What if you're wrong?

rozeboosje

Now there's a question for Atheists and Agnostics to ponder!

Ha! No, I'm not leading into the usual Pascal's wager, nor am I interested in talking about how "rational" a belief in some "god" thing or other is.

What I am talking about is that you may be barking up the wrong tree by focusing on this rationality. That believers don't care one bit about how rational their beliefs are or not.

You focus on how reasonable it is to believe in a "god" or not, while the purpose of such a belief has nothing whatsoever to do with actual "truth".

What if I told you that the purpose of faith is social cohesion? That belief in something as absurd as a "god" or anything other that is supernatural is a measure of your investment in the group that you belong to. That, in fact, the more absurd the actual belief is, the more valuable it is. Ostentatious belief, in this sense, is like a peacock's tail, a completely useless appendix that serves no practical use and that to somebody observing it rationally might even appear to be deleterious to its possessor's mental health, but that is in fact a visible marker of a fitness to being a constructive member of the group.

If we as a society are going to move beyond religious belief it won't suffice to simply replace religious belief with "rationality" or "science". We need to create new "secular" fictions that can serve the purposes of social cohesion in a way that makes religion superfluous. If we don't do this, we leave a gap that cults, fringe ideologies and charlatans will be only too happy to fill with their mumbo jumbo.

The other fella

rozeboosje wrote: »

Now there's a question for Atheists and Agnostics to ponder!

Ha! No, I'm not leading into the usual Pascal's wager, nor am I interested in talking about how "rational" a belief in some "god" thing or other is.

What I am talking about is that you may be barking up the wrong tree by focusing on this rationality. That believers don't care one bit about how rational their beliefs are or not.

You focus on how reasonable it is to believe in a "god" or not, while the purpose of such a belief has nothing whatsoever to do with actual "truth".

What if I told you that the purpose of faith is social cohesion? That belief in something as absurd as a "god" or anything other that is supernatural is a measure of your investment in the group that you belong to. That, in fact, the more absurd the actual belief is, the more valuable it is. Ostentatious belief, in this sense, is like a peacock's tail, a completely useless appendix that serves no practical use and that to somebody observing it rationally might even appear to be deleterious to its possessor's mental health, but that is in fact a visible marker of a fitness to being a constructive member of the group.

If we as a society are going to move beyond religious belief it won't suffice to simply replace religious belief with "rationality" or "science". We need to create new "secular" fictions that can serve the purposes of social cohesion in a way that makes religion superfluous. If we don't do this, we leave a gap that cults, fringe ideologies and charlatans will be only too happy to fill with their mumbo jumbo.

What sort of factions?

rozeboosje

The other fella wrote: »

What sort of factions?

Fictions, not factions.

Oh, well, shucks. I don't know. The world is full of more or less useful fictions: Nation States, Limited Companies, Human Rights, National Identities... the list is never ending. What I'm suggesting is that we can't just leave the gap unfilled. HOW we end up filling it is a whole 'nother story..

Alba Frere

And why can't the 'gap' remain unfilled?

rozeboosje

Alba Frere wrote: »

And why can't the 'gap' remain unfilled?

It won't remain unfilled, no matter what we do. But if we don't fill it with something constructive there are plenty of crackpots waiting to fill it with their insanity instead. Have you not noticed the rise in New Age nonsense, Anti-Vaxxers, Homeopathy and so on? *shudder*

dharma200

I think that social cohesion has been eroded by fiction. I really don't think any more fictions are going to help.

_Brian

Religion if nothing else provides solitude for so many and an important moral compass that otherwise not everyone would have.

The other fella

rozeboosje wrote: »

Fictions, not factions.

Oh, well, shucks. I don't know. The world is full of more or less useful fictions: Nation States, Limited Companies, Human Rights, National Identities... the list is never ending. What I'm suggesting is that we can't just leave the gap unfilled. HOW we end up filling it is a whole 'nother story..

I miss read that at first, i thought you wanted to start factions of some sort of worship, which would have contradicted your idea of preventing cultism taking over.

I'll read twice next time

Pherekydes

_Brian wrote: »

Religion if nothing else provides solitude for so many and an important moral compass that otherwise not everyone would have.

There are plenty of religious people with no moral compass.

Captain Hman

Christians have been murdering each other for centuries, u dont need a religion to have an excuse to do good deeds

The other fella

And plenty of non religious people who live very moral lives.If the world was god free, i think people would simply fill the gap by being more productive with their own lives.

Cantremember

OP everyone who has looked clearly at religion sees that. You can see it in the "I didn't go to mass" thread on AH and the type of responses from people who attended on Christmas Day. There's even one poster saying that mass gives an opportunity for young children to perform in public. So we all know that human beings social needs motivate a lot of what they do. Religion has no rational credibility: with that crutch gone it is more difficult for it to be taken seriously. Groups such as humanism Ireland and others have worked on alternative ceremonies for rites of passage.

braddun

what if I am right

matrim

The other fella wrote: »

And plenty of non religious people who live very moral lives.If the world was god free, i think people would simply fill the gap by being more productive with their own lives.

Or with some other authority figure to justify whatever stupid **** they want to do.

Cabaal

_Brian wrote: »

Religion if nothing else provides solitude for so many and an important moral compass that otherwise not everyone would have.

Moral compass?
The type that makes it ok to torture our fellow humans?



The kind of moral compass that means people are ok with denying cancer treatment to our fellow human's based on their religion?

_Brian

Yes, yes we all know that some religious people are bad eggs, this isn't news.
But in balance I feel it provides more positive influence than negative effects.

I will qualify this with I rarely ever go to mass, and many of the teachings my religion pedals are madness in my eyes. But I think the overall effect of religion is positive.

And on the topic of bad characters in religion, equally there are bad characters in medicine, yet the overall population benefit from medicine, and I don't think everyone should turn away from it.

Cabaal

_Brian wrote: »

Yes, yes we all know that some religious people are bad eggs, this isn't news.
But in balance I feel it provides more positive influence than negative effects.

So you just "believe" this, you don't actually have any proof that religion does more good and bad?

Its all silly to suggest that people should create a magical being that they then attach life and universe creating powers to just because you believe it apparently gives people a good moral compass.

Pherekydes

_Brian wrote: »

And on the topic of bad characters in religion, equally there are bad characters in medicine, yet the overall population benefit from medicine, and I don't think everyone should turn away from it.

Medicine doesn't teach that its practitioners are superior moral beings, who have the right to kill or injure those who don't believe its dogma.

Religion does. It teaches that the adherents of its particular brand are morally superior to the adherents of other brands and that only its disciples will go to heaven. Many religions teach that non-believers should be converted or killed.

rozeboosje

dharma200 wrote: »

I think that social cohesion has been eroded by fiction. I really don't think any more fictions are going to help.

"Human Rights" are a fiction. Would you like us to ditch that? I don't think that that would be very helpful, do you?

Fictions don't always take the form of "the moon is made out of green cheese" and other such clear nonsense. They can also take the form of "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights ..."

rozeboosje

The problem with many religions is that they end up dividing humanity into an in-group and an out-group. In the multi-cultural reality of an interconnected world this is no longer workable. It may help strengthen social cohesion within one semi-isolated group at the expense of xenophobia toward anybody outside the group, but it doesn't help create "world peace". For that we need new fictions that are all-inclusive and that don't exclude people or groups on the basis of who they are, what they look like, what they like or what they believe in.

vibe666

The other fella wrote: »

What sort of factions?

Red Factions

Sclosages

Your OP is incoherent so I gave up. What are ya on about?

CelticRambler

rozeboosje wrote: »

The problem with many religions is that they end up dividing humanity into an in-group and an out-group.

Just like money.

Right now, the new fiction is debt and (from the safety of a thousand kilometres) I find it amusing to watch my fellow countrymen getting all het-up over not being allowed to saddle themselves with more debt than they can afford in the New Year if the Central Bank gets its way. That is arguably more "rational" than a belief in a mystical being, but it's hardly any more logical to enslave yourself (and your children) to a financial institution just because ... well, just because.

Cantremember

CelticRambler wrote: »

Just like money.

Right now, the new fiction is debt and (from the safety of a thousand kilometres) I find it amusing to watch my fellow countrymen getting all het-up over not being allowed to saddle themselves with more debt than they can afford in the New Year if the Central Bank gets its way. That is arguably more "rational" than a belief in a mystical being, but it's hardly any more logical to enslave yourself (and your children) to a financial institution just because ... well, just because.

It makes about as much sense as defending religion on the basis it gives opportunities to young children to perform in public. A mini X factor. No one would post stuff as silly as that though.

CelticRambler

True. Participating in an organised, mutually respectful performance is so much more than the shallow silliness of the X-factor.

But that doesn't address the question of idiot parents endebting themselves to buy a plastic effigy of the Goddess Elsa that some oriental child probably made for 50cts so they can put it under their 100% god-free Christmas tree.

Human beings have a craving to belong to and/or follow something, and as the OP said when you take away one unifying belief, it will inevitably be replaced with another. I had "Christmas" dinner with some supposed non-believers on Thursday evening. Their house and lifestyle is a glorification of Steve Jobs; the paradox was quite delicious (unlike the dinner).

Brian Shanahan

rozeboosje wrote: »

What I am talking about is that you may be barking up the wrong tree by focusing on this rationality. That believers don't care one bit about how rational their beliefs are or not.

Whether it is right or wrong to not believe, given the available evidence not believing is most definitely the most rational approach. And whatever can be said about rationality, it does have a far better record of being right than subjectivity, which is what religious belief is based upon.

That is why, in the absense of contradictory evidence, I will continue to not believe in any god.

rozeboosje

Brian Shanahan wrote: »

Whether it is right or wrong to not believe, given the available evidence not believing is most definitely the most rational approach. And whatever can be said about rationality, it does have a far better record of being right than subjectivity, which is what religious belief is based upon.

That is why, in the absense of contradictory evidence, I will continue to not believe in any god.

Oh, I agree, Brian. In fact I don't even accept that any so-called "believer" has an idea of what this "god" is they claim to believe in to actually is supposed to be, so that they can communicate what the heck they are actually talking about to us who cannot buy into their BS.

But that's not the topic of this post, Brian. The point I'm making is that SOME types of fictions (excluding supernatural mumbo-jumbo) are actually not just useful, but essential to a successful society. Fictions such as "human rights", for example or "equality" in law.

Brian Shanahan

rozeboosje wrote: »

"Human Rights" are a fiction.

No they aren't. But that statement is typical of the stupid derpity that you love bringing up instead of rational and well thought out argument.

Brian Shanahan

rozeboosje wrote: »

But that's not the topic of this post, Brian. The point I'm making is that SOME types of fictions (excluding supernatural mumbo-jumbo) are actually not just useful, but essential to a successful society. Fictions such as "human rights", for example or "equality" in law.

But your problem is that the only fictions you have cited are your assertion that human rights and equality before the law are themselves fictions. They are both facts, because they have been established by law and are being carried out (albeit imperfectly).

Come back to me with an argument that is worthwhile (about the only one that got close was the rationality/irrationality bit I responded to) and then we can discuss.

rozeboosje

LOL

Right Brian. They are fact because we all believed in them hard enough. Let's click our heels three times and leave Oz now :-)

rozeboosje

*derp* http://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-A-Brief-History-Humankind/dp/0062316095

CelticRambler

Brian Shanahan wrote: »

But your problem is that the only fictions you have cited are your assertion that human rights and equality before the law are themselves fictions. They are both facts, because they have been established by law and are being carried out (albeit imperfectly).

Come back to me with an argument that is worthwhile (about the only one that got close was the rationality/irrationality bit I responded to) and then we can discuss.

They are only "facts ... established by law" because you choose to live by the laws that established them. There are places on this earth where humans live by other laws.

Ask just about anyone on this forum what a shake of the head means in response to a "Yes or No" question and they'll tell you "No" ... but there are countries in Europe where it means "Yes"

The Law is a made-up set of rules and therefore, by definition, fictional.

rozeboosje

CelticRambler wrote: »

The Law is a made-up set of rules and therefore, by definition, fictional.

Exactly.

The problem is that people see "fiction" and understand it as "worthless made-up crap". If that is how one understands "fiction" then one must convince oneself that the things one does believe in are somehow "real". Once one understands that a fiction can be useful, important and powerful there no longer is a need to delude oneself that way. Yes, laws are a fiction, but if you decide to ignore a speed limit and you kill another road user who never expected anybody to bear down on them at the insane speed at which you chose to travel, the jail you will be sent to by the judge who believes in the fiction you chose to ignore is very real.

PopePalpatine

I'm just wondering...if ethics/morality is a fiction (as it's some sort of abstract concept made up by humans), can we say the same thing about mathematics too? Granted, mathematics might be closer to reality than ethics/morality.

rozeboosje

Mathematics is definitely a human invention but maybe mathematics is a bit more like a game, with rules called "logic", perhaps? Interesting observation, to be sure.

magicbastarder

if maths is a human invention, why does the universe observe its rules too?

Harika

Mathematics are the same everywhere , 1+1=2 is always true, the formula to calculate the area of a circle is always the same, pi is a constant that is valid everywhere and it doesn't matter if here on earth, on mars or outside of the solar system.
Ethics and Morality are set by humans and even on earth between regions we see massive differences.

Shrap

magicbastarder wrote: »

if maths is a human invention, why does the universe observe its rules too?

I think "observe" is the pertinent word there. As in, it seems to observe any "rules" we discover about the universe. Isn't that a bit of an ongoing problem for quantum mechanics at the moment - ie. the behaviour of subatomic sized matter depends on the way it's being observed?

rozeboosje

Mathematics are an excellent and very accurate way of describing things that happen in the universe formally. One of, if not THE, best inventions of humanity.

Why do people keep thinking that if something is made up or invented by humans it suddenly becomes "worthless"?

Shrap

rozeboosje wrote: »

Mathematics are an excellent and very accurate way of describing things that happen in the universe formally. One of, if not THE, best inventions of humanity.

Why do people keep thinking that if something is made up or invented by humans it suddenly becomes "worthless"?

Who thought that then?! Hello....thought police? Can you come round please, there's a person thinking something I don't like.

But seriously, no. Haven't read the whole thread but there's nobody saying human fiction is worthless on this page anyway. I'm not quite following your problem here.

rozeboosje

People got their knickers in a twist when I pointed out that Mathematics is a human invention, and try to refute that statement by pointing out that "the universe observes its rules too".

Firstly I should point out that the universe does not observe our rules, our mathematics merely describe what the universe does exceedingly accurately. But, ok, let's rephrase that as:

"One can describe what the universe does very accurately using Mathematics"

Why should someone feel the need to point that out after someone else stated that Mathematics is a human invention? Maybe "worthless" is too strong a word, but I clearly get a "if Mathematics is *merely* a human invention, how come we can describe what the universe does so accurately with it?" vibe off that comment. As far as I'm concerned, the fact that Mathematics is a human invention does not devalue it one single bit.

Brian Shanahan

rozeboosje wrote: »

People got their knickers in a twist when I pointed out that Mathematics is a human invention, and try to refute that statement by pointing out that "the universe observes its rules too".

But the thing is you were implying that mathematics was a wholly human fiction when it is not. Mathematics is simply the language humans invented to describe certain relationships and regularities that are frequently observed in nature. They are explanations for reality that can be understood by us.

Dave!

I'm not wrong.

Cabaal

Err gravity is also a human invention, like maths it's an idea to explain what we observe in the universe.

Harika

Cabaal wrote: »

Err gravity is also a human invention, like maths it's an idea to explain what we observe in the universe.

Gravity is just a theory, like evolution. :rolleyes:

rozeboosje

Brian Shanahan wrote: »

But the thing is you were implying that mathematics was a wholly human fiction when it is not. Mathematics is simply the language humans invented to describe certain relationships and regularities that are frequently observed in nature. They are explanations for reality that can be understood by us.

No, I said that Mathematics was a human *invention* akin to a game, with rules called "logic"

Feel free to take that double barrel shotgun and point it at your other foot now.

magicbastarder

rozeboosje wrote: »

People got their knickers in a twist

no, they disagreed with you. subtle difference.

rozeboosje wrote:

Feel free to take that double barrel shotgun and point it at your other foot now.

i'm wondering if your impression of this discussion is a bit more dramatic than everyone elses.

anyway, the suggestion that humans 'invented' maths is a misleading way of phrasing it. more accurate to say we discovered it - because invention suggests we created it and have control over it. if that had been the case, the rules of maths would have been ours to manipulate.

it'd be great though if it had been an invention. i'd claim copyright over the number 898263809721870878772340111998222698223; i'm almost certainly the first person ever to write that number, so if you wish to use it, you'll have to talk to my legal team to discuss fees.

rozeboosje

magicbastarder wrote: »

no, they disagreed with you. subtle difference.

No, they got their knickers in a twist.

magicbastarder wrote: »

I'm wondering if your impression of this discussion is a bit more dramatic than everyone elses.

Nah. Just look at our pal Brian here. He worked himself into such a frenzy that he tried to insult me without even realising that he agreed with me, even using the word "invent" himself. Quite funny, really.

magicbastarder wrote: »

it'd be great though if it had been an invention. i'd claim copyright over the number 898263809721870878772340111998222698223;

Strawman much? You might like to try patent the game of chess, too, while you're at it.

rozeboosje

Harika wrote: »

Gravity is just a theory, like evolution. :rolleyes:

Yes, it's "just" a theory. A scientific theory, as opposed to how the word theory is used colloquially.

And yes, it's a human construct. That is why scientists to this day are still trying to improve their theories and come up with something that actually unifies theories of gravity, relativity and quantum electrodynamics. As human constructs go, our theories are the pinnacle of human achievement, and they are astonishingly accurate, but if they actually represented reality, as some of you appear to believe, science would stop today.

magicbastarder

rozeboosje wrote: »

Strawman much? You might like to try patent the game of chess, too, while you're at it.

that was a joke, not an argument. i think you're taking this discussion a mite too seriously.

rozeboosje

magicbastarder wrote: »

that was a joke, not an argument. i think you're taking this discussion a mite too seriously.

Oh alright then. But filostofy is very serious business indeed.

(Singing) who is making those new brown clouds....


Voodn Voodn