5 ms·

"Playing God" is a meaningless, dangerous cliche

40 points by jokermatt999 16y ago

SlyShy 16y ago
The people I've met who accuse scientists of "playing god" are usually doing so themselves. That is, passing judgment and condemnation. Of course, they think God is compelling them to do so, rather than that they are compelling their idea of God to do so.
- jswinghammer 16y ago
  Interesting interpretation of people who are judging others. The Bible states that people are doing this in order to distract God from their own sins that they need to confess and repent of.
  - hugh3 16y ago
    On the other hand, the Bible also says we should stone homosexuals, people who work on the sabbath and girls who aren't virgins when they get married. The Bible says a lot of things. Come to think of it, all the death-by-stoning punishments make a lot more sense than the "never judge anyone for anything" idea.
    - jswinghammer 16y ago
      Well the idea isn't to avoid correcting people who go astray but rather to avoid pointing to others faults as evidence of your righteousness. That's what most people do (even those who aren't religious as I'd normally define it). The Bible states in the same book (Romans chapter 2 for the first citation and 6 for this one) that the wages of sin is death--meaning this life or the next.
hugh3 16y ago
Fair enough: that kind of accusation has indeed a long history, harking back to the myths of Prometheus, Daedalus and Faust. But to regard hubris as “playing God” is, first, a modern perspective, and second, a secular one. After all, Prometheus did not in any sense “play God” (he was already divine, and Zeus himself gave him the role that he was deemed to have abused). Yes, Prometheus was divine, but the point of the myth was not that he stole godly powers but that he gave them to men. But the myth is interesting because it all worked out pretty well for men (but badly for Prometheus), so Prometheus is rebellious to the gods but still a great benefactor. The closest analogy in the Abrahamic religion is Adam and Eve, who again got godlike powers (the power to understand good and evil) from disobeying a god. Unlike the case of Prometheus this act of rebellion is seen as an extremely bad thing for which we are still being punished. In the same tradition there's also the Tower of Babel, another story about how man attempts to become Godlike and gets smacked down by god for it. And the Greek tragedies are basically all about folks who hubristically claim to be better than the Gods and wind up suffering horrible fates because of it. Anyway, human mythology is full of all sorts of stories about humans who try to claim powers of gods. Sometimes it ends well, usually it ends badly. Some stories are teaching us to be happy with what we've got while others are trying to explain why what we currently have sucks. Picking on Prometheus, Daedelus and Faust are lousy examples, I don't know why the author picked 'em.
- electromagnetic 16y ago
  Prometheus is a truly complex character, with a well thought out story - unlike any in the Abrahamic religions. To understand Prometheus, you have to understand his gift - foresight. He could see the future. In the battle between the Titans (which he was) and the Olympians, he saw that his kind would lose to their own children, so he 'joined' them. His acts of defiance to Zeus weren't acts of rebellion, they were acts of guerilla warfare. Prometheus took fire, the one thing that truly kept man apart from the gods (IE the ability to change our environment at will), and he didn't just give it to mankind like the myth states, he gave it to his own children - many of which were also Zeus' offspring, and mankind as a whole was allegedly Zeus' greatest love. Prometheus as it were saw the cycle of the universe. Cronus had usurped Uranus. Zeus had usurped Cronus, and Prometheus did everything in his power to ensure humans usurped Zeus. As you pointed out, there is his act of stealing fire. However, one of his greater feats (which caused him the need to steal fire) was when an agreement was to be struck between the mortals and the immortals. Prometheus had man wrap beef within the cows stomach as one sacrifice and bones wrapped within glistening fat as another. Zeus chose the latter, setting a precedent for all sacrifices. When man started burning (IE sending to the gods) the junk parts of the animals, Zeus was pissed and took fire from mankind. Then Prometheus stole it back, and got chained to the rock. However, again if you look at the bigger picture, Prometheus was never disadvantaged. He lifted mankind from the burden of sacrifice, he again gave fire to mankind, which landed him in eternal torture. However, Prometheus has illustrated several times that his foresight far out performs Zeus' omniscience. For him, eternal torture wasn't eternal, he knew Heracles (AKA Hercules) would be along shortly to free him. Prometheus eventually reconciles with Zeus by warning him that he's going to be usurped, and forms a sort of power-sharing agreement if he helps protect Zeus from being overthrown. It also, allegedly, led to the release of the other Titans from imprisonment. So the real question here is, was Zeus ever going to be usurped in the first place? It essentially went from the Titans being overthrown, Prometheus waging a guerilla war and eventually forming a coalition government between the Titans and Olympians. I've said this before to people when discussing this, but where in the hell was the imagination in the Abrahamic religions? Prometheus, a singular character in the Ancient Greek religion has a story in such a scope that it would kick LotR's ass, and still be 3-times longer . . . from what we, thousands of years later, have pieced together.
SlowOnTheUptake 16y ago
I agree that the term doesn't carry much meaning, but what is "dangerous" about it?
- powrtoch 16y ago
  E.g, the way it's employed against stem-cell research that should otherwise go on to save, you know, millions and millions of lives.
  - hugh3 16y ago
    Just because you think something will save millions of lives doesn't make every counterargument, and every turn of phrase used by every counterargument, "dangerous" though. That's just one step away from saying that your opponents are not only mistaken but unconscionable.
    - jokermatt999 16y ago
      True, but "playing God" isn't always used as meaning "we should be aware of the benefits", and often used as a cheap scare tactic. I feel that actually analyzing the risks and benefits is a better tactic than trotting out this old cliche. Furthermore, it has connotations of fearing new technology (I can't quite phrase this right, sorry). There are legitimate reasons to be concerned about discoveries such as artificially replicating DNA, but I don't think that "Man vs God" is one of them. I don't feel that I've phrased this quite as well as I'd like to. If you'd like elaboration or clarification, please ask.
      - hugh3 16y ago
        "Playing God" to me is just a turn of phrase, shorthand (and somewhat cliched) for "messing with powers beyond your understanding or ability to control". It has nothing to do with whether one or more gods actually exists and can quite sensibly be used by atheists since it means "assuming powers which should only belong to (hypothetical) gods" rather than "assuming powers which should only belong to that Yahweh dude".
jordyhoyt 16y ago
http://dresdencodak.com/2009/09/22/caveman-science-fiction/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rsspect%2FfJur+%28Dresden+Codak%29&utm_content=Google+Reader http://dresdencodak.com/2009/09/22/caveman-science-fiction/?...
- Groxx 16y ago
  Why didn't I know about this? Thanks for the link!
tjmaxal 16y ago
I think it is interesting that most religions condemn man for using the name of god to pass judgement and the religious conservatives who fear science should be just as wary of anyone who claims to know the will of god and specifically to pass judgement on others as if they were god. Those who condemn the actions of others are truly "playing god" yet there is no conservative theological out cry because as usual the heart of the matter has nothing to do with theology but rather just simple fear mongering.
- jessriedel 16y ago
  Why use the euphemism "I think it is interesting" instead of just saying that you think it's hypocritical?
  - codyrobbins 16y ago
    Probably because he’s not a robot and there’s such a thing as rhetoric. The fact that such euphemisms exist means they have a communicative purpose.
  - tjmaxal 16y ago
    Just trying to keep things polite here
    - jessriedel 16y ago
      Not that it's a big deal, but in my opinion it's more polite to criticize someone directly than obliquely.
  - donaq 16y ago
    It's a self-calibrating means of criticism. Those for whom the shoe fits will wear it and kick back.
  - jamesbritt 16y ago
    Because they don't mean the same thing? There are lots of hypocritical people and cultures but not all of them are interesting. Also, "hypocritical" carries an air of condemnation, and perhaps that's not what the poster wanted to emphasize. Finally, sometimes you get your point across better by letting the reader discover something ("hey, that sounds awfully hypocritical ...") instead of bluntly asserting it.
macrael 16y ago
But to regard hubris as “playing God” is, first, a modern perspective, and second, a secular one. This seems true; the "God" invoked in this phrase is not the religious God but more the God represented by nature and that sense of the natural order. I think that the reason this notion has become popular in recent history is that it is only in the last hundred years or so that our technology has advanced to the point where we can really fundamentally disrupt the balance created here by four and a half billion years of evolution. I'm not sure it is fair to single out creating life as especially dangerous as, to me, there are many abilities we have that wield similar amounts of power. I think of cane toads in Australia and the oil spill in the gulf and climate change. All of these are evidence of hubris, of mistakes with long term consequences and few good solutions. Creating and modifying life (something we have been in the business of doing for quite some time) does fit into this category. We are messing with with incredibly complex systems we don't near fully understand. It's science and it's exciting and we are advancing our knowledge but the possible consequences are indeed dire. I'm not trying to preach anti-technology or anything and I don't think that the fact that we are indeed "playing God" should stop us from pursuing this research and these ideas. But I do think that it is something to be mindful of. We only have the one earth. EDIT: hugh3 said it better than I did: '"Playing God" to me is just a turn of phrase, shorthand (and somewhat cliched) for "messing with powers beyond your understanding or ability to control".'
- yummyfajitas 16y ago
  ...it is only in the last hundred years or so that our technology has advanced to the point where we can really fundamentally disrupt the balance created here by four and a half billion years of evolution... This statement is so wrong I don't even know where to start. For hundreds (if not thousands) of years humans have dramatically altered their natural environment by cultivating land, hunting various animals to extinction and selective breeding. However, evolution never achieved a "balance" for humans to disrupt. Evolution and "balance" are almost diametrically opposite. Are you under the impression that after 4 billion years of evolution, we finally reached a stable terminal point, only to be disrupted by naughty humans?
  - electromagnetic 16y ago
Charuru 16y ago
"God" is a meaningless, dangerous cliche.

40 points by jokermatt999 16y ago

The people I've met who accuse scientists of "playing god" are usually doing so themselves. That is, passing judgment and condemnation. Of course, they think God is compelling them to do so, rather than that they are compelling their idea of God to do so.

jswinghammer 16y ago
Interesting interpretation of people who are judging others. The Bible states that people are doing this in order to distract God from their own sins that they need to confess and repent of.
- hugh3 16y ago
  On the other hand, the Bible also says we should stone homosexuals, people who work on the sabbath and girls who aren't virgins when they get married. The Bible says a lot of things. Come to think of it, all the death-by-stoning punishments make a lot more sense than the "never judge anyone for anything" idea.
  - jswinghammer 16y ago
    Well the idea isn't to avoid correcting people who go astray but rather to avoid pointing to others faults as evidence of your righteousness. That's what most people do (even those who aren't religious as I'd normally define it). The Bible states in the same book (Romans chapter 2 for the first citation and 6 for this one) that the wages of sin is death--meaning this life or the next.

hugh3 16y ago

Fair enough: that kind of accusation has indeed a long history, harking back to the myths of Prometheus, Daedalus and Faust. But to regard hubris as “playing God” is, first, a modern perspective, and second, a secular one. After all, Prometheus did not in any sense “play God” (he was already divine, and Zeus himself gave him the role that he was deemed to have abused). Yes, Prometheus was divine, but the point of the myth was not that he stole godly powers but that he gave them to men. But the myth is interesting because it all worked out pretty well for men (but badly for Prometheus), so Prometheus is rebellious to the gods but still a great benefactor. The closest analogy in the Abrahamic religion is Adam and Eve, who again got godlike powers (the power to understand good and evil) from disobeying a god. Unlike the case of Prometheus this act of rebellion is seen as an extremely bad thing for which we are still being punished. In the same tradition there's also the Tower of Babel, another story about how man attempts to become Godlike and gets smacked down by god for it. And the Greek tragedies are basically all about folks who hubristically claim to be better than the Gods and wind up suffering horrible fates because of it. Anyway, human mythology is full of all sorts of stories about humans who try to claim powers of gods. Sometimes it ends well, usually it ends badly. Some stories are teaching us to be happy with what we've got while others are trying to explain why what we currently have sucks. Picking on Prometheus, Daedelus and Faust are lousy examples, I don't know why the author picked 'em.

electromagnetic 16y ago
Prometheus is a truly complex character, with a well thought out story - unlike any in the Abrahamic religions. To understand Prometheus, you have to understand his gift - foresight. He could see the future. In the battle between the Titans (which he was) and the Olympians, he saw that his kind would lose to their own children, so he 'joined' them. His acts of defiance to Zeus weren't acts of rebellion, they were acts of guerilla warfare. Prometheus took fire, the one thing that truly kept man apart from the gods (IE the ability to change our environment at will), and he didn't just give it to mankind like the myth states, he gave it to his own children - many of which were also Zeus' offspring, and mankind as a whole was allegedly Zeus' greatest love. Prometheus as it were saw the cycle of the universe. Cronus had usurped Uranus. Zeus had usurped Cronus, and Prometheus did everything in his power to ensure humans usurped Zeus. As you pointed out, there is his act of stealing fire. However, one of his greater feats (which caused him the need to steal fire) was when an agreement was to be struck between the mortals and the immortals. Prometheus had man wrap beef within the cows stomach as one sacrifice and bones wrapped within glistening fat as another. Zeus chose the latter, setting a precedent for all sacrifices. When man started burning (IE sending to the gods) the junk parts of the animals, Zeus was pissed and took fire from mankind. Then Prometheus stole it back, and got chained to the rock. However, again if you look at the bigger picture, Prometheus was never disadvantaged. He lifted mankind from the burden of sacrifice, he again gave fire to mankind, which landed him in eternal torture. However, Prometheus has illustrated several times that his foresight far out performs Zeus' omniscience. For him, eternal torture wasn't eternal, he knew Heracles (AKA Hercules) would be along shortly to free him. Prometheus eventually reconciles with Zeus by warning him that he's going to be usurped, and forms a sort of power-sharing agreement if he helps protect Zeus from being overthrown. It also, allegedly, led to the release of the other Titans from imprisonment. So the real question here is, was Zeus ever going to be usurped in the first place? It essentially went from the Titans being overthrown, Prometheus waging a guerilla war and eventually forming a coalition government between the Titans and Olympians. I've said this before to people when discussing this, but where in the hell was the imagination in the Abrahamic religions? Prometheus, a singular character in the Ancient Greek religion has a story in such a scope that it would kick LotR's ass, and still be 3-times longer . . . from what we, thousands of years later, have pieced together.

SlowOnTheUptake 16y ago

I agree that the term doesn't carry much meaning, but what is "dangerous" about it?

powrtoch 16y ago
E.g, the way it's employed against stem-cell research that should otherwise go on to save, you know, millions and millions of lives.
- hugh3 16y ago
  Just because you think something will save millions of lives doesn't make every counterargument, and every turn of phrase used by every counterargument, "dangerous" though. That's just one step away from saying that your opponents are not only mistaken but unconscionable.
  - jokermatt999 16y ago
    True, but "playing God" isn't always used as meaning "we should be aware of the benefits", and often used as a cheap scare tactic. I feel that actually analyzing the risks and benefits is a better tactic than trotting out this old cliche. Furthermore, it has connotations of fearing new technology (I can't quite phrase this right, sorry). There are legitimate reasons to be concerned about discoveries such as artificially replicating DNA, but I don't think that "Man vs God" is one of them. I don't feel that I've phrased this quite as well as I'd like to. If you'd like elaboration or clarification, please ask.
    - hugh3 16y ago
      "Playing God" to me is just a turn of phrase, shorthand (and somewhat cliched) for "messing with powers beyond your understanding or ability to control". It has nothing to do with whether one or more gods actually exists and can quite sensibly be used by atheists since it means "assuming powers which should only belong to (hypothetical) gods" rather than "assuming powers which should only belong to that Yahweh dude".

jordyhoyt 16y ago

http://dresdencodak.com/2009/09/22/caveman-science-fiction/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rsspect%2FfJur+%28Dresden+Codak%29&utm_content=Google+Reader http://dresdencodak.com/2009/09/22/caveman-science-fiction/?...

Groxx 16y ago
Why didn't I know about this? Thanks for the link!

tjmaxal 16y ago

I think it is interesting that most religions condemn man for using the name of god to pass judgement and the religious conservatives who fear science should be just as wary of anyone who claims to know the will of god and specifically to pass judgement on others as if they were god. Those who condemn the actions of others are truly "playing god" yet there is no conservative theological out cry because as usual the heart of the matter has nothing to do with theology but rather just simple fear mongering.

jessriedel 16y ago
Why use the euphemism "I think it is interesting" instead of just saying that you think it's hypocritical?
- codyrobbins 16y ago
  Probably because he’s not a robot and there’s such a thing as rhetoric. The fact that such euphemisms exist means they have a communicative purpose.
- tjmaxal 16y ago
  Just trying to keep things polite here
  - jessriedel 16y ago
    Not that it's a big deal, but in my opinion it's more polite to criticize someone directly than obliquely.
- donaq 16y ago
  It's a self-calibrating means of criticism. Those for whom the shoe fits will wear it and kick back.
- jamesbritt 16y ago
  Because they don't mean the same thing? There are lots of hypocritical people and cultures but not all of them are interesting. Also, "hypocritical" carries an air of condemnation, and perhaps that's not what the poster wanted to emphasize. Finally, sometimes you get your point across better by letting the reader discover something ("hey, that sounds awfully hypocritical ...") instead of bluntly asserting it.

macrael 16y ago

But to regard hubris as “playing God” is, first, a modern perspective, and second, a secular one. This seems true; the "God" invoked in this phrase is not the religious God but more the God represented by nature and that sense of the natural order. I think that the reason this notion has become popular in recent history is that it is only in the last hundred years or so that our technology has advanced to the point where we can really fundamentally disrupt the balance created here by four and a half billion years of evolution. I'm not sure it is fair to single out creating life as especially dangerous as, to me, there are many abilities we have that wield similar amounts of power. I think of cane toads in Australia and the oil spill in the gulf and climate change. All of these are evidence of hubris, of mistakes with long term consequences and few good solutions. Creating and modifying life (something we have been in the business of doing for quite some time) does fit into this category. We are messing with with incredibly complex systems we don't near fully understand. It's science and it's exciting and we are advancing our knowledge but the possible consequences are indeed dire. I'm not trying to preach anti-technology or anything and I don't think that the fact that we are indeed "playing God" should stop us from pursuing this research and these ideas. But I do think that it is something to be mindful of. We only have the one earth. EDIT: hugh3 said it better than I did: '"Playing God" to me is just a turn of phrase, shorthand (and somewhat cliched) for "messing with powers beyond your understanding or ability to control".'

yummyfajitas 16y ago
...it is only in the last hundred years or so that our technology has advanced to the point where we can really fundamentally disrupt the balance created here by four and a half billion years of evolution... This statement is so wrong I don't even know where to start. For hundreds (if not thousands) of years humans have dramatically altered their natural environment by cultivating land, hunting various animals to extinction and selective breeding. However, evolution never achieved a "balance" for humans to disrupt. Evolution and "balance" are almost diametrically opposite. Are you under the impression that after 4 billion years of evolution, we finally reached a stable terminal point, only to be disrupted by naughty humans?
- electromagnetic 16y ago

Charuru 16y ago

"God" is a meaningless, dangerous cliche.