Christian apology by a non-Christian

[Harry Baird]

I don't "believe in" materialism; I don't even use that word. I simply know what my receptors report to my brain, understand what my reason can grasp, deal with whatever connections and patterns I can discern in the world I inhabit. I didn't choose to inhabit this world: it's the one I was given. I don't choose to disbelieve the other kind: it's one I do not perceive and to profess any such faith would be insincere.

As marjoramblues notes, you express yourself well. Just a couple of thoughts in response: firstly, the question of our "choice" to be in the world seems to me to be one we should remain agnostic on. It seems to me to be *possible* that we *do* in fact choose to incarnate here, even if we lack conscious cognisance of that choice during our incarnation. Secondly, I'd suggest that nor is quantum physics a "world" that you perceive, yet (assuming you accept the scientific verdict) it is one that you choose to believe in - based on evidence. What this implies to me is that even if you personally have not experienced the "other" world, there is sufficient (if varied) evidence of it to for you likewise to believe in it.

What would be the point, assuming that you will never experience this world? Well, to raise the most practical point: one consequence of "disbelievers" is that research into this world is stifled due to preconceptions that it does not exist. The more believers we have on board, the more likely it is that we will explore and learn something about it. After all, who could have imagined what we have discovered about the quantum world prior to our research into it? Who knows how much we might learn about the "other" world were we to approach it with the same discipline?

The world I do perceive does not bring me any more comfort than it does fear, any more peace than grief, any more satisfaction than frustration. But it does - because I have been fortunate, give me a great deal of beauty and sustenance, affection and fascination, animal pleasure and moments of transcendent joy. I certainly don't expect to live long enough to exhaust all of its possibilities or need anything more than it offers. (And I shall be sad to leave it. It would be nice to believe - it is nice to imagine - a continuation, another plane, a realm of reunions and reconciliations.)

I can understand this. For a long time, I was an agnostic with no experience of anything "weird". Had I not had those various personal experiences, I'm sure I would have remained that way, and taken a similar attitude to the one you express here. My raising of the idea of the "comfort" of a materialistic outlook stems from this: the experiences I have had were in many ways frightening; it is not always pleasant to be given a glimpse into "what lies beyond". In this sense, in many ways it *would* be more comforting to believe that what we see is what we get, with no hidden threats.

Too, I understand the notion of the beauty of scientific discovery, which, for the large part, has revealed a materialistic world. I think, though, that it's time to extend our science beyond this.

Gustav,

Acknowledging our little off-forum chat, I thought I'd try to make a more helpful contribution to the discussion you're *trying* to have in this thread.

One primary idea you're suggesting is that our (religious, cultural, etc) traditions have "formed" us as "selves", and that to lose touch with our traditions is to lose our "connection" to our selves. I can see sense in this: after all, who wants to be ignorant of *why* we do what we do? Knowledge is power, and knowledge of the causes of our culture gives us power to decide how to adapt it going forward. I think, though, as I tried to express to you off-forum, that perhaps you see more *value* in "arbitrary" human-created mental structures than I do. I think I'm more interested in what is *non-arbitrarily* true of reality in itself, and I would prefer to know the "actual" answers to existential/philosophical/spiritual questions than the answers with which our culture has supplied us ("made up") traditionally, however much those answers might have formed us into what we are. What's interesting to me, too, is that you reject much of the literal truth of our traditional "stories", such that what you must *really* be advocating for is for us to retain not our belief in traditional (as you would see them) "fairy tales" but our traditional *values*. I'd suggest here, and I'm sure you'd agree, that this should really be contingent on an examination of those values to see to what extent they "make sense", "hold up", and are in our best interests. What I'd then suggest (and it is, of course, only a suggestion) is that it would be helpful for you to outline those traditional values that you think are worth retaining, and why you think it is in our interests to retain them - a project that you have alluded to a couple of times in this thread but never, it seems to me, quite gotten around to. I know that you're not as keen as I am on "getting into the details", but there is scope for you to approach the subject as broadly as you like. What do you think?

Oh, and, marjoramblues, I voted "Yes" on the poll in that thread that you referenced, "Should A Forum With Higher Standards Be Added To This Site?". I think quality is worth filtering for.

[Hobbes' Choice]

Would it be particularly *naughty* of me to reorganise those sentiments as "I believe in materialism because it brings me comfort"?

Be as naughty as you like. But the description certainly wouldn't fit me. I don't "believe in" materialism; I don't even use that word. I simply know what my receptors report to my brain, understand what my reason can grasp, deal with whatever connections and patterns I can discern in the world I inhabit. I didn't choose to inhabit this world: it's the one I was given. I don't choose to disbelieve the other kind: it's one I do not perceive and to profess any such faith would be insincere. )

There was no "you" to choose. Saying you did not choose this world is devoid of any meaning. The 'you' of which you speak is part of that world you say you did not choose. It's garbled. You were not brought "into" the world, you emerged from it, part of it.

[marjoramblues]

Harry Baird to Gustav:

What I'd then suggest (and it is, of course, only a suggestion) is that it would be helpful for you to outline those traditional values that you think are worth retaining, and why you think it is in our interests to retain them - a project that you have alluded to a couple of times in this thread but never, it seems to me, quite gotten around to. I know that you're not as keen as I am on "getting into the details", but there is scope for you to approach the subject as broadly as you like. What do you think?

To marjoramblues,

I voted "Yes" on the poll in that thread that you referenced, "Should A Forum With Higher Standards Be Added To This Site?". I think quality is worth filtering for.

Good for you. However, I don't see the requirement for an extra 'superior' forum. Personal choice.
Quality is worth striving for, I agree. This thread has many quality posts and point-to-point objections/responses.
Unfortunately, it is difficult to uncover the substance amongst the quantity.
That was kinda my point when I suggested that if someone has already developed, even a draft pet project, some kind of an essay section might work...at any level.

After 10 or more pages, things tend to get tedious.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

What I'd then suggest (and it is, of course, only a suggestion) is that it would be helpful for you to outline those traditional values that you think are worth retaining, and why you think it is in our interests to retain them - a project that you have alluded to a couple of times in this thread but never, it seems to me, quite gotten around to. I know that you're not as keen as I am on "getting into the details", but there is scope for you to approach the subject as broadly as you like. What do you think?

Hello there Harry. You and I have spoken at some length, with some ups and downs in mutual comprehension naturally, and you have often asked me for a more specific outline of just what exactly I am referring to when, rather vaguely I admit, I refer to 'Occidental Values', or the 'core of our traditions', or 'conceptual pathways to hold to and maintain a link with 'God' or divinity', or to those 'traditions' which are part-and-parcel of the so-called Occidental Classics, etc.. etc.

First, I would submit the following: The Legacy of Greece which was edited by RW Livingstone and includes a group of men who I would describe as 'learned and worthy'. Myself, I particularly liked the essay on religion by WR Inge and, generally, I would reference it as a source for additional information about 'preserving a link to our religious traditions'. But I think that the whole book is first rate and filled with substance, and by that I mean the 'really substantial'. By saying that I am, naturally, also referring to all that is not substantial. And this is the core of my own desire: to locate and valuate what is substantial and important, and to delineate it from what is less so, and from what is unworthy. This is a territory and an activity that will always ruffle feathers. And more so in an environment in which we have become 'self loathing', and sometimes for very good reasons.

This book of essays, to me, represents a kind of 'portal' through which one can, if one so desires, enter into the very core and structure of 'value' as it is defined Occidentally. The book exists, here you have it in an electronic form by which you can flip through its pages, which is really a sort of miracle in itself.

I have only attempted to 'answer' one part of your question, namely: to 'outline those traditional values'. The other part of your question: 'why you think it is in our interests to retain them', is one which I have more difficulty answering. Not because I think that an answer is not possible, but that I just have not ever organized my writing to focus on what, to me, is somewhat 'self-evident'.

In my view, and in comparison to some other intellectual as well as moral, ethical and scientific systems that have been developed in other cultural circumstances, what is called the legacy of Greece in all these different fields (from science to religion to history to medicine, etc.), give evidence of arriving at a focus, at a definition if you wish, from out of a plethora of human possibilities. As an example, as a counter-comparison, I am just now reading a book on the history of religious traditions in India. The so-called Hindu civilization(s) was vast and important, as I see it, and yet radically different in focus from what might be called the Greek Traditions, or 'our' traditions. It is hard to come out and state it, perhaps, but myself I am decided that this group of foci and concerns (as outlined in the table of contents) largely pales that of the Hindu. The Greek Traditions shine. They are brilliant.

It is (they are) of such superior quality (and yet I am 100% aware of the value-judgment being made, always problematic) that I would not, myself, include them even in the same category. One stands over the other. This is also a problematic statement since it could propose some action: putting someone or something else down. Not only is this a possibility, it is a probability, and even a necessity. Life seems to be about assigning value and taking decisions. It is within that kind of action-izing that I desire to locate myself. I see this as a masculine attribute that is on one hand important and one that is also dangerous. Far easier in a sense to remain 'passive' and to take no stand at all. However, to propose a 'masculine' modality and to privilege it, is also to contrast that with a 'feminine' or perhaps 'non-gendered' modality (to put it in PC terms!). As you know I most definitely privilege the 'masculine' and like Camilia Paglia would suggest that 'If civilization had been left in female hands we would still be living in grass huts'. And that world of Greek intellectualism is, quintessentially, masculine as I see it. I would also suggest that it is 'imperative' to preserve a connecting link with 'our masculine modalities' and to privilege them as against 'feminine modalities', but here, again, I have stepped into a 'virtual land mine field'.

I don't know a great deal of the Chinese cultural system, nor of the Inca (and little is known), nor much about any other specific cultural system or system of civilization, and perhaps this is a fault and I need to make it up somehow, but in my present view, having been attracted to India as a 'source of knowledge' (and I still find great value there but more as it pertains to exotic forms of soteriology and religious and spiritual technique and ritualism), if push came to shove, and were it a question of raising my children in a particular tradition, I would with no hesitation choose the Greek idea-system, as it is suggested in the pages of this book.

This is the absolute best that I can do for you toward providing an answer to your question. I cannot see how I could answer it more simply and more directly. You asked for 'an outline' and I have given it. It would take 30-40 minutes to read one of those essays so it is not unattainably hard. Then you would have a base to understand what I desire to refer to. Even if you read the preface, or 15 paragraphs in each essay you'd get the idea.

But I have likely failed in your eyes to answer the other half of your question. Sorry!

[Skip]

Harry Baird
Just a couple of thoughts in response: firstly, the question of our "choice" to be in the world seems to me to be one we should remain agnostic on.

As you wish.

It seems to me to be *possible* that we *do* in fact choose to incarnate here, even if we lack conscious cognisance of that choice during our incarnation.

I take no responsibility for any choice of which I am unconscious. Nor will I undertake to discuss matters of which am unaware.

Secondly, I'd suggest that nor is quantum physics a "world" that you perceive, yet (assuming you accept the scientific verdict) it is one that you choose to believe in - based on evidence.

Not really. Like the rhinoceros in The Gods Must Be Crazy: I won't bother them if they don't bother me.

What this implies to me is that even if you personally have not experienced the "other" world, there is sufficient (if varied) evidence of it to for you likewise to believe in it.

I believe that they believe it. See above.

What would be the point, assuming that you will never experience this world?

Exactly! Since I am not aware of its existence, I can't very well expect to go there.

Well, to raise the most practical point: one consequence of "disbelievers" is that research into this world is stifled due to preconceptions that it does not exist.

You mean, I might vote against such research? True: as long as school lunches and public television can't get funding, I certainly won't allocate public moneys to ghost search projects, but I won't vote to ban them.

The more believers we have on board, the more likely it is that we will explore and learn something about it.

...and that you teach it in science class? You have the numbers already, gods help us!

My raising of the idea of the "comfort" of a materialistic outlook stems from this: the experiences I have had were in many ways frightening; it is not always pleasant to be given a glimpse into "what lies beyond".

That's you, not me.
I can only describe the reality I perceive, and fictions I imagine.

Hobbes' Choice:
There was no "you" to choose. Saying you did not choose this world is devoid of any meaning. The 'you' of which you speak is part of that world you say you did not choose. It's garbled. You were not brought "into" the world, you emerged from it, part of it.

Indeed. Communication is rife with meaningless drivel. I wonder why we keep indulging in it.

[Harry Baird]

Gustav,

Please forgive me for my lack of patience and for the tone of this response, but I don't see "Here, read this book" as an adequate or appropriate answer to a question which could be answered much more succinctly, and in your own words. I do not currently have the patience to read either the book or even one of its essays, and I don't see why I should be expected to in a thread where you have demonstrated clearly that you are capable of writing extended posts. The thesis is yours, it is up to you to develop and defend it, not me to research it. Having said that, I did read a few pages of both the introductory essay and the essay on religion. I didn't really see anything that answered my question in any depth. There was a bit about "know thyself" being an important Hellenic dictum, a bit (in poetry) about the supreme importance of the unchanging versus the ephemeral, a bit about Euclid and how long-lasting his teaching book on geometry was, and a bit about other long-lasting Greek words such as the oath taken for centuries by medical doctors. Would you like to add anything to that list? Is that sufficient to represent the values you think are so important, or would you like to elaborate further?

And yes, you have certainly not answered the other half of the question, that of why it is in our interests to retain these values (whatever they are, in your view), and surely this is really the key to your advocacy. If you cannot even explain what these values are, much less *why* they are so important, then what is the point of this thread? And to be as fair as possible, it is not even necessary for you to state anything definitively and irrevocably, it would be enough for you to put a few provisional ideas on the table that could be discussed. Nobody (at least not me) is expecting you to be omniscient or perfect, just to be able to say *something* specific.

Skip,

You wrote: "I take no responsibility for any choice of which I am unconscious". I think this is beside the point. Whether or not you take responsibility for a choice you once made is irrelevant, the point is (would be, in the case that the idea of pre-birth choice is true) that you made the choice in the first place. If you made a choice yesterday, and then got hit on the head and developed amnesia, the fact of your making the choice yesterday in the first place wouldn't be negated by your failure today to remember and take responsibility for it.

You might question though where this idea of pre-birth choice comes from. I have encountered it in books, particularly those on past-life regression techniques, where those who were regressed described a time between lives where their past life was reviewed, and their future life was planned. I do not know whether this is "how it really is", but it is at least a documented possibility. For the record, I tried past-life regression therapy when I was last in Melbourne, and, sadly, it was a dismal failure. I experienced nothing that would be better explained by controlled day-dreaming.

Harry: Secondly, I'd suggest that nor is quantum physics a "world" that you perceive, yet (assuming you accept the scientific verdict) it is one that you choose to believe in - based on evidence.

Skip: Not really.

You don't believe in quantum physics? Perhaps you could explain why.

Like the rhinoceros in The Gods Must Be Crazy: I won't bother them if they don't bother me.

You won't bother the quantum particles? I'm pretty sure that they *do* bother you, though! They are, after all, the foundation of the material of your physical body.

Harry: What this implies to me is that even if you personally have not experienced the "other" world, there is sufficient (if varied) evidence of it to for you likewise to believe in it.

Skip: I believe that they believe it. See above.

Isn't this an evasion of responsibility? Aren't you, as a rational human being, obliged to examine the evidence before forming a conclusion? Have you really done this? Or have you gone no further than "the reality I perceive"? How can you form an objective opinion based merely on what you perceive? Do the perceptions and experiences of others count for nothing?

You mean, I might vote against such research? True: as long as school lunches and public television can't get funding, I certainly won't allocate public moneys to ghost search projects, but I won't vote to ban them.

I don't think the problem with school lunches and public television not getting funding has much to do with the funding of alternative research, it has more to do with misallocation of resources, in particular the obscene amount allocated to the military.

Harry: The more believers we have on board, the more likely it is that we will explore and learn something about it.

Skip: ...and that you teach it in science class? You have the numbers already, gods help us!

Don't confuse me for a creationist. Whilst I do think that there is reason, based on evidence of etheric aspects to the human being/body, to believe that evolution is not the whole truth, and I think that this evidence should be available to students (as well as researched further), I don't think that the creation story of the Bible should be taught as literal truth.

[Felasco]

I haven't yet read the entire thread, so apologies if what I'm about to say has already been covered.

Clearly 'we' are at a point of a general and overt reassessment of the Christian belief-system.

It's perhaps helpful to propose that intellectual debate forums have a strong bias for focusing, sometimes exclusively, on the belief system part of Christianity. This is understandable, as it is the ideological component of Christianity which lends itself most easily to debate.

However, a weakness of this approach is that it tends to give the impression that Christianity is exclusively about ideological assertions, when the reality is that it is also very much an emotional experience which is not dependent on the ideology at all.

You're dashing in the rain to grab the newspaper that's been delivered to your driveway. As you reach your paper you realize that your elderly neighbor's paper is lying in her driveway too, and it's going to be hazardous for her to make the same dash you're making. So you decide to get even more wet, and deliver your neighbor's newspaper to her front door.

When you finally get back inside your house, as wet as you are, you feel better for the experience of sacrifice you just chose.

This is Christianity too, and it doesn't require a belief in Jesus, God, heaven and hell, the virgin birth and all the rest of that. Anybody who wishes to can verify the personal value of such ordinary little acts of surrender in their own daily life, without reference to any religious authority or text etc.

There is a very simple solution for anyone who can no longer believe Christian ideology. If they can't believe, be honest and don't believe. Love instead, and the best parts of Christianity are still available to explore.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Please forgive me for my lack of patience and for the tone of this response, but I don't see "Here, read this book" as an adequate or appropriate answer to a question which could be answered much more succinctly, and in your own words.

Truthfully, you would not have to make an apology because you have said nothing at all that has even a shade of aggression in it, but no poignancy either. On the other hand, I make a number of sharp statements, indeed so many and so often that I do seem to offend people. But that is as it should be, in my view. If ideas have potency they will have effect, or the power to effect. The 'real battle' in the world of ideas is quite likely to be a sort of 'war'. Whether that is really true or not I am not 100% certain but it is the idea that I entertain.

So, I will now try to express myself clearly and tell you what I think and how what I think (of your response) relates to my 'general thesis'. First, gaining knowledge is not possible through the equivalent of 'watching TV'. Obviously what I mean is a kind of passive absorption. Meaning essentially that one must work for knowledge. It seems to me that the deeper the knowledge, the more of a struggle there is to get it. Those that really go to the limits of knowledge, and note that there are very many distinct epistemological systems or 'epistemes' within which to work toward 'knowing'. People have operated within very divergent epistemes and you could contrast, say, the Greek Legacy with, say, the mystical science of Kundalini and the correspondence between the god-of-cosmos with divinity-in-the-body. Some would say the one is 'real' and the other 'unreal' and I suggest it is a bit of a puzzle to really decide, but that is digression. It seems to me important to point this out: men focus, and have focussed throughout human history, in all manner of different epistemological areas.

As I understand things, knowledge is a struggle. I believe this is why it is and will always be 'an elite project'. And I also have a very strong sense that the 'Mass Man', with whom we all share a link, who has been created, in a sense rationally created, created through decision, through specific systems of organization such as school systems, information delivering systems, etc., is a man who by his disposition, perhaps by his laziness and his passivity, and perhaps by this idea he seems to have that 'it should be easy' (like watching TV) or in any case that 'it should not be (too) hard', which is a sort of general attitudinal stance. Another related attitude is that 'I should be included in all important things' and even 'I have a right to opine in all matters of importance' and even 'I will tell YOU what is important and relevant' which is related to 'you do not have any right to decide for me what is important and relevant'. I think that you might understand where I am going with this (or perhaps, as in uwot's case, not). But here is another possible aspect. Let us suppose that:

'OK, just maybe I might recognize the importance of this Episteme you refer to but I want to know some things about it. I have a few spare minutes between doing next-to-nothing and nothing-at-all and, please sir I insist, I demand that you explain to me so I can understand just what is this Episteme and why I should consider it important and relevant. I set the clock at just under 12 minutes after which I will get irretrievable bored, so please, begin now. I am impatiently tapping my foot'.

That is a somewhat humorous way of putting it, naturally, and yet I do not at all think it is inaccurate. I suggest that for many people it is literally quite like this. There is some text, some intricate text that requires hermetical probing, that might deal on issues vitally related and even crucial to incarnation itself, to mysteries of life and being alive, in the tension between vidya and avidya, and then there is the possibility of watching a movie, or perhaps getting all hot and bothered with some porno clips, or there are any number of possible distractions, and then there is a man who will say:

• 'Just tell me what is really relevant, I demand it, I have a spare moments before I'll get smashed'.

I am not making this up to be cruel or biting. This is in truth the way it is. I suggest that to really be serious about something, about anything, requires another level of focus. It isn't a game. It is absolutely much more than a game. I suggest that there are 'cores' within what we refer to as 'Christianity' that can only be known if they are explored, and there is no easy means of exploration, just as there are no easy means within any episteme. A huge part of the battle, in my view, is just in articulating the possibility of sense that this might be so. It is impossible to do the knowledge-gaining work for another man.

[And I also think there is a mystery here, too. Divinity itself operates rather mysteriously, in my understanding. An 'omen' is a manifestation of some level of divinity that is said to appear on a man's path. I have thought of such 'omens' as 'exploding metaphors'. In this sense they 'trick' you into stopping, picking them up, handling them, and unexpectedly they explode, and 'meaning' is the result, which becomes perhaps 'a substance that lays upon the mind'. But I am indulging in obscurantist puzzles and befuddlement, naturally. My preferred territory!]

• While yet a child, and long before his time
  Had he perceived the presence and the power
  Of greatness; and deep feelings had impressed
  So vividly great objects that they lay
  Upon his mind like substances, whose presence
  Perplexed the bodily sense.

That by the way is from a Wordsworth poem quoted in that essay on Religion on page twenty-eight. Think about that image for a second: things that vividly lie upon the mind like substances. It would seem to me, and definitely in the context of the following paragraphs, that something a little monumental is being referred to. Certainly a special 'substance'. Not the same as flickering TV images, or snippets of valueless prose, or the equivalent of nutritionless processed bread. Stuff of substance. Stuff that has the power to have effect. If an idea or some ideas have also the power to 'perplex the bodily sense' that will lead to a whole other group of sensations and ideas. 'But if the body is everything, how could the sense of it be perplexed?' In any case, all that I mean by referring to it is that it seems, in this specific sense, to be about stimulating thinking to move in unfamiliar and even strange areas. In an even more specific sense I would suggest that it is necessary and even mandatory for men or 'a man' to make sacrifices for knowledge. In other words, knowledge will not come to a man in any field without sacrifice, work, struggle.

For me, this 'whole issue' is essentially what needs to be talked about or in any case I would locate it as 'the problem'. I now will locate it more specifically within this particular thread: a possible effective apology for Christianity. First, there is a vast area that is this 'Christianity'. It is quite literally vast. But in a specific sense it could be called The Greek Religion (as Inge says) and as such, through language and concept, it is fundamentally linked to ourselves insofar as we are products of a given civilization, and extends beyond religion specifically into all that we are, do, and think, I think there is a little bit there to unravel. I do not personally believe that 'all this' could be paraphrased or reduced to a sort of Reader's Digest version that could be read in 10 minutes by someone only vaguely interested because he is bored with so much else, and that's not even to speak of someone whose mind is in fact totally closed, ab initio. In order to understand the value and importance of an 'entire episteme' one has to enter into it, on one level or another.

So, there is nothing at all wrong with offering a text that contains the information which very certainly cannot be included in a post on a given Forum. I fully understand that you might not be able to read it, might not desire to read it, and might reject it. But this is really what 'all this' deals on, in my view. You can bring a horse to water but you can't make him drink. Does this really seem so outrageously unfair?

Now, the disclaimer. I have no intention whatever to offend you with brusqueness. It is only that I believe it is exceedingly important to state the truth as it is seen. All that we talk about deals with issues relevant to persons, but it must be an art and a choice not to take it personally. Still, I will take a moment to apologize to you, your heirs and assigns and anyone who, intentionally or inadvertently is damaged, offended, tizzyfied, maltickled, pickled and otherwise burnt by anything said, unsaid, undersaid, implied and alluded and extruded.

[Felasco]

I do not, however, accept the standard Christian story that God is simultaneously omnipotent and the Creator of all - I agree that if He were, it would be particularly hard to defend Christianity.

If there is something which is omnipotent and the Creator of all, such an entity would be the creator of the laws of logic as well, and thus would not be bound by those laws. Or at the least, we could not assume it to be so bound.

In such a case, all logical analysis either promoting or defending any religion goes out the window as any such analysis depends upon the rules of logic being binding on the subject at hand.

You and I can not create a square circle, as logic is binding on us. If I claim such an ability, you can confidently refute it.

It would not be possible to refute the same claim by the creator of logic. The creator of logic would be like the inventor of a card game. They could presumably change the rules of the game at any time.

Therefore, atheist ideology is revealed to be an empty suit. In order to debunk a god using logic, one would first have to state there is nothing above logic. Boiled down to it's essence, atheism is...

There is no God, therefore there is no God.

[Skip]

Whether or not you take responsibility for a choice you once made is irrelevant, the point is (would be, in the case that the idea of pre-birth choice is true) that you made the choice in the first place. If you made a choice yesterday, and then got hit on the head and developed amnesia, the fact of your making the choice yesterday in the first place wouldn't be negated by your failure today to remember and take responsibility for it.

Maybe so, and I may have to endure whatever punishment is meted out by powers greater than mine. But I cannot conduct this life - the only life I know about and have any control over - on the basis of the possibility of an unremembered past which may have rules of which I am uninformed.

You might question though where this idea of pre-birth choice comes from.

Only if somebody gets in my face with the assertion. Otherwise, it wouldn't occur to me.

I have encountered it in books,

In books, I have encountered seven-headed dragons, too, but I don't carry a sword, just in case I meet one on the subway. Since I cannot prepare for all contingencies, I prioritize according to degree of probability - as best I can figure the odds, according to available information. On the subway, a token is more likely to be useful than a sword.

You don't believe in quantum physics? Perhaps you could explain why.

Because 'believe in' is a statement of faith. I have heard of quantum physics and it's discussed with great seriousness by learned men who appear quite sane in other respects (except for that unfortunate mushroom-cloud incident). I don't understand what they're talking about, but I'm willing to suspend my disbelief until something happens to change that balance.

You won't bother the quantum particles?

Neither them nor the theorists.

I'm pretty sure that they *do* bother you, though! They are, after all, the foundation of the material of your physical body.

And I deal with that on a level that I do understand and am able to affect, without attempting to commune with the individual particles or fracture them or chase them around tunnels under mountains.

"I believe that they believe it"
Isn't this an evasion of responsibility?

For what? How d'you make out other people's delusions/ true accounts to be my fault? I do my best to talk sense; the standards by which others judge what I say is their business: they're not beholden to me.

Aren't you, as a rational human being, obliged to examine the evidence before forming a conclusion?

Unless they're on trial and I'm on the jury, no. If I thought I owed every theory, every assertion, every legend, every creed, every fad the benefit of thorough examination, I would have to spend my life doing nothing else, and still never get through the A's.

Or have you gone no further than "the reality I perceive"? How can you form an objective opinion based merely on what you perceive?

I never claimed to have an objective opinion. Beware of anyone who does.

Do the perceptions and experiences of others count for nothing?

Basically. I'm interested, of course, and often sympathetic. Some I believe, some I don't, depending on how closely their descriptions approximate my own experience and reason.

I don't think the problem with school lunches and public television not getting funding has much to do with the funding of alternative research, it has more to do with misallocation of resources, in particular the obscene amount allocated to the military.

At last - common ground! Let's beat all the tanks into Mars rovers, tinfoil hats and satellite dishes. If we could just stop blowing up so much of our asssets, we could afford to follow every avenue of inquiry.

Don't confuse me for a creationist. Whilst I do think that there is reason, based on evidence of etheric aspects to the human being/body, to believe that evolution is not the whole truth, and I think that this evidence should be available to students (as well as researched further), I don't think that the creation story of the Bible should be taught as literal truth.

That's a relief... I suppose. You still have the numbers - you don't need me.

Felasco: Boiled down to it's essence, atheism is...There is no God, therefore there is no God.

That may be one interpretation; hardly the essence.
For me it just means: I do not find that [whichever myth or holy book] story plausible; I do not believe it; I do not feel impelled to obey its tenets. And I do not owe anyone a justification or explanation as to why I reject their ideas.
If the theist has not made a good enough case to convince me, that's his failure. It may be my loss, if what he had to offer was of value and I refused it because of a botched sales-pitch. Or else, it could be my gain, if what he had to offer in trade for my rational hedonism was a life of self-denial and trepidation.
Who wants to wear a suit, anyway - I'm more fetching in just the old school tie.

[Hobbes' Choice]

I do not, however, accept the standard Christian story that God is simultaneously omnipotent and the Creator of all - I agree that if He were, it would be particularly hard to defend Christianity.

If there is something which is omnipotent and the Creator of all, such an entity would be the creator of the laws of logic as well, and thus would not be bound by those laws. Or at the least, we could not assume it to be so bound.

In such a case, all logical analysis either promoting or defending any religion goes out the window as any such analysis depends upon the rules of logic being binding on the subject at hand.

You and I can not create a square circle, as logic is binding on us. If I claim such an ability, you can confidently refute it.

It would not be possible to refute the same claim by the creator of logic. The creator of logic would be like the inventor of a card game. They could presumably change the rules of the game at any time.

Therefore, atheist ideology is revealed to be an empty suit. In order to debunk a god using logic, one would first have to state there is nothing above logic. Boiled down to it's essence, atheism is...

There is no God, therefore there is no God.

This entire argument is empty nonsense.

1) Invent a ridiculous concept.
2) Claim it is beyond refute.
3) Attack those that reject it.

Pathetic!

[uwot]

First, I would submit the following: The Legacy of Greece which was edited by RW Livingstone and includes a group of men who I would describe as 'learned and worthy'.

What independent criteria are you using for your description? Are you not using a circular argument?

But I think that the whole book is first rate and filled with substance, and by that I mean the 'really substantial'. By saying that I am, naturally, also referring to all that is not substantial. And this is the core of my own desire: to locate and valuate what is substantial and important, and to delineate it from what is less so, and from what is unworthy.

I don't think many people would be so self-aggrandising, but I suspect most believe they do a bit of that.

This is a territory and an activity that will always ruffle feathers.

I think it is more that you have some set of values, which you have discovered 'ruffle feathers'. Perhaps because you are aware that any methodological scrutiny would pick apart your beliefs, you reject any 'method' and appeal instead to 'authorities', people who believe much the same as you and have said so in print. The thing you and your authorities have in common, is enough trust in the model to extend it to some higher authority, for example: the book your 'learned and worthy' group of men appear in, the book of common prayer you mentioned at the beginning, and ultimately the bible or other religious or political text. They have all been read and criticised, sometimes sympathetically, sometimes not. Who you believe is largely a matter of personal persuasion, that is a large part of what confirmation bias is.

.... I just have not ever organized my writing to focus on what, to me, is somewhat 'self-evident'.

Which is a problem. You think your ideas are self evident; philosophical scrutiny shows them to be without foundation, you then reject philosophy and defer instead to 'learned and worthy' authorities, who you judge to be so, because they agree with you.

I suggest that to really be serious about something, about anything, requires another level of focus. It isn't a game. It is absolutely much more than a game. I suggest that there are 'cores' within what we refer to as 'Christianity' that can only be known if they are explored, and there is no easy means of exploration, just as there are no easy means within any episteme. A huge part of the battle, in my view, is just in articulating the possibility of sense that this might be so. It is impossible to do the knowledge-gaining work for another man.

This is just silly. You are insisting that there is something worth all the effort you say is beyond most people anyway, but you cannot tell even the people who are up to the task us what. This is essentially the story of The Emperor's new clothes.

[Felasco]

Felasco: Boiled down to it's essence, atheism is...There is no God, therefore there is no God.

That may be one interpretation; hardly the essence.
For me it just means: I do not find that [whichever myth or holy book] story plausible; I do not believe it; I do not feel impelled to obey its tenets. And I do not owe anyone a justification or explanation as to why I reject their ideas.

Thank you for your reply.

Just to be clear and get it off the table, it's not my goal that you should believe in any holy book or religion.

My point is that atheists reject theism based on an unproven assumption that is just as speculative as theism. That assumption is that all of reality is subject to human logic, and thus human logic can be used to generate meaningful conclusions to the god question.

My argument is not that atheists should adopt unproven theist beliefs, but rather discard their own unproven beliefs. That is, I'm suggesting atheists might be loyal to their own system.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Right at this moment, most esteemed Monsieur Uwot, I am quite fully engaged in a personal project of study. I have another area of focus for my writing that is quite demanding and though that area has many points that cross the area being talked about in this thread, it is independent. To take the time to make a case for all that is described so well in The Legacy of Greece would take me so far away from what I am now working on that, to put it simply, I just can't do it. So, I do what for me is the next best thing: submit a link to a highly readable text in electronic form.

In a sense there is no 'independent criteria' if the school of Greek thought is taken as a whole and held up as 'something of great value'. It is foundational to (our) thought itself. It is inseparable. You would have to jump into another, completely different system to have the point of comparison you might seek. I am now reading up on Hindu religion and it most definitely represents a radically different 'episteme'. It is one where if you don't like or appreciate Western (Christian, Jewish, Pagan) mysticism you would most definitely have an attack over the utterly bizarre foundations of Indian religiosity.

To say 'learned and worthy' is really a sort of empty phrase, but it is what I think and also feel (if including 'feeling' about something is valid). It is not exactly 'circular' but it is obviously 'just an opinion'.

Obviously, I start from a point of asserting a value (aggrandizement, as you say). It is true that I do not right now have the energy and the desire to write out elaborate explanations and defenses, but I can say that I have no doubt that it could be done. I could do it. But at the same time there is another potential truth: that different people in this world organize their perceptions and their valuations of things around a wide variety of different support columns. I might mention some strange South Indian cult of some regional or village Goddess as an example. It is not at all an episteme that is thought about (intellectualized by the practitioners), and we (Occidentals) are beings who are so completely invested in mental processes that I wonder if we are able to recognize that there exist other means of approaching life, of being in life, and making one's way through it? Do I have the right to exclaim that 'my' system is 'better' than another's? It is a big problem really. But, I have personally resolved the issue with a sort of Nietzschean maneouvre‎: in a sense it is 'power' that decides things in this world. If one defines some value and says this is 'noble' and 'good', and if indeed it is and this is demonstrated through action and accomplishment, isn't this 'self-evident'? Yet we certainly know how 'resentment' finds ways to subvert the actions of the so-called powerful. I do tend to think, fearfully and cynically, that it may resolve to 'power'.

Or do they resolve to simply find some sort of strength and 'way of being', as you seem to, in breaking things down to their smaller pieces? (What results from that, I wonder?) I have no real idea what your 'philosophical objectives' are, but I think that I am clear about my own, and I choose NOT to surrender to the 'acid' solutions, to that neurotic obsession of division, as seem to function some forms of philosophy, and I resolve not to. That is just a way to dissolve. To me 'having a philosophy' or 'being philosophical' has very much to do with how I choose to act and what I do in specific senses. I recognize that one could, and easily, submit oneself to a 'dissolving philosophy' but I think that that is a cause of a nihilistic position, and that it is deadly, and undesirable. So, for me these are exactly the 'cores' of what is being talked about essentially, even here with this 'conversation' that sputters along, never quite occurring and never quite ending.

I think it is more that you have some set of values, which you have discovered 'ruffle feathers'. Perhaps because you are aware that any methodological scrutiny would pick apart your beliefs, you reject any 'method' and appeal instead to 'authorities', people who believe much the same as you and have said so in print. The thing you and your authorities have in common, is enough trust in the model to extend it to some higher authority, for example: the book your 'learned and worthy' group of men appear in, the book of common prayer you mentioned at the beginning, and ultimately the bible or other religious or political text. They have all been read and criticised, sometimes sympathetically, sometimes not. Who you believe is largely a matter of personal persuasion, that is a large part of what confirmation bias is.

I don't agree completely with the way you spin this, but at the same time I don't disagree completely, either. It is quite possible, and even likely, that if it came to 'values' in the sense of decency or kindness or honestly or responsibility, that all the participants on this thread would have a good deal in common. That is my sense anyway. It is what I generally note in life. I think that certain ideas I presently work with run against 'the current of the present', but I am never completely decided about any specific idea, and that is part of a problem for me because I don't believe that one can fully rely on 'ideas' since, foundationally, we occupy space with our being and we are always much more than just our 'ideas'. In truth, an effective person in my view is one who functions with fuller being, but that is another topic.

You imagine you can 'pick my beliefs apart', but what is most important is your statement about that, the declared project, your chosen activity. You pick apart. Yet it is true that you will never be able to pick me apart, since I am a being and not a limited semantic cluster. I assume the same is true for you. I assume that somewhere in you, somehow, there is something like a core, though we both know that, philosophically perhaps, no 'core' can really be said to exist. But this turns into a game after just a couple of seconds. It becomes a game between one inclined to hunt and his chosen quarry. In my mind there is something very suspect about this. This is one reason why I mentioned 'evasion'. Really, 'evasion' is a most relevant skill especially if it happens, and it does, that one is protecting a core within oneself (I am not saying that this is so in my case, here, but I am aware that 'ideas' sometimes operate against persons and attack). Yet still, it is true, we are in so many different areas called to examine and critique and disassemble ideas, and sometimes harshly. You know: in the daily news, in political events, and also interpersonally, and you here.

One problem is that you think you have me 'located', and you think your slotting is accurate. It isn't. My defense of any particular thing is provisional. That is in a sense part of my problem (I mean personally). Yet at a core level, yes, I do hold to a groups of ideas, or patterns, or an inner sense of things, and it is spiritual, but almost impossible to explain. It is from this odd position that I can see the value in Christian structures, and in religiosity generally. And perhaps I have also a certain luxury: I can side-step any specificity and argue from the other side. I am not quite as fixed as you think.

You think your ideas are self evident; philosophical scrutiny shows them to be without foundation...

To me, this is a statement one can only laugh at. I'm sorry but it is true. I think you mean 'uwot's philosophical scrutiny', but so far what I have seen is not 'real scrutiny' and looks to me to be only a capacity, borne of desire, to 'pick apart'. You imagine you have some skill in this, you make it evident, but in no sense do I give you the power to pick me apart. Do you see how this reduces not to 'reason' but strictly to 'straight power principals'? It would surprise me if you didn't. I think it is one of the first rules of human interaction, actually. You are playing a game here, uwot. I think you should cop to it. Then, one can move beyond the game.

I say that I value authorities, and that I recognize 'authority' in the field of ideas, art, intellect, and in so many different areas. I began be speaking about hierarchy because hierarchies are foundational in civilization. I do submit to you a group of men who are authorities for me. Insofar as I emulate them. Or would relish the opportunity were it available to speak with them. Yes indeed. But what I am really saying is that authorities exist. That the things we value, and those things in people, exist. That we can recur to them. And also that we can build up value(s) in ourselves. It is really a very different statement than whatever the heck you are saying. And after you have set up your Straw Man you launch into a whole groups of comments unrelated to, and irrelevant to, me.

Who you believe is largely a matter of personal persuasion, that is a large part of what confirmation bias is.

This is an interesting statement. It is in fact, or so it would seem, 'universally true'. People work within the parameters of perhaps some basic and original orientation, maybe one that formed in the womb, or maybe even (somehow) before. But there do seem to exist 'latent structures' or 'determining structures' in people. Then, they gather round them what they need to support what has been, in some sense, pre-decided. I guess I would say that, if it were possible, it would be a significant skill to be able to inhabit, even to a limited degree, the views and 'possibilities' of others.

Perhaps you would enjoy it if I argued from a position of Radical Materialism the Dreamed-up Slop that Slithers in our World? Here is a fun quote by Michael Taussig's 'The Magic of the State':

How naturally we entity and give life to such. Take the case of God, the economy, and the state, abstract entities we credit with Being, species of things awesome with life-force of their own, transcendent over mere mortals. Clearly they are fetishes, invented wholes of materialized artifice into whose woeful insufficiency of being we have projected soulstuff. Hence the big 'S' of the State. Hence its magical attraction and repulsion, tied to the Nation, to more than a whiff of a certain sexuality reminiscent of the Law of the Father and, lest we forget, to the specter of death, human death in that soul-stirring insufficiency of Being. It is with this, then, with the magical harnessing of the dead for stately purpose, that I wish, on an admittedly unsure and naive footing, to begin.

[Skip]

.
My point is that atheists reject theism based on an unproven assumption that is just as speculative as theism.

That's just exactly what most of us are not doing. Not speculating anything, not positing anything, not assuming anything - simply rejecting a claim made by someone who has no authority over us.

That assumption is that all of reality is subject to human logic, and thus human logic can be used to generate meaningful conclusions to the god question.

It's hard to live in the world without using reason to generate meaningful conclusions about claims made by people who want me to obey them.

... but rather discard their own unproven beliefs. That is, I'm suggesting atheists might be loyal to their own system.

What system? It's not like we carry membership cards and little green books of Dawkins' tenets.