Quote:
Originally Posted by Joseph Sweeney
In the same way I can judge someone for being worse than me at riding a bike, or reciting the alphabet based on objective standards, so can I make a judgement call based on objective standards that someone is not making as rational decisions as I am.
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Reciting the alphabet is an interesting way to approach this idea. First, I want to claim there is no such thing as a fully objective standard for doing so. There may be more or less agreed upon subjective standards, but there certainly isn't an objective one beyond, perhaps, "all the letters and in the proper order" (though I think you could easily make an argument that the proper order is not necessary, and depending on the purpose of the recitation, possibly not even all of the letters).
We tend to accept the ability to recite the alphabet of those who are capable of meeting the minimum requirement without insisting that there is a single superior way to do so. I might prefer the sing-song way of reciting while someone else might prefer to simply state the letters without any associated rhythm. Someone might recite more quickly or slowly and with various regional accents without any of those reciting being "better" or "worse" than others at reciting the alphabet.
I would propose that rationality is the same. Within the accepted basics of being rational, there can be variations which do not make those involved "more" or "less" rational based on those variations. If you were to subjectively claim that the recitation of the alphabet without intonation is superior to a sing-song recitation, you should realize that is subjective and I should be allowed to disagree without your claiming an objective judgment. It is the same with rational decisions. In my view, you are supplying subjective judgment against others based on whether or not they make decisions the way you do.
On to knowledge!
I kinda agree that you either know something or you don't. At the same time, I kinda reject the idea that you either know something or you don't. It seems to me that it is useful for us in our decision making process to know things. We tend not to leave a lot of things up in the air as "well, maybe" when we can determine what seems most likely, call it knowledge, and proceed from there.
For example, I know I'm not in a computer simulation of some sort. Except I don't, not really. I couldn't prove to you that this is not some sort of elaborate simulation based on any sort of evidence. I observe reality and choose to "know" that my experiences are real. It isn't completely a matter of knowing whether or not this is reality, it is also a matter of needing not to regularly evaluate my actions on the basis of the possibility this is all some sort of simulation.
We regularly assign things to the "known" column because it is not useful for us to constantly re-evaluate them. Given new information, many people will reevaluate those things (though some don't), but without new information it isn't useful. I used to know Pluto was a planet. Even after it was declared to not be so, I still knew Pluto was a planet for a while until I took the time to look at the new information and decide I needed to update what I "knew". In any case, it is not useful to me in general to think about whether or not Pluto is a planet and so I don't spend much energy putting my decision about it into the "known" section of my understanding. And in the question of things known, Pluto is interesting as an example because there are still any number of people who "know" it is a planet, while there are others who "know" it is not.
Like I said - with the angels, I don't know. I do think you are anthropomorphizing them. Without being able to make an equivalency between people and angels, I don't believe any of the rest of your argument holds. Also, please note that I do not believe that God is unable, by His nature, to limit free will. I believe that He is generally unwilling to do so with regard to humans because of the relationship He desires to share with us.
~Aldin, choosing his words