Acting morally on atheism

[Byblos]

Instability can't become dominant, it has a specific meaning in game theory - it would become a weak strategy after only a short time.

In other words what, intelligence is a prerequisite for stability? Because it's certainly a prerequisite in game theory.

[Furstentum Liechtenstein]

I think Beanybag isn't making any sense and has painted himself into a corner with statements like these:

A somali warlord's strategy is unstable and will be rationally selected against.

Instability can't become dominant, it has a specific meaning in game theory - it would become a weak strategy after only a short time. Entropy doesn't really have anything to do with this, and entropy on Earth is generally not an issue so long as we have the Sun.

Yes, I understand it's speculation. But it has a lot of supporting evidence. It's a likely hypothesis which would put morality into the realm of science and math.

I suggest we forgive & forget and get back to discussing why an atheist would need to act morally.

FL

[Beanybag]

Instability can't become dominant, it has a specific meaning in game theory - it would become a weak strategy after only a short time.

In other words what, intelligence is a prerequisite for stability? Because it's certainly a prerequisite in game theory.

Less so intelligence and more so knowledge.

I think Beanybag isn't making any sense and has painted himself into a corner with statements like these

Perhaps.

I suggest we forgive & forget and get back to discussing why an atheist would need to act morally.

FL

A few reasons. One reason would be that, if my moral view is true, it'd be the most rational strategy. The other reason is that they fear repercussions of the society - acting in the best interest of a society ensures that it is in the best interest of a society to keep you around. Beyond that, I don't see why either atheist or theist has a moral obligation unless they've chosen to accept it upon themselves.

[Byblos]

Instability can't become dominant, it has a specific meaning in game theory - it would become a weak strategy after only a short time.

In other words what, intelligence is a prerequisite for stability? Because it's certainly a prerequisite in game theory.

Less so intelligence and more so knowledge.

Really. Please give examples of the latter without the former.

[Beanybag]

Instability can't become dominant, it has a specific meaning in game theory - it would become a weak strategy after only a short time.

In other words what, intelligence is a prerequisite for stability? Because it's certainly a prerequisite in game theory.

Less so intelligence and more so knowledge.

Really. Please give examples of the latter without the former.

A computer can be programmed to win a game using game theory, but that doesn't make it intelligent. It's just an expert knowledge-based system.

[Byblos]

Instability can't become dominant, it has a specific meaning in game theory - it would become a weak strategy after only a short time.

In other words what, intelligence is a prerequisite for stability? Because it's certainly a prerequisite in game theory.

Less so intelligence and more so knowledge.

Really. Please give examples of the latter without the former.

A computer can be programmed to win a game using game theory, but that doesn't make it intelligent. It's just an expert knowledge-based system.

I honestly expected a little more from you Beany. Seriously? That's all you could come up with? A computer that was already intelligently pre-programmed with a set of knowledge base as evidence of knowledge without intelligence? That's like offering banks as proof that a certain society is wealthy. Try again my friend.

[Beanybag]

I honestly expected a little more from you Beany. Seriously? That's all you could come up with? A computer that was already intelligently pre-programmed with a set of knowledge base as evidence of knowledge without intelligence? That's like offering banks as proof that a certain society is wealthy. Try again my friend.

Honestly, I'd say I'm expecting better than this, but I can't say that at this point. You cannot prove that all information is the result of intelligence. It is theoretically possible to deal with knowledge without involving intelligence by simply using equations and algorithms. It is an induction fallacy to assert that all algorithms are the result of intelligence since many naturally occurring algorithms have an unknown source. Knowledge is not directly correlated to intelligence even though the two are related.

All that aside, you've still missed the point. The point still stands that knowledge is more valuable than intelligence in a game, according to game theory. You only need sufficient intelligence to be able to act rationally, from there, knowledge of the game and the decisions and consequences is vastly more important. Knowledge is simply more important than intelligence in game theory, regardless of whether or not the knowledge is derived through intelligence. Notice my example. An expert-system is no where near the intelligence of a human. And yet, in a game, the human's intelligence will not enable it to pick any better or more rational of a strategy. Knowledge is the ultimate advantage in such a game.

[Byblos]

I honestly expected a little more from you Beany. Seriously? That's all you could come up with? A computer that was already intelligently pre-programmed with a set of knowledge base as evidence of knowledge without intelligence? That's like offering banks as proof that a certain society is wealthy. Try again my friend.

Honestly, I'd say I'm expecting better than this, but I can't say that at this point. You cannot prove that all information is the result of intelligence. It is theoretically possible to deal with knowledge without involving intelligence by simply using equations and algorithms. It is an induction fallacy to assert that all algorithms are the result of intelligence since many naturally occurring algorithms have an unknown source. Knowledge is not directly correlated to intelligence even though the two are related.

All I'm saying is that all known algorithms exhibit intelligence whose sources are either known or unknown. No induction fallacy there.

All that aside, you've still missed the point. The point still stands that knowledge is more valuable than intelligence in a game, according to game theory. You only need sufficient intelligence to be able to act rationally, from there, knowledge of the game and the decisions and consequences is vastly more important. Knowledge is simply more important than intelligence in game theory, regardless of whether or not the knowledge is derived through intelligence. Notice my example. An expert-system is no where near the intelligence of a human. And yet, in a game, the human's intelligence will not enable it to pick any better or more rational of a strategy. Knowledge is the ultimate advantage in such a game.

And again, that assumes algorithms can be created without intelligence. You've asserted that but haven't proven it. All you've done is show that algorithms may have an unknown (or rather unacknowledged) source.

[domokunrox]

Couple of things I wanted to point out is that stating that you know that something is unknowable is a contradiction.

If you're going to make statements like that, you can only claim "I don't know". That's not a strong position to argue from because that is argument from ignorance.

The other thing about Knowledge and intelligence is that its a silly argument. Knowledge and intelligence does not exist anywhere without a mind. Animals and inanimate objects do not have a mind.

[RickD]

I asked domokunrox a question about his statement:

Domokunrox wrote:
Animals and inanimate objects do not have a mind.

RickD wrote:
Are you sure you don't want to retract this statement? Do you really believe all animals don't have a mind?

So not to derail this thread, I moved the discussion to a new thread:http://discussions.godandscience.org/vi ... =7&t=37885

[Beanybag]

Couple of things I wanted to point out is that stating that you know that something is unknowable is a contradiction.

If you're going to make statements like that, you can only claim "I don't know". That's not a strong position to argue from because that is argument from ignorance.

Are you so sure? There happens to be an entire branch of mathematics that sets out to prove whether or not a problem is decidable - in a sense, it asks whether the answer to a problem can be known. Many problems can be 'proved' to be unknowable, or reduced to deciding an undecidable problem. It's not always an argument from ignorance if you are able to justify your position. There are things which can be said to be unknowable, and even in a practical sense, we can say things are unknowable. We don't know what spin an electron on the far side of Pluto has and I will say with confidence that that problem is unknowable. We don't know the momentum of a particle with a known spin and I would say with confidence that that is unknowable. Are you sure you haven't just asserted that 'unknowability' is unknowable using an argument from ignorance?

The other thing about Knowledge and intelligence is that its a silly argument. Knowledge and intelligence does not exist anywhere without a mind. Animals and inanimate objects do not have a mind.

Knowledge and intelligence don't exist anywhere without a mind? Care to prove that? I thought you just demonstrated an understanding of the argument ex nihilo. Maybe this is more of an induction fallacy, then. Either way. You asserted animals don't have a mind and yet they are clearly capable of knowing something. Perhaps we have different ideas of knowledge and information.

[domokunrox]

Are you so sure? There happens to be an entire branch of mathematics that sets out to prove whether or not a problem is decidable - in a sense, it asks whether the answer to a problem can be known. Many problems can be 'proved' to be unknowable, or reduced to deciding an undecidable problem. It's not always an argument from ignorance if you are able to justify your position. There are things which can be said to be unknowable, and even in a practical sense, we can say things are unknowable. We don't know what spin an electron on the far side of Pluto has and I will say with confidence that that problem is unknowable. We don't know the momentum of a particle with a known spin and I would say with confidence that that is unknowable. Are you sure you haven't just asserted that 'unknowability' is unknowable using an argument from ignorance?

Positive.

To say that you KNOW that something is UNKNOWABLE is actually saying you KNOW SOMETHING ABOUT IT

Its a contradiction. Plain and simple.

If you don't KNOW something, you can only claim your ignorance. At best, you can only claim that you KNOW that you are ignorant. You CANNOT JUSTIFY IGNORANCE, ever. It simply does not matter if you assert something in a "practical sense" (whatever that is).

Knowledge and intelligence don't exist anywhere without a mind? Care to prove that? I thought you just demonstrated an understanding of the argument ex nihilo. Maybe this is more of an induction fallacy, then. Either way. You asserted animals don't have a mind and yet they are clearly capable of knowing something. Perhaps we have different ideas of knowledge and information.

No, sir. There is no induction. The mind is non-spatial. The brain is not a mind. The mind is another substance.
You do not get metaphysics from observing physics.

Your assertion is that animals are "clearly capable of knowing something", and that is not the case at all.
All motion, and all actions are CONSTANT CONJUNCTION, and there is no justification for NECESSARY CONNECTION to metaphysics.
Metaphysics requires you to ask what it is and why in order to justify it exists.

So, if you're going to insist there is a connection for animals having a mind, you are in the position of showing me your epistemology to come to that conclusion. You are in the affirmative, sir.

Here is the venn diagram
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Class ... of-Kno.svg

[Beanybag]

Positive.

To say that you KNOW that something is UNKNOWABLE is actually saying you KNOW SOMETHING ABOUT IT

Its a contradiction. Plain and simple.

If you don't KNOW something, you can only claim your ignorance. At best, you can only claim that you KNOW that you are ignorant. You CANNOT JUSTIFY IGNORANCE, ever. It simply does not matter if you assert something in a "practical sense" (whatever that is).

It sounds like you are inventing a definition that other people don't use. When someone asserts unknowability, they aren't claiming that nothing can be known about something (that would definitely be an argument ex nihilo). They're stating that the truth value of a certain statement cannot be known. It's a separate proposition. Again, there is actually a branch of mathematics called decidability problems that address the unknowability of some problems.

So, let's look at this. We want to know if you can know something about X. We'll call this statement about X, Y. Whether or not Y can be said to be true or not would be a decidable problem, called Z. Z would assert knowledge.. not really about X. It would assert knowledge about Y which is about X. So, your objections really fall flat. On their face. Even without consideration to the other problems here.

Knowledge and intelligence don't exist anywhere without a mind? Care to prove that? I thought you just demonstrated an understanding of the argument ex nihilo. Maybe this is more of an induction fallacy, then. Either way. You asserted animals don't have a mind and yet they are clearly capable of knowing something. Perhaps we have different ideas of knowledge and information.

No, sir. There is no induction. The mind is non-spatial. The brain is not a mind. The mind is another substance.
You do not get metaphysics from observing physics.

I'm not really sure I care what your metaphysics is, but you're denying that animals can know things. You are not, however, denying that computer hard drives contain information. There is a contradiction here. Perhaps animals do not experience knowing, but there is certainly knowledge that they use in their actions. If you are asserting that information is different from knowledge, or isn't derived from knowledge, or some other same conclusion, that you have proven my point - that an algorithm can exist without a mind. Perhaps you are hurting the cause of the other posters here who are trying to assert the opposite.

[Noah1201]

So, theists...

Do you think living one's life under the dominant morality, while recognizing that this morality is not objective, is rational?

When Beanybag offered his theory of subjective morality, he was jumped at, suggesting that you think the answer is no. Still, in my discussion with FL, he told me that he thinks otherwise. So I'm confused.


EDIT: Personally, I think it is rational insofar as it is within one's material self-interest. When it is not - why? If morality is to a large extent a human construct, then obeying it when it's against your self-interest is tantamount to saying you will unthinkingly obey what a bunch of mere mortals arbitrarily decided for no reason.

Let's say, for example, that you have an opportunity to rob a bank, guaranteeing you will not be caught. Why shouldn't you do it?

Vox Day, the Christian author of the Irrational Atheist, argues that the only rational atheists are amoral sociopaths. This is what primarily influenced me to this point of view.

[Beanybag]

EDIT: Personally, I think it is rational insofar as it is within one's material self-interest. When it is not - why? If morality is to a large extent a human construct, then obeying it when it's against your self-interest is tantamount to saying you will unthinkingly obey what a bunch of mere mortals arbitrarily decided for no reason.

Let's say, for example, that you have an opportunity to rob a bank, guaranteeing you will not be caught. Why shouldn't you do it?

Vox Day, the Christian author of the Irrational Atheist, argues that the only rational atheists are amoral sociopaths. This is what primarily influenced me to this point of view.

What kind of guarantee can there be that promises your actions will not have consequences? Is this rule applied universally? Then why doesn't everyone rob banks? I feel like I can reject this example as too far removed from reality. Even the rational, amoral sociopath obeys the law.