The Repugnant Conclusion

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@joshuagrover9162 12 күн бұрын

even though it didn’t affect the debate, the moderator shouldn’t make those biased comments in favor of swinburne imo great debate so far though I wanna say major props for setting this up and hosting, super enjoying it. Thanks for doing this

@TheRepugnantConclusion 12 күн бұрын

@@joshuagrover9162 noted!

@joshuagrover9162 12 күн бұрын

@ thanks haha, love the content tho bro I went to your channel and literally put all of your videos on my watch later lol

@TheRepugnantConclusion 12 күн бұрын

@ anytime! Thanks for the feedback :)

@articlesbyaphysicist 16 күн бұрын

I think the grim reaper paradox can be resolved by appealing to the physical characteristics of the real world --- you can't actually have an infinite number of grim reapers in a room. In practice if you tried to instantiate the grim reaper paradox it would be impossible, but because only a finite mass can occupy a finite space in this physical universe. That means that a premise along the lines of "if the grim reaper setup is impossible then an infinite past is impossible" is false and the argument fails. Likewise, imagine a counter that has always existed. What would it show? In our universe, it would show "Error: arithmetic overflow detected" or if it didn't detect that overflow it would show some arbitrary incorrect number. In both cases, all you can conclude is that infinite counters who have counted since infinity past are impossible, rather than that time itself must have had a beginning. Tristram shandy will eventually forget what he was doing all those years ago and one day he will eventually even forget which day he's meant to be biographying. Sad but true - our universe simply doesn't let him or anyone remember an infinite number of things, memories being made of matter and Tristram being finite in size. Perhaps, conversely, it may be metaphysically possible for a universe to have always existed ... only if the universe has some physical law that prevents things like counting arbitrarily high, or instantaneous communication (to prevent Hilbert's hotel-like paradoxes). Oddly, perhaps the fact that our actual universe does indeed have information limits such as above is very slight evidence that the universe is indeed infinite in past: You could conceive of a universe in which it was possible to build a counter who could count higher than any given number, and in that universe, these temporal finitism arguments would succeed.

@radscorpion8 23 күн бұрын

By the way this was an excellent debate!!

@TheRepugnantConclusion 12 күн бұрын

Thanks!!

@haydendupree8032 23 күн бұрын

I don’t think Kershnar has thought much about psychophysical harmony or moral knowledge arguments

@Nitroade24 23 күн бұрын

I'd be interested to see a theist philosopher who actually does defend the PSR and the necessity of God reply to Kershnar's case. While Swinburne is a brilliant philosopher, it doesn't seem that he really has the views that Kershnar's arguments target.

@radscorpion8 24 күн бұрын

After listening for 13 minutes, I find Swinburne's position very unsatisfying. Because the approach he is outlining is the same approach that has been implemented for thousands of years of human history, and has been consistently wrong. It is not enough to have a hypothesis H that makes E more probable, and not-H that makes E less probable, and for H to be simple, and for H to fit with background evidence.  All 4 of those criteria could be applied to the decision to explain storms in ancient times to Neptune (the god). Or the Sun rising and setting to Ra. And any other number of unexplained phenomena to Gods. Time and time again, we have seen that science explains all of these phenomena without need of a God, and not because the science is simple - in many cases, the science is actually quite complicated. Plate tectonics is not obvious or simple compared to an angry God that shakes the ground. But it is, nevertheless, true. And the reason why is because we have clear evidence for it.   This is what is missing. Evidence. The time for expecting that the world should fit with our imagined picture of what it should be, that it should fit with our current reasoning and limited knowledge, has been over ever since the enlightenment. That is why philosophy is no longer used to determine what is true; we appeal to evidence instead. And no matter what the theory is, it always comes down to whether evidence can validate it.  So just appealing to these 4 criteria is clearly insufficient. We have seen throughout history how it has failed thousands of times. Why should we expect it to work this time, under even more mysterious circumstances, in a context that we can scarcely comprehend (the origin of our universe?). It just seems fantastically arrogant to think that if this approach didn’t work in much simpler cases near and on Earth, that it will be even more effective on much grander and more difficult questions.   Also his analogy completely misses this point. He thinks that determining whether God created the universe is like a detective determining if John stole money from a safe. It is not, for the simple reason that the detective has clear and abundant material evidence to support his hypothesis. With God, we have nothing. None of the purported claims about how God created the universe are testable, and they are far from obvious. And this is ignoring the huge assumption he makes about how God is the simpler explanation to begin with. To have an infinitely powerful mind that can create reality at will, of course sounds easy to say - but its ridiculous to suggest that whether a concept sounds simple in your head, is equivalent to whether it is simple in reality. A train is simple as a concept, but it is made up of many very complex pieces. How complex must God’s mind be, and how must it be constructed, for it to be able to generate universes from outside of spacetime? This is “simple” to Swinburne? And yet human brains are considered unbelievably complex to neuroscientists? To me it is one in a long list of absurdities

@harlowcj 23 күн бұрын

"That is why philosophy is no longer used to determine what is true. We appeal to evidence instead." And what is your evidence that this philosophical claim is true? If you interpret philosophy according to evidence, rather than interpret evidence according to philosophy, like literally everybody else, what is your starting evidence from which you draw your philosophy that leads you to make such a counter intuitive claim? To put it a different way, why is philosophy of science a thing you can get a degree in, but science of philosophy not only doesn't exist in academia, but seems to be an incoherent concept.

@radscorpion8 23 күн бұрын

@@harlowcj I think you are misunderstanding my position. I am not saying that we test philosophical concepts based on evidence. I don't even know how that would work. How are we going to test the principle of sufficient reason through evidence-based science? The whole point of, especially the kind of philosophy being discussed in this video is that it is purely abstract and logic driven - it doesn't use evidence to reach a conclusion. Rather it follows the format of a syllogism, in which a series of premises leads to a conclusion through reasoned argument, and those premises are sourced either from evidence or from intuition or common sense. I am saying that we should determine what exists in reality based on evidence, and that includes God. And that determining what is true solely based on philosophical arguments - especially ones like "simplicity" or "improved conceptual probability of being true" are not sufficient grounds to determine what is true, which is basically Swinburne's position. Maybe what confused you was taking my statement too literally that philosophy is "no longer used to determine what is true". Philosophy can of course still be used to determine conceptual truths and logical truths. It is a powerful tool to help us reason correctly about what his logically valid and not. But overwhelmingly, when you are talking about what is true about our reality - whether trees exist, whether stars exist, what the laws of physics are, how we interact with the world - those things are properly the domain of science because philosophy is not sufficient on its own to determine these things. It must appeal to evidence or some testable framework to achieve the certainty that is required. God being part of the world, also requires science in order to understand and validate the existence of properly.

@harlowcj 23 күн бұрын

@radscorpion8 Real question. Do you think that God is a thing made out of stuff, like a guy in the clouds?

@floydthomas4195 17 күн бұрын

imagine taking up the time to write all that, and end up sounding like an idiot.

@WorldCrucified 12 күн бұрын

This is not Richard Swinburne's argument at all. So cringe

@jeremyarcus-goldberg9543 24 күн бұрын

A high level of discussion. It would be interesting to find out if any theists believe in God because of these arguments or these are post hoc.

@keitumetsemodipa3012 24 күн бұрын

I don't really hold to the idea of generic theism but I can understand it as a means of distinction between different religions, I've just seen so much reductionists take it too far but to answer your question, Christians by in large the Orthodox and Catholic churches don't hold to the idea that logic is why one should be a Christian, it's called faith for a reason, here's a quote from Aquinas and Palamas on this respectively Aquinas in the Summa Theologica: "Reason prepares the way for faith, providing certain preambles to it, such as the existence of God. But faith itself rests upon divine revelation, which surpasses human reason." (ST II-II, Q.2, A.9) Palamas, in The Triads: "The knowledge of God is not reached by the path of reason and wisdom, but by faith, purity, and union with God through prayer." So basically repentance and believing in the Gospel beings you revelation to God's existence, we aren't a "reason" based religion and I put reason in quotes because people tend to clip me on that and run with it

@aosidh 25 күн бұрын

Did I miss something? Swinburne immediately excuses theism from being consistent with observed reality 🫡

@johnpro2847 25 күн бұрын

even if a god is believed in . How do you personalize and perform meaningless rituals to appease for which he would be totally disinterested in I suspect.Amen

@keitumetsemodipa3012 24 күн бұрын

Your question is kinda all over the place I can't even tell if it's an internal critique or an external one But I'll try my best to answer it anyway For one the assumption that the rituals are meaningless is just inserted in there for who knows what reason but I obviously object, these rituals find their telos in God. God doesn't get appeased he's immutable which entails that he's impassable basically, God's not losing sleep if you and I forget to say grace before a meal, nothing we do affects him. And lastly, God doesn't have interests for the same reason I listed above, God's not like you and I, having desires, hopes, dreams etc he's wholly independent including his actions in relation to the created order, to put it colloquially he literally couldn't be bothered

@johnpro2847 25 күн бұрын

we do not know if a supernatural power exist,, we know for sure he wants to remain anonymous if he exists.Amen

@keitumetsemodipa3012 24 күн бұрын

"We do not know if a supernatural power exist" What do you mean by this? "We know for sure he wants to remain anonymous if he exists." Then help me understand how we don't know if God exists but we somehow know that he wants to remain anonymous if he does, how can these both be the case?

@scotthutson8683 25 күн бұрын

Thanks for sharing this not only are the speakers great but the panel asking questions is full of all stars!! Loved it!