Is believing in evolution similar to believing in a religion?

Pladio said:

And yet you still don't respond to my question properly ?!
Instead you brought up Mao, who by the way isn't religious.

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If you've got time this is a very good read. It's an analysis of the similarities between the allegedly secular communist party and more traditional cults.

JemyM said:

What I have seen since post #342 forward have been all the tired old strawmen arguments and the old predictable reaction of people who haven't examined the political and social issues, but have grown up in a society where it's common etiquette to respect religion for the only reason that it's religion.

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Jemy, many people here (myself included) have attempted to put forward explanations for why we, in some cases and for some people for whom it helps, respect the impact that religion has on their lives. It's not a knee jerk half thought out "can't criticise religion" response, it's a genuine recognition that the impact of religion can be positive, a recognition that takes some effort at least from a born and bred atheist like myself. The impact of any idea and any application can be positive for someone somewhere.

And we have given thought to the political and social issues. I don't think we even entirely disagree on a lot of the changes we'd like to see in terms of non dogmatic secular teaching of a range of different ideologies and mythologies along with the range of tools children are given them to allow them to choose as best they can for themselves.

I'd like to see that, because it would move society most likely closer to me and my reality. I don't have that right though, and other people and their views and what they want for their children deserve consideration and respect too, even if I think they're wrong.

You say that you separate the ideas from the individual, that doesn't matter when your words (intentionally or not) convey the impression again and again and again that you think the ideas are WRONG and the individuals that hold them would be better and happier if they held the RIGHT ideas - i.e. the ideas you have.

JemyM said:

Based on that description, let me give you another example:

Currently the nationalist party called the "Swedish Democrats" is probably going to get into the next election. The Swedish Democrats use pseudoscience to convince the sub-educated that the time for action is now and their cause is good and just. On their agenda is demonizing immigrants as the cause for much of Swedens current problems. They also have established standards on what is to be considered "Swedish" and "unfriendly against Sweden", accusations even targeted against other ethnic Swedes. Many of it's founders were members of extreme nationalist groups, including neonazi groups.

The nutrition for the Swedish Democrats is an increased exposure to immigrants, a worse economy, a nostalgic view of the past and an education system that been too sloppy about teaching kids history.

Halting their progress require excessive feedback before they get the chance to create any harm. Much of this includes lecturing people who are pretty much clueless about the reality behind that pseudoscience. Also there's the call to repair the educational system, the return of history as a core subject, improving the economy and labour market etc.

Based on history and what happened with similar groups once they got into power, it's not unreasonable to expect society to be worse off because of it. They are sometimes refered to as "the nazis".

Is this active opposition against the Swedish Democrats to be seen as "fanatic"?

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Could be seen as fanatic, I don't know enough about it.
Depends exactly what they're doing. what the others are doing... If they are really a threat then no. The extreme right has almost always shown to be a problem to society, so it is a valid position.

Benedict said:

You were talking bout your view that "reality" breaks faith based models, and gave examples of that. I was trying to get across the idea that your view of "reality" is just that - YOUR view. And that for some people "reality" breaks science based models, even the same particular instances of "reality" as you used as examples.
They are debateable. I debate whether any cause "naturally" leads to loss of faith, and more importantly I debate whether you can lay claim to know what "reality" is.

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I disagree with the ontology that reality is a point of view. Reality cannot be created by you. Your (and my) point of view is the result of getting exposed to reality, but it's not reality itself. Even if people live up with different experiences, reality is still the same and the outside world that you have no control of will still continue to bring you challenges. In social context, striving to gain more experience, thinking about your experiences and accepting your experiences is a humility required to live together and to improve your surroundings.

Benedict said:

Fine for the strong willed who revel in confronting their pain head on and acknowledging the brutal nature of life and loss. For those who aren't as strong though, a comforting explanation that might fall to bits if they prod it too closely could be much more palatable than a bleak and depressing explanation that withstands scrutiny, because you don't have to over scrutinise things.

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A worldview that is inconsistent with new experiences is a cause for distress and conflict rather than comfort. Our culture is unfortunally set up more about avoiding problems entirely than accepting and dealing with them, with the result that we aren't prepared to stand up again if and when we fallen down. Buddhism is a religion that is taught to children. It does'nt take a strong mind, but it leads to a strong mind. We westerners tend to see that worldview as brutal, depressing and cold. They see that worldview as calm, soothing and peaceful. It's applications within therapy is today leading science in psychology.

Benedict said:

And for the 99.9% of humanity that has no need to optimise their problem solving capacity for things like the origins of life and the universe? For those for whom a simple do-gooder morality is just as sound as a more complex understanding of moral relativities? Can't it free them up with a nice simple explanation for the stuff that doesn't really matter so that they can focus on their actual life? I agree on dogma & scripture though, but they're not essential components of faith.

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I usually do not care what people think, as long as they continue to be open minded. Some teachings include being closeminded and this thread is an example of how some such ideas can be exploited as tools of politics and manipulation and that's where I draw the line.

Benedict said:

Caffeine's more effective for kicking my brain into gear and optimising my problem solving, and has less side effects than alcohol. But then alcohol's good for stopping me worrying about the stuff that's not important and for relaxing me enough to enjoy my life.
Don't assume that your medication would work for others.

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What works for you and not have alot to do with your upbringing and past experiences.

Benedict said:

Generally I'm against any attempts to tell children that "this is how reality is". I prefer more of a "maybe" approach to things, sure tell them that "some people believe some are abominations because of how they were born" in the right context and let them think what they want to think. Teach them analytical facilities rather than an inviolable "truth". By extension I wouldn't want them told definitively that there is no god.

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That's usually how school works. Except that such teachings have a corrosive effect on faith which is why some groups do not like it.

JemyM said:

I disagree with the ontology that reality is a point of view. Reality cannot be created by you. Your (and my) point of view is the result of getting exposed to reality, but it's not reality itself. Even if people live up with different experiences, reality is still the same and the outside world that you have no control of will still continue to bring you challenges. In social context, striving to gain more experience, thinking about your experiences and accepting your experiences is a humility required to live together and to improve your surroundings.

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I'd imagine there is an objective reality. I'm not claiming that there isn't. I'm just saying that we all only experience a model of a reality that our brain puts together and should ALWAYS bear that in mind before making blunt pronouncements about how "reality" IS.

A worldview that is inconsistent with new experiences is a cause for distress and conflict rather than comfort. Our culture is unfortunally set up more about avoiding problems entirely than accepting and dealing with them, with the result that we aren't prepared to stand up again if and when we fallen down. Buddhism is a religion that is taught to children. It does'nt take a strong mind, but it leads to a strong mind. We westerners tend to see that worldview as brutal, depressing and cold. They see that worldview as calm, soothing and peaceful. It's applications within therapy is today leading science in psychology.

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Don't get me wrong, I'm all for buddhism among other non religious world views, but then I would be because those are world views that work for me. I have observed however that some people take genuine comfort from, even if not full dogmatic as scripture faith, an indefinable concept of some form of higher life, some kind of faith. And there's plenty of people with a kind of faith that doesn't come into conflict with experiences, and plenty of people without faith who come into conflict with experiences that any amount of rational tools for self realisation don't really deal with all that well. A lot of old people become more religious for example.

I usually do not care what people think, as long as they continue to be open minded. Some teachings include being closeminded and this thread is an example of how some such ideas can be exploited as tools of politics and manipulation and that's where I draw the line.

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So it's okay for people to not completely agree with you so long as they remain open minded as to just how WRONG they are and how RIGHT you are?

Trust me, you come across (for all your occasional qualifications about how open minded you are) as very, very closed minded on some issues (apologies but your qualifications don't really ring true in the light of the other things you say and the way in which you say them, and it looks like there's a big discrepancy between how your conscious thinks you think and how your subconscious is actually thinking, could well just be poor communiction or poor comprehension on the part of everyone else on here, just saying that's how it comes across to me at least)

What works for you and not have alot to do with your upbringing and past experiences.

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Indeed. Same for everyone. And for some people religion is what works for them even if you think they should prefer what you prefer.

That's usually how school works. Except that such teachings have a corrosive effect on faith which is why some groups do not like it.

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In my experience most schooling does a piss poor job of giving pupils critical analytical facilities to make up their own minds. I do some marking of professional exams, and basically everyone taking the exam I mark will have a good degree from a good university, several years of professional experience and have passed about a dozen exams from one of the most challenging exam systems in the world, and only a VERY small percentage of them show any capacity to actually think and respond to unique situations (less than a 30% pass rate and most of those pass simply because they've learnt everything off by heart).

Schools know that the way to get good results is to teach pupils the answers to questions, not to teach them why or teach them how to find out for themselves or how to challenge what they're being taught, just to teach them how to say the things that they're meant to say.

In the UK at least, unless you're fortunate. My school was great, it rather resented exam league tables and made sure we whizzed through the course quickly so that they had some time to go off piste and get the class arguing with each other and stretching themselves. That's by no means the norm though

Benedict said:

I'd imagine there is an objective reality. I'm not claiming that there isn't. I'm just saying that we all only experience a model of a reality that our brain puts together and should ALWAYS bear that in mind before making blunt pronouncements about how "reality" IS.

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The clinical description of delusion is absolute certainty that is not changed by compelling counterarguments or proof of the contrary. I am always open to new ideas and new experiences, still, asking someone to back up their opinions with reason, arguments and evidence is not an unfair request. When people are going to live as neighbors they have to share their world, not tell eachother "this is my belief and you are to respect it no matter what".

Benedict said:

So it's okay for people to not completely agree with you so long as they remain open minded as to just how WRONG they are and how RIGHT you are?

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This accusation is a strawman that is often used by people who propose that all beliefs are equally valid, and it usually pops up when they simply cannot back up their opinions with genuine evidence or arguments.
At the end, that position doesn't work in a society with more than one person in it. We need to rely on democracy and research when making tough decisions, not respect. We have rules and regulations and they tend to be absolute, regardless of personal opinion, simply because every member should enjoy the same rights and benefits.

Benedict said:

Trust me, you come across (for all your occasional qualifications about how open minded you are) as very, very closed minded on some issues (apologies but your qualifications don't really ring true in the light of the other things you say and the way in which you say them, and it looks like there's a big discrepancy between how your conscious thinks you think and how your subconscious is actually thinking, could well just be poor communiction or poor comprehension on the part of everyone else on here, just saying that's how it comes across to me at least)

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I have an empiric mindset. I base my opinion on provided evidence, not on other peoples opinions. In some point of view that mindset is extremely dogmatic and closeminded because it's very difficult to convince me when one cannot provide compelling evidence for something. On the other hand I tend to flip at an instant every time I learn something new. Most recent time it happened was when someone suggested that Gandhi made a few stupid things, which means that I now have to look into that before I promote Gandhi again as an example of a good person.

Benedict said:

In my experience most schooling does a piss poor job of giving pupils critical analytical facilities to make up their own minds. I do some marking of professional exams, and basically everyone taking the exam I mark will have a good degree from a good university, several years of professional experience and have passed about a dozen exams from one of the most challenging exam systems in the world, and only a VERY small percentage of them show any capacity to actually think and respond to unique situations (less than a 30% pass rate and most of those pass simply because they've learnt everything off by heart).
Schools know that the way to get good results is to teach pupils the answers to questions, not to teach them why or teach them how to find out for themselves or how to challenge what they're being taught, just to teach them how to say the things that they're meant to say.
In the UK at least, unless you're fortunate. My school was great, it rather resented exam league tables and made sure we whizzed through the course quickly so that they had some time to go off piste and get the class arguing with each other and stretching themselves. That's by no means the norm though

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Indeed. Im not suggesting education is perfect, only that it is the most effective and also a required tool to keep up a working democracy.

I'm sorry for reviving this death thread, but I thought it was on topic.

Here's an article stating 60+% of Americans think evolution is wrong:

http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1105/darwin-debate-religion-evolution

Have a read, it's quite interesting.

I think this is a big problem, the not teaching of evolution to children in schools as it is currently at least, the most satisfying theory on how human beings and the rest of the species came to be.

Relax, Pladio. I can't think of even one person I know who doesn't believe in evolution. I can't say when they started teaching it in public schools here in California, but I attended high school over thirty years ago, and that's what everyone was taught back then.

With a name like PewResearch....

Pew is the name of the founder lol

Pladio said:

I'm sorry for reviving this death thread, but I thought it was on topic.

Here's an article stating 60+% of Americans think evolution is wrong:

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Not quite:

63 percent of Americans believe that humans and other animals have either always existed in their present form or have evolved over time under the guidance of a supreme being.

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A carefully worded survey that's then carefully misreported. I would expect that many of those 63% do believe in evolution and in some kind of god, which isn't ideal but is still better than creationism.

Such statistics include states like Texas. I have heard several witnessreports from Americans visiting the south and then expressing their surprise how different life is down there. Naturally the big cities are a step up and Austin is like an intellectual stronghold, but the only thing keeping those states afloat is the constitution, else they would replace the schools for churches in notime based on popular democratic opinion.

Benedict said:

Not quite:



A carefully worded survey that's then carefully misreported. I would expect that many of those 63% do believe in evolution and in some kind of god, which isn't ideal but is still better than creationism.

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Evolution with guidance from god is NOT the theory of evolution. It's the belief that god made the things evolve.

Pladio said:

Evolution with guidance from god is NOT the theory of evolution. It's the belief that god made the things evolve.

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If god made it evolve, it means that at least they believe that things have evolved! That's not creationism.

But it's not evolution, so the point of me misreporting the story is wrong.

Pladio said:

Evolution with guidance from god is NOT the theory of evolution. It's the belief that god made the things evolve.

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My interpretation of it (which may be wrong) is that it includes those who believe that the observable evidence for evolution is entirely credible but along with that there's a god and somewhere along the line he made it all start. Not that every step of evolution is personally micromanaged by him, but that he's still there in some respect. I could well be wrong, the site seems to have something of an agenda at first glance and I get the impression that they've done their best to structure the questions to show what they want to show.

If my interpretation is correct I think there's a big difference between people who are willing to recognise and accept the persuasive scientific arguments for an ongoing evolutionary process but who still want to maintain their sense of God and people who flat out interpret all the evidence as being the hand of a creator rather than a natural process. The first may have deep seated beliefs about the abstract issues like the origins of life and the universe etc but they're still willing to play ball on the day to day stuff and to respect the value that science can bring to practical matters. The second are just a bunch of lunatics one can't do anything with.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theistic_evolution

I guess that's what you're talking about. Right ?

EDIT: By the way, you don't have to read everything, just the top...

Pladio said:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theistic_evolution

I guess that's what you're talking about. Right ?

EDIT: By the way, you don't have to read everything, just the top...

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Yep, that's the one. I've never had a problem with that, ultimately what people think about the origins of the universe isn't hugely important unless it sets them in such a dogmatic level of lunacy that they'll ignore, argue about or try to discredit what's right in front of them.

Yes, I mostly agree with you, but it doesn't ultimately fit within the scientific theory of evolution. Of course it's better than saying scientists are blasphemers and lunatics, but it's not what Evolution is saying.

Note the tremendous difference between "a cosmic force assisted evolution" and "God did it". The second version points out a specific entity, named with a capital G. This doesn't only refer to as theism but monotheism, and specifically ties into the idea-tradition that initiated with Judaism but in our culture is more popular in it's Christian form. It doesn't just assume that evolution need assistance by a superior intellect, it specifically assume that people living in the middle east 2500 years ago had specific and exclusive information regarding the identity of that intellect. Furthermore, this tradition takes it's specific roots in a specific book, the Torah.

Pladio said:

Yes, I mostly agree with you, but it doesn't ultimately fit within the scientific theory of evolution. Of course it's better than saying scientists are blasphemers and lunatics, but it's not what Evolution is saying.

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I think one can be too dogmatic about these things, even if one's on the side of science

Faith does a lot of good to a lot of people and the only points where I think it becomes a negative force are when it deadens an enquiring mind. The last thing I'd want is for someone to feel that they have to renounce a faith that brings them comfort because scientific method seems to falsify that faith. Well no, not the last thing I'd want, the last thing I'd want is for people to renounce scientific enquiry and rational thought because their faith is under attack, but I'm actually happier if people who still want their faith can keep their faith and be open to scientific thought.

Plus things aren't going to change overnight. The sense that there is a god is, I'd imagine, a very deep and subtle thing buried at the core of people's beings. Challenge their ideas and their applications of ideas indeed, help them grow, encourage them to learn and experiment and remain open minded, but undermining a core sense of self and world only polarises people