Why Do the Religious Reject Science While Embracing the Impossible?

[BigMike]

You clearly don’t deny the facts—not really. You admit causality. You acknowledge the collapse of old metaphysical frameworks. You know, deep down, that the deterministic model is solid. You just don’t like where it leads. So instead of walking forward, you dance around it with lyrical resignation and ironic distance.

You have never, it seems, read carefully what I have written. You are super head-strong and as a preacher of a physicalist theology, you have arrived at all your conclusions. These are absolutely solid and inarguable. That is why I refer to your philosophy as “absolutist”.

I already explained, very clearly, that I accept the general notion of determinism. And that I still believe that we — human beings — can and do act in creative ways though we exist within structures that were set in motion previously.

The largest difference though is that I am not an atheist as you are. All this has been explained! But no part of it do you or can you accept!

Mike: I UNDERSTAND!

Alexis, if you understand, then you also understand why I keep pressing. Because what you’ve described here—accepting determinism, but clinging to a vaguely defined creative exception, and sheltering it behind non-atheistic language—isn’t coherence. It’s compartmentalization.

You say you accept determinism “in general,” yet insist we somehow still “act in creative ways.” But creativity, too, flows from cause. Novelty is not magic—it’s emergence from complexity. The composer’s symphony, the painter’s brushstroke, the thinker’s insight—these arise not despite determinism but because of it, through a rich weave of memory, biology, emotion, environment, and iteration. None of it requires a free-floating self or supernatural spark.

So what exactly is this “belief” you won’t let go of? If you acknowledge cause and effect, what remains for your god to do—besides serve as a placeholder for your discomfort with letting go of the old myths?

You call my approach “absolutist,” but that’s projection. I’m not the one declaring immunity from cause. I’m the one following the chain all the way down—willing to live with the consequences. You, on the other hand, want to say “yes” to determinism, while keeping a poetic back door open for metaphysics to slip in. That’s not understanding. That’s hedging.

You don't have to become an atheist. But you do have to ask yourself: if I accept cause, what justification do I have for invoking anything beyond it? If you can't answer that—if all you can offer is "but I just believe"—then you're not operating with understanding. You're just dressing nostalgia in philosophical robes.

So I’ll ask plainly, one last time:
What does your belief add? What does it explain, predict, or clarify that naturalism doesn't?

If you can't answer that with more than style and sentiment, then maybe it's not determinism that’s the problem. Maybe it's just honesty that’s uncomfortable.

[henry quirk]

AJ, I apologize if I mischaracterize you, or if you feel used.

I think you're on to sumthin' with AJ. I've read him for a while now, and yes, it does seem he's moving away from one place and toward another. But, it seems to me, he's moving away from the black pit of a kingdom of meat machines not toward it.

Like many of us who oppose you (myself included), he, I think, was once mired in that black pit of machinism you favor, and like many who oppose you (myself included) he, I think, caught a glimpse of sumthin' or someone beyond or outside that black pit.

Mebbe you'll catch your own glimpse one day. For your own sake I hope you do cuz where you are now is empty. It's the Void, and you can't fill it.

[henry quirk]

Mike: I demand evidence!

AJ: I would love to provide it, but...

AJ: But what?

AJ...you don't have the eyes to see it.

[BigMike]

AJ, I apologize if I mischaracterize you, or if you feel used.

I think you're on to sumthin' with AJ. I've read him for a while now, and yes, it does seem he's moving away from one place and toward another. But, it seems to me, he's moving away from the black pit of a kingdom of meat machines not toward it.

Like many of us who oppose you (myself included), he, I think, was once mired in that black pit of machinism you favor, and like many who oppose you (myself included) he, I think, caught a glimpse of sumthin' or someone beyond or outside that black pit.

Mebbe you'll catch your own glimpse one day. For your own sake I hope you do cuz where you are now is empty. It's the Void, and you can't fill it.

Henry, let’s get something straight: you’re not “opposing me.” You’re opposing reality—cause, effect, physics, neuroscience, and everything else that makes sense of the world without invoking ghosts or cosmic whispers.

You talk about my view as a “black pit” and “machinism,” as if facing how things actually work is some kind of spiritual disease. It’s not. What’s empty is pretending we need to hallucinate magic or divine puppeteers to make life meaningful. That’s not depth—it’s fear with a costume on.

And let’s be honest: your whole post reeks of projection. You accuse me of being in “the void,” but you're the one terrified of a world that doesn’t bend to human fantasy. You're so afraid of determinism that you’d rather invent metaphysical fluff than deal with the simple, humbling truth: we are caused, through and through. That doesn’t make us meaningless. It makes us real.

So no—I’m not in a pit. I’m standing on solid ground. You just can’t accept that your myths don’t make the earth firmer beneath your feet. You need “someone beyond” because you can’t bear that you are not beyond the laws of nature. That’s your fear—not my void.

And if Alexis is “moving away,” it’s not because he saw the light. It’s because he blinked when the truth got too bright. I didn’t flinch. That’s the difference.

So let’s not pretend this is some noble resistance to a lifeless worldview. You’re not resisting nihilism.
You’re resisting clarity.

[henry quirk]

you’re not “opposing me.”

Yes, I am. You and your religion.

So no—I’m not in a pit.

Yeah, you are, and not even Puddleglum can save you. You cannot hear him and you cannot see the Light he points to.

It may be just too late for you to catch that glimpse.

I pity you.

[BigMike]

you’re not “opposing me.”

Yes, I am. You and your religion.

So no—I’m not in a pit.

Yeah, you are, and not even Puddleglum can save you. You cannot hear him and you cannot see the Light he points to.

It may be too late for you to catch that glimpse.

I pity you.

Henry, pity’s a poor substitute for an argument.

If you’re really “opposing me,” then oppose me with substance. Show me what I’ve said that’s factually wrong, logically incoherent, or scientifically unsupported. But you won’t, because you can’t. You’re not debating me—you’re defending your discomfort with reality by romanticizing denial and calling it faith.

This whole “pit and light” narrative is just projection with a fantasy filter. You need a myth to feel anchored. I don’t. You need someone to save you. I don’t. And that difference unsettles you more than anything I’ve said.

You say I’m beyond saving. Fine. Let’s agree then—you keep your sky lanterns. I’ll keep my facts.
And we’ll both see who needs the other when the lights actually go out.

That’s all I have for you.

[Atla]

How does a perpetual afterimage of things that have already happened, "do" anything?

The current temporal state of existence exists.
The current temporal state of existence is as real as any preceding or proceeding temporal state of existence.

To describe the current temporal state of existence as an 'afterimage', is poetic language - but misleading.

A stone crushes a flower.
The stone did not aim or intend to crush the flower.
The stone's momentum/trajectory led to the outcome of the flower being crushed.
The stone can contribute to the outcome of the flower being crushed in the absence of freedom.
The stone was determined to crush the flower, based on the forces that affected the stone.
The flower would not have been crushed in the absence of the stone.

We can act volitionally, in accord with our will -
but our volition and will were not products of volition / will.
They were the inevitable product/unfolding/procession from a prior temporal state of existence,
far preceding every form of life.

A person can contribute to an outcome - but only as they were determined to do so.
Our presence affects the environment, as the environment affects us.
It is a feedback loop - but a determined one.
The illusion is not that we can have affect,
the illusion is that the effect we have was ever going to be different.
The illusion we have is that our 'choice' is not genuine, as there was only one outcome.
We experience the process of choosing and evaluating,
but our 'choices' are products of an environment that existed before us -
a chain of causality that existed before the earth.

Stones do things.
People do things.
Things determined by forces/processes/mechanisms present before they stones/people were things.
If there is only one outcome, and that outcome was determined before we existed, then we do not have meaningful freedom.

Natural selection has no aim or intent.
Natural selection has an outcome, but no preferences.
Natural selection is indifferent to whether a species goes extinct or flourishes.
Natural selection is anthropomorphized by foolish beings who think an indifferent process wants any outcome.

The result/outcome of natural selection are being that are well adapted to surviving in their environment.
This was not by design, or intent or preference.
It was an inevitable outcome of the selection pressures living beings mutated under.

We are natural.
Everything we do is natural.
All our advancements,
raise the bar for the capacity of what nature can do -
as all we do is a part of nature.

We cannot transcend nature.
We demonstrate nature's capacity for brilliance -
nature's capacity for complexity and variety.
But we will always be a product of nature,
and anything we ever create or do,
will themselves also be part of nature -
as they emerged from nature.

Artificial / man-made are subcategories of nature.
Differentiating between aspects of nature that occur due to the present of homo sapiens,
as opposed to aspects and environments that are present in the absence of homo sapiens.
There is much utility in this distinction,
but do not mistake any of our actions as unnatural -
that'd be a flaw of your thinking.

We're more intelligent than natural selection.
Natural selection has no intelligence, it isn't conscious.
Our interests, shaped and endowed by natural selection,
do not need to align with natural selection -
we can defy it.
We can cause artificial selection,
or artificially affect the development of our species.

Natural selection has it's limits.
It can only cause change incrementally,
where each increment must itself provide advantage of previous increments.
And once a mechanism is shaped that can meet a survival need of a being,
natural selection cannot go back to the drawing board with that species and make drastic changes in light of new information.
It's dumb and short sighted.

Guess who has the capacity to not be short sighted?
Homo sapiens.
We were endowed with intelligence and reason.
We can evaluate our internal and external environment,
and construct plans and strategies for actualizing our goals.
Making WISE decisions.

That something was in the past,
does not mean we ought seek it in the present.
That natural selection shaped us in the past,
does not mean we ought look to natural selection as a guideline for how to progress in the future.

We can recognize what's in our health.
We can recognize our wants and needs.
We can evaluate what is of utility or detrimental to our objectives.

Natural selection is blind.
We do not have to be blind,
despite many acting so.

Yes, obviously.

[BigMike]

Alexis, if you've never read Caught in the Pulpit: Leaving Belief Behind by Daniel Dennett and Linda LaScola, I’d encourage you to. It’s not a book of polemics. It’s a quiet, sobering account of clergy—priests, pastors, ministers—who spent years preaching belief systems they no longer accepted, trapped in roles that no longer fit, terrified to admit the truth even to themselves.

These were not shallow thinkers. They were often devout, deeply reflective people who wrestled, sometimes for decades, with growing doubts. The picture the book paints is not one of triumph or rebellion—it’s one of spiritual suffocation. People waking up in slow motion, realizing that what once gave them comfort now keeps them captive.

They speak of the psychological prison—the fear of losing community, livelihood, identity. Of being surrounded by people who would condemn them not for doing harm, but simply for being honest. They describe the panic of knowing that their inner world no longer matched the words they spoke from the pulpit. And the exhaustion of pretending day after day. Of living a split existence—one face for the world, and another they dared show only to their notebooks or late-night thoughts.

But here’s what also comes through: the relief, the clarity, the freedom that came with finally saying it out loud: “I don’t believe this anymore.” Many didn’t know where they would land. But they knew they couldn’t keep selling a worldview they didn’t actually believe just because it once gave them purpose.

And Alexis, in your writing, I see hints of the same tension. The lyrical hedging. The poetic evasions. The insistence on “not denying” science, while refusing to accept where it leads. That’s not a refutation—it’s a stall. It’s a man who suspects the old framework is broken but doesn’t want to let it go, because it feels like losing something irreplaceable.

I’m not saying you’re a priest in a pulpit. But I am saying you’re defending something you no longer fully believe. Not because it’s true, but because it’s familiar. Because it feels human. Because it once provided shelter.

But Alexis—truth is a better shelter. Because truth doesn’t need upkeep. It doesn’t require hymns or hedges or metaphysical fog to survive. It just is. And once you let go of the need for mystery to feel sacred, you discover something more profound than myth: reality. Causal, intricate, beautiful.

The clergy in Caught in the Pulpit didn’t stop caring about meaning. They stopped faking it. And in doing so, they discovered a deeper kind of integrity. You don’t need to abandon depth or wonder or poetry. But you do need to stop hiding behind them when the facts are knocking.

The leap is hard. But the air is clean on the other side.

[henry quirk]

we are caused, through and through

Indeed we are: by the Creator, and by ourselves.

We're not meat machines. We're each of us (includin' you) a free will and a moral being.

Ain't nuthin' more beautiful than bein' self-directing, self-reliant, and self-responsible.

Ain't nuthin' more ugly than bein' meaningless, empty, meat.

So: why is bein' meaningless, empty, meat so appealing to you?

I face up to facts, Henry.

Yeah, that's what you say, but -- c'mon -- you go well beyond that. You don't face facts (if indeed they are facts [jury is still out on that]) you embrace them. You love them. Your identity is undergirded by the mere possibility that mebbe you are less.

You choose to be less.

As I say: I pity you that you should choose such a thing.

[henry quirk]

The would be meat machine: I demand evidence!

The person: I would love to provide it, but...

The would be meat machine: But what?

The person:...you don't have the eyes to see it.

[Alexis Jacobi]

BigMike: The clergy in Caught in the Pulpit didn’t stop caring about meaning. They stopped faking it. And in doing so, they discovered a deeper kind of integrity. You don’t need to abandon depth or wonder or poetry. But you do need to stop hiding behind them when the facts are knocking.

The leap is hard. But the air is clean on the other side.

I don’t know this book or the author(s) though I read reviews on good reads.

It is very easy for me to understand how and why Christian clergy no longer believe the Story. The Story is (in so many cases) just that: a narrative with various purposes. If you are a religious literalist today you will inevitably have many problems to solve!

I see into and through this and all Story. And to what operates behind it. That can be alluded to but I do not think it can be explained like you can explain metallurgy or science fundamentals.

The Religions are, in my view, repositories of the experience of men in living of life. You (I mean the Dawkins-minded) will never be able to do away with the meaning that stands behind the presentations. Men will perennially seek it.

But where is it? It does not have tangible existence. For that reason — communicative efficiency — I use the term metaphysical.

But here is the key: If you believe you have theological knowledge you must prove it. And you can only carry that out through putting yourself on the line in the sense of operating your knowledge.

How could I explain to a man geared like BigMike to employ his self in (for lack of a better word) experiments through which a providential power manifests?

Other issues and questions — those that are of a theological sort like grace, salvation, spiritual deliverance, analysis of oneself on a social level, etc. — those are areas that concern those involved in spiritual life. Those involved, know. They live in that world.

Other issues like fracturation of even the possibility of “belief” — these are other topics.

No part of this present conversation changes anything about my position or outlook. I said sll of this at the beginning!

[BigMike]

BigMike: The clergy in Caught in the Pulpit didn’t stop caring about meaning. They stopped faking it. And in doing so, they discovered a deeper kind of integrity. You don’t need to abandon depth or wonder or poetry. But you do need to stop hiding behind them when the facts are knocking.

The leap is hard. But the air is clean on the other side.

I don’t know this book or the author(s) though I read reviews on good reads.

It is very easy for me to understand how and why Christian clergy no longer believe the Story. The Story is (in so many cases) just that: a narrative with various purposes. If you are a religious literalist today you will inevitably have many problems to solve!

I see into and through this and all Story. And to what operates behind it. That can be alluded to but I do not think it can be explained like you can explain metallurgy or science fundamentals.

The Religions are, in my view, repositories of the experience of men in living of life. You (I mean the Dawkins-minded) will never be able to do away with the meaning that stands behind the presentations. Men will perennially seek it.

But where is it? It does not have tangible existence. For that reason — communicative efficiency — I use the term metaphysical.

But here is the key: If you believe you have theological knowledge you must prove it. And you can only carry that out through putting yourself on the line in the sense of operating your knowledge.

How could I explain to a man geared like BigMike to employ his self in (for lack of a better word) experiments through which a providential power manifests?

Other issues and questions — those that are of a theological sort like grace, salvation, spiritual deliverance, analysis of oneself on a social level, etc. — those are areas that concern those involved in spiritual life. Those involved, know. They live in that world.

Other issues like fracturation of even the possibility of “belief” — these are other topics.

No part of this present conversation changes anything about my position or outlook. I said sll of this at the beginning!

Alexis, this is the moment where I have to say: you're still doing it. Still sidestepping. Still wrapping your reluctance in ornate language and calling it insight.

You say you "see into and through all Story"—but that’s a claim, not a demonstration. You speak of what “operates behind it,” and of “metaphysical” meaning that can’t be touched or tested or shared. That’s not a foundation. That’s a fog. It’s exactly the evasive posture Caught in the Pulpit lays bare—the one where you preserve an aura of spiritual depth by declaring it inaccessible, undefinable, and thus, conveniently, unaccountable.

You say, “Other issues like fracturation of even the possibility of belief… these are other topics.” No, Alexis. That is the topic. That fracture—the split between what people want to believe and what the facts allow—is the very tension your responses revolve around. And you keep dancing around it instead of confronting it.

You don't have to be a literalist to outgrow the Story. You just have to be honest. The clergy in Caught in the Pulpit weren’t denouncing poetry or meaning. They were denouncing pretense. They didn’t lose their sense of awe—they gained the courage to stop dressing it up as revelation.

You say: “Those involved, know.” But no, Alexis. That’s not knowledge. That’s insulation. That’s a wall of innuendo built to shield a claim from scrutiny. If it can’t be tested, can’t be explained, can’t be falsified—then it isn’t something you know. It’s something you feel. And feelings are fine—but they don’t get to dictate what’s real.

If you want to live in a symbolic world where metaphors stand in for truth, that's your right. But don’t pretend it’s a higher form of understanding. It’s a retreat. A beautiful one, maybe. A poetic one. But still a retreat from the raw clarity that determinism—and scientific truth—demands.

So no, nothing here changes your outlook. But maybe, just maybe, you’ll notice that what you’re defending is not meaning—but your resistance to meaning that doesn’t need mysticism to matter.

The clergy who stepped out of the pulpit didn’t lose faith in meaning. They just stopped hiding from reality. You can too. The door’s open.

And Alexis—if I may ask you something a little more personal:

How do you want to spend the rest of your years?

Not in abstract metaphors or clever prose, but in real, lived time. When the veil of poetic ambiguity lifts—and it will, because age has a way of stripping us down to the bone—what will you have stood for? What will be left when the metaphors stop working?

If you have descendants—children, students, readers—how do you want them to remember you?

As someone who clung to beautiful but unprovable stories out of nostalgia for mystery? As someone who wove elaborate justifications to avoid facing the raw, elegant truth of the universe? As a conflicted, brilliant, but ultimately evasive man who never quite had the courage to walk fully into the light?

Or will they remember you as the man who, when faced with the truth, chose it—not because it flattered him, not because it made him feel warm, but because it was real?

There’s no shame in realizing you’ve outgrown the myths that once gave you comfort. The shame lies in knowing that, and still pretending otherwise.

You can keep dancing. Or you can step forward with integrity, clarity, and peace.

It's your story. But at some point, you'll stop writing it. And what’s left is what people will read.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Did you think that I thought even for one fraction of a second that my last post would influence you?

Yours is a scientistic physicalism, expressed by a mathematical-type personality, neurotically driven and deeply involved in a neo-absolutism.

You’ve chosen your path, m’boy!

I recommend that you remember what ol’ Plato said in The Laws …

[BigMike]

Did you think that I thought even for one fraction of a second that my last post would influence you?

Yours is a scientistic physicalism, expressed by a mathematical-type personality, neurotically driven and deeply involved in a neo-absolutism.

You’ve chosen your path, m’boy!

I recommend that you remember what ol’ Plato said in The Laws …

Alexis—

Quoting Plato won’t save you from answering simple, direct questions. You say my view is driven by “scientistic physicalism,” “neurotically” and with “neo-absolutism,” as if calling it names makes the facts any less solid. But it’s not my attitude you’re resisting. It’s the truth you already suspect is right.

And no, I didn’t think your last post was meant to influence me—because it wasn’t even meant to respond to what I asked you. You’ve sidestepped, again.

You called my position a “partial truth.” I asked:

1. Do you agree with the facts I laid out about determinism, causality, and the origin of our decisions?
2. If so, what is missing? What would make the truth more “complete” in your view?
3. And what part of my “proverbial nutshell” do you actually object to—factually, not stylistically?

You ignored every one.

Instead, you quote Plato like it’s a spell against clarity—like some wise father figure telling me not to trust the sharpness of my own eyes because I’m too young, too headstrong. But that’s not an argument. It’s condescension disguised as caution.

And let’s be honest: if you actually had answers—solid, grounded answers—you wouldn’t need to call my worldview a disease or hide behind Plato’s worry about youthful atheism. You’d show what I’ve missed. But you can’t. Because you’re not opposing me—you’re opposing reality, and your evasions are your only armor.

So here’s one more thing Plato said, since you like him so much:

“We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.”

Take care, Alexis. And good luck finding the courage to face it.

[Alexis Jacobi]

You can keep dancing. Or you can step forward with integrity, clarity, and peace.

Here I go again!