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Well…yeah! Religion serves a function. Even if that function is psychological. When you take religion away, something else will fill the utility-gap. Silly h

by ukj 5y ago

Well…yeah! Religion serves a function. Even if that function is psychological. When you take religion away, something else will fill the utility-gap. Silly humans failing to grasp the purpose of stories/narratives. Edit for the downvoters (who clearly don’t understand): the question “Why do science and philosophy matter?” has only religious/ideological answers.

Spooky23 5y ago
Religion is about culture, belief and community. The fading of the mainstream religions is making room for the more fundamentalist, marketing driven religious practices that are often about money and politics.
- ukj 5y ago
  We are social animals. A religion is what scientists call a “paradigm”. The socially acceptable ideas/paradigms of today are the religions of next century. Hegel was right.
  - joe_the_user 5y ago
    There are parts of Europe that have far more community and where people are far more social but far less religious than the US. Religion is just a long surviving irrational belief system. It may serve a more social purpose or a less social purpose. Oppositely, the purpose of unifying a community can be served by a number of things, religion isn't necessary for that. As other mention, extreme religiosity is rising in the US even as average religion is declining but that's naturally ideological.
    - ukj 5y ago
      I have no idea what you conceptualise as a “religion”; or how you measure “religiosity”. I have a very broad definition - to me any belief system (collection of concepts used for understanding the world) is a religion. Rationalism is one religion. Irrationalism is another religion. Any preference you have for one or the other is just your opinion. The bias that you can’t justify. The long-surviving is statistically unlikely to be irrational. It survived the test of time - Entropy. What is far more likely is that you don’t (yet) understand what religion is.
    - bobthechef 5y ago
      This is an extremely ignorant position that trivializes "religion". First of all, as I have written elsewhere, everyone is religious. The question is: how good and true is your religion? To call it merely irrational is to show a total lack of understanding of the subject. And because religions are many, it makes little sense to speak of "religion" categorically in this way because they often have little or nothing in common. You have to address and criticize particular religions for particular reasons. Furthermore, those who defect from the religious faith on which their society or civilization was built often ride the coat tails of that religious faith without working out the logical consequences of their rejection. That is, it is better to describe the rejector as a heretic or an apostate than someone who has somehow freed himself from the faith in question and all its trappings. Many of these ideologies we're seeing are profound distortions or perversions of some selected element of Christianity or previous heretical position. That's one reason heresy was always regarded as dangerous. It comes from the Greek hairesis meaning "a taking or choosing for oneself, a choice"[0] meaning taking a cafeteria approach toward the dogmas of the faith which exist as a coherent whole. Any distortion or selectivity produces severe downstream consequences like ideology. Secularism and liberalism are examples. They are Christian heresies and cannot be comprehended apart from the Christian context within which they emerged. Nietzsche, who was an atheist, was smart enough to see this. The "Twilight of the Idols" is all about how silly this secular triumphalism, or even just contentment, is because it fails to see that the consequences of having "killed God" are not yet fully made manifest, but eventually will be made manifest because this state of affairs is unsustainable, and that this will result ultimately in total disorientation and chaos (I disagree with Nietzsche that God was merely an instrumental idea, but he did at least grasp the parochial and myopic nature of so many atheists and secular people; for him, atheism was a terrible thing). Intellectually serious atheists are all in agreement about how terrible atheism is (i.e., not the provincial variety like Dawkins). This state produces a fertile ground for ideology, i.e., irrational half-assed false religions. [0] https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=heresy https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=heresy
      - joe_the_user 5y ago
        This is an extremely ignorant position that trivializes "religion". First of all, as I have written elsewhere, everyone is religious. -- I can't see how that statement doesn't trivialize religion at least as much. IE, if everyone is "religious", you've set a very low bar for what qualifies as religious I think made it clear you have religious beliefs, which involve ... clearly false views of the cosmos (with the possible exception of Buddhism) and you have religious institutions, which serve a variety of social, economic and psychological purposes. A church can be club with a few nods to God or it can be something like a political party hell bent on power or it can be other things. Many American Unitarians maintain the form of religion while dropping all the God part and that's as fine as anything as far as I'm concerned.
bobthechef 5y ago
I agree with you that in the absence of what we conventionally call "religion" doesn't mean the essential character of religion is erased. Abandoning one religion means adopting another. Abandoning a religious faith with thousands of years of refinement for some quackery invented yesterday, especially without proportional reason, is not exactly the move of a sound mind. I also think religion serves a real need, but all real needs have real objects. And so I do not use the word "utility" here as if the content of the faith didn't matter, that religion is just some instrument that gets us this "other stuff" and has no intrinsic truth or meaning itself. A true religious faith is practiced because it is about the ultimate meaning of one's life and thus the meaning of everything else in life. Thus everything is always subordinate to one's faith. It is important for the faith to be true in order to be able to live one's life in the light of true ends, not mythical counterfeits. This does not contradict the essence of your main point, namely, the the eviction of one religion does not abolish religion. It typically just replaces it with something inferior. > “Why do science and philosophy matter?” I would say philosophical and religious answers. Recall that philosophy is also reflexive. But indeed, scientism is indefensible. It is a philosophical position and thus cannot be defended scientifically. You cannot simply assert it without justification.
- ukj 5y ago
  What is the utility of truth? If it has none then I don’t need it. Reflexivity is precisely where meaning/religion comes from. From the self.
  - bobthechef 5y ago
    > What is the utility of truth? I don't understand the question. Truth is the correspondence of the mind with the real. The value of some truths is mostly instrumental. The value of others is that it is good for us to know them for themselves. If you are using "utility" to mean "value", then maybe you accept this, but utility is typically something like a species of value, as I understand it. Pure practicality is incoherent. They needs to be a terminus. What is "need" here? Toward what end? Need is always about ends. > Reflexivity is precisely where meaning/religion comes from. From the self. Meaning doesn't come from ourselves. We cannot invent meaning. Either something means something, or it doesn't. What you describe is mental illness and delusion. I also don't see what this has to do with truth/utility.
redisman 5y ago
It’s spiritual, not psychological. I guess there are some connections between those two though
didibus 5y ago
> “Why do science and philosophy matter?” has only religious/ideological answers The question needs not be asked. But most people are not areligious, they have been raised within a context of religion where the question was asked to them. Religion begets religion because it teaches people that there are higher meanings and pushes people to seek their answers. A true areligious person does not ponder about the meaning of life, why we are here, and what it is we need to do with ourselves. An areligious person can simply exist in peace, guided simply by ones natural desires for fun, pleasure, comfort, safety, growth and love.
- ukj 5y ago
  > The question needs not be asked. That is a religious belief in denial of my factual needs. > A true areligious person does not ponder about the meaning of life, why we are here Great! So why does science matter to a true areligious person?

by ukj 5y ago

Spooky23 5y ago

Religion is about culture, belief and community. The fading of the mainstream religions is making room for the more fundamentalist, marketing driven religious practices that are often about money and politics.

ukj 5y ago
We are social animals. A religion is what scientists call a “paradigm”. The socially acceptable ideas/paradigms of today are the religions of next century. Hegel was right.
- joe_the_user 5y ago
  There are parts of Europe that have far more community and where people are far more social but far less religious than the US. Religion is just a long surviving irrational belief system. It may serve a more social purpose or a less social purpose. Oppositely, the purpose of unifying a community can be served by a number of things, religion isn't necessary for that. As other mention, extreme religiosity is rising in the US even as average religion is declining but that's naturally ideological.
  - ukj 5y ago
    I have no idea what you conceptualise as a “religion”; or how you measure “religiosity”. I have a very broad definition - to me any belief system (collection of concepts used for understanding the world) is a religion. Rationalism is one religion. Irrationalism is another religion. Any preference you have for one or the other is just your opinion. The bias that you can’t justify. The long-surviving is statistically unlikely to be irrational. It survived the test of time - Entropy. What is far more likely is that you don’t (yet) understand what religion is.
  - bobthechef 5y ago
    This is an extremely ignorant position that trivializes "religion". First of all, as I have written elsewhere, everyone is religious. The question is: how good and true is your religion? To call it merely irrational is to show a total lack of understanding of the subject. And because religions are many, it makes little sense to speak of "religion" categorically in this way because they often have little or nothing in common. You have to address and criticize particular religions for particular reasons. Furthermore, those who defect from the religious faith on which their society or civilization was built often ride the coat tails of that religious faith without working out the logical consequences of their rejection. That is, it is better to describe the rejector as a heretic or an apostate than someone who has somehow freed himself from the faith in question and all its trappings. Many of these ideologies we're seeing are profound distortions or perversions of some selected element of Christianity or previous heretical position. That's one reason heresy was always regarded as dangerous. It comes from the Greek hairesis meaning "a taking or choosing for oneself, a choice"[0] meaning taking a cafeteria approach toward the dogmas of the faith which exist as a coherent whole. Any distortion or selectivity produces severe downstream consequences like ideology. Secularism and liberalism are examples. They are Christian heresies and cannot be comprehended apart from the Christian context within which they emerged. Nietzsche, who was an atheist, was smart enough to see this. The "Twilight of the Idols" is all about how silly this secular triumphalism, or even just contentment, is because it fails to see that the consequences of having "killed God" are not yet fully made manifest, but eventually will be made manifest because this state of affairs is unsustainable, and that this will result ultimately in total disorientation and chaos (I disagree with Nietzsche that God was merely an instrumental idea, but he did at least grasp the parochial and myopic nature of so many atheists and secular people; for him, atheism was a terrible thing). Intellectually serious atheists are all in agreement about how terrible atheism is (i.e., not the provincial variety like Dawkins). This state produces a fertile ground for ideology, i.e., irrational half-assed false religions. [0] https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=heresy https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=heresy
    - joe_the_user 5y ago
      This is an extremely ignorant position that trivializes "religion". First of all, as I have written elsewhere, everyone is religious. -- I can't see how that statement doesn't trivialize religion at least as much. IE, if everyone is "religious", you've set a very low bar for what qualifies as religious I think made it clear you have religious beliefs, which involve ... clearly false views of the cosmos (with the possible exception of Buddhism) and you have religious institutions, which serve a variety of social, economic and psychological purposes. A church can be club with a few nods to God or it can be something like a political party hell bent on power or it can be other things. Many American Unitarians maintain the form of religion while dropping all the God part and that's as fine as anything as far as I'm concerned.

bobthechef 5y ago

I agree with you that in the absence of what we conventionally call "religion" doesn't mean the essential character of religion is erased. Abandoning one religion means adopting another. Abandoning a religious faith with thousands of years of refinement for some quackery invented yesterday, especially without proportional reason, is not exactly the move of a sound mind. I also think religion serves a real need, but all real needs have real objects. And so I do not use the word "utility" here as if the content of the faith didn't matter, that religion is just some instrument that gets us this "other stuff" and has no intrinsic truth or meaning itself. A true religious faith is practiced because it is about the ultimate meaning of one's life and thus the meaning of everything else in life. Thus everything is always subordinate to one's faith. It is important for the faith to be true in order to be able to live one's life in the light of true ends, not mythical counterfeits. This does not contradict the essence of your main point, namely, the the eviction of one religion does not abolish religion. It typically just replaces it with something inferior. > “Why do science and philosophy matter?” I would say philosophical and religious answers. Recall that philosophy is also reflexive. But indeed, scientism is indefensible. It is a philosophical position and thus cannot be defended scientifically. You cannot simply assert it without justification.

ukj 5y ago
What is the utility of truth? If it has none then I don’t need it. Reflexivity is precisely where meaning/religion comes from. From the self.
- bobthechef 5y ago
  > What is the utility of truth? I don't understand the question. Truth is the correspondence of the mind with the real. The value of some truths is mostly instrumental. The value of others is that it is good for us to know them for themselves. If you are using "utility" to mean "value", then maybe you accept this, but utility is typically something like a species of value, as I understand it. Pure practicality is incoherent. They needs to be a terminus. What is "need" here? Toward what end? Need is always about ends. > Reflexivity is precisely where meaning/religion comes from. From the self. Meaning doesn't come from ourselves. We cannot invent meaning. Either something means something, or it doesn't. What you describe is mental illness and delusion. I also don't see what this has to do with truth/utility.

redisman 5y ago

It’s spiritual, not psychological. I guess there are some connections between those two though

didibus 5y ago

> “Why do science and philosophy matter?” has only religious/ideological answers The question needs not be asked. But most people are not areligious, they have been raised within a context of religion where the question was asked to them. Religion begets religion because it teaches people that there are higher meanings and pushes people to seek their answers. A true areligious person does not ponder about the meaning of life, why we are here, and what it is we need to do with ourselves. An areligious person can simply exist in peace, guided simply by ones natural desires for fun, pleasure, comfort, safety, growth and love.

ukj 5y ago
> The question needs not be asked. That is a religious belief in denial of my factual needs. > A true areligious person does not ponder about the meaning of life, why we are here Great! So why does science matter to a true areligious person?