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True, it's unavoidable some humans are always going to be wrong. But, in the same vein as earlier, we can't reason that because (some) humans don't care about w

by keane 10y ago

True, it's unavoidable some humans are always going to be wrong. But, in the same vein as earlier, we can't reason that because (some) humans don't care about what is true, humans should continue to not care about what is true. As far as others suggesting you resolve inconsistencies and hold logically consistent conclusions: yes, to arrive at Truth by examining what logically follows from true and sound reasoning you are going to have to first adopt the 'dependency' of Western logic. But, indeed, you only need do this if you care to know Truth. Many humans reject the use of Western logic (eg, the New Age community) and prefer vague, unexamined existence but I agree this ultimately is each individual's prerogative. Your perspective seems to be "humans often hold untenable positions and Earth has not yet been destroyed because of this (or apparently impacted in any significant way from it) therefore I may (without impact) hold untenable positions", a position I and your Christian interlocutors I think unsurprisingly reject. My most sincere advice to you and to all everywhere is found in Rousseau's echo of Juvenal's motto "Vitam impendre vero"—you must stake your life on Truth. Re: your ability to be a romantic you'll note that the conclusion in Vladimir Solovyov's truncated syllogism "Man is descended from the apes; therefore we must love one another" does not follow. Materialists can practice what looks like romance but cannot be romantics in any meaningful sense of the word.

mercer 10y ago
> Materialists can practice what looks like romance but cannot be romantics in any meaningful sense of the word. I must say I really enjoy reading about your position in this and, to be honest, would wish nothing more than to be in agreement with it. I was a devout Christian for much of my life and I still feel the loss. But my reason for quitting this search and need for capital-T truth was that the Christian version of it (as well as the few others I explored) just wasn't convincing. It felt like a convenient lie to give meaning to my life rather than some Truth I happened to have figured out. But all this doesn't mean that I now spend my life an exhausted nihilist. There's plenty of room for values and truth in a world-view that holds that ultimately the Objective nature of these things is probably unknowable. By the standards I used to hold as a devout Christian, I'm quite possible a better Christian now than I was back then. Plus I'm happier. Anyways. I see your point, and I respect it for the most part, but I think it's a bit overreaching and arrogant to argue that a materialist cannot be a romantic in any meaningful sense. By my definition of meaningful, my romantic relationships are very meaningful. And practically speaking, I'm pretty sure my experience of romance is not so different from that of a Christian anyways.
- keane 10y ago
  I grew up Christian (of sorts) and drifted away from the belief. Like you write, it felt like a convenient lie. I was convinced it was a myth invented by humans to bring themselves comfort. Observing human suffering seemed to me to be proof of no God. I heard of the Buddha who declared both that there was no creator God and that life was suffering, and based on what I had seen of poverty, disease, and war this seemed to be the case. For me, I saw my rejection of Christian claims as a very element of my personal need for 'capital-T truth'. I embraced that motto of Rousseau and Juvenal and began studying every -ism and theory apart from Christianity. Eventually, I would run into a philosophy B.A. who was also a Christian. I constantly pressed them for justification of their belief and their main response was this quote by Kierkegaard: "If there were no eternal consciousness in a man, if at the bottom of everything there were only a wild ferment, a power that twisting in dark passions produced everything great or inconsequential; if an unfathomable, insatiable emptiness lay hid beneath everything, what would life be but despair?" -- If there were no God, life would be despair (and Siddhartha would be right) so we believe. This line of thought upset me. What I wanted was to know what was actually the case, how the world actually was and not how we might like it to be. Truth at any cost no matter how inconvenient, bewildering, or painful. I studied Buddhism and Eastern philosophies (which are basically methods of coming to terms with and accepting nihilism). But I retained an idea that human suffering was bad and humans somehow had value. Reading Hume is what changed me. Unless an outside rubric existed that would declare human suffering bad, human suffering never actually had been bad at all. But I believed internally stronger than any other belief that somehow it truly was bad and this instinct seemed to be a self-evident truth. What Hume shows is that this instinct that we feel is either placed in us in relation to a Supreme Being and its existence functions as a unit of evidence called natural revelation or it is a strange delusion we invent and we delude ourselves that human suffering matters. A liberating realisation was that, in light of this, if the second scenario were the case, it was also not morally 'wrong' anytime humans proclaimed suffering was wrong, one would have merely paid the universe a compliment it would not have deserved. If the unempirical does not exist, then proclaiming it does is not wrong. In the words of philosopher Thomas Nagel: "If sub specie aeternitatis there is no reason to believe that anything matters, then that does not matter either". As far as quitting the search and holding logically untenable positions, I suggest this remark by Walker Percy: "This life is too much trouble, far too strange, to arrive at the end of it and then to be asked what you make of it and have to answer “Scientific humanism.” That won’t do. A poor show. Life is a mystery, love is a delight. Therefore I take it as axiomatic that one should settle for nothing less than the infinite mystery and the infinite delight, i.e., God. In fact I demand it. I refuse to settle for anything less. I don’t see why anyone should settle for less than Jacob, who actually grabbed aholt of God and would not let go until God identified himself and blessed him." He portrays a worldview known as the supernatural existential, desiderium naturale, or Man as Wayfarer in his book The Moviegoer explained here: http://liamk.org/moviegoer/ http://liamk.org/moviegoer/

by keane 10y ago

mercer 10y ago

> Materialists can practice what looks like romance but cannot be romantics in any meaningful sense of the word. I must say I really enjoy reading about your position in this and, to be honest, would wish nothing more than to be in agreement with it. I was a devout Christian for much of my life and I still feel the loss. But my reason for quitting this search and need for capital-T truth was that the Christian version of it (as well as the few others I explored) just wasn't convincing. It felt like a convenient lie to give meaning to my life rather than some Truth I happened to have figured out. But all this doesn't mean that I now spend my life an exhausted nihilist. There's plenty of room for values and truth in a world-view that holds that ultimately the Objective nature of these things is probably unknowable. By the standards I used to hold as a devout Christian, I'm quite possible a better Christian now than I was back then. Plus I'm happier. Anyways. I see your point, and I respect it for the most part, but I think it's a bit overreaching and arrogant to argue that a materialist cannot be a romantic in any meaningful sense. By my definition of meaningful, my romantic relationships are very meaningful. And practically speaking, I'm pretty sure my experience of romance is not so different from that of a Christian anyways.

keane 10y ago
I grew up Christian (of sorts) and drifted away from the belief. Like you write, it felt like a convenient lie. I was convinced it was a myth invented by humans to bring themselves comfort. Observing human suffering seemed to me to be proof of no God. I heard of the Buddha who declared both that there was no creator God and that life was suffering, and based on what I had seen of poverty, disease, and war this seemed to be the case. For me, I saw my rejection of Christian claims as a very element of my personal need for 'capital-T truth'. I embraced that motto of Rousseau and Juvenal and began studying every -ism and theory apart from Christianity. Eventually, I would run into a philosophy B.A. who was also a Christian. I constantly pressed them for justification of their belief and their main response was this quote by Kierkegaard: "If there were no eternal consciousness in a man, if at the bottom of everything there were only a wild ferment, a power that twisting in dark passions produced everything great or inconsequential; if an unfathomable, insatiable emptiness lay hid beneath everything, what would life be but despair?" -- If there were no God, life would be despair (and Siddhartha would be right) so we believe. This line of thought upset me. What I wanted was to know what was actually the case, how the world actually was and not how we might like it to be. Truth at any cost no matter how inconvenient, bewildering, or painful. I studied Buddhism and Eastern philosophies (which are basically methods of coming to terms with and accepting nihilism). But I retained an idea that human suffering was bad and humans somehow had value. Reading Hume is what changed me. Unless an outside rubric existed that would declare human suffering bad, human suffering never actually had been bad at all. But I believed internally stronger than any other belief that somehow it truly was bad and this instinct seemed to be a self-evident truth. What Hume shows is that this instinct that we feel is either placed in us in relation to a Supreme Being and its existence functions as a unit of evidence called natural revelation or it is a strange delusion we invent and we delude ourselves that human suffering matters. A liberating realisation was that, in light of this, if the second scenario were the case, it was also not morally 'wrong' anytime humans proclaimed suffering was wrong, one would have merely paid the universe a compliment it would not have deserved. If the unempirical does not exist, then proclaiming it does is not wrong. In the words of philosopher Thomas Nagel: "If sub specie aeternitatis there is no reason to believe that anything matters, then that does not matter either". As far as quitting the search and holding logically untenable positions, I suggest this remark by Walker Percy: "This life is too much trouble, far too strange, to arrive at the end of it and then to be asked what you make of it and have to answer “Scientific humanism.” That won’t do. A poor show. Life is a mystery, love is a delight. Therefore I take it as axiomatic that one should settle for nothing less than the infinite mystery and the infinite delight, i.e., God. In fact I demand it. I refuse to settle for anything less. I don’t see why anyone should settle for less than Jacob, who actually grabbed aholt of God and would not let go until God identified himself and blessed him." He portrays a worldview known as the supernatural existential, desiderium naturale, or Man as Wayfarer in his book The Moviegoer explained here: http://liamk.org/moviegoer/ http://liamk.org/moviegoer/