VillageIRC religion discussions

Overview

This page is for summarizing some of the more interesting discussions in the irc://darkness.villageirc.net/#religion chatroom on VillageIRC. Specific chatters will not be identified (by nickname or real name) without their permission.

Unresolved Issues

2007-01-27 21:16:05 EST: quoting the Bible out of context

(Woozle said) Here are some questions which came to me as I was watching the Richard Dawkins video:

• If the Bible is being "quoted out of context" by those who attack religion (e.g. Dawkins), then why is there not more of a faith-based initiative (especially within the more moderate areas of Christianity) to publish a clearer, better-written version of the Bible which is harder to misunderstand?
• Why is there not more horror expressed by moderate Christians regarding the abuses of these "out of context" passages by those who *do* take them literally, such as those who believe adultery and homosexuality should be capital offenses?
• Where is the list of parts of the Bible which no civilized, reasonable person would take seriously?

Response was essentially "you can't just rewrite the Bible".

Counter-responses include (only the first one was brought up at the time):

• the existence of the Jefferson Bible
• the fact that there are thousands of different versions of the Bible, not to mention annotations presenting interpretations and historical background for all or part of it
• the fact that we certainly interpret the "word of God" the way we see fit; why not rewrite it to be more in line with the best ways in which people actually understand it? (If "best ways" is too vague or open to argument, then we could either apply criteria such as "doing the least harm", which would lead to rules such as "no stoning anyone for any reason even though the Bible states that stoning is required punishment for particular transgressions", or it could represent the particular views of specific sects of Christianity – something which would be useful to have regardless)

Subsequent conversation clarified some points, but did not resolve the original questions nor address these follow-up points.

2006-12-11 14:46:30 EST: church vs. truth

There was ultimately a lot more to this discussion than I have had time to map out; anyone else should, of course, feel free to add their own observations. If you were in the room at the time but do not have a log file, I will be happy to send you mine. --Woozle 17:18, 11 February 2007 (EST)

(Woozle said) And now, #673 in the ongoing chat series of Woozle's Fascinating Theologically-Related Questions Intended to Inspire Thoughtful Discussion: Which is more important – loyalty to a/the church, or learning truth? (That is, if one had to choose. Hypothetically speaking.)

Answers to this question took a very twisty path, and uncovered some new lines of inquiry:

A chatter said:

Chatter 1 said:

I hold no loyalty whatever to "a church" but wholly and totally pursue The Truth. However, The Truth is best available from God, who knows things we don't, and which are not even currently available for us to test and observe. God has said that in wisdom and order He would deliver Truth to us through trustable and consistent channels... "That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive;" have found that fount of Truth, the channels that God officially set up to help and guide and support His children in The Church.

In other words: Loyalty to the truth is more important than loyalty to the church, but the church is the best source of truth.

This at least explains the speaker's reasoning, but doesn't really address the intended question; the question was subsequently rephrased as "what would you do if the church seemed to be at odds with the truth?".

the changeability of science

The chatter's answer to this seems to be displaying a misunderstanding of how science works:

Chatter 1 said:

Current scientific method(s) allow for exactly five senses as permissible observation, and yet that very science has proved that our five senses are inadequate to perceive the complicated fabric of the universe (reference sub atomic particles, neutrinos, black matter, the distant side of the the universe and any part of the universe covered by "pre historic") Science "theorizes" the existence of dark matter.... but cannot show it to you. And as you say, tomorrow they might say "oops, got that one wrong, our new theory is...." – and their new theory will be no more real (no more provable, no more likely to be the real truth, no more likely to not be refuted in ten years) than their last – how can you know it is true?

This response seems to be based on some misperceptions:

• In order for something to be true, it must be perfect, complete, and unchanging
• New scientific theories replace or even contradict old ones, rather than being part of a process of gradual refinement
• The fact that scientific theories on the frontier of science are rather changeable calls the whole body of scientific understanding into question

Woozle responded:

If you're talking about "dark matter"... yes, that's on the very edge of what we know about; it's all highly theoretical at this point. But God doesn't say anything at *all* about why the universe is contracting when it should be expanding, does he? So you have no answers at all about that, while at least science can look at the question and start sketching some ideas. People did the same thing with electricity, decades/centuries ago... we used to have no idea what it was. (People told Ben Franklin he was tempting the wrath of God to go trying to find out about lightning, didn't they? Or was that a made-up story?)

Chatter 1's response was basically that God didn't give us any information about cosmology because it didn't affect our happiness or well-being.

Responses to that argument:

• Then why is it crucial for science to be correct and certain in this area? Let's look at other areas which are more important and do affect our lives, like evolution and geology (both flatly contradicted by "young earth" claims).
• How can you be sure it won't turn out to be important, once we understand it? If the church had had its way, we'd still believe the earth was the center of the universe, among other things. (Note to self: a list of historical truths suppressed by religion would be useful.)

innate moral sense

Chatter 1 then changed to another angle, and brought up a couple of examples of people who had "followed their gut" to arrive at a decision which both flew in the face of convention and yet was (we agreed) was morally correct (rejecting slavery at a time when slavery was the norm).

(This would be in agreement with one of Dawkins's key points that we all have an "innate moral sense", and that even the most devout fundamentalist "cherry-picks" their beliefs from scripture, following their own sense (or perhaps that of a church leader) of right and wrong rather than (despite all claims to the contrary) faithfully obeying or believing every word of the Bible.)

Chatter 1 then claimed that "Modern science proclaimed blacks and natives lesser humans.", presumably meaning the science of the time. We need some attribution for this; my understanding is that any such claims at the time may have claimed scientific backing, but they were no more scientific than the oil-company-backed "independent studies" showing that global warming isn't happening.

So, unresolved issue: Who made that claim? Source material is needed. If indeed respected scientists were in agreement with this, then it would reveal some serious flaws in the scientific process, and we need to investigate what processes eventually led to the overturning of this erroneous paradigm. Just on the face of it, though, "lesser humans" does not sound like a credibly scientific designation.

It would also seem reasonable, again, to look at the historical track record of "faith-based" decisions and "scientifically-based" decisions. The anecdotes referenced above do not seem to be especially strongly based in either science or religion, but were merely two people being free to follow the dictates of their own consciences.

Another follow-up question, then, is who is more free to follow her/his own conscience: someone who has to reconcile everything they believe or do with a set of unchangeable doctrine, or someone who is willing to trust their own observation and reason?

reason vs. doctrine

Ultimately, it seemed to come down to the question of whether you trust observation and reason (the five senses, as augmented by various tools which greatly extend those senses, plus basic rationality and the ability to follow a logical argument; "real-world evidence") more or less than you trust the church and its doctrine to help arrive at the truth. The observation that the church has a very poor track record with regard to the truth is itself an "observation" requiring "reason" to understand, while the church's eternal counter-argument of "we're still right, ignore the man behind the curtain" is basically irrefutable if you're willing to trust unthinkingly.

We are left then with the following question: Are religious believers aware that following church doctrine essentially requires a willing suspension of their ("God-given") ability to reason in certain areas? Or do they maintain that everything they believe is based on a rational understanding of the facts available to them?

2007-02-11 summary

Some additional loose ends which came up at various times:

• Chatter 1 made a reference to the "Einsteinian religion"; what is this referring to?
• What are the arguments against Dawkins' points (of which Chatter 1 believes Dawkins should have been aware but did not address)? (Woozle needs to read The God Delusion before trying to analyze those arguments, and expects to be able to do so fairly soon.)
• Woozle raised this question earlier, but didn't really understand the response: If no two religions agree about what God is, how can anyone take the idea of God seriously? A rephrase, since that wording apparently wasn't clear: How can anyone think that there actually is a God when no two observers can agree on what that might actually mean? Or, put yet another way, how can anyone be so certain that there is one when there's all this conflicting information about it?
• Did we resolve the conflict between (on the one hand) holding up the Bible as a source of moral authority and (on the other) the fact that there are many passages which can be severely and tragically misinterpreted if taken out of context? ...which is parallel to the question of how one can say anything is a good source of moral authority when you have to pick and choose which bits to follow, which bits to re-contextualize, etc.

Tentatively Resolved Issues

These issues seemed resolved to me, but as there wasn't much discussion it's hard to be sure. --Woozle 15:42, 11 February 2007 (EST)

2006-12-22 19:27:42 EST: "Men are weak"

The argument that "leaders are appointed by God, and God already knows that all Men are weak and will make mistakes, then criticizing them because of it is unhelpful" can be used to justify absolutely anything the leaders might choose to do, regardless of how stupid it might be – which makes it hardly a justification at all, even if some of the things the leaders do are correct or even directly ordered by God. (For that matter, the argument only says that they were appointed by God; couldn't they still be imperfect and make mistakes? Isn't it likely that ten reasonably intelligent people would be more likely to spot a mistake than the person committing it?)

2006-12-22 19:27:23 EST: Internal Consistency

The LDS doctrine is not internally consistent (e.g. the bits where Joseph Smith says one thing at first, and then something else 10 years later; first it was a dream, then later it was an angel, and earlier accounts said he was with his brothers, but he later said he was alone, which would have to be the case if he talked to an angel and nobody else even noticed anything...).

Resolved Issues

2007-01-05 16:17:07 EST: Milksop Jesus

Dawkins did not call Jesus a milksop; he did use the term "milksop" (or something similar), but was referring to a specific portrayal or image (in the marketing sense) of Jesus promoted by Catholicism, not the actual Jesus as given in scripture. "Jesus's milksop persona owes more to" Victorian (mis)interpretation than to Jesus himself. Nor does Dawkins say that Jesus is an "easy target"; he was calling God/Jahweh an easy target because of God's bad behavior in certain places (mostly in the Old Testament).