Specifically if you allow God to mean an agent that created the visible universe rather than a process, then I have no evidence for or against either hypothesis.
You have no evidence that you understand. Claiming that you literally have no evidence is too strong an assertion, it sounds to imply that even a Bayesian superintelligence couldn’t come to a different conclusion given all the evidence you experienced, starting from the reconstruction of your true prior.
My problem is I am not sure at all what would count as evidence in this case.
The problem comes from assuming that there are different rules before the start of the universe. If the rules are different, then the all the evidence I have collected about the world at the moment may not apply. E.g. we could be simulated on hardware in an invisible universe with completely different rules.
Yes, you are confused, but don’t expect the territory to be blank where the confusion lies in your mind. Work on understanding of the question, or of where that question came from, until you come up with a problem that actually gets resolved, even if with a negative answer.
For most factual questions this is true, I suspect we might come up against self-referential paradoxes in the discussions about how to gain knowledge about the first cause of our existence.
In several forms and ways, I’ve been told that using agnostic instead of atheist because “you can’t be absolutely certain of anything” is wrong because its overly pedantic. Your comment is pedantic in exactly the same way: of course whpearson means that he has no evidence for or against either hypothesis that he understands. When an athiest claims that there is no evidence that Gods exists, he means there is no evidence that he understands. I.e., ‘to the extent of his knowledge’. I think what you’re really trying to say is that you think there is evidence that there is no God? Why not say this outright? I think this is one of the ways people try to avoid getting in a confrontation about specific facts. Maybe you’re just not interested in discussing this because you’ve ‘seen it all before’. So you’d like to assert your point of view from some philosophically safe position without actually engaging in an argument about the real issue: is there evidence for the non-existence of God?
You have no evidence that you understand. Claiming that you literally have no evidence is too strong an assertion, it sounds to imply that even a Bayesian superintelligence couldn’t come to a different conclusion given all the evidence you experienced, starting from the reconstruction of your true prior.
My problem is I am not sure at all what would count as evidence in this case.
The problem comes from assuming that there are different rules before the start of the universe. If the rules are different, then the all the evidence I have collected about the world at the moment may not apply. E.g. we could be simulated on hardware in an invisible universe with completely different rules.
Yes, you are confused, but don’t expect the territory to be blank where the confusion lies in your mind. Work on understanding of the question, or of where that question came from, until you come up with a problem that actually gets resolved, even if with a negative answer.
I wouldn’t say I was confused, simply unresolved.
Why should all questions be resoluble?
Generally, the policy of “presumed resolvable, though perhaps not with current methods” seems to have the best results in such cases.
Sorry didn’t see this for a while.
For most factual questions this is true, I suspect we might come up against self-referential paradoxes in the discussions about how to gain knowledge about the first cause of our existence.
In several forms and ways, I’ve been told that using agnostic instead of atheist because “you can’t be absolutely certain of anything” is wrong because its overly pedantic. Your comment is pedantic in exactly the same way: of course whpearson means that he has no evidence for or against either hypothesis that he understands. When an athiest claims that there is no evidence that Gods exists, he means there is no evidence that he understands. I.e., ‘to the extent of his knowledge’. I think what you’re really trying to say is that you think there is evidence that there is no God? Why not say this outright? I think this is one of the ways people try to avoid getting in a confrontation about specific facts. Maybe you’re just not interested in discussing this because you’ve ‘seen it all before’. So you’d like to assert your point of view from some philosophically safe position without actually engaging in an argument about the real issue: is there evidence for the non-existence of God?