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

[appolose]

Final-Fan said:

The argument with your brother: 
See, this is part of why this isn't working.  You say "OMFG I have no idea what you are talking about" and yet you don't tell me if my interpretation DIRECTLY ABOVE THAT is correct and (if not) where I am wrong and in what way.  Or if the problem lies in the paragraph below, and, if so, where and in what way.  Or ANYTHING beyond your complete failure to understand me.  You ... have had me literally speechless with frustration at times due to this lack of specificity.  All this despite an explicit request for just such information. 

Also: 
You have COMPLETELY IGNORED my assertion that your current defense of the assertion "any belief set is supported by sense data" stands in stark contradiction of earlier defenses of it. 

Blurring the distinction: 
     "“empiricism is practical” is different from gaining absolute knowledge." 
Yes.  Finally.  It is different from gaining absolute knowledge about the world (including its existence).
     "What do you mean when you say empiricism is practical?"
See above link for a beginning.  Then read the below.  When you have read both, tell me what you think I mean and I'll tell you if you're right and we'll go from there. 
     "What do you mean by saying sense data is all we have? (If we were talking about a method of truth for absolute knowledge I’d say that empiricism was not the only proposed method of truth)."
To address the parenthesized first:  No, that's not what I mean, if I understand "method of truth" correctly.  I mean that the input we consciously receive is sense data, so in order to "do" anything (i.e. operate an input/output system) it is necessary to interpret sense data (the input). 
     And since an interactive input/output system pretty much by definition requires feedback to be effective (no?) then to be effective or "useful/practical" the I/O system must be capable of output that in turn affects the input.  None of this is contingent on the I/O system producing absolute truth. 
     What do you not understand or disagree with in the above three sentences?  And what, if anything, is amiss about the next most previous sentence?  You must tell me -- separately if possible. 

Confusion

You say "OMFG I have no idea what you are talking about" and yet you don't tell me if my interpretation DIRECTLY ABOVE THAT is correct and (if not) where I am wrong and in what way. 

 

   Right, because I can’t understand you. I’m sorry. The interpretations you are giving are apart of what you are saying. Thus apart of what I’m having great difficulty understanding.

   I could painstakingly go through all my difficulties with what you said and give you the possibilities running through my mind of what you meant and then give a response to every single one. But, seeing that much of our terminology apparently isn’t understood between us I’m not sure if it would make it clearer or just make it worse. I would rather just start over and make up new terms somehow step by step but it seems we have a different subject now anyway (empiricism is practical, not a way of gaining absolute knowledge). Hopefully we don’t have to use the former terminology much or in the same way on this subject.

 

lol you’ve had me speechless at misunderstanding too, but I’m not making accusations.

 

You have COMPLETELY IGNORED my assertion that your current defense of the assertion "any belief set is supported by sense data" stands in stark contradiction of earlier defenses of it. 

 

I believe this is what you are referring to:

 

So when you said "any belief set is supported by sense data" (and you now say that you meant "legitimate belief" instead of "ANY belief"), it makes no sense to me that you meant "any set of beliefs whereby one can apply a method of truth to arrive at absolute knowledge is supported by sense data", this makes no sense because you also have the position that sense data cannot be reliable evidence at all. 

 

   This is just an example of how difficult it is for me to grasp what’s happening in our confusion here. I never said only legitimate beliefs can be supported by sense data. I always stood by “any” beliefs. I think I once phrased it: legitimate and illegitimate beliefs could be supported by sense data. So apparently somewhere my terminology isn’t being understood and you’re able to induce this.

   Besides that misunderstanding over my use of “any”, the difficulty also comes in the fact that I think I’ve elsewhere seen you use ‘legitimate belief’ in a way that confused me too. So it’s like I don’t know where to start explaining myself. I don’t know how far back in the scheme of explanation our terminology is being misunderstood.

   You then said "it makes no sense to me that you meant "any set of beliefs whereby one can apply a method of truth to arrive at absolute knowledge is supported by sense data". I don’t know what that means. I know I never said that explicitly so our confusion on terminology has allowed you to induce that apparently.

  You then say “you also have the position that sense data cannot be reliable evidence at all”. Nope. Nope I don’t. But this is certainly tedious terminology if said that way. Sense data is “evidence” for any belief (aka supports any belief). Thus it’s why it can’t be used to determine the correct belief. Anyway, that’s just an example of the confusion I’m having.

   Alas, on to our new issue.

 

Blurring the Distinction

   The links lead me to a page (they both appeared to be the same) combining several things you said before in attempting to explain your “practical something thing” (not being sarcastic, I just don’t know what you prefer to call it in this way). They’re still just as confusing to me I’m afraid. You did have an addition at the end that seemed new.

   And…*sigh*… I’m sorry but the more you explain your position the more confusion I have. In this new bit you defined “knowledge that is not absolute” as “would not necessarily be true for any belief set”. What does that mean? Stated conversely you would define absolute knowledge as that which would necessarily be true for any belief set. That still doesn’t make sense to me. I mean… if taken one way in my mind it would seem to contradict your view which is dependent on assumptions.

   But but forget it, do you just mean something like “If we assume sense data is accurate we have a dependable system to operate within”?

   Or do you mean something like “there is an assumption made for each particular arrangement of sense data you receive and it’s interaction with you is dependable”?

  

“Previous Three Sentences” and “Next Most Previous Sentence”

   Um, how about did I just present your position correctly in two possibilities mentioned above? Otherwise I’m just gonna be giving you all my confusion again over those sentences or giving you a bunch of possibilities in my mind of what you meant.

 

Isn’t this the “next most previous sentence” before the three?

No, that's not what I mean, if I understand "method of truth" correctly.

Is that what you were asking what is amiss about?

 

My Original Issue Over Absolute Knowledge

Not to get back into my original issue but I’m just curious as to why you think empiricism doesn’t give absolute knowledge (if not for the explanation I give of it).

 

ps I find your tag line humorous in relation to all this: "Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts."