Why do some people feel the need to denigrate the religious?

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For me, I don't want people to do the right thing because a religion tells them to. I want them to do the right thing because they believe it's the right thing to do.

Many religious people do want to do the right thing, however. I've met lots of very kind and genuine people that happen to be very religious. My problem arises when someone just assumes they're doing the right thing because they follow a certain religion. I hope this makes sense...

I'd have to consider there to be different zones on this. Some of these, many in our culture, are tribal customs or really assumptions arrived at once upon a time whether two hundred years ago or two thousand years ago, that we follow whether the evidence has antiquated them or not - and I'd fully agree that their continued existence is almost purely a social construct in the sense most people mean it. The other zone would be incurring natural consequences, like base-jumping without a parachute for an extreme example, where people can almost assure you that such an endeavor will have disastrous consequences or in milder but more pervasive cases where we know that certain kinds of fraudulent financial activity are a bit like parasites riding on the back of real work being done in the economy and I don't mean just complex services but things that are almost pure vapor or rent-seeking.

In the most absolute sense, ie. the sense that there's nothing wrong with someone jumping naked on a big mound of cacti, drinking a whole vial of LSD, or testing a shotgun on their own arm, sure reality is that cold - maybe the only caveat for a person gaining an entry on the Darwin Awards is the degree to which their doing so negatively impacted another person's pursuit of happiness. At the same time I think the problem people are having with postmodernism as it's currently practiced either by people who just misunderstand it, deliberately want to misuse it, or are playing within the logic of certain lauded authors in the post-modernist field, fail to draw the distinction between the right and wrong of tribal knowledge (ie. collective superstition) vs accrued knowledge of activities and their natural consequences.

So I guess while it's true that, ultimately, even survival decisions or the practice of good common sense is a social construct (human beings surviving rather than dying, in good health with less suffering, is self-referential) it seems like there are plenty of ideas that are just historical artifacts and plenty which, like maintaining flood levies on a river known to flood a lot or making sure that city water filtration systems are keeping the lead out fo the public drinking water, have disastrous consequences on a wide scale if not followed. The consequences in the first case, like being burned at the stake for heresy, is a physical harm caused by social or tribal custom in motion whereas the second case, weakened levies breaking or a city full of people with lead poisoning from the water out of negligence, is a physical consequence and catalogs of known physical consequence are difficult to regard as social constructs in the sense that I think most people would use the term.



I think the way I'd phrase the set of concepts above is that our best answers for what's scientifically true, or what the best social norms for creating a moral society, is context-dependent.

That context is the state of our knowledge, the understanding that the only things we can really be sure of, being that we have no known touchstones to what one might be able to call absolute reality, is our assurances of certain relationships between things that have stood the test of time after repeated examination and study.



I'll credit ruveyn, who used to come here regularly, with a snappy quote - "A chair makes a bad ladder and an even worse tea cup". I think the way the religious often appeal to their texts as authorities on ultimate reality is using the chair as a tea cup whereas if someone goes to the opposite extreme, in the Dawkins sort of way, they're mistaking the chair as being only ever a bad tea cup. I'd agree with Sam Harris that a lot of the positives and worthwhile content to be found in the bible or the quran can be found in less adulterated forms in other places but I think as far as the sociological utility of religion, what it is and how its been used, I like Jonathan Haidt's appeals to Emile Durkheim.

I think religion is something we can learn from in terms of what worked, why it worked, what it tells us about human beings and how they socialize, and we should - as we move forward - try to use that knowledge for a) maximal social integrity with b) the least unnecessary pain to keep enough social cohesion for everything to still work.

As for scientism from the pseudoscience side or people trying to pass critiques of science off as science itself, I tend to think they're a symptom of a larger problem. While it's true that nothing like elan vital has been making it back into mainstream science much and that it's stayed quite materialistic for some time I also find it insightful to hear just how roughly Richard Feinman was even treated with his new ideas. It seems like when anyone comes to the established scientific community with a new or radical idea the ritual hazing involved is quite a sight. That's nothing unique to the sciences though, ie. anyone whose worked in enough corporate environments knows that there aren't just people trying to solve problems but lots and lots of people, especially middle to upper management, who see problem-solvers as threats, or anyone who might prove to be better than them as someone who they need to arrange failures for. Similarly if a new upstart scientist is trying to overturn a previously established theory it seems like many people who've invested in that theory take personal offense that the idea is being challenged, ie. that they could have been wrong, and they take that out on the newcomer. On one hand the hazing does send the vapid new ager away crying, at the same time it also means that the person with a credible theory - who knows it - has to work their tail off and 'pay their dues' for a very long time, and they may only get recognition well after their dead. I don't know which Tedx you're referring to but there's a couple possibilities here - the first being that they are trying to bypass the hard work dishonestly and the second being that they're reaching out for help hoping to influence aspiring researchers to join their investigation.

Human beings are just mean to each other like this, partly out of personal egotism being a large driver toward achievement and position in society and also because we just aren't very good at vetting ideas.

This is where I find it quite insightful when I hear commentators on the practice of science even voice their pessimism with the scientific community itself and consider the possibility that most scientists even don't do science well. I'm sure corporate interests controlling grant money doesn't help much and that a lot of research gets mangled by its incentive structures.

But I would still agree with you that science is the best system - when done right - for establishing boiler plate claims about reality. Where I might disagree with some other posters in this thread is that I do think that the 'supernatural' is a pool of mixed claims, ie. unknown natural at one end and pure interpolation of neural reactions on the other. I think anything that's beyond what we know that a person encounters can enter into their beliefs as an experience that has to transform them to some degree. At the same time they're stuck with a hypothesis. A thing is really in a possible but unsubstantiated state of affairs when enough people experience it but it can neither be scientifically confirmed nor denied. That's where if a person can draw upon enough ingenuity to test their intuitions or heterodox experiences and confirm or deny them, and if that experiment or series of experiments consistently gives a result that forces current orthodoxy to reconsider what they think they know about the nature of reality - they've given the world a gift, really another stepping stone in the right direction, regardless of who that gift discomforts.

shlaifu,

Something else I was just thinking about as far as the worlds problems is how insecure people sort of have an 'act on mass' thing, surround what stands out and amplify that difference into absurdity, ie. where they can confuse otherwise intelligent and clear-thinking people into not believing in themselves when really its just the dragnet that they drop on anyone that they tend to see a credible intellectual threat. Its a very subtle swap of reality for psychosocial astroturf and it seems to be a large part of what life is when we're buried in questions of what's in style, whose cool or whose not, who fits in or who doesn't, etc.. It's a bit like that marketplace of ideas has been run either by blind instinct and people's abject ignorance of it, cynical navigation by those who do have control, or it could just be a very well synced reaction of people just not wanting to see other people succeed more than themselves.

A couple things that have happened in the past few days has me deeply questioning how I've looked at myself for most of my life in this regard. It also casts a particularly long shadow on trait agreeableness in that it might have a lot to do with creating the sort of obsessive 'conform-conform-conform!' hive mind that's so often on display.

personally, I think that when it comes to the marketplace of ides - well, it succumbs to market forces. Cycles, Fashions, Profit interests, etc. - conform-conform-conform to and idea or agreeing on that apple products are superior... I don't see much difference.

This guy has interesting things to say - and it made me realize what bugs me about Jordan Peterson.
In Daniel Drezner's terms: he turned from a public intellectual, keeping check on a bad idea, into a thought leader, pushing ideas himself that have not gone through the same vetting process as the one he was previously warding off.
- he became a brand, fast, and is now making huge profits off of delivering to his clientele.


But then, there's other approaches like the very extreme feminist approach, that attacks the very way we validify (scientific) knowledge, with rhetoric hyperbole (see "Newton's rape manual"). - but since these turn against the very way science is making a discrimination between good and bad, there is no agreed upon way to actually validate what's better than another thing.

I deliberatley used the word discrimination here, to point out that there is no way of telling good from bad without discriminating in some way. It's the very essence of the process. - but discrimination has also been the thing that gave the world the nazis. so... I'm at a loss, and figured all I can do is keep reading and learn to think better.


Also: I highly recommend Steven Greenblatt'sthe Swerve -how the world became modern - which I just finished. It's a brilliant non-fiction book, reads like a novel - with about a hundred pages annex of sources and citations.

I might actually say I don't specifically have a problem with upstart injections of the like insofar as a) the idea points at something pervasive enough that it never could have really passed through that context of review on a separate piece by piece basis as a case isn't made for those pieces in isolation and b) it's happening at a time where we're hitting a wall and need potentially ground-shaking hypotheses (right or wrong) to sweep the public sphere and possibly shift public momentum toward vetting such hypotheses. I think what he does relay in a meaningful manner is that while scientists might not be able to give value judgments individuals, in trying to figure out how to best live their lives, are forced to make value judgments regardless of how they feel about it.

Also earlier I wasn't necessarily referring to the market place of ideas as a whole but the corner I was mentioning that barely seems to catch daylight much except when Einstein wrote about the fierce hatred of the great by the mediocre or works of cultural insight and history like John Ralson Saul's Voltaire's Bastards where he talks about five hundred years of political history across western Europe and the continental US in terms of what he considered the courtier middle-management sort of class which were the courts of kings and now the bureaucrats in major political cities.

from an amazon review quoting from Voltaire's Bastards:
"The undoubted sign of a society well under control or in decline is that language has ceased to be a means of communication and has become instead a shield for those who master it."

okay, this is going on the reading list. - right after "the philosophy of andy warhol". That'll make for a fun contrast, too.

but just from this one quote, I can point to one thing: I think modern western society liked to think of itself as well under control, and still holds on to the idea, even in the face of its story of "good" globalization and "good" capitalism having experienced major cracks. And now, there are lots of narratives competing, but those who like to think of the society as still well under control present competing narratives in a way that pits them against each other, rather than against the prevailing one..... so, I guess in that respect, a radical new narrative/idea is needed, however, radical new ideas have in the past never gained traction without the prevailing narrative ending in catastrophe. - for atomism, it took the plague to wipe out half of europe's population AND significant inventions that promised greater wealth.
or, as in case of the US, a perceived blank slate (never mind the indigenous population, whose culture and worldview was forced to come to what can be considered its end, in practical terms)
for communism and national socialism, it took the decline of feudalism.
so what comes after the promises of global capitalism? who knows. until then, there will be lots of argueing, and lots of stupid but radical ideas, I guess...

In that exact case I really don't think the answer will be a new philosophy so much a massive disruption of the type your mentioning by way of AI and industrial efficiency reaching such new heights that the amount of waste plummets and the possibility of having a Starbucks on every street corner of every nation, while perhaps not practical for local customary reasons (ie. not everyone drinks coffee), could still theorhetically possible in that the whole world may eventually find their primary complaints in life to be slow internet speeds or or no bars on their handheld devices.

that is the hopeful vision of technology - and I sincerely hope you're right, even though it has religious undertones.
I used to think star trek was bit naff for portraying all alien planets sharing one global culture, but I've been to China, and India repeatedly over the years and saw the increasing adoption of tech and the internet, took ubers everywhere and had conversations over southpark with people from the other side of the globe. It is pretty amazing.

That is one thing I really like about star trek you have all these different people from different planets that find ways to more or less co-exist, granted there is of course some ongoing conflict but always like seeing the people from vastly different cultures finding common ground and such.

I have noticed that people are more eager to denigrate Christians than other religions. Why is that?

Is it because Christians = establishment?

Last edited by Tim_Tex on 10 Dec 2017, 8:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.

That's more Mellen Thomas Benedict too.

This is one of the things that grieves me about the current state of information in our culture - ie. container divides seem to push out a lot of great thinkers as people want to have purity of context. Dion Fortune, Israel Regardie, Paul Foster Case, and Aleister Crowley were all profound thinkers with profound insights worth understanding even if one thinks occultism and mysticism are a crock of s---. Similarly Mellen's one of those cases where you might run into a new-ager or NDE'er who has a lot to say that actually makes an incredible amount of sense even if you might completely disagree with the context he has those ideas resting in. I sometimes feel a bit lonely because I feel like I'm one of the few people who'll wade out into those territories, lasso the gems, and not either completely dismiss people out of hand or believe everything they say as gospel truth on the other.

Well at least in my age group a lot of people grew up having their parents take them to church and Christianity was the religion the majority was exposed to. So a lot of people came to question religion in general by initially questioning Christianity or at least some of the specific beliefs of this or that denomination. So I think at least sometimes it is based on it being the main religion followed in their region.

I remember in school one time people seemed to think it was weird that a girl in our class had parents who were atheists. And that was just in the earlier 2000's.

I mean say Islam was the main religion, then I probably would have started off questioning that one initially as that is what I would have likely been mainly exposed to.

I'd actually go so far to say that our western societies are not really Christian, - our economies are not set up to care about christianity, and christian belief doesn't play a major role in decision making - except for a handful of topics, relating to death- abortion, assisted dying and so forth.

However, christianity is the religion with which humanism and science had to wrestle the most, and eventually won against.
In some cultures, this conversation here couldn't even happen, and it feels pointless to even start, actually.
Plus, with religions of minority groups, liberalism and atheism is more careful as to not appear xenophobic towards their cultures, - as if culture and religion were not deeply entwined.

Yeah, we're hypocrites, too.

Xenophobia or racism isn't always exclusive to religion or religious people. Why not?

I do find some things wrong about your comments (the part about Christianity being the only religion to go against science), also just because Christianity doesn't have an active role in most government decisions, that doesn't mean that western societies should forget that it had influenced it historically and played a role in it's formation. It's heritage, both the good and bad parts of it.

I don't think you need to be religious to dislike abortion. If someone got pregnant, it is their own fault. That child is already alive. Have you seen pictures from abortion clinics? Its horrible! Would you like to have been killed prematurely, if you parents didn't feel like having a child?

The only point in my mind where there is even a debate about abortion is if the person was raped. And even then, i still dislike the idea. Give the baby up for adoption if you need to. Just don't rob it of its chance to live.

Folks who praise religion are also usually more eager to praise Christianity than to praise say, the Druze sect.

Folks on WP spend more verbiage bashing Obama, Bush, and/or Trump, than they do bashing Mugabe.

Folks talk about what has proximity to them.

But also yes, Christian churches have the most power in the countries that have the most power. So also Christianity is "the establishment".