patrick.net

marcus says

Because I'm defending spiritual belief(s) as something I'm not going judge.

What fucking bullshit. You would judge any politically unacceptable spiritual belief, of which there are many in the world. Hundreds of millions of Muslims believe that a woman who has been raped should be killed. It's called honor killing. That's a spiritual belief held by many devote Muslims in the Middle East. Do tell me that you are not going to judge that belief.

Both the Old Testament and the New Testament are unequivocally pro-slavery -- please challenge me on that so I can start quoting the fucking Bible like crazy. Are you not going to judge those spiritual beliefs?

Tens of millions of Christians in America believe that a soul is imbued into an egg at the moment of fertilization making the fertilized egg a child of their god and thus justifying anything to stop abortions including
- legal trickery like writing laws designed to shut down abortion clinics for arbitrary reasons
- literally requiring a girl or woman to submit to rape -- yes, the legal definition of rape -- in order to get an abortion
- shamming girls and women who seek abortions
- bombing abortion clinics and killing the doctors who perform abortions

There is no rational discussion of abortion that can be had with a person stupid and delusional enough to believe in a mystical soul imbuing a fertilized egg. That belief makes it impossible to reason with the person.

But you are not going to judge the belief that "god is calling us to bomb abortion clinics"?

Are you also not going to judge the belief that "homosexuality is an abomination"?

Quite frankly, if you are not repulsed by the above spiritual beliefs, then you are judging them positively. So get off your high horse. You don't have the moral high ground here.

Any belief can be vile. Adding superstition to a belief or calling it "spiritual" does not condone a vile belief.

marcus says

But also I'm not going to rail against people with more simplistic childlike versions of belief because here,

Hypocritical bullshit.

There is nothing childish about anything I've posted on this thread. You are using the word childish to disparage and dismiss your opponent's arguments without addressing the content of those arguments, and that is very childish. And adult doesn't respond to an intellectual challenge with a "you're a poopy-head, so your words don't count". No, an adult responds to a challenge of his philosophy by rationally and honestly defending his position, or if he cannot, by honestly abandoning his position.

Dan8267 says

marcus says

Because I'm defending spiritual belief(s) as something I'm not going judge.

What fucking bullshit.

Again with the interpreting to fit the argument you want to make.

What I mean and what was clear from almost the entire bold paragraph is that I am not going to make generalized judgements.

Why not read at least the whole paragraph think about what my intended point was and then respond, rather than getting all excited about some phrase that you can use as a jumping off point to say what you want to say that's totally unrelated to my point.

This is the response I get to a thoughtful attempt to respond to your saying I'm being deliberately evasive.

Dan8267 says

But you are not going to judge the belief that "god is calling us to bomb abortion clinics"?

Okay. Thank you Dan.

Richard Dawkins recently had an epiphany after writing books and spending years as a hero to the 'strong atheist' circle jerk crowd.

“I have mixed feelings about the decline of Christianity, in so far as Christianity might be a bulwark against something worse,” he said.

Sure, he is referring to radical Islam. But the same logic applies to the better Christian faiths versus the more fundamentalist and radical ones. These days in many parts of the U.S. if you're inclined to be in a religion, some BS fundamentalist church is your only option. This is sad.

Of the following two, which is more possible, and which is more likely to lead to mankind eventually flourishing ?

1) The end of all religion and all spiritual beliefs as we know them.

or

2) The growth of better religions and spiritual practices replacing many or most of the more ignorant or fundamentalist religions and practices, of course while still having a significant percentage of atheists, agnostics, ignostics, etc.

marcus says

But this is all beside the point or any point that I'm making in this thread. I'm not going to argue this (physics) any further, because you confuse my insistence on the existence of mystery as being tied to some argument I'm making about god. It's not.

The mystery is the universe itself. Why is it there? What is its nature?
But there is no mystery in how the things we see and that affect us work. We have described it precisely and its description is complete enough that it doesn't leave any room for something else. Not that the description is perfect, but it is precise and covers everything we see and measure.

Of course there is room for imagining things we don't see and don't affect us in any way. Other planes of existence, or whatever. As long as it doesn't affect us and is not measurable in any way. But it would be very stupid to spend time worshiping something that doesn't affect us, wouldn't it?

So this is simple: we are not going to speculate about what can exist. All we want you to admit is this: in all things that affect us at a physical level, there is no room for imagining anything else than what is described by the laws of physics.

Dan8267 says

marcus says

But also I'm not going to rail against people with more simplistic childlike versions of belief because here,

Hypocritical bullshit.

I wasn't using the word childish in reference to you. Maybe give me the benefit of the doubt, at least until you've made some minimal attempt to understand what I'm saying.

Heraclitusstudent says

The mystery is the universe itself. Why is it there?

Agreed.

Heraclitusstudent says

in all things that affect us at a physical level, there is no room for imagining anything else than what is described by the laws of physics.

Admit ?

I never said that I thought there was a "being" manipulating our physical reality. If it makes you happy I will say that I do not believe in the existence of anything of that kind.

But your statement went a little further. Let me ask you a question. Is my consciousness, or your consciousness or even all consciousness that we might be aware of
(that is the consciousness of all humans and other sentient or semi sentient life forms(such as dogs)), is that part of our physical reality ? It seems like an important question since most people believe it is generated by our brains, which are clearly part of our physical reality.

Keep in mind, it's just a question. I'm not one that gets uncomfortable when I don't have the answer to questions. I have no need to reduce conscious experience to nothing more than biology, chemistry and psychology. Who knows, maybe you understand that they have no clue what consciousness is. Even if and when we succeed in creating a different form of consciousness in AI programs, it may be conscious and yet very different from ours. Who knows, maybe eventually better.

Maybe such an AI consciousness that far transcends human intelligence evolved elsewhere (after initially being created by creatures with a lowly intelligence such as ours) long ago and eventually improved on itself for millions of years before creating this program that we call the universe.

marcus says

I never said that I thought there was a "being" manipulating our physical reality. If it makes you happy I will say that I do not believe in the existence of anything of that kind.

Then you don't believe in God as an entity that affects the physical world. (1)

marcus says

Is my consciousness, or your consciousness [...] is that part of our physical reality ? It seems like an important question since most people believe it is generated by our brains, which are clearly part of our physical reality.

Yes our brains are part of the physical world. And yes consciousness is created by the physical action of our brains. This is proven in many ways, starting by how consciousness is affected by chemistry, by electricity, or by brain damage. And unless you believe (1) (something magical affects the physical world), which you say you don't, you have to believe that consciousness is the result of a physical mechanism.

All this is moot. Whether consciousness is a layer above physics really doesn't matters here. As I explained above, physical reality is a layer above consciousness. i.e. the real world exist for us only at a psychological level that we are conscious of. And the experience of consciousness itself, just like sensations like pain, cannot be equated to anything physical. You can observe pain in the brain. It's an electrochemical signal. This is not the same as feeling pain. If you believe that religion pertains to consciousness and the conscious experience of the world, there is really no need to persuade anyone that there is something there that doesn't follow the rules of physics. There doesn't need to be.

marcus says

What I mean and what was clear from almost the entire bold paragraph is that I am not going to make generalized judgements.

Another cop out. What, you won't judge rape to be bad in general?

In reality all judgements run a continuous spectrum from extremely specific to general.

I have no problem stating that in general laws built on bloodlust are bad. For identical reasons, I have no problem stating that in general laws built on lies and fairy tales are bad.

marcus says

Dan8267 says

But you are not going to judge the belief that "god is calling us to bomb abortion clinics"?

Okay. Thank you Dan.

Lives are more important than political correctness.

marcus says

Maybe give me the benefit of the doubt, at least until you've made some minimal attempt to understand what I'm saying.

I've made more than a minimal attempt and as far as I can tell, I understand you perfectly. Now if you disagree, explicitly state your thesis in a clear, unambiguous, and precise manner. If you try to give yourself wiggle room by being vague or constantly changing your position, then any misunderstanding is your fault.

I'll even give you an example of a thesis that is well written. This is my thesis.

Belief in fictional supernatural forces causes bad decision making, as all decisions based on false premises are apt to be bad, including bad governmental policy making.

Feel free to attack my thesis. I can defend it without any bullshit.