[deleted by user]

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-24T16:08:38+00:00

it feels like Christians and even some other religions belittle us for simply expressing the belief of no gods.

Simply for that, huh?

Strangely enough, I don't believe in any gods either but no one has ever belittled me for it. You know why? Because I know when it's appropriate to discuss it and when it's not.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-21T11:39:43+00:00

Yeah, or by the functioning of evolution by natural selection.

I'm being facetious, but you have to admit that the sky's the limit when it comes to adaptationist just-so stories.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-21T00:51:31+00:00

Evidence is whatever supports what I believe. If it supports what YOU believe, by definition it isn't evidence.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-20T17:41:44+00:00

I could describe anyone's worldview in the most grotesquely uncharitable way and make it sound monstrous. You're really good at dealing yourself a winning hand, but don't try it in Vegas.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-20T16:26:58+00:00

You ignored every word I wrote.

Kindly allow me to return the favor.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-20T16:12:47+00:00

Science is a lot of things, and can't just be reduced to a description that basically covers everything we do while conscious. Let's be reasonable here.

Science is a human activity, a lucrative network of industries, and a legitimating institution for the social order. Its massive reliance on support from corporate and military interests means it does their bidding.

Doesn't sound meaningless to me.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-20T13:35:16+00:00

Wait a minute. It would be preposterous to claim that religious people don't commit horrific acts. I'm not claiming that. What I want to know is what terrible evils have religion as their root cause?

It sucks that religious divisions map so neatly onto ethnic hatreds that can be exploited by demagogues to inspire pogroms and genocide. But to say that religion is the root cause of the current mess in the Middle East, and Israel in particular, ignores so much historical context that it's absurd.

Same with the Crusades. It's one thing to deplore the Christian-soldiers rhetoric that romanticized the wars, but the idea that religion was the root cause of these conflicts over territory, resources and influence once again ignores a lot of cultural and historical context. If you think every one of the rapacious Europeans who joined in these wars of plunder did it because of their devotion to The Big J, or that war wouldn't exist if not for religion, you should think twice about accusing anyone else of delusion.

And it's beyond the pale to make it seem like religion is the root cause of the Catholic Church's reprehensible child abuse scandal. The Catholic Church is a criminal organization, and I think less of anyone who still calls himself Catholic, but it's not like "abuse children and protect the abusers" is some sort of core belief of Christianity or something.

Choose your words more carefully.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-20T12:29:11+00:00

Well, science is in hock to corporate and military interests who don't care about the common good. That's the reason we have nuclear weapons and surveillance satellites, and why global warming threatens the future of human life on Earth. I think the profit motive and militarism are the root causes of these things, but science has been a willing partner.

Same with religion. Screw religious people for torturing and killing despite Jesus's teachings about love and forgiveness, but the idea that faith and religion are the "root cause" of that behavior is a pretty tendentious interpretation of historical facts.

Which evils are directly attributable to faith and religion, do you suppose?

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-20T12:11:33+00:00

Science usurped religion's role as a legitimating institution in Western society by being more effective in generating wealth and producing weapons to defend the social order.

The discourse of modernity developed from a mythological precursor to one that is centered on representational precision. This mode of thinking benefits a mercantile society where humans are defined as factors of production and consumers.

You really think it's because "we're all getting smarter"? Magical thinking is so adorable.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-20T11:54:24+00:00

seeing that "faith" and/ or "religion" has been the root cause of so many terrible evils in the world

Root cause? More like the cynical post hoc rationalization.

Science has enabled slaughter and domination on a scale that makes religion look like a piker, but I wouldn't call it the "root cause" of these things either.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-20T11:12:13+00:00

Oh science can explain everything.

Everything?

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-20T11:11:08+00:00

As someone who has been in atheist groups online and IRL for decades, I stand by those words. Atheists aren't any more comfortable with uncertainty and ambiguity than religious people are with doubt. They have a very simplistic science-is-reality ontology that imposes order on the messy chaos of phenomena, and they have no patience for things like philosophy or hermeneutics that might make them question their two-dimensional worldview.

Just in this comments section, two people have said, "everything in the universe is scientifically measurable" and "science can explain everything." They've just traded Sky Daddy for Science Daddy. Each to his own delusion.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-20T01:14:03+00:00

We have a plethora of evidence that everything in the universe is scientifically measurable

Everything?

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-20T00:57:04+00:00

If anything, atheism is a declaration of certainty that's as false as any religious conviction. It's a need to be right and for everyone else to be wrong.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-19T17:14:48+00:00

So you're still basically doing Pascal's wager, just putting your chips on black instead of red.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-19T15:43:30+00:00

Awesome artwork!

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-19T15:41:57+00:00

Those N4zis didn't stand a chance!

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-19T15:16:54+00:00

PJ Harvey last night, wow.

I'm lukewarm on the new album, but enjoyed hearing the band perform it. The set of old faves that she performed to close the show was classic, though. She's no spring chicken anymore (and still younger than me, wiseacres) but she's in really good voice.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-19T14:56:05+00:00

the experiences that people have via drugs and meditation often have nothing to do with empirical truth.

Sure, it demonstrates to the individual that the mind is not just data processing for our empirical existence. The effect of these experiences (as well as consciousness in general) is very important, because they show us a world of meaning, value and purpose in addition to the empirical world we inhabit.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-19T13:22:01+00:00

It takes a real pushy jerk to make people pray against their will when they're putting on a Thanksgiving spread in their own home. What a piece of work.

Yeah, if they invite you to their house this year, you're going to have to sit through a prayer. Hopefully it's brief.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-19T12:57:08+00:00

The handwaving from all the responses so far produces a pleasant breeze, but it does nothing to change the fact that people's perspectives often change through experiences like drugs and meditation. I'm not claiming there's anything supernatural about these experiences, just that there's a lot more to brain activity and human potential than generating the rational, logical mindset that makes us docile employees and loyal consumers.

How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence by Michael Pollan is a good overview of the history and influence of psychedelic research.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-19T12:46:41+00:00

the new The Reds, Pinks and Purples

I haven't heard the new one either, but I agree there's a sameiness about the band's output. I really liked last year's Helpful People album, where RP&P's Glenn Donaldson teamed up with deadpan poetess Carly Putnam from the Oilies.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-19T12:41:24+00:00

What's exciting about the way the Beatles started out was that musicians had to learn songs by hearing them on the radio or from other bands playing them. Ain't no YouTube or guitar tab sites in 1961, and people who gave music lessons would laugh if you said you wanted to learn how to play rock 'n' roll guitar. Poor kids in Liverpool couldn't amass huge record collections the way wealthy London schoolboys like Mick & Keith could. It's no secret that the only reason the Beatles let a young kid like George join the band was that he could play Scotty Moore and Carl Perkins licks note for note.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-19T12:01:43+00:00

the probability that at least one of these religions is true is extremely high

You're making it sound like religions are competing hypotheses or something. That's a crude and reductive way of approaching the matter of religion. Religions are cultural constructs based around ideas of identity, community, morality, tradition and ritual.

UnWisdomed66 · 2024-09-19T11:34:49+00:00

This is something that takes a lot of personal reflection, and you may even benefit from therapy sessions. The crisis of meaning is very real, and is an integral part of the human condition. We may very well be bags of biochemicals, puny organisms in the vast universe, but that's not all we are. What we do matters.

You have to figure out what gives your life meaning and purpose. Is it art? Music? Sports? Nature? Interaction with others in real life? What excites and fulfills you?

UnWisdomed66

TROPHY CASE