Are you an atheist?

[The_Doc_Man]

You only need to show that there is reasonable doubt.

Ah, Rabbie, if only that were the standard we used for religion...

But unfortunately the more - how shall I say this? - intransigently zealous members of the forum won't accept that line of thought. Oh, well.

In case I don't get to post any more in this area, I wish to all of you a happy holiday in whatever form you choose to observe it. Even the non-religious folks of the world can use Christmas as an excuse to be with family for happy reasons and that is a good thing.

 

[Libre]

I think we all agree that the burden of proof is on the prosecution. It's one of the things about law and civics that we learn very early on.
BUT
The word "PROOF" has its own meaning in court, quite different from actual, real, uncontestable PROOF.
There is no PROOF in court.
As Rabbie, Frothy, Doc Man, and myself all agree, you could never convict anyone it there were a scintilla of doubt - or unreasonable doubt - which would nearly always exist to some degree.
Courts are designed to make decisions arising out of disputes among people or convict transgressors of opaquely worded laws that have may been broken - never a precise set of circumstances. So there is no perfection there - only reasonable and unreasonable doubt. And that opens a huge can of worms.
What is reasonable to person A is unreasonable to persons B, C, and D. That's why we can have hung juries, mistrials, or in some cases, faulty verdicts.

Now, getting back to my arguments about proving negatives, I've decided after careful thought - to reject Frothy's example of the balls and ramps. It's not that I'm just a stubborn ass (although I wouldn't argue that point) but the more I think about the balls and ramps, the more it does NOT really represent proving a negative. It is simply (and I did point this out already) a logical equivalent arising from the mutual exclusivity of only two options. Balls are on the left or on the right - there is no bouncing out, no hidden secret balls up anyone's sleeve, no deception of any sort. So you are proving a negative (no balls on left) only by proving the positive (all balls on right).

This is like proving a man is NOT dead (a negative) only by proving he is in fact alive. Or, glass is half full = glass is half empty.

I do not accept these logical equivalents as in fact proving negatives.

As far as Doc Man's "exhaustive search in restricted domains" - well, my example of finding Mike in an auditorium was criticized and found faulty. So let's have an example that's not faulty - in which a negative is proved and not merely by proving its logically equivalent positive.

Ho hummm. Slow here at work. Christmas eve after all. And 70 degrees outside!

 

[Frothingslosh]

Libre, you can't reject logic simply because you don't like the conclusions it leads you to.

I can prove "there are no baseballs in that bucket" simply by showing you that that bucket is empty.

Negative proven.

And earlier you were specifically stating that 'proof' means 'beyond all possibility of even the most unlikely possibility of error'. That is an unattainable standard, if for no reason than the Uncertainty Principle. There's a reason experiments and proofs always include a standard deviation or margin of error.

And man, now I regret bringing up the legal comparison at all, especially as I appear to have confused the hell out of Rabbie thanks to poor phrasing.

Back on the Doc's original topic, it does occur to me that the EW drive might actually overthrow established scientific principles, seeing as it pretty blatantly ignores the law of conservation of momentum. It's still to early to call, but every experiment so far has confirmed that it actually works...somehow.

 

[Libre]

Libre, you can't reject logic simply because you don't like the conclusions it leads you to.

I can prove "there are no baseballs in that bucket" simply by showing you that that bucket is empty.

Negative proven.

Not quite. For a number of reasons.
One, I'm not rejecting logic because I don't like the conclusions. I'm rejecting it because in this case it's being used as a slight of hand, without furthering our knowledge in any way. If the balls are not in the bucket, it's an inescapable consequence of the balls being elsewhere. If this logic were acceptable, then pretty much ANY negative proposition can be proven by negating the positive. And if that's all you're saying, then I agree.

But, to say you've proven that there are no baseballs in the bucket by showing me the bucket is empty is another futile attempt to prove something. Not seeing something has long been discounted as proof that the something doesn't exist. There are a great many things not seen but they still exist. The bucket is far from empty first of all - it's full of air (and air that I can't see) but beyond that, simply not detecting something does not prove it doesn't exist. Radio waves. Quarks. Distant galaxies. I realize that with balls and buckets you'd want to say if they were there you'd see them, and you're right. If there were an elephant in the room I'd see it. It's just that proof of nonexistence requires more than not seeing. It would be easy to arrange the balls and buckets to give a wrong impression (if you wanted to deceive), and even if you were earnest.

All this is why my position is that negatives cannot be proven - except that because of your example, I have to amend that to, cannot be proven except by proving/disproving the opposite positive.

I'm pretty patient if you want to take this any further but frankly, I don't have much more to add. We're both reasonably intelligent and thoughtful types, I think we pretty much understand where we stand on this issue. Glad to continue but just as glad to shrug shoulders and go back to arguing with the bible thumpers - not that that will cause any minds to change, either.

 

[Frothingslosh]

Sophistry, Libre.

You are wrong, and dancing around words and taking meanings that very obviously aren't what was meant doesn't change that.

The statement was 'there are no baseballs in the bucket'.

I show you the bucket, which, lo and behold, contains no baseballs. Sorry if I was confusing by saying 'empty', it never occurred to me that you would go "BUT AIR" and use that to argue that there are invisible baseballs in the bucket.

This is a very simple example. Statement: There are no baseballs in the bucket. Proof: Bucket is shown to contain no baseballs.

It doesn't matter that baseballs exist elsewhere. I did not, in fact, provide any evidence of where the baseballs are, because that is irrelevant insofar as there are none in that bucket. There is no 'positive', as you are redefining it, in the proof being provided.

I said there were no baseballs in the bucket, then showed that the bucket, in fact, contained no baseballs, and was, in fact, by any actually-used standard, empty. Also, note that except when air is actually a factor, scientists do not refer to air-filled flasks, beakers, and other containers, either. Petri dish contents will mention gel, nutrient, and the fungus or whatever, but the air goes unsaid because it's irrelevant. When I was studying chemistry in college, my professor referred to empty gear, not air-filled gear, nor was I expected to refer to the volume of air in my containers when I wrote up my experiment results, save when air actually WAS a factor.

Unless you can prove that someone has created invisible, weightless, massless baseballs, your argument that 'not seeing any baseballs in the empty bucket is not proof that there are no baseballs in it' is sheer stubbornness, and is in fact reaching the point of being a logical fallacy.

There is no sleight of hand here. An empty bucket is absolute proof that said bucket contains no baseballs.

As to proving a negative by proving/disproving something else, that's been a basic part of logic since Greek days. Hell, have you ever done a logic puzzle? Probably 3/4 of the work involved is proving what what relationships are PRECLUDED based on other data. You MUST be able to infer what something cannot be based on the state of something else. Sometimes the solutions can only be reached by reasoning like "If Matt has the dog, and we know the dog lives in the green house, then that means Jason MUST live in the red house, but I know Jason drives the Maserati, and if the Maserati is at the red house, then the Fiat must be in the yellow house, leaving no place for the Jaguar. Therefore, Matt cannot own the dog and Jason must live in the red house."

Yeah, I like logic puzzles.

No one's arguing that negatives are difficult to prove, nor that they dont require strictly controlled situations in order for that to be done, but the fact is that it IS possible given the right circumstances, as, in fact, the people in this very forum (either Doc or one of the mods) showed me right here a year or two ago.

And you know me, Don Quixote incarnate. What this topic really needs is something new to argue oveOOOOOOO PRETTY LIGHT

 

[Libre]

I didn't notice when you changed your example from yesterday, when the "proof" consisted of 12 balls, 2 ramps, and 2 buckets.
Now it's just zero balls and one bucket.
I'm dancing around?
So to you, being shown something is proof.
For me, it is far from proof.
Do I get to examine the bucket or are you going to just hold it up and show it to me?
And from what distance?
No - I'm skeptical. I don't buy it.
You can't prove anything to me that way.
We're using proof (or we have been) not in the ordinary sense of proof (which is really anything but) but in the sense that the science text books will be rewritten and the new knowledge becomes part of the human consciousness. You example just does not fill the bill.

 

[Frothingslosh]

I simplified the example to remove any possible extraneous issue once you argued 'bouncing'.

An empty bucket is proof all on its own that it contains no baseballs.

I'm talking you and me, in the same room. I say that a bucket has no baseballs and immediately hand it to you. There are no invisible baseballs, no microscopic baseballs, no secret compartments, no mirrors, no hallucinations, no magic, no disintegrating baseballs, no intangible dark matter baseballs, no baseballs suddenly travelling to alternate universes, no photos/pictures/any other representation of baseballs, no objects with 'baseball' written on them, no dumping of baseballs, nothing. You can run any test you want, there are no baseballs in it, period.

It's a freaking empty bucket, and it is absolute logical proof of my negative statement that it contains no baseballs.

I know you don't like proven wrong; I get that. I *HATE* being proven wrong, but in this case, you are, just as I was on this very topic in this very forum just a year or so ago when I was arguing your position.

Edit: And man, I wish we lived closer to one another. This is what my friends and I consider perfect bar discussion!

 

[Libre]

Frothingslosh.
Have you ever been shown something that turned out to be not what it appeared?
Has it ever happened to you?
Have you ever seen a magician produce bouquets of flowers from their empty hand or the ace of spades plucked out of thin air?
I have many times. Many other times, where there was no intentional deception, I failed to see something that was obviously present, or did think I saw something that turned out not to really be there.
I can process information and rely on ordinary cues to tell me when a baseball is in a bucket or it isn't.
Is this a standard diameter baseball by the way?
Is it the standard color?
Could it be hidden?
Could the bucket have a false bottom?
Or is that impossible?
Sorry - I don't care how you change your example, or how often you say I'm changing the meaning of your words. I've been perfectly consistent in my argument. You have not convinced me even a smidgeon.

 

[Frothingslosh]

Libre, what you're doing is the equivalent of saying that there is a widespread voter fraud issue because in a sample set of 1 billion votes, there were 31 cases of fraud, or 0.0000031%.

Do you refuse to go through intersections because there is a tiny, tiny, tiny chance you missed someone blowing through the intersection at 80 mph?

Do you refuse to use a cell phone because it's theoretically possible for someone to have replaced its innards with a cunningly disguised charged capacitor and hidden taser?

Do you refuse to eat in restaurants because it's theoretically possible they are washing their dishes with cyanide?

How do you play your guitar, knowing that there's a possibility someone snuck into your apartment and coated it in contact poison?

Those are just as 'logical' as your attempts to prove that my empty bucket isn't actually an empty bucket.

 

[Libre]

Do you go flying through intersections without looking for pedestrians or other cars?
Do you drink from an unlabeled bottle of fluid because it appears to be milk?
I can function in the world, with only partial information.
Sometimes our assumptions bite us in the ass but we can't live our lives without uncertainties.
I trust my senses and I do not get paralyzed with uncertainty.
But we're talking about proof.
To me that means that all other explanations are - if not impossible, so exceedingly remote that they can be discounted.
You're taking it to mean that, the facts appear to support a conclusion so that conclusion is proved.
I don't need proof to function.
I need proof only to accept a proposition as incontestably true.

 

[Frothingslosh]

I straight up said it was an empty bucket. If it were a false-bottomed bucket, I would have said so. If it had magical invisible baseballs in it, I would have said so. I said the bloody thing was empty. Period. Nothing in it (except, for the pendants among us, air). No baseballs. No tap-dancing elephants singing Kumbaya. No tricks, gimmicks, illusions, just a bucket that IS empty.

I mean, christ, if we were next to each other I'd hand you one for real. If I had your address, there'd be a bucket on a UPS truck bound for your house at this very moment. It is an empty bucket. Not may be, not might be, not probably is, but *IS*.

THE

BUCKET

IS

EMPTY

You know what, fuck it, you think I'm lying about the setup, fine. Whatever.

Let's try something else.

You are the one making the extraordinary assertion that it is categorically impossible to prove a negative under any circumstances whatsoever. That puts the burden of proof on you.

So.

Prove it.

 

[Frothingslosh]

Also, for further reading:

Thinking Tools: You CAN Prove a Negative
Negative Proof (it's the bottom-most section)
You Can Prove a Negative
<unnamed article> - includes the wonderful and easily proven "five does not equal four"
Iron Chariots article on the uses and misuses of the phrase

And that's just the first page of results from Googling 'proving a negative'

 

[Libre]

THE

BUCKET

IS

EMPTY

Ah ok. So that proves it. You say it's empty and that's the proof.

Your argument, in effect, is the following:

Premise: The bucket is empty.
Conclusion: Therefore the bucket is empty.

Certainly, in your made up universe, you can say that not only is this bucket empty, but all buckets are empty. You can say that giraffes are reptiles in your world, proving that giraffes are reptiles.

In the real world, you would have to prove such statements - it would be insufficient to just insist.

I clicked only on the first link and found bias and inaccuracy.
Example - they make the statement (paraphrasing):
"A proposition cannot simultaneously be both true and false".

Incorrect!
There are numerous paradoxes, easily demonstrated.

Example:
This statement is false.
(Bertrand Russell - same guy as the teapot guy).

If the statement is true then it's false and if it's false then it's true.

Okay, first article trashed.

I'll get around to the others someday when my boredom level increases - exponentially.

I can't prove my way of thinking to you any more than you can prove yours to me. We've reached a point where our actual meanings may have become irrelevant.

Nothing more to say on this topic.
Moving on...

 

[ColinEssex]

You know what, fuck it,. . . .

I really can't see the need for language like that. You do know it demonstrates a lack of ability to use the English language and limited intelligence. Still, you are American so we shouldn't expect too much.

Oh, could you answer my questions on the other thread please? I'm keen to learn your replies. Thanks.

Col

 

[Frothingslosh]

Shall I start pulling out the other 28 million scholarly articles conclusively proving you to be wrong, Libre?

Also, a paradox is not defined as 'simultaneously true and false'. A paradox is defined as a statement or proposition that, despite sound (or apparently sound) reasoning from acceptable premises, leads to a conclusion that seems senseless, logically unacceptable, or self-contradictory.

"This sentence is false" cannot be true, nor can it be false. It is simply nonsensical. It is as logical as 'the apples sound purple'.

I'm limited to thought experiments because we are a thousand miles apart. If I could meet you face to face, I would tell you that the bucket I am carrying contains no baseballs, then hand you that empty bucket.

At this point, you're grasping at straws, man. Not to mention the hubris in assuming that every logician, mathematician, and scientist out there is wrong on this topic....

 

[Libre]

Oh no - the hubris is in your thinking that you know the minds of every logician out there.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

Oh, Hell, let's stir up the pot. TECHNICALLY the baseballs-in-the-bucket analogy has been misstated.

The correct statement of the problem, to be pedantically precise, is:

Mike claims that a baseball exists in the bucket.

Frothy disputes the claim. Since the bucket represents a limited domain for which a complete examination is possible, the negative of Mike's assertion can be proven by demonstration.

The analogous large-scale problem would be that Blade claims that a God exists in (and runs) the universe.

We who dispute the claim CANNOT demonstrate the negative of Blade's assertion because the domain is unsearchable due to its size.

We have to be careful about linguistic laziness. If there is a statement to be made AND DISPUTED, the assertion has to be of a positive nature in order for us to reach the state of being unable to prove the negative. It has to do with formal assertoric logic and the true negative of a "there exists" assertion. For instance, if the argument were "all X is Y" then it is enough to refute the negative by finding at least one X that is not Y.

It has been a long time but if I recall, the opposite of a "general assertion" is a "specific negation" - which is not an issue. But the opposite of a "specific assertion" is a "general negation" - and that is the one that can't be proved for the general case.

 

[Libre]

I can agree with most of your post Doc Man.
And I think that, when it comes to proofs, linguistic precision is absolutely necessary. Ambiguity in the phrasing of the proof invalidates it.
For one reason, ambiguity can later be used to claim something other than what was initially stated - to move the goalpost so to speak

I've already agreed that a negative can be proved by disproving or proving the positive if they are mutually exclusive. I suppose they are corollaries. So under these tightly controlled circumstances, I agree you can conjure up a situation where a negative can be proved/disproved.
Not that doing so is going to advance anyone's knowledge though.
If someone comes forward with a remarkable claim about something, I'd want exceedingly strong evidence before I would start to say it was proved and I'm sure we can all agree with that, although I can't prove it.

The problem with disproving the existence of God is not just the size of the domain but because the object of the study - namely God - may not be a physical entity but a spirit or a concept. It's like trying to prove the existence or nonexistence of love. It's open to interpretation. Someone who feels it can't convince those that can't. It can't be produced like balls in a bucket.

 

[Mike375]

This really simple.

1) Atheists state as a matter of fact that there is no God or gods or super naturals etc.

2) The theists state as a matter of fact that there is God. Variations are gods or super naturals.

3) Agnostics are in the "I don't know" but might lean one way or the other.

The first 2 have definite 100% positions but without proof. Thus they are both faith based.

In short an atheist is every bit as "religious" as a "born again"

 

[Galaxiom]

Atheists state as a matter of fact that there is no God or gods or super naturals etc.

Incorrect. Atheists state that in the absence of proof there is no reason to believe that any gods exist.

In short an atheist is every bit as "religious" as a "born again"

Not at all. The religious will not consider the possibility that there are no gods despite the absence of evidence for their existence while the atheist could accept that gods did exist if evidence were provided.