Discussion: Three Types of Atheism
New ("Dumb") Atheists
Absurdist Atheists (Peter Wessel Zapffe, Albert Camus)
Pragmatic Atheists (Jacques Fresco, Hume)
I won't discuss the first category, and I invite atheists of the first category to turn around and go back to the home page of the forums by clicking here.
Absurdist Atheism
Have a read of this essay.
The idea is this. With the development of rationality, apart from the pragmatic benefits which have enhanced survival, there grew a terrible awareness of the conditions of life, greatly increasing potential suffering. This awareness directs man towards certain activities - Zapffe counts 4 - isolation, anchoring, distraction and sublimation. To counteract this effect, a new desire was selected for in men - the desire for the transcendent (which effectively counteracts the awareness of life through anchoring and sublimation in another world), which grasps after an non-existent object which could save man from his current condition, and his inevitable death.
It seems the point of contention is over the narrative that explains man's desire for the transcendent. Whether this occurs due to the real existence of a transcendent realm, or merely as a way to counteract and somehow blind man from what his reason has revealed in order to enable survival.
Also have a look at:
(this one below isn't only absurdist, it has a spiritual side with Gurdjieff)
Pragmatic Atheism
Have a look at Jacques Fresco, one of my heroes, who recently died just this past month.
Pragmatic Atheism accuses religion of simply not being helpful, not working. For example like Fresco - if people really join God after death, then you should be happy that they died! They're in a much better place, no reason to cry if you really believe (I would personally dispute that, but that's the argument).
It seems that the point of contention here lies over whether or not religious believers are honest with themselves, and truly believe - in their hearts - what they claim to believe.
What this thread is about
I'm hoping to use this thread to jumpstart some debate between these two types of atheists and theists - a sort of brainstorming of ideas. I think some input from the "spiritual but not a theist" would also be good (thinking here of people like Wayfarer and John) in addressing the points raised by the Absurdist group. A pity 180 Proof isn't here, he'd be great batting for the Absurdists :P . Feel free to discuss any of the ideas present in this OP.
Absurdist Atheists (Peter Wessel Zapffe, Albert Camus)
Pragmatic Atheists (Jacques Fresco, Hume)
I won't discuss the first category, and I invite atheists of the first category to turn around and go back to the home page of the forums by clicking here.
Absurdist Atheism
Have a read of this essay.
The idea is this. With the development of rationality, apart from the pragmatic benefits which have enhanced survival, there grew a terrible awareness of the conditions of life, greatly increasing potential suffering. This awareness directs man towards certain activities - Zapffe counts 4 - isolation, anchoring, distraction and sublimation. To counteract this effect, a new desire was selected for in men - the desire for the transcendent (which effectively counteracts the awareness of life through anchoring and sublimation in another world), which grasps after an non-existent object which could save man from his current condition, and his inevitable death.
It seems the point of contention is over the narrative that explains man's desire for the transcendent. Whether this occurs due to the real existence of a transcendent realm, or merely as a way to counteract and somehow blind man from what his reason has revealed in order to enable survival.
Also have a look at:
(this one below isn't only absurdist, it has a spiritual side with Gurdjieff)
Pragmatic Atheism
Have a look at Jacques Fresco, one of my heroes, who recently died just this past month.
Pragmatic Atheism accuses religion of simply not being helpful, not working. For example like Fresco - if people really join God after death, then you should be happy that they died! They're in a much better place, no reason to cry if you really believe (I would personally dispute that, but that's the argument).
It seems that the point of contention here lies over whether or not religious believers are honest with themselves, and truly believe - in their hearts - what they claim to believe.
What this thread is about
I'm hoping to use this thread to jumpstart some debate between these two types of atheists and theists - a sort of brainstorming of ideas. I think some input from the "spiritual but not a theist" would also be good (thinking here of people like Wayfarer and John) in addressing the points raised by the Absurdist group. A pity 180 Proof isn't here, he'd be great batting for the Absurdists :P . Feel free to discuss any of the ideas present in this OP.
Comments (193)
That makes me think of this:
I am agnostic, what type of atheist are you?
I am not an atheist.
So then what kind of belief do you hold, is it the perfect being god, a personal god. or? and why?
But what's a new atheist and how would I know if I am one?
I believe in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - the Christian God - and not the God of the philosophers.
Quoting Cavacava
Because that's the conception of God that makes most sense of the world and that puts the human being in their right place - both exalted as the image of God - and as a finite creature who owes its existence to God (think of the story of Job).
Are you a douche?... Well that depends on whose genitals I'm meant to wash!
Obsessed with making fun of the Christian Old Testament?... I wouldn't say obsessed, but I do tend to enjoy myself when the OT gets pitted against me...
Do you think Richard Dawkins represents the real presence of Christ? More like the presence of posh Britain, but am I allowed to agree with any of his ideas and not be an idiot?
Do you enjoy being a dick toward people who are religious? No, but what if I was an equal opportunity dick instead of just to religious people?
Do you think that your disbelief in God makes you better, smarter, cooler? Well "cooler" is subjective, "better" is undefined (better at what?), and as far as "smarter" goes, belief or lack of belief doesn't make you stupid or smart either way, although I would hazard a guess that extremity in ideological beliefs of any kind correlate with stupidity.
>:O >:O >:O
Speaking of which, where is 180 Proof anyway?
I think I can represent an absurdist agnosticism - the uncertainty of God's existence adds an additional absurdity into the equation. It is a recognition of the unlikelihood of God's existence but also that the answer to this is outside the boundaries of human understanding.
Quoting Agustino
This sounds like a false distinction to me, depending on how you define these terms.
Eh, not so fast. It all depends on the spiritual state of the person who dies. If someone dies after living righteously before God then you ought to be happy for them indeed. The scripture below describes the inconceivable joy that awaits such a person.
But if someone dies without earnestly repenting of their sins then you ought to mourn for them; for they are unprepared for God's judgment. The two scriptures below vividly describe the dreadful state of such a person.
Clearly, not everybody is going to be better off in the afterlife.
[B]Edit[/b]: also worth a mention are Bertrand Russell and Friedrich Nietzsche, the latter of whom influenced Camus.
It's not clear, though. The Catholic Church, for example, hasn't definitively declared that anyone is in hell and one is allowed, even encouraged, to pray that all may be saved.
I have morals and ethics, but they come from my Mother and Father and society – not God. In my view God’s existence is subtle. The morals and ethics of God are beyond my understanding. God does not prescribe what is right and wrong on this planet. Consider for a moment what happens when a huge star goes supernova. A galaxy can be destroyed. How many times has a supernova happened - millions – trillions? Don’t you think there is intelligent life in those galaxies? I bet there is life and it probably is much more advanced than ours. And yet God allowed or caused that life to be extinguished. I think we are one of ten billion experiments by God – probably more. What is the reasoning – I don’t presume to know – do you – does anybody? I can speculate, but I think only God knows.
What I do think it signifies is that we are not exceedingly significant or important in God’s eyes. As we speak a lot of the universe is exploding. I think we are expendable. God has bigger fish to fry. Should we feel insignificant and insecure? I don’t think there is an alternative. However, we are not insignificant either - we have been provided for – a great planet, atmosphere and most importantly the tools of consciousness in a wonderful body. These are gifts - not accidents.
I do not think it is in the providence of humans to define God. I do not believe God has spoken to us directly. I think all bibles are man-made. I do believe God speaks to us indirectly – subtly. It sets a stage – in which we are allowed to evolve. I think we are required to define our own purpose. I do not think God is concerned with the human concepts and conditions of good and evil. What is good or evil to God is beyond our understanding. I do not know how we got here or what happens after we die. The reward of life is here now. We have been given a wonderful environment and great tools – this is what I call the equation of God. The stage has been set – each character has been cast – and we are performing – seeking our destiny. I think most of our existence is determined, but through the gift of emotion we are given a degree of freedom.
180 Proof was here briefly (they're still in the members list), sometime ago, only made a few comments though. I think it was before PF collapsed. Perhaps we were just not interesting enough at the time (or even now). We did/do have less variety than PF did.
I am flat out on a project at this point, so will only be able to make the odd scattered contribution. However one backgrounder I think is really useful and sober analysis by Thomas Nagel, Secular Philosophy and the Religous Temperament. Among many reasons why Nagel's contributions are valuable, is that he himself professes atheism but nevertheless seems obliged to admit the force of what might be called 'philosophical theism'. Also his comments on the 'serene atheism' of David Hume and many analytical philosophers are on the mark in my view. More later, duty calls.
Are atheists being too damned materialistic? Have theists abjectly surrendered to wishful thinking? Are agnostics blind to the evidence or lack thereof? What is going on?
To speak for myself, I'm an agnostic. I don't think there's any hard evidence to warrant a firm belief in god BUT there's ample room in our knowledge framework for spirituality, a non-materialstic POV of some sort.
Many of the new atheists are annoying, though I think that this is a case of "the minority tends to be more vocal than the majority," such that many atheists simply are not vocal about their viewpoints unless asked about them or otherwise provoked.
One told me he identifies as atheist despite being agnostic because it was 'more convenient' with his anti-religion approach to life.
That and the clichés are getting as overused as their unsubstantiated, oft-repeated, charges of logical fallacies with whosoever they discuss 'God' with.
A befitting #666 post.
Quoting Thorongil
Schopenhauer did not adhere to any religion, but he was a religious man nonetheless. He affirmed the existence of the transcendent through his philosophy.
Quoting TheWillowOfDarkness
180 had stopped posting, except very rarely, at old PF too. 180 did not like the format of the forums here.
He's become 360 Proof- the Human Panopticon, and...He's Watchin' you...
>:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O >:O :-O
Holy Shiiiit!
Are you on that level?! >:O
Sorry, Agustino, I don't understand the question (presuming for the moment that it was intended to be a serious question).
That's a question which can never be answered. Which puts us in the position of having to take the "salto mortale".
There are a few possible narratives here. There are some religious who believe only for the sake of self-calming There are atheists who disbelieve only for the sake of self-calming. One thing, though, is that atheism requires no great commitment (unless you really suspect that you might burn in hell on account of it). To be truly religious requires great commitment; the willingness to forgo everything that humans value in this life.
If you can believe, and believing enhances your life; then what possible reason could you have for not believing, since you can never know the truth one way or the other? Actually it might be possible to know the truth one way (the religious way) if Gnosis is real; but one would need to experience it to know.
Even if you could know (per impossibile) that religion is false, and yet you were nonetheless able (per impossibile) to believe that it is true, and to do so would greatly enhance your joy of living, would it then be wrong somehow to believe?
No doubt that the religious are capable to have either far more meaningful or far more successful lives than atheists generally, so in that sense it would be good to believe. Many great poets were "God-intoxicated" - many musicians, philosophers, etc. There were also many leaders, commanders and conquerors who viewed themselves as doing God's will.
But at the same time there's the question of integrity - if you knew something was false, you'd at least lack integrity if you chose to believe it was true.
OK, but what exactly, in the absence of God (absolute truth) is integrity anyway? Does it consist merely in honoring the good opinion of us held by our peers, or what?
Truthfulness towards one's own self?
Isn't everything we do true to ourselves in one way or another, though?
That could be true I suppose, but then popular music is not always the best music.
What do you mean here lol?
Let's say you know X is true but you really want to believe Y. If you believe Y you will not be acting true to the part of you that believes X. On the other hand, if you believe X you will not be acting true to the part of you that wants to believe Y.
You say that 180 Proof is well known; I'm just saying that that fact does not guarantee that his thoughts were truly unique or of high value. To be honest I found his thoughts somewhat quirky and interesting, but pretty one-sided, especially when it came to religion. But I also acknowledge that he 'knew his shit', such as it was.
Yes but would you lack integrity? You'd be truthful in your actions. You'll admit you want to believe Y, but can't because you know Y is false, and X is true.
Quoting John
Well you don't have to agree with someone to find their thinking valuable. I found 180's thinking very valuable, but I rarely agreed with him. He actually agreed with me about one thing related to religion - that God treats human beings like straw dogs :P lol
It probably would have been better if I had said "you suspect X is true but you really want to believe Y", since I don't believe we ever know when it comes to religious matters. You might be suspicious of Y just on account of the fact that you find yourself wanting to believe it. But then this suspicion might be an intersubjectively introjected trope. I tend to think of 'integrity' in terms of 'integrality', so on this view we can never have integrity unless we commit wholeheartedly, and without any wavering remainder, to our beliefs. But is that even possible if we are highly inquiring kinds of persons given to the love of free speculation? On the other hand perhaps integrity consists in holding everything absolutely open, and "waiting for the miracle to come".
Quoting Agustino
So, he did secretly believe in God (and not merely Spinoza's God) after all?
Well being inquiring is one thing, but being indecisive is another. I think indecisiveness is a problem - it means not being able to commit despite having (as much information) as possible / reasonable.
Quoting John
No but he appreciated the Old Testament view of God much more than the New Testament one so to say. A God not interested and largely indifferent to human whims and affairs - just like the God encountered by Job.
http://www.osho.com/iosho/library/read-book/online-library-disintegration-kierkegaard-doubt-50aeb447-b83?p=29f22fe6b4f6c575b8ed4c38718e200f
https://livereal.com/psychology_arena/whats_the_problem/indecisiveness_osho.htm
These were both interesting thoughts, disregarding the lack of factual statements with regards to K.
To be decisive is not necessarily, or perhaps even often, to be wholly committed in the sense I was meaning, though. Decisiveness is often driven merely by practical considerations.
Quoting Agustino
I guess, as always, it is a matter of hermeneutics, but I would say the God of the Old Testament is a jealous God; deeply, perhaps pathologically, interested in human affairs.
The God of the New Testament is too. Hell is mentioned more often in the New Testament than in the Old. Many Jewish people don't even have much of an idea of hell. It's a popular idea that the OT is harsh and the NT is loving and kind, but it's not so black and white. The Revelation is likely a lot more brutal for example than anything in the OT.
Quoting John
Check the two osho links above on decisiveness.
Perhaps K was not prepared to be decisive for merely practical reasons; and was waiting until he could commit himself absolutely. Of course this waiting must have been cruel to R, so out of love for her he had to let her go in the end.
Well I think there's a bit of fabrication on the part of Osho there. K. decided to leave R. and not the other way around, but they were engaged at that time. So there was some commitment. There is a lot of speculation as to why K. broke off the engagement (an engagement which HE started).
I have heard about Zappfe on forums previously. Also am quite familiar with Camus. I think the underlying driver for both is very much 'in the shadow of the death of God'. They're both acutely aware of the meaning of the 'death of God' - much more so than the puerile atheism that doesn't understand the meaning at all. But I still feel they're stuck at a level of intellectual rationalisation, they're not really engaging at the level of felt understanding.
One thing I picked up from Owen Barfield was the sense of 'primal intimacy' that humans had, prior to the advent of industrial society and the 'disenchantment of the world'. The belief in God or gods or ancestors and spirits was not at all intellectual in today's sense - it was a felt relationship, a network of obligations and ties. The world did not appear to such minds, as it does to us, because there was not the same sense of 'otherness' and alienation from it, which marked the advent of modernity and the realisation of the 'appalling vastnesses of space'. The world was still an enchanted garden or mystery play in which we had our parts, even if our situation appeared miserable from today's perspective.
I was interested to learn Camus did postgraduate work on some form of philosophical theology - I think it might have been Neoplatonism. Also there is said to have been a relationship between him and an American pastor in Paris, by the name of Howard Mumma, to whom he expressed some interest in conversion, prior to his death - there's some details here, although I don't know how authentic the story is.
As for me, I have never believed in the kind of God which I think the existentialists rejected - perhaps because I grew up in a post-Christian and generally non-religious household, the shadow of religion never hung over me. I wrote an undergrad essay on the topic that 'God is not God', by which I meant the image, idea, aggregated collections of thoughts, and the rest, is what people usually mean when they use the word. In other words, they're generally referring to a kind of social construct. But then, I was never atheist - I remember distinctly first understanding that there were 'atheists', aged about 6. Even though I had no idea what God really was, I still thought it was shocking that there would be people who didn't believe in something that seemed so self-evidently great to me.
Nowadays, I rarely use the word 'God', I think I'm actually aware that it does carry a certain weight. I think in terms of 'the Not' - which is the non-manifest, the uncreated, unborn - which is the apophatic way (ugly word for a very simple understanding.) But, like Karen Armstrong says, the point about any real religious life is that it is enacted, you learn to internalise it through the liturgy, symbolic actions and learning by doing. At that point you don't need to believe it, you become it.
Although, 'the absurd' is definitely an important part of religious consciousness. That is why the figures of holy madmen, enlightened rascals and vagabonds are important. Otherwise it's all starchy authoritarianism. There's a lot more of that in folk religious traditions and in the East than there are in the great pontificating power structures that the west thinks of as 'religion'.
Anyway I'm raving, need to sign off, early start, big day.
That's about as close as I've come to agreeing with Deleuze.
I'm sure you've heard of people who have had a sudden change of heart/personality - for example going from completely non-religious (of the militant kind) to religious. Or going from outright thug, gangster and mafia don, to upstanding member of the community. Or going from super-shy, agarophobic house-bound type to super-outgoing, friendly and social. Or from depressive, suicidal, don't wanna live another second, to completely in love with life and full of joy? What do you think accounts for such sudden changes if not a transcendental experience (or what participants would identify as a transcendental experience)?
Atheisms, even serene atheisms, are always phrased as "I don't agree with that". They reject a given linguistic expression. In practice, this is often a semantic problem -- the atheist is interpreting a given linguistic expression in one way, and the believer is interpreting it in another way.
It is ironic to observe that the shortcomings of language as a medium for expressing divine truths are acknowledged by basically all of the major religious traditions. Many atheists suppose that rejecting the expression X is enough to convince someone that the-truth-pointed-at-by-X is nonexistent, but this is a clear error.
It is also ironic to note that well-established traditions usually give preference to apophatic expressions, i.e., basically agreeing with atheists regarding the shortcomings of language.
The whole issue can be softened, and often dismissed, if both sides give up trying to rule on how people should use their words, and focus on what is being said underneath the words.
"Transcendental experience" is rather vague to me--you're not saying that any person who has a major change like that in a short period of time has had a religious experience, are you? (Because many people who experienced those changes would say they didn't have religious experiences. Of course, many would say they did, too . . .)
Anyway, as a physicalist/materialist, an identity theorist on the mind/brain issue, I believe that we're talking about changes in persons' brains (and events in persons' brains that count as "transcendental experiences"). Why some persons' brains change so radically in a short period of time so that we're talking about a completely different personality is a good question, but of course, we don't yet (if we'd ever) have a very good map of how brains from a third-person perspective amount to any particular first-person subjective experience.
This brings up a good study project--although one that's unfortunately not likely to be feasible any time soon because of political/ethical issues: if we were to regularly map everyone's brains in detail, say once every 2-3 years or whatever, and correlate that mapping with behavioral, personality, etc. changes they've experienced, it would help us better map third person observables to first person subjective experience.
- Mariner
I find it encouraging that even New Atheists as strident as Richard Dawkins have gone on record as saying they don't have an issue with certain conceptions of God... Dawkins admits he is just fine with what he calls a deistic God or the God of the physicist.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgrEvEM_j1o
If he had a few more lifetimes, or more interest in studying what the major traditions say about God, we could even imagine him saying that he has no problem with the Christian or the Hindu or the Muslim or the Cheyenne (etc. etc.) concept of God.
People see problems with religion. It's difficult to see how a good God would be okay with the evil done in His name.
The idea of a God who is not associated with religions has it's own appeal.
I'm not entirely sure what you mean by this. Do you mean that Dawkins could change his views or that Dawkins' comment about deism is irrelevant to his overall stance?
I think the difficulty here is that there are many different paths advocated to getting mystical experiences, so many people don't know what to believe as true. For example, Buddhism advocates meditation, while Christianity advocates prayer and devotion. So the way of accessing mystical insight isn't clear - and for those who have never had any such experiences, they don't even know what mystical insight could refer to.
Yes I obviously agree with God creating the world such that virtuous living leads to flourishing. The God of the philosophers is a phrase used by Pascal to represent what philosophers usually mean by God - something abstract, instead of Real that you can encounter right now. The Christian God for example is a personal God - you can have a relationship with God, indeed it's that relationship that makes all the difference. Whereas the God of the philosophers isn't a person - it's a "force" or something similar. The problem with that is that such a god means absolutely nothing to you in the end but an abstract concept - a story.
No, at least not all of them. St. Thomas Aquinas, or Augustine for example certainly don't turn God into an impersonal force. But Averroes does turn God into an impersonal force (first cause).
Quoting Aaron R
The Stoics, for example. Or Plotinus.
Haha okay!
I haven't read much about this, so I can only speculate. Perhaps K was expecting to be able to reach a total commitment, and then realized he could not do it, and that his wavering was hurting R.
I think this is an interesting question. Is the Christian God the only really personal God, due to His human incarnation? On the other hand, the Islamic mystic Rumi sometimes refers to God as "the Friend", and seems to be in love with Shams-i-Tabr?z? as an incarnation of the living God. So, is the notion of, and the feeling for, a personal God implicit only in the Abrahamic religions (as distinct form Hinduism, Buddhism, Daoism, etc) and explicit only in Christianity?
'Smart-arse' or 'one-upman' Atheism?
>:O
So he doesn't fall into any of the categories you listed?
I think a personal God requires revelation, and the Abrahamic religions are the only religions where there is any sort of historical revelation. Such revelation implies communication, and communication necessitates two or more persons. The difference between the Abrahamic faiths and the other religions is that the Abrahamic faiths are historical - they represent a continuous story and march through history, in opposition to Buddhism, for example, which is static and unchanging in terms of history.
When it comes to questions such as whether or not God created the world in this way or that, then the obvious question which ought to precede it is whether or not God created the world. As an atheist, I don't believe that God created the world, and as a reasonable person, I recognise that whether or not I like the idea is irrelevant to whether or not it's true.
As someone who does not believe that God exists, but who nevertheless has an interest in ethics, I would simply isolate ethical questions, such as whether living a virtuous life would lead to flourishing, from any unnecessary implications about God having created the world.
Quoting anonymous66
Why do you ask? Why would that matter? I think that that's completely the wrong question to ask, philosophically. Maybe the story that appeals to me is the story in which we all become flying pink unicorns and prance about amongst the stars. A better question would be along the lines of which theory is the most plausible.
The obvious thing to do would be to get the person to tell us of this supposed truth which is "pointed at" by X, and demonstrate how the one does indeed "point to" the other. If they can't, then that's that. It would be unreasonable to expect anyone to believe in anything that you claim to believe in if you can't even explain what it is that you claim to believe in. And if this supposed link is evidentially weak and leaves open numerous other possibilities and plausible explanations which do not involve any God (or "X", if you prefer), then that is not by any stretch a good enough reason to believe what you believe (or claim to believe) rather than something else which contradicts what you believe (or claim to believe).
You shouldn't be too hard on them, given what they're up against. It's not untypical for a believer to reason fallaciously in an attempt to support their beliefs. It's not uncommon to encounter fallacies such as begging the question, wishful thinking or special pleading from the other side.
The former. Dawkins' ideas about the matter are evolving in his ripe old age, but age by itself is rarely enough (unless one has many lifetimes available).
And if they can, that's also that.
Well, let's lose the "if". Can they or can't they? Can [i]you[/I]? Because it wasn't clear to me from your original comment what you were suggesting. Like Agustino, I thought you might have been talking about some kind of private mystical experience which you can't put into words or properly explain. Your original comment was very vague.
On the contrary. It was very specific, talking about the limitations of language. Don't you think it is curious that you then ask me to give a... linguistic account of "some kind of private mystical experience"?
This was not the subject of my post. The subject of my post was that language has limits, and that both sides (atheists and theists) should recognize that and take it into account when trying to understand the other side.
I don't know about other philosophers. but I know a little about Aristotle's beliefs, and Socrates', and Plato's and Seneca's and Marcus Aurelius', and Epictetus'. And it seems to me that their beliefs about God led them to live pretty good lives. The God these men describe sounds pretty real to me.
The problem I have with revealed religions can be explained best by dialogue...
Random Follower of a Revealed Religion: Let me tell you about my great religion and the great God behind it.
Me: Is that the religion whose followers committed these atrocities?
RFRR: No follower of my religion has ever done anything wrong!
Me: I'm not interested in a religion that promotes denial...
RFRR: Let me tell you about my great religion and the great God behind it.
Me: Is that the religion whose followers committed these atrocities?
RFRR: Well, admittedly some of our followers got some things mixed up. They thought God was telling them to do X, but really He wanted to them to do Y.
Me: How do I know you're any better now at determining what your God is like, and what He wants you to do?
Even Jesus seems to be saying that God wasn't actually the way He was as presented in the Old Testament. So, it looks like Christians have this great text... they just can't be sure what it's really saying about their God.
Deism looks pretty attractive. Stoicism looks pretty attractive. Revealed religions? Not so much.
Regarding Christianity (this is not so applicable to other religions), the text is quite secondary. The main thing is the experience of Christ's life in the believer. Institutionalized Christianity is a series of methods to foster that experience.
So, your dialogue with a Christian could be like this:
Christian: I have some good news for you.
You: ?
Christian: Are you suffering?
You: Not really.
Christian: Oh well. Call me later.
or...
You: Yes, I'm suffering.
Christian: Well, Christ can help you with that.
You: Christ? Isn't he long dead?
Christian: let's talk about that...
Christ came for the sick, not the healthy.
It is good to quote Kierkegaard about that, though. The man who thinks he does not live in despair is in the most despairing condition.
That looks to me very much like "heads I win, tails you lose."
Yep. Life's tough. :D
I recommend that, if any person is in despair, or has any problem for which he would like a solution... then he should look for a solution to his despair, or whatever problem it is.
Sure. I wouldn't say it is "THE ONLY" answer, though. I would merely say that it is the most complete and satisfying answer, for me; and that it is the most philosophically sound answer (and this is not simply "for me").
However, "philosophical soundness" is a very unimportant criterion compared to effectiveness. What matters is whether the remedies employed help the sufferer.
No, it's not their beliefs about God that caused them to behave as they did. It was their beliefs about man and his place in the world that determined their behaviour - in other words their ethical beliefs. So yes, they lived good lives - "good" here being a relative term - because they were virtuous. Could they have lived better lives? Perhaps more joy? Greater hope? Or is virtue the "peak" of what's possible?
Quoting anonymous66
That's not true, Jesus never intimated that his God is any different from the God of the Old Testament. Many people have this notion of Old Testament = violent God, New Testament = loving God. But that's very misguided. First, the NT mentions hell more frequently than the Old (which barely mentions it). The Revelation of the NT is quite likely a lot more brutal than anything described in the OT. The Holy Ghost killed Ananias and his wife Sapphira for withholding money from the Church and St. Peter on the spot, etc.
Quoting anonymous66
They are attractive, but they are very individualistic. They're not communal the way religions are communal. Religions involve a religious community of believers who share the faith together and agree to live by certain common principles and ideals.
Really? I encountered Deists in the UU church I attended. And, ever heard of Stoicon? I went last year, I'll probably go again this year. There is a thriving community of Stoics online. I suspect the same is true of Deism.
Oh.. Sounds a little like Stoicism.
yes, but they have very little in common. Stoicism doesn't cover all the bases so to speak. It covers the bases of how you should behave, but that's about it. It doesn't tell you whether there's a God or not (there are both Stoic atheists and Stoic believers), it doesn't tell you where man comes from, and where man is going to, etc. It doesn't answer existential questions. It just gives you a practice that you can do here and now. Religions aren't like this.
You mean like Christianity? http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/atheism/types/christianatheism.shtml
It also has atheists and believers.
However, it is also the case that a majority of people interested in Stoicism today are atheists... and most of them acknowledge that the Ancient Stoics were believers.. most modern Stoics just think the Ancient Stoics were wrong when it comes to question about God's existence.
Precisely the problem I was talking about. Also most of today's Stoics would disagree with the Ancient Stoics on, for example, sexual morality.
Quoting anonymous66
No. You won't see a Christian atheist in a Catholic, or Eastern Orthodox church, which are the oldest Christian churches that you can find. Sure, there are some insignificant branches of Christianity where the are atheists, but that's all.
However, it is also the case that a majority of people interested in Stoicism today are atheists... and most of them acknowledge that the Ancient Stoics were believers.. most modern Stoics just think the Ancient Stoics were wrong about the question of God's existence. — anonymous66
I've been involved with Stoicism for a little over a year. At it's core, Stoicism is the belief that Morality is The most important thing. Stoics believe that they are merely people who are on a path toward moral perfection. They are people who believe that Virtue is Necessary and sufficient for Eudaimonia (flourishing as a human).
One of the most influential people in the Modern Stoicism Movement is Massimo Pigluicci. He has a blog called howtobeastoic.
He also writes a Stoic advice column. Here is his take on Infidelity... (Spoiler alert.. he's against it).
Okay, what's his view on fornication then and promiscuous sex?
I know that it was about that, but that in no way makes it any less vague. For example, in the part that I quoted, you vaguely referred to an expression denoted by the letter X, and you vaguely referred to a truth being "pointed at" behind this expression. How you think that that requires no further clarification is beyond me. What are you talking about in particular? Can you give an example? And if you're talking about God, which, in the context of this discussion, would not be unusual, then why don't you just say so plainly? What do you mean by the phrase "point at" truth? What is that exactly? How does it work?
Quoting Mariner
You're taking my replies out of context. My initial reply did no such thing. It basically said that [i]if[/I] you can't explain yourself properly or demonstrate this truth, then that's that. And my last reply was not at all curious, but rather to be expected in light of your own comment. You said "And if they can, then that's that". So, naturally, I'm asking you whether they [I]actually[/I] can, and whether [i]you[/I] are one such person. And obviously, if we were to have any hope of getting to the truth of the matter, then merely [I]saying so[/I] wouldn't do. It would have to be put to the test.
Quoting Mariner
Yes, I get that that's what your comment was about. And, in reply, I say that what you should reasonably expect someone to believe likewise has limits. In addition, if you say, suggest, or indicate that you can't put something into words or explain it properly, then that is certainly no where near being enough to warrant that this is indicative of some kind of significant truth that's being pointed at. On the contrary, nonsense [i]cannot be[/I] true.
It has also been my experience that The most important thing for Stoics is morality. Edit: and yes, that includes sexual morality.
No, I am asking you a question. The question was:
Quoting Agustino
Here's the thing. Modern Stoics, just like they disregard what Ancient Stoic texts said about God, also disregard some things ancient texts said about fornication. They go hand-in-hand with modern culture on these issues of sexuality and God. Most people out there - even those who commit adultery (not even talking about fornication now) will say that adultery is wrong. So it's no surprise that modern stoics say that too.
What I'm trying to tell you is that there isn't unity amongst Stoics. There are very large divergences in beliefs upon key issues. You won't find such divergences amongst the oldest religious groups.
If I were talking about God, I'd have written "God". I wrote "X" precisely because the problem is not limited to theology.
We can analyze "American Pie" and the problem will be the same.
Quoting Sapientia
Sure. But not here, since here we are using language to communicate, and since I'm not talking about any particular X (which is why the symbol X is being used).
If you want me to talk about God, there is no problem with that. But talking about God will not "put it to the test", ["it"=my experience of God], due to the limitations of language. If you want to put this specific "it" to the test, you'll have to interact with me in other ways than merely linguistically. For example, I'd mention that I did some stuff, and that if you did this stuff, perhaps you'd experience something similar.
(Note that I'm answering here one of your earlier questions, "what do I mean by the phrase 'point at truth'" -- I mean the use of language to point to non-linguistic sources of truth).
Quoting Sapientia
I didn't say that "if something cannot be put into words, then it points at truth". I said that sometimes truths cannot be put into words, and must be pointed at. The important thing is that there is no linguistic criterion to distinguish which is which. Whenever you see someone claiming that language has hit a wall and that therefore you must transcend language to get to the truth, you have to verify the claim (by following its non-linguistic aspect) by yourself.
Note that "to transcend language" has a weighty sound but it is nothing mystical or extraordinary; toddlers do it, all the time.
You should be careful Sappy, who knows what "stuff" you'll be asked to do X-)
I'm after a specific example that is relevant to the topic which you think illustrates what you were talking about in that part of your original comment that I quoted, and I'd like you to elucidate any vague terms that you've used, like those I've pinpointed.
Quoting Mariner
Then think of something particular and relevant to the topic, and tell me how you'd go about it. Or are you going to tell me you can't even do that?
Quoting Mariner
Ah, that's more like it. Now we're finally getting somewhere. But that's still incredibly vague, and I hope you won't pretend otherwise. The problem is that nothing you can tell me about or get me to do will necessarily cause me to reach the conclusion that God exists, and, even if I did reach that conclusion after doing whatever it is that you have in mind, there are a whole number of explanations for why I would have reached that conclusion, and you'd then have the extremely arduous task of attempting to champion just one over many, many others, and others which, in my assessment, are much more plausible.
Quoting Mariner
There's a big difference between, on the one hand, the difficulty of a young child, or someone with a learning disability, or a poorly educated adult, struggling to explain or put into words something which is sensible and capable of being explained, and, on the other hand, people who just have vague, muddled, nonsensical thoughts and feelings, and cannot explain them properly or put them into words because of the very nature of those thoughts and feelings. It seems clear to me, although I could be wrong, that you have in mind some sort of special and profound truth which you think is being pointed to, rather than the truth that these people are simply confused and emotional.
There can also be a big difference in the evidence supporting a causal relationship between one thing and another. Even if I was lacking in linguistic ability, I might nevertheless notice the causal relationship between flicking the light switch and the light coming on, but that's a world apart from having a funny feeling, perhaps after doing something like praying or meditating, and leaping to the conclusion that God must therefore exist.
STOP!
You're going in with a preconceived idea. It's like telling me that nothing I tell you to do, even putting your hand in the right place, will convince you of the existence of fire. What I mean by fire is precisely what you experience when you put your hand in the right place.
So similarly, what Mariner means by God will be what you experience by doing the secret "stuff" he wants you to do. Not daddy in the sky, or whatever other preconceived ideas you have.
Like "American Pie"?
Or "God"?
Or perhaps you want some other example. Are not two enough?
But let's use another, since it is in my mind right now (I was reading the story to my son last night) and it is apropos.
Are you familiar with "The Little Prince"?
In that book, the Fox teaches this to the Prince:
"Whatever is essential is invisible to the eyes". (Free translation of mine there).
Here, language is being used to point to something invisible. (And I'm sure the Fox would not dispute my interpretation that "the eyes" here is a proxy for "all senses" -- it is not as if hearing or touch would be privileged).
Quoting Sapientia
I know, this is why I won't even try :D.
I'm not talking about God, but about the limitations of language, remember?
Quoting Sapientia
False dichotomy. It is not "either disabled or confused".
What I have in mind is not "some sort of special and profound truth", it is the very ordinary and commonplace phenomenon of observing the limitations of language. My 5-year old kid can grasp it. I'm sure you can too. It is, after all, observed in any internet conversation, including this one.
Quoting Sapientia
It is not about lacking any linguistic ability -- how could it be? If I'm talking about intrinsic limits of language? Not even Shakespeare could defeat intrinsic limits of language.
I would begin by recommending clear and methodical reasoning. (This is not about Sapientia by the way, it is about anyone who asked me how to approach God).
Yes but that's relatively unimportant. More important is the experience itself.
No, you STOP! And READ MORE CAREFULLY! :D
I made an important qualification by using the word "necessarily", which allowed for such possibilities. If what Mariner has in mind is like your example of sticking my hand into fire, then I would almost certainly not be an atheist. But I am much more sceptical, and, I would say, sensible, than to have such an expectation.
Hold on bruv, need to find the fuckin button for that mate!
For some people, perhaps better people, that is relatively unimportant. It wasn't for me, though, and I'd bet that most people who visit philosophy forums would agree.
Okay but reason can only make do with what you've got. If you don't have the necessary material, either you imagine it, or you experience it. Otherwise how can you even reason?
The salient point is that everyone's got what it takes to understand what theologians are talking about when they talk about God. The obstacles here are not sensorial (it's not as if theologians had better senses) or intellectual (it's not as if they were smarter). The obstacles reside mainly in the will (guided by cultural and social factors, such as a strong dislike of the historical aspects of religions), and they prevent the atheist (to get back to my first post in the thread) from reasoning clearly and methodically about the claims being offered.
Needless to say, there is a mirror image of the atheist in the theist camp, usually referred to as "fundamentalist" or "fanatic".
How is American Pie relevant to the topic? This is a discussion about atheism, is it not? What's the connection? Perhaps you're the kind of person that looks at a discussion about substance dualism and thinks "The Hangover 3", but I'm not that kind of person.
Quoting Mariner
Necessarily. I said "necessarily". Show me something like sticking my hand into fire, and there'll be one more sheep to add to the flock. If that were so, you could easily convert me and many others like me. But let's be honest, we both know that you don't have any such trick up your sleeve, and so you're probably right not to bother.
Quoting Mariner
Of course I remember. I've been trying to get you to stick to the topic of discussion, which is not a discussion about language in general. So start talking about God.
Quoting Mariner
False allegation. I didn't say that it's either disabled or confused. I pointed out an important difference between typical cases like the one you mentioned with your example of a toddler and some other cases. I didn't say that these are the only two possible cases. I focused on what I did because I think that you can't rule it out and I think that it should be seriously considered. When it comes to possible explanations, unless there's very good reason to do otherwise, the ordinary should be given priority over the extraordinary. It's ordinary for someone to be confused and emotional, and, as a result, jump to extraordinary conclusions, like, say, that they've been abducted by aliens or that God has been directly communicating with them. It would be extraordinary if these things actually happened.
Quoting Mariner
Yeah, well, [i]my[/I] 5-year-old kid can stay on topic.
Quoting Mariner
Then why bring up the example of the toddler?! That's obviously to do with lacking linguistic ability, so go think up a better example, and don't blame me for your failures.
And just because you're claiming that this is about intrinsic limits of language, that doesn't necessarily mean that it is in any given case. I'm raising alternative possibilities for consideration. It's entirely possible that there are cases that you'd count as an example of the limits of language which could better be explained due to other kinds of limitation, like limitation in linguistic or intellectual ability, or in psychological terms.
This is trying to have one's cake and eat it too. I once identified as such a person but then thought better of it. It unduly waters down the meaning of the word "Christian."
You have to accept the possibility that there is noise in our communication before the dialogue can proceed.
For example, you say that when I invoked toddlers, it "obviously" had to do with lacking linguistic ability. If you knew my 5-year old, who never stops talking (since he was about 3 years old), you'd see that was very far from my mind :D.
I can easily explain what it is that was on my mind when I mentioned the fact that my 5-year old can grasp the intrinsic limits of language. The point I wanted to make is that, to understand those limits, we must assume a vantage point which is (a) non-linguistic and (b) easily accessible (since even toddlers can access it easily). It was an attempt at encouragement.
But what was on my mind is less important than the obvious fact that there is noise in our communication when you say that something is "obvious" when it is simply wrong.
If you want to engage in a dialogue, we can proceed through short posts. This will minimize the noise. But it will be important, for both of us, to keep in mind, all the time, that communication also has intrinsic limits, and to refrain from jumping to conclusions. It will also help if we write carefully.
Let me know if this is acceptable to you. And since it is you who are driving the conversation through your questions, choose one, or a few, that I can answer concisely.
and I thought that this would have been clear -
was that they are lacking in linguistic ability in terms of vocabulary and finding the right words to explain things well. These abilities in a typical 5-year-old are clearly not going to be as advanced as they would be in a typical adult.
But I really would prefer it if we stuck to the topic. This isn't a discussion about language or children, [i]except[/I] insofar as it relates to atheists or atheism or theism or God - that kind of thing. Now, without going back over our discussion to find quotes, my understanding is roughly that you have spoken of a truth that can be pointed to behind language, and that this can be accessed somehow through certain experiences and by doing stuff. In response, I've criticised that on account of being too vague and for other reasons, which I don't think that you've properly addressed, so I think that in your next reply you should go back and start from there. And don't forget, this is about atheism, so of course, I expect this to be about things like how one can know whether or not a certain experience is an experience of God and not something else, rather than about American Pie or The Little Prince.
I'm the type of atheist that likes things to be explained clearly, so that one can determine what exactly we're talking about and whether or not it makes any sense, or has any truth to it, or whether or to what extent it's supported by evidence, and that sort of thing.
I thought that the mention of Shakespeare was clear enough, to the point that this is not what I'm talking about.
The intrinsic limits of language are not present only in deficient users. They are limits of language, not of language users.
And this is quite on-topic if you ask me. Remember, my first intervention is the thread was to point out that atheists are defined by disagreement with a given linguistic expression (for example, "God exists"). Another point made in that first post was that there are theistic, orthodox expressions (apophatic theology) which deny, just as atheists do, that "God exists".
Which goes to show that there's more going on here than what can be expressed linguistically. When a traditional Christian (like me) says "Yes, God does not exist, not as other things which we call 'existents' ", we are not suddenly turned into atheists.
Quoting Sapientia
Yep. Though I emphasized that "certain experiences" and "stuff" are far from being esoteric activities; I mentioned that they are accessible to toddlers, and, in reply to Agustino, I mentioned clear and methodical reasoning as part of the "stuff".
Quoting Sapientia
Why is it "vague"?
How can it become crisper? What kind of claim of mine would be crisper?
Let me try another tack.
Whenever an atheist says "I don't thing God exists", he is bringing into the word "God" a lot of experiences, right?
And whenever a theist disagrees and says, "Well, I think God exists", he is bringing into the word "God" another set of experiences.
Is it not obvious that, barring bad faith or plain stupidity, both parties are talking about different referents (though they are using the same word)?
To put some flesh in the scenario. In many occasions in my PF experience, I've seen people dispute that "God exists" based on a materialist notion. It may be Daddy-in-the-sky, which is silly, or it may be the infinitely complex God of Dawkins, which is not silly (though it is wrong). I would dispute that those gods, exist, too. But that does not mean I'm an atheist; because, when I say "God exists", I'm talking about something else.
"What is this something else", you ask?
Well, to begin with the God of the Philosophers that has been brought up in the thread -- it is whatever sustains the natural framework, it is the link between our reason and the external world, it is the root of beauty, it is love, it is the Agathon. Etc. (An infinite etc.).
I think it [where "it" points at everything up there in that paragraph] exists. This is why I'm not an atheist. Can an atheist believe in that with me and still call himself an atheist? Sure. What matters is not what people call themselves, it is whether or not they understand what is being said, and whether or not they are talking about the same thing.
What you refer to as "reasoning" is the bridge between experience and discourse; the origin is in experience, always in some experience, never in reasoning, nor in discourse.
"O taste and see that the Lord is good", said the psalmist. "Taste", here, is an index for intimate experience. One must taste before he sees; and as for "reasoning", it is not in the picture.
Why must you keep mistaking my input or criticism of what you're talking about for a misunderstanding of what you're talking about? In the last paragraph of one of my previous comments, I set the record straight on this:
Quoting Sapientia
Quoting Mariner
But you're wrong on that point. Atheists don't just disagree with a linguistic expression, they disagree with what it means, what it stands for. I'm aware that there are those who deny that God exists because they think that God transcends existence. But that's a difference that makes little difference. To all intents and purposes, and despite what they say, they believe that God exists. They believe that there's a God. Hence, they're not atheists.
Quoting Mariner
Details? Examples?
Quoting Mariner
Oh, come on, Mariner. You can't be serious. In your reply to me, you mentioned doing "stuff", which could mean just about anything, and you didn't specifically name or describe anything or go into any further detail. Ridiculous.
Quoting Mariner
No, not obvious, but certainly possible and perhaps in some cases likely. But I know that you claim to be Catholic, so to get an idea of what you mean, I can appeal to my knowledge of Catholicism.
Quoting Mariner
Yes, I agree that that sort of thing can complicate matters, and that to deny certain conceptions of God doesn't necessarily make one an atheist, if that term is being used in a broad and general sense, rather than a specific and relative sense. But the word "God" is rather like the word "game", in that there will likely be a family resemblance amongst all the variations, despite any differences, some of which can be stark
Quoting Mariner
It is vague, it is waxing poetic, it is a list of various different things which you are equating [i]with[/I] God, as traditionally understood.
Quoting Mariner
I don't think much of self-identified theists who can only vaguely list things which aren't even controversial to a typical atheist and merely stick onto them the label "God".
While to me, what is interesting is how people can react so strongly to the belief in things "which aren't even controversial".
It's not the belief that's the problem, it's how you wear it. It's the pretence and the equivocation. It's like if I claimed to be a Communist, and then explained, oh no, to [i]me[/I], to be a Communist means love, reason, beauty, respect, the world, humanity, romanticism, perfection and nature. I don't know why so many people think that that kind of thing is perfectly acceptable when it comes to the word "God". Strikes me as wrongheaded.
Where is the equivocation, if not between what I am saying and some independent notion of yours, about "what Christians believe in". Place it in the open and we can examine whether there is equivocation and pretense. As your post stands, to complain with your interlocutor that what he presents is not consistent with your private, unexpressed notions strikes me as wrongheaded.
The first question would be whether there is experience or knowledge that cannot in principle be verbalized.
Maps and territories come to mind.
You didn't mention an eternal being, a creator, the omni-attributes, the trinity, oneness... I find that odd for someone who claims to be 100% Christian, and quite traditional. We're not talking about practice here, which is irrelevant, so I don't know why you brought that up.
As for equivocation, you equivocate, for example, when you claim that God is love. I know that it says that in the Bible, but it's still wrong. Love is love, it's a just a feeling, and in common parlance, no one ever means "God" when then say "love", except when saying that God is love. The two words have different meanings, since meaning is use, and no one ever uses those two words as if they were synonymous and interchangeable.
As for love, well, I know that love is light (the physical light, that we can see with our eyes). If you prefer, "light is the physical manifestation of love". (This is not the only thing that love is).
It is quite emphatically not "just a feeling".
See how we can have difficulties of communication even while we use the same words?
***
Srap Tasmaner, take a look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Map–territory_relation
If there can't be a perfect map (and maps are visual, 2d objects), why would there be any hope for a perfect language (note that languages are 1d, auditory objects, far less suitable for representing reality -- at least to visual beings like us -- than maps; which is why we use maps to navigate, after all).
The fact is that reality is multidimensional; for all practical purposes, it is infinitely multidimensional. And we are not even getting into the problem of different sensorial apparatuses; and I'm focusing only on observables, leaving to the side the problem of concepts. The idea that such complexity can be encapsulated in a one-dimensional sequence of sounds is so far-fetched that I'd say the onus is on the other shoe. People who want to claim that language can, in principle, represent the entirety of reality have a huge claim to find evidence for.
None of what I mentioned was in what you said, and if you think otherwise, then you need to be a lot clearer and more explicit.
Quoting Mariner
What?? I don't know why you'd think that.
Quoting Mariner
Yes it is.
Quoting Mariner
Yes, but that's more your fault than mine because you're using words in unusual ways. And, furthermore, as with the example of "love", I think you're doing so on purpose.
Yes. Remember my comment about private, unexpressed notions? Why should I try to guess what is important to you? It's much better that you ask about your ideas regarding God.
However, the salient point (and it is so salient that I stress it again) is that the Agathon is not incompatible with everything that you mentioned (omni, eternal, trinity, oneness), and it is also not incompatible with many other Christian notions (incarnation, sovereignty over nature, good will towards men, etc. etc.). This means that there is no equivocation (nor pretence).
Quoting Sapientia
Because I reflected on it, and experienced it. You are free to disagree, of course. But you are not free to impose your ideas of how to experience the world upon me.
This is basically the problem with discussions like this one, incidentally. Instead of trying to understand how others understand the world, people prefer to dictate how other people should understand the world, and to rail against people who understand the world differently.
If you were shown evidence that Christians engage in premarital sex (and abortions, by the way) on a regular basis, would that evidence be enough to make you give up on Christianity as a religion?
Quoting Agustino
If you were shown evidence that Christianity is a religion with very little unity, and very large divergences in beliefs upon key issues... would that evidence be enough to make you give up on Christianity as a religion?
I've given evidence that the modern Stoics do have communal practices... and Stoicism itself is concerned with the well-being of all men to such an extent that they call all men their brothers.
Check out one of the disciplines of Stoicism... known as the Discipline of Action that states that all actions are meant to be performed for the good of all mankind.
You use the term individualistic like it's a problem. But, I don't see the problem. I'm not sure I agree that communal forms of relationships are for everyone, or that everyone MUST be involved with some community. I don't know what would be wrong with someone who cared about humanity (someone who considers himself to be a follower/disciple of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, etc.) but who also found it more comfortable to be around people less than others around him. Many people describe themselves as introverts who rebuild their reserves of energy by being alone. I don't see any problem with that.
(There's a generic "you" throughout this post, who isn't you, @Mariner. I trust you to point out where they overlap, if you'd like to.)
I reread the Nagel and looked at the Wikipedia article (I am not going to reread Bateson), but I'm not sure where to go from here.
(E) There is experience we can have, and experience we cannot.
(C) There is experience we can conceptualize, and experience we cannot.
(P) There is experience we can express propositionally, and experience we cannot.
(Not putting those forward as principles or endorsing them, just laying out some terms for my own sake.)
If you have an experience that you believe cannot be expressed propositionally, because you believe it cannot be conceptualized, then you might still talk about it. There is poetry, paradox, apophatic language. (Obviously you can also dance about it, make music about it, express it in how you live your life, and so on, but we're focusing on talk.) But even before getting to to questions of what you could say about such an experience, there are some other issues.
One way of taking the map-territory business would be that you might experience the territory if that experience was not representational. But how is the word "experience" being used here? Do you know that you had the experience? Do you have a memory of the experience? A memory of having the experience? If you had the same or a similar experience at another time, would you know it was the same or a similar experience? Did you, in the first place, know that the experience you were having was a "territory" experience? If so, how? By trying to conceptualize it and failing?
I don't know what to do with any of those questions, really, but maybe you have some thoughts.
Obviously then there's the question of how to characterize the experience, and some people object to some characterizations. That may be a claim that there is a kind of experience you cannot have had, or it may a sort of "whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent." Also, the Christian tradition, for instance, isn't exclusively mystical. On what grounds could you connect an unconceptualizable experience to a thoroughly conceptualized theology? There may be apophatic elements within that theology, but what about the rest? (Mystics have also had to face charges not only of heresy, but worse. How do you know what you experienced was not the Deceiver?)
Nagel I think is a mess. I don't remember what I thought of it years ago, but now, oy. I'm hesitant to start talking about that at all. Maybe it would be suitable for one of those read-alongs, since it's widely available on the interwebs. But if you'd like to pull something particular from that essay and talk about it, I'm game.
No, that evidence would not be enough to make me give up Christianity as a religion. Christianity is about a lot more than premartial sex and abortions.
But having said that, I do know that many "Christians" engage in premartial sex and abortions, however - the difference is that Christianity has a Holy Book - the Bible - which is God's revelation and contains what all believers should agree with to be Christians in the first place. Stoicism doesn't. If there's something Epictetus says that I don't like - well fuck Epictetus, he was wrong. A Christian can't do that. That's why even those Christians who do engage in premartial sex generally are aware that premartial sex is wrong. At least that much they recognise, even if they still engage in it.
Quoting anonymous66
If you could show that within a denomination - say Catholicism - there are very large divergences upon significant and relevant issues, then that would be a significant factor to consider. Enough to give up Christianity as a religion? Probably not. That would require additional evidence to put in doubt Jesus's Resurrection.
Quoting anonymous66
What rituals does Stoicism have? Rituals are the groundwork of communal activity.
Quoting anonymous66
Yeah, I'm an introvert too. But the thing with many introverts is that they simply don't have a community of people like them around, hence why they prefer being alone. There's no surprise there.
I'm not asking you to guess[/I] what's important to me, and when talking about [i]your conception of God, [i]my[/I] ideas regarding God are not the focus. I was just responding to what you yourself had said by expressing my puzzlement that you did not specifically mention any of these fundamental defining features.
No, the salient point is not about compatibility, it's about clarity, or rather, your lack of it. If you asked me how I get to work, and I replied that I move to work, then the problem would be a lack of clarity, and pointing out that the specific way in which I get to work is compatible with that answer would be to miss the point. I walk to work, by the way.
And no, this does not mean that there is no equivocation and no pretence. If you stand by your position, then I stand by my criticism of it.
Quoting Mariner
Good for you. I'm not trying to "impose" anything on you. I'm trying to get you to think about things sensibly.
Quoting Mariner
Nor am I "dictating" anything. You're exaggerating. We're both grownups having a grownup discussion and expressing our thoughts. Naturally, there is going to be some disagreement between us, but that's all it is. I'm not going to send my subordinates to come and arrest you.
There comes a point in which the territory is the territory, i.e., it is not a map. With beings like us, this point is experience. Experience cannot be representational; it is the constituent of reality for us. Any representation of ours begins with experience and is only valid inasmuch as it keeps consistency with our experience.
When you mention "experiences we cannot have" (your proposition E), you are drawing a map. The conception of experiences we cannot have already goes beyond the territory. But this does not mean it is not valid. The faculty which we use to talk about experiences we cannot have is reason (or, logic). We experience the existence of reason in our psyches, and its reach. But we also experience the existence of error in our psyches, and its reach. Given that our reason is fallible, we must be careful when employing it; and "to be careful" in this context means to always go back to direct experience.
This is basically what Plato taught as "anamnesis". The practice of anamnesis, of attending to the experience underneath the words (mental words as well as spoken words), is our best safeguard against error.
Let me address some questions of yours with that in mind.
Quoting Srap Tasmaner
Experience is the territory. It precedes conscious knowing. Babies have experiences before they know any words. In theory, it also precedes conceptualization, although it is never easy to distinguish between the two -- our psyche is very fast.
(The best source for this, by the way, is the huge book by Lonergan, Insight).
When I say that "experience is the territory", I'm underlining the fact that our viewpoints are irreducibly subjective, and that objectivity is already an extrapolation (guided by reason) of our experiences. Being that, it (the notion of objectivity) can always be mistaken, and it is always risky to invoke it in dialogues between two irreducibly subjective beings.
Quoting Srap Tasmaner
I wouldn't accept the notion of an objectively unconceptualizable experience. I can accept the notion of an experience which we, average human beings of 2017, could not conceptualize. But the idea of a purely unconceptualizable experience appears to be a limit upon reason that I do not ... experience ... in my dealings with it.
That said, reason is not the only way to refer to stuff, and symbols are very handy for that. The "unconceptualizable experience" can be symbolized and referred to. What matters is that both the "expresser" and the interpreter keep in mind the use and scope of symbols, and do not confuse them with direct language.
As for how to distinguish between sources of experiences, that is a very serious matter in Christian theology, and as you point out any experience can be fostered by the Deceiver. There is only one sure guide to be followed, according to the tradition, which is "by their fruits you shall know them".
I'll have more to say but have to leave right now :).
The "ours" here refers to a generic individual, right? Because you also say
Quoting Mariner
Let's look at an example, however provisionally.
Suppose I am holding a glass of ice water, I am having the experience of holding a glass of ice water. It may be objected that I am surely not only holding a glass of ice water, but doing many other things as well, and that is true. It's not at first clear whether we should say that I am also having the experience of standing by the fridge, say, or if we would prefer to say that everything I am doing at the relevant moment is part of one experience. Maybe either usage is okay. For that matter, there may be nothing either necessary or objectionable about circumscribing the experience temporally; maybe it is better to talk about my experience as a totality, spread across my entire life. Perhaps all that matters is that we keep in mind that, having somehow picked out something as an experience, we could make different choices that would be just as valid, or that we recognize that how we circumscribe an experience will depend on our purpose in doing so, rather than on something intrinsic to the experience.
I understand your remark about our viewpoints being irreducibly subjective to mean something like this: I am, in holding the glass of ice water, not experiencing that object (again, among other things), or not only experiencing that object, but experiencing (myself) holding that object. If I talk about the glass of ice water, I talk about something as I experienced it. Perhaps that is also to talk about the thing, but it is any rate not only to talk about the thing.
But now it seems we have to say that I was experiencing (myself) holding the-glass-of-ice-water-as-I-experienced-it, or even: I experienced (myself) holding the-glass-of-ice-water-as-I-experienced-(myself)-holding-it. Either this ends up as Bateson's infinite regress that forever keeps the territory out of the map, or it ends up trivially as the claim that I experience what I experience as I experience it. If we opt for the former, then we are in a position to say the regress relates not just to representation, but to the having of an object at all. Although we are talking about the experience, and thus conceptualizing it, nowhere was there a question of experience being representational. All we did was allow the possibility that experience was experience of something. So the natural conclusion is that if experience is irreducibly subjective, that either says nothing or it says experience cannot be experience of something.
And perhaps that's where we want to end up. If "experience is the constituent of reality for us," then experience just is, we might say (if we were comfortable saying things like "reality just is"). If experience could be experience of something, then surely those somethings would figure large in reality.
That may be a trivial claim, but it is far from being a trivial fact. That we are beings capable of experience, and of experience of a given kind (for which we can use the shortcut, "human experience"), is certainly remarkable.
When a non-trivial fact becomes a trivial claim through the activity of verbalization, we are only underlining how limited language is.
Quoting Srap Tasmaner
No, that isn't just a possibility. That's how we experience our experiences. They are always experiences of something, and usually of something extrinsic (we can easily distinguish -- in normal conditions -- dreams from interactions with external objects). Experiences are intrinsically intentional.
(Or, another way to put it would be: our selves are zero-dimensional; when we say "I experience X", X is always something apart from the self).
When we begin to discuss the experience-of-something, using this as a general descriptor, as a "possibility", this is our use of reason leading us away from the direct experience.
Quoting Srap Tasmaner
And once we reach this conclusion, we trace our steps back, check the conclusion against our direct experience (which is, in normal conditions, clearly, immediately, "experience of something"), and when we see a tension between the conclusion and the experience, we give greater weight to the experience. (That's anamnesis in a nutshell).
Now, this does not mean that we should mistrust reason in general. But it does mean that whatever we presented to reason was somehow slanted.
I think one of these slanted points was this:
Quoting Srap Tasmaner
You are distinguishing between "our purpose" (in categorizing experiences) and "something intrinsic to the experience". And they should be distinguished. But a distinction is not a separation. If we start to treat this pair as an opposition rather than a gradient, we can reach paradoxes. It is a fact that "our purpose" when categorizing experiences is remarkably consistent across cultures, times, moments of life, etc. etc. Sure, there is great diversity between viewpoints, but this diversity is constrained within some boundaries that are only very rarely expanded. It is great to read Lakoff (are you familiar with his work?) and to observe that a culture uses the same word to denote Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things (google that if you don't know the work), but after smiling we can see the common root between these three seemingly disparate things. This common root is not merely in us; it is also in the objects.
In the final analysis, the subject-object dichotomy breaks up whenever we try to handle it as a separation rather than a distinction. They are both parts of our experience, poles which can be manipulated for our symbolic convenience.
Quoting Srap Tasmaner
Sure.
Reality just is. But that does not mean we should not experience it in its diversity, nor that we should not talk about it (and for talking about it we require reason, representation, symbolization).
I posted something.. and then thought better of it....
Let me just point out that consistency/reason/rationality requires that you judge your own belief system (and its followers) by the same standards with which you judge others.
Just to leave a few more words in this short post :D:
The consubstantiality of all being is the ground of our experiences.
Reality is.
One may think that this is "saying nothing", another may think it is saying something. Reality is, whatever anyone thinks. Subjectivity and Objectivity.
Quoting anonymous66
What makes you think I don't? I highly respect Stoicism, and absent Christianity, I would say Stoicism is the highest point reachable by man. I just pointed out to something Stoicism lacks - a community bound by a clear set of rules. Stoicism also lacks the Christian hope. Otherwise the two are quite similar.
http://www.catholicworldreport.com/2014/07/31/russell-kirk-conservative-convert-catholic/
Your previous posts.
Well obviously, but what in them precisely?
I mentioned merely the fact that Christianity has a clear position on sex before marriage. There may be Christians who practice it for example, and still call themselves Christian, but they can't argue that fornication is morally permissible in Christianity. What they'll most likely say is that they fall into temptation because they are sinful, etc. etc.
Whereas Stoicism doesn't have clear and established guidelines with regards to sexuality that no one can question.
The way everyone defines it. Fornication = sex before marriage.
Quoting anonymous66
Clear textual evidence? Leviticus, 1 Corinthians, Galatians?
My statements were merely about whether there are clear rules in place. I said one advantage of Christianity is that there are clear rules, unlike in Stoicism, where this is up for interpretation, as many modern Stoics deny it. Do you disagree about that?
Of course what people are actually doing is more important, but I wasn't talking about that.
Then aren't there some things you ought to be saying to your fellow Christians?
How I am not applying the same standard?
Quoting anonymous66
Yes, I should tell them to respect the moral rules laid out in the Bible.
Are there issues in Christianity that are open to interpretation?
Yes, of course. But not so much when it comes to moral behaviour. Things are up to interpretation in the sense of the role the Trinity plays, what a certain parable means, what is required for salvation, etc. Those kind of more abstract questions.
Are attitudes about sexual orientation concerned with moral behavior? What about attitudes towards how to deal with strangers (I'm thinking about immigration)? [I'm in the US].
Sorry, but what exactly do you mean? What are you referring to by "attitudes about sexual orientation"?
Sexual orientations?! As in regarding being gay, lesbian, and stuff like that? Most are, but some obviously aren't.
No, obviously there isn't complete union. But Christianity does have a structure which helps in achieving unity. For example, finding sexually immoral people (those who engage in fornication, etc.) is rarer amongst Catholics than amongst atheists. No human structure is perfect, so of course there will never be a perfect result.
What survey method are we using for that?
That sounds pretty rigorous and reliable, haha.
Let's see Terrapin. Would you be promiscuous and claim to be a Christian believer? Probably not. Why? Because most people would not engage repeatedly (maybe they would once or twice) in activities that are completely contrary to their fundamental beliefs (why? well who the hell wants to think of themselves as dishonest, lying snitches?). So people who are promiscuous would naturally gravitate towards cultures and beliefs systems which permit this. Just like you in fact ;)
http://waitingtillmarriage.org/4-cool-statistics-about-abstinence-in-the-usa/
I'm very promiscuous, definitely. But you know what? Most of the females I've been promiscuous with were religious. Most people in general are still religious. A couple of the wildest females I've known seemed to be the most religious--one was a minister's daughter, one was at church more days of the week than not, etc.
Isn't that reporting what people say? What people say is often different than what they do.
Mate of course there's even a lot of religious people who do that, because we live in a culture which promotes and encourages promiscuity as the cool thing. What I'm saying is that LESS religious people than non-religious are going to be promiscuous.
And by the way, did you ever ask them about how their religious views affected or were related to their behaviour? Many people are "religious" in name only.
Right, but one thing you appealed to was anecdotal evidence. That doesn't suggest your conclusion here.
So what else do you got?
If you had to make a bet, would you bet against my conclusion or for it, and why?
Yes. I'd bet against your conclusion. Because religious views in this regard promote a repression that people seem to rebel against.
And how do they rebel against it mate? By doing away with their religion generally - if not in name, then in deeds. What I'm telling is sensible.
Of course most of the girls you hooked up with would be religious - no doubts about it for the simple reason that as a whole population, the religious group is much larger than the non-religious. Bayesian probability mate. So you're of course more likely, granted you pick a random woman, that she will be religious and promiscuous, than that she would be atheist and promiscuous, simply because the pool of religious is much larger than the pool of atheists, even though the probability of her being promiscuous is greater in the atheist pool.
On that view, you'd have to argue that almost no one is "really religious,"
That's not true. There's many folks who adhere to and respect their beliefs, and there is a resurgence of it amongst young people - for example look at me. I rebel against promiscuity, which was the natural state I encountered in the world, just like some rebel against monogamy, which was the natural state they've encountered in the world.
Yeah, it is true. I've known tons and tons of people who identify as religious, who regularly go to church, etc. I've not known one of them who strictly follows the religion. I don't think that what you say is at all representative of a norm--in fact, I think that just about every person on this board has some serious dysfunctional issues, and I'd not believe anything you'd say in this regard just because you're saying it. Again, people say and do very different things.
That's because you live in New York for God's sake >:O What do you expect mate, honestly?
Quoting Terrapin Station
LOOOOL >:O so what are you doing hanging around with the retards then?
Quoting Terrapin Station
SOME people - that doesn't mean everyone is like that. You're just assuming everyone is like that because the folks who live in New York and go to Church are like that. Of course they are - probably the biggest hypocrites live in those cities!
I've not only lived in New York--I wasn't born here, I didn't grow up here. And I've traveled extensively, all over the world.
Quoting Agustino
I've not done a ton of searching for outlets, but there doesn't seem to be much choice re an active board where you can talk about philosophy online, AND, what I'm saying there isn't only true of this board. It's true of boards where people can be anonymous across much of the Internet. Boards seem to attract particular sorts of people with dysfunctional issues.
Yeah, I don't quite believe that, unless you've just travelled around the Western world.
Quoting Terrapin Station
Like yourself? >:)
If only it hinged on what you believe.
Quoting Agustino
I never excluded myself.
So far you have presented zero evidence to back up or incline me to believe in your position. Instead you just dismiss statistical evidence based on what people anonymously say as wrong. Okay, even if it's wrong, do you realise how wrong it has to be? The difference between 1/30 and 1/5 is 600%. Okay, 600% is wrong, some of them are lying. Even if the difference was just 50% (3/10), that would still be significant enough to justify my conclusion. So far I have more grounds for holding this, and you have absolutely none. Except your experience, which I've already dealt with in my post explaining Bayesian probability.
Your grounds for believing what you do are really that it's the way you feel, and the way you feel people should ideally be. It's what makes sense to you given little ability to think about anything in a less black and white way. Your grounds include zero real world experience--to the point where you can't even believe that anyone could travel extensively, because it's so foreign to your own experience, and zero critical ability re thinking about sources of information that confirm your beliefs.
Now, that's funny! >:O
P1. Christianity is a religion about rules (and you admit your fellow Christians have a hard time following the ones you want them to)
P2. Stoicism is also about rules
P3. Modern Stoics don't have as much unity (when compared to Christianity) when it comes to the rules
And then you come to the conclusion
C: Christianity is better than Stoicism.
But, you also argue that it's better that one follow rules, vs just having rules. (and again, I'll point out that you admit your fellow Christians have a hard time following the rules you want them to)
Will you stand by your assertion that Christianity is about rules? Because I'm pretty sure that Jesus says otherwise.
and I'm pretty sure that you'd have to agree that Christians don't actually have much unity in any of their beliefs... including which rules to follow... (if it turns out that Christianity is actually about rules).