Why Do the Religious Reject Science While Embracing the Impossible?

[Gary Childress]

I mean, talk to me AJ. I know you see my posts and I know you fear open honest dialog with me.

[Gary Childress]

He jumped off line. Hiding in the shadows, the great mountaineer Alexis cannot confront the "sick" Gary in open dialog. Dishonesty prevails. Jesus would be very unhappy right now.

[Alexis Jacobi]

…you don’t engage with the argument—you psychoanalyze the person making it.

I have transcended argument with you, BigMike.

As to the psychic/psychological aspect of how we view things: yes, it is a big part of how I see things and what is ultimately of relevance in this discussion.

[Gary Childress]

…you don’t engage with the argument—you psychoanalyze the person making it.

I have transcended argument with you, BigMike.

As to the psychic/psychological aspect of how we view things: yes, it is a big part of how I see things and what is ultimately of relevance in this discussion.

Psychologism. The psychiatrist becomes supreme.

[Gary Childress]

Seriously, AJ. Come talk to me. Or is it beneath you to talk to "sick" Gary?

[BigMike]

Excellent!

Lately, a man (Gary) who reads as symptom of the sickness of an era, who simply put cannot, and wills not to, accept life in its tragic aspect (inevitable if life is understood as mutability, instability); whose discourse is all about complaint, weakness, withdraw, timid fear, and incapacity to find for himself a means of service to life, in life, and to others; whose discourse has no self-identity, no sense of exalted self, no means of asserting himself through acts of power, through decisiveness; whose discourse details a longing to die and in the meantime depends on the pharmaceutical industry that provides him with brain-altering chemicals …

…who cannot arrive at any empowering sense of what divine entity is in this weird World of Woe, and whose concept of Christianity is of weakness, disempowerment and ultimately of nihilism (Gary is in this sense an outcome of a debilitating feminine-minded Christianity) …

… has now become a Handmaiden in Argument to BigMike who, it sure begins to seem so, presents a strange scientistic Ponzi Scheme of the Mind, involving a physiological- philosophical anthropological ideology which must be beat into the mind with overblown physicalist rhetoric that takes virulent issue with any framework of perception that is not its own …

In this sense (I speculate) the Philosophy of Big Mike is one that dovetails with on-going trends visible and noticeable around us. It will take advantage of the weak and the profoundly unhappy as it seeks dominance in the idea-sphere, and so (potentially) gain ground in the political sphere. It involves an “appeal” to weak and weak-minded men who cannot face the rigor of life and who long for an “easy route” through life which has never been defined as easy in this flaccid (American Walmart) sense.

Anyway, just a few unedited thoughts on the implications of these BigMikean ideas.

Alexis, that’s quite the theatrical outburst—so much so that it’s hard to tell if you’re engaging in philosophy or just indulging in personal caricatures. But let’s cut through the noise.

You frame suffering and instability as some grand existential necessity, a thing to be embraced, rather than what it actually is—a problem to be solved wherever possible. You mistake rejecting needless suffering for rejecting life itself. But understanding suffering as a consequence of deterministic causes doesn’t mean shrinking from life—it means recognizing why things are the way they are and using that understanding to make them better.

Your attempt to paint determinism as an “appeal to weakness” is just another version of the same tired Nietzschean machismo—as if seeing reality clearly and rationally is some kind of moral failing. But tell me, what exactly is strong about clinging to metaphysical crutches, mystical justifications, and poetic fatalism? What’s empowering about throwing up your hands and declaring suffering noble rather than asking what causes it and how to prevent it?

You throw around words like “scientistic Ponzi Scheme” and “virulent rhetoric” as if explaining how reality actually works is some sort of manipulative power play rather than an attempt to understand and improve the human condition. And in classic fashion, when faced with a view that challenges yours, you don’t engage with the argument—you psychoanalyze the person making it.

The real irony? You claim to champion “strength” and “rigor,” yet your entire approach is built on retreating into mysticism the moment the physical world doesn’t conform to your grand vision. You prefer poetic fatalism over actual solutions. That’s not strength—it’s resignation dressed up as wisdom.

Nazi Germany was a product of Nietzsche and Heidegger. Nationalism. Race. Strength. In effect, Social Darwinism.

Gary, exactly. The whole "strength through suffering" narrative has been used to justify some of history's worst ideologies. It’s no coincidence that Nietzschean machismo fed directly into the kind of brutal nationalism that saw power and domination as virtues. When people start romanticizing hardship and struggle as ends in themselves, it’s not long before they start justifying oppression and cruelty as necessary evils.

True strength isn’t about embracing suffering—it’s about minimizing unnecessary suffering and building a world where people don’t have to endure misery just to develop resilience. The idea that hardship is what makes life meaningful is just a convenient excuse for those who benefit from maintaining systems of suffering.

[Alexiev]

Alexiev, you’re conflating the existence of suffering with its necessity for meaning. Just because courage exists in response to hardship doesn’t mean hardship is needed for a meaningful life. That’s like saying disease is necessary because it gives doctors a purpose—no, doctors exist because disease exists, but if we could eliminate disease, we would. No sane person would argue for preserving it just to keep the medical profession alive.

Suffering happens. No one is denying that. But treating it like some grand prerequisite for human virtue is just an attempt to romanticize what is, in reality, a brute fact of existence. Sure, mountaineers seek out danger, but they choose their suffering in controlled circumstances. That’s not the same as the unavoidable, senseless suffering of war, poverty, disease, and injustice—suffering that serves no higher purpose, that grinds people down rather than elevating them.

Your stance amounts to saying, Since suffering and death are inevitable, we might as well embrace them! But that’s just resignation in poetic form. Recognizing that suffering exists doesn’t mean we should stop trying to reduce it where possible. The fact that you can find meaning in suffering doesn’t mean suffering itself is inherently meaningful.

There’s no contradiction in enjoying adventure, taking risks, and making the most of life while still working to minimize pointless suffering for those who don’t have the luxury of choosing their hardships. It’s not a binary choice between embracing suffering or becoming some lifeless, fearful shut-in. It’s about understanding the difference between challenge and cruelty, between struggle and suffering that serves no purpose.

Of course we should try to minimize pointless suffering. I never suggested otherwise. Instead I pointed out that suffering is a necessary condition for certain virtues.

Doesn't love cause horrible suffering? What's worse than having a beloved child die? We can try to limit that suffering by improving medical care and nutrition for children. We could also limit suffering by never having children and never falling in love (our beloved might reject us or die).

If we see the human condition as a struggle against suffering we might protect ourselves by never caring and never loving. Indeed, this seems to be a theme in Hinduism or Buddhism. Eliminate suffering by removing yourself from worldly cares which build kharma.

I don't buy the approach. If we live actively and joyously and lovingly we embrace earthly desires, and by embracing them open ourselves up to suffering. It is because we love the world that death is huge. If we reject the world (like Gary, or like a Buddhist monk) the suffering inherent in death is mitigated. Is that really what we want?

[Gary Childress]

The return of the Social Darwinists. Not a good thing.

[Gary Childress]

AJ may need to invent a sock puppet to engage me. I sense he won't engage me up front, openly and honestly.

[Gary Childress]

Are you powered up yet, Alexis? Do you have what it takes yet?

[Alexis Jacobi]

I am in a Primal Scream therapy session. I will be available later. Please consider a donation. I can be loquacious when the coins are tossed …

[Gary Childress]

I am in a Primal Scream therapy session. I will be available later. Please consider a donation. I can be loquacious when the coins are tossed …

OK. Well, when you get your primal screams out. Just don't come hunting me with a butcher knife while wearing a hockey mask.

[Gary Childress]

You still out there, Alexis? How are your "mountaineering" skills going?

[Gary Childress]

Seriously, though, Alexis. Is there something wrong with avoiding pain or are you a masochist? If you are a masochist, then just don't turn sadist.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Hold on. Have I said anything unwittingly offensive?!? If yes, what?