determinism ' and 'cultural relativity' because these terms , if not exactly common knowledge, are easy to Google if you are not already familiar with them.
Cultural determinism can and sometimes does lead to unethical actions and ideas, as for instance does zionism and other forms of extreme nationalism.

There is a lot of devious nobbling going on by the extreme right and their nasty ideas trickle even into media such as this little forum.

I’m aware of what cultural relativism and cultural determinism entail, but I still don’t get how they relate to my point in whatever point you are trying to make. I suspect that you interpreted my reference to “territorial identity” as a reference to national identity, but these are different things, or at least meant to point to different things.

Hitler Nazis claimed they were culturally determined because their blood was northern European i.e.Nordic. The Nordic "race " was born of the soil and the climate of northern Europe. That is an example of cultural determinism in political action. Cultural relativism poses no such danger.

That could be true, but not related to my post.

[Belindi]

You did write "natural determinism of Malthusian origins", which is hard to understand. I introduced 'cultural determinism ' and 'cultural relativity' because these terms , if not exactly common knowledge, are easy to Google if you are not already familiar with them.
Cultural determinism can and sometimes does lead to unethical actions and ideas, as for instance does zionism and other forms of extreme nationalism.

There is a lot of devious nobbling going on by the extreme right and their nasty ideas trickle even into media such as this little forum.

I’m aware of what cultural relativism and cultural determinism entail, but I still don’t get how they relate to my point in whatever point you are trying to make. I suspect that you interpreted my reference to “territorial identity” as a reference to national identity, but these are different things, or at least meant to point to different things.

Hitler Nazis claimed they were culturally determined because their blood was northern European i.e.Nordic. The Nordic "race " was born of the soil and the climate of northern Europe. That is an example of cultural determinism in political action. Cultural relativism poses no such danger.

That could be true, but not related to my post.

It is simple, the relationship. If I identify myself with one territory and only one territory I am limiting my identity. Territories are never previously uninhabited. A certain man , you may remember, who was a famous American citizen claimed that he also identified with Berlin and the people there.

[Lagayascienza]

I've been thinking about Hereandnow's OP which asked about the nature of religion. He said that “religion is our collective metaphysics”. After discounting all the silly, literalist stuff religious folk are wont to go on with, he then segued into the question of how we know anything for certain except that which is given in consciousness. I have no argument with that. He went on in subsequent posts to argue that a phenomenological/idealistic view of the world explains religion and that it sat well with the indeterminacy of our valuing that anchors our otherwise meaningless existence. It provides some sort of meaning that we seem to need. At least that is how I read his argument in the many posts we later exchanged on the matter. If my reading of his position was right, then I don’t think that our hankering for meaning makes a case for Idealism/phenomenology/idealism. I don’t think that the indeterminacy of our existence and our valuing proves that Idealism/phenomenology, even as developed by Heidegger, existentialism, and then by various post-modernists, is true. Idealism is just one way of looking at things. Post-modernism is just profound sounding verbiage. Or so it seems to me. I think that there are probably naturalistic explanations for religion, just as there are naturalistic explanations for core human morality. I don’t think it furthers the basic argument motivating Idealism when people try to link it to religion and morality. Idealism can stand its ground without all that. At least, it can do so unless/until materialist science can tell us what consciousness is and what things are “in themselves”. Idealism does not explain, nor does it need or entail, religion.

[Count Lucanor]

It is simple, the relationship. If I identify myself with one territory and only one territory I am limiting my identity. Territories are never previously uninhabited. A certain man , you may remember, who was a famous American citizen claimed that he also identified with Berlin and the people there.

It seems you are referring to the ideology of nationalism, an ideology most commonly associated with the rise of the modern nation-states, what we call sovereign states, which often appeal to foundational myths pertaining the land they are currently occupying. That’s a development of modern bourgeois states. When I referred to territorial identity I was thinking of the regional culture developed in a relatively identifiable location, which is not necessarily linked to a modern nation-state.

[Sy Borg]

Noted. It should be noted also that some are too quick to fall back on easy “grey area” thinking, and that it is my understanding that most of the objections to my points in this thread make use of that “grey area fallacy”. When pressed hard, the grey area didn’t show up.

You lied. Again.

The grey area not only showed up but it pointed out that your binary thinking in regard to people's beliefs are out of touch with reality.

In a scale between 1 and 7, Count loudly proclaims that a score of 6 is not a grey area but exists at the pole, that 6 is an extremity in a scale of 7. [/quote]

Nope. Once again, we can see here sophistry in action, making use, among other cheap but handy resources, of the straw man machine. Let’s note again how this sophistry works: first, my statements about discrete states of things that make use of the logical analytic distinction (instead of the synthetic one) and the principle of no contradiction, are twisted, deformed, transposed to a epistemological domain to make them look as something else. An eukaryotic cell is not a prokaryotic cell, a married man is not an unmarried man, a natural world is not an unnatural world, a material world is not an immaterial world, and so on.

Incoherent babbling that is unrelated to anything I said.

You complain about straw men and then come up with your own list. Where have I claimed that prokaryotes and eukaryotes are the same? Why would one introduce a scale between them?

Weird.

Then the next sophistry move is to claim that levels of the Dawkins scale can represent what the mid-ground is, even though it has been demonstrated that bringing up the scale as relevant to the case is a fallacy in itself. In any case, such supposed “middle ground” does not entail that for Dawkins there’s a “grey area” in the real existence of God, or the existence of anything. He clearly states: it either exists or it doesn’t.

More dodgy misrepresentation. This is very simple, despite your attempts to paint this as some major problem.

1. A scale runs from 1-7

2. Therefore, 1 and 7 are the poles

3. Therefore 2 through to 6 represent the grey area between the poles.

This is unarguable, without lies and misrepresentation.

If you want to create sub-categories to differentiate the grey areas - as I did, using examples of shades of grey - by all means work on it.

Clearly 7 is the extremity, and 6 is close to that.

If we replace numbers with shades, 1 is white, 7 is black. Thus, 6 would be charcoal and 1 would be off-white. Are black and charcoal the same? Are white and off-white the same? Clearly no.

Are they similar? Yes. Does "similar" mean "the same"? No. [/b]

The scale is mirrored, both extremes represent full level of certainty, and so 2 mirrors the 6, 3 mirrors the 5, 4 is the only one not mirroring (which shows that’s the real neutral point). What you’re so stubbornly defending is the view that charcoal and off-white are similar and go together in the same space, a so-called middle ground, and that a de facto theist (2) shares the same ground (the middle ground) with a de facto atheist (6), even with the 6.9 atheist named Dawkins. Nonsense!!

Your claim is incoherent. I simply pointed out that Dawkins's thoughts occupies a grey area. Yes, he's functionally an atheist, but he is a scientist. A good scientist - and a good philosopher - will never proclaim 100% certainty about any issue where one cannot be 100% certain. This has been all I have been trying to say through your noise.

Your babbling, confused arguments show you to be neither a scientist nor a philosopher. Just a polemicist. As an obsessed Marxist, you cannot be objective about religion. Let's contrast your views with RD's:

- Dawkins, as a scientific thinker, COULD NOT declare himself as a 7, despite his view that religion is poppycock.

- By contrast, as a dedicated Marxist, you COULD NOT declare yourself as anything but a 7.

---------------------------------------------------

Your ideological hatred towards religion is so extreme that, even when an atheist like me defends basic logic and reason, you unleash on me as an enemy. Ideally, in philosophy, we counter dogma with reason, not an opposing dogma.

[Count Lucanor]

Where have I claimed that prokaryotes and eukaryotes are the same? Why would one introduce a scale between them?

Weird.

Yes, yes, right, who would do such a thing!! Who would put a scale between being a prokaryotic cell or not being one, between being natural and not being natural, between being material and being immaterial? Totally insane!!

1. A scale runs from 1-7

2. Therefore, 1 and 7 are the poles

3. Therefore 2 through to 6 represent the grey area between the poles.

This is unarguable, without lies and misrepresentation.

A scale of certainties is not a scale of being. Unarguably, without cheap sophistry.

Your claim is incoherent. I simply pointed out that Dawkins's thoughts occupies a grey area.

Ha! This is ridiculously false. Dawkins thought does not occupy a grey area. On a scale, he locates his commitment between the two last degrees.

Yes, he's functionally an atheist, but he is a scientist. A good scientist - and a good philosopher - will never proclaim 100% certainty about any issue where one cannot be 100% certain. This has been all I have been trying to say through your noise.

More misrepresentations. He says he is an atheist mostly because he is a scientist, he says the god problem is to be treated as a scientific hypothesis. He is committed to a lot of certainties in his book and public speeches, including the one that posits that either there’s a god or there isn’t, no permanent in-betweens as PAP agnostics proclaim. He embraces what you call binary thinking. You should read the book some day, it’s not really bad. There’s a great sentence there for you: “the mystics want to keep the mystery going on”. No wonder why they accuse him of hatred of religion.

[Count Lucanor]

As an obsessed Marxist, you cannot be objective about religion. Let's contrast your views with RD's:

- Dawkins, as a scientific thinker, COULD NOT declare himself as a 7, despite his view that religion is poppycock.

- By contrast, as a dedicated Marxist, you COULD NOT declare yourself as anything but a 7.

More nonsense from a simplistic mind. Again, confusing different domains, which are not essentially linked. One could be a Marxist without being an atheist, as actual experience shows, but you’ll never learn.

Now, as a Marxist, on a 7 point scale I would declare myself a 6. How about that!! It’s so confortable being here in the middle zone, in a grey area, so no one would be able to accuse me of being an obsessed Marxist

[Sy Borg]

Where have I claimed that prokaryotes and eukaryotes are the same? Why would one introduce a scale between them?

Weird.

Yes, yes, right, who would do such a thing!! Who would put a scale between being a prokaryotic cell or not being one, between being natural and not being natural, between being material and being immaterial? Totally insane!!

More emotional babble. Discipline!

1. A scale runs from 1-7

2. Therefore, 1 and 7 are the poles

3. Therefore 2 through to 6 represent the grey area between the poles.

This is unarguable, without lies and misrepresentation.

A scale of certainties is not a scale of being. Unarguably, without cheap sophistry.

Incoherent. A scale is a scale.

And please go easy with the projection.

Your claim is incoherent. I simply pointed out that Dawkins's thoughts occupies a grey area.

Ha! This is ridiculously false. Dawkins thought does not occupy a grey area. On a scale, he locates his commitment between the two last degrees.

"Degrees" are a grey area.

Unless one is engaging in cheap sophistry, of course.

Yes, he's functionally an atheist, but he is a scientist. A good scientist - and a good philosopher - will never proclaim 100% certainty about any issue where one cannot be 100% certain. This has been all I have been trying to say through your noise.

More misrepresentations. He says he is an atheist mostly because he is a scientist, he says the god problem is to be treated as a scientific hypothesis. He is committed to a lot of certainties in his book and public speeches, including the one that posits that either there’s a god or there isn’t, no permanent in-betweens as PAP agnostics proclaim. He embraces what you call binary thinking. You should read the book some day, it’s not really bad. There’s a great sentence there for you: “the mystics want to keep the mystery going on”. No wonder why they accuse him of hatred of religion.

I have read most of his books. Unlike you, I take what he says seriously. If he says he is a "6" on a scale of 1 to 7, then I interpret that as being cloe to "7" but not the same, which is essentially your incoherent claim.

Why are you wasting people's time on this? It's a ridiculous "discussion". Just you wasting my time and Scott's bandwidth in a desperate attempt to save face, just because I pointed out your mistakes.

[Count Lucanor]

Why are you wasting people's time on this? It's a ridiculous "discussion". Just you wasting my time and Scott's bandwidth in a desperate attempt to save face, just because I pointed out your mistakes.

You mean why I’m wasting people’s time discussing with you? I really can’t tell, perhaps because it’s easy? Anyway, that’s the same question I ask you: why do you try to mess with my usually calmed discussions with other people? Why do you waste YOUR time doing this? Why do you make it an important crusade, which anyway you are always losing badly?

[Sy Borg]

As an obsessed Marxist, you cannot be objective about religion. Let's contrast your views with RD's:

- Dawkins, as a scientific thinker, COULD NOT declare himself as a 7, despite his view that religion is poppycock.

- By contrast, as a dedicated Marxist, you COULD NOT declare yourself as anything but a 7.

More nonsense from a simplistic mind. Again, confusing different domains, which are not essentially linked. One could be a Marxist without being an atheist, as actual experience shows, but you’ll never learn.

Now, as a Marxist, on a 7 point scale I would declare myself a 6. How about that!! It’s so confortable being here in the middle zone, in a grey area, so no one would be able to accuse me of being an obsessed Marxist

More toxins.

A "6" is a strongly dedicated Marxist, just as "6" represents a strongly dedicated atheist. Not extreme - that would be a 7. You don't want to admit that these are not the same. It's very strange why you would deny such a simple and obvious thing.

"2" and "6" are not the same. "6" and "7" are also not the same. "6" is closer to "7" and "2" is closer to "1".

OMG, having to explain this physically hurts

Here's a video to help you comprehend what is going on. Pay close attention because it's probably a grade or two above you in this "debate".

[Sy Borg]

Why are you wasting people's time on this? It's a ridiculous "discussion". Just you wasting my time and Scott's bandwidth in a desperate attempt to save face, just because I pointed out your mistakes.

You mean why I’m wasting people’s time discussing with you? I really can’t tell, perhaps because it’s easy? Anyway, that’s the same question I ask you: why do you try to mess with my usually calmed discussions with other people? Why do you waste YOUR time doing this? Why do you make it an important crusade, which anyway you are always losing badly?

I was sucked into your dogmatic vortex. I tend to argue against absolutism. It's a scourge IMO.

BTW, you are no challenge to me because you are locked in a dogma. I can predict all of your responses on any given issue (aside from sudden bursts of extreme rudeness) because they MUST accord with your god - Karl Marx.