Tom Caylor wrote:
> Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
>> On 2/18/07, Tom Caylor <Daddycaylor.domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> On Feb 16, 8:18 am, "Stathis Papaioannou" <stath....domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>>>> If you built a model society and set its citizens instincts, goals,
>>>> laws-from-heaven (but really from you) and so on, would that suffice to
>>>> provide "meaning"?
>>>>
>>> It would not provide ultimate meaning for two reasons...
>>
>> My answer would have been that the beings would have no way of knowing the
>> difference between the provided meaning and "ultimate" meaning, and would
>> live their lives just as we live our lives, some of them atheists and others
>> theists. In other words, the idea of ultimate meaning can have no objective
>> or subjective consequences: you can honestly, deeply believe in it and this
>> belief can change the way you live your life, but it would do so even if it
>> had no basis in reality. A child might behave well in order to receive
>> presents from Santa Claus, but this has no bearing whatsoever on the
>> question of whether Santa Claus exists.
>>
>> 1) Logical reason, but still important and inescapable: If the source
>>> of meaning was from within the "system", i.e. the observable/
>>> controllable universe, then we can always ask the why question when we
>>> find the source. This is not acceptable as part of a scientifically
>>> observable causal universe, as it contradicts it. A closed system
>>> which is supposedly totally explainable will always have at least one
>>> fixed point that is unexplainable. This is the old positivism
>>> problem. This is actually part of the problem with a straw-man
>>> caricature god, in our image, i.e. any thing that we (as part of the
>>> universe) can think up.
>>
>> You can always draw a circle around the system + externals and call it a
>> new, larger system: the universe, the multiverse, the plenitude, God + the
>> Plenitude, or whatever. Long before it was a problem for positivism it was a
>> problem for theism: Who made God? Who gives God meaning? Who tells God
>> whether his ethical principles are right or wrong?
>>
>
> These are positivist questions. This is your basic error in this
> whole post (and previous ones). These questions are assuming that
> positivism is the right way of viewing everything, even ultimate
> meaning (at least when meaning is said to be based on God, but not
> when meaning is said to be based on ourselves).
>
> Tom
Then is it your error to assume that it must be based on God and not on ourselves?
If there is a purpose and it's not my purpose, what meaning can it provide to my actions?
Brent Meeker
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Received on Mon Feb 19 2007 - 14:23:09 PST