Possible neurological roots of empathy. https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/th ... ce-empathy

I would guess the number of human connections explains the six degrees of separation theory. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_deg ... separation

Seeing n/n+1 and 5! (5*4*3*2*1) brings back unpleasant memories of being a math major for a while in college--now I only use math for my fantasy baseball teams...

Clearly there would have been a evolutionary advantage in being able to visualize what other person is thinking or planning to do. That does not necessarily mean that you would have empathy for that person but I wonder if that process leads to some sort of empathy. But I would note that we appear to be more empathetic than people in the Middle Ages who enjoyed public executions. I suspect civilization tends to promote empathy.

Ray Jay wrote:What I think he misses is that the connection goes both way; each person empathizes with the other. You care about them, and they care about you. So, I don't think we should divide by 2 as he advises. These are (usually) 2 way connections.

(cross posted with Danivon)

Yes. So 159600 between 400 people.

Still, those are only notional and what I was asking you was how you get from the existence of empathy to some "force" that is based on the number of connections.

freeman3

Clearly there would have been a evolutionary advantage in being able to visualize what other person is thinking or planning to do. That does not necessarily mean that you would have empathy for that person but I wonder if that process leads to some sort of empathy

Natural selection breeds those qualities that produced more successful people.
Those bands and tribes that succeeded probably had people better able to communicate, and empathy produces better communication. Where some would share the results of their gathering and in return receive a share from another's hunting...

freeman3

I suspect civilization tends to promote empathy

.
Perhaps because greater empathy produces greater benefits over time than a zero sum game?

The understanding that this ethic of reciprocity would lead to greater benefit in the long run, eventually infused every religion as the most basic understanding of each religion.

What is hateful to you, do not to your fellow man. This is the law: all the rest is commentary.

Talmud, Shabbat 31a

If religion only reveals a fundamental that evolutionary biology and human experience taught the earliest hominids it seems like an awfully small contribution when measured against the strife and violence that so often came when religions came into geographic conflict.

sassenach wrote:

Technically this would make them (and me) agnostics rather than atheists, but it's a distinction without a difference

I disagree. An agnostic is open to the possibility. An atheist is not.

The former presupposes that the person is open to mystery. The latter does not.

I suppose you can change the definitions if you like, but atheism is a belief system based on its on set of truth claims.

dag hammarsjkold wrote:sassenach wrote:

Technically this would make them (and me) agnostics rather than atheists, but it's a distinction without a difference

I disagree. An agnostic is open to the possibility. An atheist is not.

The former presupposes that the person is open to mystery. The latter does not.

I suppose you can change the definitions if you like, but atheism is a belief system based on its on set of truth claims.

Or you can actually read what atheists say they believe instead of telling them.

An atheist does not believe in God/gods. That is not even a "truth claim", it is a lack of one. An agnostic says they do not or cannot know if God/gods exist(s). Which is a weak truth claim at best. One can hold both positions.

danivon wrote:

Ray Jay wrote:What I think he misses is that the connection goes both way; each person empathizes with the other. You care about them, and they care about you. So, I don't think we should divide by 2 as he advises. These are (usually) 2 way connections.

(cross posted with Danivon)

Yes. So 159600 between 400 people.

Still, those are only notional and what I was asking you was how you get from the existence of empathy to some "force" that is based on the number of connections.

It is a spiritual force, not a material one. What's the power of your love for your child? Which is stronger: an electromagnet or an idea.?

Ray Jay wrote:

danivon wrote:

Ray Jay wrote:What I think he misses is that the connection goes both way; each person empathizes with the other. You care about them, and they care about you. So, I don't think we should divide by 2 as he advises. These are (usually) 2 way connections.

(cross posted with Danivon)

Yes. So 159600 between 400 people.

Still, those are only notional and what I was asking you was how you get from the existence of empathy to some "force" that is based on the number of connections.

It is a spiritual force, not a material one. What's the power of your love for your child? Which is stronger: an electromagnet or an idea.?

Emotions are internal, however strong they are.

I disagree. An agnostic is open to the possibility. An atheist is not.

I'm open to the idea that the Flying Spaghetti Monster exists as well, at least in the sense that it's impossible to know one way or the other so it could in theory be true. Doesn't mean that I actually believe it to be true though.

Like I said, it's a distinction without a difference. I'm comfortable describing myself as an atheist.

Danivon wrote:

Or you can actually read what atheists say they believe instead of telling them.

I'm not telling anyone anything, only attempting to locate common ground so a discussion can take place. Wikipedia covers the various nuances of atheism thoroughly. You you are certainly free to dismiss the authors of wikipedia "telling" you what atheism is and is not.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atheism

An atheist does not believe in God/gods. That is not even a "truth claim", it is a lack of one.

It is if he believes his position to be true.

Earlier Freeman seemed to be sharing what he believed about the topic. I assume he believes his position to be true and that his reason for the thread isn't an exercise in sophistry.

The first line in that Wikipedia article is:

"Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities."

Which means exactly the same as my:

"An atheist does not believe in God/gods"

A lack of a belief is not a "truth claim".

Unless you believe your lack of belief to be valid.

For your consideration Dags.http://www.qcc.cuny.edu/socialsciences/ ... -Proof.htm

I guess you can argue that someone asserting X and someone asserting Not X are both making truth claims. That's why I was very careful to put the emphasis on that was very little evidence for X (God) and not to say Not X was proven. I think it is reasonable and logical that those that say X is true have the burden of proof and stop there. There is no reason to go to Not X if X can't be proven.

Freeman,

Lets leave the god question alone for a minute.

Do you believe that your statement below is true? Namely, that....

There is no reason to go to Not X if X can't be proven.

If X is asserting a truth about how things are, e.g do electrons exist. Do UFOs mean alien visitations. Until you come up with decent evidence that X exists, there is no reason to go to Not X. And in the context of religion it confuses the issue by saying that the X side and Not X side have an equal burden. Since X is making an assertion about an aspect of reality they have the burden of proof to produce enough evidence to make a prima facie case, meaning that unless evidence was produced to counter X then they would have proven their case. So absolutely I believe that there is no reason to go to Not X until X has produced sufficient evidence when X is an assertion about some aspect of reality, of whether something exists.

It confuses things to say that X and Not X positions have equal burdens of proof. If there is no evidence for X then it's a myth. A person could believe in it, it possibly could be true because since we are not all-knowing creatures we cannot prove the non-existence of something, but one would hope that human beings will eventually get beyond believing in myths. Maybe not. Maybe we will always need them to get through life. Incidentally, I think you could make a better argument for a Spinoza-like (or Hegelian Absolute) God is everywhere case than for the validity of organized religions. Basically, an argument having to do with the all the conditions necessary for life, the fact that mutations in DNA lead to an incredibly powerful organ like the brain, something like that. I am not saying that has been proven either by any means, but at least it is an argument based on some kind of evidence (though of course there is nothing to say that these processes could not have arisen by random chance, that's it's just the way things developed, and that there have innumerable iterations in the universe where intelligent life did not arise and we are the iteration where everything came together--adding some kind of intelligent entity to the mix does not it make it any more likely)

dag hammarsjkold wrote:Freeman,

Lets leave the god question alone for a minute.

Do you believe that your statement below is true? Namely, that....

There is no reason to go to Not X if X can't be proven.

Have you heard of Russell's Teapot?

Or the analogy of the invisible pink elephant?

Or the Flying Spaghetti Monster?

None of them are provable. Why do we need to expend time trying to disprove them to simply say that they don't believe in them?