Angels, Demons, Science, and Meaning

14 Responses to Angels, Demons, Science, and Meaning

1. Soul Searcher says:

   June 10, 2009 at 1:59 pm

   Please. No. Not that word. I’ve found that a “nuanced” discussion or article is a leftist code phrase for upcoming BS arguments or analysis from that source.
2. Inductivist says:

   June 10, 2009 at 2:05 pm

   Overbye claims that Hank’s character acted sheepishly toward the authority of the church. He saw a different movie than I did. Hank’s position was firm but respectful disagreement–just the right attitude if you ask me.
3. HealThoid says:

   June 10, 2009 at 3:29 pm

   Interesting… But what sign on novelties of the news?
4. Ploni says:

   June 10, 2009 at 10:45 pm

   That Overbye fellow is a moron. Sorry, but that’s the full extent of the attention the NYT article itself deserves.

   Once again: the meaning which religious people are talking about is not just caring about your kids or caring about your job or being deeply moved by a Beethoven symphony. What they mean by “meaning” is not “Wow, I feel really bad that my child was killed in that random car accident.”

   And, no, you don’t get any but the shallowest “wisdom” from geeks wearing lab coats. You might get some nice practical tips – how to get better mileage in your car, how to be improve your mood, how to stop smoking – but unless you want to define that sort of thing as wisdom, forget it. Einstein for instance is considered some kind of a sage by middlebrows, but look at pretty much anything he said which wasn’t directly related to physics. Just laughable.
5. Kevembuangga says:

   June 11, 2009 at 1:07 am

   @Ploni
   Once again: the meaning which religious people are talking about is not just caring about your kids or caring about your job or being deeply moved by a Beethoven symphony.

   You are right, but this is the problem, craving for “meaning” in the religious sense IS the root of religious evilness, since there can be no such thing and everyone has his own peculiar definition of this “meaning”.
   The only sane approach would be to unravel the evolutionary causes of this craving and for this the “geeks wearing lab coats” are the most qualified.

   I disagree about Einstein:
   Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the former.

   I keep wondering if peddling religious nonsense comes mostly from stupidity, evilness or both…
6. Ploni says:

   June 11, 2009 at 10:38 am

   Mock on, mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau:
   Mock on, mock on: ‘tis all in vain!
   You throw the sand against the wind,
   And the wind blows it back again.

   And every sand becomes a Gem,
   Reflected in the beam divine;
   Blown back they blind the mocking Eye,
   But still in Israel’s paths they shine.

   The Atoms of Democritus
   And the Newton’s Particles of Light
   Are sands upon the Red Sea shore,
   Where Israel’s tents do shine so bright.
7. Ivan Karamazov says:

   June 11, 2009 at 10:45 am

   @Ploni
   Don’t believe in giving authors credit, eh?

   And, “geeks in lab coats” are responsible for the computer and everything else technical you used to find and copy the unacknowledged Blake.
8. Ploni says:

   June 11, 2009 at 6:38 pm

   Ivan Karamazov :

   Ivan Karamazov

   @Ploni
   Don’t believe in giving authors credit, eh?
   And, “geeks in lab coats” are responsible for the computer and everything else technical you used to find and copy the unacknowledged Blake.

   It’s a famous poem by a famous poet. What, do you think I was trying to steal a poem by Blake? Next time I’ll type in the poet’s name for any retards who may be reading it, along with the publisher and date. Unbelievable.

   P.S. to non-retards: Sorry about the typo (“the Newton’s”). It was on the page that I copied shamelessly without attribution.
9. Ivan Karamazov says:

   June 11, 2009 at 6:52 pm

   @Ploni
   In your rush to express rightous indignation, you forgot to address your slam at “geeks in lab coats”, or was that Blake’s line too?
10. Kevembuangga says:

    June 11, 2009 at 8:24 pm

    or was that Blake’s line too?

    Yes it was (the “satanic mills”…) though Blake is a wonderful addictive poet.

    TIGER, tiger, burning bright
    In the forests of the night,
    What immortal hand or eye
    Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

    In what distant deeps or skies
    Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
    On what wings dare he aspire?
    What the hand dare seize the fire?

    And what shoulder and what art
    Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
    And when thy heart began to beat,
    What dread hand and what dread feet?

    What the hammer? what the chain?
    In what furnace was thy brain?
    What the anvil? What dread grasp
    Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

    When the stars threw down their spears,
    And water’d heaven with their tears,
    Did He smile His work to see?
    Did He who made the lamb make thee?

    Tiger, tiger, burning bright
    In the forests of the night,
    What immortal hand or eye
    Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

    Ploni is definitely a propagandist.
11. Clay Sills says:

    June 12, 2009 at 8:11 am

    Until science exposes gaps for God to occupy that are progressively larger instead of progressively smaller, there’s not a contest; the religious loses.

    I was raised in a Baptist church where most of the congregation (including myself) experienced fairly dependable elevations in mood during and after prayer for forgiveness. The difference between me and those still in the church is that I came to attribute the sensation to endorphins, and they to God.
12. Caledonian says:

    June 12, 2009 at 9:02 am

    Even that isn’t true, Clay Sills. Until the religious explain precisely what their hypothesis predicts, and science uncovers actual evidence that favors that hypothesis over the null statement, the religious lose.
13. John says:

    June 12, 2009 at 7:56 pm

    Clay Sills :

    Clay Sills
    Until science exposes gaps for God to occupy that are progressively larger instead of progressively smaller, there’s not a contest; the religious loses.
    I was raised in a Baptist church where most of the congregation (including myself) experienced fairly dependable elevations in mood during and after prayer for forgiveness. The difference between me and those still in the church is that I came to attribute the sensation to endorphins, and they to God.

    I started losing my religion when I realized that the whole thing just seemed too hard to believe. It wasn’t logical. I also found myself thoroughly unmoved by the fact that other people believed it. As Der–Bradlaugh, put it:

    “The ordinary modes of human thinking are magical, religious, and social. We want our wishes to come true; we want the universe to care about us; we want the esteem of our peers. For most people, wanting to know the truth about the world is way, way down the list. Scientific objectivity is a freakish, unnatural, and unpopular mode of thought, restricted to small cliques whom the generality of citizens regard with dislike and mistrust. There is probably a sizable segment in any population that believes scientists should be rounded up and killed.”
14. Cornelius J. Troost says:

    June 13, 2009 at 7:17 am

    For Clay Sills:
    The Bradlaugh quote is essentially sound because human history seems to reflect that unscientific and even anti-scientific bias. Science, however, only seems freakish because it depends upon logic, measurement, careful observation, and analytic thinking that could only emerge partially and very unevenly because it had no cultural supports.
    Around the globe science appeared only in a few places-in particular Northern Europe- where cultural evolution seems to have generated extra brain power over the last 10,000 years. All brains were never equal once we migrated out of Africa 50,000 years ago. Cultural factors helped Europeans develop science far in advance of other peoples.If you watched that old TV series called “Connections” you know very well how technology grew rapidly in the last few centuries. Science developed symbiotically with technology.Where there was no science, as in Africa, there was also no technology to speak of, but for the most primitive weapons, etc., etc.Even today much of the world has little or no science but they all have religion.
    Anne Roe did an important study of scientists’ IQ’s way back around 1949. Theoretical physicists, along with mathematicians, are at the top.Physicists are second.Chemists are still somewhat duller. Biologists are fourth and social scientists are last. This hierarchy tells us why science is rare and operates successfully only where brains with very high IQ’s exist.All scientists were above 120 and most would be called “gifted” before the Age of Obama.Indeed, theoretical physicists are supremely gifted.Latin America, with a mean IQ of about 89, would have very feeble science, which is the reality. What little science developed there would be a product of the European conquest of the sixteenth century plus European expatriots- like the Nazis- who sought refuge there.
    The capacity to do good science was present in China but never developed due to cultural constraints.Bradlaugh is right but he left out the important factor of IQ distribution that helps explain the very unequal distribution of both science and technology around the globe.

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