Hmm, well, I have to admit that I did that, internally… and now I’m trying to figure out why I didn’t want to do it outwardly.
(several wodges of deleted text later...)
Labeling a belief as “irrational” without giving a reason is (a) likely to elicit an emotional defensive response which will inhibit self-critical thinking, and (b) doesn’t address the issue of why we believe said belief to be irrational, so is just a kind of argument-from-authority (we are rationalists, which means we are rational, and we say your belief is irrational; therefore it is) which is not a good process to follow if we want to be less wrong.
...so handling it that way, if our goal is to maximize rationality in others, would be irrational.
And we can’t address the issue of why it is irrational until we know what it actually means; saying “I believe in God” isn’t really a whole lot more meaningful than “The Gostak distims the Doshes”. Heck, I can truthfully say it myself: I believe in God—as a fictional character from an ancient mythology which somehow manages to dominate political discourse in this country. Certainly that God (a character in people’s minds) exists, and is very powerful, and it would be irrational of me to deny this.
Yes, “everyone knows” that if you say “I believe in God” it means you believe in a sentient universe-creator (who probably possesses a number of additional characteristics which compel you to behave in certain ways) -- but the actual words don’t inherently mean that, which is why I say that it is more of a “social label” than a statement regarding factual matters.
I should think it would not apply to any well-defined assertion of fact—e.g “The universe was created by a conscious entity” is a statement we could discuss further—though “There is evidence that the universe was created by a conscious entity” would be better, because then we are one step further into the dialogue.
Better still would be to add ”...and that evidence is [insert argument here]”, because then we have a specific line of reasoning to look at and say “No, this doesn’t make sense because [fill in counter-argument]”, allowing the other person to then explain why our counter is wrong… and so on.
As it is… can we even have a discussion about whether the Gostak distims the Doshes, or whether it is rational to believe that this is true? Not really, because the terms are undefined; we don’t know what is being “believed”. Same with “God”, even though we know what might be (indeed, probably is) intended.
Thinking about it, this phenomenon of having a few handy exceptions to a generally-reliable rule is something frequently exploited by theists (and faitheists).
Theists freely use “God” as a club 99% of the time, to bash people into line and promote their meme, but then on those few occasions when they are backed into a corner by a skeptic they can always say “This? Oh no no, this isn’t a club for bashing people, it’s just a piece of found art I like to keep on my desk and through which I enjoy contemplating nature’s beauty.”
So it’s very important to identify what we’re talking about. If MrHen claims his God is really just a piece of found art, then we have rational grounds for objection if we ever see him using it as a club. If he openly admits that it’s a club, then we can object on rational grounds to the idea of bashing people.
While I agree with the overall point of this comment, the 99% statistic seems very wrong to me. I expect that for some individuals that’s true, but across the whole population I’d be surprised if it’s much higher than 40%. I’m basing my estimate on, among other things, having worked in a Roman Catholic nursing home (with actual nuns, though I didn’t interact with them often) for four years and not making any particular effort to hide the fact that I’m an atheist from my co-workers. (The residents, I took on a case-by-case basis, as seemed appropriate given the situation.) I experienced exactly one instance in those four years of someone objecting more strongly than ‘wait, what?’ to my lack of faith: The leader of a new bible study group took offense when I didn’t actively participate in their event (and got in my face about it in front of my residents, which you just *don’t do* - I was much more upset about her upsetting them than anything else), and my supervisor’s reaction to that was to apologize profusely to me (and not about the residents having been upset, either, heh) and forbid that group from coming back. The vast majority of instances where religion came up were either in social bonding contexts or as personal or interpersonal reassurances (‘s/he’s in heaven now’) that were rarely to never directed at me by people who were aware of my atheism, and easily ignorable in any case.
“99.999...%” was intended to refer to the portion of self-identified theists whose theistic beliefs would be demonstrably irrational if explored.
It sounds like you’re talking about the portion of self-identified theists who are offended by atheism—a number which I would expect to be substantially lower.
I used that “99%” thing twice—I apologize for getting muddled about which one you were referring to.
Since we’re talking about the “bashing” figure: I maintain that the overwhelming majority of the time when “God” is invoked in the political field, it is being used as a club to bash people into line and promote religious ideas.
I maintain that the overwhelming majority of the time when “God” is invoked in the political field, it is being used as a club to bash people into line and promote religious ideas.
I’d agree with that; I don’t see much other reason to bring religion up, in that context. I expect that politics, some kinds of child-rearing, and provoked debates constitute the bulk of instances where religion is used as a club, and that those situations aren’t the bulk of the instances where religion is used at all. (My estimate for how often religion is used as a club compared to other uses, outside those contexts, is considerably less than 10%. People live this stuff even when we’re not around for them to fight with, after all.)
Perhaps what we are working towards, then, is a recognition that an irrational belief which is Mostly Harmless in personal life can become a deadly threat when let loose in the wrong habitat (such as the political field) -- and that therefore people who wish to embrace this Mostly Harmless irrational belief are much like exotic pet owners in that they need to be aware that their cute furry wuggums can be a serious hazard if not properly contained and cared for.
To bring this back to the original issue—i.e. why it’s necessary for MrHen to explain what his belief means before anyone can claim it is rational or otherwise—and complete the metaphor:
Believing in God is rather like owning a pet. It may or may not be a particularly rational thing to do (you have to spend a lot of time and money nurturing it, and the benefit you get in return is pretty much entirely psychological), but some pets are much more dangerous than others… and the degree of danger may not have any relationship to how cute and harmless they seem when you first adopt them.
some pets are much more dangerous than others… and the degree of danger may not have any relationship to how cute and harmless they seem when you first adopt them.
And once you start owning a cute little pet, it opens the door to owning larger and more dangerous pets.
I maintain that the overwhelming majority of the time when “God” is invoked in the political field, it is being used as a club to bash people into line and promote religious ideas.
It is appropriate, then, that politics is referred to as the skillful use of blunt instruments.
Your observations may be somewhat different from mine. I don’t know where you reside but I know that in the US, for example, ‘God’ plays more part in politics than it does here in Australia.
It depends what context we’re sampling from. I was thinking of discussion in the media, and/or politics in general, where religion’s main contribution seems to be as I described it: demands that the speaker’s particular beliefs be given precedence because they come “from God”—a club for bashing people into line.
Yes, the 99% figure was overprecise; I probably should have said “the overwhelming majority of the time”. It would be an interesting study to actually count the number of “bashing people into line” usages versus all other political uses of religion; perhaps religion-based pleas for charity and mercy don’t get counted because they seem sane—something anyone reasonable would say—so my unconscious reference-counter doesn’t add them to religion’s score.
In any case, your definition-swapping with the word “club” completely misses my point. To whatever extent MrHen uses God as a club-for-joining (what I called a “social label”), I have no objection.
It is the other sort of club I want MrHen either to specifically reject or defend: does he accept such usage of “belief in God” (if someone says God said it, it must be true), or do reason and critical thinking prevail if someone tries to persuade him that he must do X because of his belief?
Hmm, well, I have to admit that I did that, internally… and now I’m trying to figure out why I didn’t want to do it outwardly.
(several wodges of deleted text later...)
Labeling a belief as “irrational” without giving a reason is (a) likely to elicit an emotional defensive response which will inhibit self-critical thinking, and (b) doesn’t address the issue of why we believe said belief to be irrational, so is just a kind of argument-from-authority (we are rationalists, which means we are rational, and we say your belief is irrational; therefore it is) which is not a good process to follow if we want to be less wrong.
...so handling it that way, if our goal is to maximize rationality in others, would be irrational.
And we can’t address the issue of why it is irrational until we know what it actually means; saying “I believe in God” isn’t really a whole lot more meaningful than “The Gostak distims the Doshes”. Heck, I can truthfully say it myself: I believe in God—as a fictional character from an ancient mythology which somehow manages to dominate political discourse in this country. Certainly that God (a character in people’s minds) exists, and is very powerful, and it would be irrational of me to deny this.
Yes, “everyone knows” that if you say “I believe in God” it means you believe in a sentient universe-creator (who probably possesses a number of additional characteristics which compel you to behave in certain ways) -- but the actual words don’t inherently mean that, which is why I say that it is more of a “social label” than a statement regarding factual matters.
What assertions does this reasoning not apply to?
I should think it would not apply to any well-defined assertion of fact—e.g “The universe was created by a conscious entity” is a statement we could discuss further—though “There is evidence that the universe was created by a conscious entity” would be better, because then we are one step further into the dialogue.
Better still would be to add ”...and that evidence is [insert argument here]”, because then we have a specific line of reasoning to look at and say “No, this doesn’t make sense because [fill in counter-argument]”, allowing the other person to then explain why our counter is wrong… and so on.
As it is… can we even have a discussion about whether the Gostak distims the Doshes, or whether it is rational to believe that this is true? Not really, because the terms are undefined; we don’t know what is being “believed”. Same with “God”, even though we know what might be (indeed, probably is) intended.
Thinking about it, this phenomenon of having a few handy exceptions to a generally-reliable rule is something frequently exploited by theists (and faitheists).
Theists freely use “God” as a club 99% of the time, to bash people into line and promote their meme, but then on those few occasions when they are backed into a corner by a skeptic they can always say “This? Oh no no, this isn’t a club for bashing people, it’s just a piece of found art I like to keep on my desk and through which I enjoy contemplating nature’s beauty.”
So it’s very important to identify what we’re talking about. If MrHen claims his God is really just a piece of found art, then we have rational grounds for objection if we ever see him using it as a club. If he openly admits that it’s a club, then we can object on rational grounds to the idea of bashing people.
While I agree with the overall point of this comment, the 99% statistic seems very wrong to me. I expect that for some individuals that’s true, but across the whole population I’d be surprised if it’s much higher than 40%. I’m basing my estimate on, among other things, having worked in a Roman Catholic nursing home (with actual nuns, though I didn’t interact with them often) for four years and not making any particular effort to hide the fact that I’m an atheist from my co-workers. (The residents, I took on a case-by-case basis, as seemed appropriate given the situation.) I experienced exactly one instance in those four years of someone objecting more strongly than ‘wait, what?’ to my lack of faith: The leader of a new bible study group took offense when I didn’t actively participate in their event (and got in my face about it in front of my residents, which you just *don’t do* - I was much more upset about her upsetting them than anything else), and my supervisor’s reaction to that was to apologize profusely to me (and not about the residents having been upset, either, heh) and forbid that group from coming back. The vast majority of instances where religion came up were either in social bonding contexts or as personal or interpersonal reassurances (‘s/he’s in heaven now’) that were rarely to never directed at me by people who were aware of my atheism, and easily ignorable in any case.
Strawmen aren’t good, ok?
“99.999...%” was intended to refer to the portion of self-identified theists whose theistic beliefs would be demonstrably irrational if explored.
It sounds like you’re talking about the portion of self-identified theists who are offended by atheism—a number which I would expect to be substantially lower.
I used that “99%” thing twice—I apologize for getting muddled about which one you were referring to.
Since we’re talking about the “bashing” figure: I maintain that the overwhelming majority of the time when “God” is invoked in the political field, it is being used as a club to bash people into line and promote religious ideas.
I’d agree with that; I don’t see much other reason to bring religion up, in that context. I expect that politics, some kinds of child-rearing, and provoked debates constitute the bulk of instances where religion is used as a club, and that those situations aren’t the bulk of the instances where religion is used at all. (My estimate for how often religion is used as a club compared to other uses, outside those contexts, is considerably less than 10%. People live this stuff even when we’re not around for them to fight with, after all.)
Perhaps what we are working towards, then, is a recognition that an irrational belief which is Mostly Harmless in personal life can become a deadly threat when let loose in the wrong habitat (such as the political field) -- and that therefore people who wish to embrace this Mostly Harmless irrational belief are much like exotic pet owners in that they need to be aware that their cute furry wuggums can be a serious hazard if not properly contained and cared for.
To bring this back to the original issue—i.e. why it’s necessary for MrHen to explain what his belief means before anyone can claim it is rational or otherwise—and complete the metaphor:
Believing in God is rather like owning a pet. It may or may not be a particularly rational thing to do (you have to spend a lot of time and money nurturing it, and the benefit you get in return is pretty much entirely psychological), but some pets are much more dangerous than others… and the degree of danger may not have any relationship to how cute and harmless they seem when you first adopt them.
And once you start owning a cute little pet, it opens the door to owning larger and more dangerous pets.
That sounds about right.
It is appropriate, then, that politics is referred to as the skillful use of blunt instruments.
Your observations may be somewhat different from mine. I don’t know where you reside but I know that in the US, for example, ‘God’ plays more part in politics than it does here in Australia.
It seems you have suffered from the blunt end of a selection effect.
Perhaps:
It depends what context we’re sampling from. I was thinking of discussion in the media, and/or politics in general, where religion’s main contribution seems to be as I described it: demands that the speaker’s particular beliefs be given precedence because they come “from God”—a club for bashing people into line.
Yes, the 99% figure was overprecise; I probably should have said “the overwhelming majority of the time”. It would be an interesting study to actually count the number of “bashing people into line” usages versus all other political uses of religion; perhaps religion-based pleas for charity and mercy don’t get counted because they seem sane—something anyone reasonable would say—so my unconscious reference-counter doesn’t add them to religion’s score.
In any case, your definition-swapping with the word “club” completely misses my point. To whatever extent MrHen uses God as a club-for-joining (what I called a “social label”), I have no objection.
It is the other sort of club I want MrHen either to specifically reject or defend: does he accept such usage of “belief in God” (if someone says God said it, it must be true), or do reason and critical thinking prevail if someone tries to persuade him that he must do X because of his belief?