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MichaelVassar comments on The Sacred Mundane - Less Wrong
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Eliezer: All the ways that you don't think that religion is entirely wrong, I think that you simple label those as "not religion" and imagine them to be "human universals" possibly after some "extrapolation of volition".
Also, isn't the science fiction about human space colonization on which your sense of space shuttles as sacred truly and entirely wrong? When I see a space shuttle... well... it's like seeing a pyramid, a Soviet factory, or some other weird monument of sincere but stupid strategic error that partially invalidates the ocean of tactical correctness that it consists of.
It is difficult for anything to be entirely wrong. Stupidity is not reversed intelligence. The question is whether you should drink from the old cup or start over. For this, a few examples of subtle poison really ought to be enough.
Re: Space shuttles: I know that, but they get to me anyway. Apparently the sacredness of space shuttles is not something that this particular truth about them can destroy. Sort of like a baby taking its very first steps and falling over. It's not going anywhere for a while, but so what.
"It is difficult for anything to be entirely wrong."
No, it really isn't. If you also consider those things which don't rise to the level of coherence necessary to be wrong, it's even easier.
Excellent second point, Michael, this is essentially what I was getting at below.
Eliezer, are we to assume from your final comment that the "baby steps" you're taking are a means to eliminate the feeling of the sacred from your life? Otherwise I don't get the baby metaphor.
I remember an interesting Slate article about the vagus nerve and the feeling of the sacred. I can't speak to the science behind it, but I think there's an interesting relationship between the notion of the sacred and AnnaSalamon's excellent "Cached Selves" post. Don't we then have a responsibility to actively avoid the feeling of the sacred?
I think he meant that a baby's first steps are sacred even though they're not impressive qua steps.
More like: religion is a thick soup. Picking out the good bits has its attractions - compared to trying to make your own soup.
To what degree does people's reverence towards space shuttles consist of admiration for complex human endeavors, and to what degree is it simple awe at something large, fast, noisy, and bright?
I rarely hear of people talking about their spiritual experiences upon considering major human accomplishments that are modest and unassertive in their sensory effects, but often come across people gushing about meaningless or even wrongheaded things that are sensational or assertive.
Does physics count? Or certain mathematical discoveries? Those are highly abstract and non-sensory but seem to be major spiritual triggers.
I would recognize those as valid. In my experience, it's the realization of just how wide-reaching and powerful the implications of certain findings are that triggers the experience.
If it's just a reaction to 'large', at least it's conceptual large rather than physical.
As another piece of evidence, people are awed by space, not because it's particularly interesting, but because "billions and billions".
Higher mathematics? Many-Worlds Interpretation? GEB? Evolutionary psychology? These things don't have massive direct sensory stimuli, but have all sent chills of awe down my spine at some point.
space shuttles = monster trucks for intellectuals
I'd like to hear about these modest unassertive major human accomplishments.
Counterexample: SpaceShipOne that won the X-Prize was not nearly as big and flamey as a space shuttle, but watching it was a more powerful experience because of what it meant.
Do people feel awe at the Internet? Toilets?
To you, or to people in general?
Totally. The communications network is the biggest machine ever built, it's parts are all replaceable without damaging the whole. Maybe you're too young to remember a time before it, but I found it at university nearly two decades ago and I was certainly awestruck.
Not so much. But then I did see a documentry about the building of the London sewerage system, the way the rivers were all paved over and turned into underground tunnels, connected by miles upon miles of underground canals. Which has lasted for a couple of hundred years!
A toilet might not be a massive engineering feat, but the sewer system in a whole city sure is.
And if I recall correctly, they built the system to beat a cholera epidemic which had been localized to the septically tainted water supply by one of the first medical statisticians. The Day the Universe Changed does a great job of making you feel that moment of awe. Dun... dun dun dun... dun DUN dun...
Joseph Bazalgette, engineer of the London sewers, is a real hero! Curiously, his great-great-grandson Peter Bazalgette produces sewage for a living.
Now you're saying they're awesome because they're big. The point was to find examples of things that are awesome even though they aren't big.
Oh, then microchips? Writing "IBM" in individual atoms with a scanning electron microscope? Nano-motors for nano-machines? Richard Hammond was on the TV the other week with a probing scanning electron microscope writing his name on a strand of hair. Awesome.