Agnosticism and Religion

I agree—forced respect is not respect at all, it is tyranny; and no one has a right to demand the respect of others simply for the sake of tradition or silly power relations. But I don’t think that’s what is going on in the majority of religious discussion—at least none appearing in the current poll or the ensuing discussion.

There certainly are people that demand homage to their chosen ideals, but both sides in the religious debate are guilty of that. Atheists demand unflinching loyalty to their version of rationality as much as the religious seem to demand unflinching loyalty to their chosen God(s).

So, it’s not so much a matter of ignoring beliefs I think are wrong, as it is a matter of live and let live. But I do work to understand them and why people hold the beliefs that they do—I even came to understand, with some work, why people can get very worked up about a sports team. Religion came more easily to me, but there were some definite challenges along the way. I am not a Christian for various reasons, but I have a solid understanding of why Christians do most of what they do.

But I had to get over my dissatisfaction with both Christianity, and football, in order to understand what motivated people to engage with them.

But I don’t think the reaction was over the top—in fact, it seemed like quite a reasonable reaction to the initial statement, which was admittedly provacative.

There’s an element of that kind of superstition to it, to be sure; but there’s also a subtler and more important symbolic element to it—that of re-enacting, in dramatized form, the facts of everyday existence.

If you remember our discussions of Australian Aborigines—I mentioned that they have a practice called renunciation whereby whenever someone needs something (like food) that someone else has, that someone else is expected to give everything of that resource to the person who needs it. This has practical benefits—like eliminating theft and poverty, but it is also a re-enactment of the sacred order of the universe.

The Aborigines believe life is constantly changing, and that every material possession—including your body—is on loan to you from the universe. In a way, it is similar to the Buddhist concept of Impermanence. Since everything you have in life you will also ultimately lose (when you die, if not sooner), there is no sense in hanging on to anything past the point of immediate usefulness. So there is no need to hoard food or posessions, and you might as well give them to someone who really needs them.

So, the act of renunciation becomes a re-enactment of the basic facts of existence. It is a reminder that life is change; as well as simply a nice thing to do for someone else. It is a sacrifice in honour of the way things really are—as well as a sacrifice which maintains social harmony.

The Christian notion of Sacrifice is different in practice, but the underlying intentions are quite similar. It’s not so much a matter of appeasing wrathful Gods—it’s really about re-affirming to yourself what community is all about.

Obviously, sometimes the sacrifice can go too far, as is the case with certain ascetic practices, but most people don’t do that.

Well, in principle I agree—which is why I support education in world religions. Where I disagree is with Scott’s “shoot first and ask questions later” kind of approach.

I don’t think it’s a matter of smartness—you’re one of the smartest people I’ve encountered—it’s just a matter of different perspectives. For some, the evidence is good and solid, and there’s no good reason to believe in God or an afterlife. For others the issue is not so clear cut—probably because they’ve had some personal experience which supports their beliefs.

Case in point: my brother-in-law’s grandfather is right now dying. He’s suffered from dementia and alzheimer’s, but he was always a strong and stubborn man. He was an atheist all his life, and his wife, who died a couple of years ago was the opposite—she believed in an afterlife and told him that if she died before him, she would come back and prove to him that the afterlife was real. Well, he suffered a kind of stroke that has made it impossible for him to eat, and so now he’s dying. He told his daughter that his dead wife appeared to him in a dream and told him that she had prepared a place for the two of them, when he’s ready.

Now, as a fellow agnostic, I’m not sure exactly what that means—maybe he’s just frightened, and this is his mind’s way of coping (“no atheists in foxholes”). Or maybe there’s more to life/existence than this temporary form we live in. Who knows?

But the belief makes everyone understand that this man is about to surrender his life, and lets them know that it’s okay—that dying is a necessary part of being alive.

I think that’s the main reason people maintain these beliefs—to make sense of an existence that is often confusing and contradictory. Unfortunately, science can’t give us the answers to a lot of these questions, because they are subjective in nature and science is limited to studying objective phenomena.

Sure, there’s another element: that of picking your team for the sake of tradition, or because somebody enforced obedience at an early age… but that’s all secondary to the fact that religion addresses real psychological needs.

I haven’t yet read the Thomas Aquinas article on Extra-terrestrial life—I’m hoping I’ll have time in the near future, but things are busy at the moment. It does look interesting, and he was certainly an interesting thinker (based on what little I know of him).

I also know that religious thinkers & innovators have always struggled with the established religion of the time. Saint Theresa of Avila had a number of mystical experiences and struggled to ensure that they fit within what the Church considered acceptable, especially since she lived in Spain during the Inquisition, and was related to “Conversos” (Jewish converts to Christianity) and would have been viewed with suspicion. Every time she had a religious experience she would go to the local religious authorities and ask what it meant, because if she had interpreted it for herself, there’s a good chance she would be labelled a heretic.

What’s interesting is that she had these experiences at all—and that if she hadn’t lived under the tyranny of the Church, she might have interpreted them differently. Either way, she had valuable insights into human experience to share with the world.

The sad thing, however, is that people today still have to be careful… only this time it’s not the Inquisition—it’s a slightly gentler psychiatric establishment they have to watch out for, lest they be labelled crazy and locked away or forced to take medication for the rest of their lives.

I think you’re on to something, at least in terms of material causes of how the world got here and why/how life developed and so on. I still think psychological / existential needs would come in, too; that go beyond what science can address.

I guess that’s why in addition to being agnostic, I also consider myself a buddhist / pantheist. Both of those views are compatible with a scientific one, but they deal with the things that science can’t really get into.