'It is best to restrict one's beliefs.....

to considering real or true only those phenomena and things or assertions current or accept past scientific research indicates are 'likely to exist or be true'"

Do you believe this is true?
Feel free to reformulate it so that you are more comfortable agreeing with it.

If you believe it is true, how did you decide that?
IOW does your own belief in this assertion live up to its own suggestion.

 

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Scientific research has been proven wrong in thousands of cases in the past. I think one should be skeptical of such scientific research.

I'm still stuck with figuring out why we should "believe" anything unless it's essential to our lives in some personal way.

Baron Max

 

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You do realize that you presented me with two beliefs. And that your third sentence has the feel of a rhetorically presented belief.

Being skeptical about scientific research might indicate that you would be willing to or even do already believe in things that are not supported by scientific theory. Is this true?

Or are you even more careful about stating what is true than scientists (ought to be)?

 

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Yeah, but I'm skeptical of them!

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And I'm skeptical of that, too.

Yeah, I'm skeptical. But I'm also skeptical about my own skepticism!

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Baron Max

 

So you're inviting me to redefine your original premise in such a way that it will conserve it's initial gist but indulge my own secret reasoning?

Well, why make a secret of it? I would appreciate the question hitting closer to home so that I could identify with it. If there's a paramount specification that proclaims that science and all things science clutches truth closer to its chest than my own embrace of my own existence, then my truths are untruths.

 

In a sense I was suggesting this might be useful. I found my wording awkward.

'fraid I need a reformulation....

 

Clever, but the patterns in your posting betray beliefs and inconsistant skepticism. What you are skeptical of and say right out and what you then, after it is pointed out, say you are skeptical about
are two
different categories.

Just like everybody else.

 

Ha ha. Touché

 

I was serious, but I am glad you enjoyed it anyway. I am interested in what you meant and did not understand.

 

But of course! It's all separate times, separate days even. Surely you don't expect me to be consistent from one moment to the next, do you?

Geez, that's just too much to ask of a person, ain't it.

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Baron Max

 

Anything that is likely to be true should be considered truth?
This is incorrect. Only what is true should be considered truth.

 

But how likely is it that "what is true" is the truth? Shouldn't that be considered?

 

Considered by who? Truth is independent of observer. Thus, anything an observer consideres has no effect on whether or not something is true. You only observe.

Take for example the lions in the jungle. Big lion killed the deer. This happened whether or not there is an observer watching. If there was an observer watching, the observer would have no effect on whether or not it happened. The observation/conclusion of the observer is irrelevant to whether or not big lion killed the deer.

 

Really? How do you know? Does the deer know it's been killed, does the lion know?

But there's a deer and a lion, two animals with sentience and observational skills. The lion observed the deer, and concluded it was dinner time.

If you were watching the lion and the deer from a distance, I guess you wouldn't have any effect on the lion or the deer, in that case. What if you weren't at a distance but got close and scared the deer away? Would the lion be able to observe you, and make the same conclusion?

To the lion, it's probably fairly relevant, which is why it went to the extent of looking for some food. To the deer, the observation of the lion is also relevant, seeing as it means it dies.

You can't put an observer in the frame, then take them out again, and conclude nothing has changed. Logic doesn't work like that.

 

Ever heard of Quantum Mechanics? Just curious - 'cos I understand that the observer can determine the outcome just by observing. In fact in some cases there is no truth until there is the observation. Hey ho.

 

Disease,

"Logic doesn't work like that."

His does.

 

Irrelevant. We are not discussing those matters here.

 

This is nothing but rhetoric, and has nothing to do with the claim I made. I am not talking about an observer standing right next to a lion. Nor am I talking about the frame of reference of the lion. You cannot make an argument against something somebody did not state. Either figure out what I am saying, and respond to that, or do not respond.

 

You guess? This is the only statement that is a valid response to what I am stating. All of your other statements are not responses to my statement. There is an example of an observer, and an example of an event. All the other garbage you wanted to throw in there was for what? Because you are not interested in having a productive discussion? Because you are using sophist tactics to win a debate without regard to pursuit of understanding?

 

Lix,

Response to Disease.

"You cannot make an argument against something somebody did not state. Either figure out what I am saying, and respond to that, or do not respond."

You did state that, here. Again, words have meaning.

"If there was an observer watching, the observer would have no effect on whether or not it happened. The observation/conclusion of the observer is irrelevant to whether or not big lion killed the deer."

So again you are bouncing back between what is truth without an observer (a tree falls in the forest but there is no one to hear it fall, did it fall ?) and what is observed as truth/knowledge. The lion killed the deer. Without the observation it is not known and therefore can not be knowledge. If we stumbled upon the remains we may be able to know. But the remains may also tell us that it died of another cause.