Schism Among Atheists II

I can't confirm what he is saying about scientists having generally left religion alone (as something to be studied), but I have no reason to doubt what he is saying is true. Yes, the book talks about ancestor worship, how religion "evolves", the nature of belief, and all sorts of stuff. It's a pretty thick book.

But isn't it true that scientists have to be able to observe an unknown phenomenon with one of the five senses for it to be measurable? Earth seasons were explainable to a low degree of variability because the theory was testable and observable. And certain things that are too small or too distant to observe by human eye were made possible to observe with advances in microscopy, x-ray technology, telescopes etc.

But further back in time, explanations for what was visible and observable came from the first scientists who were, in the beginning, shamans and tribal priests, healers and men and women who whose roles were to be seekers of wisdom and possessors of knowledge handed down over time. Later they were called learned people, and not everything they knew was true. And over time, advancing knowledge was a lesson in questioning the authorities and wisest members of society, and they began to question the keepers of knowledge and truth at great risk to their own credibility and even risking their personal safety and well being. At one time, people who questioned the wisdom of the day did so at risk of being labelled everything from screwballs to heretics and even sorcerers who had to be banished from the community, and-or punished in some way for having differences of opinion. And so this leads me to think that, philosophically speaking, it's not possible to ask a question about something that is not. Or at least not in this thread.

Yeah, I don't think so, my friend. Science and mathematics came from farmers, navigators, and builders.

And the Babylonian priests who practiced astrology, and helped create the concept of a unified, coherent cosmos that could be understood rationally.

The first farmers were definitely a plus for the community. But indigenous people often recognized special talents of those they deemed to be important to their collective survival. Some were esteemed for the their ability to anticipate migratory patterns of game. And some of them advised when to sew and when to reap, and to communicate with their long lost ancestors for important advice on everything from the weather to where to make camp. Contrary to what the first European missionaries reported back to their royal sponsors, indigenous people of North America were very spiritual. Aborigines of Australia still recognize members of their communities who have special talents. And the cultural genocide of indigenous people around the world continues. And very often it has taken the form of physical elimination.

Mathematics is a tool that scientists use, but it does not constitute all of what science is. Newton expanded on this tool used by scientists, and it was useful. But even until turn of the last century, scientists still continued to believe somewhat that all there was to know about things like the elements were already known. There was nothing more to discover. Newtonian Atomic theory said that, for instance, a wooden table is made up of inanimate and indestructible bits of matter. The scientist was understood to be an unobserved observer looking on. All that had to be discarded with the new science of Heisenberg, Bohr, Einstein etc. Some scientists today will tell us that teh universe seems to know when it is being observed and even approach the language of mysticism when describing the cosmos. But what marked the previous discovery of new ways to explain things was the change of context in which scientific questions were asked by scientists in an enlightened way. And that was to trust no one and question everything.

Some years ago, Richard Dawkins and the late Stephen J. Gould had a vigorous debate over what Gould called "Non Overlapping Majesteria".   Gould posited that science and religion had no basis for conflict as they ran in very separate spheres.  Dawkins countered that a universe that included a supreme being was fundamentally different from one without, and as such, very much was the business of scientific investigation/inquiry.

I think Dawkins was right, and while I very much admire Gould's concilliatory tone towards religion, it was ill suited to the debate and techniques of rabid fundamentalists like the late and unlamented Jerry Fallwell and his ilk.

The late Carl Sagan wrote about our sense of wonder, or the word he often used, the numenous.  As an atheist,  one of the things that can get my dander in a knot is when the religious phrase things as if they have a monopoly on spirituality, or that the numenous is something that can only be experienced through religious practice or belief.

Sagan, in a way more tactfull than I will lay out, suggests that when religion or other shysters take our sense of wonder and twist it around ideas like the Aztecs being influenced by extra terrestrials, or that Jesus rose from the dead (my examples-- Sagan, like I said, was more tactfull) they actually pervert and abuse our sense of wonder. 

That the only true excersize in the numenous comes from the pursuit of knowing, not believing.

To which I concur. Not only concur, it was an idea I held before I read Sagan, discovering it rather independantly, though Sagan expressed these ideas better than I ever could, or will.

(pause for a tear for Carl Sagan.  How can I miss this man so profoundly, when I never met him?)

But then, the next step is trying to understand of what value to our survival is the numenous?  I have to think it provides, or did provide, some survival advantage. 

Well as long as we're recruiting famous scientists to our favourite dogmatic causes, what about those scientists who were both spiritual and grounded in science? Most leading edge scientists are not out to disprove the existence of a god or anything else on the atheist-skeptics wish list. Because scientists in general know that proving the unproveable is a waste of everyone's time and energy. And so they do science instead.

Carl Sagan was a proponent of the search for extraterrestrial life, as in ET's and all that spooky stuff at the very heart of "ancient astronauts" theories that some people find so offensive.

Thanks tommy, it rings true in  my heart.

Well as long as we're recruiting famous scientists to our favourite dogmatic causes, what about those scientists who were both spiritual and grounded in science? Most leading edge scientists are not out to disprove the existence of a god or anything else on the atheist-skeptics wish list. Because scientists in general know that proving the unproveable is a waste of everyone's time and energy. And so they do science instead.

Carl Sagan was a proponent of the search for extraterrestrial life, as in ET's and all that spooky stuff at the very heart of "ancient astronauts" theories that some people find so offensive.

Well, that's a fairly accurate misscharacterization of everything, Fidel. 

When we get down to the nitty gritty of what scientists believe, and the tedious distinctions between all the isms, it's fair to say we can find scientists to fit any catagory.  And, I think sceptics in particular and many scientists don't waste thier time trying to prove a negative.  What they do do, is properly put the onus on those making the claim. 

If it's anyone's claim there is a god, then it's up to them to bring the evidence to the table.

And as far as connecting Sagan to Von Daniken, that's just foolishness born of ignorance, Fidel.  You're better than that.

Oh?

Ah, Skeptics! James Randi is not a scientist in case anyone was wondering.

But this thread belongs to skeptics. And I think that they are limited to saying little more than they are skeptical.

Just so long as no one tries connecting a briliant mind like Sagan's to that of a crackpot magician like Randi. Are we even?

Randi's far from a crackpot, and further to it, Randi and Sagan were friends.  Connecting them, or unconnecting them is not up to me.

Using scientific method to analyse religion is kind of like using string theory to understand Hieronymus Bosch.  

It makes a lot more sense to analyse religion within its own context and social framework.  You don't need to be Catholic to understand Thomas Aquinas, but you'll get more out of his writing if you understand his life and historical milieu.

Now, to say I despise organized religion would be putting it lightly - the harm it does vastly outweights any benefit it might have - but I do find various belief systems and spiritualities fascinating.  Theology tells us much more about ourselves as people than it does about the nature of god and the universe. 

You don't need to be an arrogant dissmissive a-hole like Dawkins to be atheist.  There is no unified Church of Atheism, there is no "schizm".  There are as many different kinds of atheism as there are modes of thought about pretty much anything.

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Michael, that sounds to me a bit like: "There are as many varieties of dreams as there are of dreamless nights." But I do take your meaning. There are many who call themselves "atheist". But there is only One True Atheism.

Well said, Unionist.  The only dreamless nights, after all, are the ones spent awake or dead. Those who think that they're sleeping without dreaming are deluding themselves. 

I don't find Dawkins arrogant or dissmissive, except towards debates and ideas that are so bad, they're "not even wrong".  We have to remember that Dawkins took up the fight against a crowd of creationists and Evangelical Protestant Fundamentalists whose strong suit isn't tollerance.   Dawkins just brings a gun to a gun fight, as opposed to Gould, who liked to bring letter openers to gun fights.

Just like those who don't acknowledge that, deep down, we all believe in some sort of deity - right, Michael?

Hmm Here's Randi trying to trick people on the I've got a secret show. I didn't see Carl anywhere.

And apparently Randi was the star of The Magic Clown [37]

Hmm Here's Randi trying to trick people

Do I detect a note of resentment, Fidel?  If so, it's a resentment I had toward all magicians untill I hit my thirties or so.  Before, I saw them as a type of fraudster.   We had a grade 6 teacher... forget his first name, last name was Dean.  He eventually quit teaching to do magic full time, and enjoyed some success.   I couldn't stand him.

But if we view the magician as a teacher, a teacher that illuminates the failings, limitations or quirks or our senses, then they are very much the opposite of fraudsters. 

It's probably why so many magicians are figures of note in the modern skeptical philosophy.

I don't know about you, but I certainly placed my senses in very high regard, and had difficulty coming to grips with admitting, for example, that the moon looks bigger on the horizon than it does at it's zenith for no other reason than my brain making it so.   Because we like to trust our senses.

But, as you know, we shouldn't.   So, I no longer resent magicians, but hold them in high regard.

I don't think the teachers union would have him. Randi's resume states that he was a clown school dropout.