Sam Harris: Science can answer moral questions [split]

Sam Harris wants to disregard the is/ought, fact/value dichotomies and in doing so circumvent the naturalistic fallacy and claim that science can determine an ought from an is.

I wonder if he is aware of natural law theory? Or if he even has some sort of understanding of the terms “good” and “goodness”?

Muffles, I’ll ask you again:
What is your understanding of a “materialistic (philosophically speaking) conception” of reality?

You continuously employ bait and switch tactics whenever you discuss “materialism” or “materialistic philosophy”.

You bait by praising the success and “history” of the “materialistic approach”, whatever that is, you don’t say.
And when asked to elaborate on this (and your understanding of materialistic philosophy), you switch by saying materialism is not a complete and fully-developed metaphysical position.

You want to call yourself a materialist and praise its successes but at the same time haven’t got a clue what it entails and then demand that some other “scientific” approach is needed before abandoning materialism.

Since you are patently incapable of following something that has been explained to you in several different ways at several different times and places, I’ll not waste my time.

So, whatever you say, Teleological. Whatever you say.

Now be a good boy and go back to playing with your pigeonholes, see?

'Luthon64

I wouldn’t mind a few links to these alleged explanations… Especially the ones were you “at several different times and places” explained what is your understanding of a “materialistic (philosophically speaking) conception” of reality.

Waiting…

Why? You are perhaps bored with your pigeonholes, yes? Say it’s not so!

'Luthon64

Stop evading the question ::).
What is your understanding of a “materialistic (philosophically speaking) conception” of reality?

It’s floating around these forums, as you very well know. What part of “I’ll not waste my time” is causing you grief? Hounding me won’t do you any good either. You’ll just get more of the same. Your choice.

'Luthon64

You see, the reason I keep asking you this very simple question (well it should be for a person that praises “the success and history of the materialistic approach”, whatever that is) is that you actually have not. You have not in any of your posts described what your understanding of a “materialistic (philosophically speaking) conception” of reality is.

I don’t think that you even know what you are talking about when you talk about materialism/materialistic approach/materialistic conception etc. It just seems to sounds good to you for some weird reason.

LOL! If it ain’t old BOÖTES the clone, raised from the dead just like Lazarus. It was BOÖTES, agreeing with Techne, who was really the great BOÖTES himself, who was Techne actually, and who is Teleological, who said

Well, I am with you that the statement "Reality (including your brain or mind or whatever) is nothing but matter." is probably false.

What happened? Tire of debating these heavy matters with yourself? Were you cloned by the Raelians? Or were you just Siamese twins joined at the brain, but now separated ( sadly with some loss of mental capacity )? ;D ;D

Stop being rude now, and do try to behave - remember what happened to you over at MyBB when you couldn’t control yourself LOL. And try to engage what little is left of your brain and try the amazing teleological function SEARCH - you will find Mefiante’s views clearly stated all over the forum. Or is she a tad high-brow for you, above your head, English not being your home tongue and all that? After all, no point BOÖTING yourself in the arse and looking stupid.

??? What’s this all about? Do you know the meaning of “clone/sock puppet”? It actually means the same person with different nicknames agreeing with each other (sort of like your several clones @ MyBB, Telephrone comes to mind lol), not two different people agreeing with each other no matter what. They are called sycophants, much like muffles supporting your “Merda accidit” for some weird reason lol. Now that you know the meaning of “clone/sock puppet”, I hope you realise you have mistakenly and rudely accused me of it. Bad telephrone cough rwenzori…

Well, if you stop for 1 second to just blindly (almost sycophant-like) jump in and try and defend muffles, why don’t you try to use the search button yourself to try and find where muffles explained in her own words what her understanding of a “materialistic (philosophically speaking) conception” of reality is. Be constructive for once in your life ;), you’ll realise she hasn’t got a clue.

Do you know the meaning of “gadfly/gatvlieg”?

Oh wow! THAT was a hard one to work out LOL! But you don’t see my other MyBB personae do you? Yours on the other hand are a bit obvious.

Why? Can’t you manage by yourself? Ag shame. Besides, the one with very little clue is you. But you might follow in the footsteps of the Great Redeemer and redeem yourself by telling us what YOUR view is of a “materialistic (philosophically speaking) conception”. Not quite the same as an Immaculate Conception, I’ll bet LOL. In your own words. No links, no quote-mining. If you can, anyway.

Oh yes! I quite agree with Teleological. Teleological, you know we worship your awesomeness, please tell us about materialist concoction. Oh do, please.

No, sweet Tinklepops. The reason you keep asking the question is because you are not sufficiently skerp to recognise an answer when it is presented to you, suppositorially rather than by in-you-end-o. Now you seek to make your incapacity my problem.

Oh my, what fundamentalist tendencies you display! Repeating X over and over and over again fails to render X true, you know. Sadly, religionists have exhausted that tactic for you.

You reckon, eh? Ignorance does abound.

The only weirdness here is your constant inability to grasp the goodies. And it doesn’t sound good, neither.

'Luthon64

Well now, “Flame Wars.” Hello again, old friend. ;D

'Luthon64

Muffles, you can evade the question all you want, it doesn’t change the fact that you haven’t got a clue ;). If you had any, it wouldn’t be so difficult to answer such a simple question. Instead you invest, laughingly, so much energy to evade, insult and accuse others of the very things you are guilty of. And you say others have fundamentalist tendencies…ROFL ::).

Oh Hermes, yes, I can understand why you might think of this place as a “longdrop”. Lol, that must be what rwenzori and muffles’ view of reality is like.

And can you spell… toady? And btw, do you even care that muffles is a materialist, despite her having no clue (or limited anyway) what it entails…

I defer to your far wider experience in these matters, O Evader-in-Chief.

'Luthon64

Oh well, I guess we will never know whether you actually have a clue about what materialism entails or whether you even have an understanding, despite you “proudly” associating yourself with it and praising it for its “successes” lol.

Aaaw, come on muffles, be constructive, make a thread to describe your understanding of materialism/materialistic approach/materialistic conception etc.
Then give a few reasons why you are a materialist based on this understanding of yours.

Can’t be that difficult can it?

(Emphasis added.) Not “we,” old boy. “I.” And the reason why you, and you alone will never know these things has far more to do with your various cognitive impairments than any neglect on my part. How many more times do I need to put it to you that I’ll not waste my time explaining anything to you? How long before that message finally registers and computes? Has the masochistic imperative so addled your brain that you forget your history here and elsewhere?

Putting the deductive cart before the inductive horse again, eh? With such defective understanding, it’s no wonder you are not able to follow much of anything.

Not nearly as difficult as maintaining that wall of pigeonholes – or keeping them all clean, for that matter.

'Luthon64

Evade all you want. And yes, it is not only me that does not know whether you actually understand anything with regards to materialism/materialistic approach/materialistic conception etc.

Fact is, you are a materialist, you don’t deny it, you defend materialism (whatever you think it is lol).
Fact is, you show n NO real understanding of materialism.
Fact is, you provide no reason for being a materialist.

So if it is not so difficult to be constructive make a thread to describe your understanding of materialism, why don’t you?

I don’t think you should accuse others of “evasion”, “defective understanding”, cognitive impairments etc. ;).

old tele has the innate gift of having everything he/she/it touches end up in flame wars.