Will science ever find the ultimate answer to God?

[luckyme]

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He reckons if there is an evil force, there must be a good one as well. This almost makes sense to me, except I don't accept or believe in evil.

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wow. what else does that apply to?
My right pocket has no money, therefore my left pocket has money?
What is the basis for that 'opposites must exist' theory? I can't get my head around it, so anything may help.

luckyme

[madnak]

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I'd be willing to bet there aren't as many "kinds" of insect as you think there are.

I'm not talking species here.

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What are you talking? Genus? Family?

[Inso0]

Probably family.

I'm talking about whatever animal was the common ancestor of horses and zebras.

Or barn and snow owls.

Or hammerhead and tiger sharks.

[madnak]

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Probably family.

I'm talking about whatever animal was the common ancestor of horses and zebras.

Or barn and snow owls.

Or hammerhead and tiger sharks.

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It's not that simple with all species, but it sounds like "family" is the level of classification you're looking for. If you go up to order, that would require significant differentiation at lower levels (in other words, it would imply huge structural changes not explainable by microevolution, defeating your point).

Your statement does become more true at higher levels of classification (though this is arguably a consequence of insect diversity, not a refutation of it). And I think the points about geography are more important when we're talking about diversity. But here's a (complete?) list of the insect families. More than all others combined? Well, probably not. But more than vertebrates.

(I can't find complete information online, but the NCBI is reliable.)

[madnak]

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I disagree if one insists that he is bound by logic. The problem of evil is a pretty good effort at demonstrating a contradiction in theistic premises. I havent seen any answer to it that satisfies me.

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Yet you still believe, bunny.

[bunny]

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I disagree if one insists that he is bound by logic. The problem of evil is a pretty good effort at demonstrating a contradiction in theistic premises. I havent seen any answer to it that satisfies me.

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Yet you still believe, bunny.

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Only because I'm still looking for a solution. I doubt theism will endure in my head if I give up on a solution to the problem of evil. As long as I consider ia an "open problem" then I am in the realm of two conflicting beliefs competing against one another. I'd be interested if you think I have to cede rationality here (as I do with choice of religion) given I dont claim certainty arising from faith?

[Lestat]

<font color="blue"> My right pocket has no money, therefore my left pocket has money? </font>

I'm not sure this is a true opposite. Although I remember reading an interesting argument Socrates' made concerning opposites. It was a long time ago, and I can't recall all the details. It went something like, every opposite has a transitional process. For instance, from the state of sleep is the opposite consciousness. And the transitional process is waking. From the state of life there is death. And the transitional process is dying. He then reasoned that every state must somehow have an opposite state. So therefore from the state of death, must be the process of living, ergo there is life after death.

Something like that. I'd be interested to read this again if anyone knows what I'm talking about and where to find it.

But if evil truly does exist, it stands to reason there must also be an opposite good. And the question is, where does this good come from? It's actually a pretty strong philosophical argument that I don't fully understand, but I know this conclusion has been reached by much greater minds than mine.

[luckyme]

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<font color="blue"> My right pocket has no money, therefore my left pocket has money? </font>

I'm not sure this is a true opposite. Although I remember reading an interesting argument Socrates' made concerning opposites. It was a long time ago, and I can't recall all the details. It went something like, every opposite has a transitional process. For instance, from the state of sleep is the opposite consciousness. And the transitional process is waking. From the state of life there is death. And the transitional process is dying. He then reasoned that every state must somehow have an opposite state. So therefore from the state of death, must be the process of living, ergo there is life after death.

Something like that. I'd be interested to read this again if anyone knows what I'm talking about and where to find it.

But if evil truly does exist, it stands to reason there must also be an opposite good. And the question is, where does this good come from? It's actually a pretty strong philosophical argument that I don't fully understand, but I know this conclusion has been reached by much greater minds than mine.

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There are three major weaknesses in that approach -
1) what makes X the opposite of Y. what's the opposite of bear. or running. or inhaling ( is it exhaling or not breathing) or life. different doesn't make something opposite. Landing heads .. is it landing tails or landing on edge.
2) Even if we can come up with a meaningful concept of 'opposite' there is no reason the think that because these 5 things have opposites all things have opposites.
3) the universe is one mega process. To freeze-frame any given state and then some other state and call other states between them 'tranistional' is merely arbitrary. Is water the transitional state between ice and vapor.

I can't see any merit to the concept other than at a fun parlor game level. "Find my Opposite" ( and we'll hear a lot of different claims to the correct answer)

luckyme

[tame_deuces]

And interestingly, the human brain is geared towards discovering patterns (even patterns which is not there, for example gambler's fallacy) and symmetry. I don't have any studies for this, but it wouldn't surprise me if this gives us some 'bias' towards dualistic viewpoints.

[madnak]

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I'm not sure this is a true opposite.

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What's a "true" opposite?

As for Socrates (Plato), the conclusions he reached about the world around him using these kinds of arguments were almost all completely wrong. The conclusions he reached about religion were also kooky by our standards. Empiricism, which comes to many correct conclusions, refuses to deal in opposites at all. So why do you think the idea of "opposites" is valid?

Also, I think you can find a "true" opposite any time you take something and reverse a given "polarity" wrt that thing. A concrete example is love. Love is a good example because it represents extreme emotion and kind emotion. In other words, love represents the "extreme end" of the emotional scale, and it also represents the "giving end" of the emotional scale. There are two polarities involved. Switch either polarity and you have an "opposite" - if you switch the "extreme" aspect, then you have indifference. If you switch the "giving" aspect, then you have hate. And sure enough, people argue about whether hate or indifference is the "true" opposite of love. This is consistent with tame's idea that people see "opposites" not because they exist, but because human beings like to find patterns.