Is it ever rational to believe something you have no evidence for? (morality, society)

[Scottay]

No it is not rational. But humans are not rational being much of the time so that doesnt necessarily mean that believing in God is wrong or crazy.

[NOTaTHEIST]

Originally Posted by Cleverfield

It could be the result of natural processes, but Earth is the only place in the
cosmos lucky enough to have all the right natural processes occur.

This is a blatant naked assertion. The "only" place you say? How would you go about proving that's even a remote possibility? The 3 sextillion stars in our known universe alone makes this empty assertion a near impossibility. The Earth's environment may have produced unique life forms, but it's highly unlikely it's the only place in the known universe where life exists.

You did make this argument earlier...

I have not a shred of actual concrete evidence that life on other planets
exists. Yet, I still believe that life exists elsewhere. Is that rational?

Are you now retracting it? Did you just make this argument to prop up believing in things with no evidence? Are you being hypocritical?

Additionally, I do have evidence to suggest that God exists. We know that the Matrix is possible; in other words, we know that what we perceive may not be a full representation of reality. We know that it's possible that we are like the marble/universe being played with by the alien at the end of Men in Black.

It's funny that your "evidence" is taken from fictional accounts, just like other religious fictions people actually believe are real. I find this highly ironic.

Also, I and many other people have the intuition that God exists.

First we should define what said "God" is. Do you believe it's a natural entity or a supernatural entity?

I have a very strong intuition based upon natural facts that life exists elsewhere, but at least this is a natural intuition and not based on magical/supernatural reasoning.

[NOTaTHEIST]

Originally Posted by Scottay

No it is not rational. But humans are not rational being much of the time so that doesnt necessarily mean that believing in God is wrong or crazy.

This is deep. Let me see if I can understand it. It's not rational to believe in things with no evidence, but because humans typically are not rational it's then ok to believe in things (a god for instance) that are not rational? Hmmm... if this is the case then our species is really screwed.

Perhaps what you meant to say is; because humans are typically not rational, it's understandable that they believe in irrational things like gods? Then I would say yes, you're right on the money. Also, humans have a way of compartmentalizing god belief away from their rational side. If this wasn't the case, it's highly unlikely any of us would still believe in this antiquated notion.

[Cleverfield]

I think really the issue is the difference between a priori, and a posteriori truths. a priori truths require no evidence and are true by virtue of logical necessity. There is no "evidence" that 1+1=2, but it is a logical necessity. Similarly, I believe, while there is no "evidence" of God, the existence of God may be a logical necessity. And I suppose, then I've answered my own question. You don't always need evidence to have a rational belief, sometimes you just need logic.

[NOTaTHEIST]

People wanted to see some math, so let me try some out. Let's use a slightly modified version of the Drake equation to make a point. The Drake equation is specifically looking for the frequency of extant intelligent life in our galaxy alone, but that's not the debate here. We're looking for the frequency of any life in the known universe.



nS = The number of stars capable of supporting life.

fP = The fraction of those stars with planetary systems.

nE = The number of planets, per solar system, with an environment suitable for life.

fL = The fraction of suitable planets on which life actually appears.

N = The number of planets in The Milky Way Galaxy that formed life.


nS; We'll have to assume the known universe contains the approximated 100,000,000,000 galaxies. It could be much more or it could be less because we see much of the universe as it was millions or even billions of years ago. But this is a good starting number and we'll be quantifying our Milky Way galaxy first as it's relatively close and more likely to be a fairly accurate representation.

Obviously, some stars are too short lived to produce life. Those stars we can pretty much instantly discount and are among the rarest of types. Our star is a main-sequence star and is a fairly common type. A low estimate of the number of stars in our galaxy is 200,000,000,000 (2 hundred billion) Let's say just one in 100 of those stars is a star like our own, even though our star is thought of as "common".

nS = 1/100 or 2,000,000,000 stars(2 billion)

fP; Even though we're finding planets in abundance around other stars (even stars that are not main-sequence), we'll say main-sequence stars form planets at a rate of one in ten (this number is probably much higher).

fP = 1/10 or 200,000,000 planetary solar systems (2 hundred million)

nE; We know that 2 planets and one moon in our solar system have conditions which either do support life, did support life or could still support life. Drake I believe thought this number might be as much as one per system, I however think it's probably much lower than that. So, we'll really drop the numbers here and be very conservative and NOT calculate that every system has capable planets. Let's say just one in a thousand solar systems produce such a planet.

nE = 1/1000 or 200,000 planets capable of supporting life

FL; Obviously supporting life and forming life are different propositions. If all life forms from some type of non-life to life process, than this number might be pretty small. There are theories of Transpermia, where life hitches rides on objects like comets and asteroids. If this is true, abiogenesis may not be all that necessary and planets with life might be much more common. However, we'll assume Transpermia doesn't happen and make this number low as well. Let's say just one in a thousand planets will have abiogenesis.

fL = 1/1000 or 200 planets where life formed by abiogenesis.


•N = 200 planets where life formed in the Milky Way galaxy alone. This number is probably exceedingly conservative.





Now we're not just talking about just our galaxy, we're talking about the entire known universe. Most estimates place the number of galaxies in the known universe at between 100,000,000,000 (one hundred billion) and 200,000,000,000 (2 hundred billion). Let's go with the low end number of one hundred billion. Now let's say the same thing applies to galaxies as stars (even though I don't believe this is completely the case) Let's say only one in ten galaxies have appropriate conditions to produce the correct star. So 100 billion divided by 10 leaves us with 10 billion galaxies. We can now multiply 10 billion by the number estimated in our galaxy and we come up with a number for the known universe. 200 times 10 billion

•N for universe = 2,000,000,000,000 or 2 trillion planets where life formed or is forming.


Stars go extinct as well as other events that are not conducive for life as we know it. Even so, the formation process is probably ongoing, so the extinction factor should not cause an over-all drop in numbers.

I took some great liberties with the Drake equation, but I think my numbers are still somewhat accurate if highly conservative.


Edit: had a problem with the math. Stupid windows calculator with no commas. There still may be some errors, but this makes a point nonetheless.

[NOTaTHEIST]

Originally Posted by Cleverfield

I think really the issue is the difference between a priori, and a posteriori truths. a priori truths require no evidence and are true by virtue of logical necessity. There is no "evidence" that 1+1=2, but it is a logical necessity. Similarly, I believe, while there is no "evidence" of God, the existence of God may be a logical necessity. And I suppose, then I've answered my own question. You don't always need evidence to have a rational belief, sometimes you just need logic.

Even though you didn't answer my question as to whether this god would be natural or supernatural, would you care to demonstrate how "God" (we really need to define this word before we can have a meaningful discussion about it) is a logical necessity?

You seem to be doing a bunch of fancy dancing here, but that's par for the course in discussions like this.

[Cleverfield]

Originally Posted by NOTaTHEIST

Even though you didn't answer my question as to whether this god would be natural or supernatural, would you care to demonstrate how "God" (we really need to define this word before we can have a meaningful discussion about it) is a logical necessity?

You seem to be doing a bunch of fancy dancing here, but that's par for the course in discussions like this.

Well, what is "natural" per se? I mean, god would be "supernatural" in the sense that he is above nature, he created nature, he created the rules of nature and the things that exist within nature. Don't mistake me for a creationist here, I believe in evolution, and that the Earth is billions of years old, but there has to be some reason for it all, there has to be a reason the laws of nature exist, and the materials of nature exist. Everything that we observe in nature is arbitrary, it is not a logical necessity for things to be that way. Why then do those rules exist? Something must have created them. Whatever created those rules we can call God, and we seek God by discovering and abiding by those rules.

[boner]

You cannot believe what you know, you cannot know what you believe

[Cleverfield]

Originally Posted by boner

You cannot believe what you know, you cannot know what you believe

Oy, back to this. In the colloquial sense yes, but in the context of this discussion, knowledge must include belief. According to the most accepted epistemic arguments, Knowledge is simply justified true belief. So your statement is false.

[NOTaTHEIST]

Originally Posted by Cleverfield

Well, what is "natural" per se?

Excellent. The natural would be the physical/material, which essentially consists of matter/energy. Basically the stuff that can be demonstrated. So is this god supernatural in the sense that it is not composed of the same physical matter/energy everything else in nature is composed of? This is what I was asking.

Oh... I'll wait to have this cleared up until we approach your logical necessity argument.

I mean, god would be "supernatural" in the sense that he is above nature

Does "above nature" mean not natural in the sense defined above? And why would you think of it as a "he" if it's not a natural entity?

he created nature, he created the rules of nature and the things that exist
within nature.

What the god supposedly does, does not tell me what it is.