As religious faith has declined, ideological intensity has risen • Hacker News Board

Re: As religious faith has declined, ideological intensity has risen

#651

Post by hitekker » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 2:52 PM UTC

amcoastal wrote: post #583

tonymet wrote: post #93

Becoming more religious has helped me identify religious tendencies in the secular world. Ideology doesn’t imply supernatural deities, and some worldly phenomenon can be elevated to a supernatural level. Secular belief contains rituals, origin stories, deities, saints, priesthood, blasphemy, vice & virtue just as religion does. One aspect of religion I appreciate is that these aspects are well codified and debated –…

While your points are good your last paragraph projects a lot of weaknesses onto your readers. Do you believe you're the first person to come up with these points and realize them? Or perhaps that someone could have taken an opposite approach of yours -- moving from very religious to non-religious and can see the same behaviors? And then you continue to assume the only way forward is to perpetrate that behavior. All…

I don't think the GP's intent was to project his own superiority. Rather, if we're unable to use mythologies as a metaphor for the human experience, that is, for our self-expression, we are not as smart nor as strong as we fashion ourselves to be.

Re: As religious faith has declined, ideological intensity has risen

#652

Post by everdrive » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 2:52 PM UTC

_teyd wrote: post #539

coldtea wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> First, people don't acquire the beliefs by considering and weighing evidence; they acquire them by being told them, usually at a young age, by people they trust, and making them part of their identity. That's why people are so resistant to changing such beliefs. Second, the set of beliefs acquired in this way is not just a few isolated ones, but a whole network of beliefs that cover every aspect of life and are all…

This idea that science and technology is just another random religion is so frustrating, but I encounter it online way more often than I would expect. I don’t need to personally review and understand the details of why electricity and the internet work, because I am literally typing this message on an electronic device and sending it via the internet. No faith needed, and anyway.. I can go build a simple computer and…

I think there’s an important distinction to be made here, as I’ve had a lot of the same frustrations as you. Science itself is genuinely NOT religious, and can truly be used to understand the nature of the world, and make practical use of that understanding.

But, if it’s true that man is a religious animal, it’s going to mean that people will always take a religious bent on any major topic in their lives. And so the way that many people experience and understand science may in fact have religious qualities, but this is actually going to be true of any major topic in people’s lives.

Re: As religious faith has declined, ideological intensity has risen

#653

Post by 7952 » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 2:55 PM UTC

Haiatu wrote: post #502

tonymet wrote: post #93

Becoming more religious has helped me identify religious tendencies in the secular world. Ideology doesn’t imply supernatural deities, and some worldly phenomenon can be elevated to a supernatural level. Secular belief contains rituals, origin stories, deities, saints, priesthood, blasphemy, vice & virtue just as religion does. One aspect of religion I appreciate is that these aspects are well codified and debated –…

"One aspect of religion I appreciate is that these aspects are well codified and debated – i.e. much more explicit." They are not well debated in a sense that it would be called reasonable in a normal and educated world. Thats why we call it believe. Its much easier to say 'whats written in a book from some people from some 2000 years ago is true' and start to philosoph around it than actually not stoping questioning…

An interesting thing to consider is that most religious people do not really believe with much conviction. They can clearly see that scripture is not literal truth and that there is no scientific evidence. So religion becomes about faith and faith becomes virtuous.

But a Roman citizen 2000 years ago didn't have faith. They just knew that God(s) exist. It was obvious, self-evident and compelling. The greatest thinkers of the time really believed.

Most Christians talk about faith and belief because that is the only thing left that science hasn't overturned. Our understanding of the world is dominated by science not religion. We won (mostly).

Re: As religious faith has declined, ideological intensity has risen

#654

Post by __s » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 3:02 PM UTC

tonymet wrote: post #278

sidlls wrote: post #199

> 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 hav…

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 te…

So I think I came across an article which touches on what you're getting at: https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/people-wit...

For me atheism & nihilism go a bit hand in hand, but there are atheists who aren't nihilists, which then have to still level their disbelief in god with faith in meaningfulness

Re: As religious faith has declined, ideological intensity has risen

#655

Post by 7952 » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 3:02 PM UTC

tonymet wrote: post #440

Igelau wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 had something interesting to say, why'd you have to go and close it out with flamebait?

Fair enough what's a better wording. I'm trying to convey the mental models that are more natural in the religious world and lacking in the secular world (outside of philosophy )

A better explanation is that those mental models are in fact universal. Things like bias, magical thinking, and dogma exist in all fields of humans life. Science included. But why stop there? Why not question the biological basis for those phenomena? Why not try and understand why we do those things. Light the candle and shine a light on the darkness.

Re: As religious faith has declined, ideological intensity has risen

#656

Post by snypox » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 3:08 PM UTC

baby wrote: post #543

Swizec wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn’t this what Catholicism is all about? We are all sinners and terrible people. Therefore we should see the best in fellow human and give money to the church so it can offset our tab with god I realize most people stick to the “everyone is bad” part and forget that they too are an everyone and gloss over the whole forgiveness and acceptance part.

Is it though, don’t religious people think everyone else not part of their religion is going to hell?

I asked this from a Christian friend of mine. He said that the "uninitiated", like indigenous people will be judged by their conscience.

I told him that people in Iraq are 99% muslims and they definitely know about the existence of Christianity so they aren't really uninitiated. If I remember correctly, he said that if a culture poisons your mind to not believe in the Christian God, then you're still considered "uninitiated".

Re: As religious faith has declined, ideological intensity has risen

#657

Post by ymgch » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 3:08 PM UTC

Can't say what's worse.

Re: As religious faith has declined, ideological intensity has risen

#658

Post by everdrive » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 3:11 PM UTC

throwaway210222 wrote: post #603

tonymet wrote: post #93

Becoming more religious has helped me identify religious tendencies in the secular world. Ideology doesn’t imply supernatural deities, and some worldly phenomenon can be elevated to a supernatural level. Secular belief contains rituals, origin stories, deities, saints, priesthood, blasphemy, vice & virtue just as religion does. One aspect of religion I appreciate is that these aspects are well codified and debated –…

> 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. There is no mechanism by which the ABSENCE of a belief in your parent's invisible sky wizards becomes just evidence of an alternative belief system. Not believing in the tooth fairy does not make my understanding and endorsement of say, the periodic table, an equivalen…

I think the original statement was just too strong. Generally, people are religious even if they claim to be otherwise. I do however believe that truly non religious exist, but that most people are religious or spiritual in their thinking.

Re: As religious faith has declined, ideological intensity has risen

#659

Post by splithalf » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 3:12 PM UTC

ithkuil wrote: post #598

pdonis wrote: post #488

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a system that kept a civilization together for 1000 years The fact that most people in a given civilization were Christians does not mean that the particular religious beliefs I was talking about were the ones that kept the civilization together. In fact, as the example I gave of religious wars over "homoousios" vs. "homoiousios" illustrates, those particular beliefs often caused problems that created huge rifts in…

Indeed ethical systems have changed throughout the lifespan of a religion. Religions are not set in stone and change more than what most religious people are willing to admit.

Indeed they change more than their zealous detractors, whose rigid mindsets cannot update priors despite abundant evidence contradicting their sacred beliefs, namely that the pious and meek are to be looked down upon, either pitied or scorned.

Re: As religious faith has declined, ideological intensity has risen

#660

Post by 7952 » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 3:14 PM UTC

colechristensen wrote: post #310

tonymet wrote: post #93

Becoming more religious has helped me identify religious tendencies in the secular world. Ideology doesn’t imply supernatural deities, and some worldly phenomenon can be elevated to a supernatural level. Secular belief contains rituals, origin stories, deities, saints, priesthood, blasphemy, vice & virtue just as religion does. One aspect of religion I appreciate is that these aspects are well codified and debated –…

I have been thinking a lot about region and ideology and what i’ve come up with is that the tendency to form these strong ideological behaviors is a feature of humanity and organized religion is a sort of evolved (perhaps in a meme more than a gene way) response to this tendency. Essentially groups and ideas survived better when there was an organization and social rules built up around this human tendency. Left unch…

Imagine you could go back to 0AD. And you ask the people why droughts happen, or why people get sick, or why volcanoes explode. Ask them why they are a slave, or a master.

There were religious answers to all these questions. God's were just the best explanation going for why things happened. And over the next 2000 years science slowly chipped away at that. And then the origin of species was published. To the point where in 2021 most people will have answers based on science. Even religious people.

Science has won the battle of ideas again and again. Religion has retreated into faith and existential fear. And slowly but surely science will shine a light on that fear.