Can altruism pass an outsider test?

Some people might ask whether or not we have come to think a meaningful life has to do with doing things for other people because we have been brainwashed in our society to think that way. If we look at this from a perspective of an outsider, would we prefer a life concerned with others over a self-centered life? 

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Where did we get that idea?

Well, we came up with the idea of a three-headed dog by having the idea of three, the idea of heads, and the idea of a dog, and putting them all together. How did we come up with the idea of God? 

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Relativism and the Westboro Baptist Church

Moral relativism is often motivated by a desire to be tolerant. Yet, it can end up providing a justification for the most extreme forms of intolerance. 

If morality is in the eye of the beholder, then people who, say, condemn homosexuals and carry "God hates fags" signs to military funerals can't be criticized morally, since they are doing exactly what their culture (Westboro Baptist Church) says that they ought to do. 

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The Haldane-Krauss Argument

My practice as a scientist is atheistic. That is to say, when I set up an experiment I assume that no god, angel or devil is going to interfere with its course; and this assumption has been justified by such success as I have achieved in my professional career. I should therefore be intellectually dishonest if I were not also atheistic in the affairs of the world.

-- J.B.S. Haldane

This is an argument that people who practice or accept science ought to be atheists, and it has been endorsed recently by Lawrence Krauss.  But what is the argument exactly? Here numbered premises might be nice. 

Maybe this: 

1. In setting up experiments in science, scientists set aside the possibility of divine interference changing the result of the experiment. 

2. To be consistent, therefore, someone who practices science ought also to discount the possibility of divine interference in all areas of life. 

3. To discount the possibility of divine activity in the world in all areas of life is to be, at least in practice if not in theory, an atheist. 

4. Therefore consistent thinking on the part of scientists leads to atheism. 

But I fail to see why I should believe 2. If I ask a scientist about  whether or not a hundred  dollar bill will remain in my drawer if I leave it there, the scientists might answer "yes." By this I take it he would mean that the bill did not have properties that will cause it to disintegrate there, or spontaneously combust. . But he doesn't know whether a burglar might get into the drawer. In other words, the scientist is going to tell me what will happen to the bill left to itself. It is mapping the world apart from interference, telling you what will happen all things being equal. But it is a further question as to whether all things are equal. 

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Lowder on Dawkins not debating Craig

I had missed this. Lowder offers real reasons for Dawkins' refusal to debate. I'd take it a step further, and say that even a philosopher of religion can do a disservice to his position if he doesn't have the ability to operate within a debate format. There are good philosophers of religion, both theist and atheist, who would fit in this category. 

However, Dawkins a) has gone away from actual science to doing philosophy of religion, however amateurishly, b) engages in a intellectual crusade while systematically avoiding genuine engagement with people who take the  position he's crusading against. It isn't Dawkins' failure to debate, it's the way he refuses to debate that I find objectionable. 

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Fred Dretske RIP

His passing, noted by Eric, is reported here.

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Just suppose

Suppose we were to discover that messages that we thought had to come from outer space. We use them for information. We learn to build spaceships based on that information. Then, discover evidence that the source did not evolve. Now what do we do?

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