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

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

#521

Post by raverbashing » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 8:38 AM UTC

pdonis wrote: post #470

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…

> Those two hold for, say roughly, 90% of what most people believe, secular or not See my response to tonymet upthread. > Even most scientific theories people believe, they haven't examined and are incapable of following their theories and experiements personally - they were just being told they are truth and they trust it to be so. For some theories that are called "scientific", yes, this is true--but that's because…

Yep, you are correct. At some point "scientific theories" become practical stuff.

One thing that's missing in a lot of books is: how sure are we about the various statements? How much of it is well tested (Newton, Einstein - though we still had a lot of recent confirmation), how much is still out there (example: BCS theory), how much of it is a "feel good explanation" (hybridization theory) or how much is "the math works out wonderfully if we ignore the skeletons in the closet and the theory sounds a bit crazy" (QFT/QED)

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

#522

Post by aloisdg » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 8:40 AM UTC

mrone wrote: post #421

andrepd wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Christians, Muslims, etc, cannot even agree among themselves what their "belief system" is! I think you're overestimating how well-defined people's religious beliefs are, especially the average person's.

Muslims agree on who God is and who are his prophets.

> and who are his prophets.

Well this one may differ if you ask a Sunni or a Shi'ite.

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

#523

Post by fighterpilot » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 8:41 AM UTC

KozmoNau7 wrote: post #493

irrational wrote: post #464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I just don't think there is a god. This would be agnostic (militant agnostic?), wouldn't it? I think a true atheist would say "I know that there is not a god."

Not really. There are "I know that there is not a god" atheists, those are the insufferable unholier-than-thou types like Richard Dawkins, who seem mostly interested in provoking religious people. And there are "there is no falsifiable proof at all to support the existence of a god" atheists, which are the ordinary sensible ones, who don't hate religious people, they just don't share their beliefs.

Dawkins is actually a weak atheist (agnostic atheist), not a strong atheist. He thinks an interpersonal God is highly improbable, but it's not possible to prove a negative and so he doesn't assert that it doesn't exist.

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

#524

Post by gandalfgreybeer » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 8:43 AM UTC

betwixthewires wrote: post #458

gandalfgreybeer wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m slightly surprised to see this line of thinking in HN. The so-called “Belief” in science is not driven by blind faith that what people are saying are true. It’s that you understand that before something is believed it goes through a rigorous system of fact checking / experimental confirmation. So if something is considered by people from different fields as true, then it likely is. But as you said, it’s questioni…

> So if something is considered by people from different fields as true, then it likely is. This is actually very unscientific, a good chunk of what we currently hold to be true within science disproved previous science. A good example of really strong, good and useful science that was later replaced is Newtonian mechanics. In reality, science is never finished, but the prevailing view throughout time is "we have mos…

You only highlighted one sentence of what I said but left out the part where I said:

> if new data is put forward then it can adjust.

Which is essentially the same as the ideas you put forward.

Also, coming from a Physics background, I would argue that to say that Newtonian mechanics has been completely replaced is false. There are more accurate models of the universe especially as we go to a quantum level or levels approaching the speed of light, but for most models it still works. As the saying goes, “all models are wrong, but some models are more useful than others”. Newtonian mechanics still works, but it doesn’t work all the time.

But main thing is, we are in agreement that Science is not finished; there is a balance between being open to knowing that there might be a better model compared to what we know now, but until it disproves what we know now (or explains things out current models can’t and can be verified experimentally), there is no reason to not trust our currently accepted and verified ones.

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

#525

Post by gandalfgreybeer » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 8:45 AM UTC

icelancer wrote: post #311

gandalfgreybeer wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m slightly surprised to see this line of thinking in HN. The so-called “Belief” in science is not driven by blind faith that what people are saying are true. It’s that you understand that before something is believed it goes through a rigorous system of fact checking / experimental confirmation. So if something is considered by people from different fields as true, then it likely is. But as you said, it’s questioni…

>> The so-called “Belief” in science is not driven by blind faith that what people are saying are true. It’s that you understand that before something is believed it goes through a rigorous system of fact checking / experimental confirmation. Right. None of which happened with the proclamations by the CDC/WHO who also had potential perverse incentives. Globally appointed scientists are not the arbiters of science. Th…

This statement clarified things; I see your point more clearly now.

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

#526

Post by morelisp » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 8:53 AM UTC

tonymet wrote: post #456

samhain wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with the parent, you’re argument almost appears disingenuous to the point of looking like a troll or bait. This perspective is substituting any belief with a religious belief which is a false equivalency. It’s unfortunate that the grandparent is the top comment right now.

Can you share profound beliefs that you don't believe are religious in nature? I know trivial beliefs e.g. today was 85º – we can agree that calling those religious would not be useful.

The Church-Turing thesis? That ZFC is consistent? That the driving force of history is primarily material relations between groups?

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

#527

Post by meowface » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 8:56 AM UTC

betwixthewires wrote: post #490

meowface wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>A good example of this is transhumanism, specifically, the idea that you can upload your mind to a computer. It is all but given based on our current scientific understanding that the mind is inseparable from the body, yet somehow particularly atheist people behave as if they are separate things. This is a dogmatic belief. It's unknown if such a technology will be possible one day, but I don't find transhumanism or…

Belief that your mind can be moved is a dogmatic belief, if you hold it, seeing as our current scientific understanding of the brain precludes it. That isn't to say a machine cannot be conscious, or that a different type of consciousness cannot exist.

I'd say certainty in such a belief would be dogmatic. But I don't think it's at all dogmatic (or wrong) to say that in the distant future it could maybe become possible.

If one merely says "I believe there's a chance we may one day be able to upload our minds to a machine", I don't think that's dogma. Even if one says "I believe there's a chance we may one day be able to upload our minds to a machine and retain continuous consciousness in the process" (as opposed to basically just creating a mental copy of oneself), I'd say that also isn't dogma, even if the odds are lower.

I would actually say "our current scientific understanding of the brain precludes it" is dogmatic. Unless you mean "we don't yet know how we could go about it given our current limited understanding", then sure; but asserting that something (especially something that doesn't violate any laws of physics) will never be possible is a positive, definitive statement, and one I also don't think is true.

We just know it would be enormously difficult and complex and that it's extremely unlikely it would be possible within the next few centuries, and may never be possible. There's nothing we know about right now that would fundamentally make it impossible. It's all just matter and information.

The definition of dogma, according to Google, is "a principle or set of principles laid down by an authority as incontrovertibly true". Claims of incontrovertible truth are dangerous, whichever direction they're in. If some transhumanist wholeheartedly expects they're going to be inside of a computer by the time they're 80, then that would be dogmatic, but I've personally not seen anyone with such an attitude.

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

#528

Post by kitd » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 8:57 AM UTC

whatshisface wrote: post #149

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 –…

> Few people understand that most religions e.g. Judaism and Christianity have an apologetic discipline – a deliberate arm open to debate. Open to talking about it, sure, but the crucial element that separates apologetics from real debate is that one side is forbidden from changing their mind. In religion there is a rule overshadowing the exchange of ideas that says, "no matter how convinced you are, or how weak your…

Swap "religion" for "secular ideology" and you've pretty much arrived at the conclusion of the article.

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

#529

Post by DaedPsyker » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 8:59 AM UTC

flyingchipmann wrote: post #412

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 –…

It's so funny when people intentionally define anything as kind of religion in order to fit their worldview. Take it this way, scientific thinking/method is about a system to analyze. It can be used analyze anything(yourself, math, religion). It's like a function, where you put input data and try your best analyze critically to get an reasonable output. And it can even be used to analyze itself!(like higher order fun…

I'm not an 'atheism is just a religion', I don't believe in Gods, but I do think there secular ideologies. In the US context, the civil religion, the notions of the constitution, the military, and other institutions have take on a quasi-religious nature. Founding myths that become a spirit regardless of truthfulness.

In general, cult of personalities are clearly examples of secular religion although one that can become supernatural in the case of the Kim dynasty in North Korea.

Ceremonies and traditions that we continue because 'that is just how it has always been done'. There isn't some binary notion of you are religious or your rationalist, non religious people can hold non-rationalist thought.

Personally I don't really understand what you're on about with the scientific method, the parent didn't mention anything on it.

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

#530

Post by parineum » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 9:07 AM UTC

betwixthewires wrote: post #490

meowface wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>A good example of this is transhumanism, specifically, the idea that you can upload your mind to a computer. It is all but given based on our current scientific understanding that the mind is inseparable from the body, yet somehow particularly atheist people behave as if they are separate things. This is a dogmatic belief. It's unknown if such a technology will be possible one day, but I don't find transhumanism or…

Belief that your mind can be moved is a dogmatic belief, if you hold it, seeing as our current scientific understanding of the brain precludes it. That isn't to say a machine cannot be conscious, or that a different type of consciousness cannot exist.

Current scientific understanding is inconclusive. You can't prove a negative so it definitely doesn't preclude it.