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Re: I require the same standard of evidence to be confident in anything. Dreaded Anomaly Send a noteboard - 30/06/2011 09:47:30 PM

Nobody's done it yet isn't a great standard, particularly while we're still trying to find a bunch of the stuff ourselves. I don't particularly expect anyone to find something of that variety, mind you, but these are all fairly new things.

We can only judge probabilities based on the available evidence, so "nobody's done it yet" is the only standard. The trend of hundreds of years of scientific advancement has been to debunk popular anti-reductionist ideas over and over again.

"Explain" here clearly means accurately predict behavior and describe all functioning, you know that. Weather and psych are probably the two most heavily pondered of such things, and we're making great progress, but we don't have them mastered like we do a steam engine, where one can pretty much describe and predict everything, last I checked anyway.

If that's what you meant by "explain," fine. It still lends very little support to your overall point.

I'm using 'faith' here as a pretty broad statement, people view it in a lot of different ways, and even an individual might have multiple hazy definitions, that usage is more accurate where religion is concerned. Also, much of what you're saying about religion applies equally to concepts like morality and justice and tons of other things. I'm sure you know that and would agree, but when I said I don't think you require the same level of proof across the board, this what I speak of. It's pretty hard to say something like murder or even genocide is bad without engaging in the same sorts of handwaves you ascribe to religion, yet you are making an ethical argument for gays.

No, the salient point (to which you utterly failed to respond) does not apply equally to morality. The existence of morality is dependent on the existence of people, i.e. the universe does not specify a single, correct form of morality. Religions make objective truth claims about the existence of things (God, souls, etc.), and those claims are not supported by evidence.

That depends a lot on the religion in question, and again the same thing can be said about a lot of concepts.

I do not see how it depends on the religion in question. The existence of other irrational beliefs (e.g. alternative medicine) is not a point in support of religion.

You seem to miss the core point there, if the assumption is that science makes people more likely to be atheist, then 'elite' or not, you'd want to know what they believed on Day 1 Year 1 of their scientific studies and what they believe on Day X, ya know, take 1000 random people who just enrolled in college and listed a science major and ask for their affiliation, and ask them again when they graduate, when they get a Ph.D, when they get tenure, etc.

Yes, that would be a more interesting study. The results of this study still weaken the implied point of your statement that "many" scientists are religious, because many fewer scientists are religious than people in the general population. Just from first principles, taking the scientific method seriously does not lead to religious belief.

You should probably let Helene defend herself

You mentioned Helene in your reply, so I mentioned her in mine.

Again, I feel you limit 'irrationality' to a very narrow focus, marriage isn't itself all that rational, eating meat isn't particularly rational these days, are arguing about this - although we've stayed pretty civil so I suppose we're still debating - isn't too rational either, we're unlikely to change each other's minds and neither is likely to benefit from it. drinking soda instead of water isn't too rational. This stuff isn't a problem for me, because my stance, same as on gay marriage is 'What's it to you?' but yours appears to border on 'destroy religion'... now I hope I'm mis-characterizing you there and you're just expressing a general and legitimate irritation with people who try to smash other over the head, or chop off their head, with their holy book without bothering to seek any additional justification, but it doesn't sound that way, and we've seen plenty of homophobia from atheist societies as I pointed out. There are also plenty of religions that don't give a snot about gays and plenty of denominations of Christianity that are at worst 'a little queasy' on the matter.

Now you are confusing epistemic rationality with instrumental rationality. Again, irrelevant.

The outcome that I desire is that everyone realizes the irrationality of religion and other superstitions and discards them. I do not advocate government restrictions on what people can believe, because that's not productive.

That's a pretty broad statement, virtually all law and morality, as I said earlier to either you or Helene, is based strongly around religion, culture and tradition and typically it's impossible to meaningful distinguish which of those. Prior to the Soviet Union, Russia was fairly tolerant of gays, they initially treated it as a medical and scientific oddity then re-criminalized it in the 30's, so it wasn't some old hangover of the old days, and even claimed that if they eradicated gays they'd eradicate fascism, and it used to bring a 5 year prison sentence in the borderline hells that passed for Soviet prisons, pretty much right up until the whole wretched mess finally collapsed. It was illegal in Cuba till the 80's, where marriage is defined as man and woman rather explicitly, so the whole religion as source of gay persecution idea has never held a lot of water in my book. China, another atheist state and one with a generally more tolerant attitude toward gays in it's history, has also not been a cheerful place to be of that orientation, and ha snot legalized gay marriage either.

Atheism is not an ideology in itself; it's a necessary but not sufficient part of being rational. Religion is the main source of anti-gay attitudes in America, which is the region of concern in this thread. The fact that it results from different old traditions in other places demonstrates that argument from tradition is a fallacy whether or not it's related to religion, but again, this is not a point in religion's favor.

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New York Senate approves same-sex marriage Dominic - 25/06/2011 03:47:43 AM 1157 Views

Good. *NM* Camilla - 25/06/2011 07:40:52 AM 378 Views

Re: Federalism is so fucking slow. *NM* Gaps - 25/06/2011 02:47:11 PM 213 Views

I'm actually not opposed to this. Dragonsoul - 25/06/2011 03:48:32 PM 546 Views

Makes sense to me. Joel - 25/06/2011 04:00:07 PM 703 Views

I'm not sure why there was even any need for such explicit protection. Legolas - 25/06/2011 04:04:47 PM 510 Views

There are two reasons, depending on ones position on the issue. Joel - 25/06/2011 06:04:27 PM 563 Views

Meh, you never know. Dragonsoul - 26/06/2011 12:58:37 AM 654 Views

so in your only Catholics are really married? random thoughts - 26/06/2011 12:04:07 AM 514 Views

Church Doctrine. Dragonsoul - 26/06/2011 12:57:39 AM 640 Views

That is simply not true Roland00 - 26/06/2011 08:20:59 AM 564 Views

Yes it is. Dragonsoul - 26/06/2011 05:14:29 PM 592 Views

That's patently wrong in that Orthodox weddings are explicitly recognized by the Church. Tom - 26/06/2011 02:42:00 PM 534 Views

Yeah okay... Dragonsoul - 26/06/2011 05:16:05 PM 566 Views

They are outside of the authority of Rome, and have, on occasion, excommunicated Popes. Dannymac - 27/06/2011 05:03:31 PM 539 Views

Are you sure about this? Camilla - 30/06/2011 04:47:57 PM 423 Views

Dragonsoul is wrong Roland00 - 01/07/2011 09:21:43 AM 569 Views

Glad to hear it. *NM* Legolas - 25/06/2011 04:05:15 PM 211 Views

Seems fine to me Isaac - 25/06/2011 05:44:30 PM 501 Views

Voting on civil rights constitutes tyranny of the majority, not legitimate democracy. Dreaded Anomaly - 25/06/2011 09:37:28 PM 637 Views

Direct democracy is the only true democracy. *NM* Dragonsoul - 26/06/2011 01:01:26 AM 222 Views

Sometimes it is grand not being a True Scottsman *NM* Roland00 - 26/06/2011 08:21:49 AM 209 Views

Re: Voting on civil rights constitutes tyranny of the majority, not legitimate democracy. Isaac - 26/06/2011 03:11:06 AM 584 Views

Good luck telling that to the deeply religious right. Great Lord of Chaos - 26/06/2011 03:20:04 AM 489 Views

I am a deeply religious member of the right, and I tell them that all the time *NM* Isaac - 26/06/2011 03:30:14 AM 222 Views

Then you're a rare person. *NM* Great Lord of Chaos - 26/06/2011 03:36:11 AM 222 Views

After a number of years of gay marriage Helene - 26/06/2011 06:57:07 AM 471 Views

That's more or less true of virtually everything, not a great example Isaac - 26/06/2011 07:09:03 AM 507 Views

People shouldn't turn their own religion and/or opinion into law Helene - 28/06/2011 07:33:48 PM 502 Views

I don't recall mentioning religion beyond confirming that I was religious Isaac - 28/06/2011 08:22:51 PM 539 Views

I admit I wasn't replying to you directly Helene - 29/06/2011 07:20:10 AM 496 Views

I think you should give this subject a bit more thought Isaac - 29/06/2011 02:16:04 PM 538 Views

I'll address the bulk of this later Helene - 29/06/2011 07:58:48 PM 422 Views

Believing things without strong supporting evidence is not rational. Dreaded Anomaly - 30/06/2011 12:11:33 AM 602 Views

Requiring different degrees of proof for things isn't particularly rational Isaac - 30/06/2011 01:14:44 PM 673 Views

I require the same standard of evidence to be confident in anything. Dreaded Anomaly - 30/06/2011 07:43:51 PM 1047 Views

Re: I require the same standard of evidence to be confident in anything. Isaac - 30/06/2011 08:59:00 PM 682 Views

Re: I require the same standard of evidence to be confident in anything. Dreaded Anomaly - 30/06/2011 09:47:30 PM 946 Views

We're gonna have to pick this up another time Isaac - 01/07/2011 04:37:25 AM 512 Views

No, I used the word irrational to mean that it's not rational. Helene - 30/06/2011 09:12:19 PM 526 Views

Fair Enough Isaac - 01/07/2011 04:32:44 AM 577 Views

Btw, in case you were wondering, I do like you Helene - 01/07/2011 02:17:42 PM 576 Views

Re: Voting on civil rights constitutes tyranny of the majority, not legitimate democracy. Dreaded Anomaly - 26/06/2011 10:38:56 PM 673 Views

I think you should give your fellow citizens a bit more trust and respect Isaac - 27/06/2011 05:41:52 PM 471 Views

I'm all for occasionally forcing stuff down people's throats... LadyLorraine - 28/06/2011 11:44:12 AM 463 Views

My expectations are guided by psychology and history. Dreaded Anomaly - 28/06/2011 07:08:06 PM 577 Views

That's good to know, most of us do that, though we usually just call it common sense and experience Isaac - 28/06/2011 08:55:23 PM 621 Views

No, most people don't do that. Reasoning from cognitive biases and anecdotes is much more common. Dreaded Anomaly - 30/06/2011 12:18:40 AM 529 Views

Perhaps, you seem to be claiming not do that yourself though Isaac - 30/06/2011 01:40:57 PM 621 Views

Empire State Building was lit up in rainbow colors, looked cool *NM* beetnemesis - 25/06/2011 08:21:03 PM 229 Views

Good. *NM* ironclad - 25/06/2011 11:41:30 PM 202 Views

I approved that years ago. They are way behind. Granted, I have no authority over anyone... TaskmasterJack - 26/06/2011 12:22:33 AM 408 Views

So, fifth time is a charm? everynametaken - 26/06/2011 06:38:26 AM 619 Views

The real issue is going to be when the Supreme Court rules on the full faith and credit clause. Tom - 26/06/2011 02:43:23 PM 514 Views

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<quote id="214686">
<quote id="214676">Nobody's done it yet isn't a great standard, particularly while we're still trying to find a bunch of the stuff ourselves. I don't particularly expect anyone to find something of that variety, mind you, but these are all fairly new things.</quote>

<quote id="214676">"Explain" here clearly means accurately predict behavior and describe all functioning, you know that. Weather and psych are probably the two most heavily pondered of such things, and we're making great progress, but we don't have them mastered like we do a steam engine, where one can pretty much describe and predict everything, last I checked anyway.</quote>

If that's what you meant by "explain," fine. It still lends very little support to your overall point.

<quote id="214676">I'm using 'faith' here as a pretty broad statement, people view it in a lot of different ways, and even an individual might have multiple hazy definitions, that usage is more accurate where religion is concerned. Also, much of what you're saying about religion applies equally to concepts like morality and justice and tons of other things. I'm sure you know that and would agree, but when I said I don't think you require the same level of proof across the board, this what I speak of. It's pretty hard to say something like murder or even genocide is bad without engaging in the same sorts of handwaves you ascribe to religion, yet you are making an ethical argument for gays.</quote>

<quote id="214676">That depends a lot on the religion in question, and again the same thing can be said about a lot of concepts.</quote>

I do not see how it depends on the religion in question. The existence of other irrational beliefs (e.g. alternative medicine) is not a point in support of religion.

<quote id="214676">You seem to miss the core point there, if the assumption is that science makes people more likely to be atheist, then 'elite' or not, you'd want to know what they believed on Day 1 Year 1 of their scientific studies and what they believe on Day X, ya know, take 1000 random people who just enrolled in college and listed a science major and ask for their affiliation, and ask them again when they graduate, when they get a Ph.D, when they get tenure, etc. </quote>

<quote id="214676">You should probably let Helene defend herself</quote>

You mentioned Helene in your reply, so I mentioned her in mine.

<quote id="214676">Again, I feel you limit 'irrationality' to a very narrow focus, marriage isn't itself all that rational, eating meat isn't particularly rational these days, are arguing about this - although we've stayed pretty civil so I suppose we're still debating - isn't too rational either, we're unlikely to change each other's minds and neither is likely to benefit from it. drinking soda instead of water isn't too rational. This stuff isn't a problem for me, because my stance, same as on gay marriage is 'What's it to you?' but yours appears to border on 'destroy religion'... now I hope I'm mis-characterizing you there and you're just expressing a general and legitimate irritation with people who try to smash other over the head, or chop off their head, with their holy book without bothering to seek any additional justification, but it doesn't sound that way, and we've seen plenty of homophobia from atheist societies as I pointed out. There are also plenty of religions that don't give a snot about gays and plenty of denominations of Christianity that are at worst 'a little queasy' on the matter.</quote>

Now you are confusing epistemic rationality with instrumental rationality. Again, irrelevant.

The outcome that I desire is that everyone realizes the irrationality of religion and other superstitions and discards them. I do not advocate government restrictions on what people can believe, because that's not productive.

<quote id="214676">That's a pretty broad statement, virtually all law and morality, as I said earlier to either you or Helene, is based strongly around religion, culture and tradition and typically it's impossible to meaningful distinguish which of those. Prior to the Soviet Union, Russia was fairly tolerant of gays, they initially treated it as a medical and scientific oddity then re-criminalized it in the 30's, so it wasn't some old hangover of the old days, and even claimed that if they eradicated gays they'd eradicate fascism, and it used to bring a 5 year prison sentence in the borderline hells that passed for Soviet prisons, pretty much right up until the whole wretched mess finally collapsed. It was illegal in Cuba till the 80's, where marriage is defined as man and woman rather explicitly, so the whole religion as source of gay persecution idea has never held a lot of water in my book. China, another atheist state and one with a generally more tolerant attitude toward gays in it's history, has also not been a cheerful place to be of that orientation, and ha snot legalized gay marriage either.</quote>

Atheism is not an ideology in itself; it's a necessary but not sufficient part of being rational. Religion is the main source of anti-gay attitudes in America, which is the region of concern in this thread. The fact that it results from different old traditions in other places demonstrates that argument from tradition is a fallacy whether or not it's related to religion, but again, this is not a point in religion's favor.
</quote>

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