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@Plisken
If you do not rule out any options then you reject the claim that red is the only option.
The default position.
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@secularmerlin
There is no such claim that I'm aware of.
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@secularmerlin
Surely you must believe that one of these beliefs is more reasonable than the other.
From total nothingess existence itself came into being.
Or
There has always been some form of existence.
Which seems more reasonable and justifiable of a belief?
Anytine the God denier says there is no evidence, they are really saying "I ignore all evidence".
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@Plisken
That is the hypothetical claim being made it is the entire example
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@secularmerlin
How do you suppose I know that without a higher perspective? How do we know how I would consider the idea if it occurs to me?
I mean, I might consider the idea if it occurs to me, but you seem kind of hypothetically self centered and might not have gotten a message accross. Were you ruling out possibilities right in front of me and not just saying anything last night? I don't think I'd have noted that the way you did unless we talked about it because I don't care. I don't remember you making a claim, and don't see any reason to consider the new example itself a claim except as you claim now. We can also roll with the answers you were given anyway too I guess and I'll just correct any mistakes I claimed.
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@Mopac
The truth doesn't change depending on what I think is most reasonable and I have no way of knowing the truth of the matter. To claim one hypothesis over the other with no evidence is intellectually dishonest. The only option open to me is to reject EVERY claim if direct knowledge unless it can be demonstrated. In the past people did not know what caused lightning but they were sure it had a cause so they imagined powerful beings that there lightning down from the sky. No doubt they felt this explanation was far more reasonable than that it just came from nowhere. You and I now know that it is caused by a disparity and subsequent equalization of positive and negative charge. As reasonable as it must have seemed in the bronze age the idea of Thor or Zeus now seems silly.
You have never presented me with any evidence that the universe was created by something that exists outside of physical reality but you did share an article by Stephen Hawking which suggests a plausible explanation of how it could simply exist on its own by natural processes rather like lightning. Now technically this is an appeal to authority but with two claims on the table and with Hawking relying on evidence to reach his conclusion and you relying on the feeling that it has to come from somewhere therefore a creator (which sounds like what was once claimed about lightning) I have to say that your hypothesis does not seem more reasonable to me.
The right answer is... say it with me... I don't know. And until we do (if that ever happens) I reject your claim and indeed all claims that cannot be demonstrated.
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@Plisken
By making the positive claim that the ball is red one is ruling out all other possibilities by default.
Let's look at a few other examples.
If I made the positive claim that the moon is made of cheese I am ruling out the possibility that it is made of rock.
If I made the positive claim that the Empire State Building is 10' tall I am ruling out the possibility that it is over 1000' tall.
If I claim the earth is flat I am ruling out the possibility that it is a rough spheroid.
So if I make the positive claim that the ball is red I have by default ruled put the possibility that it is green or yellow or purple or any other color or combination of colors.
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@secularmerlin
Of course that's ignoring the potential problem of perspective. I contend that if someone doesn't accept your claim that the empire state building is 10 feet tall then it still might be ten feet tall and you are the only person who has ruled out all other possibilities. The other person has not and can say, index for later use.
The same applies to your views on the ball. The other person is not necessarily rejecting your specified claim on the color of a ball. You have an exclusive mindset and they may not.
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@Plisken
You may not know what I mean when I use the word reject in reference to a claim. It is not the elimination of the possibility that the claim could be true it is merely the admission that the claim is not proven. It is possible to simultaneously reject the claim that the ball must be red and to reject the claim that the ball cannot be red but it is impossible to accept both claims simultaneously. If there is a word other than reject you would prefer to use for this concept we can discuss it but the concept is what is under discussion no matter what we call it. Perhaps you could just say that you do not accept a claim if that makes you more comfortable?
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@secularmerlin
The only thing I used Stephen Hawking to demonstrate was that the universe had a beginning. The rest was you extrapolating on your own.
But in a prior discussion, you were saying that things don't come into being, and you gave me some pseudoscientic theory to justify this irrational claim. You also seemed to be implying something about me trying to undermine science, so I explained that I love science, and to make fun of the. fact that you can't even acknowledge that you were born and came into being, I showed that even Stephen Hawking, who is an atheist, and has spent his entire life trying to get around the idea that the universe had a beginning, has to admit that all evidence points to the universe having a beginning.
But you had it right in your first sentence. The Truth doesn't change. It is The Truth. It is eternal. What does that tell me? What should that tell you? The Truth precedes everything. Even the universe.
And because it is impossible to measure eternity, you reject it, which is not the same thing as saying "I don't know" despite your insistence on using bad language.
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@ArgentTongue
My great grandfather wrote a book about how he once looked in the box and found a red ball.
This book is "proof" that the box contains a red ball.
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@Mopac
You can not say nothing can have ever come into being without a cause of you are willing to commit a black swan fallacy. You can only say that nothing can be eternal if you are willing to commit a black swan fallacy. Please familiarize yourself with the more common logical fallacies before we continue.
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@RationalMadman
Why would you believe that the concept of motive has anything at all to do with whether or not there is a ball in the box and whether or not it is red?How do I know you're not lying to the degree of certainty you suggest me to in said scenario?
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@secularmerlin
This is the "middle ground" fallacy (not to be mistaken for "common ground").Neither of us will accept that the ball is purple arguing instead that it is the colors we claimed. We both seem equally sure and both have equal evidence to present. We cannot both be right so whom do you believe?
Some arbitrary half-way-point between two opinions is not automatically more likely to be "correct".
And, if you think there are only two options, then you are probably unwittingly participating in the "black & white" or "false dichotomy" fallacy.
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@secularmerlin
You are the living embodiment of the fallacy of invincible ignorance, so keep chucking them stones, glass house. Everytime you accuse me of a fallacy, it is also inappropriate, so I believe that is a fallacy in itself... Fallacy misidentification fallacy.
Here is what you are saying to me now....
"You can not say nothing can have ever come into being without a cause"
Never said that. Nothing doesn't come into being, it is the absence of being. Besides that, I certainly can say that if something comes into being, there was a cause. Even you, being a friggen wizard, are aware that you at least have to say abracadabra first.
"You can only say that nothing can be eternal if you are willing to commit a black swan fallacy."
I am saying that The Ultimate Reality is eternal, and that is existence itself. Nothing doesn't exist, it is the absence of existence.
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@Mopac
Nothing doesn't exist, it is the absence of existence.
Yes, macro-infinite non-occupied space does exist outside of our eternally existent, finite, occupied SPACE Universe.
This is a minimal brainer of rational, logical common sense based on our observed experiences.
Trying to spin truth to false makes individual look like foolish religious _______.
Philosophy requires rational, logical common sense. This thread is not based on rational, logical common sense.
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@Outplayz
If you had one hundred boxes that appeared to be identical to the box in question, and you opened them all and they all contained balls painted blue, would that change the likelihood that the (supposed) unobserved ball in the box in question might be red?No i couldn't ... but blue would be a better guess in my opinion since it is a much more popular color. The probabilities of other colors are much more likely... green and blue... especially if the box is small. There are way more blue and green balls. Tennis balls, racket balls. Then... even in golf balls, red is not a popular color. So logic would tell me i have a good chance it's not a red ball and i'd be confident in not accepting said persons claim.
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@mustardness
Nothing is the absence of existence.
If you understand nothing as anything else, you are not really talking about nothing but something.
I mean NOTHING.
Unoccupied space is still space, which is something.
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@3RU7AL
Yeah it would affect my decision. I would think blue would be a good bet.
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@Outplayz
Yeah it would affect my decision. I would think blue would be a good bet.
This would be bad logic. A problem of induction.
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@3RU7AL
I don't think it would be bad logic. It would be induction but a good one. If every box is blue... to make a bet it's a different color would be a bad induction in my opinion. If going off percentages of chance... for it to be the same as all the other boxes is the most logical.
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@3RU7AL
With that said, it would matter how many boxes there are and if all of them came from the same source. There is of course a process that needs to be considered. But if they all came from the same source, all looked the same, and 5 or more of them all being the same... to be blue would be your best bet.
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@Outplayz
The gambler's fallacy, also known as the Monte Carlo fallacy or the fallacy of the maturity of chances, is the mistaken belief that, if something happens more frequently than normal during a given period, it will happen less frequently in the future (or vice versa). In situations where the outcome being observed is truly random and consists of independent trials of a random process, this belief is false. The fallacy can arise in many situations, but is most strongly associated with gambling, where it is common among players.
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@3RU7AL
Outplayz answer was correct given the parameters of your original question which did not specify randomness. You said 100 boxes contained 100 blue balls. What is the likelihood of a blue ball being in the 101st? Given those parameters, a blue ball is most likely when all available evidence is identical. You should have said that 100 boxes contained a randomly selected ball from a pool of different colors. All of them, it turns out, just happened to be blue. Here is another randomly selected ball in a box. What is the likelihood of that one also being blue? Then your gamblers fallacy would apply.
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@TwoMan
Good point.
What I'm saying is that the box in question may or may not have anything at all to do with the other boxes that appear (superficially) identical.
I thought of the gambler's fallacy because, "If you flip a coin 100 times and it comes up heads every time, that does not mean the chances of it coming up tails has increased on subsequent flips. Each coin flip is an isolated 50/50."
The other boxes do not necessarily have any statistical or causal relationship to the box in question.
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@3RU7AL
How do I know you're not lying to the degree of certainty you suggest me to in said scenarioWhy would you believe that the concept of motive has anything at all to do with whether or not there is a ball in the box and whether or not it is red?
Because it's his word I'm taking.
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@3RU7AL
I can see how it is valid with gambling and even arguments and such... but in this case, i wouldn't say it applies. Depending on factors of course. If each box came from a different place and they all happened to be blue... i wouldn't be so confident the closed box is blue. Id still be unsure in that case. If all the boxes came from the same source... i would be very confident the last box is the same. So it depends. Given my second example... i wouldn't say those fallacies apply.
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@Outplayz
The other boxes do not necessarily have any statistical or causal relationship to the box in question.
This fallacy is often used in marketing/advertising.
A commercial for a lottery will often show images of actors pretending to be excited by a winning lottery ticket.
Subconsciously you are led to believe, "I just saw one hundred people win the lottery, therefore it must be a common occurrence, therefore I have a realistic chance of winning the lottery."
You have no information about the source or history of the one hundred boxes that contain the balls painted blue.
You don't know if the original balls were removed and replaced or simply painted blue for your benefit.
Here's a story that illustrates a perfectly rational, scientific assessment of data.
An engineer, a physicist, and a mathematician were on a train heading north, and had just crossed the border into Scotland.
The engineer looked out of the window and said "Look! all Scottish sheep are black!"
The physicist said, "No, no. Some Scottish sheep are black."
The mathematician looked irritated. "There is, at this moment in time, at least one field in Scotland, containing at least one sheep, of which at least one side is black."