Most, but not all. The Randians come to mind. Even the Buddha encouraged people to be critical, but doesn’t seem to have stopped the cults. I was floored to learn a few weeks ago that Buddhism has formalized even when you stop doubting! When you stop doubting, you become a Sotāpanna; a Sotāpanna is marked by abandoning ‘3 fetters’, the second fetter according to Wikipedia being
Skeptical Doubt—Doubt about the Buddha and his teaching is eradicated because the Sotāpanna personally experiences the true nature of reality through insight, and this insight confirms the accuracy of the Buddha’s teaching.
As well, as unquestioningness becomes a well known trait of cults, cults tend to try to hide it. Scientology hides the craziest dogmas until you’re well and hooked, for example.
Would it be productive to be skeptical about whether your login really starts with the letter “M”? Taking an issue off the table and saying, we’re done with that, is not in itself a bad sign. The only question is whether they really do know what they think they know.
I personally endorse the very beginning of Objectivist epistemology—I mean this: “Existence exists—and the act of grasping that statement implies two corollary axioms: that something exists which one perceives and that one exists possessing consciousness, consciousness being the faculty of perceiving that which exists.” It’s the subsequent development which is a mix of further gemlike insights, paths not taken, and errors or uncertainties that are papered over.
In the case of Buddhism, one has the usual problem of knowing, at this historical distance, exactly what psychological and logical content defined “enlightenment”. One of its paradoxes is that it sounds like the experience of a phenomenological truth, and yet the key realization is often presented as the discovery that there is no true self or substantial self. I would have thought that achieving reflective consciousness implied the existence of a reflector, just as in the Objectivist account. Then again, reflection can also produce awareness that traits with which you have identified yourself are conditioned and contingent, so it can dissolve a naive concept of self, and that sounds more like the Buddhism we hear about today. The coexistence of a persistent observing consciousness, and a stream of transient identifications, in certain respects is like Hinduism; though the Buddhists can strike back by saying that the observing consciousness is not eternal and free of causality, it too exists only if it has been caused to exist.
So claims to knowledge, and the existence of a stage where you no longer doubt that this really is knowledge, and get on with developing the implications, do not in themselves imply falsity. In a systematic philosophy based on reason, a description which covers Objectivism, Buddhism, and Less-Wrong-ism, there really ought to be some notion of a development that occurs as you as learn.
The alternative is Zen Rationalism: if you meet a belief on the road (of life), doubt it! It’s a good heuristic if you are beset by nonsense, and it even has a higher form in phenomenological or experiential rationalism, where you test the truth of a proposition about consciousness by seeing whether you can plausibly deny it, even as the experience is happening. But if you do this, even while you keep returning to beginner’s mind, you should still be dialectically growing your genuine knowledge about the nature of reality.
Most, but not all. The Randians come to mind. Even the Buddha encouraged people to be critical, but doesn’t seem to have stopped the cults. I was floored to learn a few weeks ago that Buddhism has formalized even when you stop doubting! When you stop doubting, you become a Sotāpanna; a Sotāpanna is marked by abandoning ‘3 fetters’, the second fetter according to Wikipedia being
As well, as unquestioningness becomes a well known trait of cults, cults tend to try to hide it. Scientology hides the craziest dogmas until you’re well and hooked, for example.
If the Randians are a cult, LW is a cult.
Like the others, the members just think it’s unique in being valid.
If a person disagrees with Rand about a number of key beliefs, do they still count as a Randian?
If they don’t count as an Orthodox Randian, they can always become a Liberal Randian
That depends the largest part on what “a number of key beliefs” is.
Could you elaborate on this?
So there comes a point in Buddhism where you’re not supposed to be skeptical anymore. And Objectivists aren’t supposed to question Ayn Rand.
Would it be productive to be skeptical about whether your login really starts with the letter “M”? Taking an issue off the table and saying, we’re done with that, is not in itself a bad sign. The only question is whether they really do know what they think they know.
I personally endorse the very beginning of Objectivist epistemology—I mean this: “Existence exists—and the act of grasping that statement implies two corollary axioms: that something exists which one perceives and that one exists possessing consciousness, consciousness being the faculty of perceiving that which exists.” It’s the subsequent development which is a mix of further gemlike insights, paths not taken, and errors or uncertainties that are papered over.
In the case of Buddhism, one has the usual problem of knowing, at this historical distance, exactly what psychological and logical content defined “enlightenment”. One of its paradoxes is that it sounds like the experience of a phenomenological truth, and yet the key realization is often presented as the discovery that there is no true self or substantial self. I would have thought that achieving reflective consciousness implied the existence of a reflector, just as in the Objectivist account. Then again, reflection can also produce awareness that traits with which you have identified yourself are conditioned and contingent, so it can dissolve a naive concept of self, and that sounds more like the Buddhism we hear about today. The coexistence of a persistent observing consciousness, and a stream of transient identifications, in certain respects is like Hinduism; though the Buddhists can strike back by saying that the observing consciousness is not eternal and free of causality, it too exists only if it has been caused to exist.
So claims to knowledge, and the existence of a stage where you no longer doubt that this really is knowledge, and get on with developing the implications, do not in themselves imply falsity. In a systematic philosophy based on reason, a description which covers Objectivism, Buddhism, and Less-Wrong-ism, there really ought to be some notion of a development that occurs as you as learn.
The alternative is Zen Rationalism: if you meet a belief on the road (of life), doubt it! It’s a good heuristic if you are beset by nonsense, and it even has a higher form in phenomenological or experiential rationalism, where you test the truth of a proposition about consciousness by seeing whether you can plausibly deny it, even as the experience is happening. But if you do this, even while you keep returning to beginner’s mind, you should still be dialectically growing your genuine knowledge about the nature of reality.