Religion IV: Deus vult!

[Stubby]

The main difference between belief and fact is, in my view, whether something can happen regardless of beliefs.

One may believe that if I drop a coin in my office it will float away on the wings of the fae, but that will not change the fact that it will fall to the floor.

[Gears of the Beast]

Consider the following two statements of "belief":

Devon believes that humans evolved from earlier primates over 100,000 years ago.

Devon believes that humans were created less than 10,000 years ago.

These claims are clearly at odds. Since they can't both be true, Devon holds contradictory beliefs. Right?

Maybe not.

..............

I support this claim by presenting a range of empirical evidence that religious cognitive attitudes tend to lack properties characteristic of factual belief

I think that's a complete non sequitur. To say that you believe x is to simply say that you accept x is true, we can be convinced of something for good reasons or bad reasons. We know that those two beliefs are contradictory to the extent that we can know anything. The distinction isn't made in the 'type of belief' but rather how the person reached the belief. The claim is almost self refuting because under any reasonable application of the laws of logic those two positions are self evidently contradictory. If you hold two contradictory beliefs then it's a safe bet that one or both of those beliefs have been reached for bad reasons. It's not all that difficult to evaluate which beliefs are more likely to be true. The person who believes humans were created ~10,000 years ago either has poor standards of evidence/lacks critical thinking or simply doesn't care what is actually true and has become convinced because he would like it to be true - this is the case for pretty any supernatural belief I can think of. Epistemology doesn't even enter until we've started talking about what we 'know' for example, I believe there isn't a god but I make no claims that I know there isn't a god - while the same cannot be said for most theists.

[Seli]

Thanks for that Seli.

Sadly I'm not sure what distinction he's hoping to make here. Aren't credences - as defined in the paper - largely incorrect facts?

I have no idea. I would interpret them as facts that are not (necessarily) corroborated by external evidence.

[Sci-2]

The main difference between belief and fact is, in my view, whether something can happen regardless of beliefs.

One may believe that if I drop a coin in my office it will float away on the wings of the fae, but that will not change the fact that it will fall to the floor.

And to be fair, there's also the fact that modeling the coin falling on your computer is not genuinely capturing the coin, gravity, or the floor.

Yet somehow computationlists still think they are going to upload their brains into the cloud and live forever, never conceding that computation is something we attribute to reality rather than something inherent to the physical world.

Thus tying back to the religion of progress and the faith of the Singularity believer.

[Sci-2]

The Secular Religions of Progress

Economists often try to present their discipline as truly scientific — a value-neutral tool for predicting policy outcomes. But looking to history, Robert H. Nelson shows that economic science cannot be separated from its moral and even religious presuppositions.

[Ramsay Gimp]

The Secular Religions of Progress

Agree to a point. Economics can't be separated from its ethical, political, or philosophical roots, nor should it be. Marxists, Keynesians and supply-siders are all guilty of trying to sell their school as purely empirical, objective, ("scientific" in Marx's case) pursuits. Which is ironic, since Karl Marx and Milton Friedman never shied away from moral debates (I know less about Keynes).

But the author gets into some tired protectionist and environmentalist BS toward the end, which muddles his point. He says economists should take psychological wellbeing into when measuring growth, costs, etc.? But that's not what the discipline is, nor would economists be qualified to make such judgements. He started with a good point but by the end it was cliche'd "globalization is bad, trade is bad, growth is bad" stuff. Which amounts to anti-humanity IMO

Thus tying back to the religion of progress and the faith of the Singularity believer.

Sci, have you read Hyperion or it's sequel? You would love them, judging by the stuff you usually post

Without spoiling too much, the novels feature a group of AIs known as "the Core" that are independent from, but claim to support, humanity (they are actually so far beyond us that they hardly take us seriously). A faction of these AIs are working toward building the "Ultimate Intelligence," a sort of omniscient techno-God if you will. It's eventually revealed that this Ultimate Intelligence is so powerful that is has been manipulating events from the future, working toward its own creation, and fighting a cosmic struggle against another "Ultimate Intelligence" comprised of humanity's higher consciousness. Basically computer God vs. human God. This is all tied in with Jesus Christ, 18th century poets, etc.

[Galactus]

Agree to a point. Economics can't be separated from its ethical, political, or philosophical roots, nor should it be. Marxists, Keynesians and supply-siders are all guilty of trying to sell their school as purely empirical, objective, ("scientific" in Marx's case) pursuits. Which is ironic, since Karl Marx and Milton Friedman never shied away from moral debates (I know less about Keynes).

To be fair, Marx's argument was more that all science is in some sense political and a product of it's circumstances. He's very clear that scientists aren't supposed to just describe how the world "is" but create blueprints for making it better.

[Gears of the Beast]

A Pakistani woman's letter to Ben Affleck

Author says parts of it had to be censored and even then the publication took a big risk posting it - which says a lot in and of itself.

[Sci-2]

But the author gets into some tired protectionist and environmentalist BS toward the end, which muddles his point. He says economists should take psychological wellbeing into when measuring growth, costs, etc.? But that's not what the discipline is, nor would economists be qualified to make such judgements. He started with a good point but by the end it was cliche'd "globalization is bad, trade is bad, growth is bad" stuff. Which amounts to anti-humanity IMO

I'm not sure it's necessarily true economists can't take psychological well being into consideration. That's one way to interpret the concept of utility after all.

And he does not[e] that enviornmentalists don't have a clear or desirable vision for what a country's future could be.

Not sure how anti-globalization is anti-humanity, though of course the term "globalization" itself is open to varied interpretations.

Sci, have you read Hyperion or it's sequel? You would love them, judging by the stuff you usually post

Thanks for the rec. Loved Hyperion, have the sequel...somewhere but haven't finished it.

=-=-=

Two positions on religion & violence:

Richard Dawkins is wrong: Religion is not inherently violent

At this point in time — with his sweeping, unsubstantiated and historically ill-informed polemics — Dawkins has dug his own intellectual grave. Still, the question remains: How much of the planet’s history of can be laid at the feet of religion? For the vast majority of human existence, Armstrong argues, “religion” could not be separated from politics or economics or any other social institution; the idea of doing so would literally have made no sense to the members of any pre-Enlightenment culture. “Until the modern period,” Armstrong writes, “religion permeated all aspects of life, including politics and warfare, not because ambitious churchmen had ‘mixed up’ two essentially distinct activities, but because people wanted to endow everything they did with significance. Every state ideology was religious … Until the American and French Revolutions, there were no ‘secular’ societies.”

But there was power and wealth, and the way Armstrong tells it, just about every historical instance of armed conflict was rooted in both, with religion mostly serving as a legitimizing veneer or justification. In the panoramic view offered by “Fields of Blood,” faith is an undulating force, like the tide, sometimes rushing toward power and sometimes pulling away in moral horror.

Reza Aslan’s atheism problem: “Fundamentalist” atheists aren’t the issue, apologists for religions are

Now we have to stop and ponder what we are being sold here. Aslan is essentially taking a postmodernist, Derrida-esque scalpel to “scripture” and eviscerating it of objective content. This might pass muster in the college classroom these days, but what of all those ISIS warriors unschooled in French semiotic analysis who take their holy book’s admonition to do violence literally? As they rampage and behead their way through Syria and Iraq, ISIS fighters know they have the Koran on their side – a book they believe to be inerrant and immutable, the final Word of God, and not at all “malleable.” Their holy book backs up jihad, suicide attacks (“martyrdom”), beheadings, even taking captive women as sex slaves. This is not surprising; after all, the prophet Muhammad was a warrior who spread Islam by the sword in a dark, turbulent time in history. (Christianity’s propagation had, in contrast, much to do with the Roman emperor Constantine’s fourth-century conversion and subsequent decriminalization of the faith.)

Moreover, the razor-happy butchers of little girls’ clitorises and labia majora, the righteous wife-beaters, the stoners of adulterers, the shariah clerics denying women’s petitions for divorce from abusive husbands and awarding sons twice the inheritance allowed for daughters, all act with sanction from Islamic holy writ. It matters not a whit to the bloodied and battered victims of such savagery which lines from the Hadith or what verses from the Koran ordain the violence and injustice perpetrated against them, but one thing they do know: texts and belief in them have real-life consequences. And we should never forget that ISIS henchmen and executioners explicitly cite their faith in Islam as their motive. Tell that to Derrida – or Aslan.

[Gears of the Beast]

Richard Dawkins is wrong: Religion is not inherently violent

step 1. be a Salon writer

step 2. put either Dawkins or Harris in the title of your article

step 3. only quote Dawkins/Harris once, with a position that isn't even the one attributed to them in the title

step 4. repeat the same old inane argument about Tamil Tigers being secularists

step 5. make some snide remarks about how wrong these 'new militant atheists' are

step 6. profit off of your garbage clickbait intellectual pile of dogshit article

[Ramsay Gimp]

step 1. be a Salon writer

step 2. put either Dawkins or Harris in the title of your article

step 3. only quote Dawkins/Harris once, with a position that isn't even the one attributed to them in the title

step 4. repeat the same old inane argument about Tamil Tigers being secularists

step 5. make some snide remarks about how wrong these 'new militant atheists' are

step 6. profit off of your garbage clickbait intellectual pile of dogshit article

Not a huge fan of Dawkins, but this is spot-on. Then again it's Salon so I'm not sure why anyone expects differently

[Sci-2]

Not a huge fan of Dawkins, but this is spot-on. Then again it's Salon so I'm not sure why anyone expects differently

The other article I posted was from Salon as well though and it was way more anti-religion than I'd have expected. Even threw in the "religion is for the weak" canard.

[Ramsay Gimp]

The other article I posted was from Salon as well though and it was way more anti-religion than I'd have expected. Even threw in the "religion is for the weak" canard.

I just meant the way they use misleading headlines and pictures for their articles, and attack simplistic strawmen rather than their opponent's actual arguments

[Wise Fool]

So what are you arguing here? That religious intolerance is essentially a wash between Christian countries and Muslim ones? No one (least of all Gears) is claiming that Christianity is all sunshine and rainbows, or totally above oppression. But compare the state of blasphemy laws in the UK/New Zealand with any number of Muslim countries and you will see our point.

Y'know, Godwin's Law does not mean that any mention of National Socialism in an online argument is fallacious. It certainly wasn't intended to be a carte blanche excuse to avoid responding to someone's actual point, which is what you are doing here with the "Nazi-lover" line. is I'll assume you aren't actually so dumb as to think I was claiming anyone who defends Islam is a "Nazi-lover." More likely, you were just being disingenuous because you have no response to the idea that religions are ideas, and attacking ideas is not "bigotry."

Your claim that a person's beliefs have no relation to their actions is also too ridiculous to even bother with. Did you really think that through?

Your choice to compare the 'idea' of Islam and the 'idea' of National Socialism, not mine. They're clearly in the same conceptual portfolio of your ideas, namely, "bad." I mean if your point was merely to get across what an idea is, you had seemingly an infinite number of choices for examples, but focused on the KKK and Nazis. How subtle do you think this is?

I did not claim that "a person's beliefs have no relation to their actions" but that "Beliefs are often not merely separate from, but totally contradictory to, actions." Your non-refutation is noted.

This is one of the most ridiculous things you've ever said. Beliefs absolutely do inform your actions. If you believe vaccines are evil you most likely aren't going to vaccinate your children, if you believe that your god views homosexuality as immoral you probably aren't going to be all that tolerant of homosexuality. Is this not obvious to everyone? One who has beliefs that match reality is probably going to make sounder decisions than someone who has beliefs that don't match reality, this is why having deluded beliefs is undesirable while reason and logic is desirable. Moreover it's pretty easy to establish a casual relationship between the things many horrible people do and their religion. And it's painfully obvious that something like a suicide bombing pretty much necessitates a belief in paradise, their motivation and indoctrination is clear - you can simply look at what these kinds of people say and what they teach their children. Is anyone really arguing that most Islamic extremists are not in fact motivated by their religion? Such a position would require profound ignorance.

Just like RG, you favor the strawman. Apparently now I'm arguing that beliefs never inform actions, so all you need do is point out examples that contradict that and wow, I'm totally ignorant (you) and not thinking things through (RG). Except neither of you even bothered to address what I actually claimed, not that the idea of self-deception or rationalization is such a controversial claim in the first place, instead preferring to burp up a little bit of righteousness slime.

And you're not even doing that right. Suicide bombing requires belief in paradise... uh, why? Has either murder or suicide or murder-suicide been demonstrated to be correlated to "belief in paradise?" (It hasn't, by the way, and more to the point it hasn't been established such that you merit using self-congratulatory gloating bullshit phrases like "isn't this obvious to everyone?")

[Ramsay Gimp]

And you're not even doing that right. Suicide bombing requires belief in paradise... uh, why? Has either murder or suicide or murder-suicide been demonstrated to be correlated to "belief in paradise?" (It hasn't, by the way, and more to the point it hasn't been established such that you merit using self-congratulatory gloating bullshit phrases like "isn't this obvious to everyone?")

Murder-suicide? No. Suicide bombing in the Middle East? Obviously yes.

Are you claiming we don't have sufficient evidence to say Al Qaeda suicide bombers believe in paradise?

[Suttree]

step 4. repeat the same old inane argument about Tamil Tigers being secularists

Robert Pape, a professor of political science at the University Chicago and Director of the Chicago Project on Suicide Terrorism has this to say.

They're actually anti-religious. They are building the concept of martyrdom around a secular idea of individuals essentially altruistically sacrificing for the good of the local community.

You disagree I take it?

[Galactus]

Murder-suicide? No. Suicide bombing in the Middle East? Obviously yes.

Are you claiming we don't have sufficient evidence to say Al Qaeda suicide bombers believe in paradise?

Again, it's not even particularly unusual. Anarchist bomb-throwers/assassins in the 19th century, communists, nationalists, japanese kamikaze-pilots...

You don't need a belief in paradise: Just a cause you think is worth dying for. And those are dime a dozen.

[Sci-2]

Release 2.0 of the Standard Spiritualist and Occult Corpus (SSOC) Available

The work that the IAPSOP is doing to preserve these documents is incredibly important, as much of this material is in danger of disappearing as libraries and organizations disburse their collections due to funding and space constraints. Having access to this material in a digital format also allows researchers and interested individuals to discover the true depth and breath of this area of human experience which often finds itself pushed to the margins in the historical accounts provided by mainstream media.

=-=-=

The Last Twentieth-Century Book Club: Deities & Demigods

In A Secular Age, Taylor argues that while the immanent frame can “slough off the transcendent,” it does not “necessarily do so.” Rather, its assumption of human independence can be read as either “open” or “closed.” When “closed,” the frame is complete in-and-of itself. When “open,” however, the frame allows for the possibility of a transcendent reality beyond. Dungeons & Dragons, as a game, is necessarily transcended by the real world in which it is played. Within the game itself, however, aesthetics of transcendence drawn this outer world are appropriated and redeployed. Speculation about the soul becomes a matter of purchasing and absorbing the right rulebook. The power of a god in a relation to a mortal is clearly delineated; both are made part of the same human-generated and human-perpetuated system. Dungeons & Dragons is, then, in part a kind of metaphysical roller-coaster. It allows its participants to dabble in the complexities of an “open” immanent frame without ever acceding the sense of comprehensibility and control so strongly evidenced by a closed one.

[Ramsay Gimp]

Again, it's not even particularly unusual. Anarchist bomb-throwers/assassins in the 19th century, communists, nationalists, japanese kamikaze-pilots...

You don't need a belief in paradise: Just a cause you think is worth dying for. And those are dime a dozen.

Um, ok. But we aren't talking about them, are we?

This desperate need to separate Islamic beliefs from any negative action by Muslims is funny. Or are Al Qaeda members even Muslims in your eyes? You gonna claim we can't be sure what religion they follow?

BTW, if someone explicitly claimed they were blowing themselves up for Communism or Japanese nationalism, few would doubt their sincerity. Only when the stated motive is religious (Islamic, especially) does all this excuse-making emerge.

[Suttree]

This desperate need to separate Islamic beliefs from any negative action by Muslims is funny.

So it's the beliefs and not fundamentalism that's the issue?