Dogma, what is it good for?

[regretfullySaid]

Continuing from the Gay Forum Members thread: viewtopic.php?f=40&t=188325&start=240

There is a certain thing about the atheist label that I'm quoting from the Sam Harris wiki:

"...arguing that the label is both unnecessary and a liability.[20] His position is that "atheism" is not in itself a worldview or a philosophy. He believes atheists "should not call ourselves anything. We should go under the radar—for the rest of our lives. And while there, we should be decent, honest people, who destroy bad ideas wherever we find them"

Now, I don't want to come across as a mindless follower like some other types of people, referring to one as the "Grand Speaker With All The Answers" but unlike other famous atheists, Harris is the least condescending and aggressive. I think if you want to effectively make some points to the people you're arguing with, condescension isn't going to help, no matter how easy and satisfying it may be.

Here's a point to explain why some people have a big problem with religion. I'm beginning with the lead-in question to preserve the context of the answer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=p ... zM#t=1851s

Science and morality: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hj9oB4zpHww

I'm not asking you to watch this whole thing, but just the first question. It's always baffled me that some people think that you have no morals or life is pointless if you aren't religious: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=p ... Dmz0#t=41s I like that he refers to it as a "software glitch of the mind"

This is a good debate from a general public perspective and it also shows how annoying Deepak Chopra is, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0E99BdOfxAE

[beats me]

Dogma is great for creating situations where we get to test our awesome weaponry.

[regretfullySaid]

I think it would be cool to see a weapon that just uses particular frequencies to make a persons head explode. Like the Shephard Tone for example.
And for no other reason than loving Glee.
But not really though.

[pulsoc]

regarding Deepak I think if I hear another person misuse Occam's Razor MY head will explode

[regretfullySaid]

I admit he's said a couple funny thing but he's got a number of annoying traits and I'm glad he was up there since he's been so highly regarded by the general public and needs to be called out.

"Saying it louder and relentlessly is not going to make it true"

[beats me]

I have an uncle who is deeply religious. I wouldn't say he's a bible thumper because he doesn't tell people how to live their lives, but he has a knack for steering any conversation towards Jesus and his teachings. During one conversation after I reflexively pulled the atheist card repeatedly (I'm more of an agnostic) he said something that caused me to think. "If I'm wrong then I did waste a lot of my life missing out on not experiencing things (He brought up porn and multiple partners as an example), but if you're wrong then you're potentially looking at an eternity of damnation." I fully believe he thought he could be wrong but didn't want to risk it, and put in those terms a relatively short time frame of worldly pleasures doesn't seem like its worth an eternity of damnation.

I have another uncle that after early retirement from Microsoft got a degree in theology. Also not really a Bible thumper, but obviously deeply religious.

I have another uncle who is a Catholic priest and oddly enough he talks about God less than the other two.

So what do they get out of it? No less than the meaning of life, follow the playbook in this life and get rewarded with an unimaginable paradise in the next. It's a pretty persuasive argument, especially when trying to tolerate the curve balls life throws at you.

[Forge.]

this is basically what I was trying to say in that other thread of mine, and some people thought I was saying atheism is bad. Except I am an atheist too. I just don't subscribe to this idea that we are all mindless robots lumbering about trying to preserve the selfish gene like Richard Dawkins said. The stuff people think is religious is just what we don't understand yet.

Dogma of any kind is unproductive, and people like Dawkins can be just as guilty of it as any religious nut.

The Irony of Christianity is that Jesus said a few times "the kingdom of god is within you" and was slagging off the dudes in pointy hats who were saying you had to go through them to get to god, now the people who are supposed to follow him wear more pointy hats than any of them and say the same shit. So even when the dude you base your religion on says to not be dogmatic, people will be dogmatic about that. cue monty python ..... "only the true messiah would deny his divinity"

I would argue the thing that's bad about religion is people twisting it and abusing it to gain power over others or excuse shitty behaviour. There are plenty of people out there who are just quietly religious and it gives them some sense of hope and they don't bother anyone else with it. I might think they are wrong, but I think they should be left alone by 'militant atheists' like Dawkins as much as we should be left alone by the fuckheads who try and ram their religion down our throats.

Live and let live should be the whole thing.

[Forge.]

....multiple partners as an example),

funny when they use that one... assuming they'd actually be able to get two people to shag them at the same time. For most people one is hard enough... especially if you married them

but if you're wrong then you're potentially looking at an eternity of damnation." I fully believe he thought he could be wrong but didn't want to risk it, and put in those terms a relatively short time frame of worldly pleasures doesn't seem like its worth an eternity of damnation.
.

this right here is one of the reasons I can't possibly even comprehend why they believe it. To me the notion of a benevolent merciful god being into forgiveness would be such a nasty bastard that he would send you to hell for ETERNITY for relatively minor things is bizarre to say the least. I wouldn't want to hang out with a sadistic bastard like that anyway, he sounds like a cunt.

[beats me]

....multiple partners as an example),

funny when they use that one... assuming they'd actually be able to get two people to shag them at the same time. For most people one is hard enough... especially if you married them

That's not just the delusion of religious people. Just about every married guy I've met thinks if he wasn't married life would be the Playboy mansion.


Another aspect for the afterlife of religious people is you will be reunited with your dead loved ones from this life. OK, cool. But if God doesn't exist and your dirt nap is the end, you cease to exist on any level. Then what's the problem? They simply can't comprehend nothingness, as if nothingness still includes a level of depression that you aren't in paradise or reunited with your past on loved ones.

[regretfullySaid]

It really is pleasant to work with and converse with religious people who are just as upset by it's corruption and others willful ignorance; ones who are very grounded and not offended by religious discussion or debate. It seems to me the grounded ones who aren't fundamental will admit it's a form of therapy for them and may be uncertain but also some of them utilize it and the institution as a vehicle for philanthropy. I'm not the kind that would try to convince them otherwise or dismiss them as insane and some are so cool enough to have a conversation about theism vs atheism without feeling attacked or belittled. They're able to be objective about it and it's also ignorant to assume that most religious people haven't ever grappled or debated to themselves on existence and faith.

But if God doesn't exist and your dirt nap is the end, you cease to exist on any level.

Here's something to think about, what about the possibility that god and the afterlife/reincarnation could be separate?
Perhaps there could be an afterlife, or even a soul/consciousness that continues on after the body dies and enters another at a later time can exist without "god" in a theistic sense.

I'm totally down for the idea that the universe could be one large consciousness and inside it there are various forms of smaller kinds of consciousness. That our body is a temporary vehicle to use in the mean time with Earth as a school for spiritual evolution, but I don't know if that's how it is, and I'm fine if it isn't like that. But I personally think that could be more possible than the kind of theism proposed by most religions. Anything's possible. Just because something can't be proved now doesn't mean it can't be proven later, and even if science were able to provide proof of love, consciousness, etc, that doesn't make any of it less valid. Some think that if some emotional or spiritual things are proven then that makes us cold machines, like divinity MUST be unproven for it to be divine or something to that effect, as if something is proven it removes it from being special or "mystical". I'm ok with not knowing for sure. Eventually I just came to the conclusion that being alive and conscious is good enough for me, life is what you make it, and it's special and beautiful etc etc.
It's possible no matter how good of a person I am I could end up in hell for eternity for whatever reason; all the more to appreciate the here and now.

[Forge.]

But if God doesn't exist and your dirt nap is the end, you cease to exist on any level.

Here's something to think about, what about the possibility that god and the afterlife/reincarnation could be separate?
Perhaps there could be an afterlife, or even a soul/consciousness that continues on after the body dies and enters another at a later time can exist without "god" in a theistic sense.

I'm totally down for the idea that the universe could be one large consciousness and inside it there are various forms of smaller kinds of consciousness. That our body is a temporary vehicle to use in the mean time with Earth as a school for spiritual evolution, but I don't know if that's how it is, and I'm fine if it isn't like that. But I personally think that could be more possible than the kind of theism proposed by most religions. Anything's possible. Just because something can't be proved now doesn't mean it can't be proven later, and even if science were able to provide proof of love, consciousness, etc, that doesn't make any of it less valid. Some think that if some emotional or spiritual things are proven then that makes us cold machines, like divinity MUST be unproven for it to be divine or something to that effect, as if something is proven it removes it from being special or "mystical". I'm ok with not knowing for sure. Eventually I just came to the conclusion that being alive and conscious is good enough for me, life is what you make it, and it's special and beautiful etc etc.
It's possible no matter how good of a person I am I could end up in hell for eternity for whatever reason; all the more to appreciate the here and now.

did you check out any of the Stuart Hameroff links I posted in the consciousness thread? He's got some pretty cool ideas on how that could work and he goes into a lot of detail on the science.. Basically describing the "soul" as quantum information that connects with 'micro-tubules' in the brain, and when we die it's released to the universe at large but still connected via quantum entanglement. Well worth checking out. He goes into deep detail for people who can follow it in his google talk, but explains it more simply in the ted talk and other interviews.

I've always thought re-incarnation is possible even if everything is totally random and there is no soul or whatever. You have to think whatever is the truth, the simple fact is we are here now as individuals experiencing whatever we are experiencing. Even if that has happened totally randomly, then it's totally possible it could happen randomly again.

[Machinesworking]

The stuff people think is religious is just what we don't understand yet.

I think you might want to restate that. On face value:

Scientists said the Earth was round, the religious persecuted them because they believed it to be flat without any more proof than it 'looks' flat.

The What the ()*^%( Do We Know? new age quantum mechanics as the answer to how to attach spirituality to science types all believed that crystals formed in water based on the emotions the artist projected at the water because it fit with their view, not because there was a shred of actual evidence it was anything more than a hoax for art. It's how they roll.

Crazy absolutely misguided assumptions about the nature of the universe are what the religious do when confronted with what they don't understand... and I would be willing to bet flat out that if there appears hard physical evidence about the origin of life and why we are here, it won't be science that's throwing out all kinds of nonsense to try to defend it's now outdated myths and hypothesis's.
I'm also willing to bet that the more creative spiritually minded crowd will immediately develop new religious beliefs based on their limited understanding of the evidence presented.

Why do I think that? because that's what's been happening for the last 3,000 years, why should it change anytime soon?

[regretfullySaid]

did you check out any of the Stuart Hameroff links I posted in the consciousness thread? He's got some pretty cool ideas on how that could work and he goes into a lot of detail on the science.. Basically describing the "soul" as quantum information that connects with 'micro-tubules' in the brain, and when we die it's released to the universe at large but still connected via quantum entanglement. Well worth checking out. He goes into deep detail for people who can follow it in his google talk, but explains it more simply in the ted talk and other interviews.

I forgot about that actually and I'm keen to check it out. I hope he has good credentials (though it doesn't mean someone with good credentials has the all-knowing-truth). There's a good part in the CBS debate linked in the OP on how how Deepak mixes (and misuses) scientific language with metaphysics which misleads people into thinking it's concrete.

I'm going to start with the TED right now.

Oh, I already did watch the TED talk I should watch it again, though as a primer.

Keeping this for easy reference

More from Stuart Hameroff

http://www.quantumconsciousness.org

http://www.news.com.au/news/quantum-sci ... 6507686757

And here's a really technical explanation of the finer details of his theories on quantum biology and consciousness at a Google talk:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXFFbxoHp3s

[regretfullySaid]

The TED talk is over my head on a lot of parts, might have to hold off on the google talk one for later.

I have to say though, microtubulues and the cytoskeleton are fucking fascinating in and of themselves!

I think he's really onto something as far as memory storage and the computational processes which could really be applied to alzheimers.

[Forge.]

The TED talk is over my head on a lot of parts, might have to hold off on the google talk one for later.

I have to say though, microtubulues and the cytoskeleton are fucking fascinating in and of themselves!

I think he's really onto something as far as memory storage and the computational processes which could really be applied to alzheimers.

yeah the google talk was way over my head too. It's aimed at people in the field really, so probably not much use if you don't already know what he's on about.

But there are some other interviews around where he explains it well. I think the original link I quoted was the BBC NDE doco - he is a professor of Anaesthesiology and he started looking into it because of the weird things that were going on when people were under anaesthetic and for all intents and purposes completely unconscious, yet they were still having conscious experiences. That started the ball rolling for him, and over the years he and Sir Roger Penrose have been coming up with the idea of these micro-tubules being like QuBits (i.e. Quantum 'bits' as in quantum computing) and suggesting that at the very least they have a lot of reason to believe that they are at least playing a part in the workings of the brain, as opposed to it only being the normally understood mechanism of brain cells and chemicals. So there are processes going on on a much smaller scale, i.e. Quantum.

Kind of hijacking the thread, but you mentioned it!