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To: OESY; Conservative Me; ontos-on; Petronski; martin gibson; afraidfortherepublic; Antoninus; ...
Let me begin by saying I agree with one point of this article and that is the "brights" are not too bright. Anyone who categorized themselves on the basis of what they do not believe has a very narrow intellectual horizon.

Beyond that, this article is mostly nonsense. The Enlightenment Fallacy holds that human reason and science can, in principle, unmask the whole of reality.

If there has ever been a philosopher or an atheist who has said anything like, "human reason and science can, in principle, unmask the whole of reality," I have never run across them, and I have read most to the philosophers (and theologians as well). What I have found, and agree with, is that anything makes a claim for truth that is not based on reason cannot be known to be true.

Reason is the only capacity we have been given as human beings for understanding anything. When Kant makes the claim that this is not true, it is his (quite human and quite wrong) reason that makes this claim. What, was Kant privy to some other kind of reason that all other mortals are not?

But why should we believe, Kant asked, that our five-mode instrument for apprehending reality is sufficient for capturing all of reality?

Why indeed, since no one in the entire history of the world has ever made that claim. This is nothing but a straw man, than anybody could knock down. What Kant really foisted on the world was an attempt to repudiate the senses and substitute mysticism. No one claims, not even the most materialistic of empiricists, that knowledge comes exclusively and completely from the senses. (Maybe one has, but their influence must be very small, since no one has heard of them.) First of all, there are not only five senses. There is the whole world of internal experiences, like the sensations of elation, fear, nausea, vertigo, etc. that are directly perceived but not by any of the five senses.

What the rationalist opposes is mysticism, which is the belief that knowledge is possible without either evidence or reason. Being opposed to mysticism is not atheism.

It is mysticism that allows people to believe any superstitious nonsense and encourages people to do things, that, if they only used their senses and their reason, they would never do, like flying planes into sky-scrapers killing thousands of people or strapping explosives to their bodies and blowing themselves and as many others as they can to kingdom come. It is the philosophy of Kant and all other forms of mysticism that propagate superstition and irrationality.

If you understand why you believe what you believe, that belief is rational. If you believe something, but do not know why you believe it, or how you know it is true, that is superstition. Most people do not call it superstition, they call it faith. But, if you believe something, and cannot find either evidence or reason for that belief, how do you distinguish it from an illusion, or hallucination, or dementia.

Suppose we accept the premise that it is possible to have true knowledge without reason or evidence. Now comes a Muslim, a Buddhist, and a Christian, all bearing their Scriptures which they claim is a source of knowledge that must just be believed, because it cannot be known by reason or evidence. How does one decide which supposed claim to mystic truth is the correct one? Certainly, if the higher truth comes without reason, reason cannot be used to judge which higher truth is the really true higher truth. How do you decide, I mean, without using reason?

Whether you believe the nature of man is determined by God or "nature," the ability to reason is the only faculty man has been given with which to understand the truth. This article is nothing but an assault on reason, and thereby the truth, whatever you believe the truth is.

Hank

42 posted on 10/06/2003 8:20:07 AM PDT by Hank Kerchief
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To: Hank Kerchief
Suppose we accept the premise that it is possible to have true knowledge without reason or evidence.

The Gospels, and Paul's and John's espistles, make the case that a belief in the Resurrection -- and miracles -- are rational.

44 posted on 10/06/2003 8:49:40 AM PDT by Tribune7
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To: Hank Kerchief; OESY; Conservative Me; ontos-on; Petronski; martin gibson; afraidfortherepublic; ...
If there has ever been a philosopher or an atheist who has said anything like, "human reason and science can, in principle, unmask the whole of reality," I have never run across them, and I have read most to the philosophers (and theologians as well). What I have found, and agree with, is that anything makes a claim for truth that is not based on reason cannot be known to be true.

I found something pretty funny in a high school biology book edited by Ernst Mayr. He had just finished a paragraph that summed up everything from the present all the way back to the moment of the Big Bang and then said (I paraphrase), "But what came before the Big Bang we cannot say. We prefer to stay within the bounds of our experience."
52 posted on 10/06/2003 9:53:01 AM PDT by aruanan
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