Rise of atheism: 100,000 Brits seek 'de-baptism'

[appolose]

donathos said:

appolose said:

Yes, all the sensory data would be relying on other sensory data (making it useless).

And we certainly wouldn't be left with nothing (even if we were, that does not at all detract any of the assumption out of it).  For instance, you could decide that flipping a coin can determine truth (while operating under the assumption that there is a coin and you can tell which side it lands on).  Which, as a method of truth, is no less founded as empiricism.

 

When you say "we certainly wouldn't be left with nothing," I think that your example is undermined by "while operating under the assumption that there is a coin and you can tell which side it lands on."

I mean, if we grant the coin... why not grant the other things that our senses inform us of?

And besides, when I say we'd be left with absolutely nothing, I really mean it.  I mean that... our very use of language is predicated on learning that has all taken place within the context of sensory data; we can use the word cat because we've seen a cat.  (Or, a blind person has touched a cat, or heard it.  Or, we have concepts of imaginary things by making internal comparisons with things that we have experienced.)

Whatever reality we ascribe to, or can imagine, must all be predicated on our experience of sensory data.  Without that data, there'd only be void.

 

That was just one method that needed that assumption to work; that does not imply a universal need for it (nor does it somehow mean we have to grant all sensory data the assumption).  Another method would simply be "Anything that I currently think is true is true".

 And how do you know our language/meaning comes from sensory data (as opposed to other possibilites)? Also, you say that we get all our language/meanings from sensation, and as you mentioned we can make incorrect judgements about reality, so I must ask your method for determining which of your judgements are true or false.