You are, of course, correct that one can approach the Bible (or any scriptural text) the same way one approaches Aesop’s fables, or the Grimm brothers’ fairy tales, or the Watchman graphic novel—that is, as a collection of stories that reflect the concerns and ethical and aesthetic sensibilities of a particular culture at a particular time.
It’s certainly possible.
That said, the religious community I grew up in encouraged us to interpret the fossil record in ways that were consistent with the stories in the Bible, even when that required ignoring scientific evidence and in some cases common sense.
This either demonstrates (as you say) a deficient view of how stories work, or (I think more likely) that they were not approaching the Bible purely as a collection of stories.
Would you disagree?
Do you think that specific religious community was atypical?
There is a wide range of ways of interpreting mythic material, both between religious communities and between members of a single community.
In two of the three branches of American Judaism, as well as many varieties of Christianity and amalgams such as Unitarianism, not to mention Buddhism, etc., respect for science is encouraged—and thus the stories must be held to be stories, even if they are very special stories for the community. Such communities are radically different from those in which the Bible is treated as a source of scientific knowledge.
Nevertheless, there are communities in which the children literally believe in Santa Claus, while the adults know it’s a myth. And there are countless other ways of mixing up more and less literal interpretations. The same parent who disbelieves Santa Claus may take the story of Jesus’ resurrection literally. And a group of people can recite language together, which some of them treat metaphorically and others literally.
So the point isn’t what is “typical”, nor how a majority might have approached the text at a given point in history, it’s that there are examples of religious thinking that are, for those who understand them, orthogonal to questions of fact. Historically this has often been reflected in the difference between exoteric and esoteric subtraditions. Those who know the “inner meaning” of the texts no longer treat them literally. Such esoteric subtraditions are far from a modern phenomenon, as Eliezer’s argument would imply.
I certainly agree that if I use as my reference class for religious communities and individuals only those which readily acknowledge the fictional/mythical/metaphorical nature of the language they recite and its orthogonality to questions of fact, I end up with prior probabilities for assertions about religious communities and individuals that are very very different from those the OP ends up with.
You seem to be further implying that there’s some good reason to use that reference class, rather than the reference class of all communities and individuals that self-identify as religious, or the reference class of those that approach their texts and traditions non-metaphorically.
I’m not really sure how you are justifying that second claim.
By way of analogy—I freely agree that, within the community of people who claim to be Jesus Christ, there exist individuals who are no more delusional than the average person and who are, for example, playing the lead in Jesus Christ: Superstar, or various other things along those lines.
But to challenge on that basis the idea that claiming to be Jesus Christ is indicative of being delusional, and to dismiss the question of how typical those examples really are of people claiming to be Jesus Christ as beside the point, is misleading to the point of simply being wrong.
I don’t understand the claim you take to be unjustified, that there’s a “good reason to use that reference class”—use it for what? My point is that there are valuable religious practices, yes. I distinguish them from the affirmation of supernatural beliefs, including the belief that one is Jesus or that the earth was created in 6 days. I am not challenging any assertions about the truth or falsity of any beliefs. Maybe my comments are out of line with the spirit of a website devoted to the rationality of beliefs, but it seems to me that some of you may hold a mistaken belief about the nature of religious language, namely that it primarily functions as a representation of beliefs.
If you are asking for me to justify my view that there are valuable religious practices, I don’t think this is the place for it, so I’ll just say that there are valuable works of philosophy written in the context of religion, and valuable insights about ethics and aesthetics that are sometimes transmitted in religious education (especially when they are only nominally related to the pronouncements of ancient texts).
Use it for calibrating my expectations about a specific religious community in advance of further specific data… for example, about its likely influence on the cognitive habits of its members.
Anyway, I’m not challenging the claim that there exist valuable religious practices. I even agree with it.
The mixing of perspectives within a community (as I noted) makes your example problematic, but I agree that some easy cases exist: for example, a church that preaches “faith healing” for sick children may be expected to run into a specific set of difficulties, not shared by a church that tells everyone to reinterpret texts for themselves in the light of reason. And again, I agree that pronouncements of people claiming to be Jesus may be taken as indicators of delusionality. Both cases involve belief, whereas I claim that in religion, non-propositional linguistic behavior, is more significant than propositional (as regards unusual beliefs).
I’m waiting to see if anyone disagrees with my main assertions, that orthogonal-to-facts religion can be valuable, and that it is not a modern phenomenon.
You are, of course, correct that one can approach the Bible (or any scriptural text) the same way one approaches Aesop’s fables, or the Grimm brothers’ fairy tales, or the Watchman graphic novel—that is, as a collection of stories that reflect the concerns and ethical and aesthetic sensibilities of a particular culture at a particular time.
It’s certainly possible.
That said, the religious community I grew up in encouraged us to interpret the fossil record in ways that were consistent with the stories in the Bible, even when that required ignoring scientific evidence and in some cases common sense.
This either demonstrates (as you say) a deficient view of how stories work, or (I think more likely) that they were not approaching the Bible purely as a collection of stories.
Would you disagree?
Do you think that specific religious community was atypical?
There is a wide range of ways of interpreting mythic material, both between religious communities and between members of a single community.
In two of the three branches of American Judaism, as well as many varieties of Christianity and amalgams such as Unitarianism, not to mention Buddhism, etc., respect for science is encouraged—and thus the stories must be held to be stories, even if they are very special stories for the community. Such communities are radically different from those in which the Bible is treated as a source of scientific knowledge.
Nevertheless, there are communities in which the children literally believe in Santa Claus, while the adults know it’s a myth. And there are countless other ways of mixing up more and less literal interpretations. The same parent who disbelieves Santa Claus may take the story of Jesus’ resurrection literally. And a group of people can recite language together, which some of them treat metaphorically and others literally.
So the point isn’t what is “typical”, nor how a majority might have approached the text at a given point in history, it’s that there are examples of religious thinking that are, for those who understand them, orthogonal to questions of fact. Historically this has often been reflected in the difference between exoteric and esoteric subtraditions. Those who know the “inner meaning” of the texts no longer treat them literally. Such esoteric subtraditions are far from a modern phenomenon, as Eliezer’s argument would imply.
I certainly agree that if I use as my reference class for religious communities and individuals only those which readily acknowledge the fictional/mythical/metaphorical nature of the language they recite and its orthogonality to questions of fact, I end up with prior probabilities for assertions about religious communities and individuals that are very very different from those the OP ends up with.
You seem to be further implying that there’s some good reason to use that reference class, rather than the reference class of all communities and individuals that self-identify as religious, or the reference class of those that approach their texts and traditions non-metaphorically.
I’m not really sure how you are justifying that second claim.
By way of analogy—I freely agree that, within the community of people who claim to be Jesus Christ, there exist individuals who are no more delusional than the average person and who are, for example, playing the lead in Jesus Christ: Superstar, or various other things along those lines.
But to challenge on that basis the idea that claiming to be Jesus Christ is indicative of being delusional, and to dismiss the question of how typical those examples really are of people claiming to be Jesus Christ as beside the point, is misleading to the point of simply being wrong.
I don’t understand the claim you take to be unjustified, that there’s a “good reason to use that reference class”—use it for what? My point is that there are valuable religious practices, yes. I distinguish them from the affirmation of supernatural beliefs, including the belief that one is Jesus or that the earth was created in 6 days. I am not challenging any assertions about the truth or falsity of any beliefs. Maybe my comments are out of line with the spirit of a website devoted to the rationality of beliefs, but it seems to me that some of you may hold a mistaken belief about the nature of religious language, namely that it primarily functions as a representation of beliefs.
If you are asking for me to justify my view that there are valuable religious practices, I don’t think this is the place for it, so I’ll just say that there are valuable works of philosophy written in the context of religion, and valuable insights about ethics and aesthetics that are sometimes transmitted in religious education (especially when they are only nominally related to the pronouncements of ancient texts).
Use it for calibrating my expectations about a specific religious community in advance of further specific data… for example, about its likely influence on the cognitive habits of its members.
Anyway, I’m not challenging the claim that there exist valuable religious practices. I even agree with it.
The mixing of perspectives within a community (as I noted) makes your example problematic, but I agree that some easy cases exist: for example, a church that preaches “faith healing” for sick children may be expected to run into a specific set of difficulties, not shared by a church that tells everyone to reinterpret texts for themselves in the light of reason. And again, I agree that pronouncements of people claiming to be Jesus may be taken as indicators of delusionality. Both cases involve belief, whereas I claim that in religion, non-propositional linguistic behavior, is more significant than propositional (as regards unusual beliefs).
I’m waiting to see if anyone disagrees with my main assertions, that orthogonal-to-facts religion can be valuable, and that it is not a modern phenomenon.