Naturalism - What is it all about

[Hardy]

See above - "unknowable based on the information available to us at present".

[seafoid]

The Bible starts with the words 'In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.'

Later it claims: 'And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the
        field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam
        to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called
        every living creature, that was the name thereof'.

And then: 'Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field
        which the LORD God had made.'

Thus it is irrefutable, according to anyone who holds the Bible as the Truth, that God created the serpent. Not only that but He created the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

Given that God thus created everything and everyone, why would he create a) the knowledge of evil and b) the serpent?

This is the fundamental premise of creationism and any logical analysis would have to see it as at least suspect. Thus it inevitable that people would explore alternative possibilities. Science has shown most of the beliefs long held by the Church to be almost impossible. That does not rule out the existence of God, merely it undermines the interpretation and implementation of what man decided was His will.

It's also anti snake. Snakes have been persecuted for too long.

[Fear ón Srath Bán]

J70 said this in two lines, but I don't have the gift of conciseness concision.

[Hardy]

Maybe i don't have the gift of preciseness precision either, then.


However, accordion to my (Concise) OED:
concise <definition> ... ~NESS n.
concision n. Conciseness.

[The Iceman]

So here's my understanding.
Science is a trustworthy method of investigating and gaining accurate information about the natural world?
Naturalism is a philosophy that says the natural world is all there is?

[seafoid]

Why did God create so many different religions? Why do Hindus believe in thousands of gods if there is only one god  ?
Are the Hindus wrong? 

[The Iceman]

Why did God create so many different religions? Why do Hindus believe in thousands of gods if there is only one god  ?
Are the Hindus wrong?

Wrong thread  - this is about Naturalism

[Lecale2]

I thought this was a thread about going naked at the beach.

[Hardy]

So here's my understanding.
Science is a trustworthy method of investigating and gaining accurate information about the natural world?
Naturalism is a philosophy that says the natural world is all there is?

This reads like the opening line for a follow up of "OK, well in that case - GOTCHA!"

But yes, I would concur that that's a reasonable summary of naturalism, though I would amend it slightly to say naturalism is a philosophy that says the natural world is all we know there is.

I am aware of shortcomings in the applicability of the philosophy in all cases. For instance, there's a great discussion about how mathematics fits in with naturalism. The scientific method proceeds by hypothesis, test and confirmation. However, mathematics proceeds by pure reasoning – there is no process of experimentation and empirical confirmation of results. Yet science is utterly dependent on mathematics.

So it's not sufficient to say that the scientific method alone is sufficient to describe the natural world. There has to be a definition that includes mathematics and other means of reasoning – e.g. logic - that do not strictly follow the scientific method.

But the key word here is 'reasoning' and I think I would subscribe to a broader philosophy of reason or rationalism, rather than something called naturalism. In general, this contrasts with theism and religion in relying on reason and deduction from known facts and observations, using the scientific method and other means of reasoning, such as mathematics, rather than relying on speculation about supernatural intervention in the natural world.

It's a philosophy that values and promotes honesty, intellectual rigour, respect for the individual and individual responsibility as against authoritarianism, credulity and abdication of personal responsibility to arbitrary, imagined higher powers.

[seafoid]

Some of the pagans of Roman times had ideas that will resonate again once climate change hits us and religion has no answers.


http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2011/dec/08/most-charming-pagan/

The Swerve: How the World Became Modern
by Stephen Greenblatt


Lucretius, as it proclaimed, was an "Epicurean" poet—a follower of the Greek philosopher Epicurus.  The stars, the planets, and the animals and people that inhabited the earth had all come into being by chance, as particles collided, and would eventually fall apart again into nothingness. The gods formed a separate order of being, and took no interest in the fates of humans. Hence it was pointless to fear them or invoke their help.
After surveying the disasters and miseries of human life—which included the plague, vividly described in terms that Lucretius adapted from the Greek historian Thucydides—a wise man would devote himself not to the service of divinities but to the pursuit of true and lasting pleasures: above all the state of ataraxia, freedom from disturbance, which could be attained by contemplation—but also friendship. This was a magnificent vision, as Stephen Greenblatt shows in The Swerve, one that taught the votary of wisdom how to abandon fear and take pleasure in the beauty of the world—but also one impossible to reconcile with Christian ideas about God, the cosmos, and the duties of mankind.

[The Iceman]

Hardy not a gotcha moment at all. I am honestly interested in the thinking behind a lot of this.
I can't agree with your addition and underlining though if it is saying that the natural world is all there is. If Science only deals with the examination of nature, if something other than or outside nature existed, then by definition it would be outside the realm of what science investigates.

The question of whether God exists or whether nature is all there is, has to be a strictly philosophical question. The answers cannot be determined by the use of scientific method or instruments. For example you can't use a microscope to discover whether right or wrong exist or a ruler to check if courage is a virtue. Likewise just because science has not stumbled over God in a field in Kerry means nothing at all with regard to the question of whether or not God exists. If God was a material substance, it might.

Just because science helps us to better understand the natural world doesn't mean naturalism (the philosophical position that nothing exists but the natural world) is shown to be true....

[Hardy]

What is the case for God then, Iceman? By what methods are we to determine whether or not he exists?

[muppet]

So here's my understanding.
Science is a trustworthy method of investigating and gaining accurate information about the natural world?
Naturalism is a philosophy that says the natural world is all there is?

I don't necessarily subscribe to this.

You limited the thread to Naturalism and this unfairly frames those of us who struggle with the Catholic Church in particular and any other church for that matter. It does't mean I can be pigeonholed into Naturalism.

As Stephen Hawkins pointed out, we are fairly sure that the Universe began with The Big Bang. But we can't be sure what went before and thus the concept of a God must be considered possible. But this God wouldn't resemble what most of the various dogmas suggest He might be.

[The Iceman]

What is the case for God then, Iceman? By what methods are we to determine whether or not he exists?

Scripture says God exists. It says God created the Cosmos and everything in it. Me and you. And made man in His image. Consider creation and everything in it - surely that suggests to you that there is a Creator? You may not accept it as true but do you recognise my argument as at least coherent?
Following on from that then if God doesn't exist then the Cosmos surely would be irretrievably unintelligent?

Humanity itself remains forever inexplicable when seen through the lens of atheistic naturalism.

The truth that God exists is evident within all of us. We are all walking advertisements that God exists.

[J70]

We'll get back to the rest of it later, but if there is a Creator, then what created the creator? And what created that creator. And so on and on. If you posit (using only the incredulity argument, mind you) that a supposedly intelligent cosmos requires a creator by necessity, then surely the creator of such a cosmos would similarly require an even more amazing creator. Where does it end?