The Concept Of Being "God Fearing"

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Originally Posted by trish

I trust my doctor no further than he is able to explain his treatment and procedures. I trust the pharmaceuticals I buy only insofar as I trust the FDA to test them (which is getting more difficult for them to do in the present political climate). I have no faith :(

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What's next, Doubting Thomas, you'll say that 50 million Bieber fans are delusional???!!!!??? What about tacos, no love for tacos??? Are you going to say the perfect taco does not exist because you've never tasted it?
Where is the Humanity??
There's a difference from being skeptical and being pigheaded. And there's a difference from having faith and being an airhead.
There's a big difference from what the Buddha says from what the Church Lady says.
The Father in Heaven is the new improved self, more centered, more forward.
When you sell out stadiums Trish, I might listen to you. But til then, I've got Bieber Fever, baby.


PS....I think Jesus stresses Faith more than Buddhism, say, because faith was all poor Jew peasants in Biblical times could afford, and Faith is one way to get to God. He was actually talking to Jews, and he believed Jews were the chosen people.
His Flock.
I can dig that the Church of Transsexuality and the Church of Latter Day saints aren't always on the same page.

Haven't been to a doctor much lately, but when I did go, I've rarely seen receptionists like that. Maybe on T.V. ...The last time I went to a Dentist, her receptionist was a guy who never came on time. He's gone now.
So...

It's not pigheaded to want to understand a medical procedure before consenting to undergo it, nor is it pigheaded to insist on a surgeon with a good track record. Does the Platonic Taco even exist? Pride didn’t cause St. Thomas to doubt the resurrection of Jesus, lack of evidence did. He needed to see and touch the wounds. Had he not seen them (as the story goes) he probably wouldn’t be a saint. Frankly, I doubt the whole story. The dead dude with the wounds never rose, never walked; Thomas never saw the walking zombie and his doubt never relented. That's why I like kinda like him (Thomas that is). He's really sorta cute, don't you think?

looks a bit twinkish to me.

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Originally Posted by fred41

looks a bit twinkish to me.

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Yeah. He's cute, but I can't imagine having brutish anal sex with him all night long. He'd probably end up crying.

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Originally Posted by trish

Yeah. He's cute, but I can't imagine having brutish anal sex with him all night long. He'd probably end up crying.

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..and , of course....he'd doubt himself.

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Originally Posted by buttslinger

because faith was all poor Jew peasants in Biblical times could afford, and Faith is one way to get to God. He was actually talking to Jews, and he believed Jews were the chosen people.
His Flock.
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But he had a very low approval rating with his intended audience. Mind you, we wouldn't hurt a hair on his head despite what his followers would have you believe. But let's just say we didn't think he was much more credible than the local taco vendor (his name was also Jesus but he pronounced it differently) and without being disrespectful we may have had doubts about his mother's chastity. It wasn't exactly an easy topic to bring up with young Jesus.

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Originally Posted by broncofan

But he had a very low approval rating with his intended audience.

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I feel his pain. I can't even get you heathens to be Bieber Believers. Looks like Sodom and Gommorah were not good choices to start my Ministry.
Well, as long as I'm here I might as well check out a couple of clubs. I can get back on the road to Damascus tomorrow.

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Originally Posted by trish

I trust my doctor no further than he is able to explain his treatment and procedures. I trust the pharmaceuticals I buy only insofar as I trust the FDA to test them (which is getting more difficult for them to do in the present political climate). I have no faith :(

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Oh ye of little faith... You're going to piss off the Goblin. You could pick up a couple extra millennia in Purge a Tory for that kind of hubris alone. I fear for too much of your spirits being consumed, my love. Your sole could be filleted. Cum thee to the nearest Jizzuit monastery, & prostate yourself before the holee seed!
Bless you & remember that the number to "Dial-a-Prayer" is E cum speary 2 2 oh.

Now that members of HA have had their fun with cartoons and put-downs it may be time to ask what is at the core of the problem many have with God and to pose the contrast between the God of Religion and the God of Science.

I think what people object to is not so much the idea that God, or A God, or Gods created the heavens and the earth, but the way in which religion has claimed the authority of God to create or impose moral judgements about and upon human behaviour, and in particular, the idea that there is some form of eternal damnation for those who do wrong, and eternal bliss for those that do right, and moreover, that a system of reward and punishment here on Earth can be justified even when that results in acts of cruelty to the person.

A God of science is not hard to understand, because Science cannot yet explain the existence of the Universe before the Big Bang, yet it could be rational to claim it is the work of 'God' without yet being able to define what God is, to use God as a functional term. It also removes the moral core in religion by ascribing to the God of Science observable phenomena and agreeing that just as life on Earth involves us, and the rivers and the seas, hurricanes and tornadoes, volcanic eruptions and beautiful flowers, meadows and snow-capped mountains, so in the Universe solar flares, gas clouds and ice storms on Venus may be considered a form of 'Life'.

Humans can thus be understood in terms of evolutionary theory where God may be the God of Creation, but not religion.

It is clear that with a few exceptions, all human societies at some point in their existence appear to have a concept of supernatural forces that they cannot explain, but which they believe exert a controlling influence over their environment, and it also appears to be the case that probably some time after the onset of the Neolithic Revolution human societies developed a 'moral cosmology' to explain who we are, how we got here, and what the best way to live might be. From this we derive the concepts and rules of reward and punishment that sustain life as individuals and as part of a social structure -from the obvious such as not putting your hands in the fire for too long, or immersing yourself in the river for too long; to knowing how to cook animal flesh so that it does not poison the system, to not having sexual intercourse with close relatives for fear of killing the family off over the generations.

Out of basic human survival (as Hippifried has suggested in another thread) rules based on 'common sense' and a form of 'science' before science, we can see how the natural and the supernatural combine. The fear of God thus becomes a critical form of social control, for if people believe that there is a Supreme Being, that this Being not only sees us always and everywhere, but judges us, then indeed, God is to be feared if the result of bad behaviour is eternal fire. And those who claim to be in communication with God or to be his 'servants' on Earth can (and have) exert[ed] real power over others.

It thus enables the Rationalist to adopt almost all of the rules and norms of behaviour bequeathed by Religion, while removing a religious God from the argument -thus, we believe murder is wrong, robbery is wrong, lying is wrong (most of the time), that infidelity is wrong (most of the time) and so on. Basic rules and norms with a few tweaks here and there. And even where there does not appear to be a Supreme Being -absent in Jain religion and Buddhism- both are closely related to Hinduism. Some Pygmy tribes in Central Africa appear to have no system of belief, or live through rituals, but this appears to be quite unusual for humans.

One remaining and intriguing difference remains: ritual. Why have humans developed rituals as a form of expression, of faith, of apology, of remorse, of celebration and so on? Why do religions in some cases expect their faithful to kneel in prayer, or to cover, or uncover their heads? Or to 'put off their shoes' when walking on 'hallowed ground'? What does it mean to be 'anointed' and how can water or oil be 'holy'? We have seen over the millenia how a crucial ritual like Sacrifice, has gone through phases -human, animal, human, animal -but do we know why Sacrifice is even so important? Rene Girard has argued it was an essential means whereby societies could resolve inner conflicts through ritual because in most cases shedding blood terrifies and is taboo but in a controlled setting it can channel and release pent up negative energies and allow societies to express rage without causing further violence than has already taken place.

Yet outside religion, secular societies maintain rituals. A man or a woman sings a song or makes a speech, and the collective response is to clap. Crowds sing an Anthem at the start of a football game -why?

The God of Science is functional, it has no moral compass. The God of Religion is commanding, and vengeful. If you believe, then one assumes the believer lives in fear of the Wrath of God. The non-believer need not fear, yet may feel guilty when violating basic rules and norms, being unfaithful to one's partner; drowning the cat to put it out of its aged misery. Finally, and worst of all, is the campaign to force one stream of thought and behaviour upon another, and that I think is where many people take their leave of religion altogether. Because even though we are all made of the same stuff, and often adhere to the same or a similar set of rituals, we can choose to be different.

Let’s start with agreeing some definitions

Deism is the belief in a creator, who made the Universe but does not take any personal interest in it -- doesn't require worship, answer prayers, judge behavior, or necessarily promise a life after death Deism is a benign belief, because there are no consequences for accepting or rejecting it.

Theism is the belief in an active, interventionist god who not only created the Universe (maybe, mainly for us), but also requires worship, answers prayers, judges sinners, and may have created a divine son or other entities to live among us. Theists are 100% certain their god(s) exist, and have faith in this without any objective, verifiable evidence. There are many theistic religions, each of which insists it is the only true one.

Athesium is the absence of belief in any gods. It is not a belief system and it is not a religion. Based on the absence of any evidence for the existence of any god(s) where such evidence should be if god(s) did exist, many atheists are 99.9% certain that no god(s) exist. But they may be open to the slight possibility they could be wrong and would be willing to accept the existence of god(s) if convincing objective, verifiable evidence were to appear. Therefore they do not have faith in the nonexistence of god(s). They simply have no belief in any gods.

Agnosticism is a formal uncertainty about the existence or nonexistence of god(s). The agnostic asserts it is impossible to determine existence or nonexistence. Theists sometimes try to tell atheists that because they are not 100% certain god(s) don't exist, they are agnostics. This is not true. An atheist has no belief in god(s). That is not the same as believing it is impossible to tell if god(s) exist or not.

Agreed?

Now, we can continue ...

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Crowds sing an Anthem at the start of a football game -why?

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Many fans ask the question but to no avail.

If I understand correctly this “God of Science” is the Enlightenment vision that led some deists to substitute Nature for the various notions of the Divine. I’m not a defender of Nature’s God, but I do understand that quite a few of the early deists and philosophers whose work influenced the deists (e.g. Locke and Spinoza) were deeply concerned with moral philosophy and conceived the notion of Natural Rights. I think it’s unfair to accuse them of not having a moral compass; especially when the Christian’s of the same period seemed to revel in the notion that God can toss a non-Christian into the pits of Hell to burn forever and ever for the sin of disbelief. It is as you say, “The God of Religion is commanding, and vengeful.”

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Finally, and worst of all, is the campaign to force one stream of thought and behaviour upon another, and that I think is where many people take their leave of religion altogether.

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You are probably right. It is a theme that the proselytizing New Atheists effectively play upon. It is a note that Nietzsche struck over a century ago when he identified in religion the will of believers to assert their power over the most intimate thoughts and behaviors of others.

Readers of these threads already know that I subscribe to neither the God (or the gods and goddesses) of Science nor to the God (or gods and goddesses) of Religion. We humans are lost and alone in a vast uneasy sea: we have a compass, but no absolute and rock steady platform upon which to place it.

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...even though we are all made of the same stuff, and often adhere to the same or a similar set of rituals, we can choose to be different.

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Very nicely said; and a very nice post too. Thanks for taking the time to write and share.

And thank you Martin for the definitions. I think many people are confused about what it is atheists don't believe. (I wrote my response to Stavros and posted it before I read your post...otherwise I might've incorporated it in my reply).

When I think "God fearin' man" I think Gary Cooper riding his mule with his rifle through the pouring rain on a dark Kentucky road, with murder on his mind and blindness in his heart, and then lightning strikes and splits his rifle and kills his mule and he has an Enlightenment of sorts. (Sgt York)

There is a lyric from an old song the Grateful Dead sing at the end of their concerts..."I love you, but Jesus loves you best" (Goodnight)
so to me that's like Martin's breakdown of the various levels of God, how close we are to God. Jesus is a better authority on God than I am, just like Picasso is a better authority on Art than I am, but I can still have my view of God and Art, it's just not as good.
I tried to read a book on Goethe once, it referred to so many other heavy duty religious books and authors of his time, I was completely lost. Religion was much more on the forefront then.
It wasn't until the Roman Empire became the Holy Roman Empire that being gay or kinky became a bad thing, Mastering the seven deadly sins meant denying them, unlike this crew, where the latest sin goes on the weekend "TO DO" list. haw haw haw.
Finally, "The path is the goal" and if you're not interested, then that's that.
Life is Life, an experience, an outlook, a day. If God is a bringdown, then by all means, leave God in the weeds and get back to your life. You can't think outside the box til you know what the box is.
Van Gogh said Jesus was an artist of the flesh. Rather than using paint and canvas to focus on some long forgotten promise most people that claim Enlightenment get there through a pretty heavy duty daily regimen of Meditation. Breath control and yoga exercises, boring repetition. In the Middle East they pray every day. Yawn.

I don't think I like the term "new athiest". What's new about them? Every bent has its fanatic prosylitizing "wayists". Don't worry. I won't try to psychoanalyze them here. But maybe the wayists should have their own niche in this discussion. Might make it a bit easier to distinguish the catagories we're trying to establish.

Oh... We keep talking & hearing about agnostics, but not gnostics themselves. If memory serves, these are folks who are sure there's some spiritual supreme being, & actlvely seek its nature outside the strictures of dogma. I'll bet most of us know someone who says they're "spiritual but not religious". Another niche?

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I don't think I like the term "new athiest". What's new about them?

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I think they're fireproof; they're not being burned at the stake. I agree the name is a bit irritating to those who have been atheists since before ever hearing of Harris et. al. I think the big difference is they're speaking out and writing best sellers. What decade was the first to have a best seller on atheism? They can easily be accused of proselytizing (as I sometimes do) but one can also object that they are merely and finally pushing back against the influences of religious fundamentalism that constrains our politics and stifles the lives of even non-believers. Besides accusing them of being a bit proselytizing, I also thank them for creating an atmosphere (at least here in the U.S.) that has allowed atheists to come out of the closet...not that we'll have an openly atheistic president, Congressman, Senator or Supreme Court Justice anytime soon.

Firstly to Martin:

Agnosticism is a wide spectrum. Not all agnostics think it's impossible to determine the existence or non-existence of a god. You have agnostic-theists who hold a belief in God but are uncertain and agnostic-atheists who hold that there might not be a god but are uncertain so those theists who make those claims aren't exactly wrong. You do also have agnostics who think it's impossible to determine the existence or non-existence of a god too.

Atheism arguably is a belief in some. Not all atheists "hold a disbelief" some are gnostic atheists who are 100% certain there is no god despite there being no empirical evidence supporting this statement, therefore their claim is a belief based on faith and their own perception of the universe (just remember, some see the fine-tuning as argument for God's existence and from a philosophical perceptive, this can be debated).

Theism is different for different people. Some theists are certain God exists, others simply hold a belief that God exists but theism has nothing to do with worship, the following of religious rituals, belief in an after-life or prayer and most theists won't make an arrogant statement saying that they are 100% certain that God exists. This is often seen in many debates, the theist says "I believe in God" whilst the atheist says "there is no god" so which one is claiming 100% absolutely certainty? Not the theist.

Also what's the difference between being 99% certain and 100% certain? The former seems a cop-out for atheists to refuse the categorization of their worldview as a belief or that they are claiming they are absolutely sure.

Don't confuse theism with religion and even theistic religions don't all the share the same attributes in common. The Sadducees were Jews who denied the existence of an afterlife and judgement. In fact there's Christian sects and Progressive Jewish sects today who share beliefs like these still.

Now to Stavros:

I think you've got many things right. Especially the part about human desire for rituals. This is all part of our evolution. Also the point on the hatred for religion is an interesting point, I think that too is what many self-identified atheists object to really rather than the concept of a god.

Among the liberals and LGBT community, this disbelief of God seems to arise from hatred towards religion. Liberals see the bad religion did in the past (and still continues to do) and the LGBT have themselves actively experienced judgements, persecution or discrimination from religion so it's no surprise so many of them hate religion according to the statistics.

This is where the statistics become interesting, lots of those in the LGBT community, at least in the west, identify as atheist or non-religious so they became disbelievers because of what they saw and experienced of religion? Isn't their disbelief then emotional? Perhaps they can't believe in a "pure god" as they get sodomized brutally or suck cock or some nonsense because traditionally, most religions are against such practices and as they're sucking cock they're thinking "no god can exist, I LOVE THIS, COCK IS MY RELIGION!" in an effort to reduce guilt that might be brought on by continued religious belief? But then surely these aren't explicit atheists but anti-theists whose hatred is emotional?

Do some of these people who reject religion really disbelief in a god or just religion's concept of a god? I've debated with some who then turn around and say "well actually I do believe a god could exist but I just hate religion and don't think this [insert religion's deity here] could exist" so then these are anti-theists (which can refer to those who oppose religion but not belief in a god as well as those who oppose belief in a god).

Of course there are those of the LGBT who continue to follow religion, some noting that Jesus himself (the central and fundamentally, the core part of Christianity) never even spoke upon homosexuality being a sin, that notion came from Moses and later Paul. I don't know much Islam to know how the LGBT believers in that community reconcile their faith with their sexuality or lifestyle.

I've noticed many atheists debate against God's existence arguing about the evils of religion etc but few will argue against God's actual existence and seem to think when we're debating about "God" we're talking about the Judeo-Christian concept of God so they rage on about "God" being a "vindictive, bipolar, murderer" blah blah. At this point I have to point out my own god is basically a unknowable god who I believe probably does nothing but watches us (which I guess is deism but I don't deny if God interacts with the universe at all in some subtle way so I would personally label myself as a theist).

Just don't use your hatred of religion to argue against the existence of a god. There's no reason why you can't disbelieve in religion but hold the belief that there is still a god.

I've got nothing against the religious though, so long as they're tolerant, don't commit violence etc then they can have whatever views and beliefs that they want. I believe in freedom of speech and belief. There's a difference between hating gays and simply thinking homosexuality is wrong. I know many disagree or think that these religious people are still bigots but then what do you make of people who say vegetarianism is wrong? These people don't hate vegans, they just think their lifestyle is wrong, same with these type of religious people and therefore I have nothing against them even if I disagree with them.

You know, I've used prostitutes, I've lied, I've stolen and many religious people would condemn my lifestyle and say I'm going to Hell if I don't change my ways but I'm not going to hate them or their religion, they're entitled to those views even if I don't believe in Hell or their version of Hell. Yeah I see the bad of religion, it's caused deaths, discrimination and persecution but I can also see the good where it's caused great acts of charity (in fact the largest charities are still religious) and has been used to argue for tolerance.

People go on and on about religion doing bad things but forget the good. Some atheists think they're freeing the religious from a life from blind faith and delusions but what are they bringing them too? A new life of delusions in the digital age where worship of a supernatural god is replaced with a material god such as a celebrity idol, sport, lifestyle and social networking? This is different from religious devotion how? There are people who worship the likes of Kim Kardashian or refer to their twitter idols for advice on life. Now I don't know about you but I'd rather have someone preaching the words of a wise 2,000 old Jew to me than the words of Jaden Smith...

Even the atheists in this "new atheism" movement are religious in their own right having their own forums, meetups and almost religious devotion to atheist speakers even going as far to use pictures of people like Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens on their social networking profiles which they dedicate to spreading the ideals of atheism. There is even symbolism for atheism itself (the A that is inside an atom) that many atheists embrace.

Dawkins knows this religiosity of these atheists (although he refuses to directly remark upon it) which is why he rallies his followers on twitter even giving them instructions, he also is like the religious preachers of America, he has his own site that you can join the "inner circle" (which is aptly named the Dawkins Circle) of by "donating" through either monthly or annual payments and by doing so you get a chance to meet the man himself. So what we have here is a atheist cult of personality built around Richard that everyone but these atheist "Dawkinites" are too blind to see.

At the end of the day, despite what either groups may claim, no one truly knows all there is to know about the universe. The atheists try to champion science and say "see here, there is no god even though we haven't explored all of our own galaxy let alone the universe and beyond to know anything like this, I'm going to make this absolute claim anyway" and then the religious "my scripture is absolutely right and knows the answers to everything" in reality we're all in the same boat of knowing precious little even these so-called scientists are in that boat.

We haven't even got out of our own solar system for God's sake and there's arrogant people saying "there's no god beyond this universe."

So in this regard I think the atheists can be as arrogant as the religious if not more so. If the multiverse exists, then who is say what this means? Current science speculates that there's different dimensions, realms and universes where the laws of physics could be different. This means realms that we could not comprehend exist perhaps alongside beings that we could not comprehend whom would appear supernatural to us. One could even argue our own universe or another could be alive itself and then the argument falls down to not "does a god exist?" but "how do you define a god?" If a god is a creator then for all we know there could be an infinite number of extra-dimensional beings that fit this description. The multiverse says our universe is a bubble in a bigger bubble filled with other bubbles but what if the multiverse itself is just one more bubble in another?

All I can say is we should keep an open mind. If you want to say you disbelieve or believe in a god or gods, fine but when you say "I know for certain" you've got a lot to prove, in fact to "know for certain" you have to be omniscient and therefore God himself.

Oh and another thing, why the hatred and mockery for people like Jesus? You hate his followers (and arguably only the extremists) not him. If you read The Bible, Jesus was himself critical of religion! So it makes it hilarious that I see such hatred towards him from those who hate religion today. Jesus himself criticized the priests of his time as hypocrites, he criticized their traditions and rituals, their love for money as well as their intolerance, he himself refused to obey many of the laws of the Old Testament including the stoning of a woman who committed adultery even though Judaic laws commanded for her death. It's easy to read Jesus in a modern setting attacking the Catholic Church (the modern day Pharisees) and organized religion in the same way once again.

The central teaching of Jesus is this: love your fellow man. This is in fact how he summed up the 10 commandments (along with a love for God).

So if we had Jesus back in today's world, who do you'd think he'd be most critical of? People in the LGBT community or the religious? He might consider homosexuality a sin but like with the adulteress, his real ire would be directed towards the religious hypocrites who judge these people thinking that they themselves are perfect. Jesus recognized asexuality "for there are eunuchs who were born that way from their mother's womb" even going as far to praise it (possibly owing to him being asexual himself) so for all we knew he recognized other sexualities as being something nobody can help or at least not something to judge someone on.

I don't believe the future will be without religion and despite some arguments from atheists or secularists, a society without religion isn't any better. We've seen this in communist and socialist states. People will always have their ideologies that they'd be willing to fight and kill for, religious or secular. I think the future lies in unity. Unitarian Universalism has this right, combine all the good beliefs into one and be tolerant towards all. Many people of today's society already have this philosophy, even atheists, the thing about Unitarian Universalism is that it's neither theistic or atheistic, you can be a part of it regardless of your belief in God.

Long ass post I know...

ag·nos·tic

1. [agˈnästik]
   
   
   
   NOUN
   
   
   
   
   • a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God or of anything beyond material phenomena; a person who claims neither faith nor disbelief in God.
     
     
     
     
   
   
   
   
   
   

Y'all're tryin' to rewrite the dictionary to make it fit your arguments. It's not as complicated as you try to make it. Gnostic means searching for spiritual knowlege. Theist means believing in a god or gods. The prefix "a" simply means not. Atheist (long a, stress 2nd syllable) just means not theist. Agnostic (long a, silent g, stress 2nd syllable) just means not gnostic. I am both atheist & agnostic, & I resent my thought processes being defined using the blather of fanatics who don't know anything either. I'm not confused or unsure what to believe. I just can't buy the ancient tales of some omnicient goblin or that there's any klnd of spiritual knowlege to be had. It's not based in hatred either. So stop with all these lame assumptions & generalizations already. Please.

As Hippiefried and others have made clear the suffix “a” means “not” or “without.” One who is not a theist is an atheist. You may say of every atheist, “That person does not believe that such and such a deity exists.” Some atheists may also hold particular beliefs which logically entail their atheism, but the definition doesn’t require it.

Even that latter sort of person may stand upon fairly secure epistemological ground depending on the nature of his or her negative assertion. For example, even though there are infinitely many numbers and no one can list them all, a mathematician can say with confidence that none of them is the largest prime number. Even though we haven’t explored the entire universe, and much of what we wish to know about it remains obscure and beyond our reach, astrophysicists may say with confidence that of all the luminous stars in existence none have a mass smaller than that of Earth’s mass. Such an astrophysicist may acknowledge her knowledge is not absolute, but she might also remind us that the whole notion of absolute knowledge is plagued with paradoxes and ambiguities.

It is not the obscurity of the universe that makes theism problematic, but the obscurity of theism itself. When asked, “Are you a believer?” you establish the question’s context before you answer, right? Are you being asked, “Do you believe in the God of Abraham as espoused in the First Testament?” Or are you being asked, “Do you believe in Thor?” Perhaps the question is, “Do you believe in the Cause without a cause and that uncaused Cause is God?” Or, “Do you believe the Universe Itself is God and We are part of Him?” You may have different assessments of all of these queries.

My answer to all of these questions and many others like them is, “No, I don’t believe that.” As very young child I approached these sorts of questions with wonder and if not belief, a propensity to believe. These days, I approach them without belief. I think it’s only fair then to say I’m an atheist. Do I believe in God? Define God. If it a God I haven’t thought about before, I’ll think about it. Given the record though, the answer to the question will likely be, “No.”

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Originally Posted by trish

I think they're fireproof; they're not being burned at the stake. I agree the name is a bit irritating to those who have been atheists since before ever hearing of Harris et. al. I think the big difference is they're speaking out and writing best sellers. What decade was the first to have a best seller on atheism? They can easily be accused of proselytizing (as I sometimes do) but one can also object that they are merely and finally pushing back against the influences of religious fundamentalism that constrains our politics and stifles the lives of even non-believers. Besides accusing them of being a bit proselytizing, I also thank them for creating an atmosphere (at least here in the U.S.) that has allowed atheists to come out of the closet...not that we'll have an openly atheistic president, Congressman, Senator or Supreme Court Justice anytime soon.

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I rarely highlight someone's post just to say one part I like, but this is how I feel. I am not saying there is no such thing as "new atheist", but typically the word is used in a lazy fashion as a pejorative. It almost has no value to call them "new atheists" if the only thing new about them is that they are more vocal in their criticism of the excesses of religion and more eager to express the value of non-belief in a deity. If the practice of religion were invariably a benign and personal endeavor, their aggressive expression of non-belief would be puzzling and unnecessary.

I've also heard some people say stuff like "the new atheists are extremists just like religious fundamentalists." I have not seen anything from them that is dogmatic or at all analogous to religious fundamentalism. They are strident in their criticism, but they are trying to identify problems that flow directly from belief in various doctrines. I actually think that many new atheists have in good faith pointed out that religious dogmas frequently interfere with the public's ability to engage in reasoned discourse on a broad range of social issues.

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Originally Posted by trish

They can easily be accused of proselytizing

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I want to focus on this part Trish. I agree they are more solicitous and sell their viewpoint more aggressively. But I think what distinguishes religious proselytizing is that the religious are selling people on personal, spiritual benefits. They say, "believe Jesus is the savior (or some equivalent) to save your immortal soul." They want you to believe in something not because they are under threat from non-belief or competing religious beliefs, but for belief's sake. It is an aggressive intrusion into the lives of people who pose no threat to them, disguised as altruism.

New atheists are trying to sell people on the social and collective benefits that accrue to everyone from reasoning without constraints. Everyone who believes something will want others to believe it if they think the alternative interferes with their life. If a creationist wants intelligent design or some other dressed up form of creationism to be taught in schools, it soon becomes an imperative to identify the big picture problem. The big picture problem is that people allow their personal religious philosophies to interfere with policy, which secularists believe should be based on a rational interpretation of the available evidence.

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Originally Posted by broncofan

I want to focus on this part Trish. I agree they are more solicitous and sell their viewpoint more aggressively. But I think what distinguishes religious proselytizing is that the religious are selling people on personal, spiritual benefits. They say, "believe Jesus is the savior (or some equivalent) to save your immortal soul." They want you to believe in something not because they are under threat from non-belief or competing religious beliefs, but for belief's sake. It is an aggressive intrusion into the lives of people who pose no threat to them, disguised as altruism.

New atheists are trying to sell people on the social and collective benefits that accrue to everyone from reasoning without constraints. Everyone who believes something will want others to believe it if they think the alternative interferes with their life. If a creationist wants intelligent design or some other dressed up form of creationism to be taught in schools, it soon becomes an imperative to identify the big picture problem. The big picture problem is that people allow their personal religious philosophies to interfere with policy, which secularists believe should be based on a rational interpretation of the available evidence.

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The goal of proselytization is to convert. In the case of religion it would be to convert people from one religion to another or (as in the case of large non-denominational Christian churches) from one Church to another. The explicit motivation behind proselytization is to save the the souls of those to be converted. On the face of it, it seems to be a highly altruistic endeavor. The missionary’s soul is already saved, but her mission is to save the souls of as many strangers as she can.

Insofar as atheism is neither a religion nor a belief the proselytization of the “New Atheists” (if indeed they do proselytize - they do aim to “educate”) could only have the aim to convert people from a particular theistic belief to non-belief; i.e. so sow doubt. I think the fairly explicit motivation behind the books and websites of the “New Atheists” is to undercut the hold of religious fundamentalism on people, our schools, laws and political institutions. On the face of it, an altruistic endeavor.

In my mind, the difference is that one is nonsense and the other a worthy goal. But I’m not sure if that’s the crucial difference between proselytizing and educating.

As long as the aim of both is to spread, I have see them as nearly equivalent. The only real difference is content.

Perhaps the best we can do is take whatever it is we think is knowledge and make it available to people, be there to explain it and explain why we are enthusiastic about it. That is a noble goal. Expanding your numbers: not so much.

But wait. By this criteria isn’t all political campaigning ignoble? That can’t be, because democracy depends upon changing peoples minds and gathering votes. Speaking truth in the public square to power. You see what a quandary I’m in?

I’m left (right now - I’ll change my mind in an hour or two) with one conclusion. Content makes the difference between proselytization and education. One spreads memes and the other teaches critical thinking. The difference between teaching and indoctrination is the former encourages students to think and to examine everything - including the conclusions and methods of the teacher - with a critical eye (toward improving it or even undoing it all and starting over again)...the later reinforces the rote and amplifies the meme.

It remains for individuals to decide what Richard Dawkins is doing, or what Pat Robertson is doing, or what Pope Francis is doing.

Proselytizing is proselytizing, regardless of who's doing it or why. It's "Wayism". They're all preaching "THE WAY, MY WAY, OUR WAY, THE ONLY WAY", etc... Wayists sell memes. Let's face it; a huge part of what we believe or think we know is memetic. All points of view are up for debate because there's really no such thing as "ONE WAY". If there was, there would be no need for memetic competition, or memes at all for that matter. Fanatic fundamentalism is extreme wayism, measured by the amount of intolerance toward memetic competition. Content & motive really don't have much to do with it, IMO.

The problem I have with fundamentalists is not that they want me to think as they do. But rather that they want me to do as they think.
~ plageurized from a t-shirt I saw in passing ~

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Proselytizing is proselytizing, regardless of who's doing it or why.

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Never claimed otherwise. My claim is that some teaching amounts to something akin to proselytization and some does not. My suggestion is that the difference is in the lessons: do they include self-criticism and illustrate the principles of critical thinking in general? A high school physics lesson on friction might just give the usual formula for friction (the frictional force on a body sliding down an incline is proportional to that component of the body's weight normal to the incline) or one could attempt to explain where that approximation comes from, why it's only an approximation, discuss its domain of application and have the students suggest other factors that might play a role outside that domain. The former approach is memetic and indoctrinates students into a set, formulaic way of thinking, the latter is self-critical and deviates from the one-and-only-ONE-WAY approach to the issue. In the former the meme is the approach and the content. In the latter, the many-ways idea and self-criticism is both the approach and the content.

Does Dawkins The Selfish Gene proselytize or educate? You have to read it for its content to find out. Does Pat Robertson's 700 Club proselytize or educate? You have to watch a few shows to find out. Both will of course maintain that they have the correct solution to a certain sort of problem. Do they reason you through the solution, contrast it with other proposals, compare it with observation & experiment, discuss what sorts of future observations would confirm and what sorts of observations would disconfirm their hypothesis?

I'm wondering if doubt isn't one the more important elements of an education. One needs to know how to doubt, test, refine and doubt again. Doubt is an essential part of real confidence.

Sorry Trish. That doesn't work. Proselytizing is an attempt to covert a person or people to a specific doctrine or point of view. Noone's contesting the idea that friction affects a downhill slide, or that there's a way to figure out a formula to measure the effect. This is about tolerance or intolerance toward differing points of view. It's that egoistic contention between memes that causes so much trouble, not the teaching techniques.

The arguments over technique can become contentious. But most of that is short lived & silly to start with. I remember the big public argument over whether to scrap the "see-say" method of learning to read in favor of the phonics system. At 7 or 8, I understood what the argument was, but not why, since both methods were used in my class. It didn't last long. But the memory came back when I saw the scene in Gulliver's Travels where war was breaking out over a disagreement about which end of the egg to break. Silliness seems to be an age old problem. Common sense consensus usually wins out over such nonsense. But memetic arguments over politics or religion present a different dynamic because there's usually a dearth of factual information to base the most contentious opinions on.
I guess that's why we have this separate board. Right? Butt don't worry. Nobody gets left out. The general board still gets to deal with all the insipid bullshit over who's gay or not.

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Noone's contesting the idea that friction affects a downhill slide, or that there's a way to figure out a formula to measure the effect.

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Not the point of the example. Suppose someone wrote a book about (say friction, or the methods of dating geological features, or how natural selection operates at the genetic level) and that one of the premises of the book was that one has to look at all seriously competing views - including the ones the book may be endorsing - and judge them on their relative merits; i.e. their explanatory value, their internal consistency and their consistency with observation and experiment. Suppose also the book examined and clarified the conditions under which its conclusions would fail. Suppose doubting, checking, testing, eliminating inconsistencies and doubting again is not just a technique of presentation but one of the main points of the book. Would such a book be an example of proselytization?

Is Dawkins', Selfish Gene such a book or does it fail in that regard.

For that matter, does your post against "wayism" support (by way of its content) a single doctrine: the doctrine of "anti-wayism?" Is "anti-wayism" a kind of "wayism," and at the same time intolerant of "wayism," or does it somehow escape the charge of proselytization and the charge of intolerance? I'm inclined to say the latter, but I'm not sure. You seem to be saying the former, or am I reading you wrong?

For the most part, I find broad wayism to be silly, unmanagable, sometimes dangerous, & an infinite source of entertainment. We all have our own strongly held opinions. My post was merely an explanation of my perceptions. I try to keep the scope of my own proselytations & wayist viewpoints as narrow as possible.

I've heard of the selfish gene theory in passing. I think I vaguely understand the concept. But I've never actually read Dawkins' thesis, & probably won't. (Cateracts) The little bio info I've seen though, tells me he's an activist in the spread of atheism. By default, that makes him a proselytor. That's how you change beliefs or opinions in a politic manner. The term itself is neutral. We all do it to some extent. The techniques of the argument can make it more or less effective, but that doesn't change what you're doing.

Firstly, I think we need to separate Dawkins’s thesis as expressed in The Selfish Gene and his very proactive activities in condemning religion. For me, Christopher Hitchens was the far superior commentator on the failings of Abrahamic religions. I quote:

“Here is the point about myself and my co-thinkers. Our belief is not a belief. Our principles are not a faith.
We do not hold our convictions dogmatically. We believe with certainty that an ethical life can be lived without religion. And we know for a fact that the corollary holds true - that religion has caused innumerate people not just to conduct themselves no better than others, but to award themselves permission to behave in ways that would make a brothel-keeper or an ethnic cleanser raise an eyebrow.”

The underlying concept embodied in The Selfish Gene is very simple and could have been expressed in 30 pages and not 300. It is a pity that Dawkins choose the adjective “selfish” – as in no way did he imply emotions or intent to the inanimate gene. He was expressing a gene-centred view of evolution as opposed to focussing on the organism and the group. The genes that survive, that is reproducs, are the ones that embody the organism most likely to survive. It was not a radically new idea.

,,,,,

You guys are overthinking this.
There is a pivotal moment in all Religions where you "step out of your skin suit" and become aware God, and the path to God.
The path and the God are universal for everyone, and while the goal is suddenly very easy to understand, the work is just beginning. The Mountain doesn't come to Mohammed.
The path, and God, are not seen with visual light, they register by their actual energy.
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

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You guys are overthinking this.
...The path, and God, are not seen with visual light, they register by their actual energy.

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You're under-thinking this.

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There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

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That I can believe. Horatio was a protestant humanist. The only ghost in his philosophy was the Holy One.

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Originally Posted by trish

You're under-thinking this.

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The man says you gotta give action to get action.

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Originally Posted by martin48

For me, Christopher Hitchens was the far superior commentator on the failings of Abrahamic religions. I quote:
“Here is the point about myself and my co-thinkers. Our belief is not a belief. Our principles are not a faith.
We do not hold our convictions dogmatically. We believe with certainty that an ethical life can be lived without religion. And we know for a fact that the corollary holds true - that religion has caused innumerate people not just to conduct themselves no better than others, but to award themselves permission to behave in ways that would make a brothel-keeper or an ethnic cleanser raise an eyebrow.”

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The quote from Christopher Hitchens' God is not Great. Religion Poisons Everything illustrates the weakness of Hitchens as an intellectual, a man who in the course of his lifetime claims to have been a Trotskyist in his youth and by middle age endorsed regime change in Iraq, possibly because of his association with a Shi'a crook callled Ahmad Chalabi, a most unusual friendship to have for a rationalist like Hitchens. A man who dismissed religion but was married in a Greek Orthodox church, who, in effect, smoked and drank himself to death as if life had no real meaning or purpose if it was not shrouded in smoke or dunked in booze -hardly a role model for rationalists.

Among the confusing statements that Hitchens makes in order to justify his relentless attacks on religion, one finds the following -
Our belief is not a belief. Our principles are not a faith. We do not rely solely upon science and reason, because these are necessary rather than sufficient factors, but we distrust anything that contradicts science or outrages reason.
-The problem with reason is that Hitchens is unwilling or unable to recognise that to many believers, their religion is entirely rational, indeed, to such people not to believe that God created the heavens and the earth is irrational -what to Hitchens is a sequence of events that (presumably) starts with the Big Bang to others is the work of God, or, without God meaningless chaos.

We are not immune to the lure of wonder and mystery and awe: we have music and art and literature, and find that the serious ethical dilemmas are better handled by Shakespeare and Tolstoy and Schiller and Dostoyevsky and George Eliot than in the mythical morality tales of the holy books. Literature, not scripture, sustains the mind and—since there is no other metaphor—also the soul.
-It seems almost incredible that Hitchens can make this statement and conveniently ignore the extent to which the authors he mentions relied on 'the mythical morality tales of the holy books' for their language, their metaphors, their stories - does he think George Eliot got the Zionism of Daniel Deronda solely from political pamphlets? Tolstoy's religious faith is wished away for what reason? Shakespeare was baptized in Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon, he was a regular church-goer both in Stratford and in London and for a time lodged with Huguenot refugees from France, and there are numerous allusions to the Bible and Christian morality in the plays, particularly As You Like It, and The Tempest. Hitchens wants to dismiss religion and its texts, yet allows them to re-enter his cultural life through the literature of Shakespeare and Tolstoy, through the music of Bach and Beethoven without seeing a contradiction in any of this.

We believe with certainty that an ethical life can be lived without religion. And we know for a fact that the corollary holds true—that religion has caused innumerable people not just to conduct themselves no better than others, but to award themselves permission to behave in ways that would make a brothel-keeper or an ethnic cleanser raise an eyebrow.
-Where does Hitchens think ethics come from? From the same mental processes and social interactions as religion, is the answer, from devising ways in which to explain who we are, how we got here, and what the purpose of our lives might be. Incredibly, there is no disputing the vast numbers in history murdered or ostracised or injured by religion, but Marxism and the crimes committed in its name have been just as bad, perhaps because the rationalist Marx larded so much of his text with allusions from secular and religious literature? (cf SS Prawer, Karl Marx and World Literature).
The place rationalism plays in mass murder has been evident since Plato's Republic where the philosopher presents an eminently reasonable case for a dictatorship, benign or otherwise, but still a dictatorship. Thomas Hobbes in Leviathan also uses reason to argue for an absolute ruler who guarantees the security of the population through a 'state of government' but who is assumed to act in so perpetually rational a manner that no dispute could ever disrupt the practice of government (or else!). Lenin's creation of the vanguard party uses rationalism to create a ruthless political machine in which the centre issues commands that cadres pass on to the 'masses', a machinery of indoctrination, ostracism, segregation, oppression, incarceration and death that Stalin used to slaughter his way through history.
Just as Hitchens is correct to claim a weakness of religion is [its] sheer arrogance to tell us that we already have all the essential information we need, the Communist Party played the same role as the source of absolute and unchanging facts.

There is no need for us to gather every day, or every seven days, or on any high and auspicious day, to proclaim our rectitude or to grovel and wallow in our unworthiness.
-Did not Hitchens hit the bars of London and New York as often as he could to drown his inner demons?

We atheists do not require any priests, or any hierarchy above them, to police our doctrine
-But atheists value the work of Charles Darwin higher than that of say, Cardinal Newman; and Hitchens I suspect did have a hierarchy of his 'greats' in which Shakespeare ranked higher than Ben Jonson, so his own rationalism consists of a hierarchy, and it is policed -by Hitchens and people like him.

I could go on at length about this mildly interesting man, but it does not really grapple with the way in which thought and behaviour has evolved over 4 million or so years or however long it has taken for humans to emerge and become so articulate. It is absurd to deny the moral cosmology that emerged probably in the Neolithic period as the foundation of human thought, from it we have religion and science, and I agree that organised religion -like organised politics- presents as many problems as it solves, but these are challenges to be met head on, not to be dismissed because one dislikes the manner in which some people kill and their reasons for it. I am sure even Hitchens would agree that human societies have systems of punishment and reward related to human behaviour, whether the judgements of what is good or bad behaviour is endorsed by reigion or 'secular' law (if there is such a thing).

Because Hitchens, endorsing regime change in Iraq, fatally endorsed acts of violence which in other contexts he is appalled by, as if it mattered how Abdul lost his head rather than that he lost it at all, and if it was chopped off so Hitchens could sleep more soundly, so be it?

A sizable chunk of Hitchens screed can be found here-
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_a...verything.html

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Originally Posted by Stavros

-Where does Hitchens think ethics come from? From the same mental processes and social interactions as religion, is the answer, from devising ways in which to explain who we are, how we got here, and what the purpose of our lives might be.

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That was a very powerful and thorough argument. But I think we should consider at least one difference between secular ethics and religious ethics. A secularist may latch on to certain bad ideas and have difficulty letting go of them, but there is nothing to keep him from revising his views in the face of new evidence or changing conditions.

The authors of holy books may have thought about ethical issues in a sincere way, but they decided to take the Machiavellian approach of creating allegories and adopting rules that are supposed to be the word of God. So, the only thing someone who inherited this doctrine as part of their tradition can do is ignore what they don't like. Their answer for laws that do not make sense but are the word of God is cognitive dissonance.

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Originally Posted by broncofan

That was a very powerful and thorough argument. But I think we should consider at least one difference between secular ethics and religious ethics. A secularist may latch on to certain bad ideas and have difficulty letting go of them, but there is nothing to keep him from revising his views in the face of new evidence or changing conditions.

The authors of holy books may have thought about ethical issues in a sincere way, but they decided to take the Machiavellian approach of creating allegories and adopting rules that are supposed to be the word of God. So, the only thing someone who inherited this doctrine as part of their tradition can do is ignore what they don't like. Their answer for laws that do not make sense but are the word of God is cognitive dissonance.

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Yes and no. The problem is that people are turned on, or turned off by the certainty of religion and the proposition that everything we need to know is already known and written down for us, and that nothing can change. We are led to believe that it is the capacity for new thinking and change that enables Science to progress, yet a substantial part of scientific knowledge is based on the same principle that we have established facts about the world we live in and that they cannot change, or that if they did it would be because of some hitherto unexpected phenomenon -gravity would be an example.

Repetition establishes facts, to a degree, the orthopraxy of religion may be more conducive to 'social control' as the faith itself, just as science repeats itself until something goes wrong. In both cases, pragmatic behaviour violates rules and often, over time, changes what are supposed to be rules that cannot be changed. Murder and infidelity both take place in violation of Christian, Judaic and Islamic laws, the best a human can do is make an excuse and apologise, or not as the case may be, and take their punishment.

On a deeper level, it is clear that modern societies do not obey religious law -Jews no longer stone adulterers to death, and even in those Muslim countries where this happens, it is rare and I believe most Muslims think it is simply wrong. The science that explains homosexuality to be irrational is almost impeccable -if everyone were homosexual, the human race would die out. The prospect of life being freed from the conception-gestation-birth process anchored in the womb and moved to a test-tube or laboratory may remove the fixed certainty that for life to exist one needs a man and a woman.

Science relies on fixed categories or it cannot function, just as you assume the car you parked outside last night will work when you turn the key this morning. The fixed reality of gender has been challenged, successfully I think, since the 1960s but primarily at the level of social role where the definitions of homosexuality for example, have changed, and where the concept of being transgendered is different from being intersexed, which one may say is a scientific rather than a social category to explain anomalies in the formation of the human. But consider the fracas over Germane Greer's consistent attacks on transexuality and what it means to be female, or 'feminine' -is Greer arguing for a science that does not and indeed, ought not to change just to accommodate a minority of people who 'choose' to swap genders?

Science and religion are not far apart as some think, rigid thinking is found in both. 'Immutable laws' are found in both. Fanatics and fierce debates with denunciations and character assassinations are found in both, and just as the founders of modern science were arrested by the religious state, often ended up in gaol, or burned at the stake, science has subjected humans to appalling cruelty in the laboratories of the Third Reich, and only some of it was driven by the bogus science of race.

Thus science replaces religion, Darwin is to science what Moses was to religion. And so on.

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Yes and no. The problem is that people are turned on, or turned off by the certainty of religion and the proposition that everything we need to know is already known and written down for us, and that nothing can change. We are led to believe that it is the capacity for new thinking and change that enables Science to progress, yet a substantial part of scientific knowledge is based on the same principle that we have established facts about the world we live in and that they cannot change, or that if they did it would be because of some hitherto unexpected phenomenon -gravity would be an example.

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In other words, we have well substantiated claims about world which we are reluctant to modify unless further investigate of the world warrants a revision.

You mention gravity as an example. Newton’s inverse square law was such a success, it became the paradigm example of a scientific theory. It quantitatively predicted the orbits the planets, the moon and other satellites, a number of astroids, the rise and fall of the tides and more...with one exception: the rate of advance of Mercury’s perihelion. The prediction was off by 40 seconds of arc per century. The inverse square law was not abandoned, but explanations were sought. Irregularities in the Sun’s gravitational field within the orbit of Mercury due perhaps in irregularities in the Sun’s shape or distribution of mass. Perhaps there were undiscovered planetoids perturbing Mercury’s orbit. Newton’s inverse square law was bested when Einstein’s theory of gravitation accurately retrodicted the advance of Mercury’s perihelion. Do we now take Einstein’s theory to be established fact instead of Newton’s? What has been established is the domain of Newton’s applicability. What has not yet been established is the domain of applicability of Einstein’s theory.

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On a deeper level, it is clear that modern societies do not obey religious law -Jews no longer stone adulterers to death, and even in those Muslim countries where this happens, it is rare and I believe most Muslims think it is simply wrong. The science that explains homosexuality to be irrational is almost impeccable -if everyone were homosexual, the human race would die out. The prospect of life being freed from the conception-gestation-birth process anchored in the womb and moved to a test-tube or laboratory may remove the fixed certainty that for life to exist one needs a man and a woman.

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This reminds me of the Shakers who believed intercourse to be sinful if the intent was pure for procreation. Needless to say, there are no more Shakers in the world. I’m not aware of any modern science that maintains homosexuality is irrational. It would be rational to maintain that if we value the continuation of the human species, then some people have got reproduce; but that claim involves a value judgment that lies outside the principles of the biological sciences. I know of no scientific principle in physics, biology, anthropology etc. that says, “The continuation of the human species is to be valued.”

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Science and religion are not far apart as some think, rigid thinking is found in both. 'Immutable laws' are found in both. Fanatics and fierce debates with denunciations and character assassinations are found in both, and just as the founders of modern science were arrested by the religious state, often ended up in gaol, or burned at the stake, science has subjected humans to appalling cruelty in the laboratories of the Third Reich, and only some of it was driven by the bogus science of race.

Thus science replaces religion, Darwin is to science what Moses was to religion. And so on.

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There are certainly examples of scientists and preachers who are rigid thinkers, unwilling to give up principles which in their eyes are immutable for one reason or another. There are profiteers, con-men, criminals and bigots in both worlds. Both science and religion, perhaps unwittingly, provide platforms that make it easy to for such rogues to operate their scams and perpetrate their crimes. I take it we are not talking about these sorts of exceptions (although this may leave some of the ‘new atheists’ out of the discussion). As you said above, religious practices have changed and as I’ve mentioned, so have some scientific principles at a fundamental level. One difference, however, is that its seems very difficult to override sacred text. Theologians may have very progressive ideas. As far as I know, there may be books and papers by theologians that explain why stoning adulterers is not what God has in mind for modern practitioners of the faith. But it’s the Bible that most practitioners and ordinary preachers read, teach and quote; and so the naive practitioner is faced with a quandary -a contradiction between scripture and practice- which she has to work out on her own. On the other hand, there are very few astrophysicists today who still read Newton. More biologists probably read Darwin, but more with historical interest than scientific: for there are more modern sources that lay out more modern arguments upon which modern biologists are more reliant.

I am of course glad that Jews don't stone people to death and that not many Muslims support the practice. Any exception to a rule that imposes a cruel result should be considered a net positive. However, I have not heard the explanation by Jews or Muslims as to why they should not follow a practice that is commanded by their religious doctrine and presumably endorsed by the deity whom they worship.

I cannot understand how someone can practice a religion with a fully formed doctrine, complete with history and direct interactions between ancient figures and their deity and believe only some of the claims are true.

When a law is passed by a legislative body and legislators are asked what they meant, you have the difficulty of divining the opinions of dozens of legislators.They each might have had a different subjective understanding of what they passed. With scripture you have the opinion of one entity that matters but he does not exist and has not made a single appearance to arbitrate.

But often it's not even a matter of the text being unclear; people simply don't want to follow provisions that have aged badly. And there is the cognitive dissonance. They must hold beliefs that contradict each other. What they follow is the word of God, God is omniscient, and he also commands things that are unwise. And if they choose not to believe their doctrine embodies the word of God, then what is superior about this bill of goods as a moral philosophy given all the baggage it comes with?

As for science, I love to read about it, but I have very little formal study of the subject. But I feel that what makes something a science is that it is testable, and a lot of the reasoning is inductive or based on observation. A theory may be developed based upon what is observed, but if there are phenomena that challenge the theory it may then be considered a useful but incomplete description of nature. It must be refined until it describes every anomaly, or scrapped if the data supporting it were misinterpreted or some other theory better explains them. At no point in the process should someone close their eyes to contradiction or allow their beliefs to be unchanged by something that challenges their original theory.

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Originally Posted by trish

In other words, we have well substantiated claims about world which we are reluctant to modify unless further investigate of the world warrants a revision.

You mention gravity as an example. Newton’s inverse square law was such a success, it became the paradigm example of a scientific theory. It quantitatively predicted the orbits the planets, the moon and other satellites, a number of astroids, the rise and fall of the tides and more...with one exception: the rate of advance of Mercury’s perihelion. The prediction was off by 40 seconds of arc per century. The inverse square law was not abandoned, but explanations were sought. Irregularities in the Sun’s gravitational field within the orbit of Mercury due perhaps in irregularities in the Sun’s shape or distribution of mass. Perhaps there were undiscovered planetoids perturbing Mercury’s orbit. Newton’s inverse square law was bested when Einstein’s theory of gravitation accurately retrodicted the advance of Mercury’s perihelion. Do we now take Einstein’s theory to be established fact instead of Newton’s? What has been established is the domain of Newton’s applicability. What has not yet been established is the domain of applicability of Einstein’s theory.



This reminds me of the Shakers who believed intercourse to be sinful if the intent was pure for procreation. Needless to say, there are no more Shakers in the world. I’m not aware of any modern science that maintains homosexuality is irrational. It would be rational to maintain that if we value the continuation of the human species, then some people have got reproduce; but that claim involves a value judgment that lies outside the principles of the biological sciences. I know of no scientific principle in physics, biology, anthropology etc. that says, “The continuation of the human species is to be valued.”



There are certainly examples of scientists and preachers who are rigid thinkers, unwilling to give up principles which in their eyes are immutable for one reason or another. There are profiteers, con-men, criminals and bigots in both worlds. Both science and religion, perhaps unwittingly, provide platforms that make it easy to for such rogues to operate their scams and perpetrate their crimes. I take it we are not talking about these sorts of exceptions (although this may leave some of the ‘new atheists’ out of the discussion). As you said above, religious practices have changed and as I’ve mentioned, so have some scientific principles at a fundamental level. One difference, however, is that its seems very difficult to override sacred text. Theologians may have very progressive ideas. As far as I know, there may be books and papers by theologians that explain why stoning adulterers is not what God has in mind for modern practitioners of the faith. But it’s the Bible that most practitioners and ordinary preachers read, teach and quote; and so the naive practitioner is faced with a quandary -a contradiction between scripture and practice- which she has to work out on her own. On the other hand, there are very few astrophysicists today who still read Newton. More biologists probably read Darwin, but more with historical interest than scientific: for there are more modern sources that lay out more modern arguments upon which modern biologists are more reliant.

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I do not disagree with what you say, perhaps I am trying to suggest that reverence is a factor here, that the reverence that is shown to science and what it has achieved, and what people believe it can achieve, can replace religion as a form of emotional and intellectual security. If not in 'the certainty of the resurrection', the certainty that these pills will stop the pain, that if I contract a disease, there will be a cure. It is coincidental that in the latest Times Literary Supplement (October 23 1015) Martin Kemp reviews Frank Wilczek's A Beautiful Question. Finding Nature's Deep Design and calls it 'a magnum opus on the secular theology of modern physics', refers to Wilczek's discussions of bosons, muons, gluons, leptons and electrons as being part of a 'Noah's Ark of particles', perhaps inevitably referring to Pythagoras, Plato, Kepler, Descartes, Newton and Einstein as 'prophets'. Perhaps the other issue is how do core theories in science change, if at all, compared to core theories in religion? Is it so important for a Christian to believe in the Virgin Birth that not do believe it disqualifies one as a Christian? Is String Theory a core theory in science or a sham?

Historically, the claims of science are outstanding in our times, not least because since Thomas Aquinas was charged with refuting science in favour of the word of God, science has proven to have practical solutions to practical problems that in the same period religion has failed to deal with in the same way. Thus more people put their faith in science, or should the word faith be banned as being inapplicable? It is perhaps not the core beliefs that interest, but the modalities of thought and feeling that mark the transfer of allegiance from a supernatural condition to one more humble and, dare one say it, temporary. None of which proves or disproves the existence of God, but may retire the fear.

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Originally Posted by broncofan

I am of course glad that Jews don't stone people to death and that not many Muslims support the practice. Any exception to a rule that imposes a cruel result should be considered a net positive. However, I have not heard the explanation by Jews or Muslims as to why they should not follow a practice that is commanded by their religious doctrine and presumably endorsed by the deity whom they worship.

I cannot understand how someone can practice a religion with a fully formed doctrine, complete with history and direct interactions between ancient figures and their deity and believe only some of the claims are true.

When a law is passed by a legislative body and legislators are asked what they meant, you have the difficulty of divining the opinions of dozens of legislators.They each might have had a different subjective understanding of what they passed. With scripture you have the opinion of one entity that matters but he does not exist and has not made a single appearance to arbitrate.

But often it's not even a matter of the text being unclear; people simply don't want to follow provisions that have aged badly. And there is the cognitive dissonance. They must hold beliefs that contradict each other. What they follow is the word of God, God is omniscient, and he also commands things that are unwise. And if they choose not to believe their doctrine embodies the word of God, then what is superior about this bill of goods as a moral philosophy given all the baggage it comes with?

As for science, I love to read about it, but I have very little formal study of the subject. But I feel that what makes something a science is that it is testable, and a lot of the reasoning is inductive or based on observation. A theory may be developed based upon what is observed, but if there are phenomena that challenge the theory it may then be considered a useful but incomplete description of nature. It must be refined until it describes every anomaly, or scrapped if the data supporting it were misinterpreted or some other theory better explains them. At no point in the process should someone close their eyes to contradiction or allow their beliefs to be unchanged by something that challenges their original theory.

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I think what we are dealing with here is the subtle differences between orthodoxy and orthopraxy. The central tenets of a faith may not change -indeed, may not be allowed to change- yet the contemporary application of what sacred texts say is clearly not applied always and everywhere in the same way. Two outstanding issues can be found with Jews and Muslims in Christian Britain, where the rights of women to be treated equally before the law are concerned. In both cases where divorce is the issue, a legal divorce conferred by a court of law, may be challenged by the Beth Din, in the case of Jews, and by the opinion of an Imam in the case of Muslims. In many cases women argue that the Beth Din fails to recognise the law of England as the primary judgement, and that husbands, perhaps for vindictive reasons, refuse to divorce their wives 'religiously'. For observant Jewish women, obtaining a judgement from the Beth Din is crucial if they want to marry again, so that this obstacle is seen as hurtful, even if it appears to conform to Jewish law. In the case of Muslim women, the issue of who becomes the legal guardian of the children becomes an issue if an Imam awards them -as most often they do- to the father than the mother. Neither of these processes has any legal clout, but because of the behavioural nexus of Jews and Muslims 'united in their faith', it would be difficult for them to ignore the judgements or cause them genuine distress to do so.

On this basis one has to recognise that it is important for many to be part of a community of believers, but that in doing so they become part of a social group where their individuality is challenged, or enhanced as the case may be, and that I think is where the fractures appear, because how that community interprets the sacred texts -or not- can determine behaviour which may be benign in some cases -not excommunicating someone from the community for adultery- or extremely violent -excommunication or even murder as a consequence.

Mob mentality is clearly a distressing example of how badly things can go with so called 'religious faith' as the shocking case of Farkhunda in Afghanistan shows. Her personal complaint was that a man was selling spells, which is clearly not Islamic, but which also seems to be common amongst Muslims in Afghanistan much as people around the world of all faiths believe in prayer, magic, superstition, the intercession of the Virgin Mary at Lourdes, and so on- but when she challenged the man, he accused her of burning a Quran whereupon a mob descended on her, beat her to death and tried to burn her body, most of this being caught on video. I don't know if any of this has links to religion or theology, but it does illustrate how collective reactions to perceived injustices can flare up. The assumption that a course of action must be taken if someone 'insults the prophet' or the Quran is just that because there is no blasphemy in Islam and most of these violent reactions are cultural rather than theological. There is a link to Farkhunda's case here-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Farkhunda

A stark cleavage between religion and science can be seen with disease, where science has been able to isolate the causes of disease and find treatment and a cure, while religion explains disease as 'the wrath of God' or divine punishment for collective sins. This can have devastating consequences, notably for outsiders in a community. The historian Frank Snowden writing on Cholera noted how in southern Italy in the early 20th century the local name for it was 'lo zingaro' ('the gypsy') with all the connotations that has. The emerging fascist movement in the UK, the British Brothers insisted Jews brought diseases with them from Russia, just as in today's Telegraph people writing comment on an article on immigration insist Syrian refugees arriving (or in their parlance, 'invading') in Europe are bringing with them Jihad and disease, in this case with no God at the back urging them to think of it as punishment for sins committed.

I doubt most people read the Bible for what it means, but suspect they skim it for what it says, and are only satisfied when they find something they want to read just as Muslim radical read the Quran to find a justification to kill someone regardless of the actual meaning or context in which that sura was delivered. The social relations in which these religious texts are read thus shapes the way they are understood, and it may have no relation at all to the meaning that was intended but is validated by that social context, not least if there is a project to complete, be it conversion, missionary work, an assassination, or a bombing. The fact that one can probably justify anything with reference to the Bible or the Quran does not in fact justify it, and that it seems to me is where the chasm opens up between theology and politics and most of what we have these days, is politics, and bad politics at that.