Well let's see. Buffy premiered a little over 10 years ago, not 20. So let's cut that number in half. I can believe 25,000 women abandoned the established church for an alternative. But not all 25,000 turned to Wicca. And not all who went to Wicca did it because of Buffy. I would imagine if there had been no Buffy the difference in the numbers would be extremely small.
And if they did all seek out Wicca and all did it because of Buffy--so what?
So the "the kids are all leaving church to become pagan" angle has shifted from Harry Potter to a 90s tv show? I wouldn't have expected that, but it's true that the main message from Buffy jars with the more traditional messages about the place of women from various churches.
I'm surprised the Mail didn't somehow manage to blame immigration. Personally I think they need to serve more snacks at church, that'd get bums on seats (in the US sense of the word too ;). Last time I went to church they had a Powerpoint presentation and I can't have been the only one thinking "Lan Party !". What would Jesus Do ? Well he'd strafe left and then use his BFG from a distance of course ;).
And I guess we'd need to know what the men/women split was to begin with and what she means by "rate". Could be that in absolute terms there're still many more women going to church than men, i'd be surprised if that wasn't still the case to be honest.
(the Buffy connection's as thin as a gnat's wotsit too of course - unless the rate jumped up in 1998 - because she's using figures starting from 1989, 9 years before it premiered on terrestrial UK telly. And are women becoming wiccans at the same rate as they leave the C of E or is that a spurious connection too ?)
ETA: Some of which was said while I was turning my sausages - pork and apple, yum ;).
Yeah, imo, if true, great. If not true, still great. I'm glad the mother church C of E is going to ordain women as bishops, I guess - if you want to be a C of E bishop, and you're female, then more power to ya - but I'm more of the Bill Hicks school of thinking on this one:
"Women priests? Great, great. Now there's priests of both sexes I don't listen to."
I'm not sure I believe that BtVS drove great swarms of women to join the Wiccan religion, and I'm not a big supporter (to put it mildly) of any religion, including Pagan or Wiccan, but if watching Buffy led to greater (unmeasurable) female empowerment, then my only reaction is "Awesome. Well done, you."
And hurrah for pork-and-apple snausages, while I'm at it.
My over-all opinion, if these feelings of alientation exist, people leave for something What it is might have an immediate determinant but if that were absent it'd be soemthing else.
windmillchaser; To soem extent, the dynamics in European churhces, with the state church heritages hanging over them, differ from what happens over here.
QuoterGal; We can get those this side the pond? Wow.
Her logic does not resemble our Earth logic is right! The irony that female empowerment is being blamed for women essentially committing a "sin" by leaving the church. Ugh.
I've yet to see a true, accurate portrayal of pagans or witches in film or media... and a true witch wouldn't base his or her spiritual path upon the likes of any character-based witch.
Oh, fabulous. Yet another Christian jumping to silly conclusions and sweeping generalizations and making all of us Christians out to be paranoid and overly judgmental. First "Harry Potter is the devil" and now this. Just exactly what we needed.
I dunno, Simon ends up living on a spaceship with Kaylee and Doctor Who has adventures across the totality of time and space - I think they're pretty decent adverts for Drdom ;).
Yet another Christian jumping to silly conclusions and sweeping generalizations and making all of us Christians out to be paranoid and overly judgmental.
I don't read it that way at all. She may be a Christian (her choice of topics for discussion suggest she is) but she's also a sociologist at the University of Derby and writer on women's issues. The report itself (and even, in fairness, the articles summarising it) don't seem to be condemning women for their choices, if anything they seem to me to be condemning the C of E for not moving quickly enough with the times.
This is her university's press release (a lot of which seems strangely familiar) and I find it a pity that this serious (for Christian churches anyway) issue is being submerged under the frankly laughable idea that any significant number of women abandoned the church for Wicca (as seen on TV) rather than for any of the other likely reasons that are listed on that link.
Yeah but in fairness 'Top Gun' doesn't really resemble US naval aviation either, recruitment still benefited from it though ;).
(it'd be interesting to see statistics - if there are any - on the number of women abandoning wicca after a short time because it's not what they thought it was going to be)
She believes many women have been put off going to church in recent years because of the influence of feminism, which challenged the traditional Christian view of women's roles and raised their aspirations.
How awful! We women have aspirations? Raised aspirations at that. When did I miss that memo? That might have happened when I was rereading the BtVS S8… ;)
So, by DM's count Buffy turned 50,000 ladies into 'witchcraft' (so you sure, 10,000 of those didn't just choose sleeping in?)? And that’s Buffy alone - c'mon, Charmed might've been low on the well-written feminism, but give them 3 (plus) witches credit too! lol
*pickes up S8* Taking BUF's words out of context (or not, hmm)
The thing about changing the world... once you do it, the world's all different
Well, Saje, I guess this might be a case of me jumping to conclusions. It just makes me sad that while the majority (not all, mind you) of Christians that I know are lovely, generous people, the vocal minority are the ones who are constantly in the news about everything from abortion clinic bombings to burning Harry Potter to hating on anyone and anything. I've no doubts most other religions feel the same way--my Muslim friends certainly do--about the portrayal of their religion in the media.
I'm not saying that her conclusions don't have legitimacy--some of them definitely do--and I obviously didn't phrase it correctly--I think it was the reporting that was overstating things, especially in the first article. I could just easily, easily see crazy Christians waving this study around as further evidence that pop culture is destroying the world. I could see this snowballing and turning into something ugly. I just don't want to see that happen.
Last time I went to church they had a Powerpoint presentation and I can't have been the only one thinking "Lan Party !". What would Jesus Do ? Well he'd strafe left and then use his BFG from a distance of course ;).
Well, he certainly wouldn't be a filthy, low-down, CAMPER ;)!
I dunno, that might just kick the interdenominational hornet's nest ;).
Well, he certainly wouldn't be a filthy, low-down, CAMPER ;)!
There's probably a textual justification. "And yea, verily he did gib from on high and lo, from the wicked opposition many shouts, wreathed in sarcasm did follow of 'Oh, very fucking mysterious I don't think your supreme camposity'" (Note: this may be from the apocrypha, actual words may vary) ;-).
I think it was the reporting that was overstating things, especially in the first article. I could just easily, easily see crazy Christians waving this study around as further evidence that pop culture is destroying the world. I could see this snowballing and turning into something ugly.
Yeah, I get that Lirazel (as an atheist I sometimes feel the same way listening to Richard Dawkins rattle on ;). If you're not from the UK BTW you'll have no reason to know this but the Daily Mail is pretty much the epitome of a reactionary, "little England", small 'c' conservative mindset wherein everything was better before X happened, with X moving around but recently featuring the "Polish invasion" (i.e. cheap immigrant labour after Poland gained EU membership). Blowing things up to create a sensation and obscure the facts is probably in their mission statement ;).
I'm surprised Fox News in the U-S hasn't mentioned this yet. If they can accuse Michael Phelps of making kids fat because he'll be on a box of Kellogg's Frosted Flakes next month, it won't be long until they waste airtime on this "story".
All service and social organizations are adjusting to the fact that more women are in the paid workforce and fewer are available as volunteers. The Girl Scouts, which has been woman-led and feminist from its inception, has had to deal with this.
A recent sociological survey in the US found that Americans are abandoning the religions they were brought up in and switching to others at record rates, and that these conversions are going in every direction. Episcopalians may be turning Wiccan, but I know one former Wiccan who has become an Orthodox Christian.
Well, Saje, I just got back from spending summer semester in London, but truthfully, my only interaction with British newspapers was those free ones they hand out on the Tube, so I really had no idea of the Daily Mail's reputation. But your description doesn't really surprise me.
as an atheist I sometimes feel the same way listening to Richard Dawkins rattle on I can imagine. I guess we all have people from whatever group we might associate ourselves with (from religion to fandom to politics to schools we attended) that we just wish wouldn't try to speak for us. It's why we should all give each other the benefit of the doubt, I think.
Newsflash: Researchers express utter shock as feminists leave archaic patriarchal organisation! "It was tha devil!" said Mr. N. Cummings of Little Hasling Village.
Like others before me, all I can ask is: Who cares? So women are leaving the church. Whoopie-dee-freakin-do!
If you are looking for blame, look within. Buffy didn't lure them away with Wicca, ya looney-tunes. Presumably, they left because they weren't happy with this specific organized religion. Good grief. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see they are looking for a scapegoat.
The BBC, the Mail and the Telegraph appear to be misquoting the press release which clearly states that "the church (all Christian denominations)" are facing this decline not just the CofE.
Bless the Mail and their illogical right wing fears. Women have been leaving the church for a long time - it goes with female education and empowerment leading to rejection and a certain freedom from a previously patriarchial society. The Telegraph article is much better written.
The wording which annoys me the most about this, is that they do not put wiccan as the fault but "empowerment of women" It's lines like that are causing the women to leave, not because Wicca necessarily looks more enticing because of TV shows or movies. These shows show downtrod women how they could live, and I say good on them for being strong enough to get away. I wish I was. So many churches, even those with women preachers, still teach a lot of sexism at it's core. Some churches insist women wear skirts to church out of respect, and I personally, have never got how wearing a skirt is more respectful than wearing nice dress pants, when both are equally accepted as neat casual or above. Many are anti-abortion. Some allow men to remarry, but not women. Many still push for the woman to be a stay at home mum, because God created her to be a mother, so that's all she should do.
This is not much different from over in the Muslim society. Thanks to the joys of internet, cheap travel, and TV, their women see how other women in the world live. Many wish they could live like that. But unlike the CoE women, they can't just up and leave their religion. We are very lucky to be able to choose without our lives being in danger, and I am grateful for that.
Church membership waxes and wanes. Some of the fastest growing churches worldwide (e.g. pentecostal churches) are among the most conservative and only allow limited leadership roles for women.
As for me, I love both Buffy and Jesus. I attend an Episcopal church that has a woman priest, and many of my male and female friends there (including the priests' kids) are huge fans of Buffy and Firefly.
How strong can someone's faith be if it can be completely derailed by a television show? Even a show as great and thought provoking as Buffy or any Whedon effort shouldn't be able to make you change religions unless you really didn't fully BELIEVE in the first place. I, myself, am not religious, but I have loads of friends that are. I've watched Buffy with them and they don't have any henna tatoos OR spice racks! ;) No offense to wiccans, but I just had to reference that line.
Maybe science and religious-inspired violence are finally colliding in the common person's psyche. Maybe social progress now enables women to shuffle off their patriarchal limitations, realizing they are full citizens, capable of making their own life choices. Maybe religion is slowly, hopefully, becoming irrelevant, as people shuck off irrational beliefs which cannot be proved and are based on nothing but stories and traditions.
Buffy is not the cause. Buffy is a reflection, showing us how we've outgrown the naive, flat-earth of the past and moved on. Why do I say this? We don't believe Buffy is real. It is fantasy. We know this. In the same breath, a rational adult will realize the religions it borrows from are also fantasies.
For proof, look to history. Nobody takes Greek Mythology seriously, but at one time, people did. It was a real religion. Now it's just stories. The same thing will happen to the modern religions. Eventually, they will fade away. Science and rational thought will supercede them, as they should.
We're ready to take off the training wheels. We're ready to see the truth as it really is, and realize we are finite beings in a vast universe. Enjoy the moment, for it is as ours as it is fleeting.
Religion isn't the problem. Some of the things people justify with religion are. In organized religion, like in anything else, I'm happy when I see women participate as equals and am deeply worried when I don't. It doesn't surprise me that women leave institutions that don't recognize them as equals, or that media reports on it talk about but also around the issue.
It looks to me as if this is roughly what happened:
1) The number of women attending church in Britain has halved in a generation, dropping steadily by about a million over 20 years (50,000 per year).
2) A sociologist decides to investigate the reasons why.
3) She comes up with several reasons including feminism, female empowerment, and an interest in non-traditional spirituality such as Wicca.
4) The sociologist is a Buffy fan. (Guessing here...)
5) Since Buffy is all about feminism, female empowerment, and wiccans, the sociologist decides that mentioning Buffy in her press release as a personification of the changes affecting women's lives will be useful shorthand, and also attract the attention of journalists.
6) Her cunning ploy works perfectly; several national newspapers decide to run the story, and illustrate it with a photo of Sarah Michelle Gellar. She is, after all, more attractive than Rowan Williams...
I loved the blaring title of that article, focusing the fault squarely on Buffy's television shoulders, and then allows in a couple of short paragraphs that other reasons could be trying to find time for their families and church, and that senior clergy remain silent about the subject of sex. These are far more compelling reasons than blaming it on a TV show. I always thought Buffy empowered women to be their own individualistic selves, not shoving them toward being Wiccan.
6) Her cunning ploy works perfectly; several national newspapers decide to run the story, and illustrate it with a photo of Sarah Michelle Gellar. She is, after all, more attractive than Rowan Williams....
Come on. Rowan Williams is kind of a hottie. Good eyebrows, excellent duds. Interesting hair. Cross necklace!
I know a lot of former Catholics, both men and women, that turned to Wicca for all the comforts of meditation through ritual without the guilt, shame and utter confusion. You barely have to adjust your calendar of ritual events.
1. Buffy destroys the rain forest making all those stakes.
2. Buffy pollutes the atmosphere dusting all those vampires.
3. Buffy causes global warming by being hot.
stormwreath: "6) Her cunning ploy works perfectly; several national newspapers decide to run the story, and illustrate it with a photo of Sarah Michelle Gellar."
Of course, it should actually be illustrated by a picture of Alyson Hannigan (or, ideally, Amber Benson).
I'll say again that I think Dr Aune and her university have made a mistake mentioning Buffy and Wicca in her press release because it has allowed the important issues to be derailed.
Quotergal This is a little off topic but I have to say the bookcases in the background of that pic make me drool with envy! I would LOVE to have a bookcase wall (full of books).
Yeah, that's a hell of a lot of books *is also jealous - as much of the storage space as the books* ;).
I'll say again that I think Dr Aune and her university have made a mistake mentioning Buffy and Wicca in her press release because it has allowed the important issues to be derailed.
Maybe they naively thought that because what they said about Wicca is true (according to her report anyway) it would be OK to mention it (once, as an aside, followed by various other points). But yeah, anyone that's actually read a newspaper should've sussed that 'Buffy' and 'Wicca' is what they'd latch onto.
1. Buffy destroys the rain forest making all those stakes.
That's a good point (heh, sometimes I crack myself up - and then there's now ;), are Buffy's stakes made from renewable forests ? Cos I bet she goes with something hard like oak and that's a slow grower. Bad Buffy, bad ! Though that said, she does hold on to Mr Pointy for quite a while, so it's not like she goes through them quickly. And vampire dust is organic so it's like she's Sunnydale's biggest composter. It's a fair cop about global warming though.
Also, can we not do the religious debate crap again? It never ends pretty.
Actually, they've always been extremely civilised on here in my experience. Maybe not pretty though ;).
I was once an Evangelical. I stopped going to church while I was watching Buffy. But I'd say 9/11 had a lot more to do with it. (Buffy was part of it, though. I'm not interested in Wicca).
I know female Buffy fans who are in the clergy. I don't think they plan to abandon ship.
If you're not from the UK BTW you'll have no reason to know this but the Daily Mail is pretty much the epitome of a reactionary, "little England", small 'c' conservative mindset wherein everything was better before X happened
Too true, saje. I work part-time in a newsagents when I'm not needed at the theatre and in the trade it's known as the Daily Hate Mail. Its style is basically cant, hypocritical moralising and speculation presented as fact.
Sorry for the rant, but as a Buffy-loving Christian, this sort of 'reporting' really makes me angry.
The few times I've met Wicca practicing women I've noticed a much higher prevalence of Charmed boxsets and copies of The Craft than anything related to Buffy. That's not to say I find it impossible for anyone practicing Wicca to be inspired by BtVS, but the general popularisation of the religion had already been growing before Buffy graced our screens.
Also I'm really tired of reporters making sensationalist headlines out of relatively innocent academic papers; many reports I see in the mainstream media omit important details for instance: how the survey in question was conducted and the conclusion reached by the researchers. Without this kind of information a survey can be rendered effectively meaningless, and many news reports leap to the most astounding and absurd conclusions...by trying to complex ideas into bite-sized "factoids."
(Kudos to The Telegraph for prefacing their story with "The report claims..." and for all round better coverage of this book, but things can always be improved)
Wait for the follow up stories:
1. Buffy destroys the rain forest making all those stakes.
2. Buffy pollutes the atmosphere dusting all those vampires.
3. Buffy causes global warming by being hot.
4. Buffy damages the economy by abandoning her burger flipping job.
5. Buffy encourages teens to stay up late by patronizing The Bronze.
"Young women dislike the traditionalism and hierarchies they *imagine* are integral to the church."
"Imagine"??? Earth to condescending writer of article, that isn't something women "imagine".
Well let's see .... I've been a practicing Wiccan, with a good bit of Buddhism in the mix, for more than twenty years. I happily and belatedly discovered BtS and shortly thereafter, all things Joss hath created, about four years ago.
Come to think of it, that is around the time I got overly ambitious with my spells, and they all started going wonky. ;-)
Has the show actually been blamed for anything of this magnitude before? I'm not coming up with a thing (excessive reading of vampire novels, causing people to move in droves to Southern California ...)
I think the web content editors of the Mail and the Telegraph are just catching on that if they want to really boost their hit count, all they have to do is allude to Buffy and we all go stomping in to check it out. (Frankly, we're a little suggestible that way...)
I can see it: "Hey, Al, could you rewrite this to allude to Joss Whedon somehow? Our traffic's low, we need the Whedonesque bump."
"Imagine"??? Earth to condescending writer of article, that isn't something women "imagine".
I read this as a case of 'holding back judgement' on the part of the writer, reporting what the women think (using the word "imagine" to illustrate that), regardless of personal feelings on the subject. But I may be wrong.
I'm not giving away a free click, but I never left the COE because of BTVS, I left because if I was going to live my life according to the teachings of an old book, it was damn well going to be the gossip and scandal of Suetonius. (But I have the utmost respect for those who have stuck with organized religion, who obviously have far more faith than me.)
I have the next area of study for the author- 'Are middle aged men leaving the COE in the interests of establishing a 'Church of the Fonz', as seen on 'Family Guy?' (Now that article I WOULD check out!}
Mort said:
"Also, can we not do the religious debate crap again? It never ends pretty."
Like Sage said, it's usually pretty civil here. Some of the mods might prefer we don't get into it, but as long as it can be kept clean and ends up in the usual "agree to disagree" fashion...we're usually cool.
I know there are the lightning rod topics that sometimes are mentioned as wisely avoided in public forums (when I used to bartend, I remember it being recommended you stay away from politics, religion, and sex and/or money--but they all get discussed, because if you don't bring them up, your regulars will eventually). I can't see how it helps to keep away from them due to a worry of potentially insulting others though. These are the big questions, we base a lot of our decisions on them and society is built on them, they're worth getting into. It should be encouraged frequently, not stifled.
A lot of people are bored of the debate (especially when it comes to religion), either because they've seen it enough times to be annoyed by it or it's just not something they prefer to think about much (or they've made up their minds and don't like to see the challenges), but they're free to not read further when they see things headed in that direction and click elsewhere.
What quantumac said. I know the more polite response in these kinds of discussions is more along the lines of "I hope the fanaticism stops [well I do, but it probably won't any time soon] and that all religious/spiritual and non-religious/undecideds will eventually learn to live in peace", but since I was 17 I've felt that the world really would have an increased chance of improving by leaps and bounds (a chance, because atheism isn't a guaranteed cure-all) if we took the same attitude toward the remaining worshipped religions as we do to Greek Mythology (eventually you'll see "Judeo-Christian Mythology", "Muslim", etc).
So news that folks are leaving certain churches in droves ? Awesome, it means folks are either waking up or getting sick of 'em. Or both. I dunno the numbers, but this might be balanced with record recruitments in Africa though, I know the Anglican Church and such do well there. I'm not sure if that's because Christianity is something the downtrodden genuinely want, or if they simply provide enough aid and evangelizing to make it seem like a real good deal.
The real purpose of the Daily Mail article is surely contained in this single sentence, “She also said television icons such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, who promote female empowerment, discourage women from attending services.” The Mail is terrified of the “empowerment” of women, an “evil” it considers to be even greater than its usual “bogeyman” target – “immigrants”.
These are the big questions, we base a lot of our decisions on them and society is built on them, they're worth getting into. It should be encouraged frequently, not stifled.
Agreed to some extent, Kris. I myself love the discussion of religion, science, atheïsm, etcetera. I used to frequent the blog of a well-known Dutch philosopher of religion just to learn from the positions of others and debate at a higher level than - say - the local pub. It was never an option for me to do anything more than a basic class in science philosophy (which I loved) at my university while doing astrophysics, but science philosophy and related (philosophical) topics have always been of much interest to me. What people think about these issues is so fundamental to the way they see the world that it can't not be interesting. At least, not in my opinion.
But I've also been dragged into more than enough discussions that end badly, to see that it's not always a good idea to debate these issues. Because while to me, as an atheïst, the religion/faith/science debate is (mostly - I'm only human too ;)) a purely rational one, which is challenging and fun on that level (not saying this goes for all atheïsts, by the way, I know more than enough people who are angry at religion/faith and as such (also) deny it for personal, rather than cognitive reasons), this does not go for everyone. Feelings end up getting hurt, lines end up getting drawn deeper in the sand and minds end up closed rather than open. Which is why debates of these types should - in fact - not be encouraged frequently. They should be encouraged only when the setting is right and the people contributing do so for the right reasons.
So while I would love to have a debate on these matters with my fellow whedonesquers, who are some of the most well-educated, informed, behaved and intelligent people on the internet, I also think we have an obligation to our fellow posters, moderators and readers to not get into such a discussion unless really warrented and unless people want to. And so far, this thread? Not so much, I'd say. Yes, it's about religion (and then not even in general), but that's about it.
(but, having said that, if anyone'd want to hop over to the org, I'd totally be game ;))
@ Whisper and Saje: And that's just the livingroom cases. ; > True story.
1) Chronic Book Accumulation Syndrome is a sickness and 2) West Hollywood still has pockets where we grandfathered rent-controlled apartment dwellers are probably getting twice the average space for half the usual price... so I'm both cursed and blessed because it's a Law of Physics, I think, that if you have this illness and any amount of space for bookshelves, you will fill it up entirely with books. I am out of room. Again.
Aren't bookshelves the greatest thing in the world? Highly frustrating that we can't read most of the titles though, QG ;). And yeah, I have the same problem here. Books are just so darned big.
(Also, regarding my previous statement: it seems there's no clear spot on the org, for discussions of the type I suggested above. Hmm.)
I'll take this on, and do my best not to diss anybody with my generalizations.
Kris wrote, "since I was 17 I've felt that the world really would have an increased chance of improving by leaps and bounds (a chance, because atheism isn't a guaranteed cure-all) if we took the same attitude toward the remaining worshipped religions as we do to Greek Mythology (eventually you'll see "Judeo-Christian Mythology", "Muslim", etc)."
IMO, one of the biggest obstacles to productive discussions between religious people and people who think society would be better off without any religion (e.g., John "imagine no religion" Lennon") is that people holding Lennon's view very frequently don't know, and refuse to believe even when they are told, that many religious people do regard the myths of their own religion as myths and do not take those myths literally. To argue that only literalists are the "real" believers in a particular religion is setting up a straw man.
IMO, the conviction that a divine force or forces exist and have some interaction with human beings depends largely on one's life experience, not on doctrine. Religious stories exist to point the way and make some sense of those experiences when and if they happen. For these stories to be useful, one must know them, but it isn't necessary to accept them as historical narrative.
This POV is not new although it has received a big boost from the scientific method and modern historical research. Greek philosophers started questioning the literal truth of their culture's mythology in the fifth century BCE, and allegorical and symbolic interpretation of texts has been a major part of religious tradition in the West ever since. However, if your religious education stops before junior high school, you may never be exposed to that way of thinking.
I find it fascinating that several posters are seeing Buffy as being "blamed" for women leaving the church. I read it as Buffy being lauded for women being empowered and leaving organized Christian religion which tends to do the opposite of empower women.
Two sides of the same coin. People are acknowledging that the article(s) themselves (or, one of them anyway) are blaming Buffy for women leaving the church. Seems to me a number of people here in their own lives actually see it precisely the way you do.
But it seems silly to note as "fascinating" the fact that people are simply recognizing what the article's slant is.
I always find reactions that are different than mine as fascinating. No judgment involved. Just interesting how different people receive the same info differently. And maybe it is my reaction that is fascinating. :)
I read it as Buffy being lauded for women being empowered and leaving organized Christian religion which tends to do the opposite of empower women.
I may be a former Anglican but I'll stick up for the CoE. I think they are trying to empower women but unfortunately there's a sizeable reactionary element which is trying to block such progressive moves.
Simon, the CoE does seem to be more progressive on that front. Especially when compared to many of the American Christian sects. I'm not Christian and my opinion and/or observations are purely sociological.
(as an atheist I sometimes feel the same way listening to Richard Dawkins rattle on ;)
Saje, that's a good example of (bad, IMO) "athiest, scientist" for this discussion. I can't get behind Dawkins at all, much as the people from traditional religions cringe when they find themselves fronted by loud dumb-asses who go well beyond their expertise and pontificate on everything.
Here's the thing Dawkins misses I think - you have to assume most people are discussing things in good faith, you have to assume they're not insulting you in a back-handed way (until you're given no option but to think otherwise that is) or being willfully blind to the obvious or are idiots themselves because to not assume that is to cause the opposite to happen. And that applies doubly to religion which for many people is the bedrock of their lives. Not adopting a "live and let live" policy is every bit as bad from him as from the religious extremists he castigates.
All any of us can do is present our opinion and the arguments (if there are any) that justify it and then let folk take or leave it as they see fit. I get where he's coming from to be honest but as with anyone like that (on whichever issue) I always wonder who it is he thinks is listening to him, who he thinks is convinced by being told, basically, that they're either liars or idiots for believing what they believe ? The way he "argues" is (ironically) just preaching to the choir and apart from being a bit self-congratulatory that's obviously also entirely pointless.
IMO, the conviction that a divine force or forces exist and have some interaction with human beings depends largely on one's life experience, not on doctrine. Religious stories exist to point the way and make some sense of those experiences when and if they happen. For these stories to be useful, one must know them, but it isn't necessary to accept them as historical narrative.
Hmm, I agree and disagree janef. I think the urge to explain things (and therefore to ask questions) and to see patterns and order and, most importantly where religion's concerned, agency in the world is innate in humans (it's part of us being born as helpless little bags of wind and shit ;). Possibly because we have to assume agency in other humans i.e. because we're separate, self-aware entities it makes sense (to our minds/brains) to assume it in a lot of different things, so thunder is caused by a person for instance. The One True God arose fairly recently in the historical record (about 1200 BC, becoming more widespread later) out of a sort of pissing contest between all the gods we'd previously used to explain the world around us.
How we answer those questions is a matter of the available explanations though - i.e. doctrine - and all it takes to reject one doctrine over another is a nagging doubt and an opportunity IMO (like most atheists I was raised religious - Church of Scotland in my case - but was lucky enough to have the sort of parents that, though very religious themselves, realised you can't force people to believe what, to them, is unbelievable, you can only force them to act the part - and what's the point of that ?).
Here's the thing Dawkins misses I think - you have to assume most people are discussing things in good faith, you have to assume they're not insulting you in a back-handed way (until you're given no option but to think otherwise that is) or being willfully blind to the obvious or are idiots themselves because to not assume that is to cause the opposite to happen.
I haven't seen many of Dawkins' public appearances, but I've heard that he's pretty self-righteous as a debater. However, I have read 'The God Delusion' and was expecting a book from a very angry, unreasonable person which'd be only tollorable because I'm also an atheïst. Instead, what I found, was a subdued book, very rational and cognitive in its presentation, with clear argumentation and a sense of direction. I enjoyed reading it, although the later chapters lost some focus.
So to me, it's sort-of a mystery why that book caused such an uproar that even fellow atheïsts feel the need to distance themselves from it. Again, I have not seen the man in many public appearances, so maybe people are reading things into the book which are not there. The only 'fault' I could find was a tone that said the author was convinced that he was right and a chapter on agnosticism that was perhaps worded more harshly than it could've been. And I see no problem with that first thing (being right). Yes, there may be a problem with that in a discussion, but not in a book where one tries to roll out an argument for ones own point of view.
So, Dawkins? The Jury's still out on the man himself, since I don't know enough about him. But I found myself agreeing with 'The God Delusion' more than disagreeing (which I did, at a few points) and found it to be a pleasant read.
that many religious people do regard the myths of their own religion as myths and do not take those myths literally. To argue that only literalists are the "real" believers in a particular religion is setting up a straw man.
Well, as an atheïst myself, janef, I can tell you that I don't think all religious people believe everything that's in (let's say) the bible verbatim. There's degrees everywhere. But every religious person does have a certain degree of faith. They believe in God in some shape or form, depending on the religion they belong to.
And while I have much less trouble, rationally, accepting people who believe in "something undefined" rather than some random pre-defined set of beliefs dictated by what they grew up with, what they like/dislike or another external reason, it's still not something I can fully understand. Why would anyone need "something" to explain anything, anyway? I, myself, don't see the "added value", so to speak. You can be moral, without religion. You can enjoy culture, without religion. And you can even ask the big questions, without religion. In my opinion, the only thing that's missing is comfortable answers. And we don't really need those either.
(crap, now I got into the discussion anyway, despite saying I wouldn't upthread ;))
Well, confession time, 'The God Delusion' has been on my TBR pile for months and months and I still haven't got round to reading it, i'm going more by his TV appearances and newspaper articles.
I'd imagine it is a fairly temperate book though, apart from anything else the guy's a respected scientist so it makes sense that he'd adopt the same slightly distanced voice he uses in his biology books (most of which are, IMO, excellent BTW - particularly 'The Extended Phenotype' and 'The Selfish Gene', much mis-apprehended by lazy readers though it may have been).
In some ways that makes it worse of course, because his book might actually convince a few people that're currently on the fence but they won't bother to read it because of his public rhetoric.
Heh, Saje. Here it's 'The Selfish Gene' that's on my TBR pile. I've owned that for a few months now, but haven't gotten round to reading it.
As for convincing people currently on the fence: I do also think he's "preaching to the chior", so to speak, in his book. There's a relentless rationalism there, that speaks to people like me, but which probably won't speak to religious people. To "reach across the isle" you need a different method, a common basis to start from, so that people understand what you're talking about.
In my experience, using rationalism and a scientific state of mind as a way to discover larger "truths" than may be confined within active science, can lead to only one natural conclusion: atheïsm. This is something that I think Dawkins argues very elloquently in his book.
However, there's a lot of people that don't accept just that. Who think rationalism works fine within the practicality of science, but can't be extended beyond that. Who feel that truth or reality may be subjective things, that knowledge is always relative to a certain frame-of-reference, etcetera. These are all very valid, detailed philosophical schools of thought.
But this, in fact, ends up causing confusion, because to people like Dawkins (who never mentions these things) and, to a lesser extent, me, these are alien concepts that don't mesh with the implied philosophical definitions of terms like "truth", "reality" and "knowledge" we use. These uses are usually instinctive and go without definition. But these instincts may differ from person to person.
It's that fundamental difference of thinking that I've found to be striking in discussions between - say - philosophers of religion and philosophers of science. Without agreeing on a set of ground rules and coherent definitions, the discussion is often useless because they're not speaking the same language.
So, yes there's things like tone and the way in which arguments are made. These are fundamentally a matter of taste, but I feel if - as Dawkins says - the goal of his book is to convince people, he could have used more subtle expressions in places. I don't think he's wrong or crossing the line most of the time, but he's certainly not reaching out a hand either. Mostly because he feels he doesn't have to pander to religion to make his point. An argument that I mostly agree with.
But I think there's another fundamental problem in 'The God Delusion' for the thinking persons reading it. While many - possibly including Dawkins himself - may not even realise it, Dawkins is simply not speaking the same language as (some of) the people across the isle, making it hard - if not impossible - to reach them, whatever the strength of his arguments.
I think the idea that you can talk anyone into our out of believing in God is a very strange one, but I guess it happens. Every now and then Baptists here come to my door (a few weeks ago I got a "free ticket to heaven", and then the guy asked me if I thought I was going to get into heaven, which confused me a bit, 'cause he just gave me a ticket... I hadn't read the small print yet) and I'm sure they do "convert" people sometimes, and I know Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens have both said that they've had letters from people who "found the courage" to reject the beliefs they'd been raised with after hearing / reading their arguments. But I have to think it's a puny number both ways. (And re. Dawkins and Hitchens, so with you guys thinking that they are major blowhards on this issue--such brilliant and articulate men, both of them, I wish they'd pick some other agenda. )
But if I look around at the people I know (small sample group I guess but it's all I've got) I tend to think that religious "feeling" is most often kind of innate. My father was raised Irish Catholic, went into the novitiate because bookish types in that community joined the church, and lost his faith completely when he was about twenty. My mother was raised by almost ferociously atheist bohemian "artiste" types, but has prayed secretly since she can remember and found, as an adult, that the Christian church provided a deeply fulfilling structure and ritual to her personal faith. (She found out much later that she is technically Jewish, a whole other kettle of... something). My brothers and I were raised Christian in the loosest sense but it didn't stick for any of us, because none of us had that deep inner belief or feeling.
Also, very strongly agree with janef that a lot of "staunch atheists" misunderstand what religious faith is, assume that religious people take the stories that are a part of their religion literally or believe every single tenet, and that if they just thought about it rationally, they'd abandon their faith. That seems to me a total failure of imagination. I think it's rather like love. It isn't really rational, and certainly the way we choose a person to be with isn't always particularly rational. But as creatures that experience love, we find a way to express it, we find a home for it. The Church, like Marriage, is a flawed institution, but for many it's still the best home for this inexplicable feeling. We make it our own within a larger institution. People can give you a million reasons why you should or shouldn't love the person you're with, but either you feel it or you don't and nobody else is going to change that for you.
I've no idea what it is that makes some people feel some kind of force or guiding hand that they can't turn away from, while others just don't feel that at all. It's a feeling which may vary throughout one's lifetime, but I don't think Baptists going door to door, or Richard Dawkins, or Christopher Hitchens, or even Buffy (!) can change many people who weren't already going that way themselves.
Well, catherine, I would agree that it's a deeply ingrained feeling with some religious people. But I think that's not the case for all religious people. There's people who have doubts, who want/need to believe in what religion is telling them for other reasons (they - for instance- want security, or feel safer, believing in a benign God), who are socially "obligated" to be part of the same church all their friends and family are part of, etcetera.
And, when comparing it to love, there's certainly cases where rational knowlegde can influence one's love or even make one deny their love because they feel they need to and I feel the same is true for religion. Even if I, somehow, had the deep feeling that there was "something", be it a God or something else, I would now not be able to reconcile that feeling with my personal rational beliefs and would probably end up categorizing that feeling as a "trick of nature", a "sense of wonder" (which one can also get from science) and still not believe.
The same is true for the opposite. There are atheïsts who feel a severe "lack" of something, despite their rational convictions or who've been raised atheïst but feel they can't stay that way, who are only atheïst because they're angry with faith/religion and can be convinced otherwise by solving the cause of that anger or who even make a rational decission to belief, based on the fact they stop sharing the same philosophical groundwork as most rationalist atheïsts do. Etcetera.
I think movement in both directions is possible and I think most people - at least here in The Netherlands, which - admittedly - is a very different environment from most of America - tend to fall in the "in between" category. Neither convinced atheïst or devout believer, and as such possibly susceptable to arguments either way - be they rational or emotional - from both religious people and atheïsts. Even if they do feel some form of conviction or have a certain rational belief.
Not even to mention the fact that the discussion itself is interesting and teaches us more about the way others see the world, which - to me - is the most important aspect of this. The chance of me suddenly becoming religious is very, very small. But I still want to understand more about religion and want to be able to better vocalize why I'm not religious. Who knows: maybe I was wrong all along.
Lovely comment, catherine. I've always thought of faith/belief as like love - a leap of imagination into the unknowable. (And, overly personal aside, both feelings elude - or are unconsciously denied by? - my atheist father.) Or we could posit faith as poetry - ineffable, inspirational, - complemented, but not conquered, by the prose of rationality.
I've always thought of faith/belief as like love - a leap of imagination into the unknowable.
But is it, SNT? I have loved, but I do not believe in love as a "concept". I think it's explainable, knowable and probably less pretty than we hope it is. It's chemistry and biology. I don't actively use my ratio to supress the feeling while I feel it and don't let it inform my actions, but I also don't feel the need to place it beyond rational explanation.
I've never "felt" religious faith. But I also think that's biology, chemistry and not unknowable per definition. It does not make the feeling any less beautifull, but I don't need to colour in said feeling with a God either. I guess it's that that I still don't get. The feeling: yes. The way people sculpt that feeling into religion? No.
And yes - a comment like yours is much more aestethically pleasing than a relentlessly rational one. But does that also make it more true[1]?
[1] if, of course, we accept truth as a concept that even exists ;)
ETA: of course, being true of not true might not even be of interest at all, to this :)
Thanks SNT :) Love, poetry and religion are all things I have a great respect for. I'm unfortunately only any good at one of them.
And of course, you're quite right GVH that what religion means to different people depends a lot on circumstance. There are people who need it because they need something and the world is otherwise senseless and cruel--and in the admittedly few cases I know personally where that is obviously the case, I would never want to strip these people of the one thing that makes their awful circumstances bearable. In that case, religion is in part at least a kind of survival skill, maybe, and that's a different issue. Of course there are also people who have simply been raised in a religious manner, surrounded by religious people, and it takes them years to question it, to realize it doesn't truly resonate with them, that it feels hollow. And they might listen to Christopher Hitchens on a rant, feel exhilarated, write him a letter, but I don't think they would have responded to him the way they did if they weren't already looking for their way out.
I guess what I mean is that if we wiped the millennia of religious faith and institutions from the collective memory (dollhouse-style, writ large!) I think that a large number of people would be atheists, and a large number would still feel that there was something they couldn't put a name to but eventually they would come up with a name, and with rituals, and with a community and a kind of religious institution (no doubt very different from the rather antiquated institutions that are currently the Houses of Faith).
I think the religious feeling is just a fundamental part of certain people and how they experience the world. I'm with you on the not getting it. I don't get it. I've never had it, beyond the occasional slight stirring in the most fleeting moments. But I am very, very close to some people who do feel it, whatever it is (surely something different from the "sense of wonder" that obviously the universe inspires in we atheists too). I'm not sure "rational" has anything to do with it. Well, to put that more strongly, I'm absolutely sure that rationality has nothing to do with it at all. Again and of course, I'm only talking about faith in the lives of the people I know. How they define God differs, but for each of them, a religious community and the church provide some kind of home for what they believe. I get my hackles up a bit when I think people are condescending towards believers (not you, at all, GVH! but Dawkins and Hitchens and that ilk). It seems to me to be something very beautiful and very profound and worthy of respect, and entirely separate from whether or not one is a "rational" person.
(Having said that, I'm living in the US now and the religious tone in this country is pretty scary and off-putting. If my early exposure to religion hadn't been so entirely positive, I would probably have all kinds of negative biases about it now).
oops, busy posting and missed your reply GVH. I think you are right that the religious feeling is probably a matter of biology, chemistry, etc. Which doesn't make it less beautiful or worthy of respect, at least IMO (or necessarily something that doesn't point towards a kind of truth). I don't think science and god conflict. Obviously, nowadays, for any educated religious person, they can't conflict without some major fact-denial.
It does not make the feeling any less beautifull, but I don't need to colour in said feeling with a God either. I guess it's that that I still don't get. The feeling: yes. The way people sculpt that feeling into religion? No.
That's very nicely put, and it's how I feel a lot of the time too. But... well, I guess I think that I'm not understanding the feeling, not really, if I can't make that next leap (God) where other people, just as rational as me, can make it. It's a mystery to me, and it is one I've had long and fascinating conversations about with loved ones who do believe in God, but I think the mistake of the atheist is often to think that because they don't get it, and they are rational, it must be irrational. I don't really buy that.
I think we actually mostly agree, catherine. The feeling of faith is not rational at all, and just to be clear: I wasn't implying that it was. And, obviously, this also doesn't mean that religious people can't be rational in their own lives.
However, I do think that if you're completely, unforgivingly, rational and extend the scientific method to places where - according to some - it doesn't belong, using concepts as "truth", "reality", "knowledge" etcetera in the scientific not-relative way and consider a "God" as an entity able to "influence" "reality" in some way, the only "logical" conclusion is to be atheïst. Which is a large part of the reason why I am atheïst. But using a different set of definitions, even completely, unforgivingly rational people can come to different conclusions (it's not irrational or even logically fallible to assume an a priori "unknowable" agent when using different definitions for the terms I used above).
In fact, the discussion itself - which if infinately interesting if you're me - is so infused with the instinctual definitions of those words (which differ for different people), I find that that's the thing that people like Dawkins don't get and is the main cause for a lot of the misunderstandings out there, like I mentioned upthread.
As for having respect for religion: I have respect for people. I think there's beauty in everything people are passionate about, including religion. And I, too, think it would be cruel to "strip" people of faith who desperately need it. I think us atheïsts might even be less happy because they have less safe and satisfying answers and can be less sure about the "goal" of our existence (although I've always loved Joss' "if nothing we do matters, than all that matters is what we do" which is as close to a my personal life-philosophy as any pop culture outing has ever gotten) than religous people.
But I do have trouble with the way religious debate is framed by religious people. Faith gets more consideration than, say, one's political beliefs or - in fact - one's lack of faith, which can be just as personal and deeply felt. Which is why I tend to understand the more "angry" atheïsts out there (I'm not one of them, by the way), who rage against religion. I'm sure if the playing field was level, they'd be much more civilised. But for now: it isn't. But that does not - to me, at least - mean disrespecting people or behaving condescendingly towards religious people is acceptable. Respect is very important. Because raging against a concept, should never turn into raging againt the people who believe in that concept.
But... well, I guess I think that I'm not understanding the feeling, not really, if I can't make that next leap (God) where other people, just as rational as me, can make it. It's a mystery to me, and it is one I've had long and fascinating conversations about with loved ones who do believe in God,
I agree that that's a large part of the fascination and the main reason that I don't understand religion yet, as a concept, despite everything I've heard and read about it.
but I think the mistake of the atheist is often to think that because they don't get it, and they are rational, it must be irrational. I don't really buy that.
But here we disagree. In fact, if I understand you correctly (which is probably not the case, so bear with me :)) you're contradicting yourself. Because earlier you said:
I'm not sure "rational" has anything to do with it. Well, to put that more strongly, I'm absolutely sure that rationality has nothing to do with it at all.
which I was agreeing with at the top of this message. I think the religious feeling, and the "leap" to a God (which may just be a cultural one: God is out there as a concept, so the leap is made pretty easily, after all) is not rational. It's based on a feeling and rationality does not factor into that. Which, again, does not mean that religious people can't be rational. Just that they might rationaly be influenced by their feeling. I know that sounds like a contradiction, but really, it's not. If, for instance, "truth" and "reality" are subjective, relative to a frame of reference, a feeling can certainly be a good reason for a God to "exist". And that's just one of the myriad of possible rational explanations. But these come after the fact. The basis for the religious faith is and will always be a feeling. Which is, almost per definition, not rational by itself.
Hmm, I contradict myself on a daily basis and so I would be surprised if I managed to make three posts in a row without contradicting myself at some point, but I'm missing the contradiction here:
I think atheists often make the mistake of thinking "rationality" is the central issue ("I am a rational person, religion makes no kind of sense to me, ergo religion is irrational"). But I don't buy that rationality has anything to do with religious faith or the lack of it.
Does that make sense? Is it a contradiction? Certainly not very well put, either here or above... and maybe kind of a stupid point anyway.
BTW I don't think I really addressed your comments on "faith is like love" above. I didn't mean to put either love or religious faith as somehow "beyond" rational explanation, beyond the meat and bone and bits and bobs that we are. I guess I just meant you can't talk someone in or out of a feeling, and as you said, the "reasons" we make up after the fact for why we love or why we believe in something (or why we don't, why we stop) are going to be shaky at best. It's all a bit mysterious to us, which doesn't mean there are no reasons, just that we don't know what they are in their full sometimes-contradictory complexity. But it goes deep nonetheless, and is an essential part of this being human thing we're doing.
I think it's Stephen Pinker who did these amazing studies into the way that we make up reasons for our behavior after the fact. So much of us is hidden from ourselves. So a leap of faith doesn't necessarily mean that we discard the very idea of The Rational--I think it can be an acknowledgment that this is something we don't understand completely, something that is powerful and feels "True" (for lack of a better word... and perhaps the lack of better words is the real problem here?), and that we're going to nurture it and take it seriously, in fact let this bewildering faith act as a sort of guide for us. Whatever has caused it, whatever it is made of (God/Science), it's worthy of wonder and celebration. It needs stories and songs. God, like Love, is a useful word for some and probably means something different to everyone who uses the word. It's just a word for something powerful that we act on / believe in, and that we can't entirely untangle. You can absolutely look at it through the lens of science. Or the lens of poetry. It doesn't really matter and it depends on the person. We look at the world, and everything we know, and everything we don't know, and some of us think "what random, miraculous chaos this is, how incredible that it should have led to me being here and trying to understand it," and some of us get down on our knees and pray. I don't think the world-view is necessarily so different--just the response.
Ha. A good conversation to have on a Sunday too, la.
I agree with Catherine that there is a religious impulse or feeling that is innate in some people and absent in others. I have felt that impulse in a big way since childhood. None of my relatives have it. My family was and is affiliated with a liberal form of Judaism for reasons of community solidarity, not religious belief.
Catherine writes, "I don't think science and god conflict. Obviously, nowadays, for any educated religious person, they can't conflict without some major fact-denial."
I agree with a caveat. As Thomas Kuhn pointed out, scientific knowledge does not always expand linearly; once in a while there is a paradigm shift that reorganizes known facts into a different structure. This leaves a little breathing space for religious beliefs that aren't supported by current scientific knowledge.
Classical physics described a mechanistic universe with no room for divine agency, except as a Prime Mover who set the clockwork running and then went away. Current trends in physics and life sciences, if I understand them correctly, involve systems analysis and emergent properties. The scientific picture of how the world works is starting to have some resemblance (in broad outline; occasionally in details) to various ancient prescientific cosmologies.
I'm not implying that "science" has "proven" this or that religious tenet "true". Only that it's easier now to entertain the possibility that a conscious intelligence pervades the universe than it would have been in 1908.
I have to give some support for janef's (sorry, I've been asleep) earlier distinction between those who are motivated by faith and seek a form for it and those who seek a religious form that they might gain power by (that last may have been putting words in your mouth, janef, correct if wrong). I grew up among way too many of the latter, and it colored my perception of religion, certainly. Biblical inerrent believers are an actual, large, group in the U.S., though.
Speaking of Dawkins, I probably shouldn't have said "dumb-ass", since the man is surely much smarter than me. But smart is as smart does. Preaching your personal theories as scientific fact doesn't strike me as very smart, or responsible, for a scientist. Maybe I should have said "jack-ass."
While the topic of the Church of England is still here, may I just say how much I admired the music in the Episcopal church when I was drafted to some of their services as a step-daughter. Lovely canticles. I wish I could have gone apostate from there, instead.
"I have to give some support for janef's (sorry, I've been asleep) earlier distinction between those who are motivated by faith and seek a form for it and those who seek a religious form that they might gain power by (that last may have been putting words in your mouth, janef, correct if wrong). "
I said that my relatives have been active members of Jewish congregations for reasons of community solidarity. In the past (not as much recently but within living memory) there was a significant amount of anti-Semitism in America. Synagogues everywhere are places for fellowship, study, mutual aid, and educating children to take pride in their heritage. In a multi-ethnic society, synagogues are also places where nice Jewish boys can meet nice Jewish girls. It's where my father met my mother. Churches play the same role in the African-American community. When a community is beleaguered, churches are set up to shelter the community from hostile outsiders and to pool people's resources so they can help each other.
From an anthropological POV, maintenance and strengthening of community ties is a major function of organized religion. (It can also be a source of inter-community conflict, of course). Western Europe, which is largely unchurched, is in the middle of a very interesting social experiment. Never before in human history has there been a society as secular as Western Europe, except where organized religion has been suppressed by the State. Can all the other groups and organizations of civil society (clubs, professional associations, unions, etc.) hold the society together and keep it healthy without major influence from organized religion? What will that society look like and feel like in another thirty years?
Time for another reply just before this drops off the main page ;).
catherine wrote:
I think atheists often make the mistake of thinking "rationality" is the central issue ("I am a rational person, religion makes no kind of sense to me, ergo religion is irrational"). But I don't buy that rationality has anything to do with religious faith or the lack of it.
The thing here I have a "problem" with (and I use the term very loosely ;)), is that I agree that some atheïsts wrongly think that rationality is the central issue in faith. Or, to be more precise, that the fact that their rejection of faith comes from a rational place, automatically means the religious person is wrong. This is not the case, because religious faith is, in fact, not rational, but emotional. Based on a feeling. And the pure rational approach used by the atheïst might not be relevant to the religious person.
So, in fact, I think if the atheïst then assumes that religious belief isn't rational, he'd be correct. Which is where we differ.
However, I also think that while the belief is not rational, the people may be and I also believe that it is possible, to - after the fact, using a different set of rules and definitions as the atheïst is using - explain the unrational belief, rationally.
It's a subtle difference to what you're saying, but I think we may actually be agreeing already. But feel free to correct me if I'm wrong in that assumption :).
TawnyJayne: thanks for the tip! I just did some mini-research and his writing does seem to intersect with some of my personal interest. I've not delved very deeply into the philosophy of morality before - apart from some basics - but his book 'The Moral Gap' seems like a nice way to learn more about what people "on the other side of the debate" think on these matters.
It's especially interesting because I have always felt that one doesn't need religion to be moral, and this book assumes the exact opposite. As with every philosophical debate, this depends on the way a person defines the central term "moral". Is morality formed by the consequences of an action, or is there an a priori way to characterise something as moral/immoral? And if so, what is the defining quality to make such a call? I find it interesting that John Hare seems to feel that God has a definitive role to play in that determination and that one cannot be truly moral without religion (something I'd disagree with heavily out of hand).
I'm sure it'll inspire new ways of looking at this particular subject for me, which is always welcome. In fact, it's usually more interesting to read the thoughts of someone you don't agree with than someone you do agree with, because it forces you to actively think of why you don't agree, instead of copying someone else's thoughts (although that can be usefull too, at times :)).
So, in short: thanks for the tip! (although I'll either have to find a nice second-hand copy or try to look for it in my (university) library, because the price for a new copy is pretty high ;))
ETA: made some alinea-seperations in that last bit, to make it more readable ;)
I see what you're saying, GVH. BTW does John Hare think "one cannot be truly moral without religion"? That's disturbing if true, but not the impression I got from reading a wee bit about the book. Interesting questions, anyway.
Aaand this thread slides off the page. Goodnight sweet thread, may flights of angels (or some wondrous natural phenomena) sing thee to thy rest, etcetera etcetera.
"Is there an a priori way to categorize something as moral/immoral"
That question about morality was a big chunk of Kant's work as a philosopher. I haven't read John Hare. Kant's categorical imperative, a restatement of the golden rule, doesn't, IMO, require experience, but it does require recognition of other people as equal. YMMV.
janef said:
"IMO, one of the biggest obstacles to productive discussions between religious people and people who think society would be better off without any religion (e.g., John "imagine no religion" Lennon") is that people holding Lennon's view very frequently don't know, and refuse to believe even when they are told, that many religious people do regard the myths of their own religion as myths and do not take those myths literally."
I remember our religion teacher in Catholic school in Grade 10 (so I would've been 15/16), a former nun, being the only teacher/priest-type person to ever admit to this (I've seen plenty of writers since then though).
Except she only went halfway. She suggested that perhaps some of the Old Testament stuff (The Creation and Adam & Eve in Genesis and probably Noah's Ark and other crazyness you can think of) was merely symbolic, shouldn't be taken literally, but that everything in the New Testament regarding Jesus, his miracles, and the details of his life and death, definitely happened.
Me, I figured if you're gonna cast doubt on one half of the 2000-year-old-book (give or take), why not the rest ? I saw (and still see) too much fan-wanking over all the apparent plot holes by religious scholars in a feeble attempt to keep it relevant in the face of more evidence and rational thought progression that prove it otherwise.
And as for only literalists being "real" members of a religion...I believe contextualists (the terms they gave us in religion class back then, taking the Bible literally or contextually or a mixture of both) were also suggested as legitimate members of a faith, just as legitimate as hardcore literalists...but they still believe a God exists. So even if you're Catholic and don't believe the stuff in the Bible happened, but still believe in God the way Catholicism describes Him/It, I guess it sorta works to still call yourself Catholic. But if you go any further, you're agnostic. 'Cause what's the point in identifying with a specific religion otherwise ? I mean you're free to, but why bother ? Because you were raised that way isn't a worthwhile reason.
And while I don't believe we need religion to be moral, sure it's fine to read the stories and take quality lessons/advice from the texts. But that doesn't make you religious either and wouldn't make sense to call yourself Catholic or Buddhist or whatever, not if you don't buy into some of it as fact. I could use Buddhist meditation practices and really like Buddhist texts, study them extensively, and maybe even wish its view of the world to be more true than others, but unless I believe some of its proposed history, I would not call myself a Buddhist.
I never want religion to completely go away in terms of having it as a part of our history books, because it's important in that regard. But I still think it would be good for it to fade away sooner rather than later. I'm not an angry atheist. I'm arguably more agnostic, with an eye toward skepticism because of how us humans tend to be...but I still wanna remain open-minded to possibilities, it's just that something supernatural would have to practically come about and knock me on the head to convince me of its presence. So I don't come at this from an angry-at-religion/our-history perspective, just out of a frustrated need to see society progress faster (and, okay, it wouldn't hurt to have more people share my viewpoint or something closer to it, I won't lie, it's a selfish thing--arguably all decisions and feelings are).
Growing up religious, it was taken as given that parts of the Bible weren't - big 't' - True (were parables for instance or mistranslations), the idea that all religious people must believe in biblical inerrancy is a new one to me, clearly they don't. In fact, in practice i'd go so far as to say the vast majority of religious people don't believe, agree with or apply to their lives every word in their particular bible (I don't just mean out of hypocrisy - though that happens obviously - I also mean out of decency and common-sense).
(but then, biblical inerrancy wasn't even widely known about over here until about 10 or 15 years ago anyway, part of the British - particularly English - tendency to frown upon and generally be suspicious of any deeply held conviction, of whatever stripe. Not always a good quality BTW but it has its uses ;)
janef: This leaves a little breathing space for religious beliefs that aren't supported by current scientific knowledge.
But isn't that just a "god of the gaps" i.e. a god that can only exist so long as there are gaps in our knowledge of the universe ? So isn't god diminished at pace with our ignorance ? If I were a believer that'd be deeply unsatisfying and cause for worry as I watched my god being painted into a corner (maybe cause for the current apparent rise of extremism across the board ?).
janef: Current trends in physics and life sciences, if I understand them correctly, involve systems analysis and emergent properties. The scientific picture of how the world works is starting to have some resemblance (in broad outline; occasionally in details) to various ancient prescientific cosmologies.
... Only that it's easier now to entertain the possibility that a conscious intelligence pervades the universe than it would have been in 1908.
Not really. One of the fundamental points about emergent phenomena as I understand them is that they're emphatically not directed, not "conscious" in the sense we know it of some single entity with an overview of the whole process - emergence is all about the whole exceeding the sum of the parts but those parts can be totally unaware, behaving according to very simple rules (ants are a favourite example for instance) and the whole needn't be aware in our sense either. Some people choose to see this "greater than parts-ness" as God - when, for instance, Einstein talked about "the old one", that's kind of what he meant I think, he was talking about "the rules", the laws of physics and the amazingly intricate way they interact to produce the wonder of "creation" (he's on record as not believing in a personal god so that's not me claiming to know what Albert Einstein really meant BTW ;).
I don't agree that modern science has in any way "opened a door" to God, with the best will in the world what I think it's done is become more complicated - I don't mean I understand and religious people don't BTW, I mean no-one can understand all of it anymore, there's too much of it. And so we use metaphors to describe or approximate things and because those metaphors come from the same brains that came up with our creation myths, they're often quite similar (maybe the rough shape of myths is even innate ? Any comparative theologians here ?). And people are also more generally aware of the uncertainty of science, more sceptical and so those that maybe thought it was science vs religion might feel like science is on the retreat.
But of course, it never was science vs religions, they don't have that much to do with each other (if religious people didn't keep insisting on making claims about the external world - which is much more science's bailiwick - they'd have nothing to do with each other but people are always wanting to justify their internal state by pointing to the world and claiming that proves them right when all it really does is be the world). Faith isn't rational, that's the whole point of it, practically the definition - to just believe anyway, without proof, the oft-mentioned "leap of faith". That said, religion can be a rational choice, it's comforting in a way that science, with its fundamental reliance on uncertainty of conclusions, constant change and being wrong just isn't, and sometimes all you need is shelter from the storm.
And I don't consider "religious awe/faith" as any more beautiful than the "sense of wonder" I feel. In fact I don't even consider them to be different feelings, they're the same feeling mediated through a different belief system. Because faith is seen as like love people are allowed to get all daffy about it, as a culture (maybe even as a species) we give ourselves permission, whereas apparently hard-headed stuff like refraction can't be moving. But rainbows are born of refraction ;).
Thank you for flying Church of England, cake or death?
Hex | August 24, 05:50 CET
Started to check out this thread where I left off and rapidly realized I don't begin to have time to read it. But this caught my eye and I just had to add a shout-out to Eddie Izzard and the funniest stand-up show ever.
(Dressed to Kill, the uncut version they aired on HBO).
OT? I know there was lots more funny Church stuff in that routine as well, just can't remember it. ;-)
dreamlogic, yeah, I've read some of Kant's theories, which is the place in my brain I was scratching at when writing that post :).
Saje, you'll love 'The God Delusion'. You're mostly agreeing with it already ;).
And while I tend to agree with your assessment that "sense of wonder" is the same as "religious awe/faith" (an idea Dawkins is a big supporter of) on instinct, I can't be 100% sure. The feelings described by some religious people are much more instense than the sense of wonder that drove me to become an astrophysicist (because, honestly, is there a more grand-scale sense-of-wonder inspiring branch of science out there? ;)), so maybe it, in fact, is something different.
But then again, that "intense" feeling (I think) is not what the majority of religious people feel. What the majority feel is probably indeed akin to the "sense of wonder" we feel, just, like you say "mediated through a different belief system".
Saje, you'll love 'The God Delusion'. You're mostly agreeing with it already ;).
Heh, now i'm wondering if it's worth reading at all then - could've saved my money and just talked to myself for an hour or so (give me a book I want to throw across the room once or twice any day of the week ;).
(and if it's the rainbow thing BTW Dawkins talks about them in a previous book, 'Unweaving the Rainbow', which i've read. Thought it was a very nice example because as he says, you can understand refraction and internal reflection in rain drops but you still appreciate the beauty of a rainbow. So i'm not pre-cognitive or anything, don't panic ;)
And while I tend to agree with your assessment that "sense of wonder" is the same as "religious awe/faith" (an idea Dawkins is a big supporter of) on instinct, I can't be 100% sure.
Well i'm not 100% sure either (despite how I might come across sometimes ;). Might have put that badly actually, maybe "religious awe" sounds more like those very intense, ecstatic experiences folk have (what you might call experiences of "revelation", where they actually commune with God in their opinion). Remember reading that they might be associated with temporal lobe epilepsy but I never followed it up.
But I actually just meant, when people look at the world, are staggered and think "There must be something behind it, something grand". Some stop there, decide that's it there just is something grand behind it, other probe slightly deeper and maybe come to the conclusion that nature (the big nature i.e. the universe) is plenty grand enough. It's natural (literally ;) to feel a need to express your wonder at the world (we do love a good pattern and the world's full of 'em) and even to wish it actually reflected a (comparatively) cosier reality than the one we may be stuck with IMO, everybody wants to feel safe and nobody wants to die forever and ever.
Some of the mods might prefer we don't get into it
Usually because whenever religion is mentioned, the discussion gets so far off the beaten track I have to remind myself what the original topic was actually about.
I really wish I'd had time to jump in on this discussion earlier on. Cheers to all for a truly memorable and fascinating look at this topic (and a peek into your brains) :).
The One True b!X | August 22, 19:52 CET
And if they did all seek out Wicca and all did it because of Buffy--so what?
batmarlowe | August 22, 20:07 CET
Sunfire | August 22, 20:09 CET
I say this speaking as an active member of the Episcopal Church, the American branch of the Church of England.
windmillchaser | August 22, 20:09 CET
Be that as it may--I can dig it!
Technodestructo | August 22, 20:12 CET
And I guess we'd need to know what the men/women split was to begin with and what she means by "rate". Could be that in absolute terms there're still many more women going to church than men, i'd be surprised if that wasn't still the case to be honest.
(the Buffy connection's as thin as a gnat's wotsit too of course - unless the rate jumped up in 1998 - because she's using figures starting from 1989, 9 years before it premiered on terrestrial UK telly. And are women becoming wiccans at the same rate as they leave the C of E or is that a spurious connection too ?)
ETA: Some of which was said while I was turning my sausages - pork and apple, yum ;).
[ edited by Saje on 2008-08-22 20:14 ]
Saje | August 22, 20:12 CET
Krusher | August 22, 20:14 CET
"Women priests? Great, great. Now there's priests of both sexes I don't listen to."
I'm not sure I believe that BtVS drove great swarms of women to join the Wiccan religion, and I'm not a big supporter (to put it mildly) of any religion, including Pagan or Wiccan, but if watching Buffy led to greater (unmeasurable) female empowerment, then my only reaction is "Awesome. Well done, you."
And hurrah for pork-and-apple snausages, while I'm at it.
QuoterGal | August 22, 20:22 CET
windmillchaser; To soem extent, the dynamics in European churhces, with the state church heritages hanging over them, differ from what happens over here.
QuoterGal; We can get those this side the pond? Wow.
DaddyCatALSO | August 22, 20:29 CET
hacksaway | August 22, 20:33 CET
I've yet to see a true, accurate portrayal of pagans or witches in film or media... and a true witch wouldn't base his or her spiritual path upon the likes of any character-based witch.
edenrivers | August 22, 20:50 CET
zohrael | August 22, 20:54 CET
[ edited by Lirazel on 2008-08-22 21:56 ]
Lirazel | August 22, 21:00 CET
Or even worse.. Dr Who
*cringe*
Krusher | August 22, 21:02 CET
I think Doctor Who's safe. Look here.
deepgirl187 | August 22, 21:13 CET
Yet another Christian jumping to silly conclusions and sweeping generalizations and making all of us Christians out to be paranoid and overly judgmental.
I don't read it that way at all. She may be a Christian (her choice of topics for discussion suggest she is) but she's also a sociologist at the University of Derby and writer on women's issues. The report itself (and even, in fairness, the articles summarising it) don't seem to be condemning women for their choices, if anything they seem to me to be condemning the C of E for not moving quickly enough with the times.
Saje | August 22, 21:13 CET
moley75 | August 22, 21:24 CET
And as people have pointed out...the witchcraft and wicca material on Buffy doesn't really resemble Wicca beliefs in the RL at all.
EX | August 22, 21:25 CET
(it'd be interesting to see statistics - if there are any - on the number of women abandoning wicca after a short time because it's not what they thought it was going to be)
Saje | August 22, 21:29 CET
How awful! We women have aspirations? Raised aspirations at that. When did I miss that memo? That might have happened when I was rereading the BtVS S8… ;)
So, by DM's count Buffy turned 50,000 ladies into 'witchcraft' (so you sure, 10,000 of those didn't just choose sleeping in?)? And that’s Buffy alone - c'mon, Charmed might've been low on the well-written feminism, but give them 3 (plus) witches credit too! lol
*pickes up S8* Taking BUF's words out of context (or not, hmm)
The thing about changing the world... once you do it, the world's all different
Mirage | August 22, 21:30 CET
I'm not saying that her conclusions don't have legitimacy--some of them definitely do--and I obviously didn't phrase it correctly--I think it was the reporting that was overstating things, especially in the first article. I could just easily, easily see crazy Christians waving this study around as further evidence that pop culture is destroying the world. I could see this snowballing and turning into something ugly. I just don't want to see that happen.
[ edited by Lirazel on 2008-08-22 21:56 ]
Lirazel | August 22, 21:43 CET
Well, he certainly wouldn't be a filthy, low-down, CAMPER ;)!
zeitgeist | August 22, 21:51 CET
Sunfire | August 22, 22:01 CET
Well, he certainly wouldn't be a filthy, low-down, CAMPER ;)!
There's probably a textual justification. "And yea, verily he did gib from on high and lo, from the wicked opposition many shouts, wreathed in sarcasm did follow of 'Oh, very fucking mysterious I don't think your supreme camposity'" (Note: this may be from the apocrypha, actual words may vary) ;-).
I think it was the reporting that was overstating things, especially in the first article. I could just easily, easily see crazy Christians waving this study around as further evidence that pop culture is destroying the world. I could see this snowballing and turning into something ugly.
Yeah, I get that Lirazel (as an atheist I sometimes feel the same way listening to Richard Dawkins rattle on ;). If you're not from the UK BTW you'll have no reason to know this but the Daily Mail is pretty much the epitome of a reactionary, "little England", small 'c' conservative mindset wherein everything was better before X happened, with X moving around but recently featuring the "Polish invasion" (i.e. cheap immigrant labour after Poland gained EU membership). Blowing things up to create a sensation and obscure the facts is probably in their mission statement ;).
Saje | August 22, 22:06 CET
impalergeneral | August 22, 22:12 CET
A recent sociological survey in the US found that Americans are abandoning the religions they were brought up in and switching to others at record rates, and that these conversions are going in every direction. Episcopalians may be turning Wiccan, but I know one former Wiccan who has become an Orthodox Christian.
janef | August 22, 22:12 CET
as an atheist I sometimes feel the same way listening to Richard Dawkins rattle on I can imagine. I guess we all have people from whatever group we might associate ourselves with (from religion to fandom to politics to schools we attended) that we just wish wouldn't try to speak for us. It's why we should all give each other the benefit of the doubt, I think.
[ edited by Lirazel on 2008-08-22 22:15 ]
Lirazel | August 22, 22:14 CET
zz9 | August 22, 22:16 CET
Goddess bless our right wing press.
curlymynci | August 22, 22:38 CET
Krusher | August 22, 22:44 CET
If you are looking for blame, look within. Buffy didn't lure them away with Wicca, ya looney-tunes. Presumably, they left because they weren't happy with this specific organized religion. Good grief. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see they are looking for a scapegoat.
Linnea1928 | August 22, 22:51 CET
moley75 | August 22, 23:08 CET
DreamDancer | August 23, 00:02 CET
This is not much different from over in the Muslim society. Thanks to the joys of internet, cheap travel, and TV, their women see how other women in the world live. Many wish they could live like that. But unlike the CoE women, they can't just up and leave their religion. We are very lucky to be able to choose without our lives being in danger, and I am grateful for that.
Ivalaine | August 23, 00:14 CET
Some would say this makes you a Pagan, Krusher.
I still haven't got the hang of HTML quote formatting.
[ edited by Simon on 2008-08-23 07:12 ]
janef | August 23, 01:12 CET
As for me, I love both Buffy and Jesus. I attend an Episcopal church that has a woman priest, and many of my male and female friends there (including the priests' kids) are huge fans of Buffy and Firefly.
TawnyJayne | August 23, 01:23 CET
montresor | August 23, 01:57 CET
Buffy is not the cause. Buffy is a reflection, showing us how we've outgrown the naive, flat-earth of the past and moved on. Why do I say this? We don't believe Buffy is real. It is fantasy. We know this. In the same breath, a rational adult will realize the religions it borrows from are also fantasies.
For proof, look to history. Nobody takes Greek Mythology seriously, but at one time, people did. It was a real religion. Now it's just stories. The same thing will happen to the modern religions. Eventually, they will fade away. Science and rational thought will supercede them, as they should.
We're ready to take off the training wheels. We're ready to see the truth as it really is, and realize we are finite beings in a vast universe. Enjoy the moment, for it is as ours as it is fleeting.
quantumac | August 23, 02:06 CET
Tmas | August 23, 02:17 CET
Sunfire | August 23, 02:42 CET
1) The number of women attending church in Britain has halved in a generation, dropping steadily by about a million over 20 years (50,000 per year).
2) A sociologist decides to investigate the reasons why.
3) She comes up with several reasons including feminism, female empowerment, and an interest in non-traditional spirituality such as Wicca.
4) The sociologist is a Buffy fan. (Guessing here...)
5) Since Buffy is all about feminism, female empowerment, and wiccans, the sociologist decides that mentioning Buffy in her press release as a personification of the changes affecting women's lives will be useful shorthand, and also attract the attention of journalists.
6) Her cunning ploy works perfectly; several national newspapers decide to run the story, and illustrate it with a photo of Sarah Michelle Gellar. She is, after all, more attractive than Rowan Williams...
stormwreath | August 23, 02:55 CET
Tonya J | August 23, 02:59 CET
QuoterGal | August 23, 03:30 CET
Come on. Rowan Williams is kind of a hottie. Good eyebrows, excellent duds. Interesting hair. Cross necklace!
[ edited by shinygroovyj on 2008-08-23 04:26 ]
[ edited by shinygroovyj on 2008-08-23 04:26 ]
shinygroovyj | August 23, 04:25 CET
korkster | August 23, 04:38 CET
[ edited by TawnyJayne on 2008-08-23 06:49 ]
TawnyJayne | August 23, 06:47 CET
Journos are silly.
Also, can we not do the religious debate crap again? It never ends pretty.
[ edited by Mort on 2008-08-23 06:50 ]
Mort | August 23, 06:49 CET
GrrrlRomeo | August 23, 08:33 CET
[ edited by bivith on 2008-08-23 08:46 ]
bivith | August 23, 08:45 CET
1. Buffy destroys the rain forest making all those stakes.
2. Buffy pollutes the atmosphere dusting all those vampires.
3. Buffy causes global warming by being hot.
MutantFriend | August 23, 10:06 CET
Of course, it should actually be illustrated by a picture of Alyson Hannigan (or, ideally, Amber Benson).
I'll say again that I think Dr Aune and her university have made a mistake mentioning Buffy and Wicca in her press release because it has allowed the important issues to be derailed.
moley75 | August 23, 10:32 CET
Whisper | August 23, 10:38 CET
I'll say again that I think Dr Aune and her university have made a mistake mentioning Buffy and Wicca in her press release because it has allowed the important issues to be derailed.
Maybe they naively thought that because what they said about Wicca is true (according to her report anyway) it would be OK to mention it (once, as an aside, followed by various other points). But yeah, anyone that's actually read a newspaper should've sussed that 'Buffy' and 'Wicca' is what they'd latch onto.
1. Buffy destroys the rain forest making all those stakes.
That's a good point (heh, sometimes I crack myself up - and then there's now ;), are Buffy's stakes made from renewable forests ? Cos I bet she goes with something hard like oak and that's a slow grower. Bad Buffy, bad ! Though that said, she does hold on to Mr Pointy for quite a while, so it's not like she goes through them quickly. And vampire dust is organic so it's like she's Sunnydale's biggest composter. It's a fair cop about global warming though.
Also, can we not do the religious debate crap again? It never ends pretty.
Actually, they've always been extremely civilised on here in my experience. Maybe not pretty though ;).
Saje | August 23, 10:42 CET
I know female Buffy fans who are in the clergy. I don't think they plan to abandon ship.
redeem147 | August 23, 12:50 CET
If you're not from the UK BTW you'll have no reason to know this but the Daily Mail is pretty much the epitome of a reactionary, "little England", small 'c' conservative mindset wherein everything was better before X happened
Too true, saje. I work part-time in a newsagents when I'm not needed at the theatre and in the trade it's known as the Daily Hate Mail. Its style is basically cant, hypocritical moralising and speculation presented as fact.
Sorry for the rant, but as a Buffy-loving Christian, this sort of 'reporting' really makes me angry.
171Oak | August 23, 13:41 CET
Also I'm really tired of reporters making sensationalist headlines out of relatively innocent academic papers; many reports I see in the mainstream media omit important details for instance: how the survey in question was conducted and the conclusion reached by the researchers. Without this kind of information a survey can be rendered effectively meaningless, and many news reports leap to the most astounding and absurd conclusions...by trying to complex ideas into bite-sized "factoids."
(Kudos to The Telegraph for prefacing their story with "The report claims..." and for all round better coverage of this book, but things can always be improved)
1. Buffy destroys the rain forest making all those stakes.
2. Buffy pollutes the atmosphere dusting all those vampires.
3. Buffy causes global warming by being hot.
4. Buffy damages the economy by abandoning her burger flipping job.
5. Buffy encourages teens to stay up late by patronizing The Bronze.
The Londinium Sun | August 23, 13:52 CET
"Imagine"??? Earth to condescending writer of article, that isn't something women "imagine".
Well let's see .... I've been a practicing Wiccan, with a good bit of Buddhism in the mix, for more than twenty years. I happily and belatedly discovered BtS and shortly thereafter, all things Joss hath created, about four years ago.
Come to think of it, that is around the time I got overly ambitious with my spells, and they all started going wonky. ;-)
Shey | August 23, 15:56 CET
Tonya J | August 23, 16:23 CET
I can see it: "Hey, Al, could you rewrite this to allude to Joss Whedon somehow? Our traffic's low, we need the Whedonesque bump."
ManEnoughToAdmitIt | August 23, 16:53 CET
I read this as a case of 'holding back judgement' on the part of the writer, reporting what the women think (using the word "imagine" to illustrate that), regardless of personal feelings on the subject. But I may be wrong.
GVH | August 23, 18:03 CET
I have the next area of study for the author- 'Are middle aged men leaving the COE in the interests of establishing a 'Church of the Fonz', as seen on 'Family Guy?' (Now that article I WOULD check out!}
missb | August 23, 18:24 CET
"Also, can we not do the religious debate crap again? It never ends pretty."
Like Sage said, it's usually pretty civil here. Some of the mods might prefer we don't get into it, but as long as it can be kept clean and ends up in the usual "agree to disagree" fashion...we're usually cool.
I know there are the lightning rod topics that sometimes are mentioned as wisely avoided in public forums (when I used to bartend, I remember it being recommended you stay away from politics, religion, and sex and/or money--but they all get discussed, because if you don't bring them up, your regulars will eventually). I can't see how it helps to keep away from them due to a worry of potentially insulting others though. These are the big questions, we base a lot of our decisions on them and society is built on them, they're worth getting into. It should be encouraged frequently, not stifled.
A lot of people are bored of the debate (especially when it comes to religion), either because they've seen it enough times to be annoyed by it or it's just not something they prefer to think about much (or they've made up their minds and don't like to see the challenges), but they're free to not read further when they see things headed in that direction and click elsewhere.
What quantumac said. I know the more polite response in these kinds of discussions is more along the lines of "I hope the fanaticism stops [well I do, but it probably won't any time soon] and that all religious/spiritual and non-religious/undecideds will eventually learn to live in peace", but since I was 17 I've felt that the world really would have an increased chance of improving by leaps and bounds (a chance, because atheism isn't a guaranteed cure-all) if we took the same attitude toward the remaining worshipped religions as we do to Greek Mythology (eventually you'll see "Judeo-Christian Mythology", "Muslim", etc).
So news that folks are leaving certain churches in droves ? Awesome, it means folks are either waking up or getting sick of 'em. Or both. I dunno the numbers, but this might be balanced with record recruitments in Africa though, I know the Anglican Church and such do well there. I'm not sure if that's because Christianity is something the downtrodden genuinely want, or if they simply provide enough aid and evangelizing to make it seem like a real good deal.
[ edited by Kris on 2008-08-23 21:44 ]
Kris | August 23, 21:43 CET
alien lanes | August 23, 22:17 CET
Madhatter | August 23, 22:45 CET
Agreed to some extent, Kris. I myself love the discussion of religion, science, atheïsm, etcetera. I used to frequent the blog of a well-known Dutch philosopher of religion just to learn from the positions of others and debate at a higher level than - say - the local pub. It was never an option for me to do anything more than a basic class in science philosophy (which I loved) at my university while doing astrophysics, but science philosophy and related (philosophical) topics have always been of much interest to me. What people think about these issues is so fundamental to the way they see the world that it can't not be interesting. At least, not in my opinion.
But I've also been dragged into more than enough discussions that end badly, to see that it's not always a good idea to debate these issues. Because while to me, as an atheïst, the religion/faith/science debate is (mostly - I'm only human too ;)) a purely rational one, which is challenging and fun on that level (not saying this goes for all atheïsts, by the way, I know more than enough people who are angry at religion/faith and as such (also) deny it for personal, rather than cognitive reasons), this does not go for everyone. Feelings end up getting hurt, lines end up getting drawn deeper in the sand and minds end up closed rather than open. Which is why debates of these types should - in fact - not be encouraged frequently. They should be encouraged only when the setting is right and the people contributing do so for the right reasons.
So while I would love to have a debate on these matters with my fellow whedonesquers, who are some of the most well-educated, informed, behaved and intelligent people on the internet, I also think we have an obligation to our fellow posters, moderators and readers to not get into such a discussion unless really warrented and unless people want to. And so far, this thread? Not so much, I'd say. Yes, it's about religion (and then not even in general), but that's about it.
(but, having said that, if anyone'd want to hop over to the org, I'd totally be game ;))
ETR: typos
[ edited by GVH on 2008-08-24 00:46 ]
GVH | August 24, 00:43 CET
1) Chronic Book Accumulation Syndrome is a sickness and 2) West Hollywood still has pockets where we grandfathered rent-controlled apartment dwellers are probably getting twice the average space for half the usual price... so I'm both cursed and blessed because it's a Law of Physics, I think, that if you have this illness and any amount of space for bookshelves, you will fill it up entirely with books. I am out of room. Again.
QuoterGal | August 24, 01:31 CET
(Also, regarding my previous statement: it seems there's no clear spot on the org, for discussions of the type I suggested above. Hmm.)
[ edited by GVH on 2008-08-24 01:56 ]
GVH | August 24, 01:55 CET
I have nothing of substance to add to the conversation, just wanted to express my gratitude for a very good laugh from this article.
Hex | August 24, 05:50 CET
Kris wrote, "since I was 17 I've felt that the world really would have an increased chance of improving by leaps and bounds (a chance, because atheism isn't a guaranteed cure-all) if we took the same attitude toward the remaining worshipped religions as we do to Greek Mythology (eventually you'll see "Judeo-Christian Mythology", "Muslim", etc)."
IMO, one of the biggest obstacles to productive discussions between religious people and people who think society would be better off without any religion (e.g., John "imagine no religion" Lennon") is that people holding Lennon's view very frequently don't know, and refuse to believe even when they are told, that many religious people do regard the myths of their own religion as myths and do not take those myths literally. To argue that only literalists are the "real" believers in a particular religion is setting up a straw man.
IMO, the conviction that a divine force or forces exist and have some interaction with human beings depends largely on one's life experience, not on doctrine. Religious stories exist to point the way and make some sense of those experiences when and if they happen. For these stories to be useful, one must know them, but it isn't necessary to accept them as historical narrative.
This POV is not new although it has received a big boost from the scientific method and modern historical research. Greek philosophers started questioning the literal truth of their culture's mythology in the fifth century BCE, and allegorical and symbolic interpretation of texts has been a major part of religious tradition in the West ever since. However, if your religious education stops before junior high school, you may never be exposed to that way of thinking.
janef | August 24, 05:51 CET
TamaraC | August 24, 06:51 CET
But it seems silly to note as "fascinating" the fact that people are simply recognizing what the article's slant is.
[ edited by theonetruebix on 2008-08-24 07:24 ]
The One True b!X | August 24, 07:23 CET
TamaraC | August 24, 07:40 CET
I may be a former Anglican but I'll stick up for the CoE. I think they are trying to empower women but unfortunately there's a sizeable reactionary element which is trying to block such progressive moves.
Simon | August 24, 07:55 CET
TamaraC | August 24, 08:10 CET
Saje, that's a good example of (bad, IMO) "athiest, scientist" for this discussion. I can't get behind Dawkins at all, much as the people from traditional religions cringe when they find themselves fronted by loud dumb-asses who go well beyond their expertise and pontificate on everything.
dreamlogic | August 24, 08:29 CET
All any of us can do is present our opinion and the arguments (if there are any) that justify it and then let folk take or leave it as they see fit. I get where he's coming from to be honest but as with anyone like that (on whichever issue) I always wonder who it is he thinks is listening to him, who he thinks is convinced by being told, basically, that they're either liars or idiots for believing what they believe ? The way he "argues" is (ironically) just preaching to the choir and apart from being a bit self-congratulatory that's obviously also entirely pointless.
IMO, the conviction that a divine force or forces exist and have some interaction with human beings depends largely on one's life experience, not on doctrine. Religious stories exist to point the way and make some sense of those experiences when and if they happen. For these stories to be useful, one must know them, but it isn't necessary to accept them as historical narrative.
Hmm, I agree and disagree janef. I think the urge to explain things (and therefore to ask questions) and to see patterns and order and, most importantly where religion's concerned, agency in the world is innate in humans (it's part of us being born as helpless little bags of wind and shit ;). Possibly because we have to assume agency in other humans i.e. because we're separate, self-aware entities it makes sense (to our minds/brains) to assume it in a lot of different things, so thunder is caused by a person for instance. The One True God arose fairly recently in the historical record (about 1200 BC, becoming more widespread later) out of a sort of pissing contest between all the gods we'd previously used to explain the world around us.
How we answer those questions is a matter of the available explanations though - i.e. doctrine - and all it takes to reject one doctrine over another is a nagging doubt and an opportunity IMO (like most atheists I was raised religious - Church of Scotland in my case - but was lucky enough to have the sort of parents that, though very religious themselves, realised you can't force people to believe what, to them, is unbelievable, you can only force them to act the part - and what's the point of that ?).
Saje | August 24, 11:41 CET
I haven't seen many of Dawkins' public appearances, but I've heard that he's pretty self-righteous as a debater. However, I have read 'The God Delusion' and was expecting a book from a very angry, unreasonable person which'd be only tollorable because I'm also an atheïst. Instead, what I found, was a subdued book, very rational and cognitive in its presentation, with clear argumentation and a sense of direction. I enjoyed reading it, although the later chapters lost some focus.
So to me, it's sort-of a mystery why that book caused such an uproar that even fellow atheïsts feel the need to distance themselves from it. Again, I have not seen the man in many public appearances, so maybe people are reading things into the book which are not there. The only 'fault' I could find was a tone that said the author was convinced that he was right and a chapter on agnosticism that was perhaps worded more harshly than it could've been. And I see no problem with that first thing (being right). Yes, there may be a problem with that in a discussion, but not in a book where one tries to roll out an argument for ones own point of view.
So, Dawkins? The Jury's still out on the man himself, since I don't know enough about him. But I found myself agreeing with 'The God Delusion' more than disagreeing (which I did, at a few points) and found it to be a pleasant read.
Well, as an atheïst myself, janef, I can tell you that I don't think all religious people believe everything that's in (let's say) the bible verbatim. There's degrees everywhere. But every religious person does have a certain degree of faith. They believe in God in some shape or form, depending on the religion they belong to.
And while I have much less trouble, rationally, accepting people who believe in "something undefined" rather than some random pre-defined set of beliefs dictated by what they grew up with, what they like/dislike or another external reason, it's still not something I can fully understand. Why would anyone need "something" to explain anything, anyway? I, myself, don't see the "added value", so to speak. You can be moral, without religion. You can enjoy culture, without religion. And you can even ask the big questions, without religion. In my opinion, the only thing that's missing is comfortable answers. And we don't really need those either.
(crap, now I got into the discussion anyway, despite saying I wouldn't upthread ;))
GVH | August 24, 12:34 CET
I'd imagine it is a fairly temperate book though, apart from anything else the guy's a respected scientist so it makes sense that he'd adopt the same slightly distanced voice he uses in his biology books (most of which are, IMO, excellent BTW - particularly 'The Extended Phenotype' and 'The Selfish Gene', much mis-apprehended by lazy readers though it may have been).
In some ways that makes it worse of course, because his book might actually convince a few people that're currently on the fence but they won't bother to read it because of his public rhetoric.
Saje | August 24, 13:31 CET
As for convincing people currently on the fence: I do also think he's "preaching to the chior", so to speak, in his book. There's a relentless rationalism there, that speaks to people like me, but which probably won't speak to religious people. To "reach across the isle" you need a different method, a common basis to start from, so that people understand what you're talking about.
In my experience, using rationalism and a scientific state of mind as a way to discover larger "truths" than may be confined within active science, can lead to only one natural conclusion: atheïsm. This is something that I think Dawkins argues very elloquently in his book.
However, there's a lot of people that don't accept just that. Who think rationalism works fine within the practicality of science, but can't be extended beyond that. Who feel that truth or reality may be subjective things, that knowledge is always relative to a certain frame-of-reference, etcetera. These are all very valid, detailed philosophical schools of thought.
But this, in fact, ends up causing confusion, because to people like Dawkins (who never mentions these things) and, to a lesser extent, me, these are alien concepts that don't mesh with the implied philosophical definitions of terms like "truth", "reality" and "knowledge" we use. These uses are usually instinctive and go without definition. But these instincts may differ from person to person.
It's that fundamental difference of thinking that I've found to be striking in discussions between - say - philosophers of religion and philosophers of science. Without agreeing on a set of ground rules and coherent definitions, the discussion is often useless because they're not speaking the same language.
So, yes there's things like tone and the way in which arguments are made. These are fundamentally a matter of taste, but I feel if - as Dawkins says - the goal of his book is to convince people, he could have used more subtle expressions in places. I don't think he's wrong or crossing the line most of the time, but he's certainly not reaching out a hand either. Mostly because he feels he doesn't have to pander to religion to make his point. An argument that I mostly agree with.
But I think there's another fundamental problem in 'The God Delusion' for the thinking persons reading it. While many - possibly including Dawkins himself - may not even realise it, Dawkins is simply not speaking the same language as (some of) the people across the isle, making it hard - if not impossible - to reach them, whatever the strength of his arguments.
GVH | August 24, 14:19 CET
But if I look around at the people I know (small sample group I guess but it's all I've got) I tend to think that religious "feeling" is most often kind of innate. My father was raised Irish Catholic, went into the novitiate because bookish types in that community joined the church, and lost his faith completely when he was about twenty. My mother was raised by almost ferociously atheist bohemian "artiste" types, but has prayed secretly since she can remember and found, as an adult, that the Christian church provided a deeply fulfilling structure and ritual to her personal faith. (She found out much later that she is technically Jewish, a whole other kettle of... something). My brothers and I were raised Christian in the loosest sense but it didn't stick for any of us, because none of us had that deep inner belief or feeling.
Also, very strongly agree with janef that a lot of "staunch atheists" misunderstand what religious faith is, assume that religious people take the stories that are a part of their religion literally or believe every single tenet, and that if they just thought about it rationally, they'd abandon their faith. That seems to me a total failure of imagination. I think it's rather like love. It isn't really rational, and certainly the way we choose a person to be with isn't always particularly rational. But as creatures that experience love, we find a way to express it, we find a home for it. The Church, like Marriage, is a flawed institution, but for many it's still the best home for this inexplicable feeling. We make it our own within a larger institution. People can give you a million reasons why you should or shouldn't love the person you're with, but either you feel it or you don't and nobody else is going to change that for you.
I've no idea what it is that makes some people feel some kind of force or guiding hand that they can't turn away from, while others just don't feel that at all. It's a feeling which may vary throughout one's lifetime, but I don't think Baptists going door to door, or Richard Dawkins, or Christopher Hitchens, or even Buffy (!) can change many people who weren't already going that way themselves.
(oops--fixed typos)
[ edited by catherine on 2008-08-24 16:40 ]
catherine | August 24, 16:37 CET
And, when comparing it to love, there's certainly cases where rational knowlegde can influence one's love or even make one deny their love because they feel they need to and I feel the same is true for religion. Even if I, somehow, had the deep feeling that there was "something", be it a God or something else, I would now not be able to reconcile that feeling with my personal rational beliefs and would probably end up categorizing that feeling as a "trick of nature", a "sense of wonder" (which one can also get from science) and still not believe.
The same is true for the opposite. There are atheïsts who feel a severe "lack" of something, despite their rational convictions or who've been raised atheïst but feel they can't stay that way, who are only atheïst because they're angry with faith/religion and can be convinced otherwise by solving the cause of that anger or who even make a rational decission to belief, based on the fact they stop sharing the same philosophical groundwork as most rationalist atheïsts do. Etcetera.
I think movement in both directions is possible and I think most people - at least here in The Netherlands, which - admittedly - is a very different environment from most of America - tend to fall in the "in between" category. Neither convinced atheïst or devout believer, and as such possibly susceptable to arguments either way - be they rational or emotional - from both religious people and atheïsts. Even if they do feel some form of conviction or have a certain rational belief.
Not even to mention the fact that the discussion itself is interesting and teaches us more about the way others see the world, which - to me - is the most important aspect of this. The chance of me suddenly becoming religious is very, very small. But I still want to understand more about religion and want to be able to better vocalize why I'm not religious. Who knows: maybe I was wrong all along.
GVH | August 24, 16:57 CET
SoddingNancyTribe | August 24, 17:12 CET
(Sidebar - the quote when I looked at this page was: "No wonder you like this stuff. It's like reading The Sun.")
fangless | August 24, 17:13 CET
But is it, SNT? I have loved, but I do not believe in love as a "concept". I think it's explainable, knowable and probably less pretty than we hope it is. It's chemistry and biology. I don't actively use my ratio to supress the feeling while I feel it and don't let it inform my actions, but I also don't feel the need to place it beyond rational explanation.
I've never "felt" religious faith. But I also think that's biology, chemistry and not unknowable per definition. It does not make the feeling any less beautifull, but I don't need to colour in said feeling with a God either. I guess it's that that I still don't get. The feeling: yes. The way people sculpt that feeling into religion? No.
And yes - a comment like yours is much more aestethically pleasing than a relentlessly rational one. But does that also make it more true[1]?
[1] if, of course, we accept truth as a concept that even exists ;)
ETA: of course, being true of not true might not even be of interest at all, to this :)
[ edited by GVH on 2008-08-24 17:24 ]
GVH | August 24, 17:24 CET
And of course, you're quite right GVH that what religion means to different people depends a lot on circumstance. There are people who need it because they need something and the world is otherwise senseless and cruel--and in the admittedly few cases I know personally where that is obviously the case, I would never want to strip these people of the one thing that makes their awful circumstances bearable. In that case, religion is in part at least a kind of survival skill, maybe, and that's a different issue. Of course there are also people who have simply been raised in a religious manner, surrounded by religious people, and it takes them years to question it, to realize it doesn't truly resonate with them, that it feels hollow. And they might listen to Christopher Hitchens on a rant, feel exhilarated, write him a letter, but I don't think they would have responded to him the way they did if they weren't already looking for their way out.
I guess what I mean is that if we wiped the millennia of religious faith and institutions from the collective memory (dollhouse-style, writ large!) I think that a large number of people would be atheists, and a large number would still feel that there was something they couldn't put a name to but eventually they would come up with a name, and with rituals, and with a community and a kind of religious institution (no doubt very different from the rather antiquated institutions that are currently the Houses of Faith).
I think the religious feeling is just a fundamental part of certain people and how they experience the world. I'm with you on the not getting it. I don't get it. I've never had it, beyond the occasional slight stirring in the most fleeting moments. But I am very, very close to some people who do feel it, whatever it is (surely something different from the "sense of wonder" that obviously the universe inspires in we atheists too). I'm not sure "rational" has anything to do with it. Well, to put that more strongly, I'm absolutely sure that rationality has nothing to do with it at all. Again and of course, I'm only talking about faith in the lives of the people I know. How they define God differs, but for each of them, a religious community and the church provide some kind of home for what they believe. I get my hackles up a bit when I think people are condescending towards believers (not you, at all, GVH! but Dawkins and Hitchens and that ilk). It seems to me to be something very beautiful and very profound and worthy of respect, and entirely separate from whether or not one is a "rational" person.
(Having said that, I'm living in the US now and the religious tone in this country is pretty scary and off-putting. If my early exposure to religion hadn't been so entirely positive, I would probably have all kinds of negative biases about it now).
catherine | August 24, 17:56 CET
That's very nicely put, and it's how I feel a lot of the time too. But... well, I guess I think that I'm not understanding the feeling, not really, if I can't make that next leap (God) where other people, just as rational as me, can make it. It's a mystery to me, and it is one I've had long and fascinating conversations about with loved ones who do believe in God, but I think the mistake of the atheist is often to think that because they don't get it, and they are rational, it must be irrational. I don't really buy that.
catherine | August 24, 18:06 CET
However, I do think that if you're completely, unforgivingly, rational and extend the scientific method to places where - according to some - it doesn't belong, using concepts as "truth", "reality", "knowledge" etcetera in the scientific not-relative way and consider a "God" as an entity able to "influence" "reality" in some way, the only "logical" conclusion is to be atheïst. Which is a large part of the reason why I am atheïst. But using a different set of definitions, even completely, unforgivingly rational people can come to different conclusions (it's not irrational or even logically fallible to assume an a priori "unknowable" agent when using different definitions for the terms I used above).
In fact, the discussion itself - which if infinately interesting if you're me - is so infused with the instinctual definitions of those words (which differ for different people), I find that that's the thing that people like Dawkins don't get and is the main cause for a lot of the misunderstandings out there, like I mentioned upthread.
As for having respect for religion: I have respect for people. I think there's beauty in everything people are passionate about, including religion. And I, too, think it would be cruel to "strip" people of faith who desperately need it. I think us atheïsts might even be less happy because they have less safe and satisfying answers and can be less sure about the "goal" of our existence (although I've always loved Joss' "if nothing we do matters, than all that matters is what we do" which is as close to a my personal life-philosophy as any pop culture outing has ever gotten) than religous people.
But I do have trouble with the way religious debate is framed by religious people. Faith gets more consideration than, say, one's political beliefs or - in fact - one's lack of faith, which can be just as personal and deeply felt. Which is why I tend to understand the more "angry" atheïsts out there (I'm not one of them, by the way), who rage against religion. I'm sure if the playing field was level, they'd be much more civilised. But for now: it isn't. But that does not - to me, at least - mean disrespecting people or behaving condescendingly towards religious people is acceptable. Respect is very important. Because raging against a concept, should never turn into raging againt the people who believe in that concept.
I agree that that's a large part of the fascination and the main reason that I don't understand religion yet, as a concept, despite everything I've heard and read about it.
But here we disagree. In fact, if I understand you correctly (which is probably not the case, so bear with me :)) you're contradicting yourself. Because earlier you said:
which I was agreeing with at the top of this message. I think the religious feeling, and the "leap" to a God (which may just be a cultural one: God is out there as a concept, so the leap is made pretty easily, after all) is not rational. It's based on a feeling and rationality does not factor into that. Which, again, does not mean that religious people can't be rational. Just that they might rationaly be influenced by their feeling. I know that sounds like a contradiction, but really, it's not. If, for instance, "truth" and "reality" are subjective, relative to a frame of reference, a feeling can certainly be a good reason for a God to "exist". And that's just one of the myriad of possible rational explanations. But these come after the fact. The basis for the religious faith is and will always be a feeling. Which is, almost per definition, not rational by itself.
GVH | August 24, 18:38 CET
I think atheists often make the mistake of thinking "rationality" is the central issue ("I am a rational person, religion makes no kind of sense to me, ergo religion is irrational"). But I don't buy that rationality has anything to do with religious faith or the lack of it.
Does that make sense? Is it a contradiction? Certainly not very well put, either here or above... and maybe kind of a stupid point anyway.
BTW I don't think I really addressed your comments on "faith is like love" above. I didn't mean to put either love or religious faith as somehow "beyond" rational explanation, beyond the meat and bone and bits and bobs that we are. I guess I just meant you can't talk someone in or out of a feeling, and as you said, the "reasons" we make up after the fact for why we love or why we believe in something (or why we don't, why we stop) are going to be shaky at best. It's all a bit mysterious to us, which doesn't mean there are no reasons, just that we don't know what they are in their full sometimes-contradictory complexity. But it goes deep nonetheless, and is an essential part of this being human thing we're doing.
I think it's Stephen Pinker who did these amazing studies into the way that we make up reasons for our behavior after the fact. So much of us is hidden from ourselves. So a leap of faith doesn't necessarily mean that we discard the very idea of The Rational--I think it can be an acknowledgment that this is something we don't understand completely, something that is powerful and feels "True" (for lack of a better word... and perhaps the lack of better words is the real problem here?), and that we're going to nurture it and take it seriously, in fact let this bewildering faith act as a sort of guide for us. Whatever has caused it, whatever it is made of (God/Science), it's worthy of wonder and celebration. It needs stories and songs. God, like Love, is a useful word for some and probably means something different to everyone who uses the word. It's just a word for something powerful that we act on / believe in, and that we can't entirely untangle. You can absolutely look at it through the lens of science. Or the lens of poetry. It doesn't really matter and it depends on the person. We look at the world, and everything we know, and everything we don't know, and some of us think "what random, miraculous chaos this is, how incredible that it should have led to me being here and trying to understand it," and some of us get down on our knees and pray. I don't think the world-view is necessarily so different--just the response.
Ha. A good conversation to have on a Sunday too, la.
catherine | August 24, 19:02 CET
Catherine writes, "I don't think science and god conflict. Obviously, nowadays, for any educated religious person, they can't conflict without some major fact-denial."
I agree with a caveat. As Thomas Kuhn pointed out, scientific knowledge does not always expand linearly; once in a while there is a paradigm shift that reorganizes known facts into a different structure. This leaves a little breathing space for religious beliefs that aren't supported by current scientific knowledge.
Classical physics described a mechanistic universe with no room for divine agency, except as a Prime Mover who set the clockwork running and then went away. Current trends in physics and life sciences, if I understand them correctly, involve systems analysis and emergent properties. The scientific picture of how the world works is starting to have some resemblance (in broad outline; occasionally in details) to various ancient prescientific cosmologies.
I'm not implying that "science" has "proven" this or that religious tenet "true". Only that it's easier now to entertain the possibility that a conscious intelligence pervades the universe than it would have been in 1908.
janef | August 24, 19:39 CET
Speaking of Dawkins, I probably shouldn't have said "dumb-ass", since the man is surely much smarter than me. But smart is as smart does. Preaching your personal theories as scientific fact doesn't strike me as very smart, or responsible, for a scientist. Maybe I should have said "jack-ass."
While the topic of the Church of England is still here, may I just say how much I admired the music in the Episcopal church when I was drafted to some of their services as a step-daughter. Lovely canticles. I wish I could have gone apostate from there, instead.
dreamlogic | August 24, 20:44 CET
Catherine - I really enjoyed reading your posts. Thank you.
TawnyJayne | August 24, 22:23 CET
I said that my relatives have been active members of Jewish congregations for reasons of community solidarity. In the past (not as much recently but within living memory) there was a significant amount of anti-Semitism in America. Synagogues everywhere are places for fellowship, study, mutual aid, and educating children to take pride in their heritage. In a multi-ethnic society, synagogues are also places where nice Jewish boys can meet nice Jewish girls. It's where my father met my mother. Churches play the same role in the African-American community. When a community is beleaguered, churches are set up to shelter the community from hostile outsiders and to pool people's resources so they can help each other.
From an anthropological POV, maintenance and strengthening of community ties is a major function of organized religion. (It can also be a source of inter-community conflict, of course). Western Europe, which is largely unchurched, is in the middle of a very interesting social experiment. Never before in human history has there been a society as secular as Western Europe, except where organized religion has been suppressed by the State. Can all the other groups and organizations of civil society (clubs, professional associations, unions, etc.) hold the society together and keep it healthy without major influence from organized religion? What will that society look like and feel like in another thirty years?
janef | August 24, 22:30 CET
catherine wrote:
The thing here I have a "problem" with (and I use the term very loosely ;)), is that I agree that some atheïsts wrongly think that rationality is the central issue in faith. Or, to be more precise, that the fact that their rejection of faith comes from a rational place, automatically means the religious person is wrong. This is not the case, because religious faith is, in fact, not rational, but emotional. Based on a feeling. And the pure rational approach used by the atheïst might not be relevant to the religious person.
So, in fact, I think if the atheïst then assumes that religious belief isn't rational, he'd be correct. Which is where we differ.
However, I also think that while the belief is not rational, the people may be and I also believe that it is possible, to - after the fact, using a different set of rules and definitions as the atheïst is using - explain the unrational belief, rationally.
It's a subtle difference to what you're saying, but I think we may actually be agreeing already. But feel free to correct me if I'm wrong in that assumption :).
TawnyJayne: thanks for the tip! I just did some mini-research and his writing does seem to intersect with some of my personal interest. I've not delved very deeply into the philosophy of morality before - apart from some basics - but his book 'The Moral Gap' seems like a nice way to learn more about what people "on the other side of the debate" think on these matters.
It's especially interesting because I have always felt that one doesn't need religion to be moral, and this book assumes the exact opposite. As with every philosophical debate, this depends on the way a person defines the central term "moral". Is morality formed by the consequences of an action, or is there an a priori way to characterise something as moral/immoral? And if so, what is the defining quality to make such a call? I find it interesting that John Hare seems to feel that God has a definitive role to play in that determination and that one cannot be truly moral without religion (something I'd disagree with heavily out of hand).
I'm sure it'll inspire new ways of looking at this particular subject for me, which is always welcome. In fact, it's usually more interesting to read the thoughts of someone you don't agree with than someone you do agree with, because it forces you to actively think of why you don't agree, instead of copying someone else's thoughts (although that can be usefull too, at times :)).
So, in short: thanks for the tip! (although I'll either have to find a nice second-hand copy or try to look for it in my (university) library, because the price for a new copy is pretty high ;))
ETA: made some alinea-seperations in that last bit, to make it more readable ;)
[ edited by GVH on 2008-08-25 04:04 ]
GVH | August 25, 04:00 CET
Aaand this thread slides off the page. Goodnight sweet thread, may flights of angels (or some wondrous natural phenomena) sing thee to thy rest, etcetera etcetera.
catherine | August 25, 05:09 CET
That question about morality was a big chunk of Kant's work as a philosopher. I haven't read John Hare. Kant's categorical imperative, a restatement of the golden rule, doesn't, IMO, require experience, but it does require recognition of other people as equal. YMMV.
dreamlogic | August 25, 05:34 CET
"IMO, one of the biggest obstacles to productive discussions between religious people and people who think society would be better off without any religion (e.g., John "imagine no religion" Lennon") is that people holding Lennon's view very frequently don't know, and refuse to believe even when they are told, that many religious people do regard the myths of their own religion as myths and do not take those myths literally."
I remember our religion teacher in Catholic school in Grade 10 (so I would've been 15/16), a former nun, being the only teacher/priest-type person to ever admit to this (I've seen plenty of writers since then though).
Except she only went halfway. She suggested that perhaps some of the Old Testament stuff (The Creation and Adam & Eve in Genesis and probably Noah's Ark and other crazyness you can think of) was merely symbolic, shouldn't be taken literally, but that everything in the New Testament regarding Jesus, his miracles, and the details of his life and death, definitely happened.
Me, I figured if you're gonna cast doubt on one half of the 2000-year-old-book (give or take), why not the rest ? I saw (and still see) too much fan-wanking over all the apparent plot holes by religious scholars in a feeble attempt to keep it relevant in the face of more evidence and rational thought progression that prove it otherwise.
And as for only literalists being "real" members of a religion...I believe contextualists (the terms they gave us in religion class back then, taking the Bible literally or contextually or a mixture of both) were also suggested as legitimate members of a faith, just as legitimate as hardcore literalists...but they still believe a God exists. So even if you're Catholic and don't believe the stuff in the Bible happened, but still believe in God the way Catholicism describes Him/It, I guess it sorta works to still call yourself Catholic. But if you go any further, you're agnostic. 'Cause what's the point in identifying with a specific religion otherwise ? I mean you're free to, but why bother ? Because you were raised that way isn't a worthwhile reason.
And while I don't believe we need religion to be moral, sure it's fine to read the stories and take quality lessons/advice from the texts. But that doesn't make you religious either and wouldn't make sense to call yourself Catholic or Buddhist or whatever, not if you don't buy into some of it as fact. I could use Buddhist meditation practices and really like Buddhist texts, study them extensively, and maybe even wish its view of the world to be more true than others, but unless I believe some of its proposed history, I would not call myself a Buddhist.
I never want religion to completely go away in terms of having it as a part of our history books, because it's important in that regard. But I still think it would be good for it to fade away sooner rather than later. I'm not an angry atheist. I'm arguably more agnostic, with an eye toward skepticism because of how us humans tend to be...but I still wanna remain open-minded to possibilities, it's just that something supernatural would have to practically come about and knock me on the head to convince me of its presence. So I don't come at this from an angry-at-religion/our-history perspective, just out of a frustrated need to see society progress faster (and, okay, it wouldn't hurt to have more people share my viewpoint or something closer to it, I won't lie, it's a selfish thing--arguably all decisions and feelings are).
[ edited by Kris on 2008-08-25 08:38 ]
Kris | August 25, 08:34 CET
(but then, biblical inerrancy wasn't even widely known about over here until about 10 or 15 years ago anyway, part of the British - particularly English - tendency to frown upon and generally be suspicious of any deeply held conviction, of whatever stripe. Not always a good quality BTW but it has its uses ;)
janef: This leaves a little breathing space for religious beliefs that aren't supported by current scientific knowledge.
But isn't that just a "god of the gaps" i.e. a god that can only exist so long as there are gaps in our knowledge of the universe ? So isn't god diminished at pace with our ignorance ? If I were a believer that'd be deeply unsatisfying and cause for worry as I watched my god being painted into a corner (maybe cause for the current apparent rise of extremism across the board ?).
janef: Current trends in physics and life sciences, if I understand them correctly, involve systems analysis and emergent properties. The scientific picture of how the world works is starting to have some resemblance (in broad outline; occasionally in details) to various ancient prescientific cosmologies.
... Only that it's easier now to entertain the possibility that a conscious intelligence pervades the universe than it would have been in 1908.
Not really. One of the fundamental points about emergent phenomena as I understand them is that they're emphatically not directed, not "conscious" in the sense we know it of some single entity with an overview of the whole process - emergence is all about the whole exceeding the sum of the parts but those parts can be totally unaware, behaving according to very simple rules (ants are a favourite example for instance) and the whole needn't be aware in our sense either. Some people choose to see this "greater than parts-ness" as God - when, for instance, Einstein talked about "the old one", that's kind of what he meant I think, he was talking about "the rules", the laws of physics and the amazingly intricate way they interact to produce the wonder of "creation" (he's on record as not believing in a personal god so that's not me claiming to know what Albert Einstein really meant BTW ;).
I don't agree that modern science has in any way "opened a door" to God, with the best will in the world what I think it's done is become more complicated - I don't mean I understand and religious people don't BTW, I mean no-one can understand all of it anymore, there's too much of it. And so we use metaphors to describe or approximate things and because those metaphors come from the same brains that came up with our creation myths, they're often quite similar (maybe the rough shape of myths is even innate ? Any comparative theologians here ?). And people are also more generally aware of the uncertainty of science, more sceptical and so those that maybe thought it was science vs religion might feel like science is on the retreat.
But of course, it never was science vs religions, they don't have that much to do with each other (if religious people didn't keep insisting on making claims about the external world - which is much more science's bailiwick - they'd have nothing to do with each other but people are always wanting to justify their internal state by pointing to the world and claiming that proves them right when all it really does is be the world). Faith isn't rational, that's the whole point of it, practically the definition - to just believe anyway, without proof, the oft-mentioned "leap of faith". That said, religion can be a rational choice, it's comforting in a way that science, with its fundamental reliance on uncertainty of conclusions, constant change and being wrong just isn't, and sometimes all you need is shelter from the storm.
And I don't consider "religious awe/faith" as any more beautiful than the "sense of wonder" I feel. In fact I don't even consider them to be different feelings, they're the same feeling mediated through a different belief system. Because faith is seen as like love people are allowed to get all daffy about it, as a culture (maybe even as a species) we give ourselves permission, whereas apparently hard-headed stuff like refraction can't be moving. But rainbows are born of refraction ;).
Saje | August 25, 12:31 CET
Hex | August 24, 05:50 CET
Started to check out this thread where I left off and rapidly realized I don't begin to have time to read it. But this caught my eye and I just had to add a shout-out to Eddie Izzard and the funniest stand-up show ever.
(Dressed to Kill, the uncut version they aired on HBO).
OT? I know there was lots more funny Church stuff in that routine as well, just can't remember it. ;-)
[ edited by Shey on 2008-08-25 14:19 ]
Shey | August 25, 14:18 CET
Saje, you'll love 'The God Delusion'. You're mostly agreeing with it already ;).
And while I tend to agree with your assessment that "sense of wonder" is the same as "religious awe/faith" (an idea Dawkins is a big supporter of) on instinct, I can't be 100% sure. The feelings described by some religious people are much more instense than the sense of wonder that drove me to become an astrophysicist (because, honestly, is there a more grand-scale sense-of-wonder inspiring branch of science out there? ;)), so maybe it, in fact, is something different.
But then again, that "intense" feeling (I think) is not what the majority of religious people feel. What the majority feel is probably indeed akin to the "sense of wonder" we feel, just, like you say "mediated through a different belief system".
GVH | August 25, 14:25 CET
Heh, now i'm wondering if it's worth reading at all then - could've saved my money and just talked to myself for an hour or so (give me a book I want to throw across the room once or twice any day of the week ;).
(and if it's the rainbow thing BTW Dawkins talks about them in a previous book, 'Unweaving the Rainbow', which i've read. Thought it was a very nice example because as he says, you can understand refraction and internal reflection in rain drops but you still appreciate the beauty of a rainbow. So i'm not pre-cognitive or anything, don't panic ;)
And while I tend to agree with your assessment that "sense of wonder" is the same as "religious awe/faith" (an idea Dawkins is a big supporter of) on instinct, I can't be 100% sure.
Well i'm not 100% sure either (despite how I might come across sometimes ;). Might have put that badly actually, maybe "religious awe" sounds more like those very intense, ecstatic experiences folk have (what you might call experiences of "revelation", where they actually commune with God in their opinion). Remember reading that they might be associated with temporal lobe epilepsy but I never followed it up.
But I actually just meant, when people look at the world, are staggered and think "There must be something behind it, something grand". Some stop there, decide that's it there just is something grand behind it, other probe slightly deeper and maybe come to the conclusion that nature (the big nature i.e. the universe) is plenty grand enough. It's natural (literally ;) to feel a need to express your wonder at the world (we do love a good pattern and the world's full of 'em) and even to wish it actually reflected a (comparatively) cosier reality than the one we may be stuck with IMO, everybody wants to feel safe and nobody wants to die forever and ever.
[ edited by Saje on 2008-08-25 15:07 ]
Saje | August 25, 15:06 CET
Usually because whenever religion is mentioned, the discussion gets so far off the beaten track I have to remind myself what the original topic was actually about.
Simon | August 25, 15:18 CET
zeitgeist | August 25, 15:22 CET