How should we estimate probability in this case?
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Replying to @chagmed @KnowledgEcology
I find Pascal's Wager to be deeply dissatisfying. I'm not sure what kind of reasoning I would find more satisfying.
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what are your thoughts? you seemed very dissatisfied with Batchelor-esque non-commital.
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Replying to @danlistensto @KnowledgEcology
Agnostic atheists are atheists because they don't believe in the existence of deities and agnostic because they claim that the existence of a deity is either unknowable in principle or currently unknown in fact
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So it is possible to say, this thing is unknowable, but I have no good reasons to believe it's true.
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Replying to @chagmed @KnowledgEcology
that seems very close to Batchelor's position to me. I agree that it is reasonable to not believe an unevidenced claim by default. I sometimes like to think about the psychological utility of it though, which is why I mentioned Pascal.
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Pascal's wager tries to set up an asymmetry in the downsides of belief vs. disbelief but I don't accept the framing that Pascal used. I do find the utilitarian argument he makes to be a decent reason _not_ to believe. False beliefs are potentially immediately harmful.
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I think we've previously discussed my rather heterodox supposition that one of the goals of Buddha's teaching was to get people to stop believing in reincarnation. Harmful belief when constructed into a metaphysics with social consequences.
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Replying to @danlistensto @KnowledgEcology
IMO the most likely, and simplest hypothesis is that we are primates with creative minds. These minds can imagine that they transcend matter. It's rather cute. But also very silly.
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by far the most parsimonious view, which is a major epistemic advantage. from a Buddhist perspective it has the side-effect of concluding that one attains nirvana by default at the moment of death.
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Replying to @danlistensto @KnowledgEcology
All of this academic masturbation around consciousness is certainly intellectually interesting, but I find it more useful to cultivate a deep practice.
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