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Post by Pink Betty on May 4, 2010 14:44:37 GMT
i could eat Jonathan Miller  |
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Post by Pink Betty on May 4, 2010 14:45:43 GMT
.....the other one, i wouldn't even nibble.
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Post by battlerbriton on May 5, 2010 8:18:34 GMT
Thanks Betty!
Fascinating!
When Dawkins is undigmatic he is very good
I was interested to hear that he admits the existenc eof a God is unknowable.
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Post by battlerbriton on May 5, 2010 10:52:24 GMT
I like his description of natural selection giving some people ''the illusion of design''. Yes a bit like the solar sytem giving some people the illusion of a self-generating system. eh what? Or even, and a scientist like you would never believe this, some thinking that evolution is a self-generating system! Hah! What buffoons people can be eh..........what? |
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Post by Lady MH on May 5, 2010 11:31:36 GMT
I like his description of natural selection giving some people ''the illusion of design''. Yes a bit like the solar sytem giving some people the illusion of a self-generating system. eh what? Or even, and a scientist like you would never believe this, some thinking that evolution is a self-generating system! Hah! What buffoons people can be eh..........what? A bit like that, yeah. Were you born a cackling fool or was it something that just gradually evolved? |
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Post by battlerbriton on May 5, 2010 15:41:35 GMT
Yes a bit like the solar sytem giving some people the illusion of a self-generating system. eh what? Or even, and a scientist like you would never believe this, some thinking that evolution is a self-generating system! Hah! What buffoons people can be eh..........what? A bit like that, yeah. Were you born a cackling fool or was it something that just gradually evolved? Oh dear, my dear, you are getting upset! |
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Post by rjpageuk on May 13, 2010 19:31:46 GMT
I was interested to hear that he admits the existenc eof a God is unknowable. You didnt listen very well; he didnt admit the existence of a God is unknowable he acknowledged the possibility that it is. Yes a bit like the solar sytem giving some people the illusion of a self-generating system. eh what? No, more like the solar system giving some people the illusion of design. |
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alanseago
Madrigal Member 
Devout Oblivionist.
Posts: 2,292
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Post by alanseago on May 16, 2010 10:08:30 GMT
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 10, 2012 6:47:28 GMT
Rowan Williams essay last summer in response to the simplistic anti-theism advanced by Hitchens, Dawkins et al was rather good. I'll see if it's on the net.
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 10, 2012 16:02:22 GMT
Williams is always irritating people, and I think I understand why He's Welsh? I can't find it on the net - I'll see if I saved it somewhere, and give you a potted summary. I knew you liked LJ really. He grows on you. I know what you mean. I studied under a Zen master like that once, when I lived in the Pyrenees. I've also known several more down-to-earth examples - most of them Christians, of the well-meaning village-caring actively-loving CofE variety. Whatever negatives you can throw at Christianity, and dear me there's no shortage of choice, there's no doubt in my mind it's also a force for great good, and spiritual wholesomeness. In the sense of Erasmus, I should imagine, rather than Dawkins. (Though Dawkins, and Hitchens, are both.) Hmmm, well - I don't see it as a contest or conflict, so much as Christianity can, at its best and most pure at least, act as a guide to bring out and develop that good. Ramsay and Ryle used to define "belief" as a map, an inclination or disposition to act in a certain way, to achieve a certain end, rather than, say, a proposition that one takes to be true. That is, if you adopt a certain way of interpreting the universe, yourself, your destiny, your fellow creatures, this inclines you to behave in certain ways, to value certain outcomes, and achieve certain ends: and this shapes you as a person, eventually, allowing perceptions and behaviour that would otherwise have never occurred. We all have such beliefs, whether religious or atheist or anything else. Looked at in this way, the important question becomes not whether this or that belief is literally true (ultimately, it's not, even the most exhaustively corroborated scientific belief - they're all maps) but what is their outcome - where do these routes lead you? Is it a good map, letting you get to somewhere that's worth getting to? Yes. Most do argue this, I think, to be fair. |
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Post by philippa on Jan 12, 2012 0:22:24 GMT
I knew a great religious man. Great in the wondrous sense of the word. Great heart, great intellect, great understanding. He was an archbishop for a while. He was one of the few religious people that I've met who truly lived to spirit of the word, in the spirit of God, be it Spinoza's god or Christ's god or anyone Else's; in the spirit of the cosmos, in the spirit of nature, in the spirit of good. One of the few that would inspire me to be a christian. At the weekend I heard one of his old acquaintances, a man of holy orders himself, explain that this man was a true humanist. How odd, I thought, that such a prominent christian, someone who developed and shaped and ran the christian church (ecumenical man) should wind up being described as a humanist. Why not christian? I suppose the answer is that christianity is so flawed that even the best christian has to look elsewhere eventually. And it seemed, to me, to vindicate the idea that 'good' comes not from christianity but from humans. Christianity accuses humans (especially atheists) of copying and borrowing 'good' from christianity. But it's the other way around, really: christianity has tried to claim the 'good' that really just comes in the human nature package. Instead of thinking that our morality is based on christian or Godly values, christians can only truly argue that christianity can nurture the good that already exists in human nature. perhaps you were so confused by the christian gentleman who described the great religious man as a 'humanist' because the word itself needs defining. Humanist with a capital h as opposed to humanist with a small h. i see a difference in the two. humanist (capital h) is more of a movement which rejects anything supernatural, ie god. it is a way of seeing the world and is compatible with atheism and agnosticism. whereas the other, with a small h, is much more of a general term that relates more to interest in the wellfare of people. i don't see why therefore someone who is a christian cant be described as a humanist (small h) as well. could it be that the person who was describing the great man as a true humanist was being sensitive to his audience. his use of language was inclusive and encompassed all who were listening regardless of faith or creed. most christians, like anyone else, are able to aknowledge that someone is capable of being a good person on their own merit rather than because they are a christian or were motivated by god. your man probably just thanks the lord that you great man was one of them. but seriously, do you really think that christians in general are unable to recognise good people on their own human merit be they the great man you described who happened to be a christian as well, or someone like Ghandi who wasn't a christian? |
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Post by Synonym on Jan 14, 2012 1:04:21 GMT
And it seemed, to me, to vindicate the idea that 'good' comes not from christianity but from humans. Christianity accuses humans (especially atheists) of copying and borrowing 'good' from christianity. But it's the other way around, really: christianity has tried to claim the 'good' that really just comes in the human nature package. Yet different cultures with different religions can have vastly different ideas as to what is good or bad, barring perhaps a few core ideas such as the undesirability of indiscriminate killing. I'm sure we have all felt that base urge of wanting to do something of a violent nature towards the person that has angered us, yet our ideas of 'civilised behaviour' (usually) holds us back from doing what comes naturally but would be considered to be wrong. I've heard it said that male philandering is 'inbuilt'. |
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Post by Synonym on Jan 14, 2012 1:06:18 GMT
Of course if a particular religion's God exists and such a thing as an objective morality is possible, then good and bad will come from that religion. Those who make different (subjective) value judgments would be wrong.
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 16, 2012 13:49:25 GMT
The well-meaning vicar type is not someone I find very inspiring. Amiable, perhaps. Enviable, often. A positive to the community, probably. A lazy man's inspiration maybe. Very tempting, especially in times of great need. I wasn't referring to vicars. As a general class, I'm not impressed by the average career religious official either. No doubt in the past they were a more impressive bunch. I was referring to ordinary lay church members, doing good in their communities, caring for the weak and vulnerable in their village or town, and being - and I've no doubt at least partly as a result of their faith - thoroughly good, well-rounded, healthily loving people, with long-lasting happy marriages and balanced fully supported spiritually blossoming children. It strikes me as a valid response to most of Hitchens' more forceful arguments, which primarily focussed on the purported harm and abuse that some atheists are inclined to think "religion" is responsible for. Probably a less contentious term of praise to people for whom the meaning of "Christian" is a matter of fierce and irrational conflict? I see all that as largely irrelevant. The trappings and precise forms of any religion's rituals are, functionally, if we're looking to understand what religion is and does in a community, of very minor importance. Yes, I suppose so. Unlike Dawkins and Hitchens I don't think it's legitimate to draw a line between them - not if you're arguing against religion, proposing an alternative of atheistic scientism, and arguing this is in whatever way better. They both claim they have no argument with Taoism or Buddhism or Confucianism because these are "ways of life" rather than a "belief in God." To my mind that was a very serious error, revealing they understood little about these "Eastern" religions, and preventing them seeing deeply enough into the monotheistic versions they're contesting. It reduces their argument to a series of criticisms about various Church practises and doctrinal disputes throughout history - missing entirely the reasons religious belief exists, in my opinion. You don't, but neither is there any need to suppose there isn;t one to do so. The heresy issue is getting us confused with the historical issues of particular churches again - it's not touching on the real issues of the grounds to any religion. Lazy? No more so than the average "scientific" mind holds and accesses his or her beliefs. Which idea? That's the issue, it seems to me. Hitchens and Dawkins spend a great deal of their time arguing against Creationism, for example - putting forward persuasive arguments in favour of evolution, or the findings of astrophysics. Well - that doesn't touch what religion is about. Neither does the brief excursion into humanist ethics or rational jurisprudence they occasionally engage in, following what is largely the Straw Man that religion claims to itself the grounds to morality. No more important than the equally false theory that Euclidean geometry is intrinsic to the universe, or that electrons are little particles orbiting a nucleus at a great separation of empty space (a thoroughly redundant belief that I heard Brian Cox expound as known and "scientifically proven" fact only last week.) And why isn't this list about power politics? Or, for that matter, family dynamics? Well, if there was the slightest prospect of anyone having the faintest notion of how to do this, he might have a valid point. But we don't. What you're suggesting is an alternative religion. If any form of humanism could fulfill the functions that religion performs, there wouldn't be any argument left. |
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Post by ncsonde on Jan 16, 2012 14:33:09 GMT
Religions include cultural values & a religion can make itself versatile by consuming and incorporating varying cultural beliefs. A simultaneous success and failure, in my view. Success in domination, failure in proving itself to be the ultimate truth. This would only apply to those religions that make such a claim, wouldn't it? And not even the RC Church make such a grandiose claim these days. Only in the most general and vague of senses, I think, perhaps, where a theist might believe our moral sense derives from God? Blind faith being belief without any evidence for that belief? But psychologically there are no such beliefs - it's the nature of them to interpret the world in their own terms, so that they in a sense furnish their own evidence. Science is no different in this respect, as the history of scientific belief amply testifies - though very few scientists take this obvious fact on board, as equally few doctrinaire religious people are inclined to. So much depends on what you mean by belief and faith - or even Christian. For example, I could say (accurately) that I "believe" in the "Christian god." I understand those terms in a way that enables me with no rational contradiction to appreciate that what Christians mean by it is not false - misinterpreted, perhaps, or psychologically, linguistically, scientifically naive; but not false. I don't even mean it might have a "poetic" or non-rational form of "truth" - I mean that it's probably true in the standard scientific sense, just as the atomic theory is, or that the force of gravitation exists. But I know full well no one understands what this hypothetical "God" is, even roughly - any more than no one understands exactly what atoms are, or gravitation is, not by a long long way. On the contrary. I could give you a long list of fundamental beliefs that all the above absolutely depend on that have absolutely no evidence for them whatsoever, but must be taken as true on nothing other than faith if one wishes to believe that one is attaining a closer understanding of reality. It's true that you can evade this dependance by giving up on any such ambition or claim - as Bohr and the Logical Positivists did, for instance ( another fact of history that escapes the vast majority of physicists like Cox!) Here's just one example of a rationalist's belief that relies on nothing more than blind faith, as Lewis Dodgson first pointed out: p > q. Some proposition implies any other one. As the Mock Turtle points out: why should I believe that? Who says that the relation of implication is true? Or even consistent? (I think this and other cognitive relativist critiques of logic, maths, and rationalist claims to the objectivity of reason are answerable, by the way: I'm just pointing out that it's far from an easy or self-evident task, and so far at least no one has been able to satisfactorily achieve it.) |
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