Re: Paradoxes

On 20/01/2025 3:03 am, DB Cates wrote:

On 2025-01-18 9:53 p.m., MarkE wrote:
 [Let's get to your definitions]
 

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Perhaps I need to extend/clarify my position to something like this:
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"If OoL research were to find no plausible naturalistic explanation after some large amount of research time and effort, would one then consider supernatural action as a possible explanation? If your answer is no, that suggests an a priori commitment to either metaphysical naturalism or undetectable theism."
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Definitions & clarifications:
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- "find no plausible naturalistic explanation" = a general consensus that all known hypotheses, mechanisms and pathways have been shown to be implausible

 There's the rub. It is the general consensus among scientists that the 'KNOWN hypotheses, mechanisms and pathways' are wrong or at least incomplete. So any 'implausibility' is contingent. The future of scientific knowledge is still wide open to new discoveries and ideas.

There will never be a decisive and unanimous consensus. What constitutes a sufficient consensus is matter of individual judgement.

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- "implausible" = generally accepted as essentially physically impossible or with vanishingly small probability

 See above.

Also a ultimately a matter of individual judgement.

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- "some large amount of research time and effort" = an arbitrary and conservatively large allowance

 And just who is to determine what that 'conservatively large allowance' is to be?

Again, it comes down to a general consensus and individual judgement.

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- "consider supernatural action" = allow for this option, but with no requirement to abandon further research

 When 'consider supernatural action' is useful to science it will be done. There are enough theistic scientists and other scientists open to the broad scientific ethos to allow this. You just have to find good evidence to support such usefulness.

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- "suggests an a priori commitment" - at this point an unwillingness to even consider supernatural agency is rationally contrary to the balance of scientific evidence, and therefore is based on other factors

 That statement makes much more sense if you substitute 'willingness' for 'unwillingness'. See below.

Disagree. We see this differently.

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- "undetectable theism" - the position that any and all divine action is not detectable or unable to be inferred from observation/analysis of physical phenomena

 So propose a way to reliably detect 'divine action' "from observation/ analysis of physical phenomena". Interesting that you should use the term 'divine action' rather than 'supernatural action'. Does it indicate an 'a priori commitment' to find a support for supernatural action that you can shoehorn your personal theism into?

I do have a theistic bias. Though my reasoning here applies to unspecified theism.
If OoL was found to be of vanishingly small probability, or if it gave rise to an impossible paradox, then we may infer the possibility of divine action. It would likely always be debated as to whether either of these criteria had been satisfied.
My recent post "Pass the multiverse please" cites several scientists who assess OoL to be sufficiently intractable as to invoke a multiverse to increase probabilistic resources to a required level. Again, there's not consensus on this, but it shows it to be a serious option.
And that's inherently the nature of this epistemology. We must each form our own beliefs and make our own choices.

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- Would this situation provide any information about this hypothesised agent? No; that's the domain of theology, philosophy, personal experience etc
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Thoughts?
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Equally, I'd value a response to my question on intervention and
theistic evolution.

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You first, please.
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