Trying to prove naturalism and disprove theism (supernaturalism)

Hotspace

During an almost year long debate with a Christian we encountered the naturalism vs. supernaturalism worldviews. I stated that, “for everything we experience there is a natural cause”. The only proof of supernaturalism, from him, was God himself. I then countered that if you could provide one proof of supernaturalism then that would falsify my claim that, “for everything we experience there is a natural cause”. He couldn’t prove God so he switched it around and said try to prove naturalism then. Here was my approach. Of course, I can never provide absolute proof of anything, as the timely quote goes, “[Absolute] proof is only for mathematics and alcohol”; I can just give degrees of certainty. During each post I listed 10 things that have a natural cause. My idea was, that as the sheer number of things listed grew, then that gave weight to my proposition. Conversely, I asked for testable events, models, theories, probability studies etc for the supernatural or anything on the fringes of the supernatural like the paranormal. At the end of the debate no such evidence was forthcoming for supernaturalism. I’d like to pose this as a question: was I right in trying to prove naturalism and if so can such a thing be done and was my approach valid?

Hotspace

Hotspace wrote: »

I’d like to pose this as a question: was I right in trying to prove naturalism and if so can such a thing be done and was my approach valid?

That's probably more of a philosophical (logical) question than it is a question pertaining to atheism.

I'd say that you aren't right in trying to prove naturalism. I don't think such a thing can be done, really. You're trying to link together an infinite number of events with their natural causation. You can't possible prove it for an infinite number of events.

You're approach is valid if you have an infinite amount of time to link together an infinite number of events with an their natural causations (assuming that you know what the natural causation for every event is).

Anyway, I don't think it's logically possible to prove naturalism (in any way at all).

(P.S. My answer is coming from a mathematical standpoint.)

Soul Winner

Have a read of this and tell us what you think.

Zillah

I think the very premise mires the debate in semantics. One cannot define the supernatural outside of defining what it is not. Hence, you cannot define what is natural without defining it as not-supernatural.

So basically I think a naturalist's approach should be one of utter scorn. There is a physical reality, we've shown we can model it, people who claim to know anything beyond that are talking shite, and I will treat them accordingly.

bnt

Maybe I'm not getting the problem here, but to me, there can be no real contest. It's "seen" vs "unseen", where the "seen" = naturalism, and the "unseen" = supernaturalism. So, naturalism is what you get when you observe the world as it is, as opposed to how we might want it to be. Such observations include observations of people, attempting to gain an understanding of our limitations, our failings, how our wishes, education and preconceptions affect what we see. This is why we attempt to take ourselves out of the picture when seeking knowledge about the world outside ourselves since, to put it bluntly, we can see things that are not actually there.

Here's an example: I am typing this on a computer, and mere seconds after I hit Submit, this will be readable by anyone, anywhere in the world, who has a computer-type device and an internet connection. Isn't that magic? A century ago this was not even imagined in Science Fiction. Yet there is absolutely no magic involved. In the CPU of this computer, "doped" silicon is formed in to transistors, the transistors are combined to make logic gates, the gates are combined to interpret machine code instructions, and the compiled code in this web browser takes my Submit command and sends it off down the path. Other circuits take my instructions, process them, send them off down wires to other computers (switches, routers, etc.), broadcasts them over all kinds of media (wired or wireless) until the reach the boards.ie server, and the process starts again. Every step of that process is fully understood, down to the subatomic level of the silicon atoms, and every component is designed to do a function.

So, does that mean everything has to be designed - the "argument from design"? No, because we have learned how complex systems and organisms can arise without a designer, through natural selection - so in one sense, I think the real "entry point" here is for your Christian friend to gain an understanding of what Evolution through Natural Selection does - and does not - offer us. It is neither random nor directed - it is adaptive to success or failure under trial. Make a small change: test it: if it works, keep it: if it doesn't, discard it: repeat trillions upon trillions of times over billions of years. Result? Cheetahs, humans, MRSA, and the duck-billed platypus. Well, no-one's claiming that Natural Selection is efficient, never mind intelligent!

Mark Hamill

Soul Winner wrote: »

Have a read of this and tell us what you think.

Is the argument in that link really: Our beliefs are based on our cognitive abilities and since our cognitive abilities are reliable (as shown by our continued existence) then our beliefs must be reliable too?
The writer also says something about naturalism actually not being compatible with evolution, but I couldn't, in wading through all his waffle, figure out why. Do you know where he gets this from?

Sam Vimes

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Do you know where he gets this from?

I believe he may be sitting on the source

Sam Vimes

The last two posters have Terry Pratchett quotes in their sigs and I'm named after one of the characters. I'm starting to see a pattern

Zombrex

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Is the argument in that link really: Our beliefs are based on our cognitive abilities and since our cognitive abilities are reliable (as shown by our continued existence) then our beliefs must be reliable too?

Pretty much as far as I can tell. Seems to be that we wouldn't have evolved untrue beliefs so our beliefs must be true.

Mark Hamill wrote: »

The writer also says something about naturalism actually not being compatible with evolution, but I couldn't, in wading through all his waffle, figure out why. Do you know where he gets this from?

He is basically trying to use evolution to support the idea that the supernatural things we believe in (such as God) must be true because we wouldn't have evolved them otherwise because false beliefs do not help you.

A bit of a dumb thesis. Written by Alvin Plantinga, according to TIME "America's leading orthodox Protestant philosopher of God." So not really shocking he is trying to find a logical basis to support belief in the supernatural.

A response here that shows the errors in his paper (much shorter read too)

http://fitelson.org/plant.pdf

Sam Vimes

Wicknight wrote: »

Pretty much as far as I can tell. Seems to be that we wouldn't have evolved untrue beliefs so our beliefs must be true.


He is basically trying to use evolution to support the idea that the supernatural things we believe in (such as God) must be true because we wouldn't have evolved them otherwise because false beliefs do not help you.

As with the vast majority of religious arguments it fails to acknowledge the existence of all the other religions in the world which prove unequivocally that humans have supernatural beliefs that are not true because at most one of the thousands of religions in history is true

Zombrex

Sam Vimes wrote: »

As with the vast majority of religious arguments it fails to acknowledge the existence of all the other religions in the world which prove unequivocally that humans have supernatural beliefs that are not true because at most one of the thousands of religions in history is true

Or the huge amount of beliefs we have about the nature of the natural world around us (never mind the supernatural) that science has demonstrated to be incorrect.

Like everything in evolution our beliefs are good enough to allow our continued reproduction. They can be false and still good enough.

stevejazzx

Wicknight wrote: »

Pretty much as far as I can tell. Seems to be that we wouldn't have evolved untrue beliefs so our beliefs must be true.

He is basically trying to use evolution to support the idea that the supernatural things we believe in (such as God) must be true because we wouldn't have evolved them otherwise because false beliefs do not help you.

In which case he looks right except the opposite result is true as supernatural belief in all things is dying out? Quantum ideas of the universe are prevalent. Either the standard model will advance with the discovery of the Higgs field or some type of string theory but it seems that physicists are getting closer to understanding natural existence. They wouldn't have gotten this far unless evolution favors people who make right choices in all elements of survival and that includes, if not highlights, scientific progress.

Sam Vimes

Wicknight wrote: »

Or the huge amount of beliefs we have about the nature of the natural world around us (never mind the supernatural) that science has demonstrated to be incorrect.

Like everything in evolution our beliefs are good enough to allow our continued reproduction. They can be false and still good enough.

I'm sure we all remember Dawkins theory on it: that evolution adapted children to be gullible because children who believed their parents when they told them not to walk off cliffs tended to live longer and that the propagation of religion is the result of an undesirable side effect of this otherwise useful trait of believing whatever our parents tell us

Soul Winner

Just so yous know:

From the Wikipedia article re same:

"In the foreword to the anthology Naturalism Defeated? James Beilby wrote: "Plantinga's argument should not be mistaken for an argument against evolutionary theory in general or, more specifically, against the claim that humans might have evolved from more primitive life forms. Rather, the purpose of his argument is to show that the denial of the existence of a creative deity is problematic."

What I take this to mean is this: If there is no God or a higher guiding intelligence leading, then how can we be sure that what we perceive with our cognitive abilities - which obviously came about by chance - to be reliable? Because it is on these same cognitive faculties that we rely as firm grounds on which to proceed. I understand the naturalist argument of "Well then by what other method do you suggest us to proceed?", That's fine, if we were sure that there is no God. But we can't be sure of this using these limited faculties. Therefore the theist is quite reasonable to hold views which contradict the purely naturalist worldview, which said view states that there is only nature and nothing else. Even if that were actually true in reality, we could never really know it for sure when one considers that under naturalism, ‘knowing’ itself is not an absolute, because under naturalism there are no absolutes except the statement that nature is all that there is.

I rue having posted that link now

Goduznt Xzst

Hotspace wrote: »

During an almost year long debate with a Christian we encountered the naturalism vs. supernaturalism worldviews.

Hotspace, you are approaching the argument from the wrong perspective. It would be better at this point to concede that a naturalist view is equal to a supernaturalist view (get him to agree that they are equal and both can not be fully known so that he does not come back to this point)

Once he has agreed that arguing the validity of either stance is irrelevant and would merely amount to sophistry, proceed to argue the relevance to humans of each stance.

Naturalism is needed for our existence and our survival, supernaturalism is not. For example a parent will tell teach their child the naturalist belief that they should not stare at the sun or they will go blind. Even though the parent may not have direct experience with this or know of anyone who has gone blind from staring at the sun the motivation to follow this belief rests solely on its relevance to our existence and quality of being.

There is nothing your supernaturalist friend will be able to think up that is relevant to our existence, that does not have an equal naturalist belief that outweighs it.

You will inevitably encounter the "eternal life" after death argument, at which point you can explain that he can not support supernaturalism with a supernatural existence. In such, this supernatural existence has no relevance to our natural existence as they are separate. Agree to meet up with him again in the supernatural to continue your argument on each positions merits. Until that time, only natural existence, that is known, can be examined.

He can do nothing but concede that the supernatural is irrelevant to our current natural existence.

Sam Vimes

Soul Winner wrote: »

What I take this to mean is this: If there is no God or a higher guiding intelligence leading, then how can we be sure that what we perceive with our cognitive abilities - which obviously came about by chance - to be reliable?

Common and persistent misconception. Evolution is not chance at all. Our cognitive abilities came about through millions of years of natural selection which is pretty much the opposite of chance. They allowed us to survive when other species didn't. They have proven themselves to be somewhat reliable, but not completely. That's why we need to verify things and not rely on gut feelings but it doesn't mean the process is completely unreliable.

Also, even if our cognitive process couldn't be shown to be reliable, that would not prove God's existence. It would just mean we would like there to be one because it would provide that reliability.

Sam Vimes

Think of it this way Soul Winner. Two animals develop different cognitive processes through a random genetic mutation. One of these mutations makes the animal recognise that falling off a cliff is bad and the other doesn't give that ability. Result: the second animal dies.

Then a genetic mutation in the surviving animal's offspring means that they both know that falling off a cliff is bad but only one knows that certain berries are poisonous. Result: only one survives.

Repeat over millions of years, billions of animals and trillions of different scenarios and you're left with only the animals that had mostly "good" mutations. It doesn't mean our thought processes are perfect but nor does it mean they're completely unreliable. That's how evolution works.

To quote the great Dawkins : "Life results from the non-random survival of randomly varying replicators"

Soul Winner

Sam Vimes wrote: »

Think of it this way Soul Winner. Two animals develop different cognitive processes through a random genetic mutation. One of these mutations makes the animal recognise that falling off a cliff is bad and the other doesn't give that ability. Result: the second animal dies.

Then a genetic mutation in the surviving animal's offspring means that they both know that falling off a cliff is bad but only one knows that certain berries are poisonous. Result: only one survives.

Repeat over millions of years, billions of animals and trillions of different scenarios and you're left with only the animals that had mostly "good" mutations. It doesn't mean our thought processes are perfect but nor does it mean they're completely unreliable. That's how evolution works.

To quote the great Dawkins : "Life results from the non-random survival of randomly varying replicators"

I understand the basic of concept of how evolution works and it makes perfect sense if we assume that life just happened to spontaneously come about on our planet. But that is the point I was alluding to and I think Alvin Plantinga was making, and that is that if this is how it happened, that there was no God involved in the process, because there is no God, then the whole thing is an unguided process and simply the result of a chance happening. And that Natural Selection itself being the method by which species evolve is also a sort of byproduct of this original chance happening and therefore has no real goal or purpose of what it wants to bring about because there is no end goal in view as it were. Basically all that is happening is this: organisms are learning to survive through billions and billions of trial and error type events which life learns from and proceeds forward based on what it learned. If this is true then the faculty which facilitates 'false beliefs' was also allowed to evolve for no reason other than it wasn't detrimental to our survival. But surely it would have been a serious impediment to us in our dog eat dog natural world? That's all I'm saying. Seems strange that it would have even been given the proverbial foot in the door (very early on) if all that was and is important is survival.

Sam Vimes

Soul Winner wrote: »

then the whole thing is an unguided process and simply the result of a chance happening. And that Natural Selection itself being the method by which species evolve is also a sort of byproduct of this original chance happening and therefore has no real goal or purpose of what it wants to bring about because there is no end goal in view as it were.

Once again, natural selection is the opposite of chance. You gave a better analogy of it in your own post, trial and error. The very first stage of the simplest form of life came about by chance and then natural selection kicked in. The "goal" in natural selection is to survive. Whether acheiving that goal requires bigger muscles or a better immune system or a bigger brain depends on the circumstances the animal finds itself in.

Soul Winner wrote: »

Basically all that is happening is that organisms are learning to survive through billions and billions of trial and error type events which life learns from and proceeds forward based on.

Why dismiss trial and error so flippantly? It's one of the most fundamental and effective ways to learn and it's pretty much how evolution works.

Soul Winner wrote: »

If this is true then the faculty which facilitates belief was also allowed to evolve for no reason other than it wasn't detrimental to our survival. But surely it would have been a serious impediment to us in our dog eat dog natural world? That's all I'm saying. Seems strange that it would have even been given the proverbial foot in the door if all that is important is survival.

Evolution isn't perfect and some things hang on even if they aren't good or aren't needed such as wisdom teeth. But why do you say it must have been a serious impediment? As I posted earlier, this is Dawkins theory on it: that evolution adapted children to be gullible because children who believed their parents when they told them not to walk off cliffs tended to live longer and that the propagation of religion is the result of an undesirable side effect of this otherwise useful trait of believing whatever our parents tell us.

Why do you say it surely must be detrimental? I'm sure that you don't actually think religious belief is detrimental because you are religious so why would it suddenly become detrimental to survival in your opinion if you weren't going anywhere when you died? What difference would it make?

Zombrex

Soul Winner wrote: »

If this is true then the faculty which facilitates 'false beliefs' was also allowed to evolve for no reason other than it wasn't detrimental to our survival. But surely it would have been a serious impediment to us in our dog eat dog natural world?

A good idea of why this isn't true is children.

We tell our children a whole host of false beliefs in order to get them to behave or be safe. The important bits of these beliefs are whether or not they work towards that aim, not whether or not they are true.

For example Don't wander off into the woods because the boogie-man will get you is not a true belief but it can greatly increase the odds that the child will survive to reproduce due to the multitude of real dangers in the woods.

Sam Vimes

Forgot to include this point in my post: Does the simple fact that there are so many religions only one of which can be true and so many beliefs that you know to be false such as Santa Claus not prove that human beings have a tendency towards believing things because they're told they're true rather than because they're shown to be true?

Soul Winner

Wik and Sam. I understand how telling a few fibs can aid survival in certain situations now, but what I'm confused about is how the faculty which facilitated the capacity for 'false beliefs' was able to develop 'early on' in the rush and tumble time when the dog eat dog scrambling to find a niche era ruled. If Natural Selection is true then all I'm saying is that I find it difficult to accept that a faculty like this would have been allowed to develop early on. I understand that now it might be of benefit in certain situations but not back then, not even its subatomic development would have been allowed to flourish then surely? If Natural Selection is true then all that mattered was survival. If by some chance this unbeneficial (at that time) faculty was able to develop back then, then surely Natural Selection is not the only ghost in the machine here, maybe there are other process that have not been considered are at play also. Processes that allow for the formation of these types of faculties wholly apart from Natural Selection. And I'm not talking about supernatural ones, I'm looking at this as if Natural Selection is true. Sam said that Natural Selection kicked in just after life developed so it has been at work since the very beginning and would therefore have not selected the essential structures necessary to facilitate these unbeneficial faculties early on, so my question is how did we develop them later on if the basic structures in the brain which facilitate these faculties were not there?

Sam Vimes

Soul Winner wrote: »

Wik and Sam. I understand how telling a few fibs can aid survival in certain situations now, but what I'm confused about is how the faculty which facilitated the capacity for 'false beliefs' was able to develop 'early on' in the rush and tumble time when the dog eat dog scrambling to find a niche era ruled. If Natural Selection is true then all I'm saying is that I find it difficult to accept that a faculty like this would have been allowed to develop early on.

It's not a capacity for 'false beliefs', it's a compulsion to believe things that adults tell us, which is just a sentient version of copying everything our parents did so we could learn things like how to eat and how to hunt back before we were even apes. I'm sure you've heard of the old Jesuit saying "give me a child until he is seven and I will give you the man". You know yourself that children believe wholeheartedly whatever you tell them because they don't know any better.

False beliefs are a side effect of the otherwise very useful compulsion to believe whatever your parents tell you and there have been many false beliefs that have led to deaths but belief in religion is not necessarily harmful as long as it's tempered by a bit of common sense. If you believe in God it's possible that it will lead you to fly a plane into a building if people you respect tell you that's what he wants but equally it can give you confidence to take risks that work out to your advantage, such as how the Jews were encouraged to invade and conquer other nations because they thought god was on their side. Basically, just because a belief is false doesn't mean it will be harmful.

Another example would be all the rules for life in the old testament. They had to be told things like not to eat pork or shellfish because there was no safe way to cook them and they were harmful so the little white lie "God says they're bad" kept millions of people alive. I'm sure you can see yourself what you perceive to be the benefits of a life of belief, for example the moral code that says that casual sex and prostitution are bad, thus preventing STDs. Do you think these benefits would be lessened if your God wasn't actually there?

Soul Winner wrote: »

Sam said that Natural Selection kicked in just after life developed

Sorry you're kind of misunderstanding me here. It's not some kind of guided process, it's just dumb trial and error. The first basic form of life reproduced in that imperfect way that led to mutations and all but the mutations that happened to be beneficial resulted in death.

Soul Winner wrote: »

I understand that now it might be of benefit in certain situations but not back then, not even its subatomic development would have been allowed to flourish then surely? If Natural Selection is true then all that mattered was survival. If by some chance this unbeneficial (at that time) faculty was able to develop back then, then surely Natural Selection is not the only ghost in the machine here, maybe there are other process that have not been considered are at play also. Processes that allow for the formation of these types of faculties wholly apart from Natural Selection. And I'm not talking about supernatural ones, I'm looking at this as if Natural Selection is true. Sam said that Natural Selection kicked in just after life developed so it has been at work since the very beginning and would therefore have not selected the essential structures necessary to facilitate these unbeneficial faculties early on, so my question is how did we develop them later on if the basic structures in the brain which facilitate these faculties were not there?

This capacity didn't develop back in the single celled organism days, it was far later than that. For one thing the brain had to develop because a single celled organism has no concept of "parent" or anything for that matter. It was several billion years later. We developed these faculties later on because that's the wonder of evolution. A random mutation happened that meant that an animal copied everything its parents did and these animals survived better than those without that instinct, so that instinct survives to this day. Simple as that

robindch

Soul Winner wrote: »

If Natural Selection is true then all I'm saying is that I find it difficult to accept that a faculty like this would have been allowed to develop early on.

So, your own belief is that a faculty for acquiring faulty beliefs is only possible if -- ignoring the false dichotomy -- god designed you?

What does having a faulty belief mechanism say about believing that god exists?

Zombrex

Soul Winner wrote: »

Wik and Sam. I understand how telling a few fibs can aid survival in certain situations now, but what I'm confused about is how the faculty which facilitated the capacity for 'false beliefs' was able to develop 'early on' in the rush and tumble time when the dog eat dog scrambling to find a niche era ruled.

Why?

Again the truthfulness of a belief is irrelevant to evolution. All that matters is that the belief helps you survive to reproduce.

Soul Winner wrote: »

If Natural Selection is true then all that mattered was survival. If by some chance this unbeneficial (at that time) faculty was able to develop back then, then surely Natural Selection is not the only ghost in the machine here, maybe there are other process that have not been considered are at play also.

Why are you saying that developing a false belief is not beneficial?

My dog thinks fireworks are the scariest thing in the world. She goes ape crazy when she hears one. That is a false belief, the fireworks are not going to harm her at all.

But the evolutionary processes that lead to the instinct (a primitive form of belief) that "fireworks = bad, run away" has developed in her species because it provides an evolutionary benefit. Some loud things are dangerous. Evolution is not sophisticated enough to determine that fireworks are a loud thing that isn't bad. This has lead to my dog believing (for want of a better term for dogs) that fireworks are dangerous and she should run away from them, which isn't true. The falseness of this belief is absorbed into the benefit of the wider instinct. It is not that evolutionarily disadvantageous that my dog runs away from fireworks. Believing they are bad isn't going to harm her (apart from the odd story you hear about a dog being so wound up they have a heart attack). And the benefits of this belief outweigh the any potential harm.

If she believes that everything loud is bad and dangerous, even though that isn't true, this provides an evolutionary advantage. Evolution is too slow to fine grain instincts as to what is actually a dangerous loud sound and what isn't. The advantage only comes if you build the instinct that everything loud is dangerous (a false belief) and just take your changes with that.