This comment is brilliant. In particular, I’d really really love to see two top level posts covering:
Moreover, how much attention should we pay to apologetics in general? We know that theology and apologetics are areas that have spent thousands of years of memetic evolution to be as dangerous as possible. They take almost every little opportunity to exploit the flaws in human cognition. Apologetic arguments aren’t (generally) basilisk level, but they can take a large amount of cognitive resources to understand where they are wrong.
...and...
There’s a related issue: humans are overactive agent recognizers. We love to see patterns where none exist and see intelligence is random action. Theism fits with deep-seated human intuitions. In contrast, MWI, simulationism and full-scale Tegmark all clash strongly with human intuition. They may seem weird, but the weirdness may not be a product of evidential issues but rather that they clash with human intuitions. So putting them in the same category as religion may be misleading.
Both really fascinating insights, I’d love to read more. Especially the first one about memetic evolution to be dangerous—I wonder what various secular social and societal memes fit in similarly.
This comment is brilliant. In particular, I’d really really love to see two top level posts covering:
...and...
Both really fascinating insights, I’d love to read more. Especially the first one about memetic evolution to be dangerous—I wonder what various secular social and societal memes fit in similarly.