I am having a discussion with a couple of Christians and this was quoted:

contingent things need grounding

Can anyone explain to me please, in words of one syllable, what it means.

Here's part of a response I got.

Much of what was said has its origins in philosophical, metaphysical arguments (particularly of Aristotelian-Thomistic nature), which, by their very nature, are either true or they're not. He's not making some ID-like argument which is only probabilistic, and just like Paley's arguments, are not very persuasive because they accept the "mechanical" view of modern philosophers.

He then, surprise surpise, goes on to say that this is metaphysical and cannot be proved by science.

Am I wrong to start believing that philosophy is a load of fucking cock and that I shouldn't wast another breath even attempting to address this bollocks. I am sure that some who knows about this stuff would get in there and mix it with them but will anything be achieved at the end of it?

In other words is philosophy just another non subject just like theology. </rant>

John

I think the idea of the game is to use as many words as possible while trying to say as little as possible. Ideally, they should be words not often used in English, the more obscure the better. If someone actually understands what you are trying to say, that's game over and a new game begins. Oh and you automatically win if throw 2 double 6s in a row. I think.

.

It could mean almost anything. Why not ask them what they mean?

I was afraid they might give me the answer.

John

For two thousand years, Christians have suffered the continual setback of never experiencing or demonstrating the existence of a supernatural power to which they hold the keys. Therefore, in earlier times, they employed brute force to secure power and influence, then later relied upon widespreaad ignorance to promote their aims. Now they can rely upon neither force nor ignorance, and are compelled to produce results or be ridiculed. Enter: the Apologists.

Apologists are currently engaged as Master of Ceremonies in an endless sequence of Word Games. This particular word game, like some others, works this way...

"Let's tell people that intangible concepts rely upon an ultimate source of legitimacy, then define God as the only ultimate source. And if they don't like that, here's the beauty part: we'll tell them that they are relying upon unfounded assumptions and are being illogical and unscientific. Here come some atheists, let's try it... (ahem) Contingent Things Must Be Grounded!"

z8000783 wrote:I am having a discussion with a couple of Christians and this was quoted:

contingent things need grounding

Can anyone explain to me please, in words of one syllable, what it means.

Here's part of a response I got.

Much of what was said has its origins in philosophical, metaphysical arguments (particularly of Aristotelian-Thomistic nature), which, by their very nature, are either true or they're not. He's not making some ID-like argument which is only probabilistic, and just like Paley's arguments, are not very persuasive because they accept the "mechanical" view of modern philosophers.

He then, surprise surpise, goes on to say that this is metaphysical and cannot be proved by science.

Am I wrong to start believing that philosophy is a load of fucking cock and that I shouldn't wast another breath even attempting to address this bollocks. I am sure that some who knows about this stuff would get in there and mix it with them but will anything be achieved at the end of it?

In other words is philosophy just another non subject just like theology. </rant>

John

Contingent things are those which exist in some world or another but do not need to exist. that is, in some worlds, they dont exist. you, me, my dog, earth, etc. are all contingent things. generally, necessary beings are often understood to be numbers, abstracta, or even God. When he says that contingent things need a necessary grounding he's likely appealing to a certain cosmological argument from contingency. He's right when he says that science is not informative on this matter. This is a philosophical discussion based upon modal existential conditions.

philosophy isnt a load of fucking cock. there's no science without it. the above has philosophical objections and philosophical arguments in its favor. your job is to assess them and figure out where you stand.

You're likely dealing with a classical theist. Good luck with that. they are complicated beasts.

John, it is a regrettably common vice of some philosophical discussants to use unnecessary big words when simple ones would do. But that is a vice of the discussants, not of philosophy.

Philosophy contains a number of very difficult, quintessentially rational branches (along with some fairly woolly, woo-ish ones), one of which is logic, without which none of the discussion on this board would mean anything.

Mick wrote:philosophy isnt a load of fucking cock. there's no science without it.

So you are saying I cannot put a pair of electrodes into a bowl of water, connect them to a battery and watch hydrogen and oxygen being created, without philosophy?

John

andrewk wrote:John, it is a regrettably common vice of some philosophical discussants to use unnecessary big words when simple ones would do. But that is a vice of the discussants, not of philosophy.

Philosophy contains a number of very difficult, quintessentially rational branches (along with some fairly woolly, woo-ish ones), one of which is logic, without which none of the discussion on this board would mean anything.

My bold.

z8000783 wrote:

Mick wrote:philosophy isnt a load of fucking cock. there's no science without it.

So you are saying I cannot put a pair of electrodes into a bowl of water, connect them to a battery and watch hydrogen and oxygen being created, without philosophy?

John

You can make that observation. But if you try to reason about it or put it together with other observations while deciding which observations you don't need to put it with; and then draw conclusions from all that, well.... You're doing the philosophy of science.

Have you got an example?

John

z8000783 wrote:Have you got an example?

John

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/philosophy

It's more than just the wibble philosophers spew. Philosophy is an umbrella term which includes their wibble. It also includes the underpinnings of the scientific method. So some of philosophy is, I would agree, useless to all but those who make their livings writing obscure books about it. But some of it is also demonstrably the most useful way of thinking about the world that humans have come up with so far.

z8000783 wrote:I am having a discussion with a couple of Christians and this was quoted:

contingent things need grounding

Can anyone explain to me please, in words of one syllable, what it means.

He's confusing the term 'contingent things' with 'Electrical sockets'.

campermon wrote:

z8000783 wrote:I am having a discussion with a couple of Christians and this was quoted:

contingent things need grounding

Can anyone explain to me please, in words of one syllable, what it means.

He's confusing the term 'contingent things' with 'Electrical sockets'.

The problem is this. Those parts of what was once termed 'philosophy' that contained substantive knowledge, have moved on and been subsumed into other disciplines. Logic, for example, is now effectively a branch of pure mathematics. What was once termed 'natural philosophy' has become science. Most, if not all, of the testable products of philosophy have either become part of something else, or evolved into disciplines in their own right. What's been left behind, in the main, has been those parts of philosophy that Nietzsche was so scathing about, namely, the parts that involve erecting grandiose assertions, followed by pretending that reality rearranges itself to conform to those assertions. Usually motivated by a need to prop up presuppositions.

As for the various assertions concerning 'contingent' and 'necessary' entities, all too frequently, they remain mere assertions. At the moment, the only entity that appears to be necessary in a genuine sense, is a metrical frame within which all the other entities can exist. In other words, spacetime. It's rather difficult to conceive how any entity can exist without a metrical frame of some sort within which it can be embedded.

z8000783 wrote:...

He then, surprise surpise, goes on to say that this is metaphysical and cannot be proved by science.

....

Pick them up on that - if they're after "proof" then they should look towards mathematics and not science. Christians seem to assume that everyone is after the truth. For those of us who like hitting things then science is sufficient.

Christians using contingent things are barrel scrapping whereby their God of Gaps now resides at the start of a causal chain as a necessary being that give contingent things their reason to exist. I don't see why this necessary thing cannot be nothing at all. Nothing can be non-contingent.

ScholasticSpastic wrote:

z8000783 wrote:Have you got an example?

John

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/philosophy

It's more than just the wibble philosophers spew. Philosophy is an umbrella term which includes their wibble. It also includes the underpinnings of the scientific method. So some of philosophy is, I would agree, useless to all but those who make their livings writing obscure books about it. But some of it is also demonstrably the most useful way of thinking about the world that humans have come up with so far.

Sorry, I meant an example from science where a knowledge of philosophy or it's conclusions, would be necessary in order to move forward.

John

z8000783 wrote:

ScholasticSpastic wrote:

z8000783 wrote:Have you got an example?

John

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/philosophy

It's more than just the wibble philosophers spew. Philosophy is an umbrella term which includes their wibble. It also includes the underpinnings of the scientific method. So some of philosophy is, I would agree, useless to all but those who make their livings writing obscure books about it. But some of it is also demonstrably the most useful way of thinking about the world that humans have come up with so far.

Sorry, I meant an example from science where a knowledge of philosophy or it's conclusions, would be necessary in order to move forward.

John

Science is philosophy. I included the link because the merriam-webster dictionary agrees. So the knowledge requisite to do science is by definition a knowledge of a philosophy or its conclusions.

Because science was so useful in itself, it's calved off of philosophy and become its own thing. But here in the States/Colonies/Whatever, scientists still graduate as Doctors of Philosophy (PhD).