Forgive me for the rather open-ended question, I am just trying to learn.
I've often heard apologists accuse atheists of the following philosophies:
- Logical positivism
- Verificationism
- Scientism
- Philosophical/Ontological Naturalism
- Solipsism
- Faith (in properly basic beliefs, like induction, logic, and reason)
These accusation are usually rejected. The thing is, I can see pieces here and there, not in their strictest form, that make a lot of sense, ie the way some of these positions appeal to evidence and empirical data, scientific method, skepticism, etc. I'm not a scientist or philosopher, though. I am still trying to piece together my own epistemology.
So if you are not those things, then what are you? Are there labels you use to describe your own philosophy of epistemology? If there aren't, how would you describe it in terms that would point me in the right direction for further learning?
E.g. philosophy of religion is metaphysics, epistemology, semantics, psychology, ethics of religion.
E.g. metaethics is metaphysics, epistemology, semantics, psychology of ethics.
My question is asking why only these? Are there any other different types of philosophical questions one could ask about some thing or subject?
I’m a complete newbie to the subject but it sounds fascinating and I’d like to learn more. If someone can recommend a book to start with I’d appreciate it :)
e. Thank you for all the suggestions everyone!
I love the concept of SE as a tool to combat polarisation. I see polarisation as one of the greatest threats today, and it's something I see happening on both sides of most arguments. I get the feeling that most discussions are actually not about the claims but about which group of people you belong to which is mostly incredibly generalized.
I do not have faith that SE via conversations alone can spread throughout society in its current format simply because I don't think the format appeals to everyone.
I don't know about you, but it frustrates me when I continue to see on the front page of reddit and in top votes comments all over massive generalisations that can become very dangerous.
I think something bigger is needed than videos of conversations with people, because even though I enjoy them, I know a handful of people I wont get to watch these videos. Here are some ideas:
- Netflix documentaries seem to have big impact
- Memes
- People using SE online as responses to politicians
- Inviting opinion influencers (Joe Rogan etc) for conversations
How could these be done?
What do you think would be effective ways of making people more reasoning, perspectivizing and less generalizing?
What are good examples of this being done already?
Hey everyone! Like many of you I’ve really taken a liking to street epistemology and have been practicing my skills in the wild! I am particularly interested in discussing difficult concepts with those in the alt-right. This Facebook group has been an excellent resource for finding such people. https://m.facebook.com/realJosephCarbone/
To get the ball rolling I will usually ask something like “wow! I would really like to learn more about X do you have some further information I can check out?” Or ask for a source. I typically only ask questions to people that are discussing misinformation. Biden stole the election, Jewish space lasers, and Trump brain swapped with Biden to name a few.
If anyone has questions on opening questions please feel free to let me know!
I’d love to hear everyone’s thoughts on what follows.
I recently dove into a group called Street Epistemology. In a nutshell, Street Epistemology is a branch of the Socratic method aimed at inducing an interviewee (known as the interlocutor) into critically thinking through their deeply held belief systems in order to expose weaknesses and reinforce logically sound thought processes.
The idea is to uncover how the interviewee arrived at their deeply held beliefs through logic and reason. One cornerstone of this methodology is an assumption that beliefs must be made on the basis of what an individual thinks is “true” in the universal sense.
Personally, I believe the logical progression of Street Epistemology should be limited to things that can or cannot be proven true through a factual and scientific process, and that religion largely falls outside of its wheelhouse. Regardless, Street Epistemology is commonly employed by atheists trying (somewhat ironically) to evangelize religious believers to critically examine their own belief structure.
I believe this is short sighted. As a Christian, I subscribe to Rabbi Jonathan Sacks’ view that we are all meaning-seeking creatures, and that includes asking questions unanswerable by science or logical progression. We ask “why” along with “how.”
The following is from his book The Great Partnership:
Two Stories
The first: In the beginning, some 13.7 billion years ago, there was an unimaginably vast explosion of energy, out of which the universe emerged for no reason whatsoever. In the course of time stars coalesced, then planets, then, 4.54 billion years ago, one particular planet capable of supporting life. Seven hundred million years later, inanimate matter became animate. Cells began to reproduce. Life forms began to appear, first simple, then of ever-increasing complexity. Some of these survived; others disappeared. Eventually a life form came into being capable of complex patterns of speech, among them the future tense and the ability to ask questions. For the first time something in the universe became capable of knowing that the universe existed, that it might not have done, and of asking, ‘Why is it here? Why are we here?’
The formation of the universe involved massive improbabilities. Had a single one of the mathematical constants that determined the shape of the universe been slightly different – even by the order of one in a million – there would have been no stars, no planets, no life. Had th
... keep reading on reddit ➡tl;dr: Wenn ihr euch mit Verwandten und Freunden zofft wegen Verschwörungskram, zieht euch die YouTube-Videos von Anthony Magnabosco rein. Da lernt man Fragen so zu stellen, dass der andere sich selber produktiv hinterfragen kann.
Street Epistemology (SE) ist ein Gesprächstechnik die dabei hilft sich mit jedem Menschen über seine Weltanschauung zu unterhalten ohne sich mit ihm zu streiten. Stattdessen kann auch dann eine freundliche, zwischenmenschliche Beziehung gewährleistet werden, wenn umstrittene Äußerungen getätigt werden. Gleichzeitig kann man den Konversationspartner und auch sich selbst zum Nachdenken anregen.
Bei SE befragt ein Fragesteller seinen Gesprächspartner darüber, wie derjenige zu seiner Auffassung gelangt ist. Es geht um die Methode, wie man zur eigenen Schlussfolgerung kommt. Dadurch steht nicht die Meinung des Befragten an sich im Mittelpunkt, sondern der Weg dort hin. Das Thema kann alles beinhalten, z.B. Lieblingsfilme, politische Ansichten oder der individuelle Glauben an Gott.
Das letztendliche Ziel von SE ist es die Qualität der Begründungen und die Zuverlässigkeit der Argumentationsmethoden zu reflektieren. Daraus lässt sich selbstständig das Vertrauensniveau in die eigenen tief gehaltenen Überzeugungen ableiten und gegebenenfalls neu einschätzen.
SE kann praktisch überall praktiziert werden, z.B. von Angesicht zu Angesicht, im Video-, Audio- und Text-Chat und in sozialen Medien, um nur einige zu nennen.
Hintergrund
Der Erfinder der Methode ist Peter Boghossian. Er ist Philosophieprofessor und ein Aktivist aus der Skeptiker- und Atheistenszene in den USA. Die Idee stammt aus seinem Buch Die Kunst, schwierige Gespräche zu meistern: Effektiv argumentieren, hitzige Diskussionen entschärfen und Gesprächspartner überzeugen.
Generell kann man sagen, dass die Methode vor allem von bekennenden Atheisten aufgegriffen wird, um Dogmatismus und Anti-Intellektualismus etwas entgegenzusetzen. Nichtsdestominder lässt sich festhalten, dass die Methode unabhängig von der Weltanschauung der Gesprächsteilnehmer funktioniert.
Der Fragesteller ist dazu aufgefordert seine eigenes Weltbild möglichst nicht einzubringen, da dies zu einer voreingenommenen Haltung des Befragten und somit zu unerwünschten Reaktionen führen kann. Der Gesprächsverlauf und damit einhergehend der Erkenntnisprozess ist überdies nicht im Vorhinein absehbar und damit nicht kontrollierbar.
... keep reading on reddit ➡Reformed epistemology is a thesis about the rationality of religious belief more information can be found here: https://iep.utm.edu/ref-epis/#:~:text=Reformed%20epistemology%20is%20a%20thesis,reformed%20epistemologists%20support%20this%20claim.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reformed_epistemology
A: "Was the Holocaust bad?"
B: "Of course"
A: "If Armageddon had come in the 1940's, wouldn't Jehovah have killed all of the same people Hitler killed in the concentration camps?"
Thoughts?
TBM: I know the church is true, and I know that God has a plan for us.
You: How do you know that?
TBM: I have felt it, and seen it manifest in my life. I have no doubt that it is true.
You: People of all religions experience feelings and signs manifesting to them that their religion is true.
Here is where the argument could go 2 directions. Here is the first:
TBM: Well it is a matter of faith for me, and I cannot deny what I have seen.
You: So you consider faith to be a reliable tool to knowing what is true?
TBM: Yes
You: Is the faith of an Islamic person misguided then? If so, how is faith still a reliable metric?
ROUTE #2
TBM: Yes that is true. We believe that members of other religions feel the Holy Ghost because they have parts of the truth, just not the full truth.
You: And how do you know that you have the full truth?
TBM: Because that is what the church teaches
You: And how do you know the church is true?
TBM: I told you already, it is because the Spirit has borne witness to me.
You: So your belief in your church being the full truth is dependent on your spiritual witness?
TBM: That is correct
You: And how is your spiritual witness more reliable than the Islamic person who has felt the same thing about their religion. It is only based on what your church teaches, and you only know that your church is true because of your witness, which is the same as theirs.
TBM...
You: Circular thinking motherfucker. Learn about it.
OKAY... It won't usually go that well
Heavily inspired by this video from The Atheist Experience: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gn7tW2zkwxE
If anyone could give a brief answer, and point me in the right direction to finding these objections or weaknesses in his epistemology that would be appreciated.
Title says it all, just looking for a philosophy book on either of these topics because they fascinate me. Thanks!
Hello everyone,
I tried finding out whether this question is okay by the FAQ's and am still not sure.
A decade ago I read a couple of Books by Watzlawick and Glaserfeld - both self described Constructivists which I understand is a sub-category of epistemology.
Now, as far as I understood it, it is about the difference between things themselves, how we perceive them and the things we create in our minds thinking they are things in the real world but really aren't. So far, that made sense to me.
And now, someone explained phenomenology to me as the difference between objects themselves and the meanings we ascribe to them in our head and how those differences shape our view of the world.
Amateur me now thought - wait? Isn't that the same? so I tried to figure it out on my own, but I very quickly lost all understanding when trying to dig into their respective wikipedia pages. (But those still seem very similar to me, as far as I understood.) I thought maybe someone here can help me, or guide me to some easier to understand lecture. It may very well be that I misunderstand something fundamental about one or both of those.
Thank you. And if this question is not okay, please forgive me.
Introduction to question: I am a cradle catholic and have converted back to practising Catholicism about 2 years ago. In the last 2 years I took my faith more or less for granted and silenced every single doubt with a blind faith in the Tradition of the Church. I also become increasingly traditionalist. However in the last couple of months "blind faith" did not prove to be a firm enough ground for practicing the faith when I am under severe strain or temptation. Now I have discovered that the basis for my faith was very weak after my conversion, and that some of my earlier views are heresy (denying the ability of human reason to know God and overestimating the importance of tradition). So now I am trying to make an attempt at understanding faith rationally, but there is a problem: I always seem to end in scepticism. Please help and sorry about the rambling word-salad.
My attempt at understanding epistemology:
It is essential to accept truths about our lives and the world.
In order to understand our lives and the world around us we must accept things about our lives and the world, or in other words: gain knowledge of the truth.
Without knowledge we cannot function in the world. Even the most primitive animalist existence requires the acceptance of truths external to us. For example for the hunting of animals or collecting of food requires knowledge about how to do so, such as the general behaviour of animals and the location of eatable vegetation.
Without some sense of meaning behind what we experience we would not live with a purpose, but merely exist in a primitive way to meet our most basic needs. A sense of meaning is a sense of our place in the world and the cosmos.
The most basic way of accepting truths is through the senses.
We can accept things about our lives and the world based on our own perception of reality by the senses. By observing, hearing, tasting and feeling we can make observations and draw conclusions about the world around us. In very basic understanding this allows us to know that fire is hot and water is wet.
Because we have memory we can remember these conclusions and gain knowledge and make observations about the future. We observe for example that the sun dawns and sets on us every day and by observing this multiple times we gain some trust in the fact that the sun dawns and sets every day.
Trust is essential because our own perception through the senses is not sufficient.
However our perception thr
... keep reading on reddit ➡
I've been a mod over at r/StreetEpistemology and I'm an atheist who doesn't know how to distinguish an immaterial being and an imaginary being.
That said - at r/StreetEpistemology - we talk to people of all stripes about their deeply held beliefs and a lot of the topics end up being religion.
My challenge to you is to watch some of the examples of Street Epistemology we have posted and see if it's a good way to deconvert believers of other false faiths. It generally asks how confident you are and why you're confident, and then goes through the reasons to test if they're really part of the confidence %. For instance, if scientists proved that there was no karma, would that change your beliefs about Vishnu? Or, would you change your religion if your supernaturally associated religious experience was explained through natural means? These questions are designed to peel back the post-hoc rationalizations that we all make in all beliefs. However, if you peel the layers back enough - you come to a word - faith - that has many different meanings to many different people. I want you to see if you can understand how non-Christian theists use the word faith to become confident in their beliefs - and I want to challenge you to look at your own beliefs and see if your definitions are radically different.
Now - I'm curious if r/ChristianApologetics can use SE to convert an atheist, or convert another theist to Christianity.
Hi ya'll,
There are three organized SE practice events on the Street Epistemology Discord each weekend. We invite everyone who would like to participate either in the role of SE practitioner or interlocutor, or ask questions about street epistemology. It's also perfectly okay to come and listen.
The events run three hours each and begin:
Regular Saturday event at 1800 GMT.
Australia-Friendly Practice event midnight GMT
Europe-Friendly Practice event at Sundays 1600 GMT
Here is a link to the Street Epistemology Discord Server: https://discord.gg/6q9aRvKp
Hope to see some new people there practicing and learning Street Epistemology.
Thanks!
I recently had a chat with some gentleman about faith and superstition now I am a hard materialist so I explained I like empirical evidence and these things to me just seem to lead to all sorts of problems one in particular being that with faith you can justify anything you want. Having a belief based on faith makes you immune to reality checks because I can always change the narrative to align with my views I just have to have faith and my imagination and reality can be one in the same. So he comes back with "you can't prove your own consciousness so therefore you have faith that your conscious?" (I kind of thought the whole solipsism argument was better like I don't know other people are conscious but o well)
He then went on to explain that because of this scenario, me not being able to prove I am conscious to myself, that I am using faith and that now we can infer faith is just as important as other mechanisms of finding truth like evidence and logic. At this point I was like wow this guy is onto something so I explained that "for now lets ignore all the logical inconsistencies with and evidence to the contrary of belief in god/gods and with this faith framework you've told me about I'd like to announce my faith that there are no god/gods . This thought/belief whatever is backed by my faith I need not bother myself with evidence for or against the existence of deities and so there's absolutely nothing that can be done to make this false. So since my faith conjures truth, poof their still not there. Now you've got 3 strikes against ya logic, evidence, and most importantly my faith."
It seemed like this kind of threw an exception in his head so fruit for thought if anyone says pure faith can lead to "truth" tell them what the truth must be. It wont change anything you know how it is but it's kind of fun.
Here, I'm talking strictly about his epistemology, not ethics or politics. I've looked pretty much everywhere, in academic and even informal discussion circles, I don't see much of any kind of discussion of Mill's epistemology (for example his ideas in "A System of Logic"). Here and there I'd see references to his ideas, most recently in my "logic" class but nowhere near the level of Kant or Hume (or even Descartes and Aristotle). Maybe I'm looking in the wrong places but I don't see either criticisms of his epistemological ideas or supporting arguments. I know Mill's had "influences" on British empiricists and early modern economists of the time, but nowhere as substantial as Kant or Hume. Because this comes mainly from my experience, I say it's "seemingly".
Was discussing The Bible with my J.W. sister and the story of Job was brought up to explain the problem of evil. Decided to try the Socratic Method to help us analyze the reasons for coming to a conclusion. 10/10, would try again. I’m obviously not as good as Anthony Magnabosco, but it’s a start.
Me: Why did God bargain for Job’s life, but not his children’s?
Sis: Job didn’t have to die because what he went through was enough to prove the point that God didn’t make a mistake when he created humans.
Me: I want to make sure I understand what you’re saying, correct me if I’m wrong. Is it that you’re saying God let innocent children die just to prove a point?
(The tone was as non-accusatory as I could be.)
Sis: Of course not! Why would God do such a thing?
Me: But isn’t that exactly what you’re saying? Think about it.
Awkward silence
Sis: Yes, they had to die to prove a point because it was a big question God needed ended.
Me: Shocked-Pikachu Face
Sis: Just like Jesus had to die in order to accomplish God’s will....
Pause
Sis: Job’s children should be honored they died, just like Jesus was honored!
Me: If that makes sense to you, I have no further questions, Your Honor.... (Okay, now I’m paraphrasing.)
Amazing the admissions you can get just by asking questions!
YouTube: https://youtu.be/wvd5PGytMQM
Spotify, Google, Apple, etc.: https://anchor.fm/.../Episode-29-Jamal-Lyksett--M-A---J-D...
I’ve recently come across the concept of street epistemology. In a nutshell, street epistemology is the practice of helping people reflect on the quality of the reasons behind their deeply-held beliefs.
During my post-Mormon anger phase I carefully focused my religious conversations on the facts. I believed (and still do) that the facts and evidence are overwhelmingly against the foundational truth claims of Mormonism, and I made this the focus of my conversations. I think there’s a better way to frame these conversations that is more likely to lead to someone changing their views rather than the “beat-you-over-the-head-with-facts” approach I was taking.
Street epistemology provides a very positive and safe framework for engaging in these types of discussions. Let me provide examples of two conversations in an attempt to illustrate the difference. Person A is the person who still fully believes in Mormonism and Person B is the person in their faith crisis.
(Please note that these example conversations are obviously very over-simplified and a bit hyperbolic. They are just intended to illustrate the alternative approach that street epistemology can offer. I highly recommend the Street Epistemology website as a resource for improving your skills at this conversation technique.)
Example 1 - Traditional “fact-bashing”
Person A - I believe that Joseph Smith was a prophet and was called by God to restore the church.
Person B - Did you know that Joseph Smith was a con-man? He made a living by convincing people he could use a seer stone to find hidden treasure buried in the earth. The Book of Mormon and the golden plates was just a continuation of his lifelong career as a con-artist.
Person A - God has told me that the church is true. All of these arguments against Joseph Smith and the church have been answered time and time again. They’re either anti-mormon lies made up by enemies of the church or are historical details taken out of context.
I’m sure many of us have experienced the frustrating endless loop of this method. These types of conversations almost never end well and leave both parties frustrated and angry. Consider this alternative approach that may yield better results:
Example 2 - Street Epistemology
Person A - I believe that Joseph Smith was a prophet and was called by God to restore the church.
Person B - How can we reliably know that the Mormon church is the one true church of God?
... keep reading on reddit ➡There is a lot of criticism of Kant’s project of an epistemology which tries to find flaws and refute him. Most prominently that space is not Euclidean is what comes to mind. It seems to me that most Neo-Kantians were busy with “fixing” these flaws, rather than extending his work. To me there seem to be a lot of open question still, like for example: Why is space and time the condition for the possibility of experience? While his deduction makes perfect sense to me, he doesn’t seem to answer the question why this is the case (or I missed it). Or is this question non-sensical and his system is complete in that regard and I’m simply missing the point?
Knowledge is objective when it can be scrutinized by other parties than the knowledge claimant. Therefore, for a statement to be considered objective knowledge, we need two things:
- the claim, i.e. the description of the knowledge
- the justification, i.e. the explanation as to how the claim is justified
As far as I know, a formal justification document can only be one of the following three types:
- syntactic entailment, i.e. "proof" (as in mathematics**)**
- witness deposition (as in history**)**
- experimental test report (as in science)
The knowledge claimant can provide his justification document to the verifier(s), who will scrutinize the document for flaws.
By the way, does anybody know of a fourth epistemic document type that allows for objective scrutiny?
In that sense, epistemology is an elaborate application of type theory. A type is an empty data container with associated rules, which prevents incorrect data from fitting into it. By observing the universe of knowledge, epistemology empirically discovers the detailed specifications of its standard document types, of which we seem to have only three.
Is this just a Karen Barad thing
That is, what are some of the weakest parts of his epistemology, and why?
