No I am not saying that at all, disrgr. What I am saying is that being rational entails an appreciation of ratio. Ratio -- reason -- always involves a comparison of one thing to a standard; that is, to another more deeply-rooted, universal thing. Understanding takes root in this process, and only in this process.
Take for example the physical laws. They are the more deeply rooted things against which observations of phenomena are compared, such that the phenomena they describe can be comprehended and understood. Not to mention, this is the process that constitutes the knowledge by which future predictions can be more or less reliably made.
This is the level of the problem I'd most like to engage.
Other than that, let me just add that God is not "the god of the gaps." God is so fundamental, that "if He did not exist, it would be necessary to create Him."
If you can figure out what I just said, and it rings a bell somewhere, I hope you'll give it some further thought, and then ring my bell sometime soon.
best wishes, bb
But of course, people who cannot live with uncertainty do create God in their own image. All you have to do is look around at all the incompatible versions of God that infest this website. Gods that think poor people should be driven from public places, gods that think Mexicans “don’t assimilate, they contaminate,” gods that think it would be a good idea to nuke Mecca, gods that give scriptures to individuals on gold tablets but take them back before the rest of us can see them, ditto for stone tablets.
By your standards it is irrational to look for regularities in the universe that all people who look can see, but rational to trust personal revelations that divide people, and lead to wars and schisms.
A reductionist comes out of the closet. I never would have suspected.
But seriously, you're only half right. Meaning and understanding is, I agree, relational but I don't think it's a tree as you say. Rather it's a web. We understand even the "deepest" things only in their relation to other things, some of which we don't understand consciously at all but do know unconsciously. Very cool.
What I am saying is that being rational entails an appreciation of ratio. Ratio -- reason -- always involves a comparison of one thing to a standard; that is, to another more deeply-rooted, universal thing. Understanding takes root in this process, and only in this process.
Let us say that this is true. There is no reason, however, to believe that there is only one "more deeply-rooted, universal thing". For an atheist who happens to be Buddhist, for example, that standard might be the truth that all sentient beings desire happiness and do not desire suffering. While that standard is different from the one(s) that a Christian might judge by, it is no less valid. Ergo, the atheist is certainly rational/reasonable. Wouldn't you agree?