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Placing your hand on a book and uttering words is the essence of being “superstitious”, at least if you aren’t religious.

kube-system 4y ago
Rituals can have a social purpose beyond superstition: e.g. signaling.
tigerlily 4y ago
In fairness, the act of it could equally be held superstitious even if one is religious.
- Grustaf 4y ago
  Well, not if the words are aimed at your God. In Christianity and many other religions it’s a very real thing to promise God you will do something, it’s not superstition.
  - gobrewers14 4y ago
    Believing that there is a god to promise something to is the definition of superstition.
    - Grustaf 4y ago
      No, that’s not what the word means. Religion and superstition are different concepts. This is a linguistic fact, regardless of your personal beliefs.
      - defrost 4y ago
        Superstitions are literally beliefs and practices about things supernatural. Supernatural is a term attributed to non-physical entities, such as angels, demons, gods, and spirits. It also includes claimed abilities embodied in or provided by such beings, including magic, telekinesis, levitation, precognition, and extrasensory perception. One persons superstition is frequently anothers religion.
        Grustaf 4y ago
        Yes, superstitions relate to supernatural things. Religion does too, in a way. That doesn’t mean it’s the same thing. Language is a lot more complex than that. And sure, you might derogatorily refer to someone’s religion as a superstition, just like I might call someone a “pagan” even if he’s strictly speaking just a heretic. But in reality these are all precise terms with different meanings. To be a bit more precise, superstitions deal with more or less automatic things like receiving luck by touching some rock. If you swear to God, that is not some automatic process that will bring you luck, its a divine being with a will that presumably would be angry if you break your oath. Do you see the difference?
        gobrewers14 4y ago
        I touch (swear an oath and break it to) a rock (a god) and I receive luck (anger). Both are superstitions. The rock example is actually less superstitious because rocks actually exist. There is zero evidence gods exist.
        Grustaf 4y ago
        I didn’t make this up. It might seem like the same concept to you, but I assure you that any serious scholar, atheist or not, knows the difference. It really has nothing to do with what you personally believe or not. In your example the difference is that the rock effect is automatic, like gravity, but the god is a sentient being that has a will. Why is it so hard to accept that people call these different things? You can still despise people who believe in both.
        gobrewers14 4y ago
        > In your example the difference is that the rock effect is automatic, like gravity, but the god is a sentient being that has a will. There is no difference. This is the fallacy of special pleading. You're saying that the example with god is different because you defined god to be different from the thing you don't want it to be the same as. You are presupposing gods existence. There is no evidence such an entity exists and is therefore superstition.
      - gobrewers14 4y ago
        > Religion and superstition are different concepts. Please point to the part in my original response where I said religion and superstition are the same concept. I said believing in a god is superstition. Which it is. Superstition (n): A belief, practice, or rite irrationally maintained by ignorance of the laws of nature or by faith in magic or chance.
        hajile 4y ago
        This definition confuses cause and effect. A person believes something that results in superstition. This definition states that superstition creates itself rather than being the result of external factors. As a finer point, laws of nature could themselves be superstition. Godel's incompleteness theorem proves that we cannot prove all the laws in the universe. As such, we assert a truth that we know we cannot prove then act as though it must be true. Even if you accept that as incidental, we know conclusively that recent discoveries (eg, James Webb showing unexpected galaxy sizes) show that much of our current "laws of nature" are definitely in conflict with reality making scientists superstitious in practice as well. Finally, it is of no little interest to me that so many theoretical physicists are "simulationists" where they believe the universe is a simulation where the creators can exert complete control, but they still hold the belief that these creators are not actually gods (even though that is unprovable and for us would amount to a distinction without a difference). Perhaps humans are simply hardwired for religion.
        gobrewers14 4y ago
        > A person believes something that results in superstition. This definition states that superstition creates itself. This is nonsense. Nothing is "created" when someone says something superstitious. There is no cause and effect. Supernatural entities/realms either exits or they do not. And there is zero evidence they do. Whether or not they actually do doesn't matter, it is rational to not believe in them until someone presents evidence for their existence. > Godel's incompleteness theorem proves that we cannot prove all the laws in the universe His theorem says no such thing. It simply makes a statement about the trade-off between the consistency of axiomatic systems and the provability of truth statements. I could easily just argue the universe is a system with inconsistent axioms where every law can be proved. > we know conclusively that recent discoveries (eg, James Webb showing unexpected galaxy sizes) show that much of our current "laws of nature" are definitely in conflict with reality This is called science. We collect evidence. We develop approximations of reality that best conform to this evidence. We collect new evidence. We refine our approximations. > so many theoretical physicists are "simulationists" where they believe the universe is a simulation where the creators can exert complete control I don't care what "so many theoretical physicists" believe. I care what they publish in peer-reviewed literature. > Perhaps humans are simply hardwired for religion. Perhaps humans are hardwired to make spears and kill each other or hunt and gather. That doesn't mean we should be doing that in 2023.

kube-system 4y ago

Rituals can have a social purpose beyond superstition: e.g. signaling.

tigerlily 4y ago

In fairness, the act of it could equally be held superstitious even if one is religious.

Grustaf 4y ago
Well, not if the words are aimed at your God. In Christianity and many other religions it’s a very real thing to promise God you will do something, it’s not superstition.
- gobrewers14 4y ago
  Believing that there is a god to promise something to is the definition of superstition.
  - Grustaf 4y ago
    No, that’s not what the word means. Religion and superstition are different concepts. This is a linguistic fact, regardless of your personal beliefs.
    - defrost 4y ago
      Superstitions are literally beliefs and practices about things supernatural. Supernatural is a term attributed to non-physical entities, such as angels, demons, gods, and spirits. It also includes claimed abilities embodied in or provided by such beings, including magic, telekinesis, levitation, precognition, and extrasensory perception. One persons superstition is frequently anothers religion.
      - Grustaf 4y ago
        Yes, superstitions relate to supernatural things. Religion does too, in a way. That doesn’t mean it’s the same thing. Language is a lot more complex than that. And sure, you might derogatorily refer to someone’s religion as a superstition, just like I might call someone a “pagan” even if he’s strictly speaking just a heretic. But in reality these are all precise terms with different meanings. To be a bit more precise, superstitions deal with more or less automatic things like receiving luck by touching some rock. If you swear to God, that is not some automatic process that will bring you luck, its a divine being with a will that presumably would be angry if you break your oath. Do you see the difference?
        gobrewers14 4y ago
        I touch (swear an oath and break it to) a rock (a god) and I receive luck (anger). Both are superstitions. The rock example is actually less superstitious because rocks actually exist. There is zero evidence gods exist.
        Grustaf 4y ago
        I didn’t make this up. It might seem like the same concept to you, but I assure you that any serious scholar, atheist or not, knows the difference. It really has nothing to do with what you personally believe or not. In your example the difference is that the rock effect is automatic, like gravity, but the god is a sentient being that has a will. Why is it so hard to accept that people call these different things? You can still despise people who believe in both.
        gobrewers14 4y ago
        > In your example the difference is that the rock effect is automatic, like gravity, but the god is a sentient being that has a will. There is no difference. This is the fallacy of special pleading. You're saying that the example with god is different because you defined god to be different from the thing you don't want it to be the same as. You are presupposing gods existence. There is no evidence such an entity exists and is therefore superstition.
    - gobrewers14 4y ago
      > Religion and superstition are different concepts. Please point to the part in my original response where I said religion and superstition are the same concept. I said believing in a god is superstition. Which it is. Superstition (n): A belief, practice, or rite irrationally maintained by ignorance of the laws of nature or by faith in magic or chance.
      - hajile 4y ago
        This definition confuses cause and effect. A person believes something that results in superstition. This definition states that superstition creates itself rather than being the result of external factors. As a finer point, laws of nature could themselves be superstition. Godel's incompleteness theorem proves that we cannot prove all the laws in the universe. As such, we assert a truth that we know we cannot prove then act as though it must be true. Even if you accept that as incidental, we know conclusively that recent discoveries (eg, James Webb showing unexpected galaxy sizes) show that much of our current "laws of nature" are definitely in conflict with reality making scientists superstitious in practice as well. Finally, it is of no little interest to me that so many theoretical physicists are "simulationists" where they believe the universe is a simulation where the creators can exert complete control, but they still hold the belief that these creators are not actually gods (even though that is unprovable and for us would amount to a distinction without a difference). Perhaps humans are simply hardwired for religion.
        gobrewers14 4y ago
        > A person believes something that results in superstition. This definition states that superstition creates itself. This is nonsense. Nothing is "created" when someone says something superstitious. There is no cause and effect. Supernatural entities/realms either exits or they do not. And there is zero evidence they do. Whether or not they actually do doesn't matter, it is rational to not believe in them until someone presents evidence for their existence. > Godel's incompleteness theorem proves that we cannot prove all the laws in the universe His theorem says no such thing. It simply makes a statement about the trade-off between the consistency of axiomatic systems and the provability of truth statements. I could easily just argue the universe is a system with inconsistent axioms where every law can be proved. > we know conclusively that recent discoveries (eg, James Webb showing unexpected galaxy sizes) show that much of our current "laws of nature" are definitely in conflict with reality This is called science. We collect evidence. We develop approximations of reality that best conform to this evidence. We collect new evidence. We refine our approximations. > so many theoretical physicists are "simulationists" where they believe the universe is a simulation where the creators can exert complete control I don't care what "so many theoretical physicists" believe. I care what they publish in peer-reviewed literature. > Perhaps humans are simply hardwired for religion. Perhaps humans are hardwired to make spears and kill each other or hunt and gather. That doesn't mean we should be doing that in 2023.