I am reading an absolute ripper of a book by Lesslie Newbigin “Proper Confidence”, which particularly deals with the “myth of subjectivity”. Basically; We have become masters of exposing the myth of “objective knowledge” while ignoring the fact that there is no such a thing as perfectly self-referent knowledge.

Subjective/Objective is a false dichotomy: Newbigin argues convincingly that ANY exchange of knowledge requires a Subject AND and Object.

Cool huh? Kind of levels the playing field on a philosophical level; similar to your idea about neuropsychology.

Not really. There are alot of atheists that have a problem with his book (You know of Michael Ruse, even Shermer said the book wasn’t that great). I was an atheist that had a problem with this book.

I wasn’t raised in a religious home and I sort of viewed religion in the way Dawkins did (or so I thought), until I read his book. Shortly after reading it, I realized I wasn’t really buying the atheist argument anymore and later converted to Christianity. It’s as simple as that.

Am I trying to convert people? Hell no, I don’t care if you are an atheist, a Christian, a Jew, a Muslim, or a scientologist. Christians do not think that way, as many would like to think. Atheism is just as easily described through neuropsychology as theism, so in truth, the arguments for both boil down to personal belief systems, not science.

But yea, that’s messing with “playing God”, I guess. I’m basically agreeing that calling something “playing God” is a bad way to discuss ethics and morality. Much like “Goddidit” is not a good answer in science. For understanding and progress we need to dig a little deeper.

ok, not sure if this fits into the conversation but after seeing this i was amped
http://www.richarddawkins.net/article,2287,DLD08—Life-a-gene-centric-view,Richard-Dawkins-Craig-Venter
they discuss the reduction of life to information..
richard gets asked a question about us ‘playing god’ then he uses exactly the same argument i do!!! which is .. we’re already playing god when we change the enviroment, which is also ‘touched’ in TGD but more as reasoning why we should be moral. personally , i can’t wait for the day when my head gets put into a flask ala futurama while i wait for my new v6.0 body to arrive. beats the hell out of oblivion or cancer

My concern with TGD-type sentiments is the destructive nature, the breaking down of bridges, when I prefer to be constructive and build bridges.

I’m not social enough to look at things that way. But my own perception of TGD-type sentiments still might be similar. I’m particularly underwhelmed by TGD because it doesn’t lay out or defend any particular epistemology. I’ll take Richard Carrier’s Sense and Goodness Without God: A Defense of Metaphysical Naturalism over it any day, even if the author goes on about inconsequential things and comes across as a bit arrogant.

See, I’m more interested in ‘humanism for dummies’ – a KISS version of humanism.

We’ll hack on humanism as well, I’m keen to investigate parallels and diverse traditions, building bridges every which way. At some point, I’ll start reading Paul Kurtz.

My concern with TGD-type sentiments is the destructive nature, the breaking down of bridges, when I prefer to be constructive and build bridges. Of course, both are needed. I’d maybe like to say TGD is more about breaking down rickety and dangerous bridges, in order to make room for building new sturdy multi-lane highways?

OK, that’s a bit of a stretch, but the river is wide, often too hard to cross. And yet, we so often walk down to the river and peer over to the opposite side… What is it that we are looking for?

This has to be one of the arguments for continued establishment, so the Church of England can act as a kind of buffer against extremism, a buffer lacking in the US.

See, I’m more interested in ‘humanism for dummies’ – a KISS version of humanism.

I assume I can duplicate that on my blog some time?

It’s publicly available at the link, so quote it at will. Internet Infidels have gone authoritarian, unfortunately, so I no longer post there. But that’s the short version (I have a longer version on my computer at home) of my best recollection of my early thinking on the topic.

BMW vs. Mercedes: I think you might just stick to religion; it’s a much less emotional topic :p

Did I say coffee is better? Tea is good, when there’s no coffee… and saying coffee tastes bad is like saying red wine tastes bad…

Seriously, but somewhat cryptically, I do agree with Hugo. On every post so far. Even the ones you are contradictory. Maybe even especially those ones. And hopefully to ease the frustration, I think I understand what you are trying to say/do.

Oh, but I don’t agree on your post about coffee though, cause coffee is better.

- Hugofanboy

His main beef is in fact with fundamental-ism. I suggest that the people most likely to take his arguments on board are the intelligent, enlightened people in the middle ground. If he takes them out of the equation by virtue of intellectual supremacy, he leaves the space vacant for fundamentalists to take over the centre. This has to be one of the arguments for continued establishment, so the Church of England can act as a kind of buffer against extremism, a buffer lacking in the US.

“What you mean is that institutions like the Church of England would be taken over by fundamentalists because all the intelligent people would have left.” Or the institutions would cease to exist and the fundamentalists would become the centre. “I can see that and I think it’s certainly a sensible and arguable position that, short of vaccination, a weakened strain of the virus should protect against the virulent strain.” For a moment, I had forgotten I was talking to a biologist.

In South Africa, many people think the Dutch Reformed church is doomed. Personally, I really hope not. There is much work to be done, much contribution to be made. But to survive, it will probably need some serious renewal. Renewal that is taking place in the theological faculty, renewal that is taking place in churches in Stellenbosch, I still have much hope.

And then there’s schools. They need much help, they have a long way to go. But science education is picking up, and critical thinking with it. The future looks bright. Even if only because of cognitive bias, I prefer to see brightness rather than doom and despair.

Um, enough random off-topic banter from me.

How about we assume that none of us are correct; that reality is too big for us to grasp, and that we can in fact learn from other systems of “knowledge”.

We are fundamentally in a state of ignorance, and all our learning leads to tentative conclusions only. That said, all my beliefs – my tentative conclusions – are the results of our best methods: scientific, historical, etc.

I want to know more about why you believe what you believe: your personal backgrounds etc. Those of you who are offended by the church, I wanna know why. Is it because of bad doctrine in need of revision? is it because of young believers misinterpreting and being fundamentalistic about certain beliefs? Is it just one persons stupidity and misrepresentation of Christ?

My ‘testimony’ can be found here. In short, the priests and religion class instructors never gave a remotely satisfying answer as to ‘how’ they know what they taught.

To state that God is beyond our compreshension seems to me like a non-limiting framework: one that should actually inspire our change. No?

sad ben, i wish i could agree on this point, the thing is , defineing something as limitless is very limiting in itself and i also find that a very arrogant thing to say. (not saying u’re being arrogant , saying the meaning is.. ) it translates to ‘anything goes and we could never understand it because we’re too limited’. to me, it is saying that the teapot exists but we’re too stupid to ever understand the complexity ..

btw, i dont see you as a shofarian , i see you as a theist. so no specific bias , just the general one.