Ramazan

[Devrim]

Today is the second day of Ramazan. We celebrated the first day by having a nice barbacue in the park. As Leo said, it makes getting drunk doubly enjoyable.

I trust that on RevLeft it will be another oppotunity for people to echo the typical bile that comes from the right wing media in the West when talking about Muslims.

Devrim

[black magick hustla]

my biggest dreams is that mosques under workers management become bar restaurants where they serve copious amounts of beer and pork, and that churches because night clubs were orgies are legalized

[black magick hustla]

punching a hole in the mona lisa is also cool. also airing amateur pornography in times square in the huge screens so that upper middle class soccer moms get a heart attack

[Devrim]

my biggest dreams is that mosques under workers management become bar restaurants where they serve copious amounts of beer and pork, and that churches because night clubs were orgies are legalized

On Rhodes, which is a Greek island just off the coast of Turkey, is a Mosque that has been turned into a cafe/bar. I had a beer there when I visited.

Devrim

[eyedrop]

What, what? Everyone knows muslims don't drink dooh.

And obviously everyone who celebrates Ramazan (Ramadan?) is a muslim.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Today is the second day of Ramazan. We celebrated the first day by having a nice barbacue in the park. As Leo said, it makes getting drunk doubly enjoyable.

I trust that on RevLeft it will be another oppotunity for people to echo the typical bile that comes from the right wing media in the West when talking about Muslims.

Why should I care if someone fasts or not?

[Rosa Provokateur]

Let the fast begin!

[9]

So this is like a big terrorist convention, right? Where they burn a lot of American flags and that? Why do they want to take our freedom? Especially when we are in their countries giving them democracy. Muslamic extremism is a bad reflection on the small minority of Islams who are moderate. Why don't they practice an Abrahamic religion like Christianity or Israeli?

[Comrade Akai]

I hate to say this, but I feel this thread is very offensive and disrespectful. Being the minority here I probably won't get much support on this, but I don't care, as standing for one's ideals has always been a minority fight in this world.

It feels very surreal and strange to me that I have to tell my fellow communists about this, but wtf, guys?

I understand that many communists are atheists, but is one of the basic principles of communism the abolition of discrimination?

[Devrim]

I hate to say this, but I feel this thread is very offensive and disrespectful.

Who said that people have to be be respectful to absurd ideas. Personally I think that Ramazan is something is a extremely stupid that is quite dangerous to people's health. While I know that the old and ill are not obliged to fast in reality many old and ill people do feel compelled to take part. This year I am sure that it will probably kill my wife's grandmother and the father of a friend at work.


I understand that many communists are atheists, but is one of the basic principles of communism the abolition of discrimination?

Of course there is nobody physically preventing Muslims from fasting on this thread. What is quite common in our country though is students being beaten by Islamicists in universities dominated by the right for not taking part in the fasting.

Devrim

[Comrade Akai]

Who said that people have to be be respectful to absurd ideas. Personally I think that Ramazan is something is a extremely stupid that is quite dangerous to people's health. While I know that the old and ill are not obliged to fast in reality many old and ill people do feel compelled to take part. This year I am sure that it will probably kill my wife's grandmother and the father of a friend at work.
The purpose of fasting is to maintain humility as well as an understanding of what the poor have to go through, for those of us who are not poor.



Of course there is nobody physically preventing Muslims from fasting on this thread. What is quite common in our country though is students being beaten by Islamicists in universities dominated by the right for not taking part in the fasting.

Devrim
Islam does not teach to do that.

[danyboy27]

Who said that people have to be be respectful to absurd ideas. Personally I think that Ramazan is something is a extremely stupid that is quite dangerous to people's health. While I know that the old and ill are not obliged to fast in reality many old and ill people do feel compelled to take part. This year I am sure that it will probably kill my wife's grandmother and the father of a friend at work.





hey, nobody point a gun at the muslim to force them to fast, its their choice after all.. like te burqua.

[Jazzratt]

hey, nobody point a gun at the muslim to force them to fast, its their choice after all.. like te burqua.

Pointing a gun at someone is not the only way to coerce people into doing things.

[Comrade Akai]

Pointing a gun at someone is not the only way to coerce people into doing things.
I do not fast out of coercion. I fast to maintain my humility as well as to have a slight understanding of what people worse off than myself have to deal with.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

I do not fast out of coercion.

Nobody said you did.


I fast to maintain my humility as well as to have a slight understanding of what people worse off than myself have to deal with.

Fuck being humble. That's asking for people to walk all over you.

And speaking as a poor person, going hungry fucking sucks. Willingly going without food seems quite frankly bonkers to me, but I'm not going to stop you if you do it.

[danyboy27]

Pointing a gun at someone is not the only way to coerce people into doing things.

hey, if we shouldnt bother about people wearing a burkini why should we actually care of people fasting?

[ls]

The purpose of fasting is to maintain humility as well as an understanding of what the poor have to go through, for those of us who are not poor.

There can be many different purposes for fasting, some people actually stand to benefit from doing it. That's not the point though, Christians also fast you know and it's not always for the reasons you state either.

In all religions, there is a lot of moral obligation placed on the shoulders of individuals to do things that aren't even necessarily in a contemporary interpretation of the religion. It's not just individual; it was not uncommon from some more orthodox Muslim kids at my school to quietly intimidate those who didn't fast.

Perhaps the numerous Christian parented kids at my school who were beaten for blown up reasons by their parents, were given that beating to teach 'humility' too?


Islam does not teach to do that.

What you fail to understand is all too often, Religions are wielded as tools of oppression. Their inherently flawed tie to the cultures/governments that utilise them simply mean they're redefined on-the-fly.

Why don't you try talking sense into really fundamentalist religious folks and tell them what the respective religion does or doesn't teach, I wonder if you've ever tried that?

[Comrade Akai]

Nobody said you did.
It was implied.




Fuck being humble. That's asking for people to walk all over you.

If I am not mistaken, were the greatest men who ever lived not humble? Were they walked all over?


And speaking as a poor person, going hungry fucking sucks. Willingly going without food seems quite frankly bonkers to me, but I'm not going to stop you if you do it.

Just keep in mind that a practicing Muslim will always relate to you better than your average person in the West.

[Comrade Akai]

There can be many different purposes for fasting, some people actually stand to benefit from doing it. That's not the point though, Christians also fast you know and it's not always for the reasons you state either.

In all religions, there is a lot of moral obligation placed on the shoulders of individuals to do things that aren't even necessarily in a contemporary interpretation of the religion. It's not just individual; it was not uncommon from some more orthodox Muslim kids at my school to quietly intimidate those who didn't fast.

Perhaps the numerous Christian parented kids at my school who were beaten for blown up reasons by their parents, were given that beating to teach 'humility' too?
I have not witnessed that level of extremism in my experience. The worst I've seen is a fasting Muslim calling a non-fasting one a loser, and then moving on with their lives.



What you fail to understand is all too often, Religions are wielded as tools of oppression. Their inherently flawed tie to the cultures/governments that utilise them simply mean they're redefined on-the-fly.

Why don't you try talking sense into really fundamentalist religious folks and tell them what the respective religion does or doesn't teach, I wonder if you've ever tried that?
You have to change the rules of a religion to do that, and while that is acceptable in Christianity, it is not in Islam. The rules are preserved as best they can be, and generally speaking anyone who tries to change them is told to f*** right off. Islam often clashes with the rules set forth by governments and is actually quite anarchic in nature, as I have said before. It's probably the most inefficient religion out there for a government to use to their own ends.

[Jazzratt]

hey, if we shouldnt bother about people wearing a burkini why should we actually care of people fasting?

I never said we shouldn't bother about people wearing burkinis. The whole idea of making people cover up like that is repulsive to me, just as demanding people go without food bothers me. Things like this are, frankly, an illustration of the worst parts of religion.

[ls]

I have not witnessed that level of extremism in my experience.

For real? A great many "average joe" religious folks easily pack together and are rather violent about their views against homosexuality, religious practice and other such things commonly in my experience. I don't believe I live in some area where that's a one-off, it's not uncommon and it's worse in other places in this country and other countries too.

It comes from all of the religious pack mentalities that form in this and all countries and it's vile and anti-worker.


The worst I've seen is a fasting Muslim calling a non-fasting one a loser, and then moving on with their lives.

Fair enough, but worse does happen and commonly too.


You have to change the rules of a religion to do that, and while that is acceptable in Christianity, it is not in Islam.

That's the most plainly wrong statement regarding Islam, that I've ever heard.


The rules are preserved as best they can be

You're saying that because you know your previous statement was complete bollocks.


and generally speaking anyone who tries to change them is told to f*** right off.

Who tells 'them' to 'fuck right off'?


Islam often clashes with the rules set forth by governments and is actually quite anarchic in nature, as I have said before. It's probably the most inefficient religion out there for a government to use to their own ends.

You could say all religion is inefficient when politically implemented if you argued that said religion's interpretation, from a humanitarian point-of-view, was incompatible with Capitalism. The harsh truth is that religion is all too compatible with Capitalism as it's based on complete false premises, lies and deception in the first place.

There is no 'pure belief' in religion that hasn't somehow been tainted by someone's interpretation of the ideas contained therein, somewhere along the line.

[Comrade Akai]

I never said we shouldn't bother about people wearing burkinis. The whole idea of making people cover up like that is repulsive to me, just as demanding people go without food bothers me. Things like this are, frankly, an illustration of the worst parts of religion.
Islam teaches that there should be no compulsion in religion, and that religious actions should be done by choice and not by coercion.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

If I am not mistaken, were the greatest men who ever lived not humble? Were they walked all over?

Yes. Jesus got nailed to a cross. MLK was shot, as was Gandhi. And those were just the "famous people". You don't change the world (not for the better, anyway) with doe-eyed speeches about brotherly love and submission - you change the world by getting angry, grabbing a weapon, and busting some heads.


Just keep in mind that a practicing Muslim will always relate to you better than your average person in the West.

Maybe the poor ones. The rich ones that are waited on hand and foot by their personal slaves, not so much.

[Pirate turtle the 11th]

Islam teaches that there should be no compulsion in religion, and that religious actions should be done by choice and not by coercion.


Yes but what happens in real life is rather different. Also dont give me shit about it not being Islamic , we have had thousands of years of so called peaceful and loving religions spreading misery. Time to pack in the god-crack.

[Comrade Akai]

For real? A great many "average joe" religious folks easily pack together and are rather violent about their views against homosexuality, religious practice and other such things commonly in my experience. I don't believe I live in some area where that's a one-off, it's not uncommon and it's worse in other places in this country and other countries too.

It comes from all of the religious pack mentalities that form in this and all countries and it's vile and anti-worker.
Well, Islam simply does not teach that. Don't know what else to tell you.



That's the most plainly wrong statement regarding Islam, that I've ever heard.
I am a Muslim; I would not lie to you about my own faith.



You're saying that because you know your previous statement was complete bollocks.

No, not really. Can we stay civil?


Who tells 'them' to 'fuck right off'?

The Muslim people are at least supposed to.


You could say all religion is inefficient when politically implemented if you argued that said religion's interpretation, from a humanitarian point-of-view, was incompatible with Capitalism. The harsh truth is that religion is all too compatible with Capitalism as it's based on complete false premises, lies and deception in the first place.

There is no 'pure belief' in religion that hasn't somehow been tainted by someone's interpretation of the ideas contained therein, somewhere along the line.
b9Zls2AReVI
I'd like you to listen to what they have to say about religion.

[Comrade Akai]

Yes. Jesus got nailed to a cross. MLK was shot, as was Gandhi. And those were just the "famous people". You don't change the world (not for the better, anyway) with doe-eyed speeches about brotherly love and submission - you change the world by getting angry, grabbing a weapon, and busting some heads.

Whether or not Jesus actually was nailed to a cross is a matter of debate.

It's that kind of thinking that gives us anarchists a bad name.



Maybe the poor ones. The rich ones that are waited on hand and foot by their personal slaves, not so much.
You underestimate the power of fasting.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Islam doesn't teach violence you say? Islam is tolerant you say? Let's see what the Koran says (emphasis mine):

2:85 Yet ye it is who slay each other and drive out a party of your people from their homes, supporting one another against them by sin and transgression ? - and if they came to you as captives ye would ransom them, whereas their expulsion was itself unlawful for you - Believe ye in part of the Scripture and disbelieve ye in part thereof ? And what is the reward of those who do so save ignominy in the life of the world, and on the Day of Resurrection they will be consigned to the most grievous doom. For Allah is not unaware of what ye do.

2:99 Verily We have revealed unto thee clear tokens, and only miscreants will disbelieve in them.

2:178 O ye who believe! Retaliation is prescribed for you in the matter of the murdered; the freeman for the freeman, and the slave for the slave, and the female for the female. And for him who is forgiven somewhat by his (injured) brother, prosecution according to usage and payment unto him in kindness. This is an alleviation and a mercy from your Lord. He who transgresseth after this will have a painful doom. [the old "eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth" morality rears its ugly head]

2:216 Warfare is ordained for you, though it is hateful unto you; but it may happen that ye hate a thing which is good for you, and it may happen that ye love a thing which is bad for you. Allah knoweth, ye know not.

2:221 Wed not idolatresses till they believe; for lo! a believing bondwoman is better than an idolatress though she please you; and give not your daughters in marriage to idolaters till they believe, for lo! a believing slave is better than an idolater though he please you. These invite unto the Fire, and Allah inviteth unto the Garden, and unto forgiveness by His grace, and expoundeth His revelations to mankind that haply they may remember.

4:144 O ye who believe! Choose not disbelievers for (your) friends in place of believers. Would ye give Allah a clear warrant against you ?

9:5 Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever ye find them, and take them (captive), and besiege them, and prepare for them each ambush. But if they repent and establish worship and pay the poor-due, then leave their way free. Lo! Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.

This is just a sample. Interestingly, the Koran also appears to be full of claims that Allah has, variously, blinded disbelievers, decieved them, hardened their hearts, prepared for them "a shameful punishment", et cetera et cetera and so on ad nauseum.

Of course, while Islam as presented in its source text is of a barbarous nature, I've no reason to believe that actual Muslims themselves are any worse, generally speaking, than Christians, whose sacred text is similarly full of absurdities and atrocities. I shouldn't have to say that, but religion has been granted a special place in society, above all but the mildest of criticism - you can tear into someone's politics or their taste in movies with relish, but do the same thing with their religion and suddenly you're a hateful, intolerant bigot. Nonsense. No ideas should be above the harshest criticism, least of all those of religion.


Whether or not Jesus actually was nailed to a cross is a matter of debate.

It's that kind of thinking that gives us anarchists a bad name.

Regardless of the method, he still got whacked.


You underestimate the power of fasting.

You're right, I do. That's because I've seen precious little evidence that such practices actually do a damn thing apart from making those that partake in them feel smug about themselves.

[danyboy27]

I never said we shouldn't bother about people wearing burkinis. The whole idea of making people cover up like that is repulsive to me, just as demanding people go without food bothers me. Things like this are, frankly, an illustration of the worst parts of religion.
why did i came under fire with the burkini topic then?
devrim was basicly proud of making all those fasting muslim pissed, nobody seemed to make a big deal about it. but if the french governement dosnt allow burkini in public pool that an outrage.

i am not making judgement, just trying to understand the whole logic.

if i am against burqua and other religious icons i am.. a white chauvinist assole, but if i make a BBQ to make muslim pissed, it would be okay...

i dont get it, sorry guys

[ls]

why did i came under fire with the burkini topic then?
devrim was basicly proud of making all those fasting muslim pissed, nobody seemed to make a big deal about it. but if the french governement dosnt allow burkini in public pool that an outrage.

i am not making judgement, just trying to understand the whole logic.

if i am against burqua and other religious icons i am.. a white chauvinist assole, but if i make a BBQ to make muslim pissed, it would be okay...

i dont get it, sorry guys

:glare:

Because he lives in a majority Muslim country, whereas the woman in France was probably discriminated against simply because she's a Muslim.


Well, Islam simply does not teach that. Don't know what else to tell you.

Thanks for taking the time for your explanation, it really was enlightening and convinced me that Islam is not used on a wide-scale to oppress people.


I am a Muslim; I would not lie to you about my own faith.

Everyone lies about their own faith, even if only to themselves. ;)



No, not really. Can we stay civil?

Yes, yes really.


The Muslim people are at least supposed to.

And Capitalist politicians are supposed to treat people properly.


b9Zls2AReVI
I'd like you to listen to what they have to say about religion.

Watched 10 seconds of it and it looked like a shittier version of dude where's my car or something so I turned it off.

Let me guess: they are nasty white chauvinist arseholes who think "Moslems" are the enemy or something.

[Jazzratt]

why did i came under fire with the burkini topic then?

Because you were taking a moronic line on it. As I pointed out in that thread calling for bans is utterly counteractive.


devrim was basicly proud of making all those fasting muslim pissed, nobody seemed to make a big deal about it. but if the french governement dosnt allow burkini in public pool that an outrage.

Devrim is one bloke and all he is doing is eating; he is not forcing anyone to eat as well. The french government on the other hand are a state and they are taking an action to prevent others acting in a certain way. If you can't tell the difference then you are a moron.


if i am against burqua and other religious icons i am.. a white chauvinist assole, but if i make a BBQ to make muslim pissed, it would be okay...

The problem most people have is not that you're against the burqua, the concept really doesn't appeal to most on the board - it's the fact that you (and others in that thread) support government intervention against it. Many people here have pointed out the health problems with the eating patterns adopted during Ramadan but none of them have been stupid enough to call for a ban on the practice.

[Devrim]

I have not witnessed that level of extremism in my experience. The worst I've seen is a fasting Muslim calling a non-fasting one a loser, and then moving on with their lives.

I would imagine that you haven't had very much experience. I think it is quite common for people to be threatened with violence for not fasting in many Muslim countries. In others of course it is enforced by the state, in public at least.

I would imagine that you are very young (mid to late teens), are a convert to Islam, and live in an English speaking country, probably the US. People like yourself pop up on here every six months or so. The most constant feature of this type of poster is their idealism, and rejection of reality. The idea that Islam is some pure thing that lives in their heads, and not a real social force in the material world never ceases to amaze me. And the real social force is extremely reactionary.

Devrim

[Revy]

Here's a recent article in the Washington Post called "Better Health Through Fasting (http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/guestvoices/2009/08/better_health_through_fasting.html?hpid=talkbox1)".


Restraint from food, water and undesirable behavior makes a person more mentally disciplined and less prone to unhealthy behavior.WATER? I never knew this was part of Ramadan. My understanding was Muslims abstain from food for the day, and then eat at night. To try and say they shouldn't drink water is just taking it way too far.

The funny thing about this article is that it's full of health advice unrelated to Islamic teachings. So it never really proved that fasting makes you healthier - it just listed some ways to keep your fasting from being unhealthy.
It did say that calorie restriction can have some health benefits but that's not exactly news, there is a difference between calorie restriction and fasting. The difference is food is not abstained for a long period in a normal calorie restricted diet.

[9]

Here's a recent article in the Washington Post called "Better Health Through Fasting (http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/guestvoices/2009/08/better_health_through_fasting.html?hpid=talkbox1)".



Originally Posted by The Washington Post:
Restraint from...undesirable behavior makes a person...less prone to unhealthy behavior. Good to see the Washington Post really delving in deep with their investigative journalism :lol:

[Devrim]

WATER? I never knew this was part of Ramadan. My understanding was Muslims abstain from food for the day, and then eat at night. To try and say they shouldn't drink water is just taking it way too far.

It also includes smoking. It is quite funny that in a time when people are supposed to be more kindly and considerate, actually many of them are walking around completly stressed and blow up at a moments notice. Driving around the city is worse than ever in an environment where drivers are short-fused at the best of times driving becomes nearly intolerable.

Also sex is forbidden during the fast too.

Devrim

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Hearing that sort of thing makes me glad I grew up in a family that didn't give two tugs of a dead dog's cock about religion.

[eyedrop]

It also includes smoking. It is quite funny that in a time when people are supposed to be more kindly and considerate, actually many of them are walking around completly stressed and blow up at a moments notice. Driving around the city is worse than ever in an environment where drivers are short-fused at the best of times driving becomes nearly intolerable.

Also sex is forbidden during the fast too.

Devrim

Hmmm, the version of Ramadan I was taught in school included wild parties after the sun sets. I was always jealous and wanted to celebrate Ramadan myself.

[Devrim]

Hmmm, the version of Ramadan I was taught in school included wild parties after the sun sets. I was always jealous and wanted to celebrate Ramadan myself.

No, it is more like a pleasant family meal.
Devrim

[eyedrop]

No, it is more like a pleasant family meal.
Devrim
That misunderstanding may have been caused by my teenage mind at the time.

[Raúl Duke]

I've only read a bit on this thread but would like to remark on this...


I am a Muslim; I would not lie to you about my own faith.

Most of us have experienced cases in which theists lie, omit, or demonstrate a lack of understanding concerning their own faith.


Islam often clashes with the rules set forth by governments and is actually quite anarchic in nature, as I have said before. It's probably the most inefficient religion out there for a government to use to their own ends.

Perhaps, but that's not the usual case. If you are in Saudi Arabia and in Iran, you'll see that the state enforces religion strictly which later benefits them since in these states religion becomes an ideology that supports their governments.

[Rosa Provokateur]

I hate to say this, but I feel this thread is very offensive and disrespectful. Being the minority here I probably won't get much support on this, but I don't care, as standing for one's ideals has always been a minority fight in this world.

It feels very surreal and strange to me that I have to tell my fellow communists about this, but wtf, guys?

I understand that many communists are atheists, but is one of the basic principles of communism the abolition of discrimination?

Hear, hear. Our Muslim brothers and sisters are under enough weight with the Afghani and Iraqi wars going on plus Iran's election crisis. They deserve our support and even more so in this time of the year that they hold sacred.

[Rosa Provokateur]

Why don't you try talking sense into really fundamentalist religious folks and tell them what the respective religion does or doesn't teach, I wonder if you've ever tried that?

If a person doesnt follow the fundamentals of something, they're not fundamentalist. This is the case with Muslims who assault others for not fasting as well for Christians who advocate violence. Not fundamentalist, they are re-visionist and must be regarded as such.

[ls]

If a person doesnt follow the fundamentals of something, they're not fundamentalist. This is the case with Muslims who assault others for not fasting as well for Christians who advocate violence. Not fundamentalist, they are re-visionist and must be regarded as such.

In your case of Christians that makes something like 97% of Christians in the world 'revisionist', as that's the case, it would be wise to rethink your statement.


Hear, hear. Our Muslim brothers and sisters are under enough weight with the Afghani and Iraqi wars going on plus Iran's election crisis. They deserve our support and even more so in this time of the year that they hold sacred.

Furthermore, if you think that contemporary 'non-revisionist' Christianity preaches understanding and solidarity with Islam then that's complete farce too (and vice versa).

[Kukulofori]

lol @ liberals claiming that oppression is because of religion. A cursory glance at this thread will show you that atheists can be just as asinine as religious people.


Who tells 'them' to 'fuck right off'?

Iran protesting the "islamic" republic and Pakistan protesting the pretend taliban jump to mind IMMEDIATELY.

[ls]

lol @ liberals claiming that oppression is because of religion. A cursory glance at this thread will show you that atheists can be just as asinine as religious people.

No one said otherwise.


Iran protesting the "islamic" republic and Pakistan protesting the pretend taliban jump to mind IMMEDIATELY.

Nice try in smearing me as being anti-Muslim, unfortunately for you I've never attacked Muslim peoples in any state.

You realise that the people in Iran attacked the bloody Mullahs right? They haven't said "you're interpreting Islam wrongly and you should do it like this instead" as you're trying to make out. And good on the Iranians who did that.

Are you a Muslim communist yourself, Κουκουλοφόροι?

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

lol @ liberals claiming that oppression is because of religion.

lol @ someone thinking "liberal" is a cutting insult.


A cursory glance at this thread will show you that atheists can be just as asinine as religious people.

Oh boo-hoo. I'm so sorry for not cosying up to and mollycoddling your favourite form of religious delusion. Not.

[Raúl Duke]

I don't think anyone claims that "oppression is because of religion"

The oppression (and even other customs) that might come from religion has more to do with historical material conditions of the past, since ideologies arise from material conditions/"structure". Most religion arose from material conditions of the past but still remain, a bit, afterward (however, current conditions are rigged against these old ideologies). Some have adapted to attempt to maintain or to slow down the process of increasing secularization/disbelief of society (I remember there was something that Marx said about "the ghosts of the past haunting the living" or something to that effect. Religion and its fundamentalists are one of those things, however modern material conditions are negatively effecting religious belief according to a few studies/surveys).

[Kukulofori]

ITT I have to be a muslim to think they're not all slave-owning dictators who stand in the way of glorious socialism.

[ls]

Nope, but you are reactionary.

I would also add that if you were a Muslim communist, I'd suspect you're a Westernised liberal convert to Islam rather than someone that has been brought up in a majority Islam country.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

ITT I have to be a muslim to think they're not all slave-owning dictators who stand in the way of glorious socialism.

Actually I had you down as one of those types that "believes in belief" - IE, while not religious yourself, you see religion as something useful for others to have.

[Dyslexia! Well I Never!]

Nobody can argue that religious faith (particularly that of an abrahamic flavour) isn't a tool of oppression that support a nonelective ranking system (deity and their representatives at the top forever) and oppressive regulations (holy commandments, divine pronouncements, taboos) whether a particular "believer" hypocritically ignores these parts or not.

The perpetuation of the superstition enables these societorially retardant doctrines to persist like a malignancy in the fabric of a society.

[spiltteeth]

Nobody can argue that religious faith (particularly that of an abrahamic flavour) isn't a tool of oppression that support a nonelective ranking system (deity and their representatives at the top forever) and oppressive regulations (holy commandments, divine pronouncements, taboos) whether a particular "believer" hypocritically ignores these parts or not.

The perpetuation of the superstition enables these societorially retardant doctrines to persist like a malignancy in the fabric of a society.

I could argue that since most religions started as opposition to the ruling class before being expropriated and then used for oppression.
deity's at the top?! There goes half the eastern religions...Zen...Shinto...Coptic Christianity...certain sects of Hinduism...
oppressive regulations and taboos? So yr in favor of cannibalism? And incest? Or are some taboos cool?

[danyboy27]

i got a question, if i happen to have a fasting muslim where i work and beccause of that he not doing a great job, do i have the right to actually complain about it?

anyway, if its affecting their works fasting muslim should take vitamins or i dont know some kind of food supplement.

[Robert]

danyboy, you came to the right place for free Canadian legal advice:


Discrimination based on religion is prohibited in employment, in employment advertising, with respect to union membership and the treatment of union members, and with respect to services, accommodations or facilities that are customarily available to the public. However, it is a defence to a claim of discrimination in employment or services to show that a refusal, limitation, specification or preference was based on a bona fidebona fide justification occupational requirement, or a (see Appendix for text of relevant sections).


So ...


1. Yes, you have the right to complain;

2. But also, yes, he has the right to claim discrimination; so off to court you both go. Please dress appropriately.

3. You win in court if you can show that your demand that they EAT SOMETHING is based on a bona fide job requirement. Proving this is hard. I would install a video camera to show that the guys is always falling asleep or dropping things due to exhaustion. Of course, then he will sue you for invasion of his privacy.

4. But he wins in court if he can show this problem would have been avoided if you could have let him offered to let him work during non-fasting hours.

5. The lawyers for both sides get paid by the hour, regardless of who wins, and that's the most important thing.;)

[Kukulofori]

or better idea maybe you could BOTH fight for more scheduling flexibility

wouldn't want to be anywhere left of Pinochet on this issue though.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

I could argue that since most religions started as opposition to the ruling class before being expropriated and then used for oppression.

Really? Looking at history, it seems that religion is far more useful to the ruling classes than to anyone else.

If what you say is indeed the case (I think it's doubtful) then I just want to thank religious believers for handing out on a platter a good way for the ruling classes to subjugate and brainwash people. I assure you that the heavy sarcasm in that last sentence was purely intentional.


deity's at the top?! There goes half the eastern religions...Zen...Shinto...Coptic Christianity...certain sects of Hinduism...

Colour me interested when those religions have billions of followers. Of course a religion which has an inherent justified hierarchy is more likely to be spread around. Usually at the end of a weapon.


oppressive regulations and taboos? So yr in favor of cannibalism? And incest? Or are some taboos cool?

What, you don't think there are perfectly good secular reasons for discouraging cannibalism in all except the direst of circumstances? Ever heard of kuru? Not to mention the question as to exactly how one would acquire "long pig".

As for incest, I don't see the problem with it as long as contraception is used and the participants are consenting adults.

Whoops, turns out things are more complicated than simple-minded religious morals would have you believe!

[Post-Something]

So, is anyone actually doing the fast this year? I've been doing it, and it's been going pretty well; although it has been after 8 every night for sun down.

I think Ramadan is an interesting time. It gives me something to look foreward to at the end of the day, and I can focus my mind on things I deem more important. Also, it's good to just test myself, put myself through the hunger, know what it's like day in day out. Actually, I think it's one of the much better aspects of Islam, and I would probably recommend it to anyone who was interested in trying it.

[danyboy27]

danyboy, you came to the right place for free Canadian legal advice:


Discrimination based on religion is prohibited in employment, in employment advertising, with respect to union membership and the treatment of union members, and with respect to services, accommodations or facilities that are customarily available to the public. However, it is a defence to a claim of discrimination in employment or services to show that a refusal, limitation, specification or preference was based on a bona fidebona fide justification occupational requirement, or a (see Appendix for text of relevant sections).


So ...


1. Yes, you have the right to complain;

2. But also, yes, he has the right to claim discrimination; so off to court you both go. Please dress appropriately.

3. You win in court if you can show that your demand that they EAT SOMETHING is based on a bona fide job requirement. Proving this is hard. I would install a video camera to show that the guys is always falling asleep or dropping things due to exhaustion. Of course, then he will sue you for invasion of his privacy.

4. But he wins in court if he can show this problem would have been avoided if you could have let him offered to let him work during non-fasting hours.

5. The lawyers for both sides get paid by the hour, regardless of who wins, and that's the most important thing.;)


this situation didnt happened to me but to a friend of mine.
basicly, you are saying that something could be done if a religous practice fuck up a working environnement? that interesting :D

but dont worry i dont expect to actually sue someone for that, i got something else to do with my money.

tanks for the advice robert!

[spiltteeth]

NoXion;1535007]Really? Looking at history, it seems that religion is far more useful to the ruling classes than to anyone else.

If what you say is indeed the case (I think it's doubtful) then I just want to thank religious believers for handing out on a platter a good way for the ruling classes to subjugate and brainwash people. I assure you that the heavy sarcasm in that last sentence was purely intentional.

What!? Why would you thank them if -oh. Sarcasm. Oh yr good. Kudos sir or madam.

I take a marxist analysis. I don't think an idea or religion makes any difference, the ruling class always sets themselves up as the ones with *the* Truth -and if you've read your Focoult you'll know this was/is perfectly true with humanistic science and medicine as it was/is with religion. The knowledge/religion is incidental.

I do not feel history justifies your reading of religion though. Look at Christianity, it started as some non-hierarchal washing of feet small sect, opposed the state, opposed the military, and then when it got popular the ruling class took it, set up a specific structure and used it as a means of oppression and called it catholic.

Look at Catholic Christianity, the ruling class used it to oppress people and set things up to protect their own interests then a guy called Luther came along...

Look at America some small weird sect -fundamentalist Christians- have grown and is now used by the ruling class to exploit so now Sojourners and other progressive, pro-gay, socialist, sects have sprung up. If THEY get popular presumably in a capitalist society then they will be used by the ruling class to control...

Look at the Brahmins. The ruling class set up the brahmin class to oppress others and then a guy named buddha came along another sect was formed which opposed the repressive Brahmins ...

Look at Buddhism. In India buddhists begged for food. In China begging was a no-no, so they set up little communities independent of the sate. Then in some parts of the world the ruling class set up Buddhist religious institutions for their own benefit (Amida and Tibetan) etc...

Look at communism...

I'm just saying how these institutions function in society changes within the specific historical circumstances. There is a process that some might say is Marxist or dialectical. In a communist/socialist society the oppressive nature of these institutions would greatly change.


Colour me interested when those religions have billions of followers. Of course a religion which has an inherent justified hierarchy is more likely to be spread around. Usually at the end of a weapon.

Guess I'll never be colouring you, no religion has billions of followers. If you add up all the followers of the ones I mentioned you merely get hundreds of millions...


What, you don't think there are perfectly good secular reasons for discouraging cannibalism in all except the direst of circumstances? Ever heard of kuru? Not to mention the question as to exactly how one would acquire "long pig".

As for incest, I don't see the problem with it as long as contraception is used and the participants are consenting adults.

Firstly, I LOVE Kuru, it was you who made a ridiculous blanket statement that religious taboos were "oppressive regulations." Well, some are, some aren't. Blanket statements are usually simplistic and black and white. Many religious taboos actually function for the betterment of society, others are simply oppressive control measures. It's not that simple.


Whoops, turns out things are more complicated than simple-minded religious morals would have you believe!

Hmmmm. See you post....

[Raisa]

"my biggest dreams is that mosques under workers management become bar restaurants where they serve copious amounts of beer and pork, and that churches because night clubs were orgies are legalized "

Pork for the most part is a food people consume as a result of poverty and opression and then figure out ways to make it tasty and incorporate it into their cultures, workers consuming "copius amounts of beer" after work is a reaction to wage slave mundane life, and you dont have a good grasp of what liberation really is if you think this is the opposite of bourgeois lines of organized religions.

The worst I've seen is a fasting Muslim calling a non-fasting one a loser, and then moving on with their lives.

Fasting is part of Islam, we are all supposed to fast unless we have a health problem that fasting would hurt, or we are mensturating women, or we are pregnant women...for obvious reasons.

Ramadan is the best month of the year. Everyone is trying to enjoin what is good and leave that which isnt, and share with people and practice self restraint from DOING ALL THE THINGS THAT WE HAVE BEEN ENJOINED TO DO UNDER CAPITALISM TO FIT INTO THE SMALL PLACES IT HAS LEFT FOR US MENTALLY AND PHYSICALLY ON THIS EARTH. Like talking behind peoples backs, lieing, witholding things other people need, being selfish, being petty, getting intoxicated being arrogant, boisterous, foul speech, spitefulness, jealousy, etc.

Ramadan is not just about not eating and drinking, its about us trying to rid ourselves of the social diseases we have accumulated in this system and purify our hearts and souls.

Why should people have to wait 200 years for a revolution to be complete to have clean hearts? Why should we wait for society to be repaired inorder to be the people we want to be? Arent we revolutionaries....

Some of you are on point with communism, but couldnt be trusted to lead the people because your souls are filthy and hearts are diseased, and you have to be the change you want to see before you can change anything.
The first person i replied to in this post is a pure example of a person that spoke about defacing a religious center out of pure spite and replacing it with diseases of capitalist society without even thinking.

You should lead by example not by hate.

[Raisa]

"If a person doesnt follow the fundamentals of something, they're not fundamentalist. This is the case with Muslims who assault others for not fasting as well for Christians who advocate violence. Not fundamentalist, they are re-visionist and must be regarded as such. "

If I understood that right, then id have to agree.
People arent supposed to jump people for not fasting. Number one, fighting ruins your fast so in the end your fast is broken too, and number too "there is no compulsion in religion"...this is from the Quran.
So half of those "radical fundamentalists" what they are doing is trying to create an islamic state in a capitalist world, and unfortunately.........

I personally do not beleif this is possible. We submit to Allah, and then have to allow other governments to control our buisness practices and espouse capitalist practices in our own countries also?! Im not so sure it works out. Its the same as trying to have a communist country when the world is still run by a capitalist agressor.
So in the end you have a little poor country with a bunch of propaganda and political prisioners and famines.

[Leo]

The worst I've seen is a fasting Muslim calling a non-fasting one a loser, and then moving on with their lives. Really? Because I've seen fasting Muslims tying to lynch those who do not, I know people who got beaten up because they were having a beer in Ramadan. Hell, I know of underground coffee shops in some towns which people who do not fast go to in Ramadan to have a smoke and some tea because they can't even have a smoke publicly and they have a secret door knocking code in order to stay underground.

But then again, I live in a country where Islam is actually dominant, rather than being a warm and fuzzy counter-culture. It makes the insanity of it more obvious.


People arent supposed to jump people for not fasting (...) "there is no compulsion in religion"...this is from the Quran.So are these:

They desire that you should disbelieve as they have disbelieved, so that you might be (all) alike; therefore take not from among them friends until they fly (their homes) in Allah's way; but if they turn back, then seize them and kill them wherever you find them, and take not from among them a friend or a helper. (An-Nisa, 089 , Quran)

I will throw fear into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Then smite the necks and smite of them each finger. This is because they acted adversely to Allah and His Messenger; and whoever acts adversely to Allah and His Messenger-- then surely Allah is severe in requiting (evil). (Al-Anfal, 012-13, Quran)

The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger, and strive with might and main for mischief through the land is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that is their disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the Hereafter. (Al Maeda, 033, Quran)

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

I'm just saying how these institutions function in society changes within the specific historical circumstances. There is a process that some might say is Marxist or dialectical. In a communist/socialist society the oppressive nature of these institutions would greatly change.

You can't prove that. What evidence we do have (history) tends to say otherwise. Why should we take the risk?


Guess I'll never be colouring you, no religion has billions of followers. If you add up all the followers of the ones I mentioned you merely get hundreds of millions...

You're right, I was exaggerating. But let me draw you a picture:

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j99/NoXion604/rel_pie-1.gif

By far the world's biggest religions appear to be the world's nastiest. I don't think these two facts are entirely unrelated.


Firstly, I LOVE Kuru,

wat (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuru_(disease))


it was you who made a ridiculous blanket statement that religious taboos were "oppressive regulations." Well, some are, some aren't. Blanket statements are usually simplistic and black and white. Many religious taboos actually function for the betterment of society,

Such as?

[spiltteeth]

=NoXion;1535459]You can't prove that. What evidence we do have (history) tends to say otherwise. Why should we take the risk?

I thought I did give plenty of historical evidence, and, like I say, if you've read yr Focoult you'd know that the ruling class uses science -particularly medicine and psychiatry, but even literature and plenty others - for reasons of control and oppression. Whether it's medicine or religion is immaterial. So, its not the religion aspect, its the way its used by the ruling class.


You're right, I was exaggerating. But let me draw you a picture:

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j99/NoXion604/rel_pie-1.gif


By far the world's biggest religions appear to be the world's nastiest. I don't think these two facts are entirely unrelated.

Well, if you indiscriminately simplify everything like that sure. As far as christianity, look at Sojourners, look at Desomond Tu-tu, look at all the christian churches in africa, america, and england fighting for gay rights.
There's the religion of the ruling class, and the religion of the people, not that its so clear-cut, but it seems ludicrous to say 'Muslim's oppress others'. Which Muslims? Malcolm x? Sufi's?
Your chart ought to be disposed of after the 3rd grade.


Such as?

Rape, incest, cannibalism, murder...not ALL taboo's are oppressive by nature. Taboo's have a reason for existing. Like cows being sacred, if they weren't and people ate them there would actually be less food in India because it is more efficient to use them for felid work to grow food. Now, when this taboo came up I'm sure no one understood this scientifically as we do now, nevertheless it functioned.

Also, if your saying cannibalism ought to be outlawed cuz of Kuru, a simple test would be enough to tell if the flesh is safe to consume or not.

[Leo]

but it seems ludicrous to say 'Muslim's oppress others'. Which Muslims? (...) Sufi's? Actually Sufism is deeply aligned with right-wing politics in the Middle East, and notable and leading members of several middle eastern states have been aligned with nasty Sufi sects.

[danyboy27]

wow, i wasnt aware that i was eating pork beccause i was poor, tanks your for the info.

no seriously, pork is an annimal like another, there is nothing magic or unholy about it, get over it.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

I thought I did give plenty of historical evidence,

You gave lots of evidence that religions are easily co-opted, yes.


and, like I say, if you've read yr Focoult you'd know that the ruling class uses science -particularly medicine and psychiatry, but even literature and plenty others - for reasons of control and oppression.

Except that science, psychiatry and literature have positive uses. What positive uses does religion have? Positive uses that have not already been superceded by scientific or secular means?


Whether it's medicine or religion is immaterial. So, its not the religion aspect, its the way its used by the ruling class.

There's also the not-so-small matter of religion having no evidence whatsoever behind its claims.


Well, if you indiscriminately simplify everything like that sure. As far as christianity, look at Sojourners, look at Desomond Tu-tu, look at all the christian churches in africa, america, and england fighting for gay rights.
There's the religion of the ruling class, and the religion of the people, not that its so clear-cut, but it seems ludicrous to say 'Muslim's oppress others'. Which Muslims? Malcolm x? Sufi's?
Your chart ought to be disposed of after the 3rd grade.

Of course, the vast majority of religious believers aren't monsters. But it isn't the common believers that get their hands on the levers of power, is it?


Rape, incest, cannibalism, murder...not ALL taboo's are oppressive by nature.

Such general prohibitions as you mention are commonly found in different societies so religion can lay no claim on them.


Taboo's have a reason for existing. Like cows being sacred, if they weren't and people ate them there would actually be less food in India because it is more efficient to use them for felid work to grow food. Now, when this taboo came up I'm sure no one understood this scientifically as we do now, nevertheless it functioned.

It doesn't take a scientific genius to say "Hey, if you eat all the cows, who will pull the plough?". Of course I also question the wisdom of unconditionally following advice formulated centuries ago...


Also, if your saying cannibalism ought to be outlawed cuz of Kuru, a simple test would be enough to tell if the flesh is safe to consume or not.

Maybe. But I'm betting manflesh would be expensive.

[spiltteeth]

NoXion;1535527]You gave lots of evidence that religions are easily co-opted, yes.

AND they started off opposing the ruling class.


Except that science, psychiatry and literature have positive uses. What positive uses does religion have? Positive uses that have not already been superceded by scientific or secular means?


Both scientific materialism and Christianity in its modernist form subscribe to a humanocentric theology of ‘utilitarianism’ (‘the more human desires that can be met, the more moral good that has been created’ or ‘the greatest good for the greatest number’). This philosophy/theology of utilitarianism presently serves as the primary moral framework for decision making in modern societies. Utilitarianism is legitimized and sustained due to two factors: (a) a central myth of modernity that equates the telos of history as human progress brought about by goods resulting from economic development and technological innovation; and (b) the goods of human progress can be justified as moral exclusively through self-reflective
interiority and determined by human happiness measured in economic terms. Thus, your whole “God is superfluous to the order of the material world” as self-identity is defined primarily by the consumption of the goods of human progress.
Yet, without a truly post-modern Christian (or post-modern secular
materialist) ethics where Reality has a non-instrumentalist value, “the basis for the common good, for collective action, civic virtue and the very consent to common social goals on which present societies depend” is undermined.
The modern concept of ‘the environment’ inherits the central myth of modernity: reclaiming a utilitarian Garden of Eden that is a new
space of timeless convenience and unbounded personal happiness. This ‘garden’ is created through the self-interested pursuit of and consumption of industrially manufactured and marketed goods and services developed through the application of a particular, humanocentric (and oftentimes ethnocentric and/or nationalistic) and ‘modern’ rationality.


There's also the not-so-small matter of religion having no evidence whatsoever behind its claims.


1) why is evidence needed

2) who decides what evidence is? Rational empirical evidence? And when is this enough?

This preference as definitional of rationality have little conception of how science actually works in practice. How many years was it that Einstein’s Law of Special Relativity was accepted on the basis of belief before any experimental evidence was proffered to support this theory? Today, in the confluence of general relativity and quantum theory, the majority of theoretical physicists subscribe to string theory, a theory that has no foreseeable means for experimental verification.
Knowing about reality cannot be limited by rationality as only determined
empirically, either by the secular materialists or by the modern Christians who use this epistemological version of what is rational to promote the status quo against new data to the contrary.
Look at something that has been at issue for at least the past 35 years. The deniers of global warming have consistently claimed that the theory behind global warming has not been ‘scientifically proven’ (i.e. is not rational or not rational enough).


Of course, the vast majority of religious believers aren't monsters. But it isn't the common believers that get their hands on the levers of power, is it?

It really doesn't matter, if not religion then they'll use science. If people are given power, the societal consequences of the nature of that religion will change -from oppression to liberation, plenty of historical evidence - look at Desmond Tu-tu.



Such general prohibitions as you mention are commonly found in different societies so religion can lay no claim on them.

Claim? I'm saying these were religious taboos. You said religious taboos were oppressive. I say it's not so simple. Some are some aren't.


It doesn't take a scientific genius to say "Hey, if you eat all the cows, who will pull the plough?". Of course I also question the wisdom of unconditionally following advice formulated centuries ago...

Uh, for an ENTIRE continent to agree on this for hundreds of years and enforce it, is impressive, and not just ALL the cows, almost NONE could be eaten.
And it DOES take a genius. Apparently your unaware that computer models were brought in to maximize food production in India. After several disastrous years, it was proven by computer modeling that the traditional ways of farming were in fact the most efficient all along... Which were adhered to largely because of religious prescriptions.


Maybe. But I'm betting manflesh would be expensive.

Yea? Guarantee I could score human flesh in Philly for less than $20.00....ever been to parts of Africa? Life is cheap. And I don't think morality ought to be combined with economics...Hey, if you can afford it - go head!

[ls]

Really? Because I've seen fasting Muslims tying to lynch those who do not, I know people who got beaten up because they were having a beer in Ramadan. Hell, I know of underground coffee shops in some towns which people who do not fast go to in Ramadan to have a smoke and some tea because they can't even have a smoke publicly and they have a secret door knocking code in order to stay underground.

But then again, I live in a country where Islam is actually dominant, rather than being a warm and fuzzy counter-culture. It makes the insanity of it more obvious.

It's hilarious that Akai talks of experience with Islam mainly in the West.

That's what I talk about from too, experience of mostly people from majority-Islamic countries (Pakistan, Iran, Turkey).

It's odd when you can find liberal multiculturalism pervading through everything, the backwardness of religion is particularly bad of course.

It gets to the point where the Christian or whatever else fundamentalism of somewhere in the world, is actually encouraged by the bourgeois government to develop its disgusting base elsewhere.

And that happens with Islam here, some very bad things happen in the UK thanks to it is all I can say. I could go into detail about how one Pakistani lady's parents came round wanting to chop up her boyfriend with a massive butcher's knife as he "isn't even Muslim!", or how at mosque some kids at my school complained about a little **** paid to go round kicking 'bad Muslims' in the back while they're praying (thankfully he got what was coming to him, a swift right-hook and talking down).

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

AND they started off opposing the ruling class.

So what? That does nothing to mitigate millennia of failure.


Both scientific materialism and Christianity in its modernist form subscribe to a humanocentric theology of ‘utilitarianism’ (‘the more human desires that can be met, the more moral good that has been created’ or ‘the greatest good for the greatest number’). This philosophy/theology of utilitarianism presently serves as the primary moral framework for decision making in modern societies.

Interesting, what website did you rip off to come up with this? Don't try to tell me this sesquipedalian nonsense is actually yours. I thought better of you than that.


Utilitarianism is legitimized and sustained due to two factors: (a) a central myth of modernity that equates the telos of history as human progress brought about by goods resulting from economic development and technological innovation;

The fact that you can sit at a computer in a building with electricity and call modernity a "myth" speaks volumes.


and (b) the goods of human progress can be justified as moral exclusively through self-reflective
interiority and determined by human happiness measured in economic terms.

"The good of human progress" if you mean what I think you mean by the term, can be justified through their utility, aside from any economic considerations. In other words, it's good to be able to live in a house with electricity and running water - the fact that this makes you more "employable/productive/whatever" I consider to be secondary. Of course capitalists would put the economic benefits foremost, but what the hell do you expect?


Thus, your whole “God is superfluous to the order of the material world” as self-identity is defined primarily by the consumption of the goods of human progress.

That's funny, I thought it was about living life to the fullest, without having to worry about kissing the ass of some cosmic, psychopathic prison guard.


Yet, without a truly post-modern Christian (or post-modern secular
materialist) ethics where Reality has a non-instrumentalist value, “the basis for the common good, for collective action, civic virtue and the very consent to common social goals on which present societies depend” is undermined.

Why, because you say so?


The modern concept of ‘the environment’ inherits the central myth of modernity: reclaiming a utilitarian Garden of Eden that is a new
space of timeless convenience and unbounded personal happiness.

It's in our interest at all levels to ensure that the environment we live in is both habitable and comfortable to a satisfactory and sustainable level - nothing to do with a "Garden of Eden".


This ‘garden’ is created through the self-interested pursuit of and consumption of industrially manufactured and marketed goods and services developed through the application of a particular, humanocentric (and oftentimes ethnocentric and/or nationalistic) and ‘modern’ rationality.

You appear to be confusing secularism with capitalism.


1) why is evidence needed

Because when you make claims that purport to have an effect on the real world, you need (or rather, should need) to have evidence if your claim is to be taken any more seriously than the ravings of a lunatic. Unfortunately due to the privileged position that religion has in a lot of societies, absurdities can be widely accepted or even written into law.


2) who decides what evidence is? Rational empirical evidence? And when is this enough?

Well, personal revelation is right out - the person could be mentally ill, lying, on drugs or honestly mistaken.

Eyewitness evidence is similarly unreliable.

So what is left? Well, let's use Australia as an example. I've met people who claimed to come from or have visited Australia. On its own, that is not enough evidence. More convincing are photographs - sure, they could be doctored or mislabelled, but that would require an absurd conspiracy to perpetuate the idea that a continent exists. It's possible to examine objects said to come from Australia to confirm their origin. A considerable number of plant and animal species exist only in Australia. Take a trip in a spacecraft and you'll be able to see Australia from space - zoom in with a powerful telescope while you're up there and you'll be able to see the same landmarks you see in photographs. Of course, it will be cheaper to buy a plane ticket and see Australia for yourself up close.

The point is that there are many different ways of gathering evidence for the existence of something. Depending on exactly what it is you're looking for, you can also conduct experiments that can be repeated, which is important for verifying results.


This preference as definitional of rationality have little conception of how science actually works in practice. How many years was it that Einstein’s Law of Special Relativity was accepted on the basis of belief before any experimental evidence was proffered to support this theory?

Accepted by who? Scientists are not a hivemind; until the Michelson-Morley experiments and the like, it was perfectly respectable for physicists to reject Special Relativity.

Of course, the strength of science lies in the scientific method and the evidence gathered, not the opinion of scientists, who are human like the rest us.


Today, in the confluence of general relativity and quantum theory, the majority of theoretical physicists subscribe to string theory, a theory that has no foreseeable means for experimental verification.

The majority? Citation needed.

Never mind the fact that theoretical physics is a small branch on a very large tree - the only reason (I suspect) it gets more attention is because big, flashy projects like the Large Hadron Collider are more easily sold as popular science fodder than relatively low-key stuff such as gravity-wave interferometry. I blame our appalling education system.


Knowing about reality cannot be limited by rationality as only determined
empirically, either by the secular materialists or by the modern Christians who use this epistemological version of what is rational to promote the status quo against new data to the contrary.

What new data?


Look at something that has been at issue for at least the past 35 years. The deniers of global warming have consistently claimed that the theory behind global warming has not been ‘scientifically proven’ (i.e. is not rational or not rational enough).

They're wrong. Climate change deniers wilfully ignore the evidence or attempt to spin it so that it supports their position. Personally I disagree with a lot of environmental types as to how to deal with climate change, but that is another argument.


It really doesn't matter, if not religion then they'll use science.

Science is descriptive, religion is proscriptive. One can use the fruits of science for oppressive ends, but science doesn't justify them unlike religion.


If people are given power, the societal consequences of the nature of that religion will change -from oppression to liberation, plenty of historical evidence - look at Desmond Tu-tu.

The actions of individuals don't change the social role of religion as a whole. You can't just ignore millennia of history and cross your fingers, hoping things will work out right this time.


Claim? I'm saying these were religious taboos. You said religious taboos were oppressive. I say it's not so simple. Some are some aren't.

Religious "taboos" that are common to human societies aren't really religious at all, although they may have religious justifications (not that "because God said so" is much of a justification). Taboos against murder (at least as committed against other in-group members) have a secular justification, while taboos against eating pork or beef do not. I'm not saying all religious taboos are oppressive (that was someone else) - some are and some aren't, like you say - but their justifications are inherently irrational. The taboo against eating cow flesh seems mostly harmless in spite of this, but the taboo against homosexuality has killed people and ruined lives, which only serves to outline the need for social mores and conduct to have a rational, enlightened self-interest as its basis, rather than the copied and recopied writings of primitives who didn't know any better.


Uh, for an ENTIRE continent to agree on this for hundreds of years and enforce it, is impressive, and not just ALL the cows, almost NONE could be eaten.

Which only goes to show that the Hindu prohibition against consuming cowflesh has nothing to do not wanting to pull the plough oneself.


And it DOES take a genius. Apparently your unaware that computer models were brought in to maximize food production in India. After several disastrous years, it was proven by computer modeling that the traditional ways of farming were in fact the most efficient all along... Which were adhered to largely because of religious prescriptions.

"Computer models were brought in... " Doesn't that tell you something? Instead of seeking to improve on already proven methods, they sought to render improvements by bringing in farming methods developed in other environments - no surprise that failed. India certainly appears to have the intellectual capital needed to increase the output of its agriculture, but any models developed will have to be home-grown rather than relying on imported models with built-in assumptions that may not apply.

That doesn't sound to me like the ancient Indians were "geniuses" - that sounds like someone got conned into buying an irrelevant computer model. Religious prescription is very good at putting across rules to be adhered to, but is slow to change because the precriptions are assumed to have some kind of cosmic sanction, as well as being tied up with all sorts of other nonsense. For example, not eating pork makes sense if for some reason you cannot salt, smoke, or refrigerate it before it starts going off and pigs are liable to be riddled with parasites, but now? As for not wearing mixed fabrics, what the hell is that about?


Yea? Guarantee I could score human flesh in Philly for less than $20.00....ever been to parts of Africa? Life is cheap. And I don't think morality ought to be combined with economics...Hey, if you can afford it - go head!

When it comes to eating human flesh, expense should not be the only concern - the provenance is also something to consider. I doubt that whatever one could buy in Philadelphia or Africa would have been given up willingly.

[spiltteeth]

NoXion;1535960]So what? That does nothing to mitigate millennia of failure.

A failure to do what? Overthrow the ruling class? Science has yet to do that either so....let's get rid of it.


Interesting, what website did you rip off to come up with this? Don't try to tell me this sesquipedalian nonsense is actually yours. I thought better of you than that.

Old essay 'o mine

T
he fact that you can sit at a computer in a building with electricity and call modernity a "myth" speaks volumes.

I never called modernity a myth, it promulgates myths.


"The good of human progress" if you mean what I think you mean by the term, can be justified through their utility, aside from any economic considerations. In other words, it's good to be able to live in a house with electricity and running water - the fact that this makes you more "employable/productive/whatever" I consider to be secondary. Of course capitalists would put the economic benefits foremost, but what the hell do you expect?

Your the one who says we ought to view religion in the same terms as scientific utility :


Except that science, psychiatry and literature have positive uses. What positive uses does religion have? Positive uses that have not already been superceded by scientific or secular means?

see?


That's funny, I thought it was about living life to the fullest, without having to worry about kissing the ass of some cosmic, psychopathic prison guard.

Like some doctor or scientist who guards THE way to apprehend reality AND
determines the RIGHT criteria and then subsumes all other human concerns to those criteria?
Or is that how you think religious people view their situation?
Or is that how you think religious people SHOULD view their beliefs?


Why, because you say so?

Me and a billon people living in slums and another billion breaking their backs because of %14 of the world wanting progress and viewing the world, as you seem to, in utilitarian constructs because they all believe in the myths modernity promises to fulfill...


It's in our interest at all levels to ensure that the environment we live in is both habitable and comfortable to a satisfactory and sustainable level - nothing to do with a "Garden of Eden".

In other words as long as it serves our interests, then we ought to at least be minimally concerned with the earth...kinda seeing the planet as-oh, I don't know - a utility?


You appear to be confusing secularism with capitalism.

It is the natural outcome of privileging 'rationality' defined by a specific empiricism which the ruling class uses to oppress and many seculars validate...



Because when you make claims that purport to have an effect on the real world, you need (or rather, should need) to have evidence if your claim is to be taken any more seriously than the ravings of a lunatic. Unfortunately due to the privileged position that religion has in a lot of societies, absurdities can be widely accepted or even written into law.

If yr saying the fundamentalist's who confuse categories of knowledge and make scientific claims from religious material are insane people, I'll agree.


Well, personal revelation is right out - the person could be mentally ill, lying, on drugs or honestly mistaken.

Eyewitness evidence is similarly unreliable.

So what is left? Well, let's use Australia as an example. I've met people who claimed to come from or have visited Australia. On its own, that is not enough evidence. More convincing are photographs - sure, they could be doctored or mislabelled, but that would require an absurd conspiracy to perpetuate the idea that a continent exists. It's possible to examine objects said to come from Australia to confirm their origin. A considerable number of plant and animal species exist only in Australia. Take a trip in a spacecraft and you'll be able to see Australia from space - zoom in with a powerful telescope while you're up there and you'll be able to see the same landmarks you see in photographs. Of course, it will be cheaper to buy a plane ticket and see Australia for yourself up close.

The point is that there are many different ways of gathering evidence for the existence of something. Depending on exactly what it is you're looking for, you can also conduct experiments that can be repeated, which is important for verifying results.


Well, the irony of this is almost too much. You have decided religious belief must be validated by scientific criteria, which you have decided to define in terms of empiricism - the very thing I'm criticizing and the very thing fundamentalists christians do.
Boy, how does anyone prove their in love to you?


Accepted by who? Scientists are not a hivemind; until the Michelson-Morley experiments and the like, it was perfectly respectable for physicists to reject Special Relativity.

Of course, the strength of science lies in the scientific method and the evidence gathered, not the opinion of scientists, who are human like the rest us.



The majority? Citation needed.

Never mind the fact that theoretical physics is a small branch on a very large tree - the only reason (I suspect) it gets more attention is because big, flashy projects like the Large Hadron Collider are more easily sold as popular science fodder than relatively low-key stuff such as gravity-wave interferometry. I blame our appalling education system.


Ws that a response? If a branch of science is small it doesn't count? I could have brought in consciousness research, neurological biochemical research,
So, who decides which branched of science are the REAL ones? AND I kinda thought Einstein was a major player in the whole science field...


They're wrong. Climate change deniers wilfully ignore the evidence or attempt to spin it so that it supports their position. Personally I disagree with a lot of environmental types as to how to deal with climate change, but that is another argument.

Well, here in America our president Bush W and climate deniers refused to act because "ALL of the science was not yet in." It did not meet with their definition of being empiraclly validated, it was not rational enough.
Just like your apparent dissmissal of those scientists who accepted Einstein’s Law of Special Relativity before any experimental evidence was proffered to support this theory, or you dismissal of quantum theory and theoretical physicists who subscribe to string theory.

Which branches of science meet your criteria again? So we know who to lump in with the religious believer who have no proof? Lets see, before being validated Einstein would have been ostracized out from THOSE WHO REALLY HAVE ACCESS TO REALITY.
Thus said I :
"Knowing about reality cannot be limited by rationality"


Science is descriptive, religion is proscriptive. One can use the fruits of science for oppressive ends, but science doesn't justify them unlike religion.

Plenty of religions are not hierarchal, plenty do not justify oppression, actually how they function depends on historical circumstances, I've given plenty of instances.


The actions of individuals don't change the social role of religion as a whole. You can't just ignore millennia of history and cross your fingers, hoping things will work out right this time.

I'm not talking about individuals. Entire whole movements of religion. That is the argument against communism though, what makes you think its gonna work this time>? Cross yr fingers ect
And really I haven't a clue when you say 'religion hasn't 'worked,' I guess its not clear but I think one dimensionally viewing things in functional utilitarian terms is bad


Religious "taboos" that are common to human societies aren't really religious at all, although they may have religious justifications (not that "because God said so" is much of a justification). Taboos against murder (at least as committed against other in-group members) have a secular justification, while taboos against eating pork or beef do not. I'm not saying all religious taboos are oppressive (that was someone else) - some are and some aren't, like you say - but their justifications are inherently irrational. The taboo against eating cow flesh seems mostly harmless in spite of this, but the taboo against homosexuality has killed people and ruined lives, which only serves to outline the need for social mores and conduct to have a rational, enlightened self-interest as its basis, rather than the copied and recopied writings of primitives who didn't know any better.

Again, you get to decide what is rational, correct? Not unlike those irrational physicists...



Which only goes to show that the Hindu prohibition against consuming cowflesh has nothing to do not wanting to pull the plough oneself.



"Computer models were brought in... " Doesn't that tell you something? Instead of seeking to improve on already proven methods, they sought to render improvements by bringing in farming methods developed in other environments - no surprise that failed. India certainly appears to have the intellectual capital needed to increase the output of its agriculture, but any models developed will have to be home-grown rather than relying on imported models with built-in assumptions that may not apply.

No, they didn't do that. I wasn't that specific but computer experts were brought in and modeled their specific situation, then tried to maximize input.

T
hat doesn't sound to me like the ancient Indians were "geniuses" - that sounds like someone got conned into buying an irrelevant computer model. Religious prescription is very good at putting across rules to be adhered to, but is slow to change because the precriptions are assumed to have some kind of cosmic sanction, as well as being tied up with all sorts of other nonsense. For example, not eating pork makes sense if for some reason you cannot salt, smoke, or refrigerate it before it starts going off and pigs are liable to be riddled with parasites, but now? As for not wearing mixed fabrics, what the hell is that about?

I don;t know, just saying many religious prescriptions that seem absurd when viewed deeply and studied turn out to be very practical.


When it comes to eating human flesh, expense should not be the only concern - the provenance is also something to consider. I doubt that whatever one could buy in Philadelphia or Africa would have been given up willingly.

I don't know, look at all those poor mothers in India who sell their organs for money.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

A failure to do what? Overthrow the ruling class? Science has yet to do that either so....let's get rid of it.

Except that "overthrowing the ruling class" is not a stated aim of science. It's not a stated aim of any religion that I am aware of either, which probably accounts for the failures. Of course, this doesn't prevent you from bring up isolated examples like Mr Tutu, or anti-Semitic turds like Martin Luther (wasn't he the guy who wrote On the Jews and Their Lies?)


I never called modernity a myth, it promulgates myths.

Such as?


Your the one who says we ought to view religion in the same terms as scientific utility :

see?

You're the one who came out with that frankly bizarre postmodernist screed, instead of answering the question I asked first.


Like some doctor or scientist who guards THE way to apprehend reality AND
determines the RIGHT criteria and then subsumes all other human concerns to those criteria?

Nice attempt at a comeback, but that only exposes your theological thinking. The universe and its many laws and regularities do not, in fact they cannot, care about human concerns. If God exists, why doesn't he heal people? Lazy? Indifferent? Or just plain evil? In which case why do you worship him?

The most parsimonious conclusion is that he doesn't exist at all.


Or is that how you think religious people view their situation?
Or is that how you think religious people SHOULD view their beliefs?

I think that's how they should view it, although I doubt that many of them would remain religious if they did so.


Me and a billon people living in slums and another billion breaking their backs because of %14 of the world wanting progress and viewing the world, as you seem to, in utilitarian constructs because they all believe in the myths modernity promises to fulfill...

Things are far from perfect as of now, that is true. But your solution - more fucking religion, it seems - has been tried, and tried, and tried again, each time failing. It should be obvious by now that religious resistance to ruling class oppression is a band-aid solution at best and handing victory on a plate to the class enemy at worst.

Considering what "modernity" has achieved in the past 200 years compared to what religion has achieved in 2000 years, I also think you're being incredibly unfair. The economic system's fundamental assumptions are no longer valid, which has a variously depressing effect on other aspects of modern civilisation - think of all the potential scientific geniuses among those teeming billions that never got their chance because they starved to death in a village somewhere, or all the potential great artists who never came to be because they could barely afford to feed themselves, let alone buy a sketchbook. The capitalist economy is like a tumour, growing ever larger and weakening the rest of the body as it does so. Were we to excise the bloated tumescence of the capitalist price system and institute an egalitarian energy-based method of ensuring the best quality of life for the greatest amount of people, then it might just be possible for every human being on this planet to enjoy a decent life.

But we can only achieve such a thing if we pay close attention to the world in which we live, rejecting not only the physical chains that bind us, but the chains in our heads also. This not only includes capitalist myths like Horatio Alger, but also the myths of our less fortunate forebears, who lived in even more brutal times.


In other words as long as it serves our interests, then we ought to at least be minimally concerned with the earth...kinda seeing the planet as-oh, I don't know - a utility?

Yes, and? What has that to do with facile comparisons to the Garden of Eden?


It is the natural outcome of privileging 'rationality' defined by a specific empiricism which the ruling class uses to oppress and many seculars validate...

No, the ruling class does not use "empiricism" to oppress people. They use weapons, torture, propaganda, social and peer pressure, administrative chicanery, that sort of thing. This is aside from the fact that the ruling class are not all on the same page, philosophically speaking.


If yr saying the fundamentalist's who confuse categories of knowledge and make scientific claims from religious material are insane people, I'll agree.

If religious claims don't have any effect on the world as we know it, they are of no consequence and thus can be ignored as babble. It basically reduces religion to the level of arguing whether the Federation from Star Trek could beat the Empire from Star Wars. Fundamentalists realise this, which is why they are so desperate to prove, to themselves if nobody else, that the events in the Bible actually happened as per.


Well, the irony of this is almost too much. You have decided religious belief must be validated by scientific criteria, which you have decided to define in terms of empiricism - the very thing I'm criticizing and the very thing fundamentalists christians do.

I use scientific criteria because science has amassed a frankly astounding proven track record in the comparitively short period of time it has been around. Religion, and the pseudo-intellectual postmodernist bafflegab you appear to be using to justify or "fix" it, has done precisely fuck-all in comparison. Prayers never cure diseases, but medicine can. Modern religion (kinda) realises this, which is why you see church steeples with lightning rods (an astounding lack of faith I would have thought!) on the more practical side of things, while on the other whole libraries of books, filled cover-to-cover with pious theological drivel, have been written in an attempt to excuse God's embarassing absence.


Boy, how does anyone prove their in love to you?

Through their actions. What else?


Ws that a response? If a branch of science is small it doesn't count? I could have brought in consciousness research, neurological biochemical research,
So, who decides which branched of science are the REAL ones? AND I kinda thought Einstein was a major player in the whole science field...

I never said that theoretical physics "doesn't count" - pay attention! I was pointing out that generalising from a sample size of 1 is a bad idea.


Well, here in America our president Bush W and climate deniers refused to act because "ALL of the science was not yet in." It did not meet with their definition of being empiraclly validated, it was not rational enough.

No, there is enough evidence for climate change by any reasonable standard, Mr Bush was just parrotting a line fed to him by his handlers.


Just like your apparent dissmissal of those scientists who accepted Einstein’s Law of Special Relativity before any experimental evidence was proffered to support this theory, or you dismissal of quantum theory and theoretical physicists who subscribe to string theory.

I dismissed the scientists, not the science, which is what Shrubya was told to do. Special Relativity before experimental confirmation was an unproven hypothesis, just as String Theory today is an unproven hypothesis.


Which branches of science meet your criteria again? So we know who to lump in with the religious believer who have no proof? Lets see, before being validated Einstein would have been ostracized out from THOSE WHO REALLY HAVE ACCESS TO REALITY.

Einstein may have been convinced that he was right before the results came in, but that's to be expected. But the reason he wasn't laughed out of town was because his hypothesis was correct with physics as it was then known - whereas religion can make the silliest claims based on no evidence whatsoever and then, when most realise how ridiculous the claim is, cover its ass with the pathetic excuse of "well actually it's allegorical"


Plenty of religions are not hierarchal, plenty do not justify oppression, actually how they function depends on historical circumstances, I've given plenty of instances.

Well, let's look at some of the examples you gave...

1) A bunch of imperial suck-ups.

2) A vicious anti-Semite.

3) The Sojourners, who I've never heard of before in my life. Tells me all I need to know, really.

4) A bored rich kid. I suppose founding a religion is easy when you're born a prince.

Plus communism for some reason, even though it isn't a religion, although some people (on both sides) treat it like one. Really, this is a pathetic showing if you're attempting to show "the best" of religion.

There's also another problem - the "nice" churches/sects you mention, such as the Church of England, have no bloody teeth at all. Sure, they can petition the government and issue statements all sorts of other nice, soft, unthreatening to the ruling class methods, but otherwise they haven't got a mean bone in their bodies.


I'm not talking about individuals. Entire whole movements of religion. That is the argument against communism though, what makes you think its gonna work this time>? Cross yr fingers ect

Entire whole movements like the Sojourners? :lol: Yeah, I'm sure they made waves.

As for the possibilities of communism, firstly it hasn't been around as long, and secondly the attempts that were made were mostly based on the Leninist model, which I reject for various reasons.


And really I haven't a clue when you say 'religion hasn't 'worked,' I guess its not clear but I think one dimensionally viewing things in functional utilitarian terms is bad

Basically I see many very bad things about religion and few good things. We'd be better off as a species without such a metaphorical millstone around our collective necks.


Again, you get to decide what is rational, correct? Not unlike those irrational physicists...

I don't get to decide whether something is rational, it either is or it isn't. My appraisal of what and isn't rational may be incorrect, but that's we why have logical argument and more importantly evidence to reinforce our claims.


No, they didn't do that. I wasn't that specific but computer experts were brought in and modeled their specific situation, then tried to maximize input.

Without knowing what assumptions were used in the construction of the model it's impossible to say exactly what went wrong. But suffice to say that "traditional methods" are not the apex of human achievement.


I don;t know, just saying many religious prescriptions that seem absurd when viewed deeply and studied turn out to be very practical.

So follow the advice if necessary, just don't follow the religion. Simple.


I don't know, look at all those poor mothers in India who sell their organs for money.

Sarcasm, I hope. I'm also given to understand that human organs are generally traded for their medical rather than gustatory value.

[Robert]

tanks for the advice robert!

You're welcome, but remember, under capitalism, you get exactly what you pay for.:lol:

[spiltteeth]

NoXion;1536242]Except that "overthrowing the ruling class" is not a stated aim of science. It's not a stated aim of any religion that I am aware of either, which probably accounts for the failures. Of course, this doesn't prevent you from bring up isolated examples like Mr Tutu, or anti-Semitic turds like Martin Luther (wasn't he the guy who wrote On the Jews and Their Lies?)

I honestly don't know what yr trying to say - failure to do what? What has religion 'failed' to do? I wasn't aware it had a goal.


Such as?

I'll just repeat myself : a central myth of modernity that equates the telos of history as human progress brought about by goods resulting from economic development and technological innovation; and (b) the goods of human progress can be justified as moral exclusively through self-reflective
interiority and determined by human happiness measured in economic terms.


You're the one who came out with that frankly bizarre postmodernist screed, instead of answering the question I asked first.

What question?




Nice attempt at a comeback, but that only exposes your theological thinking. The universe and its many laws and regularities do not, in fact they cannot, care about human concerns. If God exists, why doesn't he heal people? Lazy? Indifferent? Or just plain evil? In which case why do you worship him?

The most parsimonious conclusion is that he doesn't exist at all.

Hmmm. I honestly don't know what yr trying to say. I'm pointing out scientists hold a similar position as priests in terms of power dynamics.
You were telling me that YOU think think is about living life to the fullest. Ok. And others think life is about something else. What makes yr claim more valid?


I think that's how they should view it, although I doubt that many of them would remain religious if they did so.

And...why should anyone value you opinion above their own?


Things are far from perfect as of now, that is true. But your solution - more fucking religion, it seems - has been tried, and tried, and tried again, each time failing. It should be obvious by now that religious resistance to ruling class oppression is a band-aid solution at best and handing victory on a plate to the class enemy at worst.

1) My solution is not more religion 2) I never thought the function of religion was to overthrow the ruling class.


Considering what "modernity" has achieved in the past 200 years compared to what religion has achieved in 2000 years, I also think you're being incredibly unfair. The economic system's fundamental assumptions are no longer valid, which has a variously depressing effect on other aspects of modern civilisation - think of all the potential scientific geniuses among those teeming billions that never got their chance because they starved to death in a village somewhere, or all the potential great artists who never came to be because they could barely afford to feed themselves, let alone buy a sketchbook. The capitalist economy is like a tumour, growing ever larger and weakening the rest of the body as it does so. Were we to excise the bloated tumescence of the capitalist price system and institute an egalitarian energy-based method of ensuring the best quality of life for the greatest amount of people, then it might just be possible for every human being on this planet to enjoy a decent life.

I agree %100. But like I said, I don't have a utilitarian view of religion, so I don't expect it to 'achieve' anything, and positing it next to scientific advancement is nonsensical.


But we can only achieve such a thing if we pay close attention to the world in which we live, rejecting not only the physical chains that bind us, but the chains in our heads also. This not only includes capitalist myths like Horatio Alger, but also the myths of our less fortunate forebears, who lived in even more brutal times.


I consider your adherence to empiricism as the basis for rationality and utilitarianism one of those myths.
But who decides which 'myths' we must reject?


No, the ruling class does not use "empiricism" to oppress people. They use weapons, torture, propaganda, social and peer pressure, administrative chicanery, that sort of thing. This is aside from the fact that the ruling class are not all on the same page, philosophically speaking.

This is ri-dic-u-lous! How can you say this? What justified the Iraq war - the 'experts' what justified the Nazi extermination procedure - Science.
You NEED to read Focault.


If religious claims don't have any effect on the world as we know it, they are of no consequence and thus can be ignored as babble. It basically reduces religion to the level of arguing whether the Federation from Star Trek could beat the Empire from Star Wars. Fundamentalists realise this, which is why they are so desperate to prove, to themselves if nobody else, that the events in the Bible actually happened as per.

It has an effect an ones relationship with the world and people. Again, this is a ridiculous response. Incidentally, you and the fundamentalists have the exact same ideological framework, both of you are just different sides of the same coin :

Here are some words from Slavoj Zizek, a die-hard atheist.

“Both liberal-skeptical cynics and fundamentalists share a basic underlying feature: the loss of the ability to believe, in the proper sense of the term. What is unthinkable for them is the groundless decision which installs every authentic belief, a decision which cannot be grounded in the chain of reasons, in positive knowledge. …the status of universal human rights is that of a pure belief: they cannot be grounded in our knowledge of human nature, they are an axiom posited by our decision. (The moment one tries to ground universal human rights in our knowledge of humanity, the inevitable conclusion will be that men are fundamentally different, that some have more dignity and wisdom than others.) At its most fundamental, authentic belief does not concern facts, but gives expression to an unconditional ethical commitment.
For both liberal cynics and religious fundamentalists, religious statements are quasi-empirical statements of direct knowledge: fundamentalists accept them as such, while skeptical cynics mock them.
… its [religious fundamentalism’s] true danger does not reside in the fact that it poses a threat to secular scientific knowledge, but in the fact that it poses a threat to authentic belief itself”
In other words, by disregarding any symbolic mediation between humanity and a reality transcendent of logical apprehension both you and the Christian right are on the same team, since both equally undermine true belief and reject those more rarified modalities of understanding and being.



I use scientific criteria because science has amassed a frankly astounding proven track record in the comparitively short period of time it has been around. Religion, and the pseudo-intellectual postmodernist bafflegab you appear to be using to justify or "fix" it, has done precisely fuck-all in comparison. Prayers never cure diseases, but medicine can. Modern religion (kinda) realises this, which is why you see church steeples with lightning rods (an astounding lack of faith I would have thought!) on the more practical side of things, while on the other whole libraries of books, filled cover-to-cover with pious theological drivel, have been written in an attempt to excuse God's embarassing absence.

Actually, I oppose postmodernism.
Well, like the fundamentalists you are confusing categories of knowledge.
You use science when someone throws you a ball? You mentally calculate its velocity etc so you know where to position your hand?
When meeting a person you scientifically evaluate if your going to choose to love them?
Or is it ridiculous to apply empiricist criteria to these things?...


Through their actions. What else?

Brillant! So they love one another person if they bring them gifts, spend time with them, get married.
Well, God is real then because people go to church, pray to him, ask Him for blessings - thats how we can tell if things are true alright!



I never said that theoretical physics "doesn't count" - pay attention! I was pointing out that generalising from a sample size of 1 is a bad idea.

So....it does count? Even though it doesn't meet your standards of whats real?


No, there is enough evidence for climate change by any reasonable standard, Mr Bush was just parrotting a line fed to him by his handlers.

A 'reasonable' standard is just what the dispute is about.


I dismissed the scientists, not the science, which is what Shrubya was told to do. Special Relativity before experimental confirmation was an unproven hypothesis, just as String Theory today is an unproven hypothesis.

Right. So its all gibberish like star-trek that we can ignore. Got it.


Einstein may have been convinced that he was right before the results came in, but that's to be expected. But the reason he wasn't laughed out of town was because his hypothesis was correct with physics as it was then known - whereas religion can make the silliest claims based on no evidence whatsoever and then, when most realise how ridiculous the claim is, cover its ass with the pathetic excuse of "well actually it's allegorical"

Not so, Here, however, are two quotes from typical priests of the third largest Christian denomination, Orthodox Christianity, Fr. Andrew Anglorus and Fr. Stephen Freeman:
…lack a Patristic understanding of the Scriptures…they do not understand the Scriptures spiritually, ascetically, allegorically, poetically, but only literally. We call such an understanding 'fundamentalist' (1).


Genesis, properly read, is not a science text book. It is about Christ and reveals Him as the very meaning and purpose of creation - as well as explicating His Pascha. If you don’t see that when you read the first chapter of Genesis, then no one ever taught you how to read Scripture as the primitive Church read Scripture….Scripture functions as a verbal icon - and like an icon requires an understanding of its spiritual grammar to see it correctly (2).
Nor is this simply a way for modern Christians to excuse obviously unscientific biblical passages. St. Maximus the Confessor, living in 500-600 A.D. wrote, “Ignorance, in other words, Hades, dominates those who understand Scripture in a fleshly (literal) way”


religion can make the silliest claims based on no evidence whatsoever

As long as religion is not making any scientific claims i feel its foolish of you to use a scientific basis for evaluating the 'evidence' of these claims.


His hypothesis was not 'correct' with physics at the time, in fact it contradicted it.

Well, let's look at some of the examples you gave...

1) A bunch of imperial suck-ups.

2) A vicious anti-Semite.

3) The Sojourners, who I've never heard of before in my life. Tells me all I need to know, really.

4) A bored rich kid. I suppose founding a religion is easy when you're born a prince.

Plus communism for some reason, even though it isn't a religion, although some people (on both sides) treat it like one. Really, this is a pathetic showing if you're attempting to show "the best" of religion.

There's also another problem - the "nice" churches/sects you mention, such as the Church of England, have no bloody teeth at all. Sure, they can petition the government and issue statements all sorts of other nice, soft, unthreatening to the ruling class methods, but otherwise they haven't got a mean bone in their bodies.


No teeth? Again, I don't see religion as 1) a scientific movement as you and the fundies do or 2) a political movement.


Entire whole movements like the Sojourners? :lol: Yeah, I'm sure they made waves.

Things were pretty vicious under the Brahmins. And Catholic church was kinda a big deal before its power was fragmented by Luther etc...


As for the possibilities of communism, firstly it hasn't been around as long, and secondly the attempts that [i]were made were mostly based on the Leninist model, which I reject for various reasons.



Basically I see many very bad things about religion and few good things. We'd be better off as a species without such a metaphorical millstone around our collective necks.

Well, you don't know much about religion except what you see on Fox news or Pat Robinson and conveniently ignore all other data.


I don't get to decide whether something is rational, it either is or it isn't. My appraisal of what and isn't rational may be incorrect, but that's we why have logical argument and more importantly evidence to reinforce our claims.

Evidence? And who gets to decide when there's 'enough evidence' to allow a new perception to come into the world? What of Jungian psychology? Does that meet your criteria?


Without knowing what assumptions were used in the construction of the model it's impossible to say exactly what went wrong. But suffice to say that "traditional methods" are not the apex of human achievement.

Obviously

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

I'll just repeat myself : a central myth of modernity that equates the telos of history as human progress brought about by goods resulting from economic development and technological innovation; and (b) the goods of human progress can be justified as moral exclusively through self-reflective
interiority and determined by human happiness measured in economic terms.

Nonsense. There is no "telos" seperate from whatever goals humans set themselves. The idea of "Human progress" is intended as a guide to one's actions, or at least that's my understanding. There can never be enough of it, it is not inevitable and setbacks do happen, but try to push it forward we must.

The goods of human progress can be justified independantly of economic concerns. Clean running water from a kitchen tap is indisputably better than muddy water drawn from a well five miles away. The fact that only a minority of the world's population enjoy such a facility means something is wrong at the systemic level.


What question?

This one: Except that science, psychiatry and literature have positive uses. What positive uses does religion have? Positive uses that have not already been superceded by scientific or secular means?



Hmmm. I honestly don't know what yr trying to say. I'm pointing out scientists hold a similar position as priests in terms of power dynamics.

Oh, if only! :laugh: The scientists would sure like that. But the fact is that the vast majority of scientists feel hamstrung by a lack of funding, a poor public image, lack of decent science graduates, a poor public understanding of science including it's basic methods, and political meddling to the detriment of the pursuit of science. That doesn't seem like the makings of a priesthood to me.


You were telling me that YOU think think is about living life to the fullest. Ok. And others think life is about something else. What makes yr claim more valid?


And...why should anyone value you opinion above their own?

Because I think they'll be better off for it. Dumping the godcrap gives one more mental and physical time, space and energy to concentrate on living, feeling human beings that actually exist.


1) My solution is not more religion 2) I never thought the function of religion was to overthrow the ruling class.

OK, so why keep it?


I agree %100. But like I said, I don't have a utilitarian view of religion, so I don't expect it to 'achieve' anything, and positing it next to scientific advancement is nonsensical.

So what is your view of religion?


I consider your adherence to empiricism as the basis for rationality and utilitarianism one of those myths.

Science is at its heart, empirical. It works. Empiricism is not a myth.


But who decides which 'myths' we must reject?

This must be the third time; no one decides - we reject myths because they are false and misleading.


This is ri-dic-u-lous! How can you say this? What justified the Iraq war - the 'experts' what justified the Nazi extermination procedure - Science.

Iraq was an imperialist land-grab. The Nazi exterminations on the idea of racial purity. How did science justify either of those events?


You NEED to read Focault.

He sounds like the kind of author I would not toss aside lightly. Indeed, he sounds like an author I would throw with great force. Maybe that's harsh, I could just be getting a bad impression of him from you


It has an effect an ones relationship with the world and people.

That's not what I asked. I acknowledge that religious claims have an effect as religious claims, which certainly affects one's relationships with the world and the people in it. But in order to verify the truth of said claims, evidence is needed.


Again, this is a ridiculous response. Incidentally, you and the fundamentalists have the exact same ideological framework, both of you are just different sides of the same coin :

Here are some words from Slavoj Zizek, a die-hard atheist.

...
In other words, by disregarding any symbolic mediation between humanity and a reality transcendent of logical apprehension both you and the Christian right are on the same team, since both equally undermine true belief and reject those more rarified modalities of understanding and being.

Good! I want this so-called "true belief" to die alongside fundamentalism. It's a whole bunch of pompous, pretentious crap that sounds fancy but has a semantic content approaching zero.

If mediation is symbolic, it's not really mediation, is it? As for realities transcendant of logical apprehension - how do we know they exist if they cannot be logically understood? So "true belief" involves fart-arsing around attempting to communicate (but only symbolically, you understand) as logical beings with "something" labelled "transcendant reality" that isn't logical in the first place.

Sounds like an exercise in futility to me.


Actually, I oppose postmodernism.
Well, like the fundamentalists you are confusing categories of knowledge.
You use science when someone throws you a ball? You mentally calculate its velocity etc so you know where to position your hand?

I don't need to. My brain does all the hard sums without my conscious mind being aware of it.


When meeting a person you scientifically evaluate if your going to choose to love them?

If I knew how, why not? Love is after all a perfectly understandable biological phenomenon. We might be sketchy on the details as of right now, but later...


Brillant! So they love one another person if they bring them gifts, spend time with them, get married.
Well, God is real then because people go to church, pray to him, ask Him for blessings - thats how we can tell if things are true alright!

No, that's evidence that people go to church and claim to love God - but where is the evidence that God loves them back? Where are the congregations all living to 120 before ascending into Heaven to the confoundment of atheists everywhere?


So....it does count? Even though it doesn't meet your standards of whats real?

They do more than come up with hypotheses in Theoretical Physics - they test them as well. If the result is negative, that's a strike against the hypothesis. If it's inconclusive, they devise another test or do it a different way. If it's positive, they subject it to more, different tests. The point about this whole exercise is not to try and prove the hypothesis is right, but to try and prove that it is wrong. That's an essential part of how basic science works.


A 'reasonable' standard is just what the dispute is about.

I believe the actual dispute is over whether climate change is anthropogenic or not - but regardless, it's not the argument we should be having, what we should be arguing about is how to deal with climate change. I've seen a couple of signs that the debate is heading in that direction, but we should be there in the first place.


Right. So its all gibberish like star-trek that we can ignore. Got it.

An unproven hypothesis is not gibberish. It is merely unproven - it could be right, it could be wrong, but either way it has to make sense within the framework of what we already know. That's the exact opposite of gibberish.


Not so, Here, however, are two quotes from typical priests of the third largest Christian denomination, Orthodox Christianity, Fr. Andrew Anglorus and Fr. Stephen Freeman:
…lack[ing] a Patristic understanding of the Scriptures…they do not understand the Scriptures spiritually, ascetically, allegorically, poetically, but only literally. We call such an understanding 'fundamentalist' (1).

Genesis, properly read, is not a science text book. It is about Christ and reveals Him as the very meaning and purpose of creation - as well as explicating His Pascha. If you don’t see that when you read the first chapter of Genesis, then no one ever taught you how to read Scripture as the primitive Church read Scripture….Scripture functions as a verbal icon - and like an icon requires an understanding of its spiritual grammar to see it correctly (2).

How can Genesis be about Jesus when it was written before he supposedly lived? This is bullcrap shovelled out for the masses in the hope of appearing profound.


Nor is this simply a way for modern Christians to excuse obviously unscientific biblical passages. St. Maximus the Confessor, living in 500-600 A.D. wrote, “Ignorance, in other words, Hades, dominates those who understand Scripture in a fleshly (literal) way”

Of course he would say that, there were verse that even in those times were ridiculous if taken literally. Like insects having four legs or pi being 3.

By the way, that word "literal" in brackets, was that in the original or added by a later editor?


As long as religion is not making any scientific claims i feel its foolish of you to use a scientific basis for evaluating the 'evidence' of these claims.

Why not? If science cannot verify a claim, how can religion? Which religion, anyway? They can't all be right.


No teeth? Again, I don't see religion as 1) a scientific movement as you and the fundies do or 2) a political movement.

I don't see religion as a scientific movement either, thank you very much. You may not see them as political movements, but as history illustrates religions have no problem with getting into politics. Or into bed with politicians, no matter how vile.


Things were pretty vicious under the Brahmins. And Catholic church was kinda a big deal before its power was fragmented by Luther etc...

Then they got into power, and it was the same old crap...


Well, you don't know much about religion except what you see on Fox news or Pat Robinson and conveniently ignore all other data.

This is an especially amusing accusation from somebody who doesn't seem to realise that the Book of Genesis was written before Christ was allegedly born.


Evidence? And who gets to decide when there's 'enough evidence' to allow a new perception to come into the world? What of Jungian psychology? Does that meet your criteria?

Nobody gets to decide when a "new perception" (whatever THAT is!) enters the world or not. People come up with them all time. I'd probably enjoy it (with the occasional guilty twinge over the ethics of the matter) if I could control people's thoughts, but fortunately for the rest of the world that's just not possible. Jungian psychology? Don't know much about it. But if it's anything like Fruedian psychology then it's probably mostly junk.

[Kwisatz Haderach]

I never said we shouldn't bother about people wearing burkinis. The whole idea of making people cover up like that is repulsive to me, just as demanding people go without food bothers me. Things like this are, frankly, an illustration of the worst parts of religion.
Have you considered the possibility that, for whatever reasons, some people really want to cover themselves up, or go without food?

Also, the clothes we wear are almost entirely a function of our cultural conditioning, and the meanings we perceive in other people's clothes are likewise a function of our culture. So, given that your tastes in clothes are dictated by your culture anyway, religious dress codes cannot do any harm unless they are wildly impractical (for example, the burqa is wildly impractical, but most other forms of hijab are not).

[spiltteeth]

NoXion;1536348]Nonsense. There is no "telos" seperate from whatever goals humans set themselves. The idea of "Human progress" is intended as a guide to one's actions, or at least that's my understanding. There can never be enough of it, it is not inevitable and setbacks do happen, but try to push it forward we must.

That fine, but and current way of viewing 'human progress' is the one I described. I don't know what yr saying, I'm a marxist so obviously I don't look for the 'goals' humans are setting for themselves, but rather the historical circumstances for which that 'telos' is used to justify the status quo. I don't get yr point.


The goods of human progress can be justified independantly of economic concerns. Clean running water from a kitchen tap is indisputably better than muddy water drawn from a well five miles away. The fact that only a minority of the world's population enjoy such a facility means something is wrong at the systemic level.

Yea, it could, however I was pointing to the connection to a rationalist empirical world view and how our ideas of progress are framed to justify the appallingly unjust system.


This one: Except that science, psychiatry and literature have positive uses. What positive uses does religion have? Positive uses that have not already been superceded by scientific or secular means?

Ummm. 'Positive uses'? I explained where that type of thinking comes from, how it supports the status quo and how it doesn't address religion, because religion is not a utility.
Religion doesn't have uses. Although I am aware you and the fundies disagree.


Oh, if only! :laugh: The scientists would sure like that. But the fact is that the vast majority of scientists feel hamstrung by a lack of funding, a poor public image, lack of decent science graduates, a poor public understanding of science including it's basic methods, and political meddling to the detriment of the pursuit of science. That doesn't seem like the makings of a priesthood to me.

Preaching to the quire. Both you and the fundies misunderstand how science functions, I'm all for education.
Oh Ok....so...whose planning the world economy for the next 10 yrs? I know there's a couple environmental scientists advising...some population experts...economists...computer specialists...technology experts...systems analysis representatives....
Again they are similar to priests only in terms of power dynamics but this is so obvious you would need to be ignorant of most sociological texts printed in the past 15 yrs and frankly I'm shocked it could be doubted!



Because I think they'll be better off for it. Dumping the godcrap gives one more mental and physical time, space and energy to concentrate on living, feeling human beings that actually exist.

Hey, I think your better off learning about Focault, transrational analysis, the ways how scientists have decided whats rational and what's not has changed in the past few years, and at the VERY least a book on scientific revolutions and how they come about -Kuhn, I would suggest.
Again, why are your positions more valid?


OK, so why keep it?

Because people should be free to believe it, if it does not harm or oppress others.


So what is your view of religion?

As to its cognitive position within a paradigm of consciousness? I would say it occupies the same place as poesy or music, when the ego or Self (if you believe in such an illusion -but then again my background is in psychoanalysis) is suspended unconscious content is free to manifest, this is how intuition function.
I don't know how you mean? As far as society is concerned its obvious hat it can be of a progressive or oppressive nature, as a brief affair with a history book will show.


Science is at its heart, empirical. It works. Empiricism is not a myth.

The basis of empiricism - validity within a rational framework is constantly shifting, this is most obvious in the Quantum field, but not at all exclusively. Look at math involving irrational number sets, or infinite numbers etc
If you only hold to science that is based on empiricism, the you do not believe in A LOT of science.



This must be the third time; no one decides - we reject myths because they are false and misleading.

Hey, get rid of yr myth that empiricism is neutral. Do you believe in Nero? Alexander the great? Some historians don't. Fact is empiricism must be based on context specific criteria. A virologist has a different definition of life than a biologist. Do you think a Virus is a living creature? Plenty of empirical data, however it is applied differently in different felids so some scientists will say yes, some no.
I think your idea of what science is completely founded on a myth.

I
raq was an imperialist land-grab. The Nazi exterminations on the idea of racial purity. How did science justify either of those events?

The idea of racial purity was litgitimized by many biological scientists. Tons of data, from all over the world was collected and scientific theories trotted out that were accepted by world renown scientists. Hell, even exterminating the Native Americans were justified by evolutionary biologists claiming they were scientifically inferior.
This is charming naiveté.


He sounds like the kind of author I would not toss aside lightly. Indeed, he sounds like an author I would throw with great force. Maybe that's harsh, I could just be getting a bad impression of him from you

Focault? He's considered by many to be the worlds greatest theorist of the past 50 yrs. Regardless, it was his content I was pointing too. Yr not very well read...



That's not what I asked. I acknowledge that religious claims have an effect as religious claims, which certainly affects one's relationships with the world and the people in it. But in order to verify the truth of said claims, evidence is needed.

Um...you do realize there are different categories of knowledge? You sound ridiculous. "Well I read Whitman's 'leaves of grass' and learned nothing of the molecular structure of grass!"
First off, you confuse categories of knowledge. You can say “a flower is a plant” and this belongs to ‘positive knowledge’ since it is empirical. Another category of knowledge is to say “flowers are beautiful.” The fundamentalist Christian, confusing the two modes of knowing, might say it is a scientific FACT that flowers are pretty. Then you would come along and say, “We’ve dissected the flower and have found no ‘beauty cells’ or ‘beauty structures’, therefore flowers are not beautiful and furthermore beauty does not exist.” Both you and religious fundamentalists deny all modalities of knowing except for the scientific one and in so doing diminish what it means to be human.


Good! I want this so-called "true belief" to die alongside fundamentalism. It's a whole bunch of pompous, pretentious crap that sounds fancy but has a semantic content approaching zero.

If mediation is symbolic, it's not really mediation, is it? As for realities transcendant of logical apprehension - how do we know they exist if they cannot be logically understood? So "true belief" involves fart-arsing around attempting to communicate (but only symbolically, you understand) as logical beings with "something" labelled "transcendant reality" that isn't logical in the first place.

Sounds like an exercise in futility to me.

Ok. Lets do away with all music. It has no positive effects.


I don't need to. My brain does all the hard sums without my conscious mind being aware of it.

Uh, no. It does not do these calculation. Your an idiot. How old are you?



If I knew how, why not? Love is after all a perfectly understandable biological phenomenon. We might be sketchy on the details as of right now, but later...

uh the nature of love precludes rational analysis. What the fuck man? Do you know nothing of biology or psychology?
No offense, if your a teen ager listen, I thought the same way too back then, but there's a lot of info out there and you better start learning. Love IS NOT a perfectly understandable phenomena, new theories come out every 3 yrs in fact, Religious experience is actually understood better, I would recommend William James 'Varieties of Religious experience' to start with.



No, that's evidence that people go to church and claim to love God - but where is the evidence that God loves them back? Where are the congregations all living to 120 before ascending into Heaven to the confoundment of atheists everywhere?

I have felt God's love as clearly as I have a lover's or my dear mother.



They do more than come up with hypotheses in Theoretical Physics - they test them as well. If the result is negative, that's a strike against the hypothesis. If it's inconclusive, they devise another test or do it a different way. If it's positive, they subject it to more, different tests. The point about this whole exercise is not to try and prove the hypothesis is right, but to try and prove that it is wrong. That's an essential part of how basic science works.

Good lord man! Did you read anything I wrote - they DON'T -perhaps never will be able to -test them! You have a child's idea of what science is.


I believe the actual dispute is over whether climate change is anthropogenic or not - but regardless, it's not the argument we should be having, what we should be arguing about is how to deal with climate change. I've seen a couple of signs that the debate is heading in that direction, but we should be there in the first place.

Hey I agree, but the CEO's in charge are using science like a priest uses warning of hell, 'global warming is a myth, why look at the sun spots...'


An unproven hypothesis is not gibberish. It is merely unproven - it could be right, it could be wrong, but either way it has to make sense within the framework of what we already know. That's the exact opposite of gibberish.


How can Genesis be about Jesus when it was written before he supposedly lived? This is bullcrap shovelled out for the masses in the hope of appearing profound.

I'm just telling you most religious folk are not fundamentalists confusing the bible with a science text book, as you seem to think, ok?


Of course he would say that, there were verse that even in those times were ridiculous if taken literally. Like insects having four legs or pi being 3.

Uh, christian fundamentalists LITERALY believe genesis. They ACTUALLY believe that a talking snake existed. These people now run America.


By the way, that word "literal" in brackets, was that in the original or added by a later editor?

It was added, 'fleshly' back in the day meant 'literally' -this was before science was even invented



Why not? If science cannot verify a claim, how can religion? Which religion, anyway? They can't all be right.

As far as I know a religion can never verify a claim in the scientific manner. Only people who even believe that should be the case are Pat Robinson fundies and you.


I don't see religion as a scientific movement either, thank you very much. You may not see them as political movements, but as history illustrates religions have no problem with getting into politics. Or into bed with politicians, no matter how vile.

True, I've even given examples of how they function.


Then they got into power, and it was the same old crap...

I'm a Marxist, so wether its christianity, Hitlers national socialism or eugenics, or whatever, the dominant ideology of the day will always be the ruling classes.


This is an especially amusing accusation from somebody who doesn't seem to realise that the Book of Genesis was written before Christ was allegedly born.

I realize that. wtf?


Nobody gets to decide when a "new perception" (whatever THAT is!) enters the world or not. People come up with them all time. I'd probably enjoy it (with the occasional guilty twinge over the ethics of the matter) if I could control people's thoughts, but fortunately for the rest of the world that's just not possible. Jungian psychology? Don't know much about it. But if it's anything like Fruedian psychology then it's probably mostly junk.

New perception : non-locality, transrationality, relativity when it came out, theory of evolution etc
twinge over ethics!? Dearest, someone ought to get rid of THAT myth for you. Right and wrong? Nothing rational there at all. You still believe in such irrational things as morality huh?

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

That fine, but and current way of viewing 'human progress' is the one I described. I don't know what yr saying, I'm a marxist so obviously I don't look for the 'goals' humans are setting for themselves, but rather the historical circumstances for which that 'telos' is used to justify the status quo. I don't get yr point.

I'm not sure I get yours either. Of course the ruling class is going to use progressive-sounding rhetoric, but surely their actions speak louder than their words?


Yea, it could, however I was pointing to the connection to a rationalist empirical world view and how our ideas of progress are framed to justify the appallingly unjust system.

So what? There's nothing inherently capitalist about plumbing.


Ummm. 'Positive uses'? I explained where that type of thinking comes from, how it supports the status quo and how it doesn't address religion, because religion is not a utility.
Religion doesn't have uses. Although I am aware you and the fundies disagree.

Have you ever actually talked to a fundie, let alone debated with one? Because they think in a very different way to me, despite your insistence otherwise. I'll provide quotes from actual religious fundamentalists to support my contention, if it comes to that.


Preaching to the quire. Both you and the fundies misunderstand how science functions, I'm all for education.
Oh Ok....so...whose planning the world economy for the next 10 yrs? I know there's a couple environmental scientists advising...some population experts...economists...computer specialists...technology experts...systems analysis representatives....
Again they are similar to priests only in terms of power dynamics but this is so obvious you would need to be ignorant of most sociological texts printed in the past 15 yrs and frankly I'm shocked it could be doubted!

My interest is in Physics and Astronomy, and on reflection I'm hugely glad of that fact, because otherwise I would come off as a pompous pseudo-intellectual twat like you. Why is it almost always the sociology types who are such insufferable pricks?

How many of those types of "scientist" you mentioned actually do any research? And what the fuck makes you think economics is a science and that economists are scientists?


Hey, I think your better off learning about Focault, transrational analysis, the ways how scientists have decided whats rational and what's not has changed in the past few years, and at the VERY least a book on scientific revolutions and how they come about -Kuhn, I would suggest.
Again, why are your positions more valid?

I'm sorry, I actually have to explain why it is good idea not to waste time and energy on imaginary beings? Time and energy that could be spent on loved ones, or even reading a good book with much more interesting characters?


Because people should be free to believe it, if it does not harm or oppress others.

In the absence of mind control, people have the freedom of belief anyway. If a zealot held a gun to my head and told me to convert, I would sincerely go through the motions in the interests of saving my skin, but I would not believe. Personally I consider violence and intimidation to be of limited utility in combating religion - the vast majority of the time such actions simply feed into martyrdom and persecution complexes. Reason is far superior, even though I never enter into a debate with the expectation that minds will be changed - the debate is for the benefit of the audience and any fence-sitters or those with wavering faith within that audience.


As to its cognitive position within a paradigm of consciousness? I would say it occupies the same place as poesy or music, when the ego or Self (if you believe in such an illusion -but then again my background is in psychoanalysis) is suspended unconscious content is free to manifest, this is how intuition function.
I don't know how you mean? As far as society is concerned its obvious hat it can be of a progressive or oppressive nature, as a brief affair with a history book will show.

But mostly oppressive.


The basis of empiricism - validity within a rational framework is constantly shifting, this is most obvious in the Quantum field, but not at all exclusively. Look at math involving irrational number sets, or infinite numbers etc
If you only hold to science that is based on empiricism, the you do not believe in A LOT of science.

The quantum world was discovered using empirical methods, and more secrets of that world continue be revealed to this day using... empirical methods! What, you thought all those colliders and synchrotrons and whatnot were for show?


Hey, get rid of yr myth that empiricism is neutral. Do you believe in Nero? Alexander the great? Some historians don't. Fact is empiricism must be based on context specific criteria. A virologist has a different definition of life than a biologist. Do you think a Virus is a living creature? Plenty of empirical data, however it is applied differently in different felids so some scientists will say yes, some no.
I think your idea of what science is completely founded on a myth.

So there's no archeological evidence whatsoever for Nero or Alexander? If that's true, I'm surprised. As for whether viruses are alive, that's a problem of taxonomy, not empiricism - vitalism is dead, so what's the problem with the border between life and non-life being a bit fuzzy, or there not being a line, but a spectrum?


The idea of racial purity was litgitimized by many biological scientists. Tons of data, from all over the world was collected and scientific theories trotted out that were accepted by world renown scientists. Hell, even exterminating the Native Americans were justified by evolutionary biologists claiming they were scientifically inferior.
This is charming naiveté.

Indeed, although it is on your part. Racial pseudoscience is pure fucking junk. How do we know that? Because other scientists made discoveries that invalidated racial pseudoscience.


Focault? He's considered by many to be the worlds greatest theorist of the past 50 yrs. Regardless, it was his content I was pointing too. Yr not very well read...

No, I just have little time or patience for philosophers, or rather, the hordes of armchair enthusiasts who think they're being totally radical by quoting Nietzche et al.


Um...you do realize there are different categories of knowledge? You sound ridiculous. "Well I read Whitman's 'leaves of grass' and learned nothing of the molecular structure of grass!"
First off, you confuse categories of knowledge. You can say “a flower is a plant” and this belongs to ‘positive knowledge’ since it is empirical. Another category of knowledge is to say “flowers are beautiful.” The fundamentalist Christian, confusing the two modes of knowing, might say it is a scientific FACT that flowers are pretty. Then you would come along and say, “We’ve dissected the flower and have found no ‘beauty cells’ or ‘beauty structures’, therefore flowers are not beautiful and furthermore beauty does not exist.” Both you and religious fundamentalists deny all modalities of knowing except for the scientific one and in so doing diminish what it means to be human.

Whut. That's utter bollocks. Beauty is not a category of knowledge, it is a subjective judgement - different flowers are considered beautiful by different people - and some people might not like flowers at all, or be completely indifferent with regards to plant genitals. It would be more accurate to say "Certain flowers, especially (insert popular flower here), are generally considered to be beautiful".

I really don't understand how scientific knowledge of something diminishes its beauty - if anything, it adds to the wonder. Take stars for example; as seen from Earth on a clear and still night, stars appear as little points that twinkle a bit. But with the knowledge that the Sun which warms and lights our planet is just one star among the many one can see at night, the possibilities magnify and multiply in ways undreamed of by the ancients. Could there be other intelligent creatures on planets orbiting those stars, also looking up and wondering at what they percieve? Whether there are or not, we all bathe in the ancient light of unimaginably distant suns. Assuming we don't fuck things up, we can make the heavens our new home, and attain immortality (or close enough as to make no difference) for our species. Is that not gloriously beautiful?

Since you've recommended books to me, allow me to return the favour - I highly recommend you read Unweaving the Rainbow by Richard Dawkins. It may give you a better idea of where I'm coming from, if the previous paragraph failed to enlighten.


Ok. Lets do away with all music. It has no positive effects.

If religion were simply a form of artistic expression like music, then I would have no problem with it. Unfortunately it isn't.


Uh, no. It does not do these calculation. Your an idiot. How old are you?

Then how does my brain work out where to put my hand in order to catch the ball, and when to close the fingers in order to grab it? My brain recieves input from the eyes as they track the progress of the ball - what does the brain do with that input, apart from some kind of calculated coordination of my arm and hand?


uh the nature of love precludes rational analysis. What the fuck man? Do you know nothing of biology or psychology?
No offense, if your a teen ager listen, I thought the same way too back then, but there's a lot of info out there and you better start learning. Love IS NOT a perfectly understandable phenomena, new theories come out every 3 yrs in fact, Religious experience is actually understood better, I would recommend William James 'Varieties of Religious experience' to start with.

How does the nature of love preclude rational analysis? The fact that they supposedly come out with new theories "every three years" only shows that our knowledge on the matter is primitive. But rest assured, the problem is being worked on.


I have felt God's love as clearly as I have a lover's or my dear mother.

Remember what I said about personal testimony?


Good lord man! Did you read anything I wrote - they DON'T -perhaps never will be able to -test them! You have a child's idea of what science is.

The reason String Theory in particular cannot be tested is because our particle accelerators just aren't powerful enough. The collision energy of the most powerful accelerator built to date (the LHC) is 14 TeV. The cancelled Superconducting SuperCollider was intended to have a collision of 40 TeV, almost triple that of the LHC. The energy required to test string theory is on the order of 10,000,000,000,000,000 TeV, or 10 quadrillion TeraelectronVolts. Clearly, a new approach is needed if we are to have any hope of of string theory becoming falsifiable.


Hey I agree, but the CEO's in charge are using science like a priest uses warning of hell, 'global warming is a myth, why look at the sun spots...'

In that case the CEO is culpable, not science. If I tell someone that lead acetate is sweet-tasting, but neglect to inform them also that it is toxic, am I to blame when they fall ill/die, or is chemistry? It's the same principle with the CEOs using lies and half-truths dressed up as "science" to avoid facing the fact of global climate change.


I'm just telling you most religious folk are not fundamentalists confusing the bible with a science text book, as you seem to think, ok?

A seminary-educated priest is not "most religious folk".


Uh, christian fundamentalists LITERALY believe genesis. They ACTUALLY believe that a talking snake existed. These people now run America.

Yep, one of the most powerful countries in the world, and a disturbing portion of them believe the Earth to be 6000 years old, among other things. So much for your "nice, nuanced" form of religious belief.


As far as I know a religion can never verify a claim in the scientific manner. Only people who even believe that should be the case are Pat Robinson fundies and you.

Pat Robertson ran for President in 1988 and hosts The 700 Club, a show that's been running since 1966, and currently airs not just to the US and Canada but to pretty much the whole world. He obviously has a significant following - why the fuck should I take you seriously and not him? It's not like he's the only one of his type, either.


I'm a Marxist, so wether its christianity, Hitlers national socialism or eugenics, or whatever, the dominant ideology of the day will always be the ruling classes.

If Hitler's ideology is ruling class, does that not make Marxism ruling class also? The Soviet Union lasted longer than the Reich.


I realize that. wtf?

What the fuck, indeed. What's wrong with your bullshit alarm? Have you taken out the batteries, or was it never installed in the first place? Don't you find it just a little bit absurd that a Christian is claiming a Jewish text has something to with Jesus, who the original authors of Genesis could not possibly have known about?


New perception : non-locality, transrationality, relativity when it came out, theory of evolution etc
twinge over ethics!? Dearest, someone ought to get rid of THAT myth for you. Right and wrong? Nothing rational there at all. You still believe in such irrational things as morality huh?

Morality is only irrational if it arrived at by irrational means. For instance, it is the interest of society to have prohibit murder, because it would fall apart otherwise. It also makes sense from an individual's perspective, as a society that does little or nothing to discourage murder is more dangerous than a society that does otherwise. They seem like much better reasons to prohibit murder than "because God said so".

[spiltteeth]

I'm not sure I get yours either. Of course the ruling class is going to use progressive-sounding rhetoric, but surely their actions speak louder than their words?



So what? There's nothing inherently capitalist about plumbing.



Have you ever actually talked to a fundie, let alone debated with one? Because they think in a very different way to me, despite your insistence otherwise. I'll provide quotes from actual religious fundamentalists to support my contention, if it comes to that.



My interest is in Physics and Astronomy, and on reflection I'm hugely glad of that fact, because otherwise I would come off as a pompous pseudo-intellectual twat like you. Why is it almost always the sociology types who are such insufferable pricks?

How many of those types of "scientist" you mentioned actually do any research? And what the fuck makes you think economics is a science and that economists are scientists?



I'm sorry, I actually have to explain why it is good idea not to waste time and energy on imaginary beings? Time and energy that could be spent on loved ones, or even reading a good book with much more interesting characters?



In the absence of mind control, people have the freedom of belief anyway. If a zealot held a gun to my head and told me to convert, I would sincerely go through the motions in the interests of saving my skin, but I would not believe. Personally I consider violence and intimidation to be of limited utility in combating religion - the vast majority of the time such actions simply feed into martyrdom and persecution complexes. Reason is far superior, even though I never enter into a debate with the expectation that minds will be changed - the debate is for the benefit of the audience and any fence-sitters or those with wavering faith within that audience.



But mostly oppressive.



The quantum world was discovered using empirical methods, and more secrets of that world continue be revealed to this day using... empirical methods! What, you thought all those colliders and synchrotrons and whatnot were for show?



So there's no archeological evidence whatsoever for Nero or Alexander? If that's true, I'm surprised. As for whether viruses are alive, that's a problem of taxonomy, not empiricism - vitalism is dead, so what's the problem with the border between life and non-life being a bit fuzzy, or there not being a line, but a spectrum?



Indeed, although it is on your part. Racial pseudoscience is pure fucking junk. How do we know that? Because other scientists made discoveries that invalidated racial pseudoscience.



No, I just have little time or patience for philosophers, or rather, the hordes of armchair enthusiasts who think they're being totally radical by quoting Nietzche et al.



Whut. That's utter bollocks. Beauty is not a category of knowledge, it is a subjective judgement - different flowers are considered beautiful by different people - and some people might not like flowers at all, or be completely indifferent with regards to plant genitals. It would be more accurate to say "Certain flowers, especially (insert popular flower here), are generally considered to be beautiful".

I really don't understand how scientific knowledge of something diminishes its beauty - if anything, it adds to the wonder. Take stars for example; as seen from Earth on a clear and still night, stars appear as little points that twinkle a bit. But with the knowledge that the Sun which warms and lights our planet is just one star among the many one can see at night, the possibilities magnify and multiply in ways undreamed of by the ancients. Could there be other intelligent creatures on planets orbiting those stars, also looking up and wondering at what they percieve? Whether there are or not, we all bathe in the ancient light of unimaginably distant suns. Assuming we don't fuck things up, we can make the heavens our new home, and attain immortality (or close enough as to make no difference) for our species. Is that not gloriously beautiful?

Since you've recommended books to me, allow me to return the favour - I highly recommend you read Unweaving the Rainbow by Richard Dawkins. It may give you a better idea of where I'm coming from, if the previous paragraph failed to enlighten.



If religion were simply a form of artistic expression like music, then I would have no problem with it. Unfortunately it isn't.



Then how does my brain work out where to put my hand in order to catch the ball, and when to close the fingers in order to grab it? My brain recieves input from the eyes as they track the progress of the ball - what does the brain do with that input, apart from some kind of calculated coordination of my arm and hand?



How does the nature of love preclude rational analysis? The fact that they supposedly come out with new theories "every three years" only shows that our knowledge on the matter is primitive. But rest assured, the problem is being worked on.



Remember what I said about personal testimony?



The reason String Theory in particular cannot be tested is because our particle accelerators just aren't powerful enough. The collision energy of the most powerful accelerator built to date (the LHC) is 14 TeV. The cancelled Superconducting SuperCollider was intended to have a collision of 40 TeV, almost triple that of the LHC. The energy required to test string theory is on the order of 10,000,000,000,000,000 TeV, or 10 quadrillion TeraelectronVolts. Clearly, a new approach is needed if we are to have any hope of of string theory becoming falsifiable.



In that case the CEO is culpable, not science. If I tell someone that lead acetate is sweet-tasting, but neglect to inform them also that it is toxic, am I to blame when they fall ill/die, or is chemistry? It's the same principle with the CEOs using lies and half-truths dressed up as "science" to avoid facing the fact of global climate change.



A seminary-educated priest is not "most religious folk".



Yep, one of the most powerful countries in the world, and a disturbing portion of them believe the Earth to be 6000 years old, among other things. So much for your "nice, nuanced" form of religious belief.



Pat Robertson ran for President in 1988 and hosts The 700 Club, a show that's been running since 1966, and currently airs not just to the US and Canada but to pretty much the whole world. He obviously has a significant following - why the fuck should I take you seriously and not him? It's not like he's the only one of his type, either.



If Hitler's ideology is ruling class, does that not make Marxism ruling class also? The Soviet Union lasted longer than the Reich.



What the fuck, indeed. What's wrong with your bullshit alarm? Have you taken out the batteries, or was it never installed in the first place? Don't you find it just a little bit absurd that a Christian is claiming a Jewish text has something to with Jesus, who the original authors of Genesis could not possibly have known about?



Morality is only irrational if it arrived at by irrational means. For instance, it is the interest of society to have prohibit murder, because it would fall apart otherwise. It also makes sense from an individual's perspective, as a society that does little or nothing to discourage murder is more dangerous than a society that does otherwise. They seem like much better reasons to prohibit murder than "because God said so".


I don't know what to tell you, you really don't understand anything I'm saying. You have the same ideology as Christian fundamentalists and your arguments are the flip side of their's. I'm rather surprised you don't understand the various categories of knowledge, since science is so reliant on its propositions. I'm in no way demeaning science, positing science next to religion is as absurd as positing it next to art. Religion isn't art, I just used that as an analogy. Like fundies you are unable to see things differently, its not that you do and then reject it, you simply can not. It seems that you don't think ideology exists, its just either your way or the flip side -the fundies way. A study of how science ACTUALLY works, can be found in Thomas Kuhn -the structure of scientific revolutions. You seem to think that science is a linear accretion of knowledge. That scientists build on the corpus that preceded them; through experiment and observation, they add a new fact here and a new discovery there, refining and adjusting the inherited learning. Slowly but surely, knowledge advances, and we modify the textbooks as we go.
This is incorrect.
Science in any given era is ruled by a paradigm, an over-arching theory that answers the big questions, and determines the bounds and the context within which everyday research takes place. Kuhn calls this everyday research "normal science," and its purpose is to flesh out and confirm the predictions of the paradigm.

At a certain point in the life of the paradigm, anomalies begin to appear. At first they are rationalized, as the paradigm is stretched and patched up to account for them. But eventually the anomalies become too glaring. Someone then comes along and proposes a bold new paradigm that completely replaces the old one. For example, Einstein's theory of relativity supplanting the former Newtonian system. Once the skeptics are defeated and the new paradigm is universally accepted, normal science resumes, but exclusively within the framework of the new paradigm.

In Kuhn's words:

"Sometimes a normal problem, one that ought to be solvable by known rules and procedures, resists the reiterated onslaught of the ablest members of the group within whose competence it falls. On other occasions a piece of equipment designed and constructed for the purpose of normal research fails to perform in the anticipated manner, revealing an anomaly that cannot, despite repeated effort, be aligned with professional expectation. In these and other ways besides, normal science repeatedly goes astray. And when it does--when, that is, the profession can no longer evade anomalies that subvert the existing tradition of scientific practice--then begin the extraordinary investigations that lead the profession at last to a new set of commitments, a new basis for the practice of science. The extraordinary episodes in which that shift of professional commitments occurs are the ones known in this essay as scientific revolutions."

If you'd realize that there is indeed a capitalistic mindset, utilizing science for its own power structures, you'd be interested in a way out of said mind set. I've come across 2 propositions -one atheist and one Christian.
Here is the 'positive' Christian one, one with a very communistic message, quoted from Millbank :

The cross is the preeminent place where God (either figuratively or
in actuality) shows his engagement, his radical involvement and identity with human beings and their history, including our brokenness and suffering to the point of his own death. God’s gracious, loving solidarity and communion with the depths of human pain and suffering, of lostness and brokenness in the death of Christ on the cross illuminates our human destiny to also be in solidarity with others in their suffering (‘others’ here might include all of creation). “It is only in this monstrosity of Christ that human freedom is grounded; and, at its most fundamental, it is neither as payment for our sins nor as legalistic ransom, but by enacting this openness that
Christ’s sacrifice sets us free” to be present with others in their suffering
Solidarity with the ‘other’ begins with accusatio sui, an alienation from self, an emptying (kenosis) that results in metanoia, a turning away from one’s former path, a conversion to a new way that “is seen as a taking of the cross, standing where Christ once stood…. This is the essence of Christian humility, the recognition of one’s total poverty [dependence on God], the ‘emptying out’ of human wisdom and human righteousness.” It is a true coming together with the ‘other’ in that it “unveils the truth” of our dependence on a God who reveals himself only in weakness, our interdependence with others, and our common suffering. The form
of this justice modeled by Christ stems from a recognition that “all existence is ‘borrowed’ as a gift from God” and thus, justice implies “equal concern for all.”

If you do choose a career in Science I hope your a great deal more open minded to new data then you have been here dismissing everything I;ve said, all the historical examples, quotes from intellectuals, cultural critics, deciding to stick to your fundamental black and white world of right and wrong, whatever those are...

Finally, since you mention one of my good friend's I'll leave you with a quote by him :

"You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist.” -Nietzsche

[Patchd]

On Rhodes, which is a Greek island just off the coast of Turkey, is a Mosque that has been turned into a cafe/bar. I had a beer there when I visited.

Devrim
Oh? More religious backtrackers? What part of the 'Holy Books are the word of God, don't fuck with it', do the reformed backtracking religious folk not get? If people are gonna be religious, at least do it properly, so I can tar them all with the same brush.

[ls]

Oh? More religious backtrackers? What part of the 'Holy Books are the word of God, don't fuck with it', do the reformed backtracking religious folk not get? If people are gonna be religious, at least do it properly, so I can tar them all with the same brush.

What do you expect. Religion not too disimilarly from racism, is completely contradictory, moralistic and weird.

[spiltteeth]

What do you expect. Religion not too disimilarly from racism, is completely contradictory, moralistic and weird.

Indeed, 'religion not too disimilary' at all.

[ls]

wat

[spiltteeth]

For your own scientific education...


NoXion;1536554]I
The quantum world was discovered using empirical methods, and more secrets of that world continue be revealed to this day using... empirical methods! What, you thought all those colliders and synchrotrons and whatnot were for show?

The quantum world was not. You do realize all those colliders exist to find empirical data for theories that already exist? Kinda my point. Theories 1st - data 2nd.


So there's no archeological evidence whatsoever for Nero or Alexander? If that's true, I'm surprised. As for whether viruses are alive, that's a problem of taxonomy, not empiricism - vitalism is dead, so what's the problem with the border between life and non-life being a bit fuzzy, or there not being a line, but a spectrum?

Uh, you keep saying no one decides what constitutes wether or not empirical data is valid. Yr wrong, there is some archeological data, according to some archeologists notions of what constitutes empirical validity Nero was indeed a real guy, others have a different criteria.
Empiricism is contextual - my whole point. According to a virologists empirical standards a Virus may be in between, a biologist might say it is dead. Someone does indeed decide what is valid empirical data within the contexts of the science and there is rarely a 100% aggreement.


Whut. That's utter bollocks. Beauty is not a category of knowledge, it is a subjective judgement - different flowers are considered beautiful by different people - and some people might not like flowers at all, or be completely indifferent with regards to plant genitals. It would be more accurate to say "Certain flowers, especially (insert popular flower here), are generally considered to be beautiful".

How does a person know if a flowers beautiful or not?

I
really don't understand how scientific knowledge of something diminishes its beauty - if anything, it adds to the wonder. Take stars for example; as seen from Earth on a clear and still night, stars appear as little points that twinkle a bit. But with the knowledge that the Sun which warms and lights our planet is just one star among the many one can see at night, the possibilities magnify and multiply in ways undreamed of by the ancients. Could there be other intelligent creatures on planets orbiting those stars, also looking up and wondering at what they percieve? Whether there are or not, we all bathe in the ancient light of unimaginably distant suns. Assuming we don't fuck things up, we can make the heavens our new home, and attain immortality (or close enough as to make no difference) for our species. Is that not gloriously beautiful?

It doesn't, not what I was saying.


Then how does my brain work out where to put my hand in order to catch the ball, and when to close the fingers in order to grab it? My brain recieves input from the eyes as they track the progress of the ball - what does the brain do with that input, apart from some kind of calculated coordination of my arm and hand?

Read 'Blink' or 'Flow' - both excellent texts.


Yep, one of the most powerful countries in the world, and a disturbing portion of them believe the Earth to be 6000 years old, among other things. So much for your "nice, nuanced" form of religious belief.

yea, because like you they are ignorant of what science is, or that there are indeed different categories of knowledge


What the fuck, indeed. What's wrong with your bullshit alarm? Have you taken out the batteries, or was it never installed in the first place? Don't you find it just a little bit absurd that a Christian is claiming a Jewish text has something to with Jesus, who the original authors of Genesis could not possibly have known about?

It is absurd. But ... your not suggesting time is linear? Haven't you read your John Wheeler - his empirical experiments are incontestable -the past is visibly changed merely by our observing it.
Also, they were reading meaning into the book of Genesis retroactively, they are not -like you and Pat Robinson - reading Genesis like a text book.

You have a bizarre world view, not scientific at all - its more in keeping with someone in the mid 1700's. Whelp, get your read on and join me in the 21st century, it looks very different....

[TheCagedLion]

every post so far

Being cocky, re-stating refuted arguments whilst claiming your opponent doesn't understand you, does not an argument make.

[spiltteeth]

Being cocky, re-stating refuted arguments whilst claiming your opponent doesn't understand you, does not an argument make.

Well, I guess it's not as good as yr argument. I mean, why point to the parts of my argument that have been refuted when it's so much easier just saying they have been!
Screw evidence or examples. I'm gonna start emulating your keen refuting skills.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Being cocky, re-stating refuted arguments whilst claiming your opponent doesn't understand you, does not an argument make.

Why do you think I stopped giving a fuck about his posts? I mean, he has the absolute front to call my thinking "old-fashioned" when he's the one who believes in God!

[spiltteeth]

Why do you think I stopped giving a fuck about his posts? I mean, he has the absolute front to call my thinking "old-fashioned" when he's the one who believes in God!

Since you don't understand the nature of belief, even though I've quoted Zizek (an intelligent atheist) on it -which you haven't engaged in, and you don't understand how quantum physics has evolved, and you don't understand how empiricism functions in modern society, and your not very well read, and you dismiss Kuhn's work, and you dismiss Foucault's work, and you don't even realize there are different categories of knowledge, and you don't understand non-rational thinking, and you think religion is a 'proposition' because you ask for 'positive uses', and you don't understand the nature of what constitutes archeological evidence, and you 'have no time for philosophers', and you don't know what 'beauty' is, and you think intuitive mechanisms in the brain that are involved in catching a ball involve rational calculations, and you think someone can love someone rationally, etc etc etc....then I'd say the reason you don't respond to my posts? Cuz I believe in God.

SO true!

A lot of nobel Laureate scientists out their that believe in god that yr gonna wanna ignore too.

[Raúl Duke]

Let me point something out:


A lot of nobel Laureate scientists out their that believe in god that yr gonna wanna ignore too.

This is a fallacious argument
(Appeal to authority (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority))

[spiltteeth]

Let me point something out:



This is a fallacious argument
(Appeal to authority (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority))

The point I was making is that he demises what I have to say about science because I believe in God.

If he does this, he must dismiss what a lot of other people who believe in God say about science, namely, a bunch of important scientists.

I haven't a clue what you thought my argument was, but as I've explained it, it is not fallacious.

[spiltteeth]

And if anyone cares to look at the argument objectively, he referenced a naive chart, I referenced scientific revolutions, historical evidence, various books, scientific data, etc etc etc
His argument was based on opinion, I actually used examples.

[spiltteeth]

Let me point something out:



This is a fallacious argument
(Appeal to authority (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority))

If there is any other point I have made which you believe is fallacious please point it out and I will clarify.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

The point I was making is that he demises what I have to say about science because I believe in God.

No, I'm saying you haven't got a leg to stand on when it comes to calling others' thinking old-fashioned.


If he does this, he must dismiss what a lot of other people who believe in God say about science, namely, a bunch of important scientists.

Jesus fuck, you still don't get it, do you? Individual scientists' opinions are irrelevant - what matters is the evidence.


I haven't a clue what you thought my argument was, but as I've explained it, it is not fallacious.

Scientific revolutions aren't as revolutionary as you might think; if Charles Darwin had died near the beginning of the Beagle's journey, someone else would have discovered evolution (most likely Alfred Wallace but who knows?) Relativity? That's still bound by the classical limit, as is quantum mechanics.

[spiltteeth]

NoXion;1538558]No, I'm saying you haven't got a leg to stand on when it comes to calling others' thinking old-fashioned.

You can say this but a decent scientist would also include evidence of why this is so.


Jesus fuck, you still don't get it, do you? Individual scientists' opinions are irrelevant - what matters is the evidence.

I haven't a clue where you got the idea that I think 1) within science evidence does not matter.

As to opinions I've quotes Kuhn's study of scientific revolutions over and over in reference how a scientists opinion interact within that eras paradigm, here I just have your opinion.
Now a decent scientist would provide me with evidence that what I say isn't true.


Scientific revolutions aren't as revolutionary as you might think; if Charles Darwin had died near the beginning of the Beagle's journey, someone else would have discovered evolu Kuhn's tion (most likely Alfred Wallace but who knows?) Relativity? That's still bound by the classical limit, as is quantum mechanics.

This is a myth. I've brought evidence to the contrary, entire scientific research denies this view point.
It's a nice opinion. But opinions need evidence or else your just another talking asshole.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

You can say this but a decent scientist would also include evidence of why this is so.

Erm, evidence for god-bothering goes back a long way. Are you being fucking thick on purpose?


I haven't a clue where you got the idea that I think 1) within science evidence does not matter.

I'm not saying you think evidence doesn't matter (although considering your stance on empiricism I wonder why you bother with it at all), I'm saying you pay too much attention to what individual scientists say.


As to opinions I've quotes Kuhn's study of scientific revolutions over and over in reference how a scientists opinion interact within that eras paradigm, here I just have your opinion.
Now a decent scientist would provide me with evidence that what I say isn't true.

That's not how it works, idiot. First of all for the most part you haven't given evidence, you've just said "lolz reed a book" or variations on that theme. If you can't summarise the arguments put forth within those books in a manner suitable for forum discussion then that is your damn problem, not mine.

Secondly, providing evidence for a negative is an exercise in futility, especially in this case - it's all too easy for types like you to use doubletalk and excuses for why the evidence against is insufficient.


This is a myth. I've brought evidence to the contrary, entire scientific research denies this view point.
It's a nice opinion. But opinions need evidence or else your just another talking asshole.

You have no evidence to the contrary. The classical limit still applies - electrons behave in a quantum mechanical manner, but beachballs do not.

[spiltteeth]

NoXion;1538694]Erm, evidence for god-bothering goes back a long way. Are you being fucking thick on purpose?

That's true. How does this pertain to your old-fashioned ideas of science?


I'm not saying you think evidence doesn't matter (although considering your stance on empiricism I wonder why you bother with it at all), I'm saying you pay too much attention to what individual scientists say.

Paying too much attention? I really don't know what yr saying. There are major paradigm shifts when a new theory emerges, regardless weather it is eventually backed up by data or not. I gave 2 good examples. Before being empirically validated Einstein theory of relativity revolutionized physics. Plus quantum data etc


That's not how it works, idiot. First of all for the most part you haven't given evidence, you've just said "lolz reed a book" or variations on that theme. If you can't summarise the arguments put forth within those books in a manner suitable for forum discussion then that is your damn problem, not mine.

Guess I'll repeat :

You seem to think that science is a linear accretion of knowledge. That scientists build on the corpus that preceded them; through experiment and observation, they add a new fact here and a new discovery there, refining and adjusting the inherited learning. Slowly but surely, knowledge advances, and we modify the textbooks as we go.
This is incorrect.
Science in any given era is ruled by a paradigm, an over-arching theory that answers the big questions, and determines the bounds and the context within which everyday research takes place. Kuhn calls this everyday research "normal science," and its purpose is to flesh out and confirm the predictions of the paradigm.

At a certain point in the life of the paradigm, anomalies begin to appear. At first they are rationalized, as the paradigm is stretched and patched up to account for them. But eventually the anomalies become too glaring. Someone then comes along and proposes a bold new paradigm that completely replaces the old one. For example, Einstein's theory of relativity supplanting the former Newtonian system. Once the skeptics are defeated and the new paradigm is universally accepted, normal science resumes, but exclusively within the framework of the new paradigm.

In Kuhn's words:

"Sometimes a normal problem, one that ought to be solvable by known rules and procedures, resists the reiterated onslaught of the ablest members of the group within whose competence it falls. On other occasions a piece of equipment designed and constructed for the purpose of normal research fails to perform in the anticipated manner, revealing an anomaly that cannot, despite repeated effort, be aligned with professional expectation. In these and other ways besides, normal science repeatedly goes astray. And when it does--when, that is, the profession can no longer evade anomalies that subvert the existing tradition of scientific practice--then begin the extraordinary investigations that lead the profession at last to a new set of commitments, a new basis for the practice of science. The extraordinary episodes in which that shift of professional commitments occurs are the ones known in this essay as scientific revolutions."


Secondly, providing evidence for a negative is an exercise in futility, especially in this case - it's all too easy for types like you to use doubletalk and excuses for why the evidence against is insufficient.

I don't think I've ever said that evidence is insufficient. If it'll help : there is zero (none) empirical evidence for the existence of God.

A negative proposition, like God, can't be proved. Seems obvious.

Since the fundamentalists, and yrself, have a rationalist ideology, this is a problem.

However, as an imperfect analogy, this is just as misguided, for the numerous reasons I've posted, to say 'their lacks empirical data to confirm that this is a good song, or a beautiful flower, or that x loves y' etc

Since only fundies confuse categories of knowledge and seek explanations for nature - science's gig - in the bible, traditionally never read literally, as I've quoted old theologians, this isn't a prob for anyone except fundies and you.


You have no evidence to the contrary. The classical limit still applies - electrons behave in a quantum mechanical manner, but beachballs do not.

Evidence to the contrary of what? That someone would've come up with evolution had not Darwin? (by the by my $ would be on Heckle not Wallace btw)

The point is this completely changed what constituted empirical data, a paradigm shift that shows how what scientist's consider evidence rational enough to be empirically valid is not some objective constant.

From * Stephen Jay Gould, The Structure of Evolutionary Theory

Darwinʼ
s theory was itself a blow to William Paley (1743–1805) and British Functionalism in its praise of “God in the details of design” where we can learn “important aspects of God's nature and character from the works of creation:” ʻThe marks of design are too strong to be got over. Design must have a designer. That designer must have been a person. That person is God.'
[“His Evidences of Christianity (1794) remained a required text for entrance to Cambridge University until the 20th century.”]Paley used the image of a fine watch to make two points: (a) complexity : natural history is too complex; chance could never result in anything so intricate; and (b)
design: natural history is adapted “toward a clearly perceived end
.” “The watch implies, by its utility, a mind capable of forethought, design, and construction....ʻThe thing required is the intending mind, the adapting hand, the intelligence by which the hand was directed.ʼ”Darwinʼs, by now irrefutable, objections to Paleyʼs intelligent watchmaker (resurfacing today as Intelligent Design - ID) utilizes: (a) Charles Lyellʼs (1797-1875)
uniformitarianism that posits History occurring over very long reaches of time. Thus, natural selection can occur by “small, isotropic, nondirectional variation.” Essentially, trial and error replaces intelligent purpose; (b) natural selection acts at the level of the individual; and (c) using Adam Smiths paradox of laissez-faire, it is individualʼs struggling for themselves alone that drives natural selection. [What is interesting is that this principle works in the natural world but has been demonstrated again and again to be less applicable to the world of economics.] These are the mechanisms that construct the “entire panoply of vast evolutionary change by cumulating its small increments through the fullness of geologic time.” God does not appear in History the way Paley imagined and History does not represent progress the way many scientific materialists and Christians would like to believe. Agency within History has shifted “from a purposefully benevolent deity to the amoral self-interest of organisms.” This may be the “most distinctive and radical aspect of Darwinism.”

[9]

Gah, how do I unsubscribe to this thread, its making me bleed out of my ears.

[Raúl Duke]

How does Kuhn's thesis on "scientific revolution" pertains to this thread? How does this thesis relates to religion (I understand Kuhn's paradigm stuff but how does this support or not religion)?

[spiltteeth]

How does Kuhn's thesis on "scientific revolution" pertains to this thread? How does this thesis relates to religion (I understand Kuhn's paradigm stuff but how does this support or not religion)?

Well, you can read the whole thread but basically he's saying religion is a myth that keeps us from seeing how things really are.
How things really are, according to him, can be determined by empiricism, which, he says, no one decides the validity of what constitutes empirically valid (rational enough) data.
Further, religion, says he, is used by the ruling class to oppress.

I say his idea's on empiricism are also a myth, I explained why I think that-weather I'm right or wrong is another matter - also I explained that science is not as certain in determining what is 'rational' enough to be considered empirically valid data, nor is it consistent. People actually decide this. Further, science, indeed all knowledge, has been used by the ruling class to oppress and it is, in my opinion, a bad idea for someone to go around deciding what myths we can keep and what myths we cannot. Further, by privileging rationality as the ONLY valid way of approaching reality you have already created power dynamics that exist today, and is one reason, say, global warming is not acted upon, so there are many negative consequences to doing this,

My argument isn't simple or black and white. I don't think the world is.

[spiltteeth]

Oh, and also I'm claiming he, like fundamentalist christians, have the exact same ideological construct which confuses categories of knowledge and so places religion in science and vice versa which is not the correct way that science functions or religion

[Kukulofori]

Splitteeth, I wish I could rep you like 12 times. Thank you.

[Dean]

Oh, and also I'm claiming he, like fundamentalist christians, have the exact same ideological construct which confuses categories of knowledge and so places religion in science and vice versa which is not the correct way that science functions or religion

This is spot-on, and until athiests start to recognize this en masse, we wil continue to have this asinine dichotomy - meant to place religion on a protective pedestal - alienating the religious from us, and reinforcing fundamental religious values.

[Hyacinth]

Oh, and also I'm claiming he, like fundamentalist christians, have the exact same ideological construct which confuses categories of knowledge and so places religion in science and vice versa which is not the correct way that science functions or religion
Yes you are claiming this, but what we've like to get is some argument for this claim.

You seem to be advocating some sort of Gouldian non-overlapping magesteria (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-overlapping_magisteria) view of science and religion, which is highly suspect vis-a-vis religion and science, since even if we grant that there are non-overlapping magesteria, i.e., that there exist "domain[s] where one form of teaching holds the appropriate tools for meaningful discourse and resolution", it is highly suspect whether religious discourse is meaningful. But, setting that aside for a moment, what exactly is suppose to be the domain of religion? "The magisterium of religion extends over questions of ultimate meaning and moral value" as Gould claims? We haven't had the need for any such hypotheses in morality since Plato, nor, given the track record of religion on moral matters, would we want religion to be involved in deciding "questions of ultimate meaning and moral value".

[spiltteeth]

Yes you are claiming this, but what we've like to get is some argument for this claim.

You seem to be advocating some sort of Gouldian non-overlapping magesteria (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-overlapping_magisteria) view of science and religion, which is highly suspect vis-a-vis religion and science, since even if we grant that there are non-overlapping magesteria, i.e., that there exist "domain[s] where one form of teaching holds the appropriate tools for meaningful discourse and resolution", it is highly suspect whether religious discourse is meaningful. But, setting that aside for a moment, what exactly is suppose to be the domain of religion? "The magisterium of religion extends over questions of ultimate meaning and moral value" as Gould claims? We haven't had the need for any such hypotheses in morality since Plato, nor, given the track record of religion on moral matters, would we want religion to be involved in deciding "questions of ultimate meaning and moral value".

I'm afraid I don't hold your utilitarian world view of apprehending the world in terms of what "we" "need." I do not view things from the position of Self. In fact, I've said elsewhere that this very position has led to terrible consequences, such as apathy in the face of a billion starving, global warming etc.
You think as humans we've reached the hight of morality? One billion living in slums, one billion starving, two massive world wars, war after war, Hiroshima, ect etc etc and you feel Man hasn't in need of any higher ethics?
You either are a madman or completely unacquainted with the savagery of history.
There are a few ways out I've heard suggested, Christianity is one way, as to why "we'd" want it involved I'll tell you :the cross is the preeminent place where God (either figuratively or in actuality) shows his engagement, his radical involvement and identity with human beings and their history, including our brokenness and suffering to the point of his own death. God’s gracious, loving solidarity and communion with the depths of human pain and suffering, of lostness and brokenness in the death of Christ on the
cross illuminates our human destiny to also be in solidarity with others in their suffering (‘others’ here might include all of creation). “It is only in this monstrosity of Christ that human freedom is grounded; and, at its most fundamental, it is neither as payment for our sins nor as legalistic ransom, but by enacting this openness that Christ’s sacrifice sets us free” to be present with others in their suffering Solidarity with the ‘other’ begins with accusatio sui, an alienation from self, an emptying (kenosis) that results in metanoia, a turning away from one’s former path, a conversion to a new way that “is seen as a taking of the cross, standing where Christ once stood…. This is the essence of Christian humility, the recognition
of one’s total poverty (dependence on God), the ‘emptying out’ of human wisdom and human righteousness.” It is a true coming together with the ‘other’ in that it “unveils the truth” of our dependence on a God who reveals himself only in weakness, our interdependence with others, and our common suffering.
The form of this justice modeled by Christ stems from a recognition that “all existence is ‘borrowed’ as a gift from God” and thus, justice implies “equal concern for all”.

Of course if your only interest is to serve your own needs and you do not have any concern with a change in the fundamental way we relate to each other, or have a stake in a more just world, then really you wouldn't care.

[Hyacinth]

I'm afraid I don't hold your utilitarian world view of apprehending the world in terms of what "we" "need." I do not view things from the position of Self. In fact, I've said elsewhere that this very position has led to terrible consequences, such as apathy in the face of a billion starving, global warming etc.
What does this have to do with anything I've said? And I've still no clue what you mean by "the position of Self", though, in this context, I presume you mean self-interest. The issue isn't too much self-interest, but, I would contend, too little. The problem is that the working class hasn't recognized that by acting collectively and overthrowing capitalism they can better attain what is in their interests. You propose that we do what instead? Appeal to people's sense of morality?


You think as humans we've reached the hight of morality? One billion living in slums, one billion starving, two massive world wars, war after war, Hiroshima, ect etc etc and you feel Man hasn't in need of any higher ethics?
You either are a madman or completely unacquainted with the savagery of history.
You would do well to address what I actually said as oppose to making things up about my view. I nowhere suggested anything of the sort, nor does anything I say imply the above.


There are a few ways out I've heard suggested, Christianity is one way, as to why "we'd" want it involved I'll tell you :the cross is the preeminent place where God (either figuratively or in actuality) shows his engagement, his radical involvement and identity with human beings and their history, including our brokenness and suffering to the point of his own death. God’s gracious, loving solidarity and communion with the depths of human pain and suffering, of lostness and brokenness in the death of Christ on the
cross illuminates our human destiny to also be in solidarity with others in their suffering (‘others’ here might include all of creation). “It is only in this monstrosity of Christ that human freedom is grounded; and, at its most fundamental, it is neither as payment for our sins nor as legalistic ransom, but by enacting this openness that Christ’s sacrifice sets us free” to be present with others in their suffering Solidarity with the ‘other’ begins with accusatio sui, an alienation from self, an emptying (kenosis) that results in metanoia, a turning away from one’s former path, a conversion to a new way that “is seen as a taking of the cross, standing where Christ once stood…. This is the essence of Christian humility, the recognition
of one’s total poverty (dependence on God), the ‘emptying out’ of human wisdom and human righteousness.” It is a true coming together with the ‘other’ in that it “unveils the truth” of our dependence on a God who reveals himself only in weakness, our interdependence with others, and our common suffering.
The form of this justice modeled by Christ stems from a recognition that “all existence is ‘borrowed’ as a gift from God” and thus, justice implies “equal concern for all”.
Except that all of this is theological nonsense.

Not to mention that even if we ignore the fact that much of what you say is empty, and working within some sort of theological framework, it ends up being inconsistent. God shows his solidarity with human suffering, suffering which, I would remind you, God is responsible for. We haven't a need for any of this gibberish to account for sympathy or moral sentiment.

Your doctrine is one of servitude, where we have to concede our total dependence on some heavenly masters. And to reject human wisdom and righteousness. I say quite the opposite: we need to embrace human understand and knowledge, reject all forms of servitude—be it to men or gods—and create a better world with our understand and knowledge.


Of course if your only interest is to serve your own needs and you do not have any concern with a change in the fundamental way we relate to each other, or have a stake in a more just world, then really you wouldn't care.
I do have the utmost concern with changing the fundamental ways in which we relate to each other, but I propose this be done by changing the mode of production upon which human social relations supervene. Whereas, evidently, you seem to think that we can magically will injustice and oppression away.

[spiltteeth]

What does this have to do with anything I've said? And I've still no clue what you mean by "the position of Self", though, in this context, I presume you mean self-interest. The issue isn't too much self-interest, but, I would contend, too little. The problem is that the working class hasn't recognized that by acting collectively and overthrowing capitalism they can better attain what is in their interests. You propose that we do what instead? Appeal to people's sense of morality?

You think religion is a proposition. You asked why people would need it. I don't propose anything like that.


You would do well to address what I actually said as oppose to making things up about my view. I nowhere suggested anything of the sort, nor does anything I say imply the above.





Except that all of this is theological nonsense.

Actually it is irrelevant if it is non-sense. I notice that you struggle with learning, so I even high-lighted the reason why.


Not to mention that even if we ignore the fact that much of what you say is empty, and working within some sort of theological framework, it ends up being inconsistent. God shows his solidarity with human suffering, suffering which, I would remind you, God is responsible for. We haven't a need for any of this gibberish to account for sympathy or moral sentiment.

Oh, we haven't any NEED - notice the last word? If I could circle it I would.


Your doctrine is one of servitude, where we have to concede our total dependence on some heavenly masters. And to reject human wisdom and righteousness. I say quite the opposite: we need to embrace human understand and knowledge, reject all forms of servitude—be it to men or gods—and create a better world with our understand and knowledge.

That's not my doctrine, I know you desperately wish it to be.


I do have the utmost concern with changing the fundamental ways in which we relate to each other, but I propose this be done by changing the mode of production upon which human social relations supervene. Whereas, evidently, you seem to think that we can magically will injustice and oppression away.

As you know I'm a marxist, that is what I'm about. WHY aren't we doing this? I believe THAT is the question for which I provided one answer, a Christian one.

[Hyacinth]

You think religion is a proposition.
Where do I say this? Religion is many things, but it is not a proposition. That doesn't make sense.

Do I think religious statements are propositions? No, I've said it many times, they are nonsense.


You asked why people would need it. I don't propose anything like that.
Evidently you can't or don't read. The only instance where I used "need" in that post was:


We haven't had the need for any [religious] hypotheses in morality since Plato, nor, given the track record of religion on moral matters, would we want religion to be involved in deciding "questions of ultimate meaning and moral value".
So I ask nothing of the sort.


Actually it is irrelevant if it is non-sense. I notice that you struggle with learning, so I even high-lighted the reason why.
Nonsense can be pernicious, so it being nonsense doesn't imply that it is irrelevant (if only!).

As for your emphasis on "either figuratively or in actuality", it doesn't rescue anything you say, insofar as in order for something to be figurative it must have a sense.


Oh, we haven't any NEED - notice the last word? If I could circle it I would.
Yes? And? Your point being? I'm well aware of what I said, as is anyone who can read.


That's not my doctrine, I know you desperately wish it to be.
No, of course it isn't your doctrine, what I've said makes sense, which is more than can be said for your "doctrine".


As you know I'm a marxist, that is what I'm about. WHY aren't we doing this? I believe THAT is the question for which I provided one answer, a Christian one.
No, you haven't provided an answer to that question, as little you've said is comprehensible. But—and I'm being very generous time and again here—even if we could make sense of what you've been saying, the sort of answer that you seem to be grasping for is an idealist one, quite antithetical to Marxism.

[spiltteeth]

Hyacinth;1542814]Where do I say this? Religion is many things, but it is not a proposition. That doesn't make sense.



Do I think religious statements are propositions? No, I've said it many times, they are nonsense.

Evidently you can't or don't read. The only instance where I used "need" in that post was:


So I ask nothing of the sort.

Sorry, I thought you were proposing that religion ought to fulfill a function


Nonsense can be pernicious, so it being nonsense doesn't imply that it is irrelevant (if only!).

I was referring specifically to what I said.


As for your emphasis on "either figuratively or in actuality", it doesn't rescue anything you say, insofar as in order for something to be figurative it must have a sense.

I meant you mustn't adopt a Christian belief to adopt the attitude (the way you relate to other people) that I've suggested.


Yes? And? Your point being? I'm well aware of what I said, as is anyone who can read.

The point is that the issue, from my perspective, is not a utilitarian one, since this does not apply to religion.



No, of course it isn't your doctrine, what I've said makes sense, which is more than can be said for your "doctrine".

Despite your obvious theological prowess, I'm gonna go out on a limb and assume you haven't a clue as to what my doctrine is. Although your theological interruption of believers as servants is deliciously perverse. I suppose how believers see things really doesn't matter though, you alone have the correct biblical interoperation.


No, you haven't provided an answer to that question, as little you've said is comprehensible. But—and I'm being very generous time and again here—even if we could make sense of what you've been saying, the sort of answer that you seem to be grasping for is an idealist one, quite antithetical to Marxism.

Ah, as to what is happening, look to Marx, as to WHY we aren't doing any thing it concerns the limitations of both your and my systems of thought for accessing Reality. These three intertwined aspects include: (1) misunderstandings of what constitutes rational thought that devises construct limitations on what new data can be incorporated into one’s understanding of reality at any given time; (2) the construction of self as the reality perceiving subject that relies on the big Other to validate the self’s experience (such as waiting for the State to validate that the science on Global warming is 'legitimate' and (3) an assumption regarding the apperception of reality that splits thinking from acting. That is, the self is allowed to perceive itself as possessing a certain attribute if it ‘thinks’ in a certain way. How the self acts either doesn’t enter in to affect such thinking or is relegated to immateriality in the assessment of one’s self-disclosure (e.g. one’s self perception of ‘Christian’ religiosity is over-determined by what one self referentially thinks of one’s Christian-ness versus how one objectively acts to exhibit Christian virtues in one’s everyday behavior).

So a Christian thinks he is Christ-like simply by holding onto some 'ism' -republican, pro-life etc etc instead of how he or she actually interacts with people.