The Culture In Communication

I want to share a passage in Women of the Forest, by Yolanda and Robert F. Murphy, an old book I just finished about the Mundurucú people of the Amazon basin:

Sojourners in exotic places become more than mere strangers; they are outsiders and "aliens" in the sense the term is used in science fiction stories. This was our dilemma. We could not speak Mundurucú, and the few people who knew some Portuguese did not like using it. To make matters worse, we could not interpret gestures or facial expressions, and most of the actions of the people around us were without meaning. Indeed, we had entered a meaningless (to us) world, and we would never again underestimate the tyranny that culture holds over our behavior, our sense of self, and our consciousness.

I want to share this because of the conclusion of the passage that culture is tyrannical in its controlling "our behavior, our sense of self, and our consciousness." It makes me think that one of the main reasons--perhaps the main reason--so many people can't (or won't) accept any of the assertions of people with whom they don't agree is their particular point of view that comes from culture in which those views are held and expressed. It seems that unless someone wants to make the effort to incorporate at least a part of the culture of others, any communication will be minimal and has a good chance of being wrong.

Many problems that religious people have with non-believers I think falls within this framework. It is much less so in the other direction because we aren't former believers, we have lived within their society and can't have helped but learned that culture. Life-long believers, on the other hand, have had little, if any, desire or experience in the culture of non-belief. It may be similar to the way a servant or slave knows their master's ways much better than the other way around.

To be fair, many non-believers have a hard time communicating on a believer's cultural terms and using their mores due to a disdain for them, having "been there." But at least they are known. It is common that a believer will refuse to acknowledge the difference and, if so, only work to get the non-believer to move into their culture. Without force, this method has a very low success rate.

Communication Is Never Easy

In order to explain something new it is often necessary to use a metaphor or analogy to something already understood--if the new thing is not understood clearly on its own. If not understood and no connection can be made with analogy and metaphor, then communication fails, either altogether or misunderstanding. When few references are shared across cultures or time, that bridge must be built first in order to communicate effectively and properly.

What's So Good About The Past?

It seems to be universal (or nearly so) that belief systems have as their basis a point in the past where perfection was once found. If not perfect time, then a person or collection of writings that are seen to be so. Whether it is a religion, politics, nationalism, or any other secular "good ol' days" sentiment, the search for truth and a way to improve society through a belief system often comes from looking to the past.

There are at least two problems with this.

1) We know that societies have improved with time. Any serious look at the conditions under which humans live will show vast improvements with time--at least for the majority, on average. (There are, of course, many cases of the worst off of a more recent period being worse off than some of those who lived previously, and vice versa.)

2) It includes the idea that all changes from the designated historical point in time are not desirable. To assert that no new information or better methods can be discovered is ludicrous. Plus, the promoted view of the past in question is often a lie or just plain wrong. There is often not enough information to make such determinations and motivations by the current promoters that make the assertions untenable.

"We think we actually understand things only when we have traced them back to what we do not understand and cannot understand - to causality, to axioms, to God, to character."  -Georg Simmel

Musical Cosmos

Music is the universe...it contains beauty, math, meaning, motion, emotion, has time-suspending ability, love, joy, ability to affect physiology, soothes, etc. It is with music that one's mind--one's self--becomes easily aligned with happiness. There are so many cases where people of all intelligence levels will appreciate and envelop themselves in the same piece of music as if there were no differences between them. The different paths to this place are minor differences that mean little once there. 

Those who don't feel anything from music might be categorized as deficient in more than a trivial way. It could be a type of sensory deprivation like color blindness, a loss on a level we don't admit or even recognize.

All things are scooped from a cosmic bowl that could be described as filled only with music.

The Universe Has No Homunculus At The Helm

I find the general attempt by many in society to link science and religion to be worthless. It's like trying to combine football and the Ice Capades because they are both arena-based entertainment. Other than paying way too much for a hot dog and a soda, there's nothing there to work with.

Religion is not only a belief, but a belief in questions that are too stupid to be contemplated. To try and find something real inside a belief in the creatures made up by human minds is not a valid endeavour. It's an attempt to justify something that has no basis for making the attempt. We are waaaaaaay past the time when we only had the tools of bare human observations, hallucinations, and unsubstantiated conjecture to determine the nature of the universe. We not only have the scientific method--which has never been shown to be faulty--we also have instruments that can determine things like the chemicals that make up a star thousands of light years away and can see the physical structure of molecules. We have much better information now; to try and keep the outdated religious-based stuff alive is just nuts, IMO. Would anyone keep drinking water that was contaminated with human waste after having learned of it?

As far as believing in general goes, we should drop it completely. It's something I've done on purpose to the point where I believe nothing at all. I don't even use the word. I either know something or I don't, I either think something or I don't. I don't believe anything. It does make me a little nuts in a pet peevish way when scientists say they "believe" something to be true. If I had the clout, I'd start a campaign to get scientists to quit using "believe." The contextual meaning of the word is not appropriate within the world of science.

I don't see how science can be seen as a religion. Other than religionists trying to create a false link in order to try and find something with which to do battle, I have seen nothing to justify the assertion. For one thing, science is subject to peer review to try and catch bullshit. While some stuff does make it through the initial process sometimes, it always gets cleaned up eventually. There is no such process in a belief system. They are set, never to change. That's why we get so many splinter groups, including tens of thousands of sects of Christianity, for example. Can you imagine a world where scientists would continually break into separate groups to maintain an ever-growing set of falsehoods? Some do, and they are called pseudo-scientists and quacks and remain on the margins of not only the scientific community (if allowed in at all), but of society in general. Beliefs are not subject to scrutiny by "true" believers and maintained as a badge of honor.

If a group of believers in anything is touting their position simply by the strength of their beliefs rather than logic or evidence, then it can be determined invalid with no further inquiry. Things that are purely observed or thought up by humans should always be assumed to be wrong. Studies have continually shown that our minds do not perceive the world correctly a lot of the time. From mistaken observations to the mixing of dreams and reality, we can really fuck things up when it comes to making conclusions. We need verifiable evidence from mechanisms and processes that leave us out of it. Only then can we begin to develop theories that have any hope of being close to accurate. Before the telescope, electricity, computers and a ton of other things, the stuff humans decided was correct was largely wrong--including the existence of deities controlling things.

The universe has no homunculus at the helm. If there was, there would be some proof of it. There's not. To hang on to the past is in some ways hopeful and soothingly nostalgic, but we now know how wrong those people could be having nothing to help them out in making determinations. We need to say goodbye to them and continue to move forward and accept all the new information that will come our way that updates what we now think we know. To assert that the past trumps the present means that everyone should just go home, get a cow and start making your own butter--if you can get online to find out how.

The Self-Stimulating Brain

We all know how bored we get when we are unstimulated while conscious. We will seek out activities to alleviate the condition. If it lasts too long, we might even do things in contrast to our normal nature in order to "fix" the problem of being unstimulated. Some may even commit violence or otherwise act outside of societal norms in order to get that mental jolt. Why can't there be a similar mechanism at work when sleeping?

Maybe dreams can be seen as a life simulation automatically employed to keep the brain active during sleep. Maybe the brain suffers some type of damage if inactive for too long and, not being able to act physically, dreams are a way of dealing with it. Maybe REM sleep is caused by dreams, being the only (or satisfactory) reaction to the dreaming brain, not the other way around.

We know that minds without stimulation become degraded, even to the point of mental illness. There may be no reason to think the phenomenon is restricted to the conscious state.

Guilty Victims

It seems to me that having a belief in a god makes people act like they are victims of their own existence, looking to "set things right" by developing enemies--real or imagined--to whom they can transfer that made up guilt.

Interrogative Questions Fail As Proof

If someone has to resort to asking a non-believer interrogative questions in order to prove the existence of their god, it means they're still looking for evidence, proving the point that none exists. Proof exists on its own and can, if valid, simply be presented for all to see.

Norwegian Attacks And The Power Of Belief

Anders Behring Breivik, the Norwegian being held on terrorist charges, has been reported to have a Twitter account with only one tweet: "One person with a belief is equal to the force of 100000 who have only interests." This has been reported as an adaptation of a quote from the 19th century philosopher John Stuart Mill: "One person with a belief is a social power equal to ninety-nine who have only interests."

This sentiment plays into something I've mentioned many times before--belief itself is a problem for humanity. While these quotes are meant to show belief as a virtue, in reality beliefs are way too often the cause of human conflict and general strife. If Breivik acted as he did because he had a strong belief--justifying his actions in his own mind--it goes to show how virtue and belief don't deserve to be attached, not the other way around.

When someone adopts a belief, it is a conclusion. The person has stopped thinking and considering in favor of a mind that's quit doing so. When that happens, the belief becomes a part of that person's self, just as much as a physical body part. If that person then experiences an attack on the belief, the self is determined to be under attack, no different that someone swinging a baseball bat at that person's head. A person will instinctively react in self-defense. And, like is often the case in a physical attack, the actions taken in self-defense can be wild and uncontrolled, even illogical.

For those who are tempted to see this is just a "bad apple" and ignore the ramifications of someone using a mindset that accepts beliefs as part of the self, please re-think that idea. We all should be working against the instinct to believe and, as a much better alternative, think instead. It's a valid way to keep the door open and will not easily allow attacks to be taken so personally as to lash out at who-knows-what.

Not So Incredible

In English the prefix "in" is one of the ways a word can be changed to denote its opposite. Indescribable is the opposite of describable, indecisive is the opposite of decisive. Incredible, however, is not the opposite of credible. I wonder if it used to be. If so, it means that our language has changed to embrace the formerly non-credible as miraculous (or simply rare) instead.

The Validity Of Humourism

If the creationist argument that any gaps in our current level of scientific knowledge prove their claims of ancient tribal deities being a valid default alternative, then any gaps in medical knowledge should also be proof that Humourism has merit. It obviously doesn't, meaning creationist "logic" is flawed at a basic level.

New information and increased knowledge will tend to produce fresh insights, advanced analysis, up-to-date facts and improved direction. Those who hold on to what is antiquated and obsolete will never find validation.

The Mental Condition Of Psychiatry

I wonder if we will eventually get to a place where we make no distinction between mental and physical illnesses, at least not in the way we do now.

In this New York Times article the idea is put forward that addictions should still be treated as brain problem, but a "physical" one. This also plays into an overall growing ability to accept the idea that what we now label mental illness is really no different from those things we now see separately as physical problems. One other example is something called Body Integrity Identity Disorder (BIID). This is where a person perceives a body part as superfluous, often asking that it be surgically removed. Research is showing this to be a condition that can be physically pinpointed to specific parts of the brain, not just an ambiguous "mental" disorder.

From an atheistic point of view, this makes perfect sense. We are only our bodies, but we have a range of reactions available to us that are expressed depending on the environment (social and physical) in which we find ourselves. That's basically it. We are who we are with no separate anything to be seen as a non-physical place we can approach alone.

Alternatively, for those who believe in things like a soul--something separate and independent from the body--the idea that it can be treated on its own supports the current psychiatric "mental" model. The mind is not physical, in this view, at least not identifiably so. To address the mind, it needs to be seen through a different lens than we see the body, in this view.

However, if there is no separate homunculus creature to be targeted--as an atheist would likely agree is the case--the approach to what we know see as solely a mental condition is seriously flawed. Maybe this is the reason why so many approaches to problems with a psychiatric tool set result in old behaviors returning fairly quickly, if they ever get altered in the first place. With a flawed premise, anywhere someone goes from there isn't going to be a rousing success.

This seems to be something not too far from assertions made by Thomas Szasz since the '60s. He has been marginalized by a good deal of the psychiatric profession, but I think he deserves some new attention. In essence, he claimed that what we label as mental illness is not scientific, it's social. Behaviors we, as a society, find distasteful or annoying we label as a mental disorder, even when a person has no physical injury or illness. It's an arbitrary line not verifiable universally. A set of behaviors in one culture seen as deviant could very well be prized in another. There's no way to draw a line other than the culture in which the behavior exists.

Between physical conditions we claim are purely "mental," and behaviors we label as non-physical "mental" problems, our view of our brains seems to be totally screwed up. We need to come up with a model that does away with the idea of a non-physical item within the human body where a treatment can be aimed--it doesn't exist. Shooting at a target that's not there will eventually hit something, but the resulting impact will not generally be useful or something that's expected.

Sicking A Gross God On Your Friends

Why would anyone want to be blessed by a god who supposedly said this:

Leviticus 4:1-12 Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, "Speak to the sons of Israel, saying, ‘If a person sins unintentionally in any of the things which the LORD has commanded not to be done, and commits any of them, if the anointed priest sins so as to bring guilt on the people, then let him offer to the LORD a bull without defect as a sin offering for the sin he has committed. He shall bring the bull to the doorway of the tent of meeting before the LORD, and he shall lay his hand on the head of the bull and slay the bull before the LORD. Then the anointed priest is to take some of the blood of the bull and bring it to the tent of meeting, and the priest shall dip his finger in the blood and sprinkle some of the blood seven times before the LORD, in front of the veil of the sanctuary. The priest shall also put some of the blood on the horns of the altar of fragrant incense which is before the LORD in the tent of meeting; and all the blood of the bull he shall pour out at the base of the altar of burnt offering which is at the doorway of the tent of meeting. He shall remove from it all the fat of the bull of the sin offering: the fat that covers the entrails, and all the fat which is on the entrails, and the two kidneys with the fat that is on them, which is on the loins, and the lobe of the liver, which he shall remove with the kidneys (just as it is removed from the ox of the sacrifice of peace offerings), and the priest is to offer them up in smoke on the altar of burnt offering. But the hide of the bull and all its flesh with its head and its legs and its entrails and its refuse, that is, all the rest of the bull, he is to bring out to a clean place outside the camp where the ashes are poured out, and burn it on wood with fire; where the ashes are poured out it shall be burned.'"

Gross.

Any creature who ever commanded anything remotely like this should result in a normal person running for cover and telling their friends to stay away. To ask this nut job to bless your friends is to prove how much you hate them.

Minotaurs v. Mermaids

When opposing religious adherents argue, to me it seems identical to people who would seriously argue the virtues of a minotaur versus a mermaid.

Mores Not Divine

Those who argue that the need for an external morality validates the existence of a god are taking a position that's not defensible. Not being able to live without myth and superstition doesn't mean reality should be ignored in favor of ancient mores masquerading as presently divine--and it certainly doesn't prove a supernatural source.

Being An Asshole Works

There has been talk off and on for a few years about being too mean in order to improve the image of atheism. I want to offer up something to think about on the topic.

Whether someone is mean or nice in their political or religious stance seems to be inconsequential. I have never read a story or account of someone who changed their position on something because the "other side" was more well-mannered. Would any of you become religious because the missionary was a nice guy/gal? Of course not. Why would we expect any believer to behave differently? No person ever said, "Those atheists are so nice, I think I'll give their information more weight." It doesn't happen.

Also, of all the world's leaders with the most numerous followers, how many of them were complete and utter assholes? I would say almost all of them. People do respond to those who are seen as mean by some. It works. Being as asshole may not get people to come over to your house to watch a football game, but it can get people to back you up religiously and politically. Being nice seems to carry no power whatsoever; it only serves to make you seem unimportant and easy to ignore.

You might say, "What about people like Martin Luther King? He was non-violent." Yes, but he was still very edgy and didn't give timid and nice speeches. His attitude was one of a fighter. If he was a timid "nice guy," he wouldn't have lasted more than a few speeches.

So, I guess my point is that if someone automatically shuns an atheist who isn't "polite" or something similar, I think you might as well give up. While it's true that people don't change by being attacked, the people who witness the attack (readers of a blog, for example) can openly and more readily accept the information because it's not personal. (And, something that's passionate is more powerful than something that's not.) The object of the attack is not important at all. What's important is that others can see it, no matter what attitude it takes.

The witness to an event always has a different experience than a participant. The witnesses are what's important.

Real Answers To Real Questions

One day, hopefully soon, the unfortunate need by so many to make ancient myths and superstitions seem real will disappear. The hallucination-induced ghost writers that so many have been indoctrinated to see as valid is so silly on its surface. It's especially so in this country, where the limited collection of writings from an ancient sect called the Hebrews continues to be pushed as relevant.

The ancient attempts by people who weren't even aware they resided on a planet at trying to provide answers was never going to be proven true--they could only look at things with their naked eyes and their "visions." Real information can't be gathered this way. Gods are an unfortunate human invention that went sour, spoiling many members of the species. Everything related to them are simply self-delusions and placebos.

The real answers to real questions are continuing to be found--and no one's god is ever discovered instead.

An Unfortunate Declaration

"...by their Creator..." and "...merciless Indian savages..." are both in the Declaration of Independence and both should be seen as a vestige of unfortunate ignorance.

The Biblical Gateway

I think the bible can be seen as a gateway drug to atheism--if you inhale the whole thing, that is. Reading it through is often the first step on a journey to the really adicting hard stuff: science, reality, reason, critical thinking, knowledge, at a lot more.

Science And An All-Powerful God Are Not Compatible

I don't think a god and science are compatible at all. Here's why:

Assuming the god in question is of the all-powerful, it-can-do-anything type, then there is no science to be discovered inside its universe. This is because if the "rules" of the universe are subject to the whims of this creature, then there literally are no hard-and-fast rules, the basis of scientific inquiry.

Any finding of a scientific experiment would have to be seen as unrevealing because the god creature could have either temporarily changed the "rules" to affect the result or altered the result. Science is predicated on the idea that rules are stable, can be discovered, and confirmed through repeated experimentation. If there is a meddling creature who can literally do anything, science would be moot. The universe would be a set of changing funhouse mirrors alterable by a deity that never reveals what he's doing.

So, for those on the religious side who love to say that their beliefs are compatible with science, they either have to change the definition of science (which is common) or ignore the implications of what an all-powerful deity actually means for the scientific method. Either way, the assertion fails.