Theism isn’t about god. It has also social and therefore strong emotional consequences. If I stop being a theist, does it mean I will lose my friends, my family will become more cold to me, and I will lose an access to world’s most wide social networks?
In such case the new required information isn’t a disproved miracle or an essay on Occam’s razor. That has zero impact on the social consequences. It’s more important to get an evidence that there is a lot of atheists, they can be happy, and some of them are considered very cool even outside of atheist circles. (And after having this evidence, somehow, the essays about Occam’s razor become more convincing.)
Or let’s look at it from the opposite side: Even the most stupid demostrations of faith send the message that it is socially accepted to be religious; that after joining a religion you will never be alone. Religion is so widespread not because the priests are extra cool or extra intelligent. It’s because they are extra visible and extra audacious: they have no problem declaring that everyone who disagrees with them is stupid and evil and will go to hell (or some more polite version of this, which still gets the message across) -- and our brains perceive that as a demonstration of social power, and it triggers our instinct to join the winning side.
Complaining about Dawkins that he is too audacious, too impolite, and seems too certain—that is complaining that he is using the winning strategy. Certainly he would be more palatable to his opponents if he chose a losing strategy instead, like most atheists are socially conditioned to do. He should be extra humble and mumble in a silent voice “we can never know for sure...” until some cocksure priest goes around and says “shut up you idiot, I am sure, my followers are sure, and you will burn in hell” and then all believers will clap their hands about this demonstration of power. Well, Dawkins is smart enough to refuse to play this game, probably because he understands the rules.
(There is a different topic about whether this approach is optimal for epistemic rationality. Probably it isn’t. But it simply means that in the middle of a battle it is not the best moment to read your textbooks; you do that in the safety of your home. Religious people are motivated to be wrong—before that motivation is gone, they are likely to be harmed by the atheists’ expressions of humility.)
Under the usual convention that “reply to” means “disagree with”, it certainly does. :D
Although the “some of them are considered very cool even outside of atheist circles” part was inspired by you mentioning Asimov. (Only the remaining 99% aren’t.)
My original question was basically asking for evidence for your hypothesis (religion is mostly a social motivated-reasoning thing, and the best way to fix it is to demonstrate (over)confidence and social acceptance) or alternative hypothesis. It sounds plausible, but I don’t think anyone has actually tried to check with any degree of rigor.
Theism isn’t about god. It has also social and therefore strong emotional consequences. If I stop being a theist, does it mean I will lose my friends, my family will become more cold to me, and I will lose an access to world’s most wide social networks?
In such case the new required information isn’t a disproved miracle or an essay on Occam’s razor. That has zero impact on the social consequences. It’s more important to get an evidence that there is a lot of atheists, they can be happy, and some of them are considered very cool even outside of atheist circles. (And after having this evidence, somehow, the essays about Occam’s razor become more convincing.)
Or let’s look at it from the opposite side: Even the most stupid demostrations of faith send the message that it is socially accepted to be religious; that after joining a religion you will never be alone. Religion is so widespread not because the priests are extra cool or extra intelligent. It’s because they are extra visible and extra audacious: they have no problem declaring that everyone who disagrees with them is stupid and evil and will go to hell (or some more polite version of this, which still gets the message across) -- and our brains perceive that as a demonstration of social power, and it triggers our instinct to join the winning side.
Complaining about Dawkins that he is too audacious, too impolite, and seems too certain—that is complaining that he is using the winning strategy. Certainly he would be more palatable to his opponents if he chose a losing strategy instead, like most atheists are socially conditioned to do. He should be extra humble and mumble in a silent voice “we can never know for sure...” until some cocksure priest goes around and says “shut up you idiot, I am sure, my followers are sure, and you will burn in hell” and then all believers will clap their hands about this demonstration of power. Well, Dawkins is smart enough to refuse to play this game, probably because he understands the rules.
(There is a different topic about whether this approach is optimal for epistemic rationality. Probably it isn’t. But it simply means that in the middle of a battle it is not the best moment to read your textbooks; you do that in the safety of your home. Religious people are motivated to be wrong—before that motivation is gone, they are likely to be harmed by the atheists’ expressions of humility.)
That looks like more of a reply to the parent comment than to mine.
Under the usual convention that “reply to” means “disagree with”, it certainly does. :D
Although the “some of them are considered very cool even outside of atheist circles” part was inspired by you mentioning Asimov. (Only the remaining 99% aren’t.)
My original question was basically asking for evidence for your hypothesis (religion is mostly a social motivated-reasoning thing, and the best way to fix it is to demonstrate (over)confidence and social acceptance) or alternative hypothesis. It sounds plausible, but I don’t think anyone has actually tried to check with any degree of rigor.