Is it rational to be a theist?

[harvey1]

According to an atheist, there are few, if any, reasons to believe that God exists, and the God belief has been passed down from pre-scientific times in the guise of religion. The atheist often believes this in itself is good reason to reject the existence of God. The atheist might even say it is not rational to believe in God. Is it rational to be a theist?

[QED]

I would say that there is no doubt that man has always thought it rational to have mystical beliefs. You would have a hard time convincing anyone otherwise. The issue has to be: are such beliefs justifiable? The fact that mankind has depicted mystical events and beings right from the very beginning of recorded history is also beyond question. The earliest cave paintings are a clear indicator of a belief in the transcendency of natural forms into the supernatural. It strikes me that this could be the result of one of two things:

1)Either there is a real 'signal' coming from the supernatural realm into the natural that inspires such behavior.

2)Or it is all just a result of humans filling their imaginations with interesting possibilities.

A combination of the two is not worth considering as it is covered by the first proposition. What we do know is that the 'signal' if it exists is far from clear. The scrapyard of religious beliefs tells us this much. This is the first warning sign that human imagination is playing a role in a belief of the supernatural. Unfortunately for most strains of theistic beliefs there is also a clear motive for their fabrication -- if the 'signal' that is being received presented us with something hard to swallow we might consider such beliefs to be somewhat more trustworthy, but as the news always seems good in the face of what appears to be an otherwise indifferent world, we should once again be on our guard.

The main source of irrationality therefore is the naked assertion that there is a supernatural component to the world in the absence of unambiguous evidence. Without the benefit of our modern understanding of all the "ologies" we might be forgiven for ascribing puzzling phenomena to supernatural forces, yet a vast amount of the puzzle that influenced earlier philosophers/religions has now been given fully naturalistic explanations.

Indeed we are now reaching the point of where we can only argue that it is just the origin of nature that could be supernatural but would knowledge of this have been such a source of inspiration to religious/mystical thinking in the past? I don't believe it would have been: We have to contemplate the effects of this knowledge on cavemen through to thinkers of the modern day. This means, for example, that there would never have been any blood sacrifices and Mr Paley would not have puzzled over the found watch. Of course it is not practical to repeat this experiment on the past and present population of the planet, but we can see the effects by talking with children educated in modern day science. In my experience a child read in all the 'ologies', with a firm grasp of most of the natural processes leading to the visible world is quite content to consider the existence of the supernatural as a moot point.

[Curious]

Had I not had overwhelming evidence to compel me into believing, I would have remained an atheist. I am not saying I believe everything, or even much of what is claimed but I know that if it looks like a duck and sounds like a duck, then it is more than likely a duck.
I think many people believe because they wish to cheat death. I suppose it might be thought irrational by some to accept death without at least attempting some form of avoidance.

[ST88]

According to an atheist, there are few, if any, reasons to believe that God exists, and the God belief has been passed down from pre-scientific times in the guise of religion. The atheist often believes this in itself is good reason to reject the existence of God. The atheist might even say it is not rational to believe in God. Is it rational to be a theist?

The question is a little bit more complex than it appears. Many people are given (or see for themselves) only bits of the picture, and these bits are usually the most eye-poppingly convincing bits of support for the existence of God. In the face of such evidence, and very little to the contrary, a rational person would have no choice but to believe in God.

But, of course, these bits are taken in isolation -- without context, without contributing and coincidental factors, and without sufficient information from a non-theist viewpoint that would have explained what those bits were doing there. I don't think it's a question of rationality. I think it's a question of having all the facts -- and even knowing that there are additional facts to be had.

For example, I would hazard a guess that a majority of the population would not know how to corectly explain how evolution works, theist or no. And so, when confronted by the false picture of evolution that is given to them by Creationists -- infamously straw men pictures -- it would be presented such that any rational person would reject that picture. Without knowing all the facts, it could be rejected as a ridiculous theory. Why are scientists pursuing this hombobbery? It's so clearly false. A good deal of this goes on in politics, also, which explains the re-election of our current president.

[harvey1]

But, of course, these bits are taken in isolation -- without context, without contributing and coincidental factors, and without sufficient information from a non-theist viewpoint that would have explained what those bits were doing there. I don't think it's a question of rationality. I think it's a question of having all the facts -- and even knowing that there are additional facts to be had.

If you don't know the answer to a mystery, it's typical to use a branching decision tree to label the possibilities. So, for example, there are some very unusual constant values that seem ideal for life and formation of galaxies, stars, etc.. Would you consider that God is one possibility to explain why this is so? If so, you have a branch dividing right at that point. Theists go one direction, atheists suppose the mystery is solved by selecting a different branch, agnostics suppose that we don't have enough information to decide which branch is correct.

If we follow the atheist branch we find the branch terminates into the trunck, namely some uncaused multiverse. Hence, we haven't explained anything really about the universe. The universe is caused by a Universe having more structure and more mystery behind it than the simplest state of our world: a big bang.

Why would someone not only assume the atheist branch is reasonable, why would they make the further statement that the theist branch is not rational? It seems to me that the atheist is the one who is being irrational. Please explain that to me.

[QED]

Why would someone not only assume the atheist branch is reasonable, why would they make the further statement that the theist branch is not rational? It seems to me that the atheist is the one who is being irrational. Please explain that to me.

In my particular case your 'not only' is superfluous because the reason for taking the A-branch is that it's the only known alternative to the T-branch wich has been judged to be irrational.

This judgment is based on numerous observations but the one that seems most immediate is the observation that an uncaused causer of the (meta)universe looks to be far less parsimonious than a 'plain old' uncaused (meta)universe on its own. (I use "uncaused" here to stand for a naked fact, unknown, mystery etc. It could even stand for "collapse of wavefunction").

When it comes to judging parsimony I think that theists are way too lenient with themselves in counting the cost of the attributes they endow on their god(s). I would have to believe that it would be relatively 'easy' for a god to come about rather than a (meta)universe for the T-branch to look attractive. But simple logic tells me that anything capable of having a desire to create an entire universe for an objectively good purpose is a whole mountain of stuff bigger than a plasma that takes 13 billion years to customize itself into stuff that can also have desires let alone create whole universes.

So after 13 billion years this custom stuff is stood around contemplating it's home. This stuff has only just got to the point where it can afford to stand around and contemplate things because it's only just learnt the trick of planning and designing - things that free stuff from a purely mechanical existence and things that only very highly evolved stuff can do. It's understandable, therefore, why the mystery presented by existence would be explained in the highly evolved terms of planning and designing, and why the stuff might take such things for granted when counting the cost of an imagined designer.

Add to this the modus-operandi of life which grants a brief spell of consciousness to all living stuff and engenders a powerful compulsion towards survival. This provides a sure recipe for imagining a scheme in which stuff becomes immortal and given the evident indifference of the environment and disease to which stuff is subject, it would feel greatly comforted by the idea that someone was looking out for it all the same. And this emotional investment becomes yet another reason to overlook the unlikeliness of an imagined designer.

[harvey1]

In my particular case your 'not only' is superfluous because the reason for taking the A-branch is that it's the only known alternative to the T-branch wich has been judged to be irrational.

Who made the judgement and when? And, supposing that it was judged to be irrational by some competent source, the question still remains, why consider it irrational to disacknowledge the T-branch when it requires us to advocate an irrational termination of the A-branch into a Universe more complex than our own? If that is the case, then aren't both branches irrational, hence aren't both rational by that reasoning?

This judgment is based on numerous observations but the one that seems most immediate is the observation that an uncaused causer of the (meta)universe looks to be far less parsimonious than a 'plain old' uncaused (meta)universe on its own. (I use "uncaused" here to stand for a naked fact, unknown, mystery etc. It could even stand for "collapse of wavefunction").

There are numerous observations of "no God" says the atheist, but once you branch goes further and further away from our universe, it seems to me that the atheist must claim more and more knowledge about what is further and further away. The theist is not necessarily in this situation. The theist can think the concept of rationality involves mind. For example, we talked about interpretation of truth and how that involves a mindful interpretation. The theist can believe that this is much more reasonable a view without having to postulate an A-branch that connects to a bigger and more mysterious universe than the one we find ourselves in. Why not even consider the first few trillionth of a second moments as almost the beginning? Why all of sudden switch gears and imagine a material reality more complicated than the one we see? However, despite this, isn't it rational and reasonable to believe that truth may be required, and truth might require mindful interpretation (e.g., an omniscient interpreter)?

But simple logic tells me that anything capable of having a desire to create an entire universe for an objectively good purpose is a whole mountain of stuff bigger than a plasma that takes 13 billion years to customize itself into stuff that can also have desires let alone create whole universes.

Let's suppose that gobbly-gook stuff is the cause of the universe. It still doesn't answer why a universe such as ours can happen in principle. For example, divide the evolving gobbly-gook into small time pieces of gook events. Let's say that we divide the gook events into the smallest gook events possible. This is either an infinitesimal moment of being a particular state of gook, or it is some quanta finite moment of gook evolution. Either case, you still cannot explain how a gook-1 slice of time evolves into a gook-2 slice of time. What connects the two gook moments? If you say they randomly evolve from gook-1 to gook-2, then how can there be anything but random events in the universe? Everything is random. This doesn't square with our own notions of mental control where we non-randomly choose what we are going to do and how we are going to do it. If random gook evolution was responsible, it would seem contradictory that gook-1 evolves into gook-2 randomly.

On the other hand, if gook-1 evolves into gook-2 because of some reason, then there is something more fundamental than goobly-gook in your atheist scenario. You have something metaphysical that dictates what goobly-gook can become and how, and that would seem to call for some kind of laws. However, if there are laws, then you're back to the problem of interpretation. How is it that the laws know that gook-1 is becoming gook-2, and not gook-2 becoming gook-1? How come gook-1 doesn't get stuck on the way to becoming gook-2, or simply get caught in some kind of LP record skip where gook-1 becomes gook-2, and does it over and over ad infinitum? Or, even worse, why doesn't alpha gook skip to omega-gook and the universe is over even before it began. It seems that the laws cannot be deaf, dumb, and blind, and that requires attributing a certain amount of intelligence to the laws. Something that your A-scenario requires that you label as irrational.

Therefore, it seems that your ontology just doesn't want to consider T-branch. I still cannot get a reason why that is so given the above reasons to consider it. At least consider it a rational and reasonable perspective. It would seem you could go at least that far.

[QED]

Who made the judgement and when?

In my particular case your 'not only' is superfluous because the reason for taking the A-branch is that it's the only known alternative to the T-branch wich has been judged to be irrational.

And, supposing that it was judged to be irrational by some competent source, the question still remains,why consider it irrational to disacknowledge the T-branch when it requires us to advocate an irrational termination of the A-branch into a Universe more complex than our own?

Explain to me how it is known that we branch into a universe more complex than our own?

There are numerous observations of "no God" says the atheist, but once you branch goes further and further away from our universe, it seems to me that the atheist must claim more and more knowledge about what is further and further away.

On the contrary "The Knowledge" is firmly rooted in those universal observations about the capacity of evolving systems to buck the trend towards higher entropy. We can study our own universe and make comfortable inferences about lower levels of complexity evolving towards higher levels.

The theist is not necessarily in this situation. The theist can think the concept of rationality involves mind. For example, we talked about interpretation of truth and how that involves a mindful interpretation.

The theist can believe that this is much more reasonable a view without having to postulate an A-branch that connects to a bigger and more mysterious universe than the one we find ourselves in. Why not even consider the first few trillionth of a second moments as almost the beginning? Why all of sudden switch gears and imagine a material reality more complicated than the one we see? However, despite this, isn't it rational and reasonable to believe that truth may be required, and truth might require mindful interpretation (e.g., an omniscient interpreter)?.

Well I recognize that this is the kernel of your pet theory, but you have failed to join all the dots for spetey and me. I think it is entirely reasonable to stick to the opinion that minds are made from matter and I'm sorry to say that this puts pay to the remainder your argument straight away.

[harvey1]

Explain to me how it is known that we branch into a universe more complex than our own?

The universe at the big bang contained one force (the graviostrongelectroweak force), it was no larger than a planck length across, and it was expanding. That's about as simple as it gets. Now, you want to say it came from some universe infinitely bigger, infinitely older, and infinitely more structures than the one we observe today?

On the contrary "The Knowledge" is firmly rooted in those universal observations about the capacity of evolving systems to buck the trend towards higher entropy. We can study our own universe and make comfortable inferences about lower levels of complexity evolving towards higher levels.

But, that's all that they are, inferences. Can you use the same kind of inference to describe the picture hanging on the wall next to me? I'm much, much closer than this distant world where you claim to have knowledge, so please tell me what this picture looks like by your amazing gift of inference.

Well I recognize that this is the kernel of your pet theory, but you have failed to join all the dots for spetey and me. I think it is entirely reasonable to stick to the opinion that minds are made from matter and I'm sorry to say that this puts pay to the remainder your argument straight away.

I think you are confusing this "pet theory" with another pet theory of mine. Spetey has never been introduced to it. So, please tell me how causal ties connect one gook moment to the next. I think it is important since you are advocating a view that you think is correct, so you should be able to answer objections to it.

[ST88]

Why would someone not only assume the atheist branch is reasonable, why would they make the further statement that the theist branch is not rational? It seems to me that the atheist is the one who is being irrational. Please explain that to me.

I happen to agree that strict atheism is not completely rational. It makes no sense to answer a yes or no question like this that carries with it no opportunity for evidence or validation. To answer the question at all is not rational. I believe it is just as irrational to be a theist.

Naturally, this is a zero sum game, so either side claims the other is wrong. That makes sense in a situation where beliefs are held firmly.