I’m enjoying this more and more. At first (and it was probably apparent), I was pretty defensive, particularly because this is obviously something personal and important and I felt a bit threatened. I think I (at least, maybe “we”) have leveled off and are actually getting places now :)
if their belief is justified it’s mostly the result of epistemic luck...
Well put, and we agree on that. Though your big bang cosmology example made me realize that this is more true in far more areas of my life than I am aware of (or even care to think about in order to avoid an ugh field).
It’s probable that my default model doesn’t apply...
Maybe, maybe not. I was around my father and brother during Christmas break and they don’t believe. I was with my wife, though, and we both did very strongly. I said rosary on the plane on the way down, tried to take some personal prayer time, etc. So… I’m not explicitly aware of those things, but then again I was in close proximity to non-believers (which perhaps forced me to wonder why they didn’t believe, leading me to my first major cognitive dissonance) and away from my typical very-tight-knit Catholic social sphere for ~10 days.
Then again, I’ve debated my dad about biblical interpretation and tended to view them in a pained manner, as in a “Why can’t they just see the truth?” type of way. It was an unusual circumstance, but I’ve typically held my own without feeling any doubts or uncertainty before. I could see it either way.
I’ll check out the link on rationalization. Thanks.
I think Catholicism has the most reliably good infrastructure of doctrine, but again I may be wrong.
We don’t have to pursue this more, but I’d be interested in how you think Catholics are so good. Is it, as you said before, by epistemic luck, or because they actually have some sort of connection to a divine being’s will/intention? Similarly, just to probe some specifics:
Do you sign onto this being having a purpose/design for humans? As in, was the universe created for us to exist as the pinnacle of creation, to live out holy lives, and then spend eternity in a heaven if we’ve lived good enough?
Similarly, with something like contraception (contraversial, I know), the typical route Catholics would take to their stance is that it’s “unnatural.” God intended sperm to meet the egg and so preventing that in some non-natural way is thus contrary to his will. How do you sit with that specific line of moral thought and subsequent implication derivation (not just on contraception, any don’t-fiddle-with-how-god-designed-things line of argument)?
I’m not very confident of theism...
Oh. When I replied at that other thread (though, that was WIN_2011), it was to you saying you were highly confident in an omni-max being, which I took to mean theism.
I think that’s a mischaracterization...
Re-read, and I can see that. I think I’m also still having a hard time wrapping my mind around your use of the word “theism” (or at least what you meant a year ago in that post). “Agent-y processes” is not what typically comes to mind when I’m talking about theism :)
To be fair, though, you do seem to be talking about YHWH, or at least perhaps you’re saying that people writing in the bible have been interpreting this simulation machine as the analog of a person, but with magic powers and an interest in their eternal future?
You too; I’m glad there exists a place like LessWrong where...
Indeed! Like I said, I feel much more on the same page with you after some back and forth. It’s at least been mind opening to some other views and you’ll surely have my head involuntarily occupied (well, your ideas) on my car rides to and from work for several days or more.
We don’t have to pursue this more, but I’d be interested in how you think Catholics are so good. Is it, as you said before, by epistemic luck, or because they actually have some sort of connection to a divine being’s will/intention?
My own personal belief (not that you were asking me) is that any religion around long enough during periods of intellectual progress will get some sort of internally consistent formulation, however much violence it may do to a naive reading of the original texts. Catholicism is a good example, with the reconstruction of theology by the Scholastics on top of the original revisionism of Paul and later Greek-influenced scholars like Augustine. But you could as easily point to Buddhism, which in areas has some pretty excellent philosophizing to back up its beliefs. (Reading Nagarjuna’s Verses on the Heart of the Middle Way, I had the eerie feeling I was reading Sextus Empiricus’s sharp logical paradoxes, just with different vocabulary.) Confucianism didn’t do too shabbily after 2+ millennia of development, and even something as crude as Shintoism got some pretty heavy intellectual development during the Meiji era and run up to WWII, becoming part of the quasi-fascist nationalist ideology of those periods which apparently convinced the Japanese public and many intellectuals. (Nor did Japanese Buddhism escape this process of rationalizing—read Zen at War.)
I’m quite glad you commented, and interesting take. What about younger religions that still seem to manager to woo people and hold them intellectually captive like Mormonism (~150 yrs) and Scientology (~50 yrs).
Most of humanity is not part of them, but Mormonism in particular is very quickly growing. Do you think it’s success had to do with the aspect of being internally consistent, or some other attractive feature?
I don’t know about Mormonism. Reading calcsam’s articles, I get the impression that the superficial archaeological gloss provides some intellectual respectability. But more generally, I get the impression that right now the Mormon community is still young and functional—like the early Christians, who really did provide a lot of charity, form loving accepting communities, pool their resources, etc. (And lost it as they grew. Any successful startup can sympathize.) If this is so, then we can expect to see their growth level off at some point. Early Christianity began losing it by the 300s or so, which gives Mormonism plenty of time left (but on the other hand, they grew much faster).
How memetically fit their beliefs are now, consistency-wise or appeal-wise, I don’t know.
With Scientology, they have an interesting esoteric hierarchy of knowledge, which has long been a drawn to humans (think Eliezer’s Conspiracy universe, or the Christian Gnostics, for that matter), and a number of half-baked Western & New Age derived techniques that apparently do work—a religious Toastmasters or pickup artist movement, you might say. (I think Luke posted an article on this. Could probably find it googling the ‘Scientology stare’.) They haven’t been that successful that their success stands in need of explaining; if they are still around in a century and have more than 10 million members, say, then they will be much more interesting a phenomena.
I’m enjoying this more and more. At first (and it was probably apparent), I was pretty defensive, particularly because this is obviously something personal and important and I felt a bit threatened. I think I (at least, maybe “we”) have leveled off and are actually getting places now :)
Well put, and we agree on that. Though your big bang cosmology example made me realize that this is more true in far more areas of my life than I am aware of (or even care to think about in order to avoid an ugh field).
Maybe, maybe not. I was around my father and brother during Christmas break and they don’t believe. I was with my wife, though, and we both did very strongly. I said rosary on the plane on the way down, tried to take some personal prayer time, etc. So… I’m not explicitly aware of those things, but then again I was in close proximity to non-believers (which perhaps forced me to wonder why they didn’t believe, leading me to my first major cognitive dissonance) and away from my typical very-tight-knit Catholic social sphere for ~10 days.
Then again, I’ve debated my dad about biblical interpretation and tended to view them in a pained manner, as in a “Why can’t they just see the truth?” type of way. It was an unusual circumstance, but I’ve typically held my own without feeling any doubts or uncertainty before. I could see it either way.
I’ll check out the link on rationalization. Thanks.
We don’t have to pursue this more, but I’d be interested in how you think Catholics are so good. Is it, as you said before, by epistemic luck, or because they actually have some sort of connection to a divine being’s will/intention? Similarly, just to probe some specifics:
Do you sign onto this being having a purpose/design for humans? As in, was the universe created for us to exist as the pinnacle of creation, to live out holy lives, and then spend eternity in a heaven if we’ve lived good enough?
Similarly, with something like contraception (contraversial, I know), the typical route Catholics would take to their stance is that it’s “unnatural.” God intended sperm to meet the egg and so preventing that in some non-natural way is thus contrary to his will. How do you sit with that specific line of moral thought and subsequent implication derivation (not just on contraception, any don’t-fiddle-with-how-god-designed-things line of argument)?
Oh. When I replied at that other thread (though, that was WIN_2011), it was to you saying you were highly confident in an omni-max being, which I took to mean theism.
Re-read, and I can see that. I think I’m also still having a hard time wrapping my mind around your use of the word “theism” (or at least what you meant a year ago in that post). “Agent-y processes” is not what typically comes to mind when I’m talking about theism :)
To be fair, though, you do seem to be talking about YHWH, or at least perhaps you’re saying that people writing in the bible have been interpreting this simulation machine as the analog of a person, but with magic powers and an interest in their eternal future?
Indeed! Like I said, I feel much more on the same page with you after some back and forth. It’s at least been mind opening to some other views and you’ll surely have my head involuntarily occupied (well, your ideas) on my car rides to and from work for several days or more.
My own personal belief (not that you were asking me) is that any religion around long enough during periods of intellectual progress will get some sort of internally consistent formulation, however much violence it may do to a naive reading of the original texts. Catholicism is a good example, with the reconstruction of theology by the Scholastics on top of the original revisionism of Paul and later Greek-influenced scholars like Augustine. But you could as easily point to Buddhism, which in areas has some pretty excellent philosophizing to back up its beliefs. (Reading Nagarjuna’s Verses on the Heart of the Middle Way, I had the eerie feeling I was reading Sextus Empiricus’s sharp logical paradoxes, just with different vocabulary.) Confucianism didn’t do too shabbily after 2+ millennia of development, and even something as crude as Shintoism got some pretty heavy intellectual development during the Meiji era and run up to WWII, becoming part of the quasi-fascist nationalist ideology of those periods which apparently convinced the Japanese public and many intellectuals. (Nor did Japanese Buddhism escape this process of rationalizing—read Zen at War.)
I’m quite glad you commented, and interesting take. What about younger religions that still seem to manager to woo people and hold them intellectually captive like Mormonism (~150 yrs) and Scientology (~50 yrs).
Most of humanity is not part of them, but Mormonism in particular is very quickly growing. Do you think it’s success had to do with the aspect of being internally consistent, or some other attractive feature?
I don’t know about Mormonism. Reading calcsam’s articles, I get the impression that the superficial archaeological gloss provides some intellectual respectability. But more generally, I get the impression that right now the Mormon community is still young and functional—like the early Christians, who really did provide a lot of charity, form loving accepting communities, pool their resources, etc. (And lost it as they grew. Any successful startup can sympathize.) If this is so, then we can expect to see their growth level off at some point. Early Christianity began losing it by the 300s or so, which gives Mormonism plenty of time left (but on the other hand, they grew much faster).
How memetically fit their beliefs are now, consistency-wise or appeal-wise, I don’t know.
With Scientology, they have an interesting esoteric hierarchy of knowledge, which has long been a drawn to humans (think Eliezer’s Conspiracy universe, or the Christian Gnostics, for that matter), and a number of half-baked Western & New Age derived techniques that apparently do work—a religious Toastmasters or pickup artist movement, you might say. (I think Luke posted an article on this. Could probably find it googling the ‘Scientology stare’.) They haven’t been that successful that their success stands in need of explaining; if they are still around in a century and have more than 10 million members, say, then they will be much more interesting a phenomena.