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What does that mean to directly realize that 2+2=4 ? That terminology kind of makes sense if we apply it to Being , but to me it doesn't make any sense when you apply it to the relative domain. @UnbornTao This is the kind of category-error that I was talking about.

By 'one falling away from the source' do you mean something like - getting lost in the propositional domain (getting lost in arguing and in searching for the best arguments for or against God and hardcore focusing on whats in a given holybook and how to properly interpret the book) rather than focusing on having a mystical experience and establishing a genuine relationship/connection and deriving the insights from there?

@Reciprocality Lets pivot from the mind and from the brain for a second, and lets talk about physical exercise. Would you raise the exact same issues with workout ? If the answer is no, whats the difference?

and what is that an argument for?

Even if we grant you that all mystical experiences are delusions, the arguments for God will still stand and even if you can poke holes in those arguments, you will need to provide atheist arguments that end with the conclusion that 'God doesn't exist'. Otherwise , at best you will only establish that its more reasonable to be an agnostic rather than a theist. There are some good atheist arguments that work againts some special version of God (if God has a specific set of traits) but I don't know any argument that will refute the whole category of theism.

@Marcel Again the way to do this in a reasonable way is by starting with laying out a clear definition for what you mean by justification and knowing and from that it will follow the answer to the "how do you know" question and then to the "how do you actually know" question. But until then because of the ambiguity in the question, you cant expect a quality answer. The "how do you know" question can be unreasonable to ask, depending on what you mean by "know" because it can lead to a category error. Again there is nothing wrong with questioning if its done in a good faith way. As long as you are honest about the entailments of being skeptical of certain things, you are good. "How can we agree on things" Is one of the toughest questions philosophy deals with - but in general the following is enough to solve most problems: We need to clarify what our goal is and then that goal will outline a common ground and a context we can work in. For example, if our goal is to check how to make the most money - once we share the semantics of what we mean by making money - we can develop a set of methods and then empirically check which method will lead to better results with respect to our shared goal.

For example, in a courtroom where one needs to prove a rape case and lets say there is DNA evidence and video evidence (of the act) and the guy who committed the crime actually confess that he did it. You can still say that you are skeptical of all of that and ask, " but can we definitely know or be 100% sure without a doubt that he did it? It might be the case that the video is fake, and that they faked the DNA test or that the DNA test was wrong and that they forced the guy to confess and lie." You can do that skepticism, but then one of the entailment is that you want so high level evidence and your standard is so high that it becomes impossible to prove any case - not because its unreasonable to think that the avalaible evidence proves the case or because the guy who has a lower standard than you is a complete loser because he didn't question all assumptions, but because you have a much much higher standard for evidence. Questioning is not wrong, but be good faith and be honest about what entailments comes from questioning certain things or from having higher standards.

Whats the argument that it is not an inquiry? See I can even apply it there - I can question your assessment about what even an inquiry is. That depends on what your concept of "understanding" or what you take to be enough. But operating in this vague cloud where it isn't clear what you mean by it makes it so that you can play these skeptic games where you can never be satisfied or argued against, because you can just say "why should I accept that?" and you can always just move the goalpost. The very idea that everything needs to be justified is something that can be questioned - that everything requires/ought to have a reason and justification or that everything has a reason. The reasonable way people do this (who actually wants to question in good faith and not just purposefully want to undermine the other's position for the sake, so that they can maintain their own position without needing to deal with any pushback ) is by being okay with and being honest about some set of starting assumptions. "Okay given these assumptions, I want you to show me how your conclusion follows or why it is likely" or you can attack their starting assumptions if you want, but you have to be honest about the entailments of being skeptical of certian assumptions , because skepticism sometimes undermines its own self and leads you to certain entailments that you might not be okay with.

Oh yes it is, Im skeptical of x - go ahead establish and lay out the reasons why you think x is real or why x exist. That is an inquiry. We can play these recontextualization games forever. Its very easy to roleplay the skeptic.

How can one reasonably respond to absolute skepticism? For the sake of trolling - I can just deny that consciousness exist in the firstplace and conclude that nothing is conscious and then go around pressing people to provide and arugment why consciousness does exist and then question all of the premises that they use to establish their argument.

A moderator and the administrator are exposing themselves. The trans shadow is coming out . To max out your cognitive development , wearing a wig like that is a prerequisite.

https://edition.cnn.com/2024/08/26/politics/kfile-rfk-jr-trump-endorsement/index.html

Because you dont just follow wherever the truth leads, and the term of being an unbiased observer is often times meaningless. The idea that you can just passively observe things - thats in and of itself rests on certain metaphysical assumptions.

Relax , it wasnt serious.

Most people here could benefit from more reading (including me). And some of the claims that are made are non-empirical, so they cant be tested.

The shadow is coming out

The response to this is that its probably better to be aware of metaphysical assumptions than not. Now you might consciously choose certain metaphyiscal assumptions that might turn out to be wrong, but its still probably better to have an understanding of the debates around metaphysics than to unconsciously go with a particular set of metaphysical beliefs (where you are not even aware that those are beliefs, you just take them for granted). There is a difference between the position of "after deeply thinking about metaphysics and after reviewing in depth the arguments around different metaphysical beliefs , I think I have very good reasons to think this set of metaphysical beliefs is true" vs the position of "I am clueless about metaphysical debates, I have 0 knowledge about metaphyiscs, and I unconsciously go with a set of metaphysical beliefs, where I am not even aware that those are actually beliefs). Now there is a third question - whether it is better to not engage with metaphysics at all vs just dipping your toe in metaphysics a little bit, without seriously engaging with it. It might be the case, that engaging with it just a little bit is worse than not engaging with it at all, because you will mindfuck yourself and you will adopt a set of metaphysical beliefs for bad reasons (this is might be what you tried to argue using Einstein). But I think you are right, in that there can be made an opposite case as well, but that case is little bit different from the way you outlined it. That case is that some philosophers tend to make false claims about science, because they often lack the scientific knowledge and other times they lack rigor. Some philosophers also like to make empirical claims and then not back those up with any empirical evidence - they like to purely rely on their armchair.

Would you advocate for the idea that scientists need to take at least 1 class on philosophy of science and one class on metaphysics?

You can, its more like - you cannot do science without a set of philosophical assumptions. You probably agree with Thomas Kuhn's take on science, but agreeing with him doesn't prevent you from having a different definition for science and for philosophy.

@Leo Gura I know this is a complex question, but given that we have these two variables (one is spiritual development the other is cognitive development) and lets say for the sake of simplicity that these variables can only take on two values (low or high). I wont define what I personally mean by spiritual development and cognitive development - use your personal definition for them ( you don't need to spell out your definitions , its more than enough if you can engage with the model) We can create a small model like this: Person 1) low spiritual development - low cognitive development Person 2) low spiritual development - high cognitive development Person 3) high spiritual development - low cognitive development Person 4) high spiritual development - high cognitive development Can you describe the differences between each person? Like what would be the difference between person 3 and person 4? Your answer doesn't need to be extremely precise and extensive , I just want to get a general picture of how you use these concepts.

Do you take cognitive development to necessarily entail some kind of moral development? Cant you imagine a 200 IQ systems-thinker, who is a complete psychopath and completely selfish?

Yeah I guess we would need to flesh out what we mean by "not being careful about one's rhetoric". By not being careful I would personally say not being clear about the conclusion you try to establish and you let the audience to fill the inference gap (to make inferences for themselves from the premises that you lay out). Also qualifying your statements sometimes is probably good, if you know that a good chunk of your audience is prone to misinterpret your content in a particular way. I think that certain people cant be "saved" and will misuse your content no matter what , and those people cant be persuaded - so catering to those people is definitely the wrong move. Those people will weaponize your arguments and statements no matter what. Given that those people exist, is that alone a good argument to not have public talks and debates about certain topics? Probably not, only if there is a very good argument that can demonstrate that it has much more negative effects than good effects. There are other groups though (saveable people), where doing some mitigation (that I listed above) can be more than enough to significantly lower the chance of them misinterpreting your statements . So I think it is fair to ask for that.

Yeah, I have argued extensively against the favoritism of some of these people in other threads . I have a very low opinion on Bret Weinstein because of his incredibly misleading and sometimes outright wrong takes on covid vaccines. I have low opinion on Terrence Howard (when it comes to him being a revolutionary math guy or scientist - but he is an okay actor). I have argued against Terrence Howard in other threads. With respect to Eric Weinstein - I cant engage with his ideas in depth so I cant comment on that - but my general assumption is that people probably have a good reason to reject it. I dont have a personal issue with Dave , I also have no issue with acknowledging and admitting the great effects of his work. I think his rigor is very good and a lot of people lack that. I have issue with him being dismissive of certain things , or strawmanning certain things - and those things are mostly related to philosophy and not to science.

No I dont try to claim that, my claim was specifically aimed at people who incorrectly use the "but science works though" talking point to dismiss new potential theories (this point stands even if the theory in question is garbage - the point is not about how valid the theory is, it is whether the argument that used against it makes sense or not) or they use it to dismiss any kind of criticism of science. This is why I said that suggesting a new theory doesnt entail that science wont work and making a criticism of science (for example about methods) from that doesn't necessarily follow that science wont work (since you dont attack the parts of science that gives you the ability to send a rocket to the moon). I dont have any data on how most scientists react to new potential theories or how they engage with criticism of science, so I have no comment on that.