Over the last week I’ve had an interesting conversation in the comment thread to Frum Satire’s post, Is the Torah outdated and irrelevant? I’ve found myself in a debate over the existence of God, arguing for the unlikelihood of His existence. Frum Satire’s blog is an interesting place to have conversations like these because he draws a diverse group of people, who range from strong believers to atheists and from educated intellectuals to… those who are not so intellectual.
I have to ask myself, why do I do this? Part of the answer is because it’s fun. I enjoy debating (especially winning). Part of it is that such conversations force me to think about other points of view and to articulate my own beliefs, which leads me to a better understanding of issues surrounding religion. But I had to ask myself: could part of it be the zealotry of a recent convert?
I’ve been a skeptic for as long as I can remember, always insisting that what I learned in school make logical sense. I’ve always tried to relate what I learned to the real world, and thought about the practical implications of the various things my rabbeim would teach me. I’ve had serious doubts about religion and God since I was sixteen. Yet I’ve always had this hazy notion in the back of my head that God was out there. There were a few arguments for the existence of God that I had heard as a teenager, thought were pretty good, and never really let myself examine. Everyone around me didn’t have any doubts. I couldn’t deny the basis of my culture. And yet, I remember writing papers in college for a writing class where I discussed arguments for various religions and concluded that Hashem was the Creator of the universe and Judasim was the One True Religion. And I didn’t buy it. (The professor, a frum woman, loved it. I got an “A” in that class.)
It wasn’t until I discovered the blogosphere that I realized I wasn’t unique, that there were other people out there who agreed with me, and that it was okay to think the way I did. I found myself drawn to the blogs of fellow skeptics, both those who had left the frum lifestyle and those who, like me, continue to live in the frum community. We all love to hear opinions that confirm our own, and I was eating it up. Very quickly, I came to identify myself as a skeptic and even as an atheist. All this within the last couple of years.
So while the skeptical mode of thought is not new to me, my interest in science, logic, history, and theology are not new, my self-identification as a skeptic is new. And maybe, just maybe, part of why I’m drawn to theological debates is a compulsion to defend my new identity.
Interesting.
ReplyDeleteAnd yet, I remember writing papers in college for a writing class where I discussed arguments for various religions and concluded that Hashem was the Creator of the universe and Judasim was the One True Religion. And I didn’t buy it. (The professor, a frum woman, loved it. I got an “A” in that class.)
Reminds me of a report I once wrote in an English class , was for a non frum Jewish prof who seemed to be finding his to yiddishkeit. I wrote about Nehama Dechusfa , bread of shame as per the Ramchal. I got an A , but he told me to stay away from religion in the future. That was back in my yeshiva days, in Brooklyn Koilegge. I was into religion and bought it all at that time.
The good old days.
Could an increase in skepticism be the result of an increased interest in Internet porn?
ReplyDeleteI'm skeptical of skeptics.
>Could an increase in skepticism be the result of an increased interest in Internet porn?
ReplyDeleteCould be. It could also be in proportion to the economy, in which case, we would expect to have seen a drop in skepticism over the past year and then start to build up again, which seems to be the case. Or it could be proptional to the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. In short it could be anything. How would an intelligent man like you go about finding out the following? A) Is there really an increase in skepticism. B) What it's cause is.
JP, if you're talking about me personally, I thought I made it clear that my level of skepticism didn’t increase, only my identification with the label changed.
ReplyDeleteIf you mean skeptic blogs at in general, their appearance actually does correlate with that of internet porn, but only because both forms of media are dependent on the existence of the internet. As is the troll.
As a philosopher, I must attempt to understand why people would believe total nonsense, like the idea that chemicals plus radiation plus time equals people. The obvious answer is that this is a means of rationalizing an addiction disorder. If we're all just soulless bags of chemicals, overgrown amoebae, then there's no reason to feel guilty about anything is there?
ReplyDeleteThere ia no rational reason to feel guilty. But so what? Most of what we do isn't rational. If we feel guilty, its because of our wiring or because we've been socialized to feel guilty.
ReplyDeleteAs for skeptiscism being a rationalization for a porn addiction:
1) There is no hard evidence that porn is addictive.
2) Even if there were, that is not the only possible reason for skeptiscism. You're saying it is doesn't make it so.
3) Evolution isn't nonsense, and its been demonsrated that chemicals can form proteins. Again, your saying that something is nonsense doesn't make it so.
We're I so inclined, I could turn the question around and speculate about the shortcomings of those who cling to superstitions. But I won't, because unlike yourself I'm able to understand that people can disagree with me without there being something fundementally wrong with them.
"Most of what we do isn't rational."
ReplyDeleteI'm not so sure where that statistic comes from. People tend to weigh profit vs loss and if the profit of murder is significant and the chance of punishment is small (which is often true) they will murder. For example stranger homicides or "joy killings" are seldom solved and are becoming more popular. Likewise combination murder\suicides. The perpetrator in any case wants to die so he decides to have the satisfaction of taking a few others with him.
"There is no hard evidence that porn is addictive."
It's debatable if "addiction" or "compulsion" is more accurate,
http://men.webmd.com/guide/is-pornography-addictive
but I see no reason to consider it to be different than a gambling problem, which is often called an "addiction".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_gambling
"chemicals can form proteins"
I think you mean amino acids, which are far simpler than proteins.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller%E2%80%93Urey_experiment
JP, you cleam that people do rational things.
ReplyDeleteYou also claim that people leave Torah observance because of our desires. But you also claim that the truth of the Torah is obvious. Well, if we really believe in the truth of the Torah, why would I rationally give up an eternal Olam Haboh for a few moments of pleasure?
So, all of those three premises above cannot be true.
> I'm not so sure where that statistic comes from.
ReplyDeleteIt’s not a “statistic,” it’s the way people work. I can’t squeeze an entire cognitive psych course into a comment, so suffice it to say that if we consciously weighed the pros and cons of everything we did we wouldn’t have time to actually do anything. Instead we rely on intuition, emotion, and heuristics.
We rationalize more than we’re rational, and often the reason that we say we did something and the reason we actually did it are not the same. If you’re interested and have the time you can try and find some of the many experiments that have shown this to be true.
> It's debatable if "addiction" or "compulsion" is more accurate
Addictions and compulsions are different things, though addictions often also include compulsive components. Anyway, you’re the one who chose the words ”addiction disorder.”
> but I see no reason to consider it to be different than a gambling problem, which is often called an "addiction".
Addiction, in a clinical sense, is a precisely defined term. It includes things like altered mental states, disruption to the person’s life, an inability to stop easily, withdrawal symptoms, and some other things I don’t remember off the top of my head. I don’t think that viewing porn has been shown to meet the criteria to be defined as an addiction.
Why are we discussing this anyway? Even if porn is addictive, your premise is ridiculous. There were many people who questioned and left Orthodoxy and even Judaism completely before there was ANY porn at all, let alone internet porn. Therefore to claim that addiction to internet porn is the only reason anyone would be skeptical of Judaism is clearly false.
> I think you mean amino acids, which are far simpler than proteins.
Yes, thank you. See, you can be reasonable!
I think in common language, compulsive and unhealthy sexual behavior would be called an addiction. There is a sex addicts anonymous.
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_Addicts_Anonymous
Is this type of problem common place among atheists? This year's atheist of the year would suggest that it is.
http://jewishphilosopher.blogspot.com/2009/08/winner.html
Additionally, it would seem reasonable to assume that if people believe that rationally murder is nothing more than destroying a garbage bag filled with dirty water, they will be more prone to murder.
I've tried being reasonable and polite, but clearly you're only interested in insults and porn.
ReplyDeleteDespite what you might think it "seems reasonable to assume" we judge people by their actions. The skeptics in the blogoshpere are polite, decent people. You are obsessed with porn, are frequently insulting, and have engaged in behavior that, had it been done in person instead of online, would have gotten you arrested for sexual harrasment.
JP, it is as usual painfully apparent that you are a sex-obsessed individual who also has no understanding what he is talking about. I'm particularly amused by your claim that evolution claims that "chemicals plus radiation plus time equals people" given that the overarching notions in the theory of evolution don't concern themselves with either chemicals, radiation or people. I presume you mention radiation as you think it has something to do with mutations. Most mutations are not caused by radiation although radiation can cause mutations.
ReplyDelete