Religions and their respective bubbles of delusion

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One of the most outrageous hubristic characteristics of human speculation is that reason is an exclusively human capability. I can accept that humans have a much stronger ability than most other animals (we do not know enough to totally exclude all other life) but reason is a common capability in many other species as it is a basic survival characteristic. I have experienced reason in many other animals although it does not rest in language.

First of all to attempt comparison with something undefined is beyond foolishness. It is abysmal stupidity.
DW_a_mom may feel attacked by somebody attempting to apply logic to her conceptions but that is a psychological problem she has to learn to live with. Any thinking person who must rely on what they believe to be a pragmatic method for comprehending the world is perfectly within his/her right to apply that method to any belief. That people might be offended by that only reveals a basic insecurity within themselves and that is outside the realm of normal interpersonal civil interaction. The much publicized violent reaction of Muslim fundamentalists to any expressed doubts to their beliefs merely indicates how fragile those beliefs must be to demand obliteration of anyone expressing those doubts.

Well, technically God is a thing with certain descriptions, the issue is that God does not have a definite definition. God may have descriptive characteristics, but that is a different thing. And the lack of a definition could be due to a qualitative issue. How do you define blue without referring back to the physics? You can't, you just say that blue is this, some things are bluer, and some things are less blue. God is then just to be taken as basic like that.

By "apply logic" you mean "criticize". There is a difference between the two things you know. People are offended whenever *any* of their holy cows are attacked, and this isn't just a matter of "basic insecurity" but it is a matter of identity. I mean, if one "applied logic" to let's say my cooking skills, I could end up being very offended too. This isn't an abnormal reaction, and in fact, the abnormal reaction is probably the opposite.

Islam has a very touchy belief system. That does not mean fragile, that means touchy. I mean, one does not have to have logical flaw to identify with a belief, most people do this.

Technically, "blue" is just a human abstraction that only exist in our brains.

The color blue can be traced as a reaction to a physical stimulus. It is a basic phenomenon of the nervous system. The idea of God has no basic nervous system reaction. It is a deduction assumed from observations that can be interpreted in many ways, some in conformity with logic and some mere speculation.

Touchy is merely a word to describe a reaction to a confrontation that is out of proportion to the stimulus and the reason for that violent reaction is that the stimulus is a strong threat to the stability of a conviction. It is a fear reaction that demands wiping out of the threat with maximum violence and demonstrates the vulnerability of the conviction.

One could say the same thing about perfection. The point I am getting at stands, that certain notions cannot really be defined because of their basicness.


I think you are missing my point. I mean, yes, blue is just a basic reaction to a physical stimulus, but the issue isn't "basic nervous system reactions", the issue is definitions. Blue cannot really be defined as something other than [blue]this color[/blue], and attempting to use other methods, while giving additional information, still does not really show us what blue is.


Umm... a fear reaction? The Koran emphasizes Allah's supreme nature and importance. Attacking their religion, to them, could be considered the same as insulting their family, nation, political beliefs, and personal hygiene put on steroids. Is this the same as being afraid?? Not really, this is just a sign of being very sensitive to the demands of their deity, and Allah is a rather demanding deity, where this life is considered less important than the will of Allah.

You are very vague about what you mean by "is" as in the infamous Clinton quote. Evidently you believe God and blue are semantic rather than perceptual problems.

As far as Arab culture is concerned, all you have done is specified where the fear originates but does not deny that the fear exists. There is great fear of personal social loss in that it leads to violent and frequently fatal social retribution and evidently Allah is considered in the same light.

I don't think so. I am outlining a principle, and using a similar situation, a brute phenomenal fact, as an analogy.

The issue I am getting at is that not all things can be arrived at through defining other things. We do not really get to blueness without seeing blue, however, we can define other things in relationship to blue (blueberries). I believe Alexander Pruss's argument relies on this similar principle, however, he is arguing up from blueberries to the existence of blueness.


Um... I didn't specify a fear. I never said anything about social loss. I said something about offense. Being offended does not imply that an individual lose something. I am offended by child molestation, but I am not afraid of child molesters or anything of that nature.

Insofar as "blue" is concerned the assumption that is ubiquitous that blue is a universal quality derived from the abstraction from the bundles of qualities exhibited by many sources from blueberries to the sea to the clear sky and it possesses a unique existence of its own is very useful but it is false. I know from my own neural circuitry that what I call blue detected by my right eye is not quite the same as the blue from my left eye. If that difference exists within the relative homogeneous environment of my own organism it is not unlikely that greater differences exist between individual humans, not to speak of different species. Your seeming disdain of scientific references to specific spectral frequencies dismisses the only common ground for nailing down the stimulus that creates what we each accept as blue. In actuality there are no such things as qualities or objects in what is assumed to be objective reality. There is only a continuous cascade of events interacting with our sense mechanisms from which we draw conclusions of commonality and with which we construct a continuously modified internal model which permits us to navigate successfully. Since all humans, and to an extent, many other related species, have sense mechanisms with many common features we go under the assumption that we all use somewhat the same model and this assumption permits rational interaction to a large extent but problems in social interaction clearly demonstrate the faults in that assumption.

Being offended does indicate an attack on a social assumption and permitting any success in that attack generates a sense that those assumptions might be false. In western society most people feel confident enough of their assumptions to dismiss these attacks as inconsequential but the fierceness of the response in Arab society clearly indicates the knife edge precariousness of social relationships in the Arab world. That a family will viciously execute a daughter that strays even slightly from social norms makes it obvious that the family feels tremendously threatened by the social context and that is a clear and open exhibition of fear that cannot be denied whether you choose to recognize it or not.

It's not only the Arab society which does that.
I think that all societies do it, in a way or another, when they're or feel threatened.

Many examples avalaible everywhere - in newspapers, on television, in history, wherever you'd like to look at.

And for the blue, what about the colour blindness?

What about color blindness?

Echolalia?



Ah! But you live in Finland! It's all white overthere, isn't it?
... Well, at least for a good part of the year.

No, it's not very different in weather from New York City. The woods around here are lush and green and full of mushrooms.

Not echolalia, I'm asking what you are trying to say about the color blue. If you can't distinguish it from any other color it has no visual existence for you. Like ultra violet. But it still can be detected by a spectrometer.

It was a metaphor.
People are human, not spectrometers.

So, if someone can't detect the blue color from another one, or the green from the yellow does this person have to wear some kind of special glasses all the time?
Like policemen or military in the night or some kind of Hanibal Lecter in movies.

There are special glasses for strong lights like brown, blue, green, even pink but to see the colours that your eyes cannot detect?
I'm not sure it's already invented.

I don't understand your problem. Do you feel it absolutely necessary to see radio waves ore radar waves or gamma radiation? They are all part of the electro-magnetic spectrum. If you don't see it you do without it. Color blind people might have problems with traffic lights but I believe the red and the green are always in the same vertical relationship so color isn't absolutely necessary although it is very helpful.

I agree with you.

And besides, it doesn't matter either if you don't understand my problem.
It wouldn't be useful to you either

... I'm not a traffic light!