Richard of the secular realm

The largest work I have written so far is finally done. Took quite some time. Quite nervous about publishing it but also very excited for you all to read it! A huge thank you to @Anton_Leclerc for his review. Link: open.substack.com/pub/rickardkar…

@DPSThomas I don't see why naturalism has any difficulties in explaining altruistic behavior. Could you elaborate on that?

@LatFilosof My point though, is why not make the same effort to reconcile animal suffering with God’s existence? There are many avenues of approach. Difficulties in explaining altruism <> naturalism is untrue. Likewise, difficulties in explaining animal suffering <> no God

The argument from evolutionary suffering. I've talked about this before but I've never actually written something extensive about it. So, here we go: Link: rickardkarlsson.substack.com/publish/post/1…

@LarvatusWatch @pitiklinov >_> critiquing something you didn't even bother to read, a twitter classic.

@LatFilosof @pitiklinov I didn't bother because the summary provided was already rather questionable.

Rickard Karlsson presenta aquí lo que considera (y yo también) uno de los argumentos más sólidos contra la existencia de Dios: el sufrimiento evolutivo. A lo largo de cientos de millones de años, antes de que existieran los seres humanos, miles de millones de animales sufrieron de forma brutal y aparentemente innecesaria: fueron devorados vivos, murieron lentamente de hambre, enfermedades, parásitos, heridas o desastres naturales. Este inmenso sufrimiento ocurrió durante casi toda la historia de la Tierra (4.600 millones de años), mucho antes de cualquier posible “caída” humana o pecado. El argumento es potente porque no depende de conceptos morales humanos ni del libre albedrío. Las respuestas clásicas al problema del mal (como que el sufrimiento sirve para el “alma-building”) resultan muy débiles aquí. El “alma-building” es la idea teológica de que el sufrimiento ayuda a las personas a desarrollar virtudes, carácter o crecimiento espiritual. Sin embargo, esto no tiene mucho sentido aplicado a un velociraptor que muere aplastado bajo una roca o a un pez devorado vivo hace 300 millones de años: ¿qué carácter o alma se estaba formando en ellos? Karlsson argumenta que, bajo el naturalismo (evolución sin Dios), este sufrimiento es exactamente lo que cabría esperar: un proceso ciego, despiadado y sin ningún propósito. En cambio, bajo un teísmo que postula un Dios bondadoso y omnipotente, resulta muy difícil de explicar: ¿por qué un Dios que se preocupa por los seres vivos diseñaría un sistema basado en competencia brutal, dolor y muerte durante cientos de millones de años? El autor reconoce que los animales no sufren exactamente igual que los humanos, pero afirma que sí experimentan estados subjetivos indeseables (dolor, miedo, estrés, hambre), algo que apoya la neurociencia y el comportamiento animal. En conclusión, Karlsson no dice que este argumento demuestre de forma definitiva que Dios no existe, pero sí considera que hace que el naturalismo explique mucho mejor la realidad observada que el teísmo, por lo que reduce significativamente su creencia en la existencia de Dios.

@DeivonDrago I love the feeling of being ontologically correct.

Please stop saying that modern adherents of metaphysical naturalism are “materialists”. We prefer the terms “physicalist” and “right about reality”.

@LarvatusWatch @pitiklinov I also make that distinction clear in the article if you bothered to read it.

@LatFilosof @pitiklinov Read the basic definition of phoné and lógos by Aristotle. It's a better way of framing the problem. Suffering and joy are not simply pain and pleasure.

@JohanssonV94516 Bra val

Name a philosopher you consider genuinely brilliant — even a genius — but whose views you strongly disagree with. I'll go first! Thomas Aquinas.

@No5mallf3at You have the transcendental categories. That's something

Sometimes I wonder why I’m alone and then I recall it’s because I’m a piece of shit. Self loathing really does enforce itself. Why care when you have nothing.

@HunterHarpy Science jargon 😭 Lewis’s answers deals with morality and humans fall, not non-moral suffering and especially not that of animals far preceding human existence. His answers are not applicable here, it’s a category error.

@LatFilosof Your argument is just a rebrand of the Problem of Evil, which his book does address. Throwing some science jargon around and swapping a few names doesn't change that.

@LarvatusWatch @pitiklinov Read how I define it. It doesn’t require any moral self-awareness at all.

@pitiklinov Error semántico grave. El dolor no es sufrimiento. Para que haya sufrimiento (suffering) es precisa la autoconciencia moral, algo que solo aparece inequívocamente con el ser humano. Todo el argumento se cae.

@ZaatarHoney3 @DeEchteRuben No it’s not implied. And a naturalistic explanation is more likely simply based on that it requires fewer auxiliaries to support. It’s parsimony. On top of other factors.

@LatFilosof @DeEchteRuben Not directly, but it's implied. Why do you think God being caring makes Him a less likely explanation for suffering? Btw you give no criteria whatsoever for the likeliness of either possibilities you're comparing, so the whole thing is just your subjective opinion to begin with.

@HunterHarpy He does not deal with my argument.

@LatFilosof That's just an attempt to rebrand the Problem of Evil, which has been addressed many times. For one, here's something CS Lewis shared about it; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Probl…

@AtheistOwner No, not even remotely close. I don't even say God is doing anything wrong by allowing it. If you want to create a strawman, at least understand the material first.

@LatFilosof So just a really really long ass essay on "grr god mean" reducing it to base laziness and opinions because extinction is somehow painful or something in your eyes when it happens naturally for...reasons.

@ZaatarHoney3 @DeEchteRuben No it does not. I explicitly do *not* invoke morality to make my argument. I highly recommend reading the actual article so that you don't have to make these mistakes.

@LatFilosof @DeEchteRuben Cool, the point still stands.

@DeEchteRuben Costly? Not necessarily. Also not necessarily unnecessary, I also explain that in the article. But undesirable? Yes, by definition. I'm sorry but I now highly doubt you read it carefully, I took great care in defining my terms in the article. These questions are answered therein

@LatFilosof And in your own words this phenomenal experience is undesirable, costly and unnecessary, right?

@DPSThomas Oh wow, there is a lot to unpack here.

The same way we might try to understand altruism from a naturalistic perspective. How can we make sense of it? You could throw out naturalism as a framework altogether or try to understand it. God, as a functional concept, deserves the same. Especially given that, at least, God conceptually underpins all reality.

@ektromati Yes, I am actually very unhappy with how I formulated the syllogism. And I will likely rework it today or tomorrow so look out for that. It's messy and unclear, and I also don't talk about it afterwards. It was actually the last thing I added, and arguably it was a mistake.

@LatFilosof Fair enough. Then my point is more narrow: (4) my be formulated more correctly as a relative confirmation claim, not as naturalism being more likely simpliciter, to be consistent with your conclusion. I´ll check on the rest , hopefully , on the weekend.

@agostino_harry Oh yah, latter. Not former. I confuse them^^

@LatFilosof Seems like any argument from suffering is of the latter rather than the former kind: it’s concerned with evil outweighing good on the scales of the aggregate experience of the cosmos. Life and peace being the fragile contingency, death and violence the brute necessity.

@LatFilosof The premises support: evolutionary suffering is more expected on naturalism. They do not support: naturalism is therefore more likely true. That stronger conclusion requires weighing all evidence, including evidence independently favoring theism.

@agostino_harry Mine takes the former. My conclusion is literally that -- while I do think the argument has force -- it is by no means a "knock-down" argument. I don't think anyone should be convinced by it alone. It's just one piece in a wide net of arguments you have to consider.

@LatFilosof He takes exactly two objections to God’s existence seriously: -the parsimony of explanations in natural terms -evil as framed above Every worthwhile objection to God’s existence falls into one of those two broadly construed. He really did just set the terms.

@agostino_harry Yes. But it is, in my opinion, even more forceful than Aquinas could ever imagine. He was not aware of how long this have taken place and the very process that demands such suffering.

@LatFilosof It’s one of the contours I address in the piece I’m sharing as a reply, under the subsection “untangling ‘natural’ evils”. Would you say this is a roughly fair characterization of the force of it?

@agostino_harry As always, there he is, that god damn Saint dropping truth bombs hundreds of years after he died LOL

@LatFilosof You are, you’re very clear and charitable! I do think it’s a special case of the “problem of evil” broadly construed, in the manner St Thomas elucidates it, applied especially to the case of constitutive suffering in the fabric of nature: