That is just an inherent feature of empiricism- you know, that thing you’re always stumping for? Every empirical case will always be open to alternatives.
Already done, and you already agreed with all the key points. Since all sincerely held beliefs or intellectual activity seems to produce positive-brain-goo rewards, the fact that religious belief produces positive brain goo rewards says nothing about the truth or falsehood about religion. It contributes nothing.
The production of good juices in the brain indicate the brain is functioning accordingly not necessary properly.
If the brain produce excessive amounts of any juices [good or ‘bad’], it may not be functioning properly.
Some part of the bodily functions act upon instincts not necessary from the brain.
Not sure what you meant not addressed and no refuted?
The relevant point is the brain creates religion and there is no God existing as real that direct the emergence of religions.
How can you claim to argue honorably when you do not provide any justifications to the above assertion?
The brain produces soothing juices when triggered by certain beliefs [not all].
The OP established the correlation between religions and soothing juices produced by the brain.
The issue here is theists claim religions are created and directed by a God.
However the OP also state, there is no evidence to prove the reality of the beliefs, e.g. a real Buddha as told, a real God as claimed exists and other supernatural claims.
I have provided arguments elsewhere the idea of God is an illusion and an impossibility and that the idea of God is driven by psychological forces deep within the brain.
Religions have never been “created and directed by God”. They amount to human assessments of what God is and does, assessments that have evolved over the centuries. In the evolution of ideas, old ones may hang around even though outdated because they have meaning for some folks.
It is the old ideas that are presented here for refutation. New ideas, such as that the brain creates feel good juices as evidence of its stability are currently being examined in the psychiatric community, which in general would deny any feel good, God is real type connection. The feel good comes from good brain functioning regardless of the nature of ideas the mind is thinking. One can be an atheist and can get feel good juices in the brain following or during the thinking of certain ideas such as God does not exist.
What I meant is theistic religions are ultimately linked to a God via beliefs and holy texts supposedly from a God [illusory and impossible]. Theistic religions do not exist without a God.
As I had stated humans are by default infected with psychological desperation. This is recognized by Eastern religions like Buddhism, i.e. Life is Dukkha [translated as suffering] but that is basically psychological desperation and dealt as such.
But for theists, to soothe the above psychological desperation the majority [theists] discover theistic religions do produce soothing juices in the brain which are very effective to inhibit the associated angst. Religions follow from this discovery as organized religions.
Note the brain has a modular neural ‘feel good’ function represented by a specific circuit connected to various other parts of the brain like a spider web. This neural circuit can be triggered from various sources [sex, food, security, love, etc.] which can be good or evil [e.g. sadism].
Theistic religion happened to be one stimulus that trigger this ‘feel good’ function in the brain.
“The Brain Creates Religion” but there is a complex process and processes behind it.
That the brain can think religion is not proof that the brain created religion. We may have evolved to think as we do, with physicality as the ground of all beliefs.
One proof is this;
Since the brain creates religion, the brain can also ‘uncreate’ religion.
Evidently, there are many religious people who has become unreligious and this can only be done by their brain.
In addition there is an increasing trend of people being irreligious [theistic and non-theistic] since 500 years ago.
The brain creates religion to deal with psychological impulses relating to the existential crisis.
There is no pre-existing God to direct the establishment of theistic religions.
As people keep pointing out to you people create beliefs of ALL kinds and these beliefs, including one’s you hold dear, can change over time. There are diseases that doctors thought were just in the minds of their patients, but later these turned out to be real diseases, and now the doctors have other beliefs. Communists become capitalists. Atheists become theists. Skeptics become believers. Believers become skeptics. And this all includes believers in objects you think are real.
You confuse listing assertions with demonstrating the truth of something.
I agree beliefs can change either way.
But for beliefs to be objective knowledge it has to be justified, i.e. JTB.
Note I mentioned in the other thread, the question of God is moot and a non-starter, thus the question of justification via the empirical rational basis is out of the question.
The above are assertions but I have provided their justification in various threads to justify my assertions.
See:
God is an Impossibility
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=193474
The idea of God is possible within the following;
The Ultimate Ground of God is Psychological.
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=193697
Who or what determines JTB? If it is one idea held by a billion or so individuals, Christianity would fit the bill. This is not an populist fallacy. It is evidence that what works for one may work for many.
Furthermore, the Christian nations are the most technologically and scientifically advanced and also the most politically free.
Therefore, Christianity appears “to work” on many levels.
JTB is not appeal to popularity. If your specific justification system is based on that criterion, then OK. But generally people who talk about JTB do not use that as justification. In fact I have never encountered it. If you are saying that christianity works,then you need to justify that. Phyllo makes an attempt, though we would need to show its causal not correlation. And an athiest might thne point out that these societies are more secular than others. This might mean, for example, that Christianity is better than other religions because it comes to be ignored by so many facets of the societies it is the main religion. In any case that would be a kind of intrumentalist justification. That is one not based on truth, ie. ontology. I happen to like that kind of justification, though I think it doesnt work well in this example.
The most credible JTBs are scientific knowledge and more credible when further rationalized and reinforced with philosophy-proper.
Why are scientific knowledge the most credible?
It is because they are leveraged upon a Scientific Framework and System with its Scientific Methods, assumptions, limitations, principles, processes, peer review and other conditions.
Scientific knowledge is the most credible because it is objective, i.e. testable and repeatable and any one can test the conclusion [without personal subjective bias] to convince themselves it is true.
Whilst Scientists rely totally on their Framework and System to judge the credibility of scientific knowledge, philosophers reinforce scientific knowledge with rational and sound philosophical theories.
Christianity is not leverage on objective knowledge.
What Christianity is leveraged on is the claim that God exists who delivered his message to one person called Jesus Christs.
The idea God exists [as demonstrated] is an impossibility and there is no way for any one to test and repeat the same conclusion ‘God exists as real’.
By its defaults, it is impossible for Science to prove the existence of God.
Now what other more efficient Framework and System can you think, show, produce to rely on to prove God exists? I say there is none, except;
My claim is the ‘idea of God exists’ arose purely out of psychological impulses within the brain of theists to deal with an inherent unavoidable existential crisis. I have given explanations and evidences to prove the above.
In addition, many Eastern philosophies has recognized this non-theistic psychological perspective and dealt with it psychologically.
With the above views, one is throwing one’s intelligence into the drain.
When and where has Christianity been the determining factor to drive objective knowledge and technology?
Note my reply to Ierrellus above.
Christianity says that the world is ordered, that knowledge can be gained about it and that it can be changed. It’s a real objective external world. That philosophical approach makes science possible.
The above is a very messy claim.
Note GIGO and it does not follow.
Note premise 1 is based on an illusion, thus deductively all that follow are illusory.
Philosophical?? It is an illusory theory.
No proper scientist will agree with the above.
What makes Science possible is the establishment of the Scientific Framework and System to process and churn out empirical scientific knowledge.
It makes no difference whether God exists or not.
It works either way.
Where is your sense of logic and rationality?
Anyone can insist on the above. Whatever ideology and the evil elements proposed by Islam [with 1.5 billion Muslims] also works.
Note the original point was Ierrellus claimed Christianity is based on JTB which he wrongly thought is based on the consensus of billions of people.
viewtopic.php?p=2692261#p2692261
I have shown Christianity has no solid grounds to be a JTB.
Pretty much all the religions say that. You could argue that Hinduism says it is Maya, but still one can learn about Maya. It is an ordered set of phenomena one can learn about. Certainly all indigenous groups, who would not separate out relgion from other facets of life the way moderns tend to, learned via empiricism, though not only through the kinds of learning we tend to lump under (scientific) empiricism. So we still would need to show why Christianity leads to advancing some societies, if it does.