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[vagel7]

Question 1: Point me in the direction of a current example where a mainstream religion is being overpowered by extremist elements. It sure is not Islam.

I said that it is overpowered by extremists or fundamentalists when those people are loud enough to sway the public opinion on what that or that religion is like. This is the thing that for example Fox News is doing, a very conservative news station that like it or not is trying to spread religious dogma.

Question 2: Was it "bad" when the west meddled with the Iran/Iraq war, or in the Afghanistan/USSR conflict, or in any other examples where people could be manipulated to our benefit? Is it only "bad" when people take power for themselves according to thier held ideals rather than being given it?

The "good-bad" dynamics are introduced by you. There is no clear good or bad, everything depends upon the perspective, there are only different shades of grey. I'm not quite sure that I can answer this question as I am quite Machiavellian myself.

Question 3: Could you give me an example to point out where a religious extremist group is making the most moves in a political field? I am struggling to think of any off the top of my head.

Applying strong pressure and public protests are political moves. This can be seen in the UK where Muslims want to implement Sharia law and are organizing protests for it.

Question 4: People have always let thier religion (or religion as a whole) affect thier politics. A countries laws and heritage often reflect the religions that shaped the histroy of thier country, be they Christian, Bhuddist, Jewish or Islamic. This is not new. Consider statements ike "In God We Trust". Look at Turkey - a secular nation with an Islamic heritage. Its religion has shaped its politics but is is far from a threatening entity. Is it only wrong/bad if the veiw represented is not one you can identify with?

No, religion as a whole is bad in politics and should not have any say in it. I myself am lucky to have been born in a country that is very atheistic, in fact 49% are atheists and our president nor our primeminister has the word "god" in their oath.

Question 4: Is the only reason you see this as not extremist is that it is a point of veiw that matches your own viewpoint? I mean, from an outside standpoint (be it a different branch of Christianity, Islam, Bhudism, Hinduism or whatever) it is easy to see how decrees banning condoms and unusual behaviour in the face of sexual abuse allegations could be portryaed as "extremist behaviour".

The Vatican eased its ban on condoms 2 years ago, it is now more of a grey area. However I make no attempt at defending them in the sexual abuse case, that was wrong through and through, yet it is not different than what many other politicians would attempt. The Vatican is a political organization and the pope as well as the high ranking figures in the Holy See are politicians as much as they are religious figures.

Context: I am a Nihilistic Atheist. Whilst I dislike religions I also accept that I have in no way shape or form the right to tell others what to think or beleive. I respect those who hold any sort of faith in the same way I respect anyone who has a similar world veiw to my own. I just feel you need to help me understand the points you are trying to make here - I am not saying you are wrong, I just want to know where you are coming from.

I myself also respect peoples views on everything in life, but I just like to debate and that may give an impression that I am intolerant. I also accept that some of my points might come through wrong since English is not my first language.

[Cthulhu]

Regarding apologetics and counter-apologetics, I've come across an apologetics website that's basically the result of a guy guzzling Craig/Plantinga sophistry and regurgitating it all over wordpress.  Every ridiculous argument you've ever heard is there.  Now obviously I want to put this guy in his place, but I'm not a formal debater and I'm having some issues cutting through his stuff and driving my point home.  Right now we're arguing about fine-tuning, and while I'm pretty sure I know why he's wrong, I'm not 100% sure and would like some advice in winning this discussion.  I've been mostly arguing the weak anthropic principle, and I'm not sure he knows what that is or how it works.  I need to learn formal logic and rhetoric, I love to argue but I don't think I'm all that great at it.The relevant parts of the discussion so far:

Let’s say you’re driving with your dog. You need to stop at the store so you park your car and leave the dog inside for a few minutes. When you come out, you’ve forgotten what your car looks like, and worse, there are a million cars in the parking lot. After some time, you come across a car containing your dog.
 By your logic re: anthropic constants, you would look at this car and say “This can’t be my car, the odds of any given car being mine are one in a million,” ignoring your dog. In reality, the other cars (possible realities) are irrelevant, and the probability of this world supporting life are irrelevant because it supports life. The probability of an event that’s already happened is 1.

Design is, simply put, an illusion. If I pour water into a hole, the water will perfectly conform to the shape of the hole. Would the water be justified in believing the hole was designed to fit it? No. Likewise, the fact that human life is adapted to life on Earth does not imply the Earth was designed to accommodate human life.

If the argument was from only the small probability, you would have a point. But it is not just the small probability; it is the corresponding pattern as well. As I explained, any license plate is just as unlikely. But if you get a license plate with your name and birth date, you would be obtuse to just shrug that off.

The license plate analogy is a false one, you’re forgetting the anthropic principle. If you’re right and any of the constants being wrong would make it impossible for humans to exist, then there’s only one reality where humans exist to observe it: This one. While there may be alternative universes, this universe must necessarily be compatible with human life, and its compatibility is not remarkable.

It absolutely is an accurate analogy. It is used to explain the corresponding pattern (namely, the initial condition needed for human life) along with the infinitesimally improbability of that actually occurring. You might not like my license plate analogy; that is fine. It was just used as an illustration to make the main point more clear. Which is that your refutation is logically invalid, because it assumes that the argument is completely dependent on the vast improbability, when it is not.

You’re apparently going to have to explain this “pattern” to me, because I see no pattern in your argument that doesn’t fall under necessary conditions based on the anthropic principle. If, due to some bizarre circumstances, the only universe in which Bob can exist is the one where his license plate is BOB 4442, then it is not remarkable that he got that license plate, regardless of its special relevance /or/ its rarity based on simple probability. It is the only license plate he can exist to observe. Likewise, a universe whose conditions allow human life is the only kind of universe humans can exist to observe, so our observing such a universe is not remarkable.

Your defense of chance is incredible. You are essentially saying that because the actual world is actualized, that therefore there are no other possible worlds, which is patently absurd. If to follow this objection to its’ logical conclusion, one would literally be left defending the premise that the actual world is the only possible world, which, again, leaves you with a burden of proof that you cannot bear.

That is not what I’m saying. I’m saying that a world with humans to observe it must necessarily be a world that can support humans. There is no need for proof here, it’s self-evident. It isn’t remarkable that the Earth is where it is because if it were somewhere else we wouldn’t be here to observe it. Wikipedia’s summary of Brandon Carter’s Weak Anthropic Principle is good:

“… the universe’s ostensible fine tuning is the result of selection bias: i.e., only in a universe capable of eventually supporting life will there be living beings capable of observing any such fine tuning, while a universe less compatible with life will go unbeheld.”

I find it logically appalling to think that this undercuts anything in the argument. That we happen to notice truth says absolutely nothing about the validity of truth. This bad objection is guilty of the logical fallacy known as the fallacy of genetics. One cannot refute a position by indicating how it is that one has come to know that position. Of course we came to know it because we are in such a universe.

I mean even granting this objection, both the infinitesimal probability and the corresponding pattern remain. So I grant your objection, but the conclusion that it is ‘not remarkable’, does not even follow.

This is where we are.  I'm pretty sure the genetic fallacy doesn't apply here.  Aside from that I'm still working through it and trying to put together an argument, but my lack of experience in actual formal debate is hindering me.  Any advice?  Did I fuck up at any obvious points?

[penguinofhonor]

What was his original point exactly? "The odds of this world supporting human life are infinitely small, therefore it must be intelligently designed"?

I'm assuming that's what it is but I want conformation before I go on getting the context of the argument wrong.

[Cthulhu]

Yes, that there are 122 so-called anthropic constants, and if any of them are off humans couldn't exist.  He also repeatedly references a "pattern" but doesn't elaborate except by analogy, borrowing a silly William Lane Craig quote about how a given random license plate isn't remarkable, but a license plate that contains your name and birthdate is.

I don't know how that applies here.

[Grek]

The anthropic principle only works if you can properly explain it. Merely saying, "But the anthropic principle!" is not enough, if neither you nor your opponent can articulate the idea that those words represent. As it stands, you're using the idea like a magic incantation to conjure the powers of reason and ward off evil, without knowing (or, at least, without explaining) why anthropic principle should actually work like you say it should, or, for that matter, why we should agree with the anthropic principle at all.

Can you explain, in your own words, that what Brandon Carter means when he says things like "selection bias"? If so, tell him that. If not, you have no business winning a debate by saying "anthropic principle", much less believing in such a principle, and it would be unfair to your opponent to help you win by tricking him into thinking that you have better reasons than you actually do.

[Cthulhu]

Ouch, that hurts.

But you're right.  That I'm not ready for this debate I'm in is hard to accept but you're right, I'm not ready for this debate I'm in.

[Karlito]

@Cthulu
Your argument looks sound to me, though since I already understand the weak anthropic principle I couldn't say how your explanation looks to someone who doesn't.

Psudo-Edit: I had started typing a bunch of stuff regarding the 122 anthropic constants argument, but then I realized that it wasn't entirely relevant.

[Cthulhu]

Yeah, that's the problem.  It doesn't matter if I'm right, if I can't articulate my rightness in a way that convinces the other guy.

[MagmaMcFry]

You’re apparently going to have to explain this “pattern” to me, because I see no pattern in your argument that doesn’t fall under necessary conditions based on the anthropic principle. If, due to some bizarre circumstances, the only universe in which Bob can exist is the one where his license plate is BOB 4442, then it is not remarkable that he got that license plate, regardless of its special relevance /or/ its rarity based on simple probability. It is the only license plate he can exist to observe. Likewise, a universe whose conditions allow human life is the only kind of universe humans can exist to observe, so our observing such a universe is not remarkable.

Your defense of chance is incredible. You are essentially saying that because the actual world is actualized, that therefore there are no other possible worlds, which is patently absurd. If to follow this objection to its’ logical conclusion, one would literally be left defending the premise that the actual world is the only possible world, which, again, leaves you with a burden of proof that you cannot bear.

Holy shit, this is the most epic straw man I've ever seen.

Here's a nice follow-up:

Let's assume there are exactly 2.5 bajillion universes, and all of them have slightly different parameters. Some universes support Bob's existence, and some don't. Now if we pick one at random and ask it "Hey, Bob, does your universe support your existence?", then what is the chance that we get a "No" back?
Now let's return back to our universe. You find it incredibly inexplicable that our universe supports our existence. But shouldn't you be much more surprised if our universe wouldn't support our existence? The question "Does our universe support our existence" is a yes/no question, and if you find both answers surprising, then there must be something you fail to comprehend.

[palsch]

I think it's best to go back to basics and look at what exactly the anthropic principle says in it's absolute weakest form.

The principle here is that whether the universe was designed or not, whether it were deliberately fine tuned or not, we would expect it to appear as though it was fine tuned. That the universe is fit to human life is equally justified by saying that human life is fit to the universe (in the 'survival of the most fit' sense). In this sense, no matter how fine the apparent tuning, the anthropic principle suggests that this is to be expected in a universe where man evolved by chance. Were the tuning different then man would be similarly different, fit to that new tuning, or absent if the tuning is, well, atonal.

Alone the principle isn't enough to show the universe isn't designed, although usually the evidence used to argue against it can be turned around to show that the universe isn't actually all that well designed for human life, given that even within our fairly habitable strips of the narrow atmosphere wrapping this one planet there are an awful lot of things that not only don't help human life but are efficient at ending it. If the universe were tuned especially for humans is there any reason for the tuning to stop once it's created such a fragile environment?

It's also a principle we need to keep in mind when taking into account our biases. It's like a test where the pass mark is always set at the lowest grade. Using the fact that you passed such a test as evidence that you are good at the subject just isn't a valid argument. If you relied on the fact that you passed that test to accept that you are doing enough work and learning the subject well then you might get into trouble when you actually have to use that knowledge in the future.

I also think Douglas Adams summed this one up well;

This is rather as if you imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in - an interesting hole I find myself in - fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!' This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, it's still frantically hanging on to the notion that everything's going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise. I think this may be something we need to be on the watch out for.

[MonkeyHead]

Nobody was around to count the universes that failed to allow the emergence of an entity cable of observing the universe...

[MagmaMcFry]

what is the chance that we get a "No" back?

very, very low because bob isn't alive.

My point exactly.

[kaijyuu]

Nobody was around to count the universes that failed to allow the emergence of an entity cable of observing the universe...

Assuming there are other universes at all.


The multiverse concept is kinda wacky, actually. For the longest time no one really thought that way, and thought God and heaven and whatever all existed in this one. Then we found reason to doubt that, and invented new spacial dimensions to stick them in. Then we found a certain uncertainty principle, and thought it'd be funny if the universe split into infinite other universes every instant.

Allow me to take a skepticist position for once. Why would we expect there to be any other plane of existence than our own? Ours can be literally the only one. That it has a distinct beginning (unless you count imaginary time) and end (big rip, woo!) doesn't suggest it's not unique.

[Graknorke]

Because then the plot of Back to the Future 2 doesn't make sense.
Or really any time travelling story ever that features something that isn't stable time loops (All of them that aren't Doctor Who).

[kaijyuu]

TBH if time travel ever becomes possible, stable time loops are what I'd expect. Though there is the Dr. McNinja method, which would require multiple universes, but that would be silly.