3 ms·

You mean, how can you know someone's true thoughts? You can't, but you can make a reasonable guess based on their actions, social cues, and communications with

by pluto9 8y ago

You mean, how can you know someone's true thoughts? You can't, but you can make a reasonable guess based on their actions, social cues, and communications with others. There is plenty of precedent for making legal decisions on this basis. That's why our legal vocabulary includes phrases such as "intent to do harm" and "knowledge of wrongdoing". That's beside the point, though. What's relevant in this case is the intent of the religion itself, not its individual adherents. Geniune religions are intended to be sincerely believed in, even if every single one of their followers is faking it. Pastafarianism is intended to be a parody, no matter how many Pastafarians happen to genuinely believe in the existence of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

perl4ever 8y ago
"Pastafarianism is intended to be a parody, no matter how many Pastafarians happen to genuinely believe in the existence of the Flying Spaghetti Monster." So if you demonstrated through a preponderance of the evidence that the historical figure behind a religion wasn't serious, it would retroactively change its status? Consider: - L. Ron Hubbard - Joseph Smith - Anton LaVey Do empirical facts about these founders really affect whether they started religions?
- pluto9 8y ago
  > So if you demonstrated through a preponderance of the evidence that the historical figure behind a religion wasn't serious, it would retroactively change its status? Possibly, though in practice I think it would be unwise to revoke the status of an already legally recognized religion, especially if it has a large and genuine following. But I would argue that Scientology and the Church of Satan should never have been legally recognized in the first place, precisely because their founders were not sincere. Mormonism I'm not so sure about--your comment seems to imply that it's an established fact that Joseph Smith founded the LDS church in bad faith, but it is not. There's plenty of room for debate on that subject. One could argue that if enough of a religion's adherents are sincere, the religion takes on a "life of its own" independent of its founder's intentions, and should therefore be considered sincere. That argument could be used in favor of Scientology's legitimacy, for example. However, that is clearly not the case with Pastafarianism, so it doesn't apply to this court decision. This is all really quite simple: the difference between a sincere religion and a parody religion is that one is sincere and the other is a parody. Stated another way, any "religion" that exists solely to be a parody of religion is, by definition, not a religion. That is what the Dutch court recognized. The willful blindness to this obvious fact on the part of the FSM crowd is amusing. They're appalled that a court doesn't take their "religion" seriously when they've publicly stated that they don't take it seriously themselves.
  - perl4ever 8y ago
    "your comment seems to imply that it's an established fact that Joseph Smith founded the LDS church in bad faith" No, those were just examples where the question is potentially debatable, because enough is known about the founder to have a meaningful conversation. By comparison, you can't really debate Christianity the same way, because if it was founded by Jesus, not enough is known about him, and if it wasn't, not enough is known about whoever was responsible. "One could argue that if enough of a religion's adherents are sincere..." But you were, I thought, not considering that to be determinative.
    - pluto9 8y ago
      > But you were, I thought, not considering that to be determinative. I refined my definition somewhat because Scientology is an edge case I hadn't fully considered. So my previous statement about Pastafarians is incorrect--if enough of them held genuine belief, then it might be said that their faith had taken on a sincerity independent of the founders' intent, and their religion might then be considered valid. Of course, that hasn't happened and it's hard to imagine it ever happening given the deliberately farcical nature of their deity.

by pluto9 8y ago

perl4ever 8y ago

"Pastafarianism is intended to be a parody, no matter how many Pastafarians happen to genuinely believe in the existence of the Flying Spaghetti Monster." So if you demonstrated through a preponderance of the evidence that the historical figure behind a religion wasn't serious, it would retroactively change its status? Consider: - L. Ron Hubbard - Joseph Smith - Anton LaVey Do empirical facts about these founders really affect whether they started religions?

pluto9 8y ago
> So if you demonstrated through a preponderance of the evidence that the historical figure behind a religion wasn't serious, it would retroactively change its status? Possibly, though in practice I think it would be unwise to revoke the status of an already legally recognized religion, especially if it has a large and genuine following. But I would argue that Scientology and the Church of Satan should never have been legally recognized in the first place, precisely because their founders were not sincere. Mormonism I'm not so sure about--your comment seems to imply that it's an established fact that Joseph Smith founded the LDS church in bad faith, but it is not. There's plenty of room for debate on that subject. One could argue that if enough of a religion's adherents are sincere, the religion takes on a "life of its own" independent of its founder's intentions, and should therefore be considered sincere. That argument could be used in favor of Scientology's legitimacy, for example. However, that is clearly not the case with Pastafarianism, so it doesn't apply to this court decision. This is all really quite simple: the difference between a sincere religion and a parody religion is that one is sincere and the other is a parody. Stated another way, any "religion" that exists solely to be a parody of religion is, by definition, not a religion. That is what the Dutch court recognized. The willful blindness to this obvious fact on the part of the FSM crowd is amusing. They're appalled that a court doesn't take their "religion" seriously when they've publicly stated that they don't take it seriously themselves.
- perl4ever 8y ago
  "your comment seems to imply that it's an established fact that Joseph Smith founded the LDS church in bad faith" No, those were just examples where the question is potentially debatable, because enough is known about the founder to have a meaningful conversation. By comparison, you can't really debate Christianity the same way, because if it was founded by Jesus, not enough is known about him, and if it wasn't, not enough is known about whoever was responsible. "One could argue that if enough of a religion's adherents are sincere..." But you were, I thought, not considering that to be determinative.
  - pluto9 8y ago
    > But you were, I thought, not considering that to be determinative. I refined my definition somewhat because Scientology is an edge case I hadn't fully considered. So my previous statement about Pastafarians is incorrect--if enough of them held genuine belief, then it might be said that their faith had taken on a sincerity independent of the founders' intent, and their religion might then be considered valid. Of course, that hasn't happened and it's hard to imagine it ever happening given the deliberately farcical nature of their deity.