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Generic warning to all - keep the discussion civilized. Any further ad-hom attacks will be moderated. |
On September 29 2013 14:55 koreasilver wrote:
So to begin with, you refuse to actually define what you mean by "rationality". To be fair, sc2superfan's post is beyond reasonableness in the sense that it has no scientific content in methodological rigour.
I've been made aware of the kind of stuff you post on these forums and my suspicions are founded, so I'll try not to spend too much time here.
I don't refuse to define rationality. I use a loose definition of rationality, a common one. Most people should be familiar with the idea of rationality. It's about using sound reasoning to reach a conclusion that's based on evidence. The belief in a God occurs without evidence, and is therefore irrational. That does not make it wrong, and it doesn't mean that God doesn't exist. Rationality doesn't lead to truths, and irrationality can lead to truths (someone could just happen to be right about the earth being spherical without evidence - it would be irrational but true).
I don't know blubbdavid so I can't say what his purpose was in asking that question, but it isn't just a "cheap rhetorical question" (this deflection is just a dodge) - it's forcing you to define your terms and your methodology which you have refused to show. The recurring theme is that you continue to imply a set standard for the meaning of what reason is, how it operates, and by what standard - and by this logic you are able to say a sentence such as "The admission that their faith is not rational shows that at least they're intellectually honest". The implication is that for you "rationality" is univocal. The purpose of my Adorno, Schmitt, and Heidegger examples was to question that. Especially in the case of Schmitt, realpolitik would be nothing but absolute nonsense if you were unable to understand that the political operates under its own axioms so that even if political action was "irrational" by moral, aesthetic, and/or economic standards, it could still nevertheless be absolutely rational within its own processes. So I would ask, "What rationality? Rationality by what measure? Rationality for what purpose?". You don't offer any real explanation and simply saying that it is "obvious" and the such just doesn't cut it. It doesn't matter if we might agree completely on this point if there is no methodological rigour. Any idiot could believe in the "right things". Method is everything. Relying on truisms is nothing.
This is interesting because it's getting increasingly clear that you're a new university student (sorry if I'm wrong). I do the same thing with my students and I tell them to be sure to define their concepts to make sure we're all on the same wavelength. This is important, especially with new students, so they don't just start bullshitting their way through papers. That's why they'll preface their text by explaining what they mean with various terms, including widely understood concepts such as rationality. And yet when discussing things with people, we don't define those words unless we're trying to talk about a very specific thing.
You've drifted far, far away from reality when you start asking a man to explain his methodology on a forum, due to a perceived disconnect with a term which you should, in all likelyhood, know yourself. You would have grounds to ask for a proper definition if you had any reason to be confused about what I was saying, but I'm reading myself and they can understand what I mean if they know what people mean when they use the word "rationality". Which one of my claim is so outlandish that it needs a methodology?
Now if I understand correctly, you're asking me to define how I come to the conclusion that belief in God is irrational. When I made this affirmation, I didn't intend to make it look like a truism but I'll admit that it seems self evident to me. It's also evident to the Christians I know who admit completely that their religion is about faith. You have to make a leap of faith to believe in something which cannot be proved by the scientific method or any rigid method of acquiring evidence. Why believe in the Bible? You have to have faith. It doesn't make you wrong, but it certainly makes you irrational (for that matter specifically) by any reasonable definition of what rationality is. I want to stress that "irrational" is not an insult. I'm irrational all the time, and you're irrational when you try to force me to elaborate a methodology to talk about rationality.
So here's a point where you just don't understand the point farvacola is trying to make. The first main problem, which is very common in the West, is this understanding of religion as something that is of its own category that can be viewed apart from the rest of society. This is something that you do constantly by abstracting "religion" as having its own kind of pure agency and autonomy in reality. This is a Protestant ideological import where there is a secular/religious divide in society and the individual thus "religion" can be viewed as something private, personal, and a privation of the secular and the "rational". This becomes all the more apparent when anthropological studies show that the concept of what "religion" is very, very different in cultures that are otherwise to the Western, Christian, Eurocentric world, but I digress. You cleanly separate "ideologies" from "religions" without much explanation. What makes "religion" so structurally different from "ideologies" that it isn't one? God knows.
You say I don't understand but I understand perfectly every setting of what's being said here. The issue I have is that you're both wrong about this and the reason for it is very simple. You're trying to say that religion is indissociable from the society it inhabits, which is true. The part where your argument falls apart is that, there's nothing that prevents us from talking about specific parts of society.
Everything about social sciences, from language to form of government, is indissociable from the rest of society. And yet papers are written, largely in a vacuum, about languages and dialects and forms of governments and transitions or consolidation of certain forms of governments toward others. Everything is part of a larger system and everything is affected by every other part of the system. We're aware of this. Knowing this, we can SELECT the pieces of the system that we want to study. It doesn't mean that we're ignoring the interractions between the different parts of the system. It doesn't imply that religion or religions are autonomous and separate from society. This is true of every social question ever - they have roots that go EXTREMELY far. It doesn't mean don't ask those questions.
by what conceptual method do you show that religion in itself is inherently problematic?
I made no such comment, and if I did it would be personal belief which is not illegal.
Nevermind the fact that you still haven't shown how "religion" is structurally different from "ideologies" as a whole, the only thing you've shown with this entire post is that religion can influence people in good and bad ways. There is no method here. You say this as if there is something that cannot be abused.
I have openly said that religion are akin to ideologies, I don't know why I would want to prove otherwise. You've clearly shown that you don't understand what I'm saying
In the last two quotes you have assumed
1- That I said religion is inherently problematic. I didn't say that, nor would I be able to prove it. And any method to try to prove it would have to be extremely arbitrary.
2- I don't think religions are particularly different from ideologies, I don't know why you demand of me that I prove something which I don't believe to be true. That said, even though they may not be hugely "structurally" different, it's still possible to focus on religions, which are different in some ways, otherwise we wouldn't have two different terms.
You've been relying pretty much entirely on implied truisms that beg the question. Nowhere have you shown exactly how "religion" is separate from "ideology" or even the rest of society, so the only way you could possibly say that carrying on the discourse to see the context of where religion is situated in is "stalling discussion"
You're now accusing of stalling but the last part of my post showed one thing... you've been arguing with a strawman.
And as a footnote, lets all remember how pathetic it is to accuse another of being "pretentious" or a "pseudo-intellectual" - this isn't an argument; it's just a weak false-humility. If you can't read and if you aren't familiar with an area of study, then perhaps defer yourself? Imagine how comical it would be if the author of that "progressive faith" blog went up to an evolutionary biologist and just said "Nah, all this scientific jargon - it's just pretentious, I can't understand it. You're a pseudo-intellectual."
You are pretentious, you are a pseudo-intellectual, and you are a joke and I'll also add that you're a hypocrite, having insulted my intelligence countless times despite the fact that all you've done is dropping garbage. You criticize me, you call me "pathetic" for my little attacks at you, after having tried to diminish me with your cheap fucking one liner and philosophers that you keep in your pocket because you can't have thoughts of your own.
You misunderstood what I said, you've made assumptions, and you've distorted what I said, perhaps maliciously. And you don't seem to know what humility means...
NEVER FORGET, this is the kind of person you are. This isn't an argument either:
On September 29 2013 07:21 koreasilver wrote:
posts like Djzapz in religion threads wouldn't exist if everyone read Nietzsche even just once.
In conclusion, I want to say that the youtube video posted by omnic does justice to this situation. You're that guy who's trying to impress by citing other people because you can't have a thought of your own, and you try to make other people look dumb with your "jargon" (actually just simple words that you don't even know how to use). At best, you fool uneducated people.
And I'm not just gratuitously trying to insult you. You're the one who went at me by cheaply dropping Nietzsche name. Your behavior is shameful as fuck.
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On September 27 2013 13:00 Qwyn wrote:
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You wouldn't even be writing this blog. You wouldn't believe in atheism. A stronger, more valid belief which is closer to neutrality would be to believe in everything. But how can you do that? It's too hard for a mortal mind to comprehend. So we pick sides. Because we are fundamentally irrational beings.
I liked this. It was similar to venting. Good job OP. We both vented today.
You don't "believe in atheism" (or you can, but it makes as much sense as believing in a deity). You don't believe, that's what being atheist means.
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On September 30 2013 00:34 Djzapz wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On September 29 2013 14:55 koreasilver wrote:
So to begin with, you refuse to actually define what you mean by "rationality". To be fair, sc2superfan's post is beyond reasonableness in the sense that it has no scientific content in methodological rigour. I've been made aware of the kind of stuff you post on these forums and my suspicions are founded, so I'll try not to spend too much time here. I don't refuse to define rationality. I use a loose definition of rationality, a common one. Most people should be familiar with the idea of rationality. It's about using sound reasoning to reach a conclusion that's based on evidence. The belief in a God occurs without evidence, and is therefore irrational. That does not make it wrong, and it doesn't mean that God doesn't exist. Rationality doesn't lead to truths, and irrationality can lead to truths (someone could just happen to be right about the earth being spherical without evidence - it would be irrational but true). I don't know blubbdavid so I can't say what his purpose was in asking that question, but it isn't just a "cheap rhetorical question" (this deflection is just a dodge) - it's forcing you to define your terms and your methodology which you have refused to show. The recurring theme is that you continue to imply a set standard for the meaning of what reason is, how it operates, and by what standard - and by this logic you are able to say a sentence such as "The admission that their faith is not rational shows that at least they're intellectually honest". The implication is that for you "rationality" is univocal. The purpose of my Adorno, Schmitt, and Heidegger examples was to question that. Especially in the case of Schmitt, realpolitik would be nothing but absolute nonsense if you were unable to understand that the political operates under its own axioms so that even if political action was "irrational" by moral, aesthetic, and/or economic standards, it could still nevertheless be absolutely rational within its own processes. So I would ask, "What rationality? Rationality by what measure? Rationality for what purpose?". You don't offer any real explanation and simply saying that it is "obvious" and the such just doesn't cut it. It doesn't matter if we might agree completely on this point if there is no methodological rigour. Any idiot could believe in the "right things". Method is everything. Relying on truisms is nothing. This is interesting because it's getting increasingly clear that you're a new university student (sorry if I'm wrong). I do the same thing with my students and I tell them to be sure to define their concepts to make sure we're all on the same wavelength. This is important, especially with new students, so they don't just start bullshitting their way through papers. That's why they'll preface their text by explaining what they mean with various terms, including widely understood concepts such as rationality. And yet when discussing things with people, we don't define those words unless we're trying to talk about a very specific thing. You've drifted far, far away from reality when you start asking a man to explain his methodology on a forum, due to a perceived disconnect with a term which you should, in all likelyhood, know yourself. You would have grounds to ask for a proper definition if you had any reason to be confused about what I was saying, but I'm reading myself and they can understand what I mean if they know what people mean when they use the word "rationality". Which one of my claim is so outlandish that it needs a methodology? Now if I understand correctly, you're asking me to define how I come to the conclusion that belief in God is irrational. When I made this affirmation, I didn't intend to make it look like a truism but I'll admit that it seems self evident to me. It's also evident to the Christians I know who admit completely that their religion is about faith. You have to make a leap of faith to believe in something which cannot be proved by the scientific method or any rigid method of acquiring evidence. Why believe in the Bible? You have to have faith. It doesn't make you wrong, but it certainly makes you irrational (for that matter specifically) by any reasonable definition of what rationality is. I want to stress that "irrational" is not an insult. I'm irrational all the time, and you're irrational when you try to force me to elaborate a methodology to talk about rationality. So here's a point where you just don't understand the point farvacola is trying to make. The first main problem, which is very common in the West, is this understanding of religion as something that is of its own category that can be viewed apart from the rest of society. This is something that you do constantly by abstracting "religion" as having its own kind of pure agency and autonomy in reality. This is a Protestant ideological import where there is a secular/religious divide in society and the individual thus "religion" can be viewed as something private, personal, and a privation of the secular and the "rational". This becomes all the more apparent when anthropological studies show that the concept of what "religion" is very, very different in cultures that are otherwise to the Western, Christian, Eurocentric world, but I digress. You cleanly separate "ideologies" from "religions" without much explanation. What makes "religion" so structurally different from "ideologies" that it isn't one? God knows. You say I don't understand but I understand perfectly every setting of what's being said here. The issue I have is that you're both wrong about this and the reason for it is very simple. You're trying to say that religion is indissociable from the society it inhabits, which is true. The part where your argument falls apart is that, there's nothing that prevents us from talking about specific parts of society. Everything about social sciences, from language to form of government, is indissociable from the rest of society. And yet papers are written, largely in a vacuum, about languages and dialects and forms of governments and transitions or consolidation of certain forms of governments toward others. Everything is part of a larger system and everything is affected by every other part of the system. We're aware of this. Knowing this, we can SELECT the pieces of the system that we want to study. It doesn't mean that we're ignoring the interractions between the different parts of the system. It doesn't imply that religion or religions are autonomous and separate from society. This is true of every social question ever - they have roots that go EXTREMELY far. It doesn't mean don't ask those questions. by what conceptual method do you show that religion in itself is inherently problematic? I made no such comment, and if I did it would be personal belief which is not illegal. Nevermind the fact that you still haven't shown how "religion" is structurally different from "ideologies" as a whole, the only thing you've shown with this entire post is that religion can influence people in good and bad ways. There is no method here. You say this as if there is something that cannot be abused. I have openly said that religion are akin to ideologies, I don't know why I would want to prove otherwise. You've clearly shown that you don't understand what I'm saying In the last two quotes you have assumed 1- That I said religion is inherently problematic. I didn't say that, nor would I be able to prove it. And any method to try to prove it would have to be extremely arbitrary. 2- I don't think religions are particularly different from ideologies, I don't know why you demand of me that I prove something which I don't believe to be true. That said, even though they may not be hugely "structurally" different, it's still possible to focus on religions, which are different in some ways, otherwise we wouldn't have two different terms. You've been relying pretty much entirely on implied truisms that beg the question. Nowhere have you shown exactly how "religion" is separate from "ideology" or even the rest of society, so the only way you could possibly say that carrying on the discourse to see the context of where religion is situated in is "stalling discussion" You're now accusing of stalling but the last part of my post showed one thing... you've been arguing with a strawman. And as a footnote, lets all remember how pathetic it is to accuse another of being "pretentious" or a "pseudo-intellectual" - this isn't an argument; it's just a weak false-humility. If you can't read and if you aren't familiar with an area of study, then perhaps defer yourself? Imagine how comical it would be if the author of that "progressive faith" blog went up to an evolutionary biologist and just said "Nah, all this scientific jargon - it's just pretentious, I can't understand it. You're a pseudo-intellectual." You are pretentious, you are a pseudo-intellectual, and you are a joke and I'll also add that you're a hypocrite, having insulted my intelligence countless times despite the fact that all you've done is dropping garbage. You criticize me, you call me "pathetic" for my little attacks at you, after having tried to diminish me with your cheap fucking one liner and philosophers that you keep in your pocket because you can't have thoughts of your own. You misunderstood what I said, you've made assumptions, and you've distorted what I said, perhaps maliciously. And you don't seem to know what humility means... NEVER FORGET, this is the kind of person you are. This isn't an argument either: On September 29 2013 07:21 koreasilver wrote:
posts like Djzapz in religion threads wouldn't exist if everyone read Nietzsche even just once. In conclusion, I want to say that the youtube video posted by omnic does justice to this situation. You're that guy who's trying to impress by citing other people because you can't have a thought of your own, and you try to make other people look dumb with your "jargon" (actually just simple words that you don't even know how to use). At best, you fool uneducated people. And I'm not just gratuitously trying to insult you. You're the one who went at me by cheaply dropping Nietzsche name. Your behavior is shameful as fuck.
Let's put aside the finger of shame and pretentiousness for a moment. As I previously asked, what does your suggested line of inquiry yield in terms of insight? It is abundantly clear to most with a head for this sort of thing that religious thinking can indeed bring about some very negative attitudes. What now? What does saying this get us? The essence of my and koreasilver's posts is that there is no meaningful segue here that does not address the possibility that religion is, in and of itself, not really the culprit here. I mean, come on, you are getting incredibly huffy while defending the sanctity of a discussion begun by "I'm afraid of religious people, and I've realised I'm getting more afraid, untrusting and skeptical of them as time goes by. " If anything, this thread is full of evidence that regarding religion as a culprit has already brought a number of people beyond the pale of reasonable consideration, so when myself and others come in and say, "Hold on guys, this might not be the right way to think of things.", to immediately take offense on your part seems incredibly silly and rather suspicious. Are you harboring some sort of fear of religious people you want to talk about or something, or do you legitimately think that that is a good starting place for a discussion?
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Imagine thinking there is "thoughts of one's own" - this is just textbook liberalism that actually thinks you can think in a purely abstract way that is free from context. You might as well return to a Cartesian transcendentalism and say that it's actually defendable because that's pretty much what you're saying. How in the world you are even able to say something like that as someone who does social science is beyond me given that such methodologies are comically outdated and would be laughed at by any serious scholar of the social sciences today. The fact that you're even in a position to teach or guide students is an embarrassment to the disciplines that fall under our category. And if we're going to resort to dick waving, I'm a graduate student at one of the largest religious studies departments in North America (it's a secular department) that is the largest department in the university's social sciences. Your posts are just beyond comical because absolutely nowhere have you shown at all that you have any real awareness of recent scholarship on this topic. It's just astonishing how you could write so much empty nonsense with the pretense of holding the discourse sacred when you don't even know the scholarship. And you're the one that's teaching new students? That's just desperate.
I use a loose definition of rationality, a common one. Most people should be familiar with the idea of rationality.
You truly are a rigorous, enlightened man. What a waste of time.
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On September 30 2013 00:45 3772 wrote:
You don't "believe in atheism" (or you can, but it makes as much sense as believing in a deity). You don't believe, that's what being atheist means.
If you're an atheist, you have a strong belief in the non-existence of god-like beings. This can make sense or not, depending on why you believe that. If instead you refuse to form a strong belief on that matter, you're an agnostic.
I don't know what Rekrul means by "people who believe in nothing", but having fear of those people only makes sense if you're talking about nihilists, and I don't think I've ever met anyone who is a real nihilist.
On September 30 2013 00:34 Djzapz wrote:
I don't refuse to define rationality. I use a loose definition of rationality, a common one. Most people should be familiar with the idea of rationality. It's about using sound reasoning to reach a conclusion that's based on evidence. The belief in a God occurs without evidence, and is therefore irrational. That does not make it wrong, and it doesn't mean that God doesn't exist. Rationality doesn't lead to truths, and irrationality can lead to truths (someone could just happen to be right about the earth being spherical without evidence - it would be irrational but true).
Seems like you're talking about epistemic rationality, which is the the common definition as used by pretty much anyone except those who only use the word "rationality" in sentences like "rationality is arbitrary and cannot be defined". This definition hinges on the definition of evidence, as religious people of course see e.g. religious scriptures as evidence for their belief in gods or reincarnation or whatever. The important word here is Bayesian evidence, which, in simplified terms, is any observation that has a different likelihood depending on whether the hypothesis for which it is evidence is true.
Religious scriptures are very, very weak Bayesian evidence, as there are tons of them that all reject each other. So if you believe in a god because of a religious scripture or because other people told you about their close personal relationship with that god or whatever, you're not being rational.
Now can we please put the issue of rationality to rest...
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Baltimore, USA22247 Posts
Generic warning to all - keep the discussion civilized. Any further ad-hom attacks will be moderated.
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On September 30 2013 03:17 koreasilver wrote:
You truly are a rigorous, enlightened man. What a waste of time.
You dropped a one liner, and then you continued to ask for methodology behind an informal discussion, and tried to act like I really badly need to define rationality in order to proceed with this informal discussion. And when I gave you a perfectly fair explanation of what I meant by "rationality", you mocked me, again because you want a straight definition rather than a practical and workable explanation.
You artificially limit this discussion to your understanding of how to write a cheap 1st-year undergrad philosophy essay. (I don't mean this as an attack on your person, it's a legitimate observation and I believe it to be strikingly accurate)
How in the world you are even able to say something like that as someone who does social science is beyond me given that such methodologies are comically outdated and would be laughed at by any serious scholar of the social sciences today. The fact that you're even in a position to teach or guide students is an embarrassment to the disciplines that fall under our category. And if we're going to resort to dick waving, I'm a graduate student at one of the largest religious studies departments in North America (it's a secular department) that is the largest department in the university's social sciences. Your posts are just beyond comical because absolutely nowhere have you shown at all that you have any real awareness of recent scholarship on this topic. It's just astonishing how you could write so much empty nonsense with the pretense of holding the discourse sacred when you don't even know the scholarship. And you're the one that's teaching new students? That's just desperate.
If I were you, I would at least try to correct the part where you were wrong about things I said instead of just dropping your credentials and trying to insult my intelligence for the 6th of 7th time in complete despair.
Feel free to contact McGill and tell them not to give me my masters degree, and you can also contact UQAM where I teach so I'll lose my job which I'm too dumb to have  .
On September 30 2013 02:49 farvacola wrote:Show nested quote +On September 30 2013 00:34 Djzapz wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On September 29 2013 14:55 koreasilver wrote:
So to begin with, you refuse to actually define what you mean by "rationality". To be fair, sc2superfan's post is beyond reasonableness in the sense that it has no scientific content in methodological rigour. I've been made aware of the kind of stuff you post on these forums and my suspicions are founded, so I'll try not to spend too much time here. I don't refuse to define rationality. I use a loose definition of rationality, a common one. Most people should be familiar with the idea of rationality. It's about using sound reasoning to reach a conclusion that's based on evidence. The belief in a God occurs without evidence, and is therefore irrational. That does not make it wrong, and it doesn't mean that God doesn't exist. Rationality doesn't lead to truths, and irrationality can lead to truths (someone could just happen to be right about the earth being spherical without evidence - it would be irrational but true). I don't know blubbdavid so I can't say what his purpose was in asking that question, but it isn't just a "cheap rhetorical question" (this deflection is just a dodge) - it's forcing you to define your terms and your methodology which you have refused to show. The recurring theme is that you continue to imply a set standard for the meaning of what reason is, how it operates, and by what standard - and by this logic you are able to say a sentence such as "The admission that their faith is not rational shows that at least they're intellectually honest". The implication is that for you "rationality" is univocal. The purpose of my Adorno, Schmitt, and Heidegger examples was to question that. Especially in the case of Schmitt, realpolitik would be nothing but absolute nonsense if you were unable to understand that the political operates under its own axioms so that even if political action was "irrational" by moral, aesthetic, and/or economic standards, it could still nevertheless be absolutely rational within its own processes. So I would ask, "What rationality? Rationality by what measure? Rationality for what purpose?". You don't offer any real explanation and simply saying that it is "obvious" and the such just doesn't cut it. It doesn't matter if we might agree completely on this point if there is no methodological rigour. Any idiot could believe in the "right things". Method is everything. Relying on truisms is nothing. This is interesting because it's getting increasingly clear that you're a new university student (sorry if I'm wrong). I do the same thing with my students and I tell them to be sure to define their concepts to make sure we're all on the same wavelength. This is important, especially with new students, so they don't just start bullshitting their way through papers. That's why they'll preface their text by explaining what they mean with various terms, including widely understood concepts such as rationality. And yet when discussing things with people, we don't define those words unless we're trying to talk about a very specific thing. You've drifted far, far away from reality when you start asking a man to explain his methodology on a forum, due to a perceived disconnect with a term which you should, in all likelyhood, know yourself. You would have grounds to ask for a proper definition if you had any reason to be confused about what I was saying, but I'm reading myself and they can understand what I mean if they know what people mean when they use the word "rationality". Which one of my claim is so outlandish that it needs a methodology? Now if I understand correctly, you're asking me to define how I come to the conclusion that belief in God is irrational. When I made this affirmation, I didn't intend to make it look like a truism but I'll admit that it seems self evident to me. It's also evident to the Christians I know who admit completely that their religion is about faith. You have to make a leap of faith to believe in something which cannot be proved by the scientific method or any rigid method of acquiring evidence. Why believe in the Bible? You have to have faith. It doesn't make you wrong, but it certainly makes you irrational (for that matter specifically) by any reasonable definition of what rationality is. I want to stress that "irrational" is not an insult. I'm irrational all the time, and you're irrational when you try to force me to elaborate a methodology to talk about rationality. So here's a point where you just don't understand the point farvacola is trying to make. The first main problem, which is very common in the West, is this understanding of religion as something that is of its own category that can be viewed apart from the rest of society. This is something that you do constantly by abstracting "religion" as having its own kind of pure agency and autonomy in reality. This is a Protestant ideological import where there is a secular/religious divide in society and the individual thus "religion" can be viewed as something private, personal, and a privation of the secular and the "rational". This becomes all the more apparent when anthropological studies show that the concept of what "religion" is very, very different in cultures that are otherwise to the Western, Christian, Eurocentric world, but I digress. You cleanly separate "ideologies" from "religions" without much explanation. What makes "religion" so structurally different from "ideologies" that it isn't one? God knows. You say I don't understand but I understand perfectly every setting of what's being said here. The issue I have is that you're both wrong about this and the reason for it is very simple. You're trying to say that religion is indissociable from the society it inhabits, which is true. The part where your argument falls apart is that, there's nothing that prevents us from talking about specific parts of society. Everything about social sciences, from language to form of government, is indissociable from the rest of society. And yet papers are written, largely in a vacuum, about languages and dialects and forms of governments and transitions or consolidation of certain forms of governments toward others. Everything is part of a larger system and everything is affected by every other part of the system. We're aware of this. Knowing this, we can SELECT the pieces of the system that we want to study. It doesn't mean that we're ignoring the interractions between the different parts of the system. It doesn't imply that religion or religions are autonomous and separate from society. This is true of every social question ever - they have roots that go EXTREMELY far. It doesn't mean don't ask those questions. by what conceptual method do you show that religion in itself is inherently problematic? I made no such comment, and if I did it would be personal belief which is not illegal. Nevermind the fact that you still haven't shown how "religion" is structurally different from "ideologies" as a whole, the only thing you've shown with this entire post is that religion can influence people in good and bad ways. There is no method here. You say this as if there is something that cannot be abused. I have openly said that religion are akin to ideologies, I don't know why I would want to prove otherwise. You've clearly shown that you don't understand what I'm saying In the last two quotes you have assumed 1- That I said religion is inherently problematic. I didn't say that, nor would I be able to prove it. And any method to try to prove it would have to be extremely arbitrary. 2- I don't think religions are particularly different from ideologies, I don't know why you demand of me that I prove something which I don't believe to be true. That said, even though they may not be hugely "structurally" different, it's still possible to focus on religions, which are different in some ways, otherwise we wouldn't have two different terms. You've been relying pretty much entirely on implied truisms that beg the question. Nowhere have you shown exactly how "religion" is separate from "ideology" or even the rest of society, so the only way you could possibly say that carrying on the discourse to see the context of where religion is situated in is "stalling discussion" You're now accusing of stalling but the last part of my post showed one thing... you've been arguing with a strawman. And as a footnote, lets all remember how pathetic it is to accuse another of being "pretentious" or a "pseudo-intellectual" - this isn't an argument; it's just a weak false-humility. If you can't read and if you aren't familiar with an area of study, then perhaps defer yourself? Imagine how comical it would be if the author of that "progressive faith" blog went up to an evolutionary biologist and just said "Nah, all this scientific jargon - it's just pretentious, I can't understand it. You're a pseudo-intellectual." You are pretentious, you are a pseudo-intellectual, and you are a joke and I'll also add that you're a hypocrite, having insulted my intelligence countless times despite the fact that all you've done is dropping garbage. You criticize me, you call me "pathetic" for my little attacks at you, after having tried to diminish me with your cheap fucking one liner and philosophers that you keep in your pocket because you can't have thoughts of your own. You misunderstood what I said, you've made assumptions, and you've distorted what I said, perhaps maliciously. And you don't seem to know what humility means... NEVER FORGET, this is the kind of person you are. This isn't an argument either: On September 29 2013 07:21 koreasilver wrote:
posts like Djzapz in religion threads wouldn't exist if everyone read Nietzsche even just once. In conclusion, I want to say that the youtube video posted by omnic does justice to this situation. You're that guy who's trying to impress by citing other people because you can't have a thought of your own, and you try to make other people look dumb with your "jargon" (actually just simple words that you don't even know how to use). At best, you fool uneducated people. And I'm not just gratuitously trying to insult you. You're the one who went at me by cheaply dropping Nietzsche name. Your behavior is shameful as fuck. Let's put aside the finger of shame and pretentiousness for a moment. As I previously asked, what does your suggested line of inquiry yield in terms of insight? It is abundantly clear to most with a head for this sort of thing that religious thinking can indeed bring about some very negative attitudes. What now? What does saying this get us? The essence of my and koreasilver's posts is that there is no meaningful segue here that does not address the possibility that religion is, in and of itself, not really the culprit here. I mean, come on, you are getting incredibly huffy while defending the sanctity of a discussion begun by "I'm afraid of religious people, and I've realised I'm getting more afraid, untrusting and skeptical of them as time goes by. " If anything, this thread is full of evidence that regarding religion as a culprit has already brought a number of people beyond the pale of reasonable consideration, so when myself and others come in and say, " Hold on guys, this might not be the right way to think of things.", to immediately take offense on your part seems incredibly silly and rather suspicious. Are you harboring some sort of fear of religious people you want to talk about or something, or do you legitimately think that that is a good starting place for a discussion?
Well see when you put it that way (in bold), it doesn't sound unreasonable to me. You bring up a question. I would admit that perhaps there are better angles to explore this question. My issue stems from the fact that you were not merely suggesting looking at this from another angle. Rather, you outright dismissed the direct approach by calling it a red herring and suggested that a more general approach would be better.
Now I understand your concerns and I even admitted that, as with all things, taking a step back and looking at the big picture can always help because it allows to process more information and more tangents. However, none of these things can serve to dismiss the topic in its infancy because this is true, like I said, with every topic ever. Everything in life is incredibly complex so you can always take a more general approach, but you have to start somewhere.
I also understand that the OP's approach makes the direct look at religion as a source of "evils" look bad, because clearly he's misguided. However, his irrational (scary word here) outlook does not mean that the approach of focusing on religion is fundamentally flawed. Certainly, we could look at religion, ideologies, beliefs more generally - but where does it stop? We could also look into psychology, branches of psychology, the various ways in which our brains can be influenced through interaction with other people or groups of people... We can stretch it out forever.
My contention is that for the sake of a thread, it's perfectly fine to limit the topic to religion and the ways religion affects the actions of people. And certainly it's fine if it bleeds out of that frame because it's always interesting to also talk about why ideologies are similar in many ways. But I see no convincing reason to pull back the frame solely because there are examples of people misusing it.
To summarize, your position can be defended and I admit that it has its virtues and serious advantages, but at the same time if you broaden the scope too much, the topic becomes unworkable for a casual discussion between us forumgoers. My issue comes from the outright dismissal of the religion-focused approach, which is by no means inherently wrong.
On September 30 2013 03:27 And G wrote:Seems like you're talking about epistemic rationality, which is the the common definition as used by pretty much anyone except those who only use the word "rationality" in sentences like "rationality is arbitrary and cannot be defined". This definition hinges on the definition of evidence, as religious people of course see e.g. religious scriptures as evidence for their belief in gods or reincarnation or whatever. The important word here is Bayesian evidence, which, in simplified terms, is any observation that has a different likelihood depending on whether the hypothesis for which it is evidence is true. Religious scriptures are very, very weak Bayesian evidence, as there are tons of them that all reject each other. So if you believe in a god because of a religious scripture or because other people told you about their close personal relationship with that god or whatever, you're not being rational. Now can we please put the issue of rationality to rest...
That does the trick for me.
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If anything, this thread is full of evidence that regarding religion as a culprit has already brought a number of people beyond the pale of reasonable consideration
Actually, this thread would profit from a re-reading the parable of the Pharisee and the publican:
Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican.
The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican.
I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.
And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.
I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for every one that exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.
The pharisee is of course our very own rationalists. The irony of the parable is of course the pharisee prays, and performs all the ritualistic acts of piety, but he does not have a connection to God; his piety is egocentric. He sanctifies himself and makes himself righteous. Because he is only capable of looking into himself, he cannot even see himself, not to mention everything else of which he makes himself the supreme judge. In the same vein, our rationalists have but a superficial relationship to the truth of which they claim to be the servants: they cannot see themselves in the light of the truth, they can only see the truth in the light of themselves.
The secular mind has lost something significant in recoiling from the Platonic hierarchy of being. On this forum, everyone is his own little God, letting all the lesser Gods know what stultifying, irrational beings they are. The truth about the paradoxial nature of man (to teach he must be a learner, to be merciful he must beg forgiveness, to be rich he must be poor) which is hinted at throughout the gospels is something that is lost to our age.
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On September 30 2013 20:17 MoltkeWarding wrote:
The secular mind has lost something significant in recoiling from the Platonic hierarchy of being. On this forum, everyone is his own little God, letting all the lesser Gods know what stultifying, irrational beings they are. The truth about the paradoxial nature of man (to teach he must be a learner, to be merciful he must beg forgiveness, to be rich he must be poor) which is hinted at throughout the gospels is something that is lost to our age.
I understand what you're saying although I don't agree that the secular mind has 'lost' anything, because I don't think people previously had anything desirable in that respect, but wouldn't you agree that whatever it is you're talking about would also be lost by many of the 'religious' people who now believe in God but don't actually do anything about it? Because it seems to me like many of the religious people around me, most of whom are Catholics, now have this kind of belief in God in the back of their mind sometimes, but they otherwise demand the same level of evidence for everything else. They live largely like myself, using morals that they've derived from their surroundings - some of which have roots in their religion, others have roots in the greatness of drinking and fucking and other unholy business.
Also, I'm not super familiar with the Plantonic hierarchy of being, but doesn't that thing say essentially nobility is better than simple plebs and whatnot? I've read The Republic some 3-4 years ago and I've got to say that there's a lot of self-love in there
Anyway maybe some of the essence of your post was lost on me, it seemed a little preachy and haughty. In a sense it's a bit sad when you really think about it... most atheists look down on the religious, praising 'our' 'superior' ability to be rational and smart, and religious people will look down on atheists, calling them immoral beasts who are somehow lesser humans because they're missing that great piece of humanity that is the ability to have faith or something.
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That many Christians treat God like a golden idol whom they only bring out of the closet at opportune times merely illustrates the point: it doesn't matter what you call yourself or what you say you believe, and it doesn't even matter what you do, except in a truthful relation to the interior essence of that thing. Here we see the difference between the worship of God, and the instrumentalisation of God. The latter will feed the mouth of famine, and cure the blight of disease, and to the extent that God can help with these noble tasks, one's relationship to him becomes a secondary virtue.
Yet, however many he will save by his actions, he still cannot save himself, and therefore cannot ultimately save anyone else: man cannot improve the world beyond his own limitations, and he cannot improve beyond his own limitations because he is himself the standard by which he measures everything (and everyone) else. The secular man can only stoop down, he cannot rise up. He may stoop down to share his virtue in so many ways: he may be the champagne socialist who is calling for the redistribution of property, he may be the sociology professor expounding a greater consciousness of white guilt, yet ultimately what is he doing, apart from playing the pharisee? Without becoming a better man himself, his call to others to become better men produces a hollow ring.*
The path of the religious man is not there to put him in a certain place, it is there to show him where he must go. Some people acknowledge the path but don't walk very far along it, what of it?
*There is presently a debate going on in the General Forum over the issue of Public masturbation, yet I cannot believe that a majority has voted against such acts of gratuitous self-satisfaction in public, since most people here are addicts of moral/intellectual masturbation: an act of egocentric ecstasy which leaves you feeling futile and depleted as soon as you've hit the post button.
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Can we please get from the general topic of religion back to "are religious people scary"? And I don't quite understand why religious people are even posting here, since obviously few people would agree with the notion that a group they willingly identify with is scary.
I mean, if you want to know whether Koreans/nazis/clowns/vegetarians/anarchists are scary, you don't ask Koreans/nazis/clowns/vegetarians/anarchists, right? Or am I missing something here?
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On September 27 2013 12:11 hypercube wrote:
Not sure why you think leaders are religious. The pursuit of power is a highly competitive field. Arguably the most competitve one. I am sure that anyone who succeeds is extremely rational.
Other than that, most people defer to some authority over observation and rational analysis. And even those who claim to be rational in principle often fall short in practice. Religion is just one example and it might not even be the most common one by now.
lol at politics beeing competitive
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On October 01 2013 00:27 And G wrote:
Can we please get from the general topic of religion back to "are religious people scary"? And I don't quite understand why religious people are even posting here, since obviously few people would agree with the notion that a group they willingly identify with is scary.
I mean, if you want to know whether Koreans/nazis/clowns/vegetarians/anarchists are scary, you don't ask Koreans/nazis/clowns/vegetarians/anarchists, right? Or am I missing something here?
That's exactly what you should do.
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Politics is competitive, but the most important attributes are charisma, wealth, social skills, and class.
On October 01 2013 01:35 farvacola wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2013 00:27 And G wrote:
Can we please get from the general topic of religion back to "are religious people scary"? And I don't quite understand why religious people are even posting here, since obviously few people would agree with the notion that a group they willingly identify with is scary.
I mean, if you want to know whether Koreans/nazis/clowns/vegetarians/anarchists are scary, you don't ask Koreans/nazis/clowns/vegetarians/anarchists, right? Or am I missing something here? That's exactly what you should do.
Already did, but some people keep going off on tangents, and it's difficult having a discussion alone.
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On October 01 2013 00:06 MoltkeWarding wrote:
Yet, however many he will save by his actions, he still cannot save himself, and therefore cannot ultimately save anyone else: man cannot improve the world beyond his own limitations, and he cannot improve beyond his own limitations because he is himself the standard by which he measures everything (and everyone) else. The secular man can only stoop down, he cannot rise up. He may stoop down to share his virtue in so many ways: he may be the champagne socialist who is calling for the redistribution of property, he may be the sociology professor expounding a greater consciousness of white guilt, yet ultimately what is he doing, apart from playing the pharisee? Without becoming a better man himself, his call to others to become better men produces a hollow ring.*
The path of the religious man is not there to put him in a certain place, it is there to show him where he must go. Some people acknowledge the path but don't walk very far along it, what of it?
I still don't understand by what standards you determine that only religious people have something more than that, though. I believe that none of us, religious or otherwise, can improve the world beyond our own limitations. There are people who improve the world in their own ways - selfishly or selflessly.
Religious people are bound by the same kind of limitations as the secular people. They can use whatever tools they have at their disposal to improve the world, and they can try to 'save' other people according to the settings of their religion... But are they really 'rising' above me?
They may believe that their 'spiritual' contributions are more relevant than my worldly contributions, but why would that make his better? After all, maybe they're worshiping a false idol.
My point is, you argue that secular people are missing out. I argue that hands stuck together, idling in prayer, don't contribute to anything that actually exists. A secular fellow might grab a hammer and build a school. (And a religious man could also grab a hammer and build a school). I say the only things that we know to exist, this universe, is the only one that we (for all intents and purposes) know we can affect.
You can believe otherwise, of course - but my issue is that 'holier than thou' vibe that you give off. It makes me sad that my good deeds are irrelevant to you  . It seems to me like your beliefs, that you assume to be truthful, are making you look down on a whole bunch of people.
On October 01 2013 01:47 And G wrote:
Already did, but some people keep going off on tangents, and it's difficult having a discussion alone.
Sorry
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I just got back from holiday and there are a lot interesting and amusing posts here.
On September 28 2013 01:26 blubbdavid wrote:
What's the notion of rationality?
I don't think my view of this would surprise anyone. It's a standard scientific one of hypothesis supported by observed evidence. Suggesting a hypothesis without observation or one which has an observation which critically contradicts the hypothesis is illogical. Observations are then held up to scrutiny as to their validity. It's pretty standard.
On September 29 2013 05:55 TheOneWhoKnocks wrote:
@farva We are usually polar opposites, but in this case I agree completely with your points. Another way of putting it is that religion isn't the cause of behavior such as vaccine denial, it is merely correlated with other factors which lead to such behavior, such as a lack of education.
It's an interesting idea. I don't believe it because of the hatred which is universally present in the main religions. Also, for example the catholic church actively preaches against homosexuality and the use of condoms which promotes hatred in the first and death and suffering in the second.
Anyway, this isn't really the point I was making, though I guess it is related.
On September 29 2013 06:31 bartus88 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 27 2013 10:33 deathly rat wrote:
Secondly, I fear that someone who has come to what I consider such a highly irrational conclusion as believing in a god (no matter how rational you may think it is), makes me wonder what other kind of highly irrational conclusions they may reach in the future. Oh man it really gets under my skin when people say something like this. Simply because they themselves are incapable of justifying other people's views, they deem it illogical. When it basically comes down to the fact that the person him/herself is not intelligent or educated enough to see things from a different perspective. The world would be a much better place when people would stop doing this.
Sometimes other people's views are unjustifiable, but that doesn't mean they haven't been considered.
On September 29 2013 07:46 And G wrote:
Oh dear, Nietzsche. Please let's not drag this discussion down to that level.
Indeed. If you are going to argue that each argument can have it's own logic, then soon you'll be arguing about a world which is completely irrelevant to the one in which we live. If we can discuss the content, whilst keeping it relevant to things we can actually observe then we won't devolve into you shouting "Nietzsche!" and me shouting "Dawkins!" and you shouting "Kant!" and me shouting "Russell!"
To be honest when people quote ancient philosophers, it really makes me wonder if times haven't moved on from building philosophical houses of cards. Don't we understand the world significantly better now than we did a hundred years ago?
On September 29 2013 13:38 Jaaaaasper wrote:
Boy the blog sure is euphoric. you might say op is enlightened by his own intelligence. Frankly I'm much more afraid of anyone who sees the world this black and white, because them vs us where one side is right and the other is mentally ill, has lead to some really scary shit.
I really don't think my OP was boastful. In fact I think I said it might be an unhealthy way of looking at things. So, no, like any good scientist I am open to peer review!
On September 30 2013 03:27 And G wrote:Show nested quote +On September 30 2013 00:45 3772 wrote:
You don't "believe in atheism" (or you can, but it makes as much sense as believing in a deity). You don't believe, that's what being atheist means. If you're an atheist, you have a strong belief in the non-existence of god-like beings. This can make sense or not, depending on why you believe that. If instead you refuse to form a strong belief on that matter, you're an agnostic. I don't know what Rekrul means by "people who believe in nothing", but having fear of those people only makes sense if you're talking about nihilists, and I don't think I've ever met anyone who is a real nihilist.
I think it's really an argument of semantics. Of course by the true definition of the word almost all atheists are agnostic, but we don't like this term because it is abused by religious people who say "haha! so you don't really KNOW! We do know, we have the answers, come to us all those who are looking for the truth!" It's a basic rhetorical flaw in the scientific method that it is open to this kind of purposeful manipulation of what it is. So we say atheist because we believe in God the same amount as we believe in anything else that has absolutely no evidence supporting it.
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On October 04 2013 10:51 deathly rat wrote:
Don't we understand the world significantly better now that we did a hundred years ago?
yes of course, and not at all
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If you're an atheist, you have a strong belief in the non-existence of god-like beings. This can make sense or not, depending on why you believe that. If instead you refuse to form a strong belief on that matter, you're an agnostic.
Well agnostic means you don't think something is provable either way, because of the limits of our knowledge. It's still a strong belief (that the bible is not enough proof, that the human knowledge of the world is incomplete). Unfortunately, if you're a philosopher you can be agnostic about nearly everything that isn't cogito ergo sum. Are you really another person? Well I can't possibly know that. In this way agnostic is not a particularly useful description, since it applies to so much.
Atheist on the other hand is only mildly more decisive. It's not a conviction that there's no god, it's just a belief there is no god. Not that different from believing there is not motor oil in your fridge. There's a lot of reasons to believe there's no motor oil in the fridge. It's quite reasonable. It doesn't mean you deny that it's possible, and that someone could have put a bottle of it in your fridge, but it's downright unlikely given a few assumed premises about your reality. The limit of one person's knowledge may suggest we can't know whether or not there is a bottle of motor oil in the fridge, and that's technically agnostic, but most of us don't live our lives questioning every facet of our reality. We just work within the reality that presents itself to us and decide what to believe given what's presented to us so far.
Belief in god is merely taking the aspects of your reality, maybe your whole family believing in god, the whole institutions of religions, the massive churches, etc etc. and saying these things make me think it's likely there's a god. As the world has become more globalized and information has become more accessible, and science has advanced further, that's where we gain our skepticism of these institutions. When they claim 'god did it!' but now we have a scientific answer too. When fossil records contradict the history told by the bible. When we don't get called heretics for not believing in god, and when we can easily find other people who don't believe in god either because of that freedom to admit it. Evidence keeps piling up that what we thought only God could explain now doesn't need god, and we all have access to that evidence. And that's what an atheist is. An atheist could admit that there is a limit to human knowledge and that an agnostic belief is valid, but the atheist says that perceived reality is our only way of living and interacting with the world, so in the same manner they believe other human beings exist, they don't believe god does.
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EPT
