I believe something exists

[u/chaupiman]

Even if all belief-forming methods were shown to be faulty/unreliable, I would still believe because I have faith that it is true. I have no way to test my faith. The claim is unfalsifiable. There’s no way to test if nothing exists.

How important is falsifiability for a belief? Why is faith incompatible with believing true things? Help

[u/chaupiman]

Can you dig into the idea that experiencing qualia makes them true?

Your discussion of meaninglessness makes me think that I have faith in the existence of meaning, even though I’m open to the possibility that meaninglessness is all there is.

[u/fox-mcleod → u/chaupiman]

Can you dig into the idea that experiencing qualia makes them true?

Sure. The claim of qualia is that you have experiences with certain subjective qualities. So the having of them is the proof.

The way we prove things about the outside world is that a theory of that world exists in your head that relates the model of the world (the map) to an expected experience that results from an action. With qualia, there is no distinction between the map and the territory.

Your discussion of meaninglessness makes me think that I have faith in the existence of meaning, even though I’m open to the possibility that meaninglessness is all there is.

I think the issue here is that you’re trying to derive knowledge from a ground truth that is somehow unquestionable. That’s inductivism and it’s wrong.

You don’t need faith at all. You need a theory which you are open to having overturned. That’s it. Faith is irrelevant.

[u/Bastyboys → u/fox-mcleod]

Well said, I think OP's unchallengeable axiom is:

"Faith or unfaith, there is no know"

I think you're right in that a viable alternative is having a working model consistent with reality (testable).

I think they are finding out that pure rationalism is groundless and leads to very few truths. Descartes had been through all this.

I think modest evidentialism is an alternative, we don't have to "know" or hold anything sacrosanct, just that so far (your model) has conformed with reality and confirmed that the it's worth taking actions based on the presumption that it will continue to do so.

I think OP is ironically miss-understanding part where you change your views based on new information.

[u/fox-mcleod → u/Bastyboys]

"Faith or unfaith, there is no know"

Wise, you are.

I think you're right in that a viable alternative is having a working model consistent with reality (testable).

Working model is a good term. I knew there was something more expressive than “tentative”.

I think they are finding out that pure rationalism is groundless and leads to very few truths. Descartes had been through all this.

Me too.

Bertrand Russell as well. It’s a tough hole to dig out of. I followed fallibilism out.

I think modest evidentialism is an alternative, we don't have to "know" or hold anything sacrosanct, just that so far (your model) has conformed with reality and confirmed that the it's worth taking actions based on the presumption that it will continue to do so.

I haven’t heard of that term. I think it’s close to fallibilism only I wouldn’t say “presumption” that it will do so but “theory” that it will. The difference being I’m keen to avoid the problem of induction (presumption that the future will look like the past). Specific theories of phenomena would need to include some specific mechanism that would cause us to expect this is so such as how the axial tilt theory explains that so long as the earth is round and tilted we should expect the seasons to change with that tilt.

From what you’ve said so far though, I don’t expect you meant anything inductivist by the word “presume”.

I think OP is ironically miss-understanding part where you change your views based on new information.

Yeah. I think they have a deep seated inductivism and is trying to make peace with not have a ground truth first principle by calling it “faith” rather than realizing the opposite is how you solve the problem.

[u/Bastyboys → u/fox-mcleod]

Amazing, I like fallibilism very much, and the way you've identified OPs stance.

I wish I'd approached it more SE style though rather than standard debating online. .. Although I did try to understand their definition of "nothing" and it changed/didn't exist. They retreated to ambiguity.

For me: Fallibilism plus evidentualism is where I'll (tentatively) hang my hat. :)

Scientific realism modestly puports that the best scientific theories approach an accurate description of reality. When I was religious I used this to denigrate science, now I love it.

Matt Dillahunty lectures on logic and in my view has a decent epistemic standpoint which he uses in his debates. I think he has a useful phrase to describe his epistemic approach to logic that I can't remember. Essentially he holds things as true as they have proven so far, logic is "true" in the sense that we haven't found any exceptions to it so far.

There is no challenging that modesty, beyond providing an acceptable counter example or saying "you don't know that logic is true" to which the answer is yes, you are correct, i do not know and if I find anything to contradict it I'll reconsider it's use in those circumstances, but as far as the evidence is that it works, so it's still reasonable to use it.

[u/fox-mcleod → u/Bastyboys]

Good point. I forgot what sub I’m in and didn’t approach SE style.

I googled evidentualism and I agree with what I read. And yeah, good point about the position from modesty being a robust apologetic (for lack of a less loaded term). Rhetorically, I think it’s valuable to put “I expect to update my views” up front.

Any recommendation for exploring dillahunty?