On 6/16/05, Yoshie Furuhashi <furuhashi.1 at osu.edu> wrote:
> >[lbo-talk] Appeal to Ignorance
> >Carrol Cox cbcox at ilstu.edu
> >Thu Jun 16 10:40:39 PDT 2005
> <snip>
> >Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
> >>It doesn't seem possible to reject anything by your standard.
> >
> >I think you push him too hard. Remember that he does call himself an
> >atheist! I think the debate here is on a narrower issue: not on
> >whether science gives scientists a reason not to be interested in
> >religion (I think that is the case) but over whether science can
> >_disprove_ religion_. And your comparison may be defective. We don't
> >try to "disprove" capitalism, we fight against it. Neither, really,
> >do we try to disprove religion; we try to provide more interesting
> >activity.
>
> It seems to me there is no reason why Jeff's demand for a
> "satisfactory definition" doesn't apply to lacking any interest in
> religion. By his logic, how can anyone know whether or not he is
> interested in religion as long as he lacks a "satisfactory
> definition" of it?
but yoshie, precisely my point has been that religion is so variously conceptualized, understood, and practiced -- both temporally and geographically -- that it precludes any easy definition, and maybe any useful *universal* definition AT ALL (see my post in response to wojtek and the references to geertz and talal asad) . . . NOT that one cannot be either religious or irreligious without a "satisfactory definition". this is also not saying "we all have our own definitions". it's that religion is a culturally located phenomenon with a long long long history (or, really, set of histories) and we get reductionist on it at our peril.
that's what i've been trying to say all along (and carrol gets this, i think) and it's why i have trouble less with a scientist saying "i reject religion" than with a scientist saying "scientists reject religion" or with people on a mailing list deploying either of the latter in an argument about how nonsensical "religion" is because scientists reject it. that's all. it's about the kinds of claims we can make.
> Also, how can anyone claim to be religious who
> lacks a "satisfactory definition" of it, since a system of belief
> that he believes to be religion may not fit the "satisfactory
> definition"?
how about instead of "satisfactory definition" we substitute "what the hell you mean by"? where i require a satisfactory definition is for the broad sweeping claims -- at least, if you expect them to stand up. beyond that, see above.
>
> >[lbo-talk] let's talk about logic (was yoshie's Appeal to Ignorance)
> >Jeffrey Fisher jeff.jfisher at gmail.com
> >Thu Jun 16 10:39:21 PDT 2005
> <snip>
> >i'm getting really tired of your condescension.
>
> You've said something similar several times, but I don't believe I
> have said anything that belittles your intelligence though you have
> mine.
au contraire. i've said on and off-list that i think you're quite smart. i think you mistake some of my comments for sarcasm. when i'm being sarcastic, i think you'll know it. and as i've said before, i agree with an awful lot of what you've been saying.
for the rest, you need to reread your posts as if someone else had written them to you and see what you think.
>
> >which is that the scientists in question are rejecting fairly
> >specific religious conceptions (whichever conception it happens to
> >be), but calling it "religion" that they are rejecting.
>
> The questions asked in the survey of US scientists concern God and
> immortality, and tenets of actually-existing religions that claim the
> largest numbers of adherents include both and many others include
> both or either. To be sure, the survey doesn't ask exhaustive
> questions concerning all actually-existing religions, so if you were
> to say, "Well, scientists may not believe in God or immortality, but
> a large number of them may very well be Buddhists, Unitarians, etc.,
> rather than irreligious," I'd agree with you that it is a good
> hypothesis, and a testable one, too. But you go further than that
> and say that we can't reject anything unless we have a "satisfactory
> definition" of it. But what's a "satisfactory definition" of a
> "satisfactory definition"? Can you do better than Wittgenstein's
> family resemblance?
i can do recursion, too, yoshie, but we're trying to get somewhere. obviously, what constitutes a satisfactory definition is up for debate. but i'd rather debate whether the definition i offered previously is satisfactory than what a satisfactory definition of satisfactory definition would be.
i quite like this about wittgenstein, btw, and it's a remarkably useful concept, in philosophy of religion and elsewhere. but you have to recognize that if that's the criterion you're working with, basically analogy, then there are things you can't say coherently. i think "game" is the example LW liked to use (others will know this better than i)? imagine saying, "scientists reject games". what does that mean? i'm not asking if it's stupid. i'm asking what it *means*.
my point about the rejection of "religion" is precisely that, without some specificity or clarity, what's being rejected is, well, mightily unclear. and so meaningless -- and worse, open to all kinds of abuse and misuse.
>
> >i say, see, communism is bankrupt. and you say, well, ok, soviet
> >communism was bankrupt, but that wasn't *really* communism (or,
> >which is functionally to say the same thing, that wasn't the only
> >possible form of communism)
>
> I'd regard such an argument in the same way I regard a libertarian
> claim that actually-existing capitalism isn't really capitalism,
> which is to say, I don't find it compelling. I'm sure it is tempting
> for anyone to attribute all or most evils of a system (be it
> capitalism or communism or religion) to its essence if she
> disapproves of it while dismissing all or most evils of a system (be
> it capitalism or communism or religion) as just accidents if she
> approves of it. That's an understandable response (perhaps even an
> inescapable one psychologically unless one consciously struggles
> against it), but it doesn't help us to analyze the system in question
> or reckon with its history.
yup. capitalism or communism is what it has been, not some eternal essence to which we conform or do not conform. likewise religion, with one important difference. you can't (and not very many people really try) to make a case for "religion" the way people do for capitalism and communism. who is the hayek or smith or marx or engels of religion, who analyzes the world and says, it is right and true that we be "religious" (in that family resemblance way)? don't people make cases in general for specific religions? they might concede that there are "other paths" or whatever, but where is the person who is converted to "religion"? aren't you converted to A religion? you don't say, "we can work out the details of the religion later, when we can see what it looks like, but in the meantime, we need to be trying to overthrow atheism". do we?
you work to bring about communism, but you don't work to bring about "religion". because they're different kinds of concepts. indeed, some would say that communism is a religion.
oops.
now what do we do?
LOL
oh my. ok. i'm done.
i should just say, btw, that i *don't* think communism is a religion and don't think it should be (so don't come after me on that) and it's why i don't believe in "converting" people in organizing -- precisely because i don't like the analogy (family resemblance -- again, i swear to you i am not being snide, here) to religion.
j
-- http://www.brainmortgage.com/
Among medieval and modern philosophers, anxious to establish the religious significance of God, an unfortunate habit has prevailed of paying to Him metaphysical compliments.
- Alfred North Whitehead