Mind Boggling

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You are using equivocating rhetoric that is pure nonsense


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Substitute nonrational. Substitute arational. Substitute without rationality. I don't see how you gain anything.

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So, you think the universe is rational? It has a mind? And the apple or rock? Rational too?

[NotReady]

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So, you think the universe is rational?


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It is the product of a Mind.

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I don't care what people believe... whatever makes them happy is fine. I only start to care when they start to use that belief as justification for making other people unhappy.

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Bingo. (Although I disagree with your next to last sentence in cases of scientific prodigies who could advance medicine and knowledge.)

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True. I guess I do care to an extent... as much as I would care if a medical prodigy decided to spend their life playing poker, perhaps. But, I wouldn't care enough that I'd tell them they were wrong. It's their life, and they can choose to do with it what they want. If we all had to reach our maximal potential for helping society, then we'd all have a lot of work to do. [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img] But, yes, I think it would be better if someone spent their time and energy on things that really mattered. Like posting on two plus two! LOL.

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So, you think the universe is rational?


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It is the product of a Mind.

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So, is something that is a product of a mind, "rational" or "irrational"? You suggested that only atheists claim the universe is "irrational". Please answer the question this time. Thank you.

[NotReady]

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So, is something that is a product of a mind, "rational" or "irrational"? You suggested that only atheists claim the universe is "irrational". Please answer the question this time. Thank you.


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I will reanswer it. Rational means based on a mind. It can also mean a mind that works according to reason. The universe is based on a Mind. The Mind it is based on is rational. I could type "based on reason and therefore rational or based on rational because it is the product of a Mind". Or I could just type "rational". I choose the latter.

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So, is something that is a product of a mind, "rational" or "irrational"? You suggested that only atheists claim the universe is "irrational". Please answer the question this time. Thank you.


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I will reanswer it. Rational means based on a mind. It can also mean a mind that works according to reason. The universe is based on a Mind. The Mind it is based on is rational. I could type "based on reason and therefore rational or based on rational because it is the product of a Mind". Or I could just type "rational". I choose the latter.

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Is that a yes? Or a no? Geez.

"Rational means based on a mind?" "The universe is based on a mind?" WTF are you talking about?!? Rational is a quality of thought.

A thought is a product of a mind. The universe is a product of a mind. Therefore, the universe is a thought.

Retarded is based on intelligence. The universe is based on intelligence. Therefore, the universe is retarded.

[Trantor]

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It does not follow, that something is "irrational" or "illogical" just because it doesn't have a an "ultimate purpose"

And how an unconscious thing can be "irrational" has yet to be explained.


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Purpose implies mind. No purpose implies no mind. No mind means irrational. If chance is ultimate, since chance is irrational, the universe has no ultimate purpose or meaning.

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Continued debate really is pointless if you think this series of statements has any foundation in logic. Even if someone accepted your premises they would not lead in any logical fashion to your conclusion. You may have just stated the conclusion as fact, the rest is pointless and superflous irrespective of whether they are considered true statements or not.

[chezlaw]

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It does not follow, that something is "irrational" or "illogical" just because it doesn't have a an "ultimate purpose"

And how an unconscious thing can be "irrational" has yet to be explained.


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Purpose implies mind. No purpose implies no mind. No mind means irrational. If chance is ultimate, since chance is irrational, the universe has no ultimate purpose or meaning.

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Continued debate really is pointless if you think this series of statements has any foundation in logic. Even if someone accepted your premises they would not lead in any logical fashion to your conclusion. You may have just stated the conclusion as fact, the rest is pointless and superflous irrespective of whether they are considered true statements or not.

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We seem to have gone round in full circle. NotReady is stating the conclusion as fact. The question is about whether his conclusion is self-consistent and why he believes it.

We have hammered those to death. The bit I still don't get is his claim that all other conclusions are necessarily inconsistent. I think he has cleared up that he doesn't make this claim but I'm not sure.

chez

[NotReady]

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Continued debate really is pointless


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Amen, brother.


http://www.tameri.com/csw/exist/


Existentialism attempts to describe our desire to make rational decisions despite existing in an irrational universe

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Answer_to_Life,_the_Universe,_and_Everything

One would be that Arthur indeed discovered the Ultimate Question, which doesn't match the Answer simply because the universe is bizarre and irrational

http://phrontistery.info/isms.htmlabsurdism
doctrine that we live in an irrational universe

http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_...atic_Arts.html

Despite the assumption of an irrational universe, Sartre and Camus created dramas

http://www.quis.cc/words/self/

The most prominent existentialist is probably Sartre. He saw humans as being lost in a meaningless and irrational universe,

http://www.mala.bc.ca/~johnstoi/homer/iliadessay4.htm

Thus, the warrior fights because in an irrational, hostile universe he wants his life to mean something, to have value, to earn respect.

http://fusionanomaly.net/absurdity.html

noun
The condition or state in which human beings exist in a meaningless, irrational universe wherein people's lives have no purpose or meaning. Used chiefly with the.

http://www.kn.pacbell.com/wired/fil/...hilosopea.html

Existentialism: An Introduction - Existentialism attempts to describe our desire to make rational decisions despite existing in an irrational universe.

http://www.cgjungpage.org/talk/showthread.php?t=2931

The Irrationality of the Universe
Though The Stranger is a work of fiction, it contains a strong resonance of Camus’s philosophical notion of absurdity. In his essays, Camus asserts that individual lives and human existence in general have no rational meaning or order.

http://www.utilitarian.com/danz/autob.html

It was during my teenage years that I became increasingly isolated from the world and interested in everything that to me seemed negative at the time (and therefore positive) * heavy metal, rap music, misanthropy, nihilism and ultimately, negative utilitarianism (NU). (NU stipulates that in a seemingly irrational universe

http://www.normanball.com/essays/return1.html

Thus like most post-modern sonneteers, my loyalties to the form are divided; in short, a minefield of qualifications. A reluctant co-inheritor of our asymmetric, chaotic and largely irrational universe, I mourn the loss of our Newtonian pulleys and levers with no less fervor than the phantom who sits beside me on the subway.

http://sangha.net/messengers/dostoevsky.htm

The profound intellectual and spiritual significance of the massive novel is gradually revealed in the confrontations among the Karamazov brothers: the intellectual skeptic, Ivan; the emotional man of action, Dmitri, a novice from the monastery; and the saintly boy, Alyosha. The three protagonists-metaphysical symbols of body, mind, and spirit of the modern human being-engage in passionate debate, revolving around themes considered in the author's earlier works: the expiation of sin through suffering, the need for a moral force in an irrational universe,

http://www.bartleby.com/61/96/A0029600.html

absurd

SYLLABICATION: ab·surd
PRONUNCIATION: b-sûrd, -zûrd
ADJECTIVE: 1. Ridiculously incongruous or unreasonable. See synonyms at foolish. 2. Of, relating to, or manifesting the view that there is no order or value in human life or in the universe

http://register.stuy.edu/program_off...ions/e7ee.html

Existentialism can be considered a post-war philosophy (although it does have earlier roots in the writings of Kierkegaard and Nietzche) that stresses fervent individualism in the face of an irrational universe.

Divorced from topicality and controversy, Venus On The Half-Shell can be read as a lively satirical anatomy, an absurdist novel that manages to parody Vonnegut while ridiculing human pretentiousness and our persistent search for metaphysical answers in an irrational universe.

So, you googled "irrational universe" and found some links. That's great. I suppose that's the last resort for someone that can't explain their own statements.

So, you showed that Existentialists and Absurdists claim the universe is irrational. Now, let's conclude:

Bottom line is this: you seemed to suggest that you would call the universe "rational", while non-theists would call it "irrational". If by "rational" you mean, it was created by an intelligent being... then, sure. You're right. I wish you would just say that instead of obfuscating with your equivocations.

The thing is, for non-theists, WE CREATE OUR OWN MEANINGS. Actually, theists do to, just under the illusion that their meanings came from a higher power.