Not happy with Peter Atkins

[_Tarski]

I'm not happy with Peter Atkins' performance in this debate.
http://thinking-critically.blogspot.com ... ister.html
It's not that Alister wins, but rather that Atkins manages to come across as an actual practitioner of dogmatic scientism. Many are accused by theists of being promoters of scientism but do we actual have the real thing here? Did he actually say that science can answer EVERY important question? If science is about evidence, why is he so willing to dogmatically assert so many things for which he has no evidence such as the idea that all questions can be answered by science. Notice the use of the word "all". All moral questions? All metamathematical questions? All philosophical questions? What counts as good art and music? When to kill and when to let live? When to strive egotistically and when to let go?

Peter also needs lessons in charm. He comes across as having no heart and 1-dimensional. Am I wrong?
I prefer Dennett or Sam Harris by a light year.


http://thinking-critically.blogspot.com ... ister.html

[_The Dude]

Can't watch the video now, but I will tomorrow. It sounds bad from your description.

Sam Harris totally reminds me of Ben Stiller.





Too bad Dan Dennett doesn't look anything like Hansel.

[_Tarski]

Too bad Dan Dennett doesn't look anything like Hansel.

LOL

[_truth dancer]

Tarski... and others,

In the closing statement, Peter discussed the idea of science pointing to something more. Do you think there might be something more? Something still yet to be discovered?

Might science in a few thousand years discover we are part of something much more than what we can currently image, let alone understand?

I don't believe in any sort of a man/God/human male type of being as a creator/director God of our universe but I seriously sense something beyond our human understanding. I can't define it but it seems there is a lot more to come.

The way I see it God is the mystery...

~dancer~

[_cksalmon]

I'm not happy with Peter Atkins' performance in this debate.
http://thinking-critically.blogspot.com ... ister.html
It's not that Alister wins, but rather that Atkins manages to come across as an actual practitioner of dogmatic scientism. Many are accused by theists of being promoters of scientism but do we actual have the real thing here? Did he actually say that science can answer EVERY important question? If science is about evidence, why is he so willing to dogmatically assert so many things for which he has no evidence such as the idea that all questions can be answered by science. Notice the use of the word "all". All moral questions? All metamathematical questions? All philosophical questions? What counts as good art and music? When to kill and when to let live? When to strive egotistically and when to let go?

Peter also needs lessons in charm. He comes across as having no heart and 1-dimensional. Am I wrong?
I prefer Dennett or Sam Harris by a light year.


http://thinking-critically.blogspot.com ... ister.html

Thanks for the link, Tarski.

I got to here from there: http://atheistdebate.org/

I'm a big fan of the debate form, and this might just become a great site. Two (free!) debates available so far.

EDIT: We've got our own humorless, unappealing, stick-figure as well: his name's Demski.

[_Ren]

If science is about evidence, why is he so willing to dogmatically assert so many things for which he has no evidence such as the idea that all questions can be answered by science. Notice the use of the word "all". All moral questions? All metamathematical questions? All philosophical questions? What counts as good art and music? When to kill and when to let live? When to strive egotistically and when to let go?

...making it clear that I don't agree with Atkins position...

...I think it kinda makes sense in light of his thinking that all 'why' questions are 'nonsense' - and that they can only potentially be sensible if they are restructured into 'how' questions.

I started to think after those kinds of statements: "I bet this guy is no fan of philosophy!"


...and low and behold - at 1 hour 1 min - he confirms it!
He says: "Philosophy is based on pessimism, whereas science is based on optimism"


I didn't think he came across as 'heartless' or 'humourless' though. He was dry - certainly. And McGrath was more charasmatic - for sure. But I thought he was quite funny at a few points...

What I really liked about Atkins was that he pushed for more of a 'discussion' - and not just set 2 minutes turns of 'reply, response'. The discussion got a lot more interesting when they started 'interrupting' each other :)


But - of course - 90% of McGrath's 'arguments' can be boiled down to 2 points:

"God makes sense - to me"
...and...
"God makes me feel good"

[_cksalmon]

I didn't think he came across as 'heartless' or 'humourless' though. He was dry - certainly. And McGrath was more charasmatic - for sure. But I thought he was quite funny at a few points...

Must be British humor, Ren.

I found him quite unengaging, which has nothing to do, of course, with the debate thesis. I didn't find him boring at all, on the other hand.

But - of course - 90% of McGrath's 'arguments' can be boiled down to 2 points:

"God makes sense - to me"
...and...
"God makes me feel good"

I think this is a caricature, frankly.

EDIT: I think Ken Humphreys is a walking caricature. Much more engaging, but a very poor debater. I'll take a Peter Atkins any day over that mess.

[Guest]

Must be British humor, Ren.

...could well be... :)

I found him quite unengaging

Oh - I think I'd agree on this. I agree with Tarksi - give me a Dennett any day of the week over this guy. (Not so sure about Sam Harris - less familiar with him...)

I was only talking about him being 'humourless' and 'heartless'. I don't think he was either particularly. Could he be more humourous? Could he be more 'heartfelt'? Sure - but that's a different question.
I'd doubt he's the life and soul at parties... Although - you never know. Get a couple of whiskey's down him...

I think this is a caricature, frankly

*shrug* Maybe. A bit.
I suppose it might be a bit of a caricature to summarise Atkins thus:
"Science explains everything. And if you disagree, you're deluded".
...but it at least points you in - about - the right direction...

[_Tarski]

...I think it kinda makes sense in light of his thinking that all 'why' questions are 'nonsense' - and that they can only potentially be sensible if they are restructured into 'how' questions.

See, I actually think this often promoted notion is a bit wrong headed.
If all "why"-questions are literally nonsense, then sentences that feature the word why should have no meaning at all. This is clearly not true.
OK, then suppose every why-question can be rephrased without the use of the word "why". Well, so what? Would the meaing of the sentences change? If so then I guess the word why meant something after all and we really should keep it around. This could still be possible perhaps for metaphysical questions and so forth.
Even those that can be rephrased lose something when we do it: Why don't atoms collapse given that accelerating electrons should radiate and lose energy?
Why is the sky blue? (another quantum mechanical answers awaits). These questions lose a certain impulse or facination when rephrased with the word how. The teaching of science would suffer and fewer people would become interested in science should we go about rephrasing things in accordance with this dogma.

Just as an excersise, consider the following sentences.

A. Why did you move the couch to that side of the room?
B. Why did you vote for McCain? (How did the atoms in your brain move so that you voted for McCain??)
C. Why did you use a hammer to strike that nail? (Inspired by Heidegger-LOL).
D. Why should we conclude that all why-questions are meaningless? (!)

No simple substitution of how for why will work obviously. "How did you vote for McCain?" has a different meaning unless by some slang or street usage it just means "how could you have voted for McCain? (you traitor!). My answer would have been "By absentee ballot" or "By pushing this button". But even doing more work and finally translating those sentences in terms of the word how is not worth the work even where possible.

Even if human/social/moral/linguistic realities supervene on biological and ultimately physical realities, it does then follow that all meaningful sentences can be rephrased in the language of biology and then finally the language of physics and then mathematics (at least it's not obvious). That would seem to be what Dennett (a reductionist himself) calls greedy reductionism. Atkins may think such philosophical questions are either meaningless or settled, but I don't. It's all still debatable.

Finally, I would say that the word "why" has shades of meaning and cannot be treated as a discrete and atomic semantic item. This has to be kept in mind when considering what Atkins and others say about why-questions.

[Guest]

See, I actually think this often promoted notion is a bit wrong headed.

Just so I'm clear, I also agree it's a bit wrong headed.
I meant to clarify that at the top of my last post. But I probably wasn't that clear.

I don't agree with him. I just mean that I understand his point - where he's coming from - I guess. Even if I don't agree...


But yeah, Saying 'You'd have to reconstruct the question' gives you all kinds of room to play a very open ended game.
For example, you could say that the question:

"Why did you vote for McCain?"

...should be reconstructed to...

"How did you decide to vote for McCain?" - as opposed to "How did you vote for McCain" (which - as you suggest - you might answer by describing the voting booth...!)

But anyway, framing this as 'reconstructing the question' is a bit of semantic nonsense.
I prefer the statement 'I'm not a big fan of philosophy!' That's a bit more straight-forward (to my ears).

Even if human/social/moral/linguistic realities supervene on biological and ultimately physical realities, it does then follow that all meaningful sentences can be rephrased in the language of biology and then finally the language of physics and then mathematics (at least it's not obvious). That would seem to be what Dennett (a reductionist himself) calls greedy reductionism. Atkins may think such philosophical questions are either meaningless or settled, but I don't. It's all still debatable.

Again, I agree.