I don’t like this. Preface: This connects my Information Theory argument to the Trinity to an Information Theory argument from Theism which I might have just discovered? This makes me uncomfortable because it’s forcing me to make a wildly immodest claim about atheism, and I’m not used to that🤣 If this is true, however, then atheism just does have a probability of exactly 0. Or maybe it just shows a posterior of ε, due to the constraints of Bayes or whatever. Idk Or maybe this is simply deduction that uses the structure of Bayes as the structure and/or set up for showing the deductive contradiction? Idk Or maybe Bayes IS a form deduction that can utilize probabilities because it’s math, and math IS deduction. So maybe you can’t use probability theory without also be using deduction in the same exact act? If so, then as long as we don’t assign a probability of 0, getting a probability of 0 out of the math shouldn’t break any rules of Bayes? Maybe someone smarter than me can explain to me why I’ve made a mistake here (especially after I post the full argument when I’ve written it out) or whatever and why this didn’t mathematically follow or whatever. So if Than, Tim, or whoever else who understands math and this stuff better than me can tell me if this is overtly flawed reasoning or at least plausible or even sound, that would be awesome! Here’s the argument: Core Methodological Reasoning: The core of this argument is basically setting of an internal logical consistency test. You make a hypothesis’ possibility space allow contradictions to see how much of its own predictions avoids contradiction or how much contradiction dominates the space. A hypothesis can fail this test at a rate of .5, which removes that .5 and moves the probability over to the remaining alternatives. You do this with every hypothesis to remove the contradictory possibility space and then normalize. If, however, the entire possibility space fails this test, then you’ve been able to show that this hypothesis is actually contradictory because it predicts only contradictions. So if you can use Information Theory to show that a hypothesis’ possible predictions are entirely eaten by its contradictory predictions such that that math results in a ratio of “0 : 1” in possibility to contradiction, then this seems to be a form of a proof for contradiction.

Currently watching the IPA stream today talking about the Joe Schmid conversion and loved the article Tim reads at about 30:00. This isn’t about debating denominations but just standards of evidence and applied epistemology in general. I’m not actually all that interesting in interdenominational debates, especially not here. I just want a discussion on epistemology, methodology, and bayes, if anyone has any insights or whatever they think are valuable. I kinda want to go a bit more in depth here than what Tim talked about (at the point where I’m at in the video, not sure what he says after). I’m not well versed in catholic miracles, but it does seem to be, given the claims I’ve heard, that there are highly evidential miracles for Catholicism that seemingly, at least on a surface reading, could indicate catholic doctrine, like Mary telling people to follow certain Marian dogmas. However, I’m not sure miracles are actually robust enough to instantiate a specific sect or doctrine of Christianity in the modern era. It’s far easier to understand God’s general motives for general ways in which he acts in the world, like with theodicy or incarcerating as a man, than to understand his motives for acting in specific historical cases. First, as a side note, do not live in biblical times nor with biblical prophets. The way God interacts with us is fundamentally different from back then. We have a closed canon now and don’t have to rely on direct revelation to understand theology. Second, for the main point, instantiating a sub-sect within a broader religion with miracles seems to require higher order resolution of understanding divine psychology than what we actually can have. I’m not a skeptical theist, but I do value being able to cleanly separate a hypothesis’ predictions from the predictions from mere background knowledge, and I’m not convinced those miracles do that. We know God values speech act theory not only because I and IP holds to it but because it seems evident in scripture. So when you look at even explicit catholic miracles that’s directed to an unbelieving or predominantly Catholic audience, there seems to be clear motivations to use the culture/people’s easiest access point to understand God as the means through which he communicates with those people. Those situations seem like the exact situations I’d expect a denominationally indifferent God (regardless of whether he’s Catholic or Protestant) would act like that.

So I just mentioned in today’s IPA stream about possibly using Skool for help writing academic papers for those with little or no experience, as with myself. Than said that it’s a good idea, and Ryan said he actually has a lecture he had on the topic he could use. So like/comment if that is something you’d be interested in and/or if you have some ideas for it. For me, a mini to full course on it would be interesting, but even just 1-3 lectures would be helpful. I’d be interested in: — ofc having some sort of lecture(s) or even a mini/full course on it (possibly explaining the process and how long it takes for different kinds of papers/journals, how to help your chances of getting published, a list of good journals and how to know which you should publish in, how to know if your idea is worth writing on or if it’s an overly saturated topic or whatever, how to find (and take notes/cite) relevant papers to pass the bar for academic rigor to be published, how to get feed back from philosophers, how to possible work with a philosopher for them to co-author or even just helping edit/finalize it and what that entails, be especially focused for those who aren’t college for a field for active academics, etc) — community feedback on in progress papers (from other Skool students or possibly Than/Tim, potentially from Ryan or other academics if they can/want to) where we discuss general good prose, relevant papers/sources to use, etc. May also be cool to possibly have a Skool tab for those to talk about various papers they’re working on and anything related to this, though the tabs we already have may be better… kinda depends on how easily they get buried by other discussions people start. — It would be very cool to run an IPA stream with Than/Tim and possibly a Skool academic reviewing community papers… like going over: • fully published papers and whatever interesting implications, impact for the field, etc or whatever they want to talk about (possibly doing several papers in a stream if one paper doesn’t have enough to talk about for a full stream)

Another cool mini-course or whatever to do at some point would be something that helps people who on more knowledgeable/mature on the philosophy/apologetics side learn how to talk with others who have came to them about doubts or whatever… basically Tim/Than using their psychology knowledge or papers they’ve read and their experience to help teach how to bridge the rational side of apologetics with the emotional, psychological, and pastoral side of using it effectively. Just an idea. I know there’s some thing that I could learn from Than/Tim or others, but I’m also not in desperate need for this. One guy messaged me on IG from him seeing a comment I made on someone’s post recently. The conversation has just started, so I’m not in any particular need rn, but it may be something I possibly encounter more often… especially since there’s been 1 or 2 guys from the IP discord I’ve talked with. So it may need to be a skill I develop over time, even if I’m not directly involved in a ministry. Plus, I’m sure others could benefit from this too. So I have no rush or real need for this to happen soon or at all (not sure if others do tho), it was just an idea of something I’d possibly be interested in some day. Oh, this could also be the same course where you could possibly talk about parenting your current/future children in ways to teach them philosophy, apologetics, theology, etc and helping them through doubts or other issues that’s relevant to the IPA ministry, or possibly even more general parenting advice if you see it valuable and doesn’t contradict the scope of the broader IP ministry.

Looks like all of you are being taught by the worst internet apologist 🤣💀 But in all seriousness, this is a really REALLY bad take from someone who is a scholar. My take is entirely informed by the theistic heavy weights such as Joshua Rasmussen and Trent Dougherty. Remember this one for the rest of your lives: 1️⃣Logically, the argument with the weakest premise is the strongest argument. 2️⃣The perception of morality is obviously a weaker premise than the objectivity of morality. This is not hard.