quote:stick your head in a bucket if you don't care to even allow others to define their terms of speech. Brat.
Except generally speaking, we DON'T define our own terms of speech when talking with other people. If I say that copacetic really means "unacceptable" when you're talking with me, why in the world should you be inclined to accept that definition?
Like I said, maybe you need a time out...
quote:The focus of the question was "how relevant were any of the experiences I just discussed to the experiences that you have found to be common?"
Lots of people I met had similar experiences, so, yes, I suppose those experiences are relevant to their faith. But consider: you had 2 disparate and unrelated experiences. Religious folks may have many many more such experiences, more consistently and more frequently.
Showing that you had similar experiences doesn't invalidate religious reasoning.
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Scott, stop. just stop. Stop baiting me, stop playing the stupid goddamn game you always play. No response necessary, just stop.
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Scott, seriously, you are being petulant. I outlined several cases within a religious discussion where it was valuable (and common)to have different definitions of faith and belief. Did you read it at all?
You are the one who is trying to enforce a minority definition. Even ignoring that, you're not letting someone define or clarify their own terms, which is an important part of debate. I'm approaching the point where I write you off as yet another troll on this forum.
(Not quite edited in time)
[ March 07, 2010, 10:07 AM: Message edited by: Raymond Arnold ]
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Scott, the second you stop acting like an arrogant ****head is the second I start engaging with you again. Now is not the time.
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I'm not sure whether you are deliberately trolling or just hopelessly ignorant but this isn't worth my time until someone else returns to the discussion. I had actually been hopeful for a moment we might be getting something worthwhile done here.
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quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: Scott, the second you stop acting like an arrogant ****head is the second I start engaging with you again. Now is not the time.
I really don't see what the problem is. You wanted to define belief and faith as somehow separate, non-synonymous terms. But they are synonymous, and most people use faith and belief interchangeably. Even the dictionary example you pointed out implied this point.
SO... come back whenever you like, Orincoro.
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Is there anyone else still following this? I really did feel for a brief moment hope this discussion might go somewhere worthwhile. In particular I was hoping for a theist to comment on the lengthy explanation of my own religious journey or lack thereof on the previous page.
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quote:You wanted to define belief and faith as somehow separate, non-synonymous terms. But they are synonymous...
Scott, have you never had a philosophical conversation? I ask this because you seem to be unfamiliar with the utility of maintaining a distinction between two terms that are lazily used as synonyms in order to address elements of the one definition that are absent in the other. It's quite common, and was explicitly what Orincoro was doing. Would you like me to explain why this is an accepted practice in this sort of conversation?
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Hey Raymond. I was following. Only jumping in because you asked.
I liked your almost religious journey. Not sure why you reached the conclusion you did. Just because your friend wasn't receptive enough to fathom the depth of your experience doesn't mean that you should have turned yourself off to perhaps altering your perspective.
Not sure why you chose to test out Zoroastrianism. I think there is actually a lot of scholarly debate as to whether or not Zoroastrianism heavily influenced Judaism or Judaism heavily influenced Zoroastrianism, though, as with Christianity, I can see both being true.
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Scott, you are being seriously obstructive to having a constructive conversation, here. Just as you usually are, to be sure, which is why I rarely bother with you. But since it seems you're unaware of it, or at least pretending to be unaware, perhaps another note telling you so will be helpful.
On a different point, you never responded to my question on how you justify beliefs you can't articulate.
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I think that, although there is significant overlap between words like "faith", "belief", and "knowledge", it would be helpful to this conversation if, for the purposes of this conversation, we could agree to more specific definitions.
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The third experience worth mentioning (I left off before due to brevity concerns) is that I have an active imagination and spent a lot of time during childhood by myself. Whenever I wanted to talk to someone and there wasn't anybody there, I'd just carry on a conversation with an imaginary version of a friend.
This is a habit that I've maintained to this day. Early on, it basically consisted of monologuing, the only difference being that I was imagining a particular friend doing the listening. Generally I pretended they just agreed with whatever I was saying.
Over time that started to feel unrealistic. I'd say something, and then get a feeling like the person I was talking to would have disapproved of what I'd just said, and I'd try to come up with another way to word it or maybe even change my opinion if I thought their (presumed, imaginary) disapproval was warranted.
Effectively all this was was me working out my own problems, but I was doing it through the lens of having other people to talk to about it.
I'm also a writer-ish (more of a storyteller in general, whatever medium I'm using) so a lot of times I carry out scenes in my head between two characters. While I'm doing that, I'm submerged in the role of the two characters. I'll imagine one character saying something, and then immediately, as the other character, I'll think of a retort that isn't necessarily something that I personally would really say, but character I'm envisioning would do so naturally.
The above example is actually why I don't have the logical problem with the idea of the Trinity that a lot of atheists do - I know what it's like to be two different people at once while still being a third person who created both of them, and if I had unlimited intelligence and imagination I think I'd do a far better job of it. But the extent to which I can feel like I'm getting a response from an entity that I know perfectly well doesn't exist makes me suspicious of those who claim to have conversations with God.
Finally (this is a related but separate point) I frequently have dreams that reflect whatever I'm currently obsessing over. I also find that my dreams tend to be structured in a cinematic manner that reflects my focus on storytelling in real life. I assume based on conversations with other friends that everyone's dreams to tend to reflect what they are interested and passionate about, and will likely be structured in ways similar to how they structure most of their thinking. (I am constantly looking for stories and ways to connect disparate "plot elements" in the real world together, and I like it when life experiences translate into a beginning, middle and end)
So to recap, I have experienced:
1) a sudden appearance of signs an portents that guided me in my life 2) a moment of clarity in which a divine plan felt "revealed" to me, which I don't feel that I consciously chose - it simply came to me fully formed. 3) the ability to carry on in depth conversations with people that don't exist 4) potent narrative dreams that reflect whatever I'm currently spending a lot of time thinking about.
None of these things had to do with each other. And none of these things are directly identical to what any theist that I know personally has told me. But they are all very clearly related to the experiences that theists have described. They are also all things obviously influenced by my own life - I play Magic a lot, I studied Zoroastrianism and I only have fake conversations with versions of people I personally know that I want to have a real conversation with.
If, growing up, I had been encouraged to have conversations with God instead of friends from school, and told that it was a real conversation, if religious teachings had been more important to my life and I looked more actively for signs and portents of a religious nature, and if that moment of clarity had related to a religion I was already predisposed to believe in, I would no doubt have a very hard time saying "all these things, no matter how real and important they seem to me, are simply fictional."
The reason I didn't try for more than three days to find some kind of religious truth is that the longer I spent waiting and trying and focusing on it, the more likely I was to receive a "false positive" - a spiritual sign that was the product only of my own imagination and current focus on religion.
I didn't give up on religion because one particular friend was narrow minded. I gave up because I realized (in a direct, personal experience way instead of an abstract academic way like I had before) that it is very easy to find the kinds of signs that the religious ascribe significance to without them having any significance at all.
It is also possible to do so without being mentally ill - I consider myself a mentally healthy individual, but all it would have taken to make me a more religious person than I am is for the experiences I have already had to align in a slightly different way.
And I'd note that I HAVEN'T completely given up. If an angel shows up tomorrow and performs miracles right in front of me, I'll certainly be open to persuasion. But the kinds of signs that most adult theists described to me are indistinguishable from tricks of the mind.
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You're 100 percent right. The biggest obstacle to my own faith is identifying that these same things that are present in religion are present in many superstitious cults, or even in day-to-day experiences and are not divine.
As such, I've rooted them out of my own religious thought. The more I've come to study my own religion, the more I realize that these spiritual self-deceptions are not at all a part of my religion. My religion is founded on knowledge, and it is not based on "searching with your heart", "intense emotional and intellectual searches", frenzied introspective encounters that self-deceptively lead toward the predetermined, desired, destination of faith.
But what has kept me wary of Atheism is that there is as much self-deception and human flaw that is found among atheism and that makes it attractive to the lazy thinker in me, and repulsive to the more clear part of me.
It is common that atheists are reactive, elitist, and use their atheism as a platform to hoist themselves up onto a pedestal. (Everything I'm about to say is in the general sense and I don't believe to be true about all atheists:) Many are ignorant as to the truths about religion, and limit their search for truth to learning from other religionists - which is unfortunate, because the average religionist is ignorant and practices with the flaws you mentioned above. An atheist doesn't choose to be an agnostic engaged in a search, they specifically choose to be atheistic, claiming to be fully-formed in their thought, having reached the conclusion of their search. I know my friends who were in engaged in a search and so happily grabbed on to Dawkins and his argument about how we're all atheists, Thor-Atheists, etc. He equated the search for God to be similar to that of the search for the truth of Zeus - a false parallel that formerly agnostic, now atheists clung to so that they could climb the latter of condescension and don an identity when they may have felt loss and cut-off.
Psychological flaws, self-deception, it's rampant in both camps. Atheists have a cosmetic leg-up in this realm because many religionists claim that closing your eyes, squinting real tight, is a valid form of truth-seeking. But that doesn't mean anything in terms of the real answer to the God question.
What I'm trying to say is that the conclusion to your distaste shouldn't be setting the evidence bar at a miracle or direct communication - that's not exactly an honest way at the answer. If you are truly interested, the information for the real foundations of faith (again, using the Jewish definition where faith means loyalty to what you know to be true, not "belief" for the sake of leaping or whatever)is out there. Go and study, if you like.
Nachmanidies, one of the greatest Jewish Biblical and Talmudic commentaries (13th century) writes in his commentary on Exodus that God wasn't interested in bringing a miracle to each generation. But if you study the Bible, God didn't shy away from revealing Himself to the people. Not just through miracles. The generation of the exodus experienced the 10 plagues, the splitting of the see, manna from the heavens, pillars of fire and clouds of protection...The generations after, until the destruction of the first temple experienced other miracles, great and small, all confirming to all, the existence of God. Additionally, the generation of the exodus heard God speak to them - He revealed Himself to them and they were all prophets. Again, Judaism is unique in this mass revelation - where all other faiths begin with one prophet, Judaism begins with a generation of prophets. A much harder story to fabricate and to sell to people: "Your dad was a prophet, remember? Oh, he didn't tell you? Believe me, he was...check out my book, it's called the Bible..."
Part of Judaism is that this entire world is really about a relationship with God. And I mean that word, "relationship" in the heavy sense - with all the depth of a romantic relationship between husband and wife, the undying love between parent and child, the great understanding of friends, and the euphoria of partnership. God's relationship with mankind is also a part of the long-view and not just the detail of our generation. And Nachmanidies points out that God revealed Himself to the earlier generations - the struggle of their relationship was less about seeing God, and more about what to do in a world where God is always in your face. Will you "hide" from Him, because He is too much? Will your selfish desire to express yourself and not see yourself as a part of a relationship win-out? And those generations need to be studied in that light. But the relationship of later generations is one in which we are expected to be honest - to relate to Him through the world, to see Him in it, even though He appears to be hidden. To remain loyal to a God who was with us so blatantly in generations past...
And in my own struggles - I can tell you from an atheists point of view, how "convenient" my religious philosophy is. I relate to God through finding Him in the word and relying on the evidence of His presence in the past. I've romanticized the search and it blinds me. Yea. I get that that is a possibility.
But I'll tell you on the other hand how much of a hard time I have obligating myself to the realities that I know exist. How I can't stick to a diet. I can't exercise when I know it's right for me. How I can't be honest when I always want to be. How I can't be kind even though I know it's in everyone's best interest that I be kind. And how I only question my faith with the analysis mentioned in the last paragraph when I'm failing to adhere to the religion that I've come to the conclusion is true.
It gives me great pause to know how badly we don't want to be cognitively dissonant. How we hate to live in contradiction - so we either try to bring our actions to adhere to the truth, or we chuck our definition of the truth and choose a new one. I've seen so many people do the latter - and so I pour enormous amounts of effort into living with the dissonance, so that one day, when I'm ready, I can bring my actions to align with what I believe to be true rather than changing my definition of truth to align with my behavior - the ultimate dishonesty.
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quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: I think that, although there is significant overlap between words like "faith", "belief", and "knowledge", it would be helpful to this conversation if, for the purposes of this conversation, we could agree to more specific definitions.
A careful separation between "conclusions which are adequately supported by evidence and reason" and "conclusions which are not so supported" would make it impossible to engage in the fallacy of equivocation. Apparently, Scott is not willing to have a discussion without this fallacy being at his disposal.
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quote:In particular I was hoping for a theist to comment on the lengthy explanation of my own religious journey or lack thereof on the previous page.
I commented.
quote:you never responded to my question on how you justify beliefs you can't articulate.
I'm not sure you can. But that may be a consequence of the adherent's ability-- it doesn't say anything about the validity of the belief itself.
Witness various efforts at convincing people of global warming or evolution: the fact that these things have been so poorly communicated doesn't remove the fact that they're...fact.
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Orincoro, however justified you feel your response may be, it's not acceptable here, even as a response to (what you perceive as) obtuseness or baiting. Please refrain from using abusive language.
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quote:you never responded to my question on how you justify beliefs you can't articulate.
I'm not sure you can. But that may be a consequence of the adherent's ability-- it doesn't say anything about the validity of the belief itself.
Witness various efforts at convincing people of global warming or evolution: the fact that these things have been so poorly communicated doesn't remove the fact that they're...fact.
You have to be kidding. Scientists can articulate their claims. You are claiming that you can't.
You are equivocating between different meanings of "communicate". It is patheticlaly transparant.
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quote:you never responded to my question on how you justify beliefs you can't articulate.
I'm not sure you can. But that may be a consequence of the adherent's ability-- it doesn't say anything about the validity of the belief itself.
Witness various efforts at convincing people of global warming or evolution: the fact that these things have been so poorly communicated doesn't remove the fact that they're...fact.
You have to be kidding. Scientists can articulate their claims. You are claiming that you can't.
You are equivocating between different meanings of "communicate". It is patheticlaly transparant.
I don't think it's pathetically transparent...
I understood him to say that his experience, though difficult to communicate, should not have any bearing on whether or not his experience is true. He drew an imperfect analogy to scientists and global warming. The process may not be the same, but just because it is difficult to convey, doesn't make it suspect for being false.
Nothing pathetic about his reasoning.
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quote:you never responded to my question on how you justify beliefs you can't articulate.
I'm not sure you can. But that may be a consequence of the adherent's ability-- it doesn't say anything about the validity of the belief itself.
Witness various efforts at convincing people of global warming or evolution: the fact that these things have been so poorly communicated doesn't remove the fact that they're...fact.
You have to be kidding. Scientists can articulate their claims. You are claiming that you can't.
You are equivocating between different meanings of "communicate". It is patheticlaly transparant.
I don't think it's pathetically transparent...
I understood him to say that his experience, though difficult to communicate, should not have any bearing on whether or not his experience is true.
No. You can't possibly identify truth without a robust system of detecting untruths. And in order to catch an untruth, you have to be able to examine your idea. How do you intend to examine an idea that you can't articulate?
Ah, of course, you and Scott have a perfect way that works all the time, you are just unable to articulate what it is. How convenient.
quote:He drew an imperfect analogy to scientists and global warming.
Blatent fallacies are not accurately described as "imperfect analogies".
You can't possibly read the text you cited and conclude that "articulation" and "convincing irrational people" are remotely the same thing, yet Scott's argument equates them.
That's transparent. That such a transparant equivocation was the best argument he could make is pathetic.
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1)I did not say that my system is anything close to that of Scott (it's not). You were just being a little rough with him and I figured I'd lend a hand.
2)Truth is detected by a person's interaction with the world. Ultimately, each person decides for himself what he believes to be true. In the same way that nothing is provable, our existence is not even provable, we set our own standards for what we assume so strongly to be true that we don't even question it anymore.
I assume so strongly that I am speaking to another human being, and not hallucinating this interaction.
Perhaps Scott has a way to reach an emotional/intellectual frenzied state and he becomes a prophet. In that state, the information he receives and the feeling he has is unique and indescribable, but it simply "feels" true. He is unequivocal about that, it "feels" true. You may not feel the way he feels, but the point is, because he had the experience and he defines it as a valid measure of truth - you can't say that it isn't true just because you didn't experience it, and just because he can't make you feel what he felt.
3) Scott doesn't equate the two in their entirety. He just demonstrates that just like it would be invalid to disprove Global warming because it is difficult to convey, it is invalid to attack his reasoning for that reason.
4) Check your ego at the door. No one wants to read you being a jerk to someone just because you disagree with him. I've seen many theists on this forum engage in self-deception. We all engage in self deception. If it suits your argument to point it out, point it out. But don't be a jerk about it.
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quote: Scott doesn't equate the two in their entirety. He just demonstrates that just like it would be invalid to disprove Global warming because it is difficult to convey, it is invalid to attack his reasoning for that reason.
I think Scott is saying that global warming is no less factual simply because a certain person can't convey it very well. Not that global warming is necessarily difficult to convey. He said "witness various efforts" and I took that to mean that there are people who try and convince others of the truth of global warming, but don't have the skills to do so accurately, and he drew a parallel between that and a religious adherent's ability to fully articulate his beliefs. That doesn't strike me as false at all.
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I should have paid more attention to Orincoro's overall point. While I don't concede I was being..."obstructionist," I probably wasn't giving his argument due consideration.
quote:I didn't give up on religion because one particular friend was narrow minded. I gave up because I realized (in a direct, personal experience way instead of an abstract academic way like I had before) that it is very easy to find the kinds of signs that the religious ascribe significance to without them having any significance at all.
I agree with this point that it is very easy to ascribe significance to things that don't really have any significance. When it comes to religion, it's clear by looking at things objectively that there's almost no way of really knowing we haven't completely fooled ourselves.
But what I've come to conclude is that this isn't just true for religion; its true for almost everything complicated - politics, interpersonal relationships, right and wrong, parenting, anything. We know its very easy to be convinced of something that isn't true. Given this, I think a degree of skepticism must ultimately be balanced with a degree of trust in oneself. I don't think its best to go around saying "I could easily be wrong, so I won't believe it". I think its better to say "I might be wrong, so I will keep an open mind for new information, but until something makes me judge things to be different than they seem to me to be now I will trust what I believe."
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quote:Given this, I think a degree of skepticism must ultimately be balanced with a degree of trust in oneself.
And, apparently, skepticism in others, since you haven't concluded that all those Mormons going around bearing their testimony are correct about God.
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But with politics and interpersonal relationships, there are identifiable results that you can look at and and change your mind based on. Even if you've become emotionally attached to one particular worldview, there are measures you can take to keep yourself grounded. If you are basing religion off of nothing but inner feelings, then you have no such mechanism for self correction.
@Armoth - I will be replying to that eventually but I keep not having time to sit and read the whole thing with my full attention.
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quote:Originally posted by Tresopax: But what I've come to conclude is that this isn't just true for religion; its true for almost everything complicated - politics, interpersonal relationships, right and wrong, parenting, anything. We know its very easy to be convinced of something that isn't true. Given this, I think a degree of skepticism must ultimately be balanced with a degree of trust in oneself.
But you don't "balance" at all! What you clearly mean by this is "When it comes to things I deeply want to be true, I throw away skepticism". You've already admitted that other people should not trust themselves if they beleive certain things (like that Christians can drink poison and live), so what, besides your egoism, makes you different from them?
quote:I don't think its best to go around saying "I could easily be wrong, so I won't believe it". I think its better to say "I might be wrong, so I will keep an open mind for new information, but until something makes me judge things to be different than they seem to me to be now I will trust what I believe."
In order for that scheme to work you have to be able to articulate exactly what information would cause you to change your conclusions, and then you have to go look for it. You can't do that, and you never will.
Once again, let me apply your exact reasoning to a specific case, and we'll see if you actually believe your argument:
I don't think its best to go around saying "I could easily be wrong about my conclusion that that old woman killed her neighbor's cow with witchcraft, so I won't believe it". I think its better to say "I might be wrong about that witch, so I will keep an open mind for new information (like what she'll say after I torture her for hours), but until something makes me judge things to be different (and more cow deaths after her death won't count, because there might be more witches) than they seem to me to be now I will trust what I believe."
I don't think its best to go around saying "I could easily be wrong about my conclusion it's God's will that Tres's child be treated with prayer alone, therefore, I'll use the treatment that evidence predicts will cure her". I think its better to say "I might be wrong about God's plan so I will keep an open mind for new information (like waiting to see if my deeply held feeling changes), but until something makes me judge things to be different than they seem to me to be now (God's plan may be that the child should die, so that changes nothing if it happens) I will trust what I believe."
Is this really how you think people ought to behave and justify their actions?
Theists, I'm sorry, but there is no way for you to justify your nicey-nice deeply held wishes on the basis of their sincerity alone without justifying sincere horrors. So stop justifying atrocities already.
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quote:Originally posted by swbarnes2: [QUOTE]Originally posted by Tresopax:
Theists, I'm sorry, but there is no way for you to justify your nicey-nice deeply held wishes on the basis of their sincerity alone without justifying sincere horrors. So stop justifying atrocities already.
Please elaborate. What are you talking about? When were theists justifying atrocities?
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Um, any atrocity committed in the name of religion ever? Inquisition, crusades, 9/11, to name the first ones that come to my mind, let alone smaller scale stuff. Not to mention that swbarnes includes witchcraft and faith-healing for children who desperately need real medicine.
Theists in this thread have not been doing advocating these things. The point is that other people have used the exact same reasoning presented by people in this thread to do terrible things. If your reasoning can result in such things, you should rethink your reasoning.
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Justifying atrocities would be a great example of choosing bad stuff. Again, if someone chooses to justify atrocities, (and it is perfectly possible to do that without religion, too) that is on them.
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I should have paid more attention to Orincoro's overall point. While I don't concede I was being..."obstructionist," I probably wasn't giving his argument due consideration.
My apologies.
Accepted. I apologize for being impatient, as usual.
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quote:Justifying atrocities would be a great example of choosing bad stuff. Again, if someone chooses to justify atrocities, (and it is perfectly possible to do that without religion, too) that is on them.
This is totally missing the point. If the process by which you justify atrocities (or any particular kind of "bad stuff") is identical to the process by which you justify good stuff, how can you tell the difference? Especially given that, with some frequently, people use the method Tres has described to derive their moral framework in the first place.
To the person who chooses faith healing or witchburning, they appear to be choosing the good stuff. They are simply doing what their gut tells them to. In the case of faith healing, there have been some interviews showing families whose child died, and they still thought that faith healing was the right thing to do, that the charlatan who tricked them was still a good man, and that it was all part of God's plan, or that they simply didn't pray hard enough. They didn't go out and say "hey, let's choose to use our gut inner feelings to derive an absolutely terrible idea!" They did what they felt was right.
Until you provide some concrete examples of what the good stuff is and how you can tell, I cannot take you remotely seriously on this.
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Really? You can't tell good stuff from bad without a "process"?
It isn't about the process; it is about the result.
You seem to be under the impression that faith precludes using other "processes" as well. It doesn't. A person of faith can be perfectly capable of using reason and science and evidence as well as far as they go. Some things are beyond using those tools; there I use faith.
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Okay. That was a little snarky. Here is an example of the process I would use if someone told me that God wanted me to do X.
Who is telling me? Do I trust them? Does X seem reasonable and good given everything I have so far experienced about reasonable and good? How does it fit with the original premiss that God is good? Let's see what God really had to say on the matter. Study scripture, check the context, read, check other sources. Do I trust those sources? Pray, think, study some more.
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: Really? You can't tell good stuff from bad without a "process"?
No, because anything at all can fall under a person's judgment as to what "God's plan" is. And following God's plan has to be "good stuff", right?
quote:It isn't about the process; it is about the result.
Right, and what better result could there be than to "convince" someone to renounce heresy, for example? Go read the first page of the board abotu the Pearls. Those people were aiming for what they thought of as good results. They thought that raising their chidren according to those religious priciples was "good stuff".
quote:You seem to be under the impression that faith precludes using other "processes" as well. It doesn't. A person of faith can be perfectly capable of using reason and science and evidence as well as far as they go.
Think of reason and evidence as driving with headlights. If someone tells you that there's this great place to drive to at night, but you can't use your headlights, you shouldn't try it. It's just a bad idea, someone is going to get hurt.
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quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: Really? You can't tell good stuff from bad without a "process"?
No, because anything at all can fall under a person's judgment as to what "God's plan" is. And following God's plan has to be "good stuff", right?
Only if we know what that is and clearly we get that wrong all the time.
quote:
quote:It isn't about the process; it is about the result.
Right, and what better result could there be than to "convince" someone to renounce heresy, for example? Go read the first page of the board abotu the Pearls. Those people were aiming for what they thought of as good results. They thought that raising their chidren according to those religious priciples was "good stuff".
And they were wrong.
quote:
quote:You seem to be under the impression that faith precludes using other "processes" as well. It doesn't. A person of faith can be perfectly capable of using reason and science and evidence as well as far as they go.
Think of reason and evidence as driving with headlights. If someone tells you that there's this great place to drive to at night, but you can't use your headlights, you shouldn't try it. It's just a bad idea, someone is going to get hurt.
Who says I can't use my headlights? Why not? You seem to think having faith means I can't use headlights but it doesn't mean that at all.
Posts: 11187 | Registered: Sep 2005
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quote:The point is that other people have used the exact same reasoning presented by people in this thread to do terrible things. If your reasoning can result in such things, you should rethink your reasoning.
Consider...
Person A: "The candidate with the most votes should win an election." Person B: "Not so. What if the majority are Nazis, and the candidate with the most votes is Hitler? That would result in an atrocity! Therefore the candidate with the most votes should not win elections."
See the problem in person B's argument here?
There are rules that usually give the best result, but don't always give the best result. If you try hard, you can think of many instances where it fails to give a good result, but that doesn't necessarily mean it is a bad rule. The fact that it is possible to come up with instances where trusting your judgement in making beliefs will lead you to a horrible mistake does not imply that in general it is the wrong way to think.
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There are rules that usually give the best result, but don't always give the best result.
In real life, there are virtually no rules that always give the best result. Therefore, you should stick with the ones that are most likely to do so.
quote:The fact that it is possible to come up with instances where trusting your judgement in making beliefs will lead you to a horrible mistake does not imply that in general it is the wrong way to think.
What makes irrational thinking in general inferior to reason and evidence is that reason and evidence do a good job of catching mistakes. Irrational and religoius thinking do a terrible job at it.
Tres, you seem to be arguing that because human reason isn't perfect, that anything widly irrational can't be a worse way to think. Hence your repeated claim that one's belief that the sun will rise tomorrow is no less "faith-based" than a belief that Jesus died and was resurrected. It's just not true.
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On multiple threads, I've striven to make my perspective known as different from that of Kmb.
I do believe that it is the process that is important. Our intuition, our perspective on "result" is flawed, often biased by emotion or desire. Emphasis on process, an honest process, leads one to truth. Truth may be ugly, but at least it is real.
I reached my religious conclusions through process. In fact, I tell young Jews whom I know that before God, comes intellectual honesty. If you cannot find God through honesty, then to be religious is a lie.
As for justification of religious evils, we've addressed this on the forum many times. Here are a number of answers:
1) It isn't religion that is the cause of violence and war, it is passion. Our desire to fight for something to believe in something so powerfully that we fight for it, is a very human desire. We aren't good with "happily ever after" we always seek to strive, to struggle, and to work for our happiness. We get obsessively passionate over football teams, and we'd die for our team just because we live in the state where they play. On a less ridiculous scale - Communism and Nazism were entirely secular, even anti-religious. Nationalism, Racism, etc.
2) I'd venture to say that most of the atrocities committed in the name of religion are actually human atrocities committed through ego, pride, a desire to oppress so as to raise oneself up, for politics and power - all prostituting religion to suit their own ends. I'd argue that most religious atrocities were not about God at all.
There are studies about witch persecution that explain that their persecution arose as a result of fears that existed at the time (of the elderly, of harvest, of disease) - religion was just an excuse. The same is true of persecution of Jews - the forced subservience of one culture, raises up another.
These are human flaws, not religious ones.
3)Ultimately, you are right. My conception of God is one in which I equate Him with all of existence. He isn't a glorified superhero to me, but He who perpetuates existence such that my fingers can type at these keys, and so that your eyes can follow the words on the screen. My interaction with the universe, with everything and everyone, to me, is an interaction with God. As I said above, I came to this understanding through a process - an intellectually honest one. As such, I define my morality, not "objectively" (a result - centered approach), but through God ( a process - centered one).
God, and the Torah, is a guide for every moral struggle I face. I don't follow my gut, but I follow the processes laid out in Judaism, which I believe are processes laid out by God.
If God asked me to commit an "atrocity" it wouldn't be an atrocity. I don't start off with the premise that Kmb does. Instead, I start off with the premise that God exists and that he perpetuates everything. When I smell fresh air, listen to music, or am just happy to be up in the morning, then I feel like I am having a relationship with God. When I stub my toe or when someone close to me dies, I am also having a relationship with God. In general, I feel that I have been given, that we have all been given a lot more good than we have been given evil. There is evil in the world - and the Bible and Talmud (or God's revelations to mankind) explain why and how we are supposed to deal with that. I am compelled by the explanations within, and understand and accept the pain I experience in this lifetime. As such, the ultimate good for me, is a relationship with God - the source of all good I've experienced in this world. So good for me is defined by what brings me close to God and what brings me far from Him.
If the scales ever tipped - If I felt that God caused too much pain, if the revelations in Bible and Talmud didn't exist, and if I lost the will to come close to a God who only brought pain - I'd no longer define "good" by my relationship with Him. But since I've identified Him as the source of all existence - in such a scenario, I'd wait to be smitten, since I know of no way of escaping God.
But in the world that currently exists, I still define good by relationship with Him. In Exodus, God tells Moses that he will wipe out nation of Israel (after the sin of the golden calf) and make a new nation from him. Moses doesn't say - "awesome, go ahead." - He argues. He tells God to erase him from His book. To Moses, it was an atrocity too great to bear, and so he challenged God. Not that it would help anything if he were shot down...
God didn't change His mind. He was testing Moses. Would Moses show His love for the nation of Israel? The point is - it's all about relationship. God's relationship with the world, with Moses, with Israel. He has proven that throughout history. With Abraham, God tested his loyalty. But in both cases, the result was good.
It's so complicated...I hate reducing all this to a post on hatrack, but maybe this gave you a glimpse of my life and my religion. I'm sure it's scary to interact with someone who powerfully believes in a force that is external and that has the ability to command him to commit "atrocities" in the name of religion. And unless you believe in the God that I do, nothing I say will comfort you. I guess the only thing that will is that my God hasn't commanded me to do anything that you would view as an atrocity. Actually, it's quite the opposite. the world would truly be a better place if I truly aligned my beliefs and actions, instead of merely vocalizing my faith.
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I'd like to repeat something I said a while ago, the clarify what I'm actually arguing:
quote:kmbboots didn't clarify what her belief in God actually WAS, but I would say that if you are, for all practical purposes, defining God as an invisible friend who offers you encouragement and comfort, then you're fine. Possibly wrong, but not consequentially so.
If you're defining God as an entity that would ever influence you to actually change your actions on anything remotely important, then as swbarnes as notes, you are running a very grave risk.
Kmbboots seems to be saying that she already has a system to determine if something is good or not. If someone tells her God wants her to do something, and that something isn't good, then she doesn't do it.
Depending on how Kmbboots defines "good" in the first place, that might be fine. But if that's the case, then God is not an entity that actually influences your life - you already have a system by which to decide what actions to take and God's approval is merely a formality. As I said, it's if you rely on God to tell you whether something is good in the first place, that you are taking a grave risk.
I'd also note that once you've accepted the existence of the afterlife, you can justify pretty much any action ever so long as you honestly believe it is God's plan. If you choose faith healing and your child dies, you can rest assured that this was all for the best, that the child is now with God and that that was the plan all along. And there is nothing anyone can tell you to prove otherwise.
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There are rules that usually give the best result, but don't always give the best result.
In real life, there are virtually no rules that always give the best result. Therefore, you should stick with the ones that are most likely to do so.
quote:The fact that it is possible to come up with instances where trusting your judgement in making beliefs will lead you to a horrible mistake does not imply that in general it is the wrong way to think.
What makes irrational thinking in general inferior to reason and evidence is that reason and evidence do a good job of catching mistakes. Irrational and religoius thinking do a terrible job at it.
Tres, you seem to be arguing that because human reason isn't perfect, that anything widly irrational can't be a worse way to think. Hence your repeated claim that one's belief that the sun will rise tomorrow is no less "faith-based" than a belief that Jesus died and was resurrected. It's just not true.
Again, this isn't my approach. But is it possible that choosing to live a faith-based life, engaging in self-deception and living according to the romance of religion is a far more attractive easy and fulfilling life than living life as an atheist? Atheists also have to engage in a whole host of self deception and distraction to find their lives fulfilling as well. Religion have whole institutions and communities for that. Isn't it just easier to be religious?
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quote:Originally posted by Armoth: If God asked me to commit an "atrocity" it wouldn't be an atrocity.
I have to admit, you are one of a very small number of theists I have seen on these boards who is willing to own up to the consequences of their beliefs and arguments, even when those consequences are unpleasant and unpopular.
Things would be much simpler if the other theists would be so straightforward.
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I could say that I know what good is because of God. Another question to ask is if the thing in question is consistent with what I have already experienced of God.
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