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> Few people understand that most religions e.g. Judaism and Christianity have an apologetic discipline – a deliberate arm open to debate. The range of permiss

by sidlls 5y ago

> Few people understand that most religions e.g. Judaism and Christianity have an apologetic discipline – a deliberate arm open to debate. The range of permissible debate is quite narrow in reality, and usually start from an assumption that the core tenets are more or less true. > If you believe you are not religious, it just means that you don’t have the cognitive tools to recognize the secular ideology that you have adopted. You're basically defining all belief as religious belief. You're welcome to it, but it's not particularly useful or constructive. And suggesting those that don't have the belief haven't actually thought about it, or lack the tools to do so, is a bit antagonistic, really.

manmal 5y ago
I had an otherwise enjoyable conversation with a just recently-turned-religious person. As soon as core tenets, as you nicely put it, where up for discussion, conversation came to a screeching halt. People who think the ten amendments must be strictly followed have a lot of cognitive dissonance to resolve, and reasoning is not welcome. The same person asked me into great detail why vaccinations should be a good idea, and expected me to provide all the answers. We both remained at our positions - she‘s now contemplating homeschooling her kid because of mask requirements, and I still don’t believe in a religion that says my gay friends need to become straight.
- friedman23 5y ago
  You can't think of anything you believe in that if someone came to you to "discuss" you wouldn't react instantly negative and start calling the other person insults?
  - sidlls 5y ago
    Why bother? I don’t hold any belief strongly enough to merit such a reaction, though I might react negatively for other reasons. For example, past experience showing the insincerity of their own debate tactics and a lack of patience for rehashing it all yet again.
    - friedman23 5y ago
      I don't know you and can't speak for you. But my point that all the people on here criticizing people on their moral systems are baseless stands. These same people would've been in the mob in salem executing so called witches a couple hundred years ago and would have been just as certain in their beliefs then.
      - lotsofpulp 5y ago
        It is funny seeing this: > These same people would've been in the mob in salem executing so called witches a couple hundred years ago and would have been just as certain in their beliefs then. after this: > I don't know you and can't speak for you.
        friedman23 5y ago
        Explain how this is funny at all?
        lotsofpulp 5y ago
        Not being able to speak for someone implies you do not know their thoughts or motivations. So in the second sentence, you acknowledge that you do not know the thoughts or motivations of the person you are responding to, but the preceding sentence implies that you do know the thoughts and motivations of some other people, and what they would or would not have done a couple hundred years ago. I.e. a very strong claim about one group of people you do not know, followed by an acknowledgement that said strong claim cannot be made for another group of people you do not know.
        friedman23 5y ago
        I don't know the thoughts and motivations of individuals but I can make generalizations about groups. The contradiction you imagined doesn't exist.
      - manmal 5y ago
  - manmal 5y ago
    Nothing comes to mind, really. I call people names when they threaten my life in traffic, but that’s about it.
- 1123581321 5y ago
  What led her to change to the religion?
  - manmal 5y ago
    Hard to tell for me what triggered this. She completely changed careers at that point it seems, maybe it was burnout.
- Thorrez 5y ago
  >the ten amendments That's hilarious. I'm not sure if that's a typo or joke. It also makes me think of the US Bill of Rights, which are the first ten amendments to the US Constitution.
tonymet 5y ago
You raised a good point about all belief vs religious belief. Which beliefs do you take on faith? Which would have you outcast if you didn’t believe them? Which lead you to a personal sacrifice? Which beliefs cause great anxiety or pleasure with no tangible evidence? Not comprehensive but those are categories of beliefs elevated to religious in nature. For example, believing that the Lakers are the best basketball team probably is not religious, but believing that your life got substantially better or worse following an election would be a religious belief.
- kemayo 5y ago
  Religion has a meaning, and it specifically relates to the supernatural. If something makes no supernatural claims, it's not a religion. To whit, "believing that your life got substantially better or worse following an election" would not be a religious belief. This is because it can be tested, and would have a simple cause/effect based in physical reality. It might be an intangible "I feel better about things because I know people agree with me, and think that people in positions of political power will support my interests" -- but there's nothing supernatural about that. As was said, if you want to redefine the word "religion" to mean "any sort of belief system", then sure, go for it. It's a great way to troll and provoke arguments.
  - tonymet 5y ago
    There can be natural objects with supernatural reverence like god emperors . Money, covid, climate change are all supernatural phenomenon with a material basis
    - tonymet 5y ago
      The modern state , with perceived ability to control fate is another
    - tonymet 5y ago
      Along with cosmological origins which cannot be observed materially like Big Bang predicate or multiverse
friedman23 5y ago
> usually start from an assumption that the core tenets are more or less true. You use this as a criticism of religion but I find it's true of secular people as well who have baseless beliefs that are just as deeply ingrained. Telling someone on hackernews you are religious you will probably get a ton of criticism and downvotes. You know what will get the same reaction? Telling someone you are a moral nihilist. Why is murder evil? Why is stealing evil? Why is anything evil or good for that matter? At least religious people have answers to these questions. (Although I don't think they are necessarily good answers, why is something good because some omnipotent being said so? what if that omnipotent being was evil?) I feel like I'm screaming at windmills but everything people get hysterical over in our modern world is baseless. All values do not stand up to scrutiny and can be argued against using the one word question "why?" edit: I was predictably downvoted, please don't take this as me complaining and trying to claim victimhood because it truly doesn't affect me. I just find it funny how uncomfortable my comment makes people that are supposedly open minded and critical of their beliefs but surprisingly share the same beliefs as their entire social group.
- TimPC 5y ago
  There is an entire branch of Philosophy called Ethics that gives us better answers to these questions and a better framework for grappling with them then religion ever has. It is quite arrogant to assume that atheists have no answers at all to these questions.
  - friedman23 5y ago
    Ah yeah, good argument, a field of study exists. Given you are a well educated atheist you can explain the underpinnings of your morality right?
    - andrepd 5y ago
      Yes. A set of ab initio values and the golden rule as a base, and societal consensus to work out the finer details.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Cyberthal 5y ago
> The range of permissible debate is quite narrow in reality What? Christian apologetics meets atheists, Satanists, Darwinists, whoever. I don't even know how restricting apologetics to a very narrow permissible debate would work, unless like the MSM one can control which opponent gets on the mic. Christians enforce a narrow range of theological divergence acceptable as orthodox, but that is not apologetics. > You're basically defining all belief as religious belief No he isn't. He's defining humans as religious, and observing that the absence of affiliation with a major organized religion doesn't change this. I live in a Communist country in which the Party sometimes explicitly substitutes for a church. In the USA, congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, which means that naturally a state church will evolve that denies being a state church -- both the "state" and "church" parts. Humans being both religious and hierarchical, it's often tricky to determine whether state is running church or vice versa. The ball is always under the other cup. If you dare, I'm sure you can think of a few recently-invented blasphemies which if violated would result in censure of a progressively more official nature. Whoever can hunt witches, holds the pulpit, even if it comes with a press badge rather than a funny hat. Remember to recycle.
Thorrez 5y ago
>The range of permissible debate is quite narrow in reality, and usually start from an assumption that the core tenets are more or less true. The purpose of apologetics is to defend the faith debates with people of other religions or atheists. If there are rules about not allowing certain things to be debated that's not going to work at all.
dang 5y ago
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27488136 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27488136.

by sidlls 5y ago

manmal 5y ago

I had an otherwise enjoyable conversation with a just recently-turned-religious person. As soon as core tenets, as you nicely put it, where up for discussion, conversation came to a screeching halt. People who think the ten amendments must be strictly followed have a lot of cognitive dissonance to resolve, and reasoning is not welcome. The same person asked me into great detail why vaccinations should be a good idea, and expected me to provide all the answers. We both remained at our positions - she‘s now contemplating homeschooling her kid because of mask requirements, and I still don’t believe in a religion that says my gay friends need to become straight.

friedman23 5y ago
You can't think of anything you believe in that if someone came to you to "discuss" you wouldn't react instantly negative and start calling the other person insults?
- sidlls 5y ago
  Why bother? I don’t hold any belief strongly enough to merit such a reaction, though I might react negatively for other reasons. For example, past experience showing the insincerity of their own debate tactics and a lack of patience for rehashing it all yet again.
  - friedman23 5y ago
    I don't know you and can't speak for you. But my point that all the people on here criticizing people on their moral systems are baseless stands. These same people would've been in the mob in salem executing so called witches a couple hundred years ago and would have been just as certain in their beliefs then.
    - lotsofpulp 5y ago
      It is funny seeing this: > These same people would've been in the mob in salem executing so called witches a couple hundred years ago and would have been just as certain in their beliefs then. after this: > I don't know you and can't speak for you.
      - friedman23 5y ago
        Explain how this is funny at all?
        lotsofpulp 5y ago
        Not being able to speak for someone implies you do not know their thoughts or motivations. So in the second sentence, you acknowledge that you do not know the thoughts or motivations of the person you are responding to, but the preceding sentence implies that you do know the thoughts and motivations of some other people, and what they would or would not have done a couple hundred years ago. I.e. a very strong claim about one group of people you do not know, followed by an acknowledgement that said strong claim cannot be made for another group of people you do not know.
        friedman23 5y ago
        I don't know the thoughts and motivations of individuals but I can make generalizations about groups. The contradiction you imagined doesn't exist.
    - manmal 5y ago
- manmal 5y ago
  Nothing comes to mind, really. I call people names when they threaten my life in traffic, but that’s about it.
1123581321 5y ago
What led her to change to the religion?
- manmal 5y ago
  Hard to tell for me what triggered this. She completely changed careers at that point it seems, maybe it was burnout.
Thorrez 5y ago
>the ten amendments That's hilarious. I'm not sure if that's a typo or joke. It also makes me think of the US Bill of Rights, which are the first ten amendments to the US Constitution.

tonymet 5y ago

You raised a good point about all belief vs religious belief. Which beliefs do you take on faith? Which would have you outcast if you didn’t believe them? Which lead you to a personal sacrifice? Which beliefs cause great anxiety or pleasure with no tangible evidence? Not comprehensive but those are categories of beliefs elevated to religious in nature. For example, believing that the Lakers are the best basketball team probably is not religious, but believing that your life got substantially better or worse following an election would be a religious belief.

kemayo 5y ago
Religion has a meaning, and it specifically relates to the supernatural. If something makes no supernatural claims, it's not a religion. To whit, "believing that your life got substantially better or worse following an election" would not be a religious belief. This is because it can be tested, and would have a simple cause/effect based in physical reality. It might be an intangible "I feel better about things because I know people agree with me, and think that people in positions of political power will support my interests" -- but there's nothing supernatural about that. As was said, if you want to redefine the word "religion" to mean "any sort of belief system", then sure, go for it. It's a great way to troll and provoke arguments.
- tonymet 5y ago
  There can be natural objects with supernatural reverence like god emperors . Money, covid, climate change are all supernatural phenomenon with a material basis
  - tonymet 5y ago
    The modern state , with perceived ability to control fate is another
  - tonymet 5y ago
    Along with cosmological origins which cannot be observed materially like Big Bang predicate or multiverse

friedman23 5y ago

> usually start from an assumption that the core tenets are more or less true. You use this as a criticism of religion but I find it's true of secular people as well who have baseless beliefs that are just as deeply ingrained. Telling someone on hackernews you are religious you will probably get a ton of criticism and downvotes. You know what will get the same reaction? Telling someone you are a moral nihilist. Why is murder evil? Why is stealing evil? Why is anything evil or good for that matter? At least religious people have answers to these questions. (Although I don't think they are necessarily good answers, why is something good because some omnipotent being said so? what if that omnipotent being was evil?) I feel like I'm screaming at windmills but everything people get hysterical over in our modern world is baseless. All values do not stand up to scrutiny and can be argued against using the one word question "why?" edit: I was predictably downvoted, please don't take this as me complaining and trying to claim victimhood because it truly doesn't affect me. I just find it funny how uncomfortable my comment makes people that are supposedly open minded and critical of their beliefs but surprisingly share the same beliefs as their entire social group.

TimPC 5y ago
There is an entire branch of Philosophy called Ethics that gives us better answers to these questions and a better framework for grappling with them then religion ever has. It is quite arrogant to assume that atheists have no answers at all to these questions.
- friedman23 5y ago
  Ah yeah, good argument, a field of study exists. Given you are a well educated atheist you can explain the underpinnings of your morality right?
  - andrepd 5y ago
    Yes. A set of ab initio values and the golden rule as a base, and societal consensus to work out the finer details.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

Cyberthal 5y ago

> The range of permissible debate is quite narrow in reality What? Christian apologetics meets atheists, Satanists, Darwinists, whoever. I don't even know how restricting apologetics to a very narrow permissible debate would work, unless like the MSM one can control which opponent gets on the mic. Christians enforce a narrow range of theological divergence acceptable as orthodox, but that is not apologetics. > You're basically defining all belief as religious belief No he isn't. He's defining humans as religious, and observing that the absence of affiliation with a major organized religion doesn't change this. I live in a Communist country in which the Party sometimes explicitly substitutes for a church. In the USA, congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, which means that naturally a state church will evolve that denies being a state church -- both the "state" and "church" parts. Humans being both religious and hierarchical, it's often tricky to determine whether state is running church or vice versa. The ball is always under the other cup. If you dare, I'm sure you can think of a few recently-invented blasphemies which if violated would result in censure of a progressively more official nature. Whoever can hunt witches, holds the pulpit, even if it comes with a press badge rather than a funny hat. Remember to recycle.

Thorrez 5y ago

>The range of permissible debate is quite narrow in reality, and usually start from an assumption that the core tenets are more or less true. The purpose of apologetics is to defend the faith debates with people of other religions or atheists. If there are rules about not allowing certain things to be debated that's not going to work at all.

dang 5y ago

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27488136 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27488136.