7/7 lest we forget

[Haunted]

Quoting MaverickMenzies from 15:35, 9th Jul 2008
Counter-example: The secular Tamil Tigers.

see - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberation ... amil_Eelam

Pre the invasion of iraq, they had carried out the majority of suicide bombings in the world.

Secular =/= non-theistic. Tamils are strong Hindus.

Besides, I feel it worth pointing out that I never said ALL suicide bombers were faithheads. Given the right stimuli (brainwashing) you could be one yourself.
[hr]

Now with 100% more corn

[LonelyPilgrim]

Quoting stevienicksfan from 08:30, 9th Jul 2008
I think your premise that the US is a secular society is quite simply ridiculous. Maybe on the East-coast where thankfully some rationality seems to prevail in your country this is true. However, the very fact that both McCain and Obama have had to take into account to such a large extent the musings of their pastors and really come out against them both displays the importance the religious sector in that country has.

To be frank people pay a little attention to what the Archbishop of Canterbury says here as they know he is a genuinely nice fellow and wont say anything to nasty. Then they disregard him. Not so in the US where faith is a huge issue for peoples politics and personal lives. I see no difference whatsoever between evangelicals and muslim extremists. They both believe in entirely irrational beliefs.

Go back and look at the statistics of "believers" in your country and you will see you are quite simply wrong.

I will see no such thing, since I was quite well aware of those statistics before I made my original point. Frankly, if you've not lived here, and you're prepared to call someone who does live here and grew up here a liar who knows not what he's talking about, I don't see any way of making you understand the interplay of personal faith with a secular society that exists in the US.

Consider, though, that if American's political and social decisions were determined, lockstep, by the doctrines of their churches:

1. We'd have no contraception available anywhere in the country.

2. Abortion would be illegal instead of being legal and supported by a considerable majority of the electorate.

3. Prohibition would never have been repealed.

There was a study that came out... last week, I think it was. I don't remember who did it, it might have been the Pew Forum, but it found that most Americans professing faith either do not know or do not agree with a majority of the doctrines and dogmas of their particular churches. In other words, just because someone's pastor is preaching X, it should not be assumed that the entire congregation believe X. In fact, the data suggests quite the opposite.

Of course, some of the more flamboyant rabble-rousing evangelical pastors decried the country's 'shallow' faith when this report came out. I would rather argue that most Americans have a sense of the division between the private and the public. Privately we are a very religious country, but publicly we are secular in most things. Fanatically secular, in fact.

You would almost certainly have to live here to understand how dogmatically the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) polices the church-state divide.

But perhaps there is a breakdown of communication between America and Europe. After all we do not equate 'secular' to 'athiest' and certainly not to Humphrey's clearly defined "New Athiesm". Militant athiesm is distasteful to the American mind because of its profoundly universalist appeal to deny freedom of conscience.

To us 'secular' means equal rights to everyone, regardless of their belief or lack thereof, and the absence of religion in the law. Secularism is not inherently athiestic, it's simply the belief that religious faith is a private, and not a public matter. By that standard, the US is secular. What you want us to be is something more.

[hr]

Man is free; yet we must not suppose that he is at liberty to do everything he pleases, for he becomes a slave the moment he allows his actions to be ruled by passion. --Giacomo Casanova

[stevienicksfan]

Firstly I didn't mean to offend any persons here-in who may be american but I also must add my girlfriend comes from New York State and also knows a little about your country and supports my claim entirely!

Your definition of a militant atheism is interesting. If you mean the denial of anything but the world we see around us and truly rational scientific thinking then we are proud of this form of atheism. To state it denies conscience of any form is absolute nonsense. Our country I think you will find has a far more open press, religious freedom and more importantly INTEGRATION of faiths into our communities.

It doesn't matter that the ACLU exists when George Bush can come out and claim god told him to invade Iraq! In this country he would get locked inside for a few weeks to rethink his life if he were to so openly express such a thing.

When I make statements about the country of the United States I want to make clear it is aimed at no particular individual but instead the false argument that there is a real division between politics and religion in that country. I instead state that some of the recent arrogant things America has done in world politics have in fact been inextricably linked to religion and an arrogant belief that their nation is somehow chosen by god over all others. This is what scares us all. This also may be the thing that sparks new conflicts throughout the globe by nations who also have such an arrogant self-assesment.

Going back to the basic premise of the post the US, Iran, Israel and other states where religious fanaticism is allowed to exist are the ones threatening global security at this time.

[munchingfoo]

Quoting Haunted from 18:27, 9th Jul 2008
To say that western morality is christian is to say that western wine is christian.

Isn't that why they drink the blood of Christ? :p

[hr]

"The entirety of these definitions lie outside the gamut of the sRGB color space — such a pure color cannot be represented using RGB primaries. The color swatch to the right is a desaturated approximation, created by taking the centroid of the standard definition and moving it towards the D65 white point, until it meets the sRGB gamut triangle."

[Humphrey]

Excellent. As the car advert says ‘discussion stimulates debate and debate will bring us together’...or not as the case may be.

The issue here is that you can’t simply take your present day metaphysical narrative and then -‘standing on the summit of history’ as Herbert Butterfield would have put it- begin restructuring the past according to your beliefs. Notice I haven’t actually said anything controversial or a-historical. I simply said that as inhabitants of a civilisation that is, and has been, socially, politically and historically Judeo-Christian, we may well have got most of our ethics from Judeo-Christianity. The most influential man in our history was Mr Cosmic Zombie and the Bronze age goat herders (sounds like a psychedelic rock band!). Indeed if you look back through the history of thought you can see where those beliefs have come from and see that those thinkers were in fact monotheists. A lot of them criticised religion as I have said but they were not anti-religion, often they sought through their works to understand their relationship with their creator in a clearer light and they based their ethical concepts on their monotheistic worldview.

Anyway this is the most interesting topic so i’ll have to come back to it. I’ll deal with the minor points first.

1) Definitions of atheism – I did make a mistake here. I was trying to say that there are many ideologies and belief systems with an atheist component and I wanted to distinguish between them. For instance you can’t lump the Buddhists in with the Communists etc... The problem is that when you type overly long posts you are prone to use a kind of bastardised shorthand at times which leaves you open to serious nit-picking. Throughout this post I was addressing the ‘New Atheism’ which makes comments on many things, above and beyond a lack of belief in deities.

2) ‘New Atheist anger’ – Well, they are angry, go look at Richard dawkins.net or the internet infidels board. It’s as though they think that all they need to do is continue to be angry and religion will just evaporate into thin air. That didn’t work for the Communists and it won’t work for the ‘New atheists’ either.

3) ‘Jesus myth’. I hope you mean the ‘Jesus Resurrection Myth’ and you haven’t bought into the newly raging internet conspiracy among the ‘New Atheists’ that the historical Jesus of Nazareth didn’t exist at all. This is one of those issues that is only really controversial on the internet, much like the faked moon landings and the involvement of the CIA in 9/11

4) ‘Only once control was wrested from the church did our enlightenment begin’ – Ouch. This a particularly virulent strain of 19th century mythology. I’ll come back to this later.

5) Dennett and free Will – As I understand it Dennett has a deterministic view of the human brain and ignores the ‘Hard Problem of Consciousness’. All our actions are therefore determined either randomly or by external causes. All these causes are also either random or caused. Sounds like he denies the existence of free will in its conventional sense and he has simply redefined it.

6) Pullman – Why bring him up. Well he is a high profile figure among the ‘New Atheists’ and I am writing about the ‘New Atheists’, therefore I brought him up. He also contributed to ‘How a scientist changed the way we think’ so I don’t think you should stigmatise him as merely ‘a children’s writer’. Since this is such a broad movement I don’t see why I should restrict myself to intellectuals, if I did I would have to ignore Hitchens and Sam Harris.

7) ‘To say that western morality is Christian is to say that western wine is Christian.’ Eh?. Bit of a dodgy soundbite there.

8) Dawkins and the Selfish Gene – Ah yes, this one was a bit off the wall. This is an example of the perpetuation of Judeo-Christian categories of thought. Dawkins is an excellent writer and needed a narrative structure with which to tie together the theories of Trivers, Maynard-Smith and Hamilton. The analogy he comes up with sounds suspiciously like the fall, although there may be nothing in it.

9) Useless parallels – I think the ‘new atheism’ is fast becoming a ‘secular religion’. The Brights movement is effectively a cult of reason like the Jacobins.

10) Memes are an allegory – This was by far the best comment!. Memes were just a cute allegory were they!. Actually Dawkins intended them to be a scientific theory. Memes was supposed to be postulated as the fundamental replicating unit in social evolution, a process which is treated as technically equivalent to biological (genetic) evolution. He later backtracked but not before they were snapped up by Susan Blackmore and Dan Dennett (http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/dan_ ... memes.html) . There is now a wannabe science of Memetics. If it is just an allegory as you say, someone had better tell them!.


[hr]

http://humphreyclarke.blogspot.com/
http://www.livejournal.com/users/humphrey_clarke/

[Haunted]

Quoting humphrey from 09:47, 10th Jul 2008
I simply said that as inhabitants of a civilisation that is, and has been, socially, politically and historically Judeo-Christian, we may well have got most of our ethics from Judeo-Christianity.

Even though most of those ethics were around before judeo-christianity? This is still a correlation, you have to show how we could've only got such ethics from judeo-christianity.

The most influential man in our history was Mr Cosmic Zombie and the Bronze age goat herders

Debatable but lets grant that. People whom I would hold as more influential? Mitocondrial Eve, and the guy who first realised a pointy stick made him a better hunter.

Indeed if you look back through the history of thought you can see where those beliefs have come from and see that those thinkers were in fact monotheists.

With the exception of all the pre-Jesus philosophers I quoted above. Also remember how dangerous it has been historically to assert disbelief.

Throughout this post I was addressing the ‘New Atheism’ which makes comments on many things, above and beyond a lack of belief in deities.

Which leaves the realm of atheism and into things like secular humanism.

'New Atheist anger’

Even if I grant this, how does it advance your arguement?

‘Jesus myth’

The authors you cited all believe in a historical Jesus. By myth, I did of course refer to the supernatural aspects of it. But as far as I am aware the only evidence for such a person ever existing is only in the four canonical gospels, written decades after he supposedly died...

‘Only once control was wrested from the church did our enlightenment begin’ – Ouch. This a particularly virulent strain of 19th century mythology. I’ll come back to this later.

The enlightenment of the 18th century coincided with a of huge loss of church power and an overturning of the accepted belief that mysticism and revelation are the primary sources of knowledge and wisdom.

Dennett and free Will

Yes, he argues for the existence of free will. It is an interesting arguement, certainly worthy of a read.

‘To say that western morality is Christian is to say that western wine is Christian.’ Eh?. Bit of a dodgy soundbite there.

The morality you spoke of was around before christianity just as the wine was.

The analogy he comes up with sounds suspiciously like the fall, although there may be nothing in it.

It could also suspiciously like the dropping of thetans into volcanoes, but then there may be nothing in that. Apophenia.

Useless parallels – I think the ‘new atheism’ is fast becoming a ‘secular religion’. The Brights movement is effectively a cult of reason like the Jacobins.

Be careful not to confuse the word religion with movement. Again there are of course parallels but lets not carried away or we could end up thinking how odd it is that scientology explains christianity and claims to have been around for longer. Coincidence?

Memes are an allegory

EDIT: hurried it and it came out rather confusing.

The idea that a "meme" (or idea) is a physical object has been around as long as materialism/monism has. What Dawkins did was compare the transfer of memes to genes. Dawkins did not even coin the word meme.

There is now a wannabe science of Memetics.

Yes and the authors you have cited will acknowledge that memetics grew out of a cultural analogy to genetics. But the idea that information is transmitted from person to person has been around as long as thought itself, it was only until Richard that compared them to lifeforms that the word "meme" took off even though there is plenty of books written on the transfer of ideas long before.


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[munchingfoo]

Sorry for not quoting the text, but its getting rather long. I'll just quote the numbers each reply refers to.

Quoting humphrey from 09:47, 10th Jul 2008

1) and 9) How can you, with one hand state that your merely use the term "New Atheism" to describe all beliefs (and non-beliefs I assume?) that contain atheism, and with the other state that this concept you just made up as a place holder for hundreds of other concepts is "fast becoming a ‘secular religion’". That just doesn't make any sense.

2)I'm an atheist, I'm not angry because of it. Osama Bin Laden, theist. He's one angry dude. Should we conclude that atheist are angry, or that theists are angry? I'll let you pick.

You cannot make sweeping generalisations against a group of people, especially when that group of people is an imaginary placeholder for your discussion. Some people are angry and some others are not.


My take on your view in general.

I think it is far more likely that morality invented Christianiy than that Christianity invented modern morality.







[hr]

"The entirety of these definitions lie outside the gamut of the sRGB color space — such a pure color cannot be represented using RGB primaries. The color swatch to the right is a desaturated approximation, created by taking the centroid of the standard definition and moving it towards the D65 white point, until it meets the sRGB gamut triangle."

[Humphrey]

Hi. Two quick points

Quoting munchingfoo from 10:45, 10th Jul 2008
1) and 9) How can you, with one hand state that your merely use the term "New Atheism" to describe all beliefs (and non-beliefs I assume?) that contain atheism, and with the other state that this concept you just made up as a place holder for hundreds of other concepts is "fast becoming a ‘secular religion’". That just doesn't make any sense.

I am addressing the 'New Atheist' movement. I didn't make this term up. This is a media phenomenon derived from the works of Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, Dan Dennett and Christopher Hitchens. See http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/europe/11 ... index.html . It might also refer to derivatives such as the brights. The reason I am attacking them is because I am a sceptic and scepticism must necessarily extend to all belief systems if it is to be at all useful.

2)I'm an atheist, I'm not angry because of it. Osama Bin Laden, theist. He's one angry dude. Should we conclude that atheist are angry, or that theists are angry? I'll let you pick.

I was comparing Dawkins etc to other atheists like John Gray or more famously Schopenhauer. He was an atheist, but he didn't go around trying to de-convert the world. He didn't think that if you could only get rid of religious belief, the world would suddenly be a better place. He didn't describe religion as poison. He didn't say that people who raise their children in a religious environments were committing child abuse. He didn't claim that people who hold different beliefs than him were suffering from a mind virus.



[hr]

http://humphreyclarke.blogspot.com/
http://www.livejournal.com/users/humphrey_clarke/

[Raindance]

Quoting Haunted from 10:17, 10th Jul 2008

The authors you cited all believe in a historical Jesus. By myth, I did of course refer to the supernatural aspects of it. But as far as I am aware the only evidence for such a person ever existing is only in the four canonical gospels, written decades after he supposedly died...

I don't really want to get involved but as the Romans kept pretty good records of things we can be certain of Jesus' existance, his place of birth and the fact that he was executed for his part in some religious insurrection. The rest is open to the imagination and should not be considered fact due to lack of evidence.

Now to go back to observing this train wreck from a distance.

Edit: I just realised that given how this thread started that last comment could be taken the wrong way (I'm talking about the argument).

[hr]

I'm only here because b3ta is broken.

[Haunted]

Quoting Raindance from 16:15, 10th Jul 2008
I don't really want to get involved but as the Romans kept pretty good records of things we can be certain of Jesus' existance, his place of birth and the fact that he was executed for his part in some religious insurrection. The rest is open to the imagination and should not be considered fact due to lack of evidence.

Well thats interesting because I had no idea there were any Roman records of Jesus, do you have any sources?

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[Humphrey]

Quoting Haunted from 16:32, 10th Jul 2008

Quoting Raindance from 16:15, 10th Jul 2008
I don't really want to get involved but as the Romans kept pretty good records of things we can be certain of Jesus' existance, his place of birth and the fact that he was executed for his part in some religious insurrection. The rest is open to the imagination and should not be considered fact due to lack of evidence.

Well thats interesting because I had no idea there were any Roman records of Jesus, do you have any sources?

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Neither did I for that matter. Raindance must be sitting on a goldmine of historical evidence not privy to New Testament scholarship, unless of course it is a reference to Tacitus and Josephus.

[hr]

http://humphreyclarke.blogspot.com/
http://www.livejournal.com/users/humphrey_clarke/

[Senethro]

I still don't get why we're treating Christianity as special and ignoring that many of its positive features are also present in other religions.

[novium]

Oh, you're girlfriend comes from new york. Wow. How silly of us to argue with you then. Because obviously, one random, anonymous, not-even-present person from an a-typical city can speak for everyone's experience in every state.

if you couldn't already tell.

Or maybe I shouldn't have written the closing slash. Jeez. Better integration in britain? are you kidding me?
Or maybe I just am mistaken about all the acts of terrorism/attempted acts of terrorism from britain's oh-so-well integrated communities.

And in fact, I'm just going to stop there, because your claims just get more ridiculous, and i've learned that it really isn't worth my time.

Quoting stevienicksfan from 20:44, 9th Jul 2008
Firstly I didn't mean to offend any persons here-in who may be american but I also must add my girlfriend comes from New York State and also knows a little about your country and supports my claim entirely!

Your definition of a militant atheism is interesting. If you mean the denial of anything but the world we see around us and truly rational scientific thinking then we are proud of this form of atheism. To state it denies conscience of any form is absolute nonsense. Our country I think you will find has a far more open press, religious freedom and more importantly INTEGRATION of faiths into our communities.

It doesn't matter that the ACLU exists when George Bush can come out and claim god told him to invade Iraq! In this country he would get locked inside for a few weeks to rethink his life if he were to so openly express such a thing.

When I make statements about the country of the United States I want to make clear it is aimed at no particular individual but instead the false argument that there is a real division between politics and religion in that country. I instead state that some of the recent arrogant things America has done in world politics have in fact been inextricably linked to religion and an arrogant belief that their nation is somehow chosen by god over all others. This is what scares us all. This also may be the thing that sparks new conflicts throughout the globe by nations who also have such an arrogant self-assesment.

Going back to the basic premise of the post the US, Iran, Israel and other states where religious fanaticism is allowed to exist are the ones threatening global security at this time.

[hr]

Neither the storms of crisis, nor the breezes of ambition could ever divert him, either by hope or by fear, from the course that he had chosen

[novium]

mentions are made in a letter from Pliny to the emperor, and in the text the jewish war. And in tacitus. Oh, and suetonius.

Quoting Haunted from 16:32, 10th Jul 2008

Quoting Raindance from 16:15, 10th Jul 2008
I don't really want to get involved but as the Romans kept pretty good records of things we can be certain of Jesus' existance, his place of birth and the fact that he was executed for his part in some religious insurrection. The rest is open to the imagination and should not be considered fact due to lack of evidence.

Well thats interesting because I had no idea there were any Roman records of Jesus, do you have any sources?

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[hr]

Neither the storms of crisis, nor the breezes of ambition could ever divert him, either by hope or by fear, from the course that he had chosen

[Haunted]

Quoting novium from 18:36, 10th Jul 2008
mentions are made in a letter from Pliny to the emperor, and in the text the jewish war. And in tacitus. Oh, and suetonius.

If I am correct in thinking, those referees only refer to christians as a group and not christ himself.

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[Haunted]

Quoting Senethro from 16:53, 10th Jul 2008
I still don't get why we're treating Christianity as special

[s]Psst! It's because we offer it as a degree.[/s]

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[j4sh56]

Quoting Haunted from 18:56, 10th Jul 2008

Quoting Senethro from 16:53, 10th Jul 2008
I still don't get why we're treating Christianity as special

[s]Psst! It's because we offer it as a degree.[/s]

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Hmm, a BA degree in Chirstianity? What would the exam be? "Do you believe Jesus Christ was the son of God?" Answer "Yes.", instant degree.

[Keep me logged in]

A lot of stevienicksfan posts on The Sinner have really fecked me off. They're obnoxiously designed to stir shit up.

[Humphrey]

Quoting Haunted from 18:48, 10th Jul 2008

Quoting novium from 18:36, 10th Jul 2008
mentions are made in a letter from Pliny to the emperor, and in the text the jewish war. And in tacitus. Oh, and suetonius.

If I am correct in thinking, those referees only refer to christians as a group and not christ himself.

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Still not bad considering the amount of sources we have for other figures in ancient history such as Socrates Julius Caesar and Alexander the Great. In fact one of my aquintances has started a Hannibal myth conspiracy.

Although there is plenty of writing about Hannibal, none of it is contemporary and there is no archaeological evidence for him at all (not surprising given the Romans razed the city from whence he came). Furthermore he is not mentioned in any Carthaginian sources - incredible given he was supposed to be their greatest leader (there are no Carthaginian sources as the Romans burnt their city down)! We find when we actually try to pin him down he tends to recede further into the mists of time. His exploits, such as leading elephants over the Alps, are clearly legendary (the sceptic pretends to be incredulous but seems happy to buy his own amazing theory) and it is not hard to find a motive for the creation of this colourful character by Roman writers (as long we can invent a motive for fabrication we can assume that fabrication exists).

Rome and Carthage were great trading rivals in the Western Mediterranean and it did not take them long to come to blows. Rome signed a peace treaty but, under the leadership of the elder Cato desperately wanted to rid itself permanently of the competition. (this is actually true and so helps to hide when we slip into fantasy) They needed an excuse and the idea they came up with was brilliant. Like all ancient civilisations, the Romans rewrote history as it suited them to demonstrate their own prowess. (a useful and exaggerated generalisation) Consequently we should not be surprised to find that they invented a great enemy from Carthage to demonstrate the threat still existed and justify a further war to wipe them out.

The author of the fiction was Cato himself (we need someone to point the finger at and note how there is no distinction made between the background material above and theorising here) who we know wrote the earliest Roman History (true as well, actually). But it was intended simply as a justification for a further war with Carthage. It contained the details of Hannibal's alleged campaigns against the Romans including victories on Italian soil (it might well do but Cato's history has conveniently not survived). Cato brilliantly combined the truth with his own anti-Carthaginian propaganda with the intention of goading Rome into another wholly unjustified war with the old enemy (give the fabricator lots of credit for his invention). Once the war was over and Carthage razed to the ground, the Romans were able to ensure that only their version of history survived (this is important as it enables all other sources to be declared forgeries).

[hr]

http://humphreyclarke.blogspot.com/
http://www.livejournal.com/users/humphrey_clarke/

[i am sportacus]

Quoting novium from 18:30, 10th Jul 2008
Oh, you're girlfriend comes from new york. Wow. How silly of us to argue with you then. Because obviously, one random, anonymous, not-even-present person from an a-typical city can speak for everyone's experience in every state.

if you couldn't already tell.

Or maybe I shouldn't have written the closing slash. Jeez. Better integration in britain? are you kidding me?
Or maybe I just am mistaken about all the acts of terrorism/attempted acts of terrorism from britain's oh-so-well integrated communities.

And in fact, I'm just going to stop there, because your claims just get more ridiculous, and i've learned that it really isn't worth my time.

Ahahaha, this is pretty damn close to trolling. Who'd have thought that of novium a few years back?