Dr. Jordan B. Peterson

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Manocean wrote:

The popularity of Jordan Peterson should be encouraged, he is a pretty influential force in pushing people away from the far-right and far-left.

I'm a hardcore centrist. Or as Jennik would say, 50% Nazi. Lul.

In all seriousness, the documentary I linked to in OP has a bit about how left- and right-wing belief are both somewhat based on biology/genes, and how both are necessary. I pretty much agree. The way I see things, the key to understanding objective morality vs moral relativism is understanding both the moral foundation necessary for, and the effects of, economic specialization.

It's a moral good for us to engage in economic specialization for the sake of intellectual efficiency, therefore the morality necessary to make free trade possible is essentially objective — that opposed to diversity of occupation is evil, and if pursued to its logical conclusion erodes civilization until we all return to the single-occupation culture of agrarian — and tribalist — survivalism from wence we came.

However, once the legal infrastructure for economic specialization is achieved, then so long as that infrastructure is not undermined by an oppositional ethical code, then our economic niches differ greatly, thus our goals in action differ greatly, thus right and wrong behavior differ greatly, thus morality differs greatly. We need different people with different jobs, different goals, different tasks and different ethics united under voluntary trade. Each person has essentially two moralities; their morality as a trader, and their morality as a baker or a painter or a journalist or a game designer.

Or a legislator. We need people who make new rules well, and people who dismantle rules that serve us no longer; these are different disciplines. We need both the Left and the Right in this way. But in employing each it beooves us to remember Maslow's law of the instrument: "it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail."

What's sad is the othering that occurs under partisanship. When we look at people who disagree with us as the evil to our good, rather than as the yin to our yang.

I'm getting the uncomfortable feeling that the 'responses' to that interview have completely missed the point. If you're projecting prejudices onto either argument, or either participant in the interview, you're going to end up with a misleading or false conclusion.

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CanHasPants wrote:

Except they are neither unproductive nor frivolous? I described pretty exactly what I believe to be a (the?) fundamental flaw of so called “progress.” We’re changing stuff all willy nilly without consideration for the things they are peripheral to, co-dependent of, or otherwise interacting with. If I am right, and there is an absence of due diligence in the relationship between science and politics, then it’s causing real harm to people. That is lazy.

Counterpoint: being afraid to make any changes, to try and make any repairs, for fear of breaking things further means stagnation, strangulation, and eventual dissolution. Society never stops changing. You can either try to steer it, guide the inevitable metamorphosis of society in a more positive direction, or you can ignore it until you get left behind.

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CanHasPants wrote:

See above. Like, alright, abandon religion, that’s fine. But it was part of a system and that system maintained a sort of homeostasis, so what’re you going to replace it with so shit doesn’t get turbulent? Nothing? Shit’s turbulent? Huh.

I’m not suggesting atheism is to blame for our sociopolitical climate, but that it is symptomatic of what is. It’s only relevant to the conversation because it is relevant to the precipitating thoughts—the relationship between religion and evolution.

First of all, will admit - have not watched videos. Poked my head in this thread at work. So trying to keep my comments simple and relevant only to what's said. That said...

We don't need an invisible giant space man to tell us to be decent human beings. if the invisible giant space man helps you to be a decent human being, gives you the strength to get through your day? Awesome. You believe in the invisible giant space man all you want. I have no desire to take that away from you.

But your invisible giant space man means nothing to me. I don't want decisions by my real-life actual dirt man government to be made based on what the invisible giant space man is said to like or dislike by people who cannot agree on what the invisible giant space man is supposed to stand for. I would like decisions to be made for reasons that are grounded in the physical reality we all live in. Separation of church and state is important. Nobody wants to live in the Dark Ages again.

People who worship God want God to be an important and integral part of their lives. People who don't care about the IGSM want the laws that govern us all to have real logic, sense, and rationale behind them. Fortunately, we can all mostly agree that the IGSM seems to generally want what's best for society, so he shouldn't have any trouble letting us do us, should he?

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1453R wrote:

People who don't care about the IGSM want the laws that govern us all to have real logic, sense, and rationale behind them. Fortunately, we can all mostly agree that the IGSM seems to generally want what's best for society, so he shouldn't have any trouble letting us do us, should he?

Indeed He doesn't, judging from the behavior of those who, unlike me, believe He exists. Historically, secularism was born from Christian civilization. Although there's an obvious theological disagreement, I don't see how you can view the ideologies that originally implemented secularism as existential threats to secularism.

Between us atheists, I like watching George Carlin rant about how religion is the ultimate bullshit story just as much as the next heathen, but other than perhaps a mild contempt for those running the churches, this doesn't actually make you feel angry at Christians, does it? I don't think it makes Carlin angry (the emotion he explicitly names, IIRC, is "awe," albeit ironically). We just listen and think to ourselves "man, what suckers." Suckers aren't threats. Christians are as harmless as... people who actually buy things from infomercials, dontcha think?

I meant it when I said that I'm happy for folks who find strength and serenity in their belief. People who're empowered to cope with the world's endless shit by their strength of faith have it made. I don't perceive your ordinary Christian, or your ordinary Muslim, Jew, or whatever else, as a threat, no. That's silly. Heh, I'll admit that George Carlin came to mind for me too, but yeah.

The only Christians I have beef with are the ones who've literally walked up and shoved a Bible in my bag as they told me "read this - you clearly need Jesus." Unironically. This happened to me. I'm not kidding. I remain baffled to this day where this guy got the spare Bible from - did/does he just, like...keep a stack of them hidden in his clothes to accost people with when they disagree with him?

Obviously the vast majority of the religious folk out there don't hurl holy books at other people's heads, but I do see more religious arguments than I like on legal issues such as abortion. It's not the rule for legal discussions, but on certain topics it's an almost rote response. 'JESUS LOVES BABIES' is a billboard I'd like to stop seeing, thanks.

A lot of people call themselves atheist Jews.

Ali Rivzi likes to call himself an atheist Muslim.

I'm an atheist Christian. Why not?

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1453R wrote:

Counterpoint: being afraid to make any changes, to try and make any repairs, for fear of breaking things further means stagnation, strangulation, and eventual dissolution. Society never stops changing. You can either try to steer it, guide the inevitable metamorphosis of society in a more positive direction, or you can ignore it until you get left behind.

I’d never advocate stagnation, because it does not exist. (Social) change is constant and occurs in two ways—that which occurs naturally, and that which is forced. Natural change is the process of responding to shared stressors with collective trial and error until viable solutions are discovered and voluntarily adopted en masse. Forced change attempts to shortcut the trial and error process by implementing a theoretical solution and either convincing or coercing people to adopt it. It is the latter that I fear we have a fetish for, and the risk is the same as any rushed task: poor proofing and shoddy craftsmanship.

How often do we actually solve a problem, and how often do we just redistribute its burden? Systems can only accept so much stress, and if redistribution is the de facto solution, then eventually the system will buckle. Shift perspective away from macro examination, and untested forced change has the potential to harm people, individually.

Fear is a healthy and necessary mechanism; it warns us away from destructive behavior. I am not afraid of change, I am afraid of irresponsibility—the point where responsibility and authority intersect, and, in the absence of responsibility, solutions are determined for you and in spite of their possible consequences.

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1453R wrote:

First of all, will admit - have not watched videos. Poked my head in this thread at work. So trying to keep my comments simple and relevant only to what's said. That said...

We don't need an invisible giant space man to tell us to be decent human beings. if the invisible giant space man helps you to be a decent human being, gives you the strength to get through your day? Awesome. You believe in the invisible giant space man all you want. I have no desire to take that away from you.

But your invisible giant space man means nothing to me. I don't want decisions by my real-life actual dirt man government to be made based on what the invisible giant space man is said to like or dislike by people who cannot agree on what the invisible giant space man is supposed to stand for. I would like decisions to be made for reasons that are grounded in the physical reality we all live in. Separation of church and state is important. Nobody wants to live in the Dark Ages again.

People who worship God want God to be an important and integral part of their lives. People who don't care about the IGSM want the laws that govern us all to have real logic, sense, and rationale behind them. Fortunately, we can all mostly agree that the IGSM seems to generally want what's best for society, so he shouldn't have any trouble letting us do us, should he?

None of that is the point. Religion is an evolutionary response to our cognitive development as a species. I am merely suggesting that the stimulus antecedent to religion’s conception may still exist, and that healthy (prosocial) cognitive functions may depend upon some mechanism’s response to that stimulus. That is to say, “God” is not just a metaphysical illusion, but exists within the real physics of our brains (but is also still a metaphysical illusion).

Edit: Addendum: Separation of church and state is to prevent powerful religious organizations (like the Vatican) from gaining representation in governance (remember the Inquisition, Bloody Mary, etc. etc.?). It does not mean that religiously motivated citizens cannot democratically vote for a religiously motivated political platform, or that a political platform cannot express religious motivations. So.. Jesus billboards will exist so long as people with money want to put Jesus on a billboard, and people with billboards want to accept money.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

A lot of people call themselves atheist Jews.

Ali Rivzi likes to call himself an atheist Muslim.

I'm an atheist Christian. Why not?

Penn Jillette once said that there's no such thing as (the popular perception of) an agnostic. To be a Christian, one must believe in Jesus Christ the Lord as their savior and in the existence and benevolence of God. This is the absolute coremost, fundamental tenet of Christianity, to the point that it is literally their name. 'Christ'-ianity.

If someone asks you if you believe in God and you say "I don't know, but I'm willing to keep an open mind"...that makes you an atheist, in that you do not believe in God. You are willing to believe in God if provided evidence sufficiently convincing, but until then the don't-knower generally acts as if God does not exist.

Keeping an open mind does not qualify one for a special title, other than 'not an asshat'. It is perfectly possible to believe in the values Christianity espouses - tolerance, familial closeness and loyalty, generosity and charity, humility and traditional virtues - and not be a Christian. I believe in most of those myself (perhaps not so much the 'humility' bit - there are times when a woman is perfectly friggin' justified in being proud of herself, damnit), but I do not believe in Christ the Savior, the Holy Trio, the Afterlife, or in any of the million and three denominations of Christian church.

It's a lesson I wish more people could learn, honestly. You don't have to be religious or pseudo-religious to be a decent human being. Atheists can be not-asshats, too.

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1453R wrote:

You don't have to be religious or pseudo-religious to be a decent human being. Atheists can be not-asshats, too.

If you had said "you don't need to be a theist or a pseudo-theist" then I'd readily agree. But religion and theism are not synonyms; it is possible to be a religious atheist. Or perhaps a better way of phrasing it is that one can choose an object (or objects) or worship that are real, a standard of holiness that is realistically achievable, and hold as sacred things that are not wholly imaginary. Why is it that we hold the trait of existence with such apparent disdain that to be existent is somehow a disqualifier for sanctity?

The truth of the matter is: it isn't. You can watch everyday people go about their days protecting that which they consider sacred (locking doors), seeking penance for their sins (cheating on one's diet), questing in the pursuit of prophecy (lottery tickets), and chastising blasphemers for their heresy (social justice warriors on Twitter). Our brains are hardwired for religious conviction, and as I said earlier, the person who denies their religiosity to themselves lives in willfull ignorance of their own sacrament.

Of course, an unexamined dedication to an ideal is likely to become an erratic one. In a sense the only practical meaning of "irreligiosity" is "fickleness." They say you can't serve two masters, and perhaps in a single action one cannot... but it's not that difficult to act in service of one set of principles only to betray them in the next minute.

One of my favorite books is the Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand. In the book the hero is a very rational, very self-exacting atheist architect, and at some point a weird client asks him to build a temple. The architect refuses initially, but the client replies with "you're very religious, in your own way; I can see it in your buildings." The hero is then amazed that the client realized something about him that he didn't realize himself. His consistent dedication to a mostly singular set of principles was something he could honor, so he then accepted. You, too, should build your own temple to the human spirit, figuratively if not literally.

We may be speaking from a difference in personal terminology. I don't like religion, mostly for the connotations inbuilt into most (formal) religions of the innate worthlessness of the self. The self, in and and of itself, is at best of null value and at worst actively harmful - the notion of 'Original Sin' and the inherent, inescapable filthiness of the individual baked into many Christian and a few non-Christian religions. Only by subsuming the self into service to a greater whole, only by sacrificing your own desires in their entirety and realigning them with the collective whole governed by the Church, are you able to escape the trap of worthlessness capital-R Religion seeks to ensnare everyone on the planet in.

You mention Fountainhead as one of your favorite books, so I'm going to assume you know about and at least respect/tolerate, if not practice, Objectivism. What would an Objectivist think of the common religious notion that the individual is worthless unless it's willing to submit all of its desires, all of its goals, and all of its energy and drive to the central authority that is the religion in question?

What you're talking about is conviction, which does not have to be sacred to be worth upholding. Every man, woman and child in this world should be allowed to be their own god. We do not need to venerate anything outside of ourselves; our own ideals and convictions should be enough. You're correct in that true conviction is born of deep introspection and consideration, of a sort that's increasingly rare these days. Positions change, minds change, and people are far too willing to let their favorite Twitter celebrities tell them what their ideals and convictions should be, which is a lamentable state of being. People clamor for attention, hurl their opinion out in front of them like a battleaxe and attempt to chop it into the heads of everyone else with no consideration for what's been hacked into their own.

I'll admit, I have not fully mapped my own psyche. I don't have a deeply, consciously held conviction for any question that could possibly face me, and frankly one of the convictions I do hold is that nothing is permanent. An agile mind able to examine new facts and modify its convictions as required is a desirable trait, but the weakness of that sort of mind is that it's vulnerable to being swayed unduly by the constant torrent of, as a certain fictional Senator whose ass I just kicked put it, "this 24-hour Internet spew of trivia and celebrity bullshit!" A mind deep and unshakeable in its convictions, armored against the Internet Spew, is steadfast and reliable but is itself prone to stubbornness and clinging to outmoded beliefs long after they should have been changed or replaced.

Again, however - religion has nothing to do with this. That's one of my convictions. We as a species don't need false idols or propped-up cardboard cutout deities to cling to. The sooner we can accept our actions as belonging solely to us, the sooner we can, perhaps, stop fucking everything up so much.

...and that's as flowery and philosophicalish as I've gotten in quite some time. Yeesh. Now I need to go find something to cuss crudely at for a while to balance the scales.