Atheism 6.Faith is unreason

Faith is an act of unreason - it means giving up thinking and going on hunches and intuition and leaving thought behind.Faith does not require any tests of what it believes - Reason on the other hand demands that the speculations it may make be tested and be found to be true before being accepted as a truth.Anyone who decides how the world works by faith has lost the capacity to think coherently because they are presuming things without requiring evidence or proof.

Subj: Print Edition e-zine: The science of belief

30 January 2006

SPECIAL REPORT: BEYOND BELIEF

Is religious belief a part of human nature? Why did it evolve? When did we start believing in gods? Why do so many people believe in the paranormal? In this 12-page special report, New Scientist examines the science of belief. While some hard-line atheists believe religion is the root of all evil, the very antithesis of science, and certainly not a proper subject for scientific inquiry, a growing number of researchers think otherwise, and the study of belief in all its forms has become a very hot topic...more

WE BELIEVE

Religious belief is a conundrum. In our everyday lives, most of us make at least some effort to check the truth of claims for ourselves. Yet when it comes to religion, studies show that we are most persuaded by stories that contradict the known laws of physics, such as tales of supernatural beings walking on water and raising the dead. Why are we humans so willing to commit to religious beliefs we can never hope to verify? Now it seems, there are at least four very good evolutionary reasons...more

GLAD TO BE GULLIBLE

You pick up the phone and give someone a call. They answer, exclaiming that they were just in process of emailing you! Do you immediately put it down to some paranormal explanation, or do you blame a more mundane alternative such as coincidence? It all depends on whether you are a sheep or a goat. Sheep tend to believe in the paranormal while goats do not. Which is it better to be? It turns out that the kind of thinking involved in paranormal belief helps us carry out a range of important tasks: the sheep may be onto something...more

PARTICLES OF FAITH

It may never have literally moved a mountain, but belief has created plenty of other dramatic effects. Take Madeleine Rizan. By the time she bathed in the water of Lourdes, she had been paralysed for 24 years, yet apparently she regained her ability to move. Then there's the women who stop menstruating, grow a round belly and begin to lactate, in the mistaken belief they are pregnant. What is going on inside our brains and bodies when we believe? Exactly what is the biological basis of belief? There seem to be at least two lines of thinking...more

PLUS: THE QUANTUM COCKTAIL

Physicist Frank Steglich is watching a small crystal flout the traditional precepts of physics. This crystal, a cocktail of ytterbium, rhodium and silicon, is conducting electricity, but no one knows how. Common wisdom says that when electricity flows through a material, it's the electrons that do the job. But as Steglich and his colleagues cool their crystal down toward absolute zero under a strong magnetic field, the electrons come to a halt, unable to move. The experiment suggests that the electrons may even be splitting apart. And yet the current keeps flowing. How? The answer may solve some of the most important riddles in physics...more

http://www.newscientist.com/archive.ns

© Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd. 2006


"Kissing Hank's [Butt]" (or "The logic of Christians" - for "Hank" read "God")

This morning there was a knock at my door. When I answered the door I found a well groomed, nicely dressed couple. The man spoke first:

John: "Hi! I'm John, and this is Mary."
Mary: "Hi! We're here to invite you to come kiss Hank's [butt] with us."
Me: "Pardon me?! What are you talking about? Who's Hank, and why would I want to kiss His [butt]?"
John: "If you kiss Hank's [butt], He'll give you a million dollars; and if you don't, He'll kick the [crap] out of you."
Me: "What? Is this some sort of bizarre mob shake-down?"
John: "Hank is a billionaire philanthropist. Hank built this town. Hank owns this town. He can do whatever he wants, and what He wants is to give you a million dollars, but He can't until you kiss his [butt]."
Me: "That doesn't make any sense. Why..."
Mary: "Who are you to question Hank's gift? Don't you want a million dollars? Isn't it worth a little kiss on the [butt]?"
Me: "Well maybe, if it's legit, but..."
John: "Then come kiss Hank's [butt] with us."
Me: "Do you kiss Hank's [butt] often?"
Mary: "Oh yes, all the time..."
Me: "And has He given you a million dollars?"
John: "Well no. You don't actually get the money until you leave town."
Me: "So why don't you just leave town now?"
Mary: "You can't leave until Hank tells you to, or you don't get the money, and He kicks the [crap] out of you."
Me: "Do you know anyone who kissed Hank's [butt], left town, and got the million dollars?"
John: "My mother kissed Hank's [butt] for years. She left town last year, and I'm sure she got the money."
Me: "Haven't you talked to her since then?"
John: "Of course not, Hank doesn't allow it."
Me: "So what makes you think He'll actually give you the money if you've never talked to anyone who got the money?"
Mary: "Well, he gives you a little bit before you leave. Maybe you'll get a raise, maybe you'll win a small lotto, maybe you'll just find a twenty-dollar bill on the street."
Me: "What's that got to do with Hank?"
John: "Hank has certain 'connections.'"
Me: "I'm sorry, but this sounds like some sort of bizarre con game."
John: "But it's a million dollars, can you really take the chance? And remember, if you don't kiss Hank's [butt] He'll kick the [crap] out of you."
Me: "Maybe if I could see Hank, talk to Him, get the details straight from him..."
Mary: "No one sees Hank, no one talks to Hank."
Me: "Then how do you kiss His [butt]?"
John: "Sometimes we just blow Him a kiss, and think of His [butt]. Other times we kiss Karl's [butt], and he passes it on."
Me: "Who's Karl?"
Mary: "A friend of ours. He's the one who taught us all about kissing Hank's [butt]. All we had to do was take him out to dinner a few times."
Me: "And you just took his word for it when he said there was a Hank, that Hank wanted you to kiss His [butt], and that Hank would reward you?"
John: "Oh no! Karl has a letter he got from Hank years ago explaining the whole thing. Here's a copy; see for yourself."

From the desk of Karl

1. Kiss Hank's [butt] and He'll give you a million dollars when you leave town.
2. Drink only in moderation.
3. Kick the [crap] out of people who aren't like you.
4. Eat right.
5. Hank dictated this list Himself.
6. The moon is made of green cheese.
7. Everything Hank says is right.
8. Wash your hands after going to the bathroom.
9. Don't use alcohol.
10. Eat your weiners on buns, no condiments.
11. Kiss Hank's [butt] or He'll kick the [crap] out of you.

Me: "This appears to be written on Karl's letterhead."
Mary: "Hank didn't have any paper."
Me: "I have a hunch that if we checked we'd find this is Karl's handwriting."
John: "Of course, Hank dictated it."
Me: "I thought you said no one gets to see Hank?"
Mary: "Not now, but years ago He would talk to some people."
Me: "I thought you said He was a philanthropist. What sort of philanthropist kicks the [crap] out of people just because they're different?"
Mary: "It's what Hank wants, and Hank's always right."
Me: "How do you figure that?"
Mary: "Item 7 says 'Everything Hank says is right.' That's good enough for me!"
Me: "Maybe your friend Karl just made the whole thing up."
John: "No way! Item 5 says 'Hank dictated this list himself.' Besides, item 2 says 'Use alcohol in moderation,' Item 4 says 'Eat right,' and item 8 says 'Wash your hands after going to the bathroom.' Everyone knows those things are right, so the rest must be true, too."
Me: "But 9 says 'Don't use alcohol.' which doesn't quite go with item 2, and 6 says 'The moon is made of green cheese,' which is just plain wrong."
John: "There's no contradiction between 9 and 2, 9 just clarifies 2. As far as 6 goes, you've never been to the moon, so you can't say for sure."
Me: "Scientists have pretty firmly established that the moon is made of rock..."
Mary: "But they don't know if the rock came from the Earth, or from out of space, so it could just as easily be green cheese."
Me: "I'm not really an expert, but I think the theory that the Moon was somehow 'captured' by the Earth has been discounted*. Besides, not knowing where the rock came from doesn't make it cheese."
John: "Aha! You just admitted that scientists make mistakes, but we know Hank is always right!"
Me: "We do?"
Mary: "Of course we do, Item 5 says so."
Me: "You're saying Hank's always right because the list says so, the list is right because Hank dictated it, and we know that Hank dictated it because the list says so. That's circular logic, no different than saying 'Hank's right because He says He's right.'"
John: "Now you're getting it! It's so rewarding to see someone come around to Hank's way of thinking."
Me: "But...oh, never mind. What's the deal with weiners?"
Mary blushes.
John: "Weiners, in buns, no condiments. It's Hank's way. Anything else is wrong."
Me: "What if I don't have a bun?"
John: "No bun, no weiner. A weiner without a bun is wrong."
Me: "No relish? No mustard?"
Mary looks positively stricken.
John shouts: "There's no need for such language! Condiments of any kind are wrong!"
Me: "So a big pile of sauerkraut with some weiners chopped up in it would be out of the question?"
Mary sticks her fingers in her ears."I am not listening to this. La la la, la la, la la la."
John: "That's disgusting. Only some sort of evil deviant would eat that..."
Me: "It's good! I eat it all the time."
Mary faints.
John catches Mary. "Well, if I'd known you were one of those I wouldn't have wasted my time. When Hank kicks the [crap] out of you I'll be there, counting my money and laughing. I'll kiss Hank's [butt] for you, you bunless cut-weinered kraut-eater."
With this, John dragged Mary to their waiting car, and they sped off.

Upon the following article written by David Eagleman - find my replies at the bottom which show why his view is untenable - other comments about his article follow:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20727795.300-between-god-and-atheism-why-i-am-a-possibilian.html

When it comes to the big questions, why should we have to either deny God or believe?

Surely good science doesn't so restrict us, says David Eagleman

I HAVE devoted my life to scientific pursuit. After all, if we want to crack the mysteries of our existence, there may be no better approach than to directly study the blueprints. And science over the past 400 years has been tremendously successful. We have reached the moon, eradicated smallpox, built the internet, tripled lifespans, and increasingly tapped into those mind-blowing truths around us. We've found them to be deeper and more beautiful than anyone could have guessed.

But when we reach the end of the pier of everything we know, we find that it only takes us part of the way. Beyond that all we see is uncharted water. Past the end of the pier lies all the mystery about our deeply strange existence: the equivalence of mass and energy, dark matter, multiple spatial dimensions, how to build consciousness, and the big questions of meaning and existence.

I have no doubt that we will continue to add to the pier of knowledge, appending several new slats in each generation. But we have no guarantee how far we'll get. There may be some domains beyond the tools of science - perhaps temporarily, perhaps always. We also have to acknowledge that we won't answer many of the big questions in our brief twinkling of a 21st-century lifetime: even if science can determine the correct answer, we won't get to enjoy hearing it.

This situation calls for an openness in approaching the big questions of our existence. When there is a lack of meaningful data to weigh in on a problem, good scientists are comfortable holding many possibilities at once, rather than committing to a particular story over others. In light of this, I have found myself surprised by the amount of certainty out there.

Take, for example, this decade's books by the new atheists, such as Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens. Their books are brilliant and insightful, but sometimes feed a widespread misconception that scientists don't have the capacity to gambol around beyond the available data. Some readers walk away from these books with the impression that scientists think they have the big picture solved - if not in detail, at least in outline.

But good science is always open-minded, and the history of science is one of surprises and overturnings. Science is nothing but careful thinking, and careful thinking encourages an appreciation of the complexity of the world. The complexity encourages us to maintain several possibilities at once. In a single lifetime, we may have no way to remove the ambiguities from these possibilities.

A scientist may tend to favour one story over the others, but will always be careful to concede uncertainty and maintain a willingness to change the balance with new, incoming information. As an example, there are two very different interpretations about the reality underlying quantum physics. It is possible that there will be no way to ever know which is correct, or if instead some entirely new theory is correct. And that ambiguity is accepted as part of the enormity of the mysteries we face, and the terms of the agreement we have with nature.

So while there are plenty of good books by scientist-atheists, they sometimes under-emphasise the main lesson from science: that our knowledge is vastly outstripped by our ignorance. For me, a life in science prompts awe and exploration over dogmatism.

A life in science prompts awe and exploration over dogmatism

Given these considerations, I do not call myself an atheist. I don't feel that I have enough data to firmly rule out other interesting possibilities. On the other hand, I do not subscribe to any religion. Traditional religious stories can be beautiful and often crystallise hard-won wisdom - but it is hardly a challenge to poke holes in them. Religious structures are built by humans and brim with all manner of strange human claims - they often reflect cults of personality, xenophobia or mental illness. The holy books of these religions were written millennia ago by people who never had the opportunity to know about DNA, other galaxies, information theory, electricity, the big bang, the big crunch, or even other cultures, literatures or landscapes.

So it seems we know too little to commit to strict atheism, and too much to commit to any religion. Given this, I am often surprised by the number of people who seem to possess total certainty about their position. I know a lot of atheists who seethe at the idea of religion, and religious followers who seethe at the idea of atheism - but neither group is bothering with more interesting ideas. They make their impassioned arguments as though the God versus no-God dichotomy were enough for a modern discussion.

What if we were planted here by aliens? What if there are civilisations in spatial dimensions seven through nine? What if we are nodes in a vast, cosmic, computational device? Wouldn't that make their debates seem limited, in retrospect? I don't think the important goal should be to fight for a particular story in the absence of strong evidence; it should be to explore and celebrate the vast possibilities.

Consider the enormous "possibility space" of stories that can be dreamed up. Take the entirety of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition as a single point in this possibility space. The eastern religions are another point. Strict atheism is another point. Now think of the immense landscape of the points in between. Many of these points will contain stories that are crazy, silly, or merely wildly improbable. But in the absence of data, they can't be ruled out of that space.

This is why I call myself a "possibilian". Possibilianism emphasises the active exploration of new, unconsidered notions. A possibilian is comfortable holding multiple ideas in mind and is not driven by the idea of fighting for a single, particular story. The key emphasis of possibilianism is to shine a flashlight around the possibility space. It is a plea not simply for open-mindedness, but for an active exploration of new ideas.

Is possibilianism compatible with a scientific career? Indeed, it represents the heart of science. Real science operates by holding limitless possibilities in mind and working to see which one is most supported by the data. Sometimes it is difficult or impossible to gather data that weighs in - and in those cases we simply retain the possibilities. We don't commit to a particular version of the story when there is no reason to.

Possibilianism does not suggest free rein to believe whatever strikes one's fancy. It is not tantamount to "anything goes". We know a great deal, not only about the cosmos and molecules, but also about human yearning, fallibilities, poor memories and our extraordinary ability to fabricate any variety of fantastic but utterly untrue stories. Within the realm of what is addressable, we profitably apply logic to further knowledge. Possibilianism is "anything goes at first" - but we then use science to rule out parts of the possibility space, and often to rule in new parts.

In every generation, people are seduced by the idea that they possess all the tools they need to explain the universe. They have always been wrong. From consciousness to dark energy, we know that we are missing an unknowable number of pieces of the puzzle. This is why in the debates between the strict atheists and the fundamentally religious, I choose a third side. A little less pretence of certainty and a little more exploration of the possibility space.

As Voltaire put it, "Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd."

Profile

David Eagleman is a neuroscientist at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. He directs both the Laboratory for Perception and Action and the Initiative on Neuroscience and Law. His book of "possibilian" tales, Sum, became an international best-seller and is published in 22 languages

Comments:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20727795.300-beyond-god-and-atheism-why-i-am-a-possibilian.html

Dear Mr Eagleman,

I hope I have it right that it was you that published the article in newsci about keeping an open mind and vaguely chastised atheist-scientists for being so loud.

I have to tell you that you have fallen foul of one of the Christian fallacies that I deal with regularly in Yahoo QA among other places - that is - that there is sufficient reason to keep out minds open about God as other things - this is not so.

In a court of law we are presumed innocent - there is a good reason for this - it creates least false positives - and minimises the people we send to jail incorrectly.

Science uses the same axiom - and so we presume NOT to believe UNTIL something is proven beyond a doubt - this means we START from atheism and require proof of God - much as we presume fairies/unicorns/aliens DO NOT exist and ask for proof in their favour.

We cannot prove a negative - and so there is no onus on scientists to disprove God - so until further notice Richard Dawkins et al are correct - we all should be athiests as the scientific evidence starts from there and nothing has shown we need alter that view.

I find it altogether amazing that a man in such an illustrious academic position doesn't seem to be aware of how it is science goes about its business and why it is RD and others are so angry about religion trying to shove other agenda such as Intelligent design and alternate evolution theories into the classroom.

The reason is that most if not all those ideas fall foul of the above rule and Occam's Razor - and should not be given credence - you maybe right about what is beyond the end of the pier - but the fact is we know what is on shore and all the way to the pier - and nothing in that path shows any credence to supernature and all of what we have found so far shows that the universe is Godless and lacking in all other supernatural claims - until there is any evidence to the contrary then the onus is on us to accept the evidence so far - if we do not - we cannot claim to be scientists - since you do - you have to accept the evidence - and that says "There is no God.".

Playing the Pasca's Wager card only confuses the issue for people who already believe in God and for whom science is difficult - the last thing we need is scientists saying "Oh yeah- there might be a god off the end of the pier".

To my mind - that's where he belongs.

http://leebor2.741.com/atheism.html

By the way it was very interesting that in the same NEWSCI issue was a multipage spread indicating how human life came to be as it is from the nanosecond after the Big bang - and nowhere was God mentioned. God cannot have made the big bang because elsewhere in Newsci it explains how that happened without a causal event.

http://www.godisimaginary.com

The above hopefully shows you that God does not fit into the picture of any possiblarian, as god is not possible.



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