This logic is not sound. Why couldn’t be the case that only one religion is right?
Three people looking at a triangle might have different opinions about what shape it is. It is inconceivable that they are all right, but that does not imply that they are all wrong.
If only one religion is right, then the God of that religion is either evil or an asshole or not all knowing and all powerful.
If you think about it, and all knowing all powerful God that allows a gigantic portion of his beloved children to live in complete and total ignorance for their entire lives without even the chance of ever knowing the truth would be a terrible asshole at best, and that’s only assuming that he doesn’t throw everyone that doesn’t get the truth he didn’t give them into hell forever.
Of course that only covers the abrahamic religions. I feel like Zoroastrianism would probably still be okay because as little of it as I understand it seems to be more like the world is a stage where a chess game is being played and each piece moves as it will and the battling deities over watching the game can only make so many moves each to keep it fair.
Buddhism can’t really complain about it other than that it sucks that we’re all currently stuck in hell and having to live tens of thousands of lives until we’re allowed to get out, seems like more people should make it out as time goes by.
Either way though, if there is one true religion it would be amazing if the god of that religion would occasionally pop onto the planet and remind everybody that they exist, maybe give us the bread and circuses show to catch us back up, maybe throw out a couple of worldwide hey I forgive everybody’s and then pop back off just to remind us.
A thousand years without a reappearance of the God of all gods is a long time to keep the torch burning.
it would be amazing if the god of that religion would occasionally pop onto the planet and remind everybody that they exist, maybe give us the bread and circuses show to catch us back up, maybe throw out a couple of worldwide hey I forgive everybody’s and then pop back off just to remind us.
A thousand years without a reappearance of the God of all gods is a long time to keep the torch burning.
https://slrpnk.net/comment/9243887
A dramatization, if you will.
God’s Final Message
After discovering that the people of the Universe were rather unhappy with their Universe, God set out to make sure they understood He hadn’t purposefully tried to screw with them. And so He wrote the following message on a mountain for anybody within range to see. The message went as follows:
WE APOLOGISE FOR THE INCONVENIENCE.
The message eventually became a tourist attraction.
The logic seems sound to me.
If they all look at thin air, and claim there stand different kinds of magical beings, and as evidence they say they imagined it, isn’t it reasonable to conclude there actually is none of the magical beings they claim? Since they use the same vastly erroneous process to make similar extraordinary claims.
As Richard Dawkins say: Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
How so, isn’t it a definite origin for how all of the everything got here and what it means to be part of the origin. Is there a religion without an origin story implied or actuated?
That’s why it says “most reasonable conclusion.” If all of these religions have the same level of evidence of their existence, all have people who are certain that their religion is real and all others are false, and they all claim to be the “truth” then what’s most reasonable?
Obviously it’s possible that any given religion is correct about the world, but if you ask me which is more probable: that every human religion is wrong except the 1 that is correct, or that every human religion is wrong? I think I agree with the original quote
The reasonable conclusion comes from the vast range of possibilities of what is true, which is exponentially larger than the range of possibilities specifically expressed in the world’s popular religions, even if we were to assume that every human being has their own understanding of what is true. The range of possibilities not conceived of by one of eight-billion human beings is vastly greater, so the chances of one person getting it right is akin to winning the lottery.
If we assume that any two people agree on religious truth, that number of religions becomes less, and the odds it is not one of those becomes even greater.
Note that there are about (not quite) 40,000 denominations of Christianity (and then all the non-denominational churches, some of which are megachurches that stay ND so they are not recognized as an NRM, which law enforcement presumes is a potentially-dangerous cult-or-sect) so we get very specific as to what religious truth is, and we fight wars or litigate over these specifics.
Considering the scope of the universe compared to the scope of life on earth (let alone human life), it’s highly more likely the Milky Way galaxy (including the solar system and everything in it) is incidental to any divine purpose of the cosmos. The difference between the chances that we’re special or important, and the chances mold under a specific Sequoia tree in central California is special or important is infinitesimal.
So even when we only consider theistic possibilities within the universe as we see and understand it, any popular religion that has a non-zero possibility of being true still doesn’t have much more than that.
Correct. By their very nature of certain religions being mutually exclusive, they can’t all be correct, but they could all be wrong.
They aren’t wrong because some are mutually exclusive. That’s a non-sequitur. They are false or at least not true, because the evidence either falsifies the claims or doesn’t prove them to be true.
I do think it’s reasonable to say they are all wrong, but I agree with you, this logic provided in the image doesn’t make sense.
It being impossible for all to be true, doesn’t imply they are all false.
It’s likely they are all false, if you subscribe to the philosophy of science, where without testable evidence, it’s deemed unreasonable to assume something likely to be true.
The (in my opinion) correct opinion is that all religions are very likely false, because none have provided convincing evidence according to the scientific method.
Say I have 6 people all guessing a different result of a roll of a D6. It’s inconceivable that they are all right, and it’s absolutely not a “reasonable conclusion” that they are all wrong.
Additionally, if we include the people who believe they know there is no god (a position held with no proof) as a religion (which is not much of a stretch) then it’s also included in the " they are all wrong" group.
I lack a belief in a god because I’ve been provided no evidence that own exists, but the logic in this picture is full of holes.
Say I have 6 people all guessing a different result of a roll of a D6. It’s inconceivable that they are all right, and it’s absolutely not a “reasonable conclusion” that they are all wrong.
In this strawman, you are correct as you 1) already know there are only 6 possible answers to choose from; 2) you know at least 1 of the participants will get it right as you set the conditions to be “different results” and 3) the result is discrete and absolute.
None of the above conditions apply to religions in general… 1) we do not know how many possible right answer are there; 2) the options are endless and can overlap and 3) if one of them is right in someway, it would 100% be a matter of perspective and context
- already know there are only 6 possible answers to choose from; 2) you know at least 1 of the participants will get it right as you set the conditions to be “different results” and 3) the result is discrete and absolute.
You are pointing out how a 6D dice is different than picking/defining a religion. I’m not saying they are the same thing, I’m giving you an example where just because it is inconceivable all answers are correct, that doesn’t mean no answer can be correct. There is no strawman in my argument, I’m just applying the logic to something we would all agree one.
- we do not know how many possible right answer are there; 2) the options are endless and can overlap and 3) if one of them is right in someway, it would 100% be a matter of perspective and context
This is expanding, by leaps and bounds, the argument in the OP’s image. You are now introducing a bunch of other things. Unprovable, of course. Seriously, how could you know that being correct about a religious would be “100% a matter of perspective and context”? Why couldn’t it be just objectively and patently correct? The fact that some might be partially correct doesn’t change the fact that one could be completely correct.
This is expanding, by leaps and bounds, the argument in the OP’s image
So you are ok with Op narrowing down all religions to 6 discreet choices where one is absolute truth but I’m the one with the scope problem?
You are now introducing a bunch of other things. Unprovable, of course. Seriously, how could you know that being correct about a religious would be "100%
Well, op declared that one must be correct and therefore the actual initial argument was wrong. Lol how can you blame me for saying religion is unprobable while defending an argument that claims some religion is certainly right without an iota of proof???
None of the above conditions apply to religions in general…
Or any kind of philosophy, for that matter. You can always play at God of the Gaps and insist the scientific worldview is incomplete. You can always lean on the Gödel’s incompleteness theorem to assert a certain amount of unknowableness in the universe.
Does that mean every effort at understanding the world around us is pointless? Or does it mean the task of building a working model of the universe is more difficult than any single lifetime - or civilization’s worth of lifetimes - can hope to accomplish?
if one of them is right in someway, it would 100% be a matter of perspective and context
Which seems like it would add some degree of value to our overarching understanding of our human condition. Something worth studying and learning from, rather than casually dismissing as wrong for being incomplete.
I have no idea what you are shooting at with this latest goal post move.
I simply stated your analogy was a poor strawman you used to attack the original point
Does that mean every effort at understanding the world around us is pointless? Or does it mean the task of building a working model of the universe is more difficult than any single lifetime - or civilization’s worth of lifetimes - can hope to accomplish?
Where the hell did I even come close to suggest the contrary?
Which seems like it would add some degree of value to our overarching understanding of our human condition.
Absolutely. Get some proof and we’ll talk. But that’s not what you want, you want to define your own version and expect the world around you to follow suit
Something worth studying and learning from, rather than casually dismissing as wrong for being incomplete.
Study it all you want. Just don’t make civil law based on it
People are attacking this as if it’s a hard deductive proof and if is very clearly a statement of what is “most reasonable.”
I don’t think that’s an accurate comparison, it’s more like a few hundred people guessing a different result of a practically infinite-sided die. For all we know, the origin of the universe can be anything, and it’s maybe (who are we kidding, definitely) something even beyond our imaginations. For all we know, we’re trapped in Charlie’s Chocolate Factory. What are the odds that anyone who ever wrote a book about a diety/universal origins actually got it right? Hint: it’s not 1/6 odds, or even 1/1,000,000,000, it’s 1/∞. Technically not zero, but c’mon, it’s practically zero.
The argument put forth is not that the chances of them being right is small, but that because they can’t all be right, they must all be wrong. I gave a counter example that demonstrates, pretty clearly, that this logic doesn’t make sense. I’m not comparing religious beliefs to a D6, but giving a demonstration as to why the logic is bad.
Gotcha, I see where you’re coming from. I think that the phrase isn’t meant to be taken as cold hard logic but a rule of thumb for the default position on a theory. To reiterate, we don’t know that any religion is right, but because they contradict each other, we do know that some must be wrong. Since none provide proof, and especially because they all contradict each other, a reasonable person would assume that they’re all all wrong until actually finding some evidence.
So yeah, the way it’s worded it does sound like a logical expression, but really it’s “If 20 people tell you the answer and they all give you different answers without showing their work, it’s not safe to bet that any one of them are right”
Right but they are right that it’s not zero.
It might be that everyone is wrong, but just maybe someone got it right…
Remember that next time the crazy man walking down the street screams at you that they made the world with their fart and a lighter… Cause it might just be the correct answer.
I miss Hitch
Isn’t it just as likely that one religion across c all of human history was right than absolutely none from like a ‘logic’ standpoint?
I’m not a religious person, but the conclusion that all are wrong because all can’t be right is just bad logic and doesn’t follow from the premise.
Since it is inconceivable all scientific theories are correct, the most logical conclusion is they are all wrong.
Almost. That is almost what Science says. It does say that most theories are probably wrong and certainly any that have been shown to contradict known evidence are. The ones that are not known to be wrong should be treated skeptically ( not cynically ). In practice, all we can do is work with the best that we have so far. They are the “most correct” even if they turn out to be wrong.
Like another commenter though, the problem with your analogy here is that not all scientific theories try to describe the same phenomenon and so they are not all mutually nullifying ( as the original quote proposes religions are ). Newton’s Laws do not support or nullify evolution whereas the Jews and Christians cannot both be right about Jesus and, if either of them is right about the rest, then the Norse certainly got it wrong.
I dislike it when people argue science vs religion though. The standard for science is evidence. The standard for religion is faith. They are almost opposite concepts. One is not invalid because it does not adhere to the other. Comparing them is at best not useful and pehaps deliberately misleading.
A person truly without religious faith is probably agnostic. Most atheists I have talked to have quite a lot of religious faith ( arrived at absent evidence ). They are just not honest about it. Richard Dawkins for example wrote a completely political and anti-Science book called The God Delusion and did not even seem to realize that he was arguing for faith over evidence. It is filled with stuff like “I believe” someday science will answer every question. Our current math and science excludes a great many answers in principle ( not just unknown but unknowable ). So his opinion is not rooted in evidence. “I believe” is of course self-evidently a statement of faith. “Science” can be what you call your religion whether you add in the Flying Spaghetti monsters or not.
Apologies. I kind of went off here. Not a criticism of the comment above. I just like science and would rather people not mislabel their political or “faith-based” opinions as scientific assertions.
I like the explanation of AI with a pencil and googly eyes. Give the pencil some googly eyes and call it Mohammed, or Carl, and talk to someone with it, using ventriloquism or something, doesn’t have to be good. They will form an emotional connection to the pencil and react, some even violently, if the pencil is broken midconversation in front of them.
That is the reason why people think AI is a thing. That is also why people think a god is a thing. They are wrong in both cases.
Gods are never real in a sense of natural science, they have no body, no voice; they aren’t existant. They exist as an idea, a thought people have.
Gods never work in the physical world, none of them have a will, they can only be used to steer people through the people’s thoughts.
Yes I’m referring to LLMs, and image classification models. And image generation models. And even the code that controls the Creepers in Minecraft. AGI isn’t a thing, but we’ve had AI for a looong time. It’s just not as flashy as it often looks in Sci-Fi movies.
It isn’t an intelligence, it’s just repeating patterns (the behaviorism theory of psychology has already been disproven (if I’m not mistaken). This just shows, people percieve anything capable of speech intelligent (like parrots, bit not crows which are scientifically proven to be intelligent). I’m sure some of my fellow autistics could chime in and tell how we’re percieved (spoiler alert, not great).
hello it’s me, a fellow autistic. we’ve had ai for a long long time now, even before LLMs. just not AGI. just because you don’t think it’s smart doesn’t mean it’s not AI. the code controlling the creepers in Minecraft is AI too
