Thanks for sharing your thoughts. From a pragmatic sense, you may be right—whether striving for rationally decided goals or to please a cosmic being, one may improve one’s self. On the theoretical level, however, I find it a barrier when talking to religious (now that I doubt) since we obviously attribute different causation to events. On that level, I wonder if it’s healthy to think that an immaterial being inspired you to think thought x, provided you with a much needed pay increase, healed your flu earlier than you expected, or caused a healing in a strained relationship.
On those levels, I think there is a big difference. I do still think you made a valid point. Without explicitly asking one to provide the source of one’s “goodness” or success… individuals are probably indistinguishable to some degree if only studying actions, what they appear to value, etc.
Interesting point about Eliezer. I agree to some degree, though I’ve noticed a decent amount of negative feedback provided to him on various posts. I can admit a halo effect on my own part when reading him… but part of that is simply due to the fact that I really do like his writing (both content and style).
The one thing I think we do better here than any religion is to keep the open mind, that any question which is settled is only a little settled, for convenience of discussion, and is not so settled that we would ban or declare sinful any questioning of it.
I really liked that and agree that this is a large differentiating factor. Religions do not seem to allow for updating given new evidence or the possibility of fallibility (at least on some issues). I desire certainty but am trying to improve my ability to tolerate ambiguity.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. From a pragmatic sense, you may be right—whether striving for rationally decided goals or to please a cosmic being, one may improve one’s self. On the theoretical level, however, I find it a barrier when talking to religious (now that I doubt) since we obviously attribute different causation to events. On that level, I wonder if it’s healthy to think that an immaterial being inspired you to think thought x, provided you with a much needed pay increase, healed your flu earlier than you expected, or caused a healing in a strained relationship.
On those levels, I think there is a big difference. I do still think you made a valid point. Without explicitly asking one to provide the source of one’s “goodness” or success… individuals are probably indistinguishable to some degree if only studying actions, what they appear to value, etc.
Interesting point about Eliezer. I agree to some degree, though I’ve noticed a decent amount of negative feedback provided to him on various posts. I can admit a halo effect on my own part when reading him… but part of that is simply due to the fact that I really do like his writing (both content and style).
I really liked that and agree that this is a large differentiating factor. Religions do not seem to allow for updating given new evidence or the possibility of fallibility (at least on some issues). I desire certainty but am trying to improve my ability to tolerate ambiguity.
Thanks for the closing compliments.