Thursday, May 29, 2014

Religion and Nature: The Template Problem

Welcome friends!

I was just contemplating why religious people tend to have such a rigid, simplistic, intrusive, and ultimately obnoxious relationship to other people, which is an issue that is often on my mind these days, particularly whenever I read the daily news.  I reviewed one of my previous posts on the subject in which I suggested part of the problem may arise from religious people’s egotistical infatuation with their own intellect and storytelling ability, which I linked to a concomitant preference for relatively simple and stylized narratives over messy reality, but I wasn’t entirely satisfied with what I said there.  (Religion and the Great I in the Sky.  August 19, 2011.)  I wouldn’t necessarily say I’ve changed my mind.  I still think that’s very likely a significant part of the problem.  But it did occur to me we might be talking about something operating at an even more primitive or subconscious level than the ego, which I suppose would already be pretty primitive and subconscious, so you know we’re going back a ways.  I’m now wondering if we might be talking about religion’s power to shape the entire way one thinks about the world.  It’s a somewhat interesting issue to me because it gets to the nexus of the positive and normative, which is where I think all manner of confusing but interesting things tend to happen.  You say it doesn’t really sound all that interesting?  Well, OK, let me break it down into two posts so I can keep things moving.  In this first post I’ll address this issue in the context in which the religious mode of thought tends to put an ethical spin on things that strike secular humanists as really outside the scope of ethics per se, which I think is the more straightforward and obvious case.  In the next post I’ll address this issue in the context in which both groups tend to agree we’re talking about ethics.

I’m sure I must have mentioned many times before I think the central theme of the liberal ethos is that we really have no business getting involved in another person’s affairs unless that person is doing something that has a significant effect on other people, in which case we have an interpersonal conflict we need to think about how to resolve because we’re going to become implicated in its resolution one way or another, either through our action or our inaction.  One way of thinking about this idea is that there is a realm where the actions of other people present ethical problems we need to address and another realm in which they don’t.  Now as I’ve said before I don’t think restricting the scope of what we mean by ethics in this way implies one has to be agnostic with respect to what one might choose to do in isolation, that is to say, without significantly affecting other people.  One can still think a particular course of action is preferable to another.  It’s just that it might be more useful to think of this situation as involving something other than ethics, per se, maybe preferences.  For example, one may think one ought to respect one’s own health and given the choice of a glass of beautiful life sustaining wine and a glass of that noxious mixture of sugar, gas, and water known as soda pop one should really always choose the wine.  However, it seems a little funny to your average humanist to think about that as an ethical issue, per se.  Yes, we can argue back to first principles very much as we do with ethics, and it certainly involves what one thinks one ought to do, but in some fundamental sense it doesn’t really involve other people in the way more serious ethical issues do.  We can try to hash out which drink is preferable but in the end I don’t really need to get involved in whatever you decide to do.  No one but you is being harmed and being a free man or woman you can harm yourself if that’s what you want to do.  Now I suppose we could also think of it as a sort of ethical issue that is just a different sort of ethical issue than the sort that involves resolving interpersonal conflicts.  However, I think it’s clearer to give that category of issues an entirely different name, such as preferences.  You may prefer soda pop and I may prefer wine, and we might both have our very cogent reasons for our preferences, and we could always get together and discuss them, but I think in the end you should drink whatever you want to drink and I would hope you extend the same consideration to me.

Now I’ve noted before religious people tend to have trouble seeing the significance of this whole issue of having or not having a significant effect on other people and hence typically don’t have much appreciation of the liberal ethos.  They see behavior in isolation as every bit as much of an ethical matter as behavior that affects other people.  The interesting question is why do they think that way?

Well, I suspect part of what’s going on is that religious people have been trained to view the world as having been created by a supernatural entity operating with a sort of perfect template or blueprint and that the essence of ethics is trying to bring things into alignment with this template of divine perfection.  In other words, for religious people there’s a best and most correct form for everything.  And when you think like that all manner of peculiar things tend to get imbued with ethical significance, although diversity is generally not one of them.  In contrast, I think secular humanists tend to view the external world more in the context of nature and of course nature thrives on variation, mutability, and change.  Indeed, life is such a powerful force precisely because it is forever changing and mutating to fit any niche and take any advantage.  It’s something that was really driven home to me a few years ago when I happened to visit the very high quality San Diego Zoo but really I suppose visiting any major zoo would do the trick.  Just spend the entire day surveying our fellow creatures and you’ll see what I mean.  Such an astounding profusion of life.  I had the impression I must have seen every possible permutation of limbs, hides, sensory organs, body shapes, colors, sizes, abilities, and everything else.  You know, if something works at all then nature will try it and if it doesn’t work right now nature will be sure to try it again later.  When you start from this more outward looking and naturalistic perspective it just doesn’t really make sense to think of everything in terms of its correspondence or lack of correspondence to some template of perfection.  Were the dodo bird and the dinosaur perfect?  Well, yes and no.  They were perfect in the same way we all are.  They were fine until they weren’t, then they died.  From this more naturalistic perspective diversity, variability, and mutability is the natural order.

I think this difference in fundamental perspectives is particularly noticeable in two areas where religious people tend to find a great deal of ethical content and secular humanists tend to think we’re not really talking about ethics at all.  The first area is the theory of evolution.  Secular humanists tend to see this theory as simply what it is: a scientific theory that explains rather well the observed development of species over time.  There’s nothing particularly ethical or unethical about it.  Like the external world, it is what it is.  You may have noticed many religious people on the other hand tend to find that particular scientific theory rather troubling and challenging, which I think one can fairly surmise comes from the notion that the theory of evolution is corrosive to the religious way of thinking about the world and indeed about ethics.  I think it’s just very hard to maintain a belief in an ideal template if everything keeps changing all the time.  I suppose you could have a dynamic template of change, but it’s just not really the same, is it?  And for religious people once you’ve gotten rid of the ideal template you’ve gotten rid of the basis of ethics, and you know that can’t be good.

The second area in which this template problem becomes rather obvious is the differing perspectives on the ethical significance of homosexuality.  For secular humanists like me homosexuality itself just does not seem to present an ethical issue.  To me it’s more in the realm of natural variation.  Where does it come from?  How should I know and why should I care?  It doesn’t make any difference to me.  I suppose human sexuality is complicated.  Maybe it’s just random variation.  Or maybe it’s related to something else that has proven useful in an evolutionary sense.  I’d suggest it might have something to do with our oversized craniums getting in the way of the impulse to procreate but I think they’ve observed homosexuality in many species that are less gifted in that department than we are.  So let’s just say I have no idea.  But since I’m not really thinking in terms of a template of ideal sexuality I really don’t see any need to worry about this type of variability.  The fact some people are or anyway seem to be homosexual doesn’t imply to me everyone must be homosexual at some level or if I don’t denounce it then I’m implying everyone should be homosexual, any more than the fact that I recognize there tends to be relatively more straight people implies to me everyone must really be straight or everyone ought to be straight.  It’s fine with me if people differ in this way.  You know, some people seem to be really, really straight; some seem to be really, really gay; and some people seem to be a bit more flexible in that department.  What difference does it make?

Now religious people famously have a rather different take on this issue.  As in the case for everything else in this world religious people believe there’s a correct form of human sexuality and an incorrect form or really I suppose a multiplicity of incorrect forms.  According to their philosophy, God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.  It’s the template that matters.  Adam can’t have been straight and gay; we have to choose one or the other and whatever we choose will have to be the best and what we should all aspire to.  And since bringing the world into correspondence with this ideal template is for religious people the essence of ethics the idea some people might be gay and thus diverging from the template becomes a matter of great ethical significance.  It doesn’t take very much imagination to see the same general phenomenon at work in other forms of intolerance of human diversity such as racism, culturalism, nationalism, and even sexism.  You know, Adam must have been one race or another.  God didn’t create a white Adam, a black Adam, and an Asian Adam.  Adam, and hence God whose image he supposedly recreated according to Christian doctrine, must have looked a lot more like some people than other people.  God didn’t create a fair haired and a dark haired Adam, a tall and a short Adam, a thin and a fat Adam, an intelligent and a slow Adam, a cold and an emotional Adam, etc.  As for behaviors, well Adam either did or did not shave, sport a mullet or an Afro, eat bananas, and whatever else one might choose to do or not do in a fantastical garden of the imagination.  And as far as sexism goes, well, God’s image must correspond to either Adam or Eve.  It can’t very well correspond to both or we’d end up with a great Conchita in the Sky, and you know our Russian friends would never stand for that!

Things get a little different when we start thinking about intellectual artifacts like ethics.  We pretty much have to have some sort of ideal template in our minds in that case or it’s hard to know what we mean by acting ethically.  But notice I said in our minds, not in the world, and that’s rather a big difference.  You want to get things in the right order or you won’t know which way to go.  And where the mind meets the world in the context of what we all agree are ethical issues, well, that’s where things can start to get a tad confusing.  But let’s save that for next time, shall we?

Thursday, May 15, 2014

American Intolerance for Religious Display and Intolerance

Welcome friends!

I had a different post all lined up for today but I looked at a paper a few days ago and I think I really need to say a few words about the recent US Supreme Court ruling in which the conservative caucus determined that having (Christian) prayer sessions before government functions is consistent with the US Constitution.  I found that a bit disappointing for reasons I’ll explain shortly, but then I happened to notice a little opinion piece by professional conservative bloviator George Will entitled American Intolerance for Religious Display that really pushed me over the edge.  No, I didn’t actually read the piece.  Really, there was no need.  Just the title is sufficient.  You see, I’ve heard it all before.  Multiple times.  I’m quite sure it must have involved this theory that conservative pundits have been pushing the past several years to the effect that unless they are able to spout off about their religious beliefs whenever and wherever they see fit then everyone else is being intolerant and not respecting their rights.  I wrote something about this theory previously.  (See my post for September 20, 2013.)  It’s kind of weird that they come out with this stuff even when things go their way but that’s the funny thing about conservatives: most of what they say is more in the nature of political theater than serious conversation so what they want to talk about and what is germane to any given issue are generally two entirely different things.

Anyway, let me first explain why I don’t much care for the Supreme Court ruling in the off chance that it’s not already entirely obvious to anyone reading my blog... Sorry but only selected archived (previous year) posts are currently available full text on this website.  All posts including this one are available in my annual anthology ebook series available at the Amazon Kindle Bookstore for a nominal fee.  Hey, we all need to make a buck somehow, right?  If you find my timeless jewels of wisdom amusing or perhaps even amusingly irritating throw me a bone now and then.  Thank you my friends!

Thursday, May 1, 2014

Republicans To Restore Slavery

Welcome friends!

I was just sitting around thinking about something of great personal significance to me, money, and I ran across a couple of news stories that got the old wheels turning again so I thought, what the heck, why don’t we have another go at one of my favorite themes: the distribution of economic power.  I know I’ve discussed it a number of times before but it’s so darned interesting I just can’t leave it alone.

The first story that caught my attention was yet another glimpse into how the big boys make money.  No, I’m not talking about working stiffs like you and me.  It’s sort of obvious how we make money: we go to work and get a paycheck... Sorry but only selected archived (previous year) posts are currently available full text on this website.  All posts including this one are available in my annual anthology ebook series available at the Amazon Kindle Bookstore for a nominal fee.  Hey, we all need to make a buck somehow, right?  If you find my timeless jewels of wisdom amusing or perhaps even amusingly irritating throw me a bone now and then.  Thank you my friends!