tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4307187040250193857.post6184148261343963312..comments2024-03-20T03:33:22.357-07:00Comments on Skeptophilia: The Motive Fallacy and the reincarnation of Steve JobsGordon Bonnethttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06003472005971594466noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4307187040250193857.post-46677711673816043072020-12-05T09:25:12.938-08:002020-12-05T09:25:12.938-08:00Take a look at, for a reincarnation example,
https...Take a look at, for a reincarnation example,<br />https://www.academia.edu/38590496/A_COMPARISON_OF_MODERN_SCIENCE_WITH_VEDIC_SCIENCE idpnsdhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17696520316209922553noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4307187040250193857.post-88653299262316166662012-09-07T13:42:49.323-07:002012-09-07T13:42:49.323-07:00The scientific approach requires no empathy. It ju...The scientific approach requires no empathy. It just is.<br /><br />"...You have to look at it through their perspective to understand..." <br /><br />No. <br /><br />Accepting someone else's "beliefs" to provide the context for their motives is convoluted. The truth gets lost in the unnecessary conversation over the justification for unverifiable belief. I don't want to view something "through someone else's eyes." Mine work just fine. To then say that my lack of empathy has a dehumanizing potential, is ironic to me. Science humanizes us. Religion makes us God (succinct).<br /><br />As far as "dogmatic monoliths" are concerned, let me quote George Michael from the song "Freedom:"<br /><br />"Some mistakes were built to last..."<br /><br />Maybe if the Monolith wasn't covered in frescos of Spanish Inquisitors, Puritans from Salem, or Mujahideen, I might have a different perspective.Hontseur Thotshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10799765178908406877noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4307187040250193857.post-3408930522069015062012-09-07T06:15:54.338-07:002012-09-07T06:15:54.338-07:00You said, 'I have no way to understand Phra Ch...You said, 'I have no way to understand Phra Chaibul's statements EXCEPT as a direct claim about how the universe works', but that's exactly what I was trying to offer; you can still, surely, understand them as statements about *some picture* of how the universe works (in much the way that I could recite and understand Newton's laws of motion despite their ultimate inaccuracy). It's an inaccurate picture, but that doesn't mean it's not useful to be able to understand it.<br /><br />As for people within the system and why they don't ask for proof, I'm not sure that's not a fallacy of definition. People who genuinely believe any religion don't do so without some motivation (and OK, sometimes it's a conscious decision to go with the flow of family or community, which is a separate phenomenon); often, I think it is simply that they have accepted an evidential standard which isn't purely empirical - it's quite plausible that you *have* to accept some such standard to believe.<br /><br />But by that understanding, if you hold to a purely empirical evidential standard, then you're already incompatible with the faith, so you're *not* part of it.<br /><br />So the question isn't 'why don't these people ask for empirical proof?', but 'why do they accept some non-empirical evidential standard?'. And that, I think, is a question for which psychology has a whole range of good answers, whether it's following authority, or confirmation bias, or something else (those are the two that come to mind, but I'm sure you can think of others). As a species, we often don't demand complete systemic empirical proofs for things (sometimes for quite good reasons) - the question is why some people allow exceptions for religion and others don't.<br /><br />I'm not making value judgements (at least, not here) about differing evidential standards, though of course that's a question which bears investigation in a big way. I've just noticed a trend among atheists to treat religions as dogmatic monoliths rather than interesting psychological phenomena which we need to understand. It strays dangerously close to dehumanising the people who don't ask the same questions we do (and yeah, I'm a theist, but I try to avoid straying from a strictly empirical evidence criterion within the empirical sphere, so I *am* asking more or less the same questions you are).Beckyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16677076598470332030noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4307187040250193857.post-86965936631642154312012-09-07T05:48:56.910-07:002012-09-07T05:48:56.910-07:00I'm with Gould on this one. I see no harm in a...I'm with Gould on this one. I see no harm in a bunch of people believing that Steve Jobs is in some boring techno-heaven, helping the electrons rece faster in their circuits. It helps them get through their day if they feel that the their iPhone really is holy, as they suspected all along. They won't do anything differently, but they might feel different about it, be less conflicted about whether they're living in accordance with their religion, and turn their worry to more productive uses. Or, if people get over their grief better by believing that their departed loved ones are not really gone, but have moved to some happy place, or that the stupid, random things that happen to them have some higher purpose, that makes them happier and more useful to society. No problem.<br /><br />Where religion makes claims that are testable, they're crossing Gould's fence. Claiming that prayer is a substitute for medical care, for instance, is departing from the "internal, unverifiable" sphere. No religion I know of adheres to that boundary, however. It would be a very unsatisfactory religion. The whole point for most people is to give them a sense of control. But once you claim to be able to control something, you can start devising tests for whether you really can.<br /><br />Humans are such pattern seekers that once you believe that there's a deity that oversees your life, you naturally, even unconsciously, start to look for messages from the deity. Omens. The random signs they manage to spot might influence their behavior. Fortunately, humans are best at spotting the patterns they want to spot, so it usually doesn't keep them from doing whatever they wanted to do anyway. "Ooh. Black cat. Well, let's try for two out of three."Tyler Torkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11460706772136362593noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4307187040250193857.post-88278938141021666922012-09-07T05:42:28.300-07:002012-09-07T05:42:28.300-07:00Hi Rik,
Thanks for your thoughtful response to my...Hi Rik,<br /><br />Thanks for your thoughtful response to my post.<br /><br />I agree with you that Phra Payom Kallayano's comments make sense from within the system. Since he obviously buys the rest of the Buddhist interpretation of the world, his only basis for an objection would be Phra Chaibul's motives.<br /><br />However, coming (as I do) from outside the system, I have no way to understand Phra Chaibul's statements EXCEPT as a direct claim about how the universe works, and as far as I can see, the whole system falls based on a complete lack of evidence that this really IS how things are. So perhaps my pointing at Phra Payom Kallayano was wrong, because of course he would see nothing wrong with the basic assumptions of the system.<br /><br />But I can say that as someone who was raised in the Catholic church, by devoutly Catholic parents, even at a very young age I recall sitting in the pew and thinking, "Why on earth do you believe that? How do you know this is true?" Even for someone WITHIN the system, it still strikes me as odd that no one seems to stop and think, "Really? Show me your proof."<br /><br />cheers,<br /><br />GordonGordon Bonnethttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06003472005971594466noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4307187040250193857.post-51794746006249014142012-09-07T05:31:53.742-07:002012-09-07T05:31:53.742-07:00Can I offer an alternative interpretation of the s...Can I offer an alternative interpretation of the scenario? One that at least makes sense of Phra Payom Kallayano's response from his own perspective?<br /><br />Let's assume that, however cynical they may be about it's real-world implications, both Phra Chaibul and Tony Tseung are sincere in their faith (actually, we don't need to assume this of Tseung - he could just be curious about what this strand of Buddhism says).<br /><br />This would mean there's an implicit qualifier in the question - it's tacitly prefaced with 'according to our/your faith...'. And 'According to our/your faith, what has happened to Steve Jobs now he's dead?' is a legitimate question, quite possibly with a determinate answer, similarly prefixed (i.e., the answer is of the form 'According to our faith, Steve Jobs is...')<br /><br />And while I don't know anything about the particular strand of Buddhism practiced at Dhammakaya, I do know that the Buddha himself said that one should never ask, nor try to answer, questions about where people were or will end up in their other lives. So Phra Chaibul's statements are (as far as I know) false *according to his faith*. And so Phra Payom Kallayano is entirely right - according to his faith - in rebuking Phra Chaibul.<br /><br />Why is any of this important to an atheist? (and I'm not an atheist, but that's a debate for another time) It's important because if you believe, as you seem to, that theism is in all cases a barrier to knowledge, or involves a knowledge standard you don't countenance (and speaking as a philosopher of religion, I can outline ways in which both complaints may be avoided), then quite rightly you should oppose theism. But that doesn't mean being ignorant of the structure of theism or rejecting all religious statements instead of treating them as qualified.<br /><br />In fact, it means exactly the opposite - if you want to argue against theism in a productive way, a way that actually stands a chance of changing people's minds (and I certainly accept that there are pernicious and dangerous forms of theism out there which need challenging), you have to understand the psychology of theism *from the perspective of theists*. You have to understand how religion works. In this case, you have to understand that Phra Payom Kallayano's comments make complete sense from his perspective.<br /><br />Yes, Phra Chaibul's statements aren't subject to empirical testing and are thus at best highly dubious from something approaching an 'objective' point of view. But they are *also* wrongly motivated and misleading relative to appropriate qualification of the question. And Phra Payom Kallayano is thus right not only to protest the inaccuracy of Phra Chaibul's statements, whether or not his employment of the motive fallacy has any bearing on the issue (and Buddhism is a religion all about motive).<br /><br />Sorry, long comment is long, and still only a sketch of my objection to your position.Beckyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16677076598470332030noreply@blogger.com