Re: religion help

In article <cfmk25tqk5acb603t8l2t928oaufq6e6sf@xxxxxxx>,
Eric Ammadon <email_addr@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

David Friedman <ddfr@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

If someone claims both to know
how to get me into heaven and to know what the weather will be next
month, I can't check the former, I can check the latter, and if his
prediction turns out to be wrong that's a reason to doubt his claims.

We look upon the ad-hominem with some disdain, but what you seem to be
saying here is that because soandso can't predict the weather all his
predictions must therefore be unreliable. I'm not saying that to
attack you David, but to try and point out how homeopathic human logic
seems to be. The vulcan in me says that you don't trust the guy to
predict the weather but you don't judge his predictions on post-mortal
destination until you have actual evidence by which to judge their
accuracy.

I think the vulcan in you is wrong.

Why do we prefer prediction in advance, as a test of a scientific
theory, to after the fact explanation? Both demonstrate that the theory
is consistent with the data. But after the fact demonstration only shows
that I can construct a theory that fits the known data. Predicting in
advance is evidence that I know something about the subject that gives
the right answer without peeking.

To put it differently, if we believed that all scientific theories were
constructed essentially at random, with no special knowledge or
intuition, and the correct ones were just lucky guesses, then prediction
before the fact and explanation after would be equivalent tests.

Similarly here. If I claim to know both how to get into heaven and what
the weather is going to be next month, in each case because God is
telling me, then the fact that I'm wrong about the latter is evidence
either that God isn't telling me, that He isn't reliable, or that I am
not reliable. Any of those is a reason to distrust the former claim as
well.

--
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/ http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/
Author of
_Future Imperfect: Technology and Freedom in an Uncertain World_,
Cambridge University Press.
.

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