I genuinely believe that an opposite conclusion, unsavoury as it may be to some, can allow us to understand why there is such a diversity of conclusions with regard to the subject of this thread.
In other words, I believe our individual objectives have little if anything to do with establishing what is real about any situation. Rather our primary aim is to reach a conclusion that is comfortable and convenient of us personally, or basically, what makes us most happy. Pretence and self-delusion are major attributes of the human modus operandi.
Given that in the area of religion, we are dealing with an area where we simply cannot know the reality (despite the repeated assertions of one poster in this thread, I remain resolutely unconvinced). Therefore, we are essentially free to concoct any sort of nonsense that is most convenient to us. As none of us can ever know the reality, genuine contradiction is impossible.
Wonderful opportunity for imposters.

When we realize this, I think it makes us that much more tolerant of others' beliefs, since they are as likely to be correct as our own.

Well, that is certainly true. Since, without the Bible, I could not claim knowledge at all, and since any attempt to construct a workable epistemology would result in self-refuting incoherence, it is certainly the case that there is no possibility of proving the biblical worldview wrong. But one cannot prove the truth wrong in any case, so you are merely stating the obvious.

Perhaps so. I do not preclude that possibility.

But I have explained why it is not arbitrary. It seems as if you are acknowledging that my reasoning is valid, but denying that this has any ramifications. Do you consider reasoning to be unrelated to reality?

Yes it does, and I have shown why. There is not an atheist here who can justify any non-trivial claim to knowledge, nor refute the biblical worldview. On the other hand, the Christians (if they are holding fast to Scripture) are in quite the opposite situation.

An epistemology based on personal assertion is incoherent. It, in effect, relegates all events to the mind of the asserter, and therefore denies an external reality. However, even in an internal reality, no justification exists for belief in uniformity, induction, etc. An assertion based on subjective perception by definition is rationally unjustified, even to oneself. Only an assertion based on objective knowledge (such as the self-knowledge God has) can provide a valid epistemological foundation. The fact that there is no point of contact between a subjectivist, internal worldview and an objectivist, external worldview is irrelevant to the question, because I am not trying to use one to refute the other. I don't need to, since I can simply point out that the subjectivist worldview is self-refuting by definition.

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I think you mean what sort of justification for belief. Clearly, the objective revelation of the source of knowledge is the justification I would accept. The personal assertion of a subjective person who comes by their beliefs in a way they don't understand is certainly not a valid justification for anything.

You appear to have missed my point entirely regarding why God's revelation is a valid justification—it is because he does not gain knowledge from an external source, but all knowledge is internal to him. God is the originator of knowledge, and is thus the only qualified party for asserting something as true. We can only assert something as true inasmuch as we are echoing an assertion of God.

You also failed to recognize what I said earlier regarding empiricism. I deny that the physical event of my reading is in any way causally connected to the mental (non-physical) event of my knowing. To believe such a thing would be, frankly, stupid. Rather, I affirm that there is a correlation between sense experience and knowledge: a correlation caused by God. On the occasion of sense experience, corresponding knowledge is imparted by God to my mind. I do not gain knowledge by some kind of power of my own, and neither is knowledge created by some kind of power of the external world. It is simply absurd to suppose that non-rational physical processes could give rise to rational non-physical cognitive processes.

Such as what?

I just mentioned one, above: non-rational processes leading to rational ones. There are all sorts of arguments which can be made from the existence of reason which demonstrate any God-denying worldview to be inherently self-contradictory.

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But you have no justification for trusting what you see with your own eyes, if you do not presuppose the objective revelation of God which says that it is trustworthy. Without a knowledge-giver infallibly revealing that your senses are basically accurate, you have utterly no epistemic basis for assuming so. It could be the case that your senses are completely inaccurate; or even that the association you make between the mental event of "seeing" and the physical event of light entering your eyes is a false one. Perhaps you only appear to have eyes. Perhaps you are not physical at all. It is surprising that atheists are so heavily materialist/naturalist, affirming the physical and reducing the mental to mere abstractions of physical events, when in fact the only thing they know is that mental events, and not physical ones, occur. You have no rational reason to believe in physical events whatsoever, except your own assumption of it, which is simply question-begging.

Why? You seem to be assuming that God's sovereignty precludes communication, which is obviously not the case. You are equivocating between the mechanism of belief-acquisition (the metaphysic), and the study of those beliefs (the epistemology). It is quite possible for God to impart false beliefs as well as true ones—for example, your belief that he does not exist. These beliefs can be rationally evaluated (ie, they can be examined and seen to be logically inconsistent in some way) so that we can determine their truth. We may have little in common in terms of our axioms, but we are nonetheless able to communicate, which fact presupposes at least logical laws in common between us.

You are considering the topic only superficially. For example, you say that water falls on your head; therefore you think such-and-such. But what caused you to think this? The water drop, in and of itself, certainly has no power to cause thoughts in your mind, so there are probably several assumptions about causality implicit here which you have not clarified—and none of them is necessarily rational.

But more basically, I was referring to the notion of evolution; or, more generally, the notion of rational processes taking place in a purely naturalistic world. You see that physical events give rise to other physical events, but when it comes to abstract things like logic you are without explanation. Logic is clearly not a physical thing, and yet it is nonetheless unequivocally necessary and inviolable. It is universal to everyone, and thus is clearly not "created" by anyone within their own mind. It obviously isn't a mere convention, since a convention by definition could be otherwise and can be changed—if we try to think of logic like this it immediately reduces to self-refuting incoherency. Logical laws are something which we all perceive in the same way, and are evidently universal principles which we apprehend. Thus they constitute a kind of basic, universal knowledge. But we know that knowledge entails a mind—and universal knowledge entails a universal mind.

A naturalistic worldview denies the existence of a universal mind and supposes that logical laws are merely the results of physical processes. It assumes that thought is merely some kind of abstraction of the physical. But the physical, by definition, is physical and does not permit abstraction in such a way. You cannot speak of mental events in terms of physical events without losing all explanatory power and invoking some kind of mystery—the very thing that atheists, in their supposed rationality, are so eager to avoid. The very rationality which they claim to uphold is the very thing they are unable to explain, and which is totally incongruent with their beliefs about the world.

I don't need to. Your axioms are internally inconsistent. The supposition of rational processes without a rational agent from which they stem is itself inconsistent. You rely upon logic, yet you are unable to account for it.

Consider my points above. A knowledge of how we come to beliefs relies upon a knowledge of what logic and consciousness is, its origin, and the causal relationships which it entails. You have none of these things. I do, since the Bible infallibly explains them.

Also, you didn't answer my question:

Hope I am not repeating someone(so much to read), hell, let it be said twice:
Come On! What the fuck do you do all day!! You blame non- uniformity of nature when you are late? Ever seen anything drop upward? Would your computer work if the transistors were not extremely unlikely to fail? How is it reasonable to think it ever behaved any different, based on a book 2kyr old?
Science is pretty damn rational. Why? Because it works.. Physics has been used in neigh-every human-made object you have used since birth. And it *is* a tool to get information, albeit physical.

I am sure the bible says some reasonable things, but also that there is plenty of crap in there. (maybe i should read it, so i can point out things next time) By the way, not believing our memories are reliable might well mean that people overwriting the bible might make mistakes too? What about translations? Also, people wrote the bible, not god, why believe them?
By the way, the bible somehow fails to mention how out of 5 × 10^22 observable stars god is somehow interested in what happens on the surface of a small planet near one. If it were so damn rational, why does it not re-assure us?

It's also possible you are not thinking clearly. It's possible that you've misinterpreted the Bible. It's also possible that your dialogs with God are nothing more than delusions of grandeur. Or it's possible that the author of the Bible was really just some guy who was a loony (or even ... an evil demon).

The basic assumptions you are taking for granted are the same things a scientist takes for granted. For example, through all of this, you are assuming you are not loony. Can you justify this assumption?

On knowledge:

Many people hold the common misconception (like Descartes) that there must be a solid foundation to knowledge ... and that one's epistemology must be structured much like a building ... with a solid concrete slab at the bottom. Although this is not the correct model at all.

It reminds me of early cosmology, where the world is asserted to sit on the back of an elephant ... which stands on the back of a tortoise ... who's legs are infinitely long. The only thing that made sense to these people was something sitting on top of something else that was solid.

But the problem with any foundationalist approach to knowledge -- including your own -- is that we may always ask: what is the foundation of the foundation?

A better model of knowledge is to first reject absolute certainty as self-delusion, and then see the picture more like a *web* of beliefs, which are connected at varying tensions. The fundamental question really boils down to *which* assumptions one starts with. These can then be refined repeatedly, or even rejected altogether in favor of others (like a dynamically changing web-like structure). Generally, the starting points are the instincts one is born with (which can't be completely bad, otherwise we'd be dead by now).

I also question why extreme skepticism is assumed to be the correct starting point of any epistemology. Since, if we start there, we can't conclude anything. The research program is still-born. This starting point is rejected by lack of fruit. Or, we may add it as a footnote to more interesting starting points.

About my earlier post; ok, you do accept uniformity. My point was that uniformity is justifyable (but not provable) without god.

The fact that some things in physics behave in a way we can model rationally does not mean that they are rational. Also, structures can form which are a-priory not expected. For instance, formation of crystals, and emergent behavior. Like how flocks of birds, groups of fish and some computer programs behave. Indeed, it is how human cells form humans.

Your system of axioms seems to be monolithic;
-God exists, and he created the bible.(indirectly maybe, at least he determined the contents)
Since he is god, it is true. And it says a lot of things on how to live and such. and is somehow objectively interpretable.
One consequence (according to you) is that god maintains uniformity of physics. (determines what nature does)

Oh, yeah perhaps the above is not the axiom, but the axiom is:
-You can have a "relevation" from which you can objective know the above axiom is actually a fact.
Big deal, just replacing an assumption with another.

Just accept, that like all of us, your beliefs are based on assumptions. Perhaps even stronger; these types of assumptions cannot even be communicated strictly enough to assure that people with seemingly the same assumptions have the same results.
I do believe though, that atheists have the higher ground when it comes to justifying their beliefs, because their beliefs are generally less arbritrary. For instance, it does not contain a god managing a giant universe, but is interested in the surface of this small planet anyway. And this god has a book, but somehow forgot to mention why the universe is so large for so few people.

...

Jasper, you appear to think that I don't believe in the uniformity of nature. But I do. As do you. But if it is so "damn rational" to believe it, it should be easy to make a rational case for it. If it works, you should be able to easily make an airtight case that proves it works. But, on the contrary, although it seems eminently rational and reasonable, one finds that when one attempts to justify this belief, one is confronted with a situation of hopeless doubt from which an epistemology cannot be built. I agree that it seems reasonable to believe that the universe is consistent and uniform, and that we gain information about it through the use of our senses, and that communication is possible, and all these other things we take for granted. It is reasonable to believe these things because the universe is upheld continually by a rational and orderly God, who enables knowledge and communication—and we are all created with an innate knowledge of this. Given a naturalistic worldview, we would to have no reason whatsoever to believe these things.

How can you say this if you haven't read it? Are you just believing it because you feel like it must be true? That is certainly not very rational.

Justifiable and provable mean effectively the same thing. Something is rationally justified if it is rationally proven. How would you justify uniformity?

In any case, my worldview is certainly not based on an assumption; it is based upon the work of God's Spirit in renewing my mind to know the truth of his word. Naturally you will reject this as impossible since you reject, a priori, the existence of God himself; but I have already shown that you have no valid foundation for knowledge, and so your rejection is merely an opinion you hold, and in no way reflects upon the actual state of reality. You may not believe me, but this does not make my testimony false.

As for the size of the universe, even if God had failed to mention why it is so big, what precisely is your argument? That because God has not revealed everything, he therefore cannot exist? I am confused. In any case, you spoke out of turn by presuming to know that the Bible does not comment on this, when in fact it says, saying, "the heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork" (Ps 19:1). The heavens are vast and beautiful to remind us of how infinite and magnificent God is.

I have already answered this objection by pointing out that words have meaning, and that the validity of reasoning can be evaluated using reasoning itself. As for dialogs with God, I am not sure from where you plucked that particular gem. I have never claimed such. And if the numerous authors of the Bible were all insane, it would not be congruent with reality, and would not be consistent between books.

You appear to have missed the point where the presupposition of the Bible as the word of God has logical priority over every other proposition within my worldview. This is what an epistemology does, by definition: rationally justifies other propositions which would otherwise be assumed without warrant. So again, you need to show that you have a valid epistemology in order to justify your assumptions, but I have already done this and so asking me how I justify my assumptions would appear to indicate that you have simply failed to understand most of what I have said so far.

Upon what foundation are you asserting this? It amazes me that you would openly affirm such an obviously self-refuting statement. Since I have a "house-shaped" epistemology, I am in an invincible position from which to declare that you are simply wrong about this. Your inability to construct your own epistemology does not mean that one need not be constructed; that is simply foolish. You are effectively admitting the complete inability of your own worldview to make justified claims to belief, and so are moving the goalpost to obfuscate the fact and pretending that it doesn't matter.

The biblical foundationalist approach is not the same as others. I have already clearly and adequately explained that the foundation of the foundation is the foundation. Obviously a non-revelational foundational approach will fail, because it has no objective propositions upon which to rest. But the Bible is not subjective; it is the revealed word of the self-affirming, self-existent God who created and sustains all things, and in whom knowledge itself exists. It justifies itself by definition.

I am not sure if you are being serious or not; it's hard to take you seriously, but I have heard more insane and obviously self-refuting things affirmed in the past, so I suppose I should give you the benefit of the doubt. In any case, you are simply admitting that you think a totally subjective, knowledge-destroying worldview in which all beliefs are simply chosen and prioritized arbitrarily is acceptable. If that is the case, then it is certainly true that the fool says in his heart, "there is no God" (Ps 14:1), and whoever trusts in his own mind is a fool (Pr 28:26), for you have made knowledge utterly impossible, and thus have no foundation upon which to mount argumentation at all. You may believe that Christianity is false, but you certainly cannot pretend to have rational reasons for it, since your entire worldview is founded upon non-rational assumptions and beliefs.

If you were either, you would not claim to know anything—including that absolute knowledge is impossible, and that Christianity is false. You certainly wouldn't claim to be more rational than me.

In what sense are these plausible? To claim that they are plausible you must have some way of determining this; some foundation of knowledge! When you say they are plausible, you really mean they have a high probability of being correct. But probability is a mathematical function, and is not worked out in the way you would apparently like to think. It requires knowledge of a numerator and a denominator. You do not have these. Do you really only believe without rational justification that it is plausible to think that your senses are accurate. It could be equally plausible that they are not. Again, if you are simply using unjustified subjective beliefs as axioms, you have no foundation for knowledge—you are admitting that nothing you know is necessarily true, and that everything you believe is held irrationally, apart from any kind of logical proof. This is not the position in which the Christian finds himself, since he does not rely upon subjective axioms at all.

If that is merely your opinion, then I can safely ignore it, since it is both unjustified by rational argumentation, and obviously false besides. Do you have any reason for saying this?

And again, on what epistemic basis do you hold this belief about epistemic bases?

As for logical laws, since it takes logic to deny logic, I reject your notion that logic is not universal. How will you prove otherwise? If you try, you use logic, and thus prove my point.

Upon what basis do you assume this? I am glad you seem to agree that a universal knowledge-giver, who must be a personal Mind, must exist for logic to exist, but this does not solve all your problems. If he grants us knowledge, then he must be meddling with us every moment of our existence. Knowledge is not unrelated to other events, so presumably if he is giving us knowledge of them, he is also causing the events themselves, and ordering everything according to his will. In any case, we can agree even on this tentative hypothesis that this Mind is intimately and continually involved with our existence, which certainly implies that we are of some concern to him.

That being the case, and since he is concerned with giving us knowledge, and since I have shown already that only a public and objective revelation can constitute a valid foundation for building a worldview, we should assume that he has given us this revelation. Simply assuming the existence of this mind on the basis of an argument from reason is insufficient. It still does not answer many metaphysical or epistemological questions, and so it does not constitute a valid first principle. For example, the problem of the one and many—how do we answer it? We can only guess. If we are to have a valid worldview, we must be doing more than guessing; we must be certain. So again, we come back to the need for revelation.

Anyway, that's enough for now.

I don't claim to know anything with certainty. I thought I made that clear. (?)

I BELIEVE that absolute CERTAINTY about knowledge is false.

I haven't commented on Christianity, I don't think.

I'm pretty sure I haven't claimed to be more rational than you, either. We can check--I only have about 10 posts.

They are plausible to ME! In the sense that I like them, they resonate with me, they make sense to ME.

I don't ask that you adopt them. You can decide for yourself what is plausible to you.

No I don't!

Yes: favorable outcomes/total possible outcomes.

IMO mathematical probability makes no sense whatsoever in discussing this issue. None at all. Numerator and denominator wouldn't even be numbers. They just don't make sense here, which is why I didn't think about, or bring up probability.

Yes.

I don't believe justification is possible for axioms, or required.

Yes. Except, since we're being picky, I would say nothing I believe is necessarily true.

Well, not exactly. I would say that many of my beliefs are arrived at logically, assuming my axioms are true. (which they might not be).

So, everything I believe might be wrong; but some of it is arrived at logically, from the axioms.

My friend, you can safely ignore anything I say on this board, if you like.

I'll try to make my posts as interesting as I can, so that you don't want to ignore them; but it's safe to do so, in any case.

My reason for saying it (DChristopher: "even presupposition of revelation of God would not be sufficient justification to guarantee "knowledge."") is that I don't believe we can justify knowledge at ALL. In the end, nothing can be justified all the way. You have to start with an unjustified axiom, and go from there.

On what epistemic basis do I hold the belief that there is no epistemic basis possible?

Is this a serious question?

Clarification: by "not universal," I just mean that some people don't understand logic. I would prove that to you by introducing you to an idiot.

I still think there is an absolute correct logic; I even allowed for a Logic-Giver later in my post. Sorry for the confusion.

By definition of "assumption," I don't need a basis for one.

I'll come back to the rest later, gotta run.

[n] loyalty or allegiance to a cause or a person; "keep the faith"; "they broke faith with their investors"
[n] complete confidence in a person or plan etc; "he cherished the faith of a good woman"; "the doctor-patient relationship is based on trust"
[n] a strong belief in a supernatural power or powers that control human destiny; "he lost his faith but not his morality"
[n] institution to express belief in a divine power; "he was raised in the Baptist religion"; "a member of his own faith contradicted him"

(lol, kuja, refreshing)
Actually, i got that impression, but when read things better, i posted the mistake. (see reply #91) It is very reasonable to have the uniformity axiom, because, as i pointed out, you actually use it all day.(#89) Why should i get a way stronger axiom for it, when this one explains what i need. (of course (some) axioms are to help explain what is going on, and are thus based on what is observed)

Frankly, i can tell from what people say based on it, and that the wording is so different from things i read that make sense, also no-one ever gives a good summary. Guess it is a hunch, really. Perhaps i should read it before saying it next time.
Actually, not really, when people say an axiom/postulate is justifyable they do not mean provable. Making an axiom of the existence of a spaghetti monster is certainly less reasonable then the uniformity of physics axiom. I certainly would not try to prove uniformity by assuming the existence of a spaghetti monster that makes uniformity true. (this as been pointed out before by the way.)
Been over this.. You can rename it revelation, the 'work of God's Spirit in renewing my mind to know the truth' or whatever you want, but existence of god is still an assumption. And although circular reasoning is not inconsistent, it does not prove anything either.
Presuming the existence of god, and assuming he wants me to believe in him, and that he will know we will learn about the size of the universe, he has to mention, because not mentioning so would be a counterargument against the bible.(and you said christians were supposedly rational in their belief) (because it would seem unlikely he would make the universe that large, just for humans.)
"the heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork" ... does not say anything about the actual size of the universe. Sounds like some dude totally unaware of the scales. The sentence after that, _you_ added.

(#88)Even knowing it is based on math axioms, maybe none of us really know what logic is. That does not justify your claim on that this logic somehow belongs to god.

This is circular reasoning.

For you the tortoise is standing on it's own back. This still leaves you with a tortoise floating in mid air.

Thank you.

Who was the loony that wrote that?

To me, it seems like you've assumed your own mind is reliable though. Otherwise, we wouldn't be having a debat