jwhendy

Karma: 807

jwhendy Mar 5, 2012, 6:01 PM
0 points
in reply to: Vladimir_Nesov’s comment on: Theists are wrong; is theism?
Fair enough, and I’ve heard that before as well. The typical theistic issue is how to reconcile god’s knowledge and free will, hence why I don’t think we need to continue in this discussion anymore. You are responding to my questions based on things being determined, which is not what I think most theists believe.

This is why many attempts have been made to reconcile free will and omniscience by apologists.

But that’s not the discussion I think we’re having. It’s shifted to determinism and omniscience, which I think is compatible, but I’m still not on board with some kind of mind that could house all information that exists, or at least that mind being consistent with what theists generally want it to mean (it caused the universe specifically for us, wants us to be in heaven with it forever, inspired holy books to be written, and so on.)

jwhendy Mar 5, 2012, 5:43 PM
0 points
in reply to: Vladimir_Nesov’s comment on: Theists are wrong; is theism?

Logical impossibility is a bad argument against theism, as it’s possible to...

Good point, though my jury is still out on whether it really is possible to parse what it would mean to be omniscient, for example. Or if we can suggest things like the universe “knowing everything,” it’s typically not what theists are implying when they speak of an omniscient being.

...it’s still unclear what you’re inquiring about.

I think I’ll just let it go. Even the fact that we’re both on the same page with respect to determinism pretty much ends the need to have a discussion. Conundrums like how an omniscient being can know what it will do and also be said to be responsive (change what it was going to do) based on being asked via prayer only seems to work if determinism is not on the table, and about every apologetics bit I’ve read suggests that it’s not on the table.

This thread has been the first time I think I can see how intercession and omniscience could jive in a deterministic sense. A being could know that it will answer a prayer, and that a pray-er would pray for such an answer.

From the theists I know/interact with, I think they would find this like going through the motions though. It would remove the “magic” from things for them. I could be wrong.

jwhendy Mar 5, 2012, 1:48 PM
0 points
in reply to: Vladimir_Nesov’s comment on: Theists are wrong; is theism?
True, but I more meant the idea of theistic intervention, how that works with intercession and so on. The world “knows” everyone’s decisions… but no one intercedes to the world expecting it to change something about the future. But theists do.

I suppose one can simply take the view that god knows both what will happen, what people will intercede for, and that he will or will not answer those prayers. Thus, most theists think they are calling on god to change something, when in reality he “already” “knew” they would ask for it and already knew he would do it.

Is it any clearer what I was inquiring about?

jwhendy Mar 5, 2012, 1:48 PM
1 point
in reply to: dbaupp’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
Thanks for clarifying.

jwhendy Mar 5, 2012, 4:34 AM
0 points
in reply to: Will_Newsome’s comment on: Theists are wrong; is theism?
...a high probability to it being omniscient and omnipotent, a fair probability to it being omnibenevolent...

I realize this is a necromancer post, but I’m interested in your definitions of the above. How do you square up with some of the questions regarding:
- on what mindware something non-physical would store all the information that is
- how omniscience settles with free-will (if you believe we have free will)
- how omniscience interacts with the idea that this being could intervene (doing something different than it knows it’s going to do)
I won’t go on to more. I’m sure you’re familiar with things like this; I was just surprised to see that you listed these terms outright, and wanted ti inquire about details.

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 7:20 PM
0 points
in reply to: Eugine_Nier’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
A very possible outcome. What’s missing is what I pointed out above in my response to Dallas.

Nonetheless, it still strikes me as a complex situation and I’m not settled on how to judge potential future states and sum the collective happinesses of the stakeholders.

How does one factor in various happinesses, potentially negative views of myself and atheists in general, my childrens’ development/emotional/intellectual health, and so on?

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 7:17 PM
1 point
in reply to: Paul Crowley’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
I could do that—I wrote it in org-mode, which lets me export to nearly anything. I’ll have to tweak some of the LaTeX specific stuff, but should be doable. Is it that the html version definitely displays in a browser vs. having to download a pdf if no browser plugin is available? Or to read on mobile devices? Just wondering what the appeal of html is. Thanks!

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 5:44 PM
0 points
in reply to: Bruno_Coelho’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
Thanks for the comment. As I put in the document, I’d like to move toward what I consider to be more productive endeavors, including diving in more fully here at LW.

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 5:43 PM
1 point
in reply to: stoat’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
That’s a good sign. Thank you for your donation of time and effort!

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 5:41 PM
3 points
in reply to: David_Gerard’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
Gotcha. I’m still not sure my specific readership will say, as you put it, “An, an atheist—tl;dr,” but I’ll keep thinking about this. I hoped it would be concise (not necessarily 1 page, but not 10, either). As with most of my things, it ended up much longer than I expected. Thanks for the continued input.

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 1:47 PM
0 points
in reply to: atorm’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
Indeed, I’m no pro. Thanks for the clarification!

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 1:24 PM
1 point
in reply to: Nicholas_Covington’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
Thanks for the comment. Similar to atorm, I did think it was perhaps a bit over the top in terms of its optimism, but I appreciate the gesture.

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 5:22 AM
0 points
in reply to: TimS’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
That’s a good point I hadn’t considered. Maybe I should stick to my overall plan and keep all reasons out of it. Your’e correct about my reason for including it; it was the major turning point. The point where I first questioned. I’ll think more about rearranging or just ditching it and linking to it somewhere else.

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 5:05 AM
2 points
in reply to: orthonormal’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
The conclusion was also written on the very early side :)

Re. the Outsider Test, one of the most eye opening things for me, albeit recently and much post-deconversion, was listening to an Islamic convert from Christianity (example). While I still might not agree with his reasons, it was enlightening to hear someone talk with passion, conviction, reasons, scriptural backings, and so forth about a completely alien faith… all while using the same language, emotion, and excitement that I did about my faith.

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 3:57 AM
3 points
in reply to: orthonormal’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
I agree, and I was. I also started that first (naturally), so I think the idea of finally writing this was more dramatic to me at the time, hence what you’re picking up. Hopefully the rest isn’t like that (as much). I’ll re-read with this in mind and try to be more natural.

Edit your first page until you can read it out loud to a stranger and have it sound like natural speech.

Well put, especially in terms of having something tangible to know when it’s right.

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 3:04 AM
3 points
in reply to: Will_Newsome’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
Huh. What, then, do you believe when it comes to a deity? I may have misread this comment, but it strikes me as saying that you’re Catholic for pragmatic/social reasons?

Put another way: what of Catholic doctrine counts as as “largely some really tricky game theory” and what counts as actually true?

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 3:01 AM
4 points
in reply to: Will_Newsome’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
Thanks for the honest reply. You are probably much smarter/informed than I am (not stated in a negative/sarcastic manner at all; I really mean that).

I guess I expected you to explain what specifically convinced you...

I stated why I didn’t do that in my document. I consider the aspect of relating to friends/acquaintances, mutual understanding/sharing, and simply coming out more important than risking 1) no one reading it to understand/empathize, 2) people getting upset, and 3) unintentionally kicking off about 100 email debates.

...this is clearly an important part of your life, you should be taking it at least that seriously.

Agreed, and so I invested two years of most waking thoughts on this. How does social psychology play into whether or not a theistic being is real or not? Also, see the apologist’s turnstile (I’m the “John” mentioned, just as a neat tidbit).

On that note, do you express consistent dissatisfaction with your fellow Catholics on a weekly basis? I hardly expect that many/most/the majority of them expended as much mental and emotional energy into the study of religious apologetics as I did. If you don’t accept my apostasy as legit, do you accept the beliefs of most of your fellow Catholics as such? They know less than I do and yet are (at least based on my surroundings of extremely devout (in the dedication-to-Mary-daily-mass-and-adoration-novena-saying sort of way) Catholics) more confident in their beliefs.

...the default explanation for conversion, i.e. largely-unconscious far-sighted social pragmatics...

Could you provide some more specifics? Like I want to sin or don’t like my friends or what?

I think you’d have to be at a Michael Vassar or Nick Tarleton level...

And are they Catholic or non-religious? If non-religious… do you accept their apostasy?

I wouldn’t be surprised if smart Catholic readers of your explanation for your apostasy felt the same way...

That very well may happen.

...it was an easy read and kept me engaged enough that I didn’t compulsively switch tabs or take a bath or whatever, which is a good sign.

Why thank you.

While I’m not smart enough to do it (yet), I would love to see a Bayesian analysis (since you mentioned it) on the probability that a god who values the salvation of souls in the highest degree would require the subject comprehension and intellectual dedication you demand to order to believe (or not). Or require the words of a book spread on foot as the only means toward knowing which specific god is real. Or even that given one true god, the other fake ones would also use the means of an inspired text to spread knowledge of themselves.

Or lastly, that the reading of another fasle god’s text could prevent someone from having an inkling whatsoever of being wrong for the rest of their lives, even while having full awareness of competing gods/texts. This is the equivalent of saying that a human (for that’s what the authors of non-true-god texts are) like Dan Brown could prevent billions of potential Christians from being so due to their encountering the DaVinci Code before the Bible.

ETA: Oh, and I meant to ask: feel free to provide links/references to what you find most convincing concerning theism.

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 2:39 AM
1 point
in reply to: Bugmaster’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion

I just finished reading it, and I found it quite moving. It has a few minor syntax errors, but other than that it’s good.

Thanks! I got some specific corrections from a blog reader; I’ll update and re-upload the new version to avoid repeat corrections. Glad you liked it.

...your family is an order of magnitude larger than mine...

Well, community of religious believers. The family who will receive this, if any, is probably only ~20 strong. Which, in that case, perhaps I should wait until the next family get together to announce in person. Though, the best time tends to be at meal time, and the last time that would have happened, I got asked to pray at Thanksgiving because my family thinks I’m the “holy one.” I didn’t think it was the best time to deny or announce my nonbelief… so, embarrassed as I am to admit it, I faked it. Apparently, they didn’t know the difference.

There’s a danger that some people might find your document a bit, well, preachy...

Fair enough. My brother commented that it was “processy.” I could see taking my explicit explanation of how I go about things as implying that however they went about their belief isn’t as good as mine and thus they would deconvert if they investigated as well. I’ll keep that in mind.

Many, many thanks for reading the whole thing and providing input.

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 1:59 AM
4 points
in reply to: Bugmaster’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
Fair points. Did you read the document? Other than a handful, none of my footnotes are scholarly references.

Some of this is from a practical standpoint. I had coffee and dinner and lunch dates with many, many close friends/acquaintances to tell them in person. The community I was involved in contains some 500 people. I don’t know if I can have such an interaction with all of them. I’ll keep thinking about this point, though. Maybe this would be counter-productive.

ETA: Oh, and sorry… I didn’t answer the main question. My primary objective is simply to inform all those who still don’t know after two years. I was a member of a community and disappeared. I’d like people to know why, and not have heard via a telephone game. Those who are really important already know. Many beside that know me, don’t know yet.

jwhendy Mar 4, 2012, 1:55 AM
−1 points
in reply to: NancyLebovitz’s comment on: Request for input: draft of my “coming out” statement on religious deconversion
Good point, though Catholics are (can be?) pretty darn mild when it comes to hell. My wife and surrounding community are super tame concerning things like that. There’s no outright judgment, but they still probably pray for the future of my soul.

I also plan on opposing things that seem to be unjustified/unreasonable outright. Hell would be one. First communion at age seven is another example. No child can comprehend what they need to in order to profess that a wafer just had it’s essence turned into the flesh of a non-physical deity while retaining all of its physical characteristics.

While things seem to be okay at the moment, we haven’t crossed a time-sensitive binary option bridge like communion yet. Thus, I don’t know what the reaction will be toward my resistance. My wife is very sensitive to her social environment and I think she will feel a lot of guilt and shame for not having her kids go through visible rituals like the sacraments (like everyone else’s kids).

Not to mention, once they’re at that age, all of our friends’ kids will be receiving communion and ours will be sitting there. This will be a stab in the heart every single week.