Can the Religious Be Trusted?

[Belinda]

It’s easy to look at the young and see in them a kind of freedom that, in some ways, feels enviable. The freedom to be silly for the sake of it. To offend, not with malice, but with a kind of gleeful irreverence. To laugh at the world, at authority, at themselves, and feel as though time is infinite, stretched out before them like a long summer day. It’s part of what it means to be young, I suppose—that sense of limitless possibility, the feeling that there’s always more time to figure out what matters.

But five years ago, my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer, and that idea of infinite time was shattered. I don’t think I’d ever fully reckoned with just how finite life is until that moment. Of course, we all know it, intellectually. We know that life has an end, but we push that knowledge to the back of our minds because it’s uncomfortable. But when the person you love most in the world is suddenly staring down the possibility of not being here, that uncomfortable truth comes charging to the front. It demands your attention. And once it’s there, you can’t look away.

Her diagnosis drove home the reality that not just her time, but mine—and all of ours—is finite. There’s only so much of it. And it made me realize something I hadn’t quite understood before: that wasting time isn’t just a disservice to yourself; it’s a disservice to everyone around you. It’s taking something precious and throwing it away.

For me, that realization brought urgency. An urgency to stop wasting my time and to stop wasting other people’s time. I’m not saying there’s no room for laughter or for joy. God knows, laughter is what kept us afloat through some of the darkest moments. But what I’m saying is that there’s a difference between joy and distraction. There’s a difference between humor that connects and humor that tears down. There’s a difference between living fully and simply filling the hours.

If I have something to say before I leave this world—and, like it or not, we all leave it—I feel an urgency to say it now. Because the clock is ticking for all of us, whether we choose to hear it or not. My wife’s fight with cancer didn’t just remind me of that truth; it demanded that I live it. That I stop putting things off. That I stop wasting the time I’ve been given. And maybe more than anything, that I stop indulging in the kind of emptiness that serves no one.

So yes, there’s fun to be had in being silly, in pushing boundaries, in being irreverent. But at some point, if we’re lucky, we’re confronted with the reality that time isn’t infinite. And when that happens, we have a choice: to keep distracting ourselves or to get serious about the kind of legacy we’re leaving behind. For me, that legacy is about honesty, connection, and doing what I can to leave the world a little better than I found it. Because when all is said and done, that’s what matters most. At least, that’s what I’ve come to believe.

A heart-string tugging story for certain, but...

God knows,

Doesn't this shoot your OP in the foot?

Aren't you supposed to be non-Religious?

God is a deterministic concept.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Obviously from what you write you do not understand determinism. Why not just leave determinism, put it on the back burner, and seek God in your own way.

I think we must state that BigMike has offered a very odd version of determinism. He follows traditional determinism at one moment, and then reintroduces full-fledged choice and decision in the next. If his version is “determinism” I am genuinely confused.

Can you clarify what “determinism” is? And also what understanding it, or “believing in it” can and should do for us?

[Alexis Jacobi]

Another worthy Ernst Becker quote:

In man a working level of narcissism is inseparable from self-esteem, from a basic sense of self-worth. We have learned, mostly from Alfred Adler, that what man needs most is to feel secure in his self-esteem. But man is not just a blind glob of idling protoplasm, but a creature with a name who lives in a world of symbols and dreams and not merely matter. His sense of self-worth is constituted symbolically, his cherished narcissism feeds on symbols, on an abstract idea of his own worth, an idea composed of sounds, words, and images, in the air, in the mind, on paper. And this means that man's natural yearning for organismic activity, the pleasures of incorporation and expansion, can be fed limitlessly in the domain of symbols and so into immortality. The single organism can expand into dimensions of worlds and times without moving a physical limb; it can take eternity into itself even as it gaspingly dies.

[Alexis Jacobi]

It doesn't matter whether the cultural hero-system is frankly magical, religious, and primitive or secular, scientific, and civilized. It is still a mythical hero-system in which people serve in order to earn a feeling of primary value, of cosmic specialness, of ultimate usefulness to creation, of unshakable meaning. They earn this feeling by carving out a place in nature, by building an edifice that reflects human value: a temple, a cathedral, a totem pole, a sky-scraper, a family that spans three generations. The hope and belief is that the things that man creates in society are of lasting worth and meaning, that they outlive or outshine death and decay, that man and his products count. When Norman O. Brown said that Western society since Newton, no matter how scientific or secular it claims to be, is still as “religious” as any other, this is what he meant: “civilized” society is a hopeful belief and protest that science, money and goods make man count for more than any other animal. In this sense everything that man does is religious and heroic, and yet in danger of being fictitious and fallible.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Hark!

[Jacobsladder]

Another worthy Ernst Becker quote:

In man a working level of narcissism is inseparable from self-esteem, from a basic sense of self-worth. We have learned, mostly from Alfred Adler, that what man needs most is to feel secure in his self-esteem. But man is not just a blind glob of idling protoplasm, but a creature with a name who lives in a world of symbols and dreams and not merely matter. His sense of self-worth is constituted symbolically, his cherished narcissism feeds on symbols, on an abstract idea of his own worth, an idea composed of sounds, words, and images, in the air, in the mind, on paper. And this means that man's natural yearning for organismic activity, the pleasures of incorporation and expansion, can be fed limitlessly in the domain of symbols and so into immortality. The single organism can expand into dimensions of worlds and times without moving a physical limb; it can take eternity into itself even as it gaspingly dies.

Becker as typical product of the essentially narcissist society (e.g. The Culture of Narcissism, Lash, 1979) which already was forming in his day and age. He could just as well be seen as a great apologist for narcissistic philosophy. The world as a sequence of pages, analysis, snapshots and assumptions to serve his own needs, mostly. People most acutely aware of their own demise are often people consumed by the narcissist disorder simply because the main driver of the psychological configuration is ones own collapse, around the inner void - of continuous buildup of falsehood.

For those in doubt, psychoanalysts and cultural anthropologists are notoriously analyzed as narcissistic or schizoid but in case of Becker, with his "theatrical" lectures and poses, to confuse narcissistic distortion and its mislabeling with healthy ego-function, fantasy or libido is telling enough.

And yet there's a lot of (trivial) truth involved with Becker's philosophy. Life itself can be said to be a denial or challenging of death or entropy on many symbolic, even physical levels. And human organization pre-occupied with is own demise becomes quickly death culture and deeply nihilistic. To define ones "life" in too many specifics and certainties, automatically would invoke the specter of death. Denial of shadows equals invocation of midday.

[Atla]

It’s easy to look at the young and see in them a kind of freedom that, in some ways, feels enviable. The freedom to be silly for the sake of it. To offend, not with malice, but with a kind of gleeful irreverence. To laugh at the world, at authority, at themselves, and feel as though time is infinite, stretched out before them like a long summer day. It’s part of what it means to be young, I suppose—that sense of limitless possibility, the feeling that there’s always more time to figure out what matters.

But five years ago, my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer, and that idea of infinite time was shattered. I don’t think I’d ever fully reckoned with just how finite life is until that moment. Of course, we all know it, intellectually. We know that life has an end, but we push that knowledge to the back of our minds because it’s uncomfortable. But when the person you love most in the world is suddenly staring down the possibility of not being here, that uncomfortable truth comes charging to the front. It demands your attention. And once it’s there, you can’t look away.

Her diagnosis drove home the reality that not just her time, but mine—and all of ours—is finite. There’s only so much of it. And it made me realize something I hadn’t quite understood before: that wasting time isn’t just a disservice to yourself; it’s a disservice to everyone around you. It’s taking something precious and throwing it away.

For me, that realization brought urgency. An urgency to stop wasting my time and to stop wasting other people’s time. I’m not saying there’s no room for laughter or for joy. God knows, laughter is what kept us afloat through some of the darkest moments. But what I’m saying is that there’s a difference between joy and distraction. There’s a difference between humor that connects and humor that tears down. There’s a difference between living fully and simply filling the hours.

If I have something to say before I leave this world—and, like it or not, we all leave it—I feel an urgency to say it now. Because the clock is ticking for all of us, whether we choose to hear it or not. My wife’s fight with cancer didn’t just remind me of that truth; it demanded that I live it. That I stop putting things off. That I stop wasting the time I’ve been given. And maybe more than anything, that I stop indulging in the kind of emptiness that serves no one.

So yes, there’s fun to be had in being silly, in pushing boundaries, in being irreverent. But at some point, if we’re lucky, we’re confronted with the reality that time isn’t infinite. And when that happens, we have a choice: to keep distracting ourselves or to get serious about the kind of legacy we’re leaving behind. For me, that legacy is about honesty, connection, and doing what I can to leave the world a little better than I found it. Because when all is said and done, that’s what matters most. At least, that’s what I’ve come to believe.

Dude, if we do what you suggest and get real serious about always keeping determinism and finality in mind, then we'll also have to keep in mind that those who come after us will also die and our legacy will be lost. Obviously. Eventually humanity will end altogether.

[seeds]

From The Denial of Death by Ernst Becker (1973)

"...The lower animals are, of course, spared this painful contradiction, as they lack a symbolic identity and the self-consciousness that goes with it. They merely act and move reflexively as they are driven by their instincts. If they pause at all, it is only a physical pause; inside they are anonymous, and even their faces have no name..."

An animal with a face named "dindin," listening to one of the greatest pieces of music ever composed...

https://youtu.be/2fpIa30D6oM
_______

[Alexis Jacobi]

He could just as well be seen as a great apologist for narcissistic philosophy.

Make hay while the sun shines, I always say.

I don’t see much utility in your critical comments. The fact here is that all the concerns encapsulated in these various threads, and certainly BigMike’s now declared reason for his deep preoccupation with death, limited time, fragility that (he says) push him toward conscious seriousness, is precisely the matter of concern for all of us, and a defining background of the extreme cultural angst so apparent all around us, and which seems to be moving to a crisis point.

Here is a short lecture outlining these concerns.

Seems sufficiently apropos, at least from where I sit: the Cat Bird’s Seat of Professional Narcissism.

[accelafine]

It’s easy to look at the young and see in them a kind of freedom that, in some ways, feels enviable. The freedom to be silly for the sake of it. To offend, not with malice, but with a kind of gleeful irreverence. To laugh at the world, at authority, at themselves, and feel as though time is infinite, stretched out before them like a long summer day. It’s part of what it means to be young, I suppose—that sense of limitless possibility, the feeling that there’s always more time to figure out what matters.

But five years ago, my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer, and that idea of infinite time was shattered. I don’t think I’d ever fully reckoned with just how finite life is until that moment. Of course, we all know it, intellectually. We know that life has an end, but we push that knowledge to the back of our minds because it’s uncomfortable. But when the person you love most in the world is suddenly staring down the possibility of not being here, that uncomfortable truth comes charging to the front. It demands your attention. And once it’s there, you can’t look away.

Her diagnosis drove home the reality that not just her time, but mine—and all of ours—is finite. There’s only so much of it. And it made me realize something I hadn’t quite understood before: that wasting time isn’t just a disservice to yourself; it’s a disservice to everyone around you. It’s taking something precious and throwing it away.

For me, that realization brought urgency. An urgency to stop wasting my time and to stop wasting other people’s time. I’m not saying there’s no room for laughter or for joy. God knows, laughter is what kept us afloat through some of the darkest moments. But what I’m saying is that there’s a difference between joy and distraction. There’s a difference between humor that connects and humor that tears down. There’s a difference between living fully and simply filling the hours.

If I have something to say before I leave this world—and, like it or not, we all leave it—I feel an urgency to say it now. Because the clock is ticking for all of us, whether we choose to hear it or not. My wife’s fight with cancer didn’t just remind me of that truth; it demanded that I live it. That I stop putting things off. That I stop wasting the time I’ve been given. And maybe more than anything, that I stop indulging in the kind of emptiness that serves no one.

So yes, there’s fun to be had in being silly, in pushing boundaries, in being irreverent. But at some point, if we’re lucky, we’re confronted with the reality that time isn’t infinite. And when that happens, we have a choice: to keep distracting ourselves or to get serious about the kind of legacy we’re leaving behind. For me, that legacy is about honesty, connection, and doing what I can to leave the world a little better than I found it. Because when all is said and done, that’s what matters most. At least, that’s what I’ve come to believe.

A heart-string tugging story for certain, but...

God knows,

Doesn't this shoot your OP in the foot?

Aren't you supposed to be non-Religious?

It's called a figure of speech, just as I might say 'Jesus Christ you are a total ********* with nothing interesting to say on any topic' (hypothetically of course).

[Alexis Jacobi]

“Just as a physician might say that there is very likely not one single living human being who is completely healthy, so anyone who really knows mankind might say there is not one single living human being who does not…secretly harbor an unrest, an inner strife, a disharmony, an anxiety about an unknown something or something he does not even dare to try to know, an anxiety about some possibility in existence or an anxiety about himself…an anxiety he cannot explain.”

— Soren Kierkegaard, The Sickness Unto Death

[Alexis Jacobi]

One other comment re: BigMike …

He wants, or he has no choice but to reduce Man to the physiological brain, but when we introduce what IC referred to as “mind” we come face to face with the chiefest of human contradictions: the conflict between “body” (animal existence, man in a meaningless material conundrum), and “mind” (man as a ‘self’ and as a complex symbol-making and symbol-perceiving being who cannot but conceive of transcendence out of and beyond horrifying limitations.)

What is all this mishegoss about “determinism”, then, in BigMike’s vision of himself, first and foremost, and of Man in this unfathomable world? It really makes no sense.

BigMike has symbolized man by a harsh imposition which he describes as “science truthfulness”. But really, what constructive function does this have?

[Dubious]

BigMike has symbolized man by a harsh imposition which he describes as “science truthfulness”. But really, what constructive function does this have?

...very little when taken at par compared to all that follows. As recently mentioned, determinism is the soil that grows its own crops as an endless sequence of variables indigenous to any civilization in the cosmos as symbolized by our own.

What is complexity for if not to generate the endless separate destinies which are all rooted in the same reality and subservient to its rules? What emerges from determinism is the Glass Bead Game of all subsequent existence managed through the interplay of symbols which derives its potency from that which underpins it long before any symbolizing consciousness was there to manifest itself in all its kaleidoscopic variety flowing unceasingly beyond its origins.

It's not possible to hold in one's cranium a hundred billion neurons linked by a network of a hundred trillion synaptic connections and default only to science or god for any kind of meaning being itself in a constant state of transfiguration and never finalized...except for those who purposely put an end to the process by closing the book on any sequel which is sure to emerge upon any prior thought or belief.

[BigMike]

One other comment re: BigMike …

He wants, or he has no choice but to reduce Man to the physiological brain, but when we introduce what IC referred to as “mind” we come face to face with the chiefest of human contradictions: the conflict between “body” (animal existence, man in a meaningless material conundrum), and “mind” (man as a ‘self’ and as a complex symbol-making and symbol-perceiving being who cannot but conceive of transcendence out of and beyond horrifying limitations.)

What is all this mishegoss about “determinism”, then, in BigMike’s vision of himself, first and foremost, and of Man in this unfathomable world? It really makes no sense.

BigMike has symbolized man by a harsh imposition which he describes as “science truthfulness”. But really, what constructive function does this have?

Alexis,

You’re raising what seems to be a common critique, but in doing so, you’ve sidestepped a central and undeniable feature of human existence—perhaps intentionally, perhaps not. You claim I “reduce” humanity to the physiological brain, as though acknowledging the physical processes underlying learning, memory, and behavior somehow strips away what makes us human. But in framing it this way, you miss what is, to me, the single most remarkable characteristic of humanity: our ability to learn and remember, and how this reshapes not just who we are but how we act. This isn’t some vague philosophical point; it’s the backbone of my view. And yet, it seems to be the one thing you, and most others here, consistently fail to engage with.

Let’s start with this: Do you acknowledge that memories are “stored” in the brain as physical alterations? Not as ethereal impressions, but as real, tangible changes to the brain’s structure? This is foundational. Memories reside in the strengthening or weakening of synaptic connections—those intricate links between neurons that adapt based on experience. When you learn something, whether it’s a philosophical argument or how to tie your shoes, your brain physically changes—almost permanently. The pathways that encode this information become more efficient, altering the “terrain” of your neural network. This isn’t conjecture or reductionism; it’s neuroscience, grounded in the laws of physics and chemistry.

So let me ask you directly: How do you think learning and memory work? Where do you think they reside, if not in the physical architecture of the brain? And why do you think anyone—yourself included—cannot acknowledge that studying, learning, and remembering something today can fundamentally alter what you do or say a year from now? What about this contradicts determinism? Because unless you can explain how memory and learning exist outside the realm of physical processes, your argument becomes little more than discomfort with the implications of what we already know.

Let me paint this in a way that might resonate with you. Imagine a river delta—a vast, intricate network of branching streams and tributaries. The path of each drop of water, each individual molecule, is determined entirely by the topology of the delta, the slope of the land, and the force of the water pushing behind it. There’s no mystery here, no agency in the water itself. When it reaches a fork, it doesn’t stop to ponder which way to flow. It simply follows the inevitable course dictated by gravity, pressure, and the physical constraints of the branching channels.

Now, picture your nervous system as that river delta. Electrical signals—like the water molecules—flow through this vast network of synaptic pathways. Their path is determined by the architecture of the neural connections, the strength of the synapses, and the electrochemical conditions at that moment. What we perceive as “choices” are not conscious deliberations but the inevitable result of these signals flowing through the prearranged structure of your brain.

But here’s the key: unlike the static delta, the brain is dynamic. Learning and memory reshape it. Studying a subject today is like carving a new channel in the delta, redirecting the flow of signals. As those pathways are strengthened, they influence how you act tomorrow, a year from now, or decades into the future. This process is deterministic, but it’s anything but static or limiting. It’s what allows us to adapt, to grow, to change. And it is precisely what makes humans unique among the animals.

This is where your critique, and those of many others here, fails to land. You speak of the “mind” as though it’s something separate from the brain, something transcendent that operates beyond the deterministic processes of matter. But what is the “mind,” if not the functioning of the brain? The thoughts you have, the symbols you perceive, the metaphors you create—all of it emerges from the physical processes of neurons firing, synapses connecting, and memories shaping the flow of those signals. The very act of conceiving of transcendence, of pondering the limits of existence, is itself the product of deterministic forces playing out in your neural architecture.

You accuse me of imposing a “harsh” vision of “science truthfulness,” as though this perspective is somehow reductive or dehumanizing. But in reality, it’s the opposite. Understanding the physical basis of learning and memory doesn’t strip away meaning; it enriches it. It shows us how deeply connected we are to the causal fabric of the universe, how every experience leaves an imprint, and how those imprints shape the very essence of who we are. Recognizing that our actions are determined by this interplay of forces isn’t a denial of humanity—it’s an embrace of it.

You ask what constructive function this has. Let me tell you: understanding that our learning, our growth, and our actions are all part of a deterministic process gives us the tools to shape the future. It allows us to recognize the profound impact of education, of knowledge, of deliberate effort to create positive changes in ourselves and in the world. When we see that learning reshapes the neural pathways that guide our actions, we understand why it matters to seek truth, to expand our perspectives, to teach and to learn. Far from being nihilistic or fatalistic, this understanding is profoundly empowering.

So, Alexis, here’s my challenge to you: If you truly believe that the “mind” operates outside the deterministic processes of the brain, explain how. Don’t hide behind poetic abstractions or appeals to transcendence. Show me, in concrete terms, where learning and memory reside if not in the physical structure of the brain. Show me how they operate if not through the strengthening and weakening of synaptic connections. And explain why recognizing this would diminish the value of human experience, rather than deepening it.

Until then, all you’ve done is restate your resistance to what the evidence already tells us. The nervous system, like the river delta, is a marvel of deterministic design. Its ability to adapt, to reshape, to learn, and to grow is what makes us human. And in that, Alexis, I find more meaning and wonder than any myth of free will could ever provide.

[Atla]

But here’s the key: unlike the static delta, the brain is dynamic. Learning and memory reshape it. Studying a subject today is like carving a new channel in the delta, redirecting the flow of signals. As those pathways are strengthened, they influence how you act tomorrow, a year from now, or decades into the future. This process is deterministic, but it’s anything but static or limiting. It’s what allows us to adapt, to grow, to change. And it is precisely what makes humans unique among the animals.

You mean, the brains of all animals are dynamic, so in that regard we aren't unique among the animals at all. I guess you meant that, because we humans possess enough intelligent volitional self-consciousness, we can deliberately change (rewire) ourselves on a level that's unique, unprecedented among animals.

And as usual you're fundamentally wrong, since the average intelligence of humans is too low, only say about 20-30% of humans can do this on a sufficient level. The rest are more like automatons, and could only be rewired sufficiently by a well-meaning world government, which they won't elect.