gjm comments on Rationality Quotes Thread October 2015 - Less Wrong

3 Post author: elharo 03 October 2015 01:23PM

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Comment author: gjm 01 December 2015 04:25:11PM 0 points [-]

Your feelings in this regard may be shaped by religion in a subtler way. Suppose, for instance, the following things are true:

  • The culture you're in has been strongly shaped by Religion X.
  • Religion X has a strong tradition of modesty about bodies, extending to more or less every part of the body for which there isn't common need to have it uncovered.
    • Not because of anything very specific in Religion X's sacred writings or official dogma; but the tradition has grown up within Religion X and is widely held there.
  • As a result, in this culture it is usual for people to keep most of their bodies covered in public.
  • As a result, you are not used to seeing people more-than-usually uncovered in public.
  • Therefore, seeing people so may (1) just seem strange-and-therefore-uncomfortable to you, and/or (2) look like a signal of intimacy that's uncomfortable outside contexts where intimacy would normally be signalled.

Once this effect is in play, it can continue even if Religion X becomes much less influential or loses its misgivings about exposing bodies: it's traditional to keep most of your body covered up, so most people do, so doing otherwise makes people uncomfortable, so the tradition persists.

In such situations it's difficult to tell how far Religion X really is the cause, though. It could just be a free-floating tradition. It could be a tradition with some other origin that Religion X has (at least within your culture) assimilated.

Comment author: entirelyuseless 01 December 2015 04:43:44PM 0 points [-]

All of this is plausible but also consistent with the idea that Religion X took the tradition in the first place from culture, rather than inventing the tradition, as Lumifer at least seemed to be proposing at first.

Comment author: Lumifer 01 December 2015 08:43:13PM 0 points [-]

rather than inventing the tradition, as Lumifer at least seemed to be proposing at first

Let me quote myself: "Religion is usually tightly intertwined with culture and disentangling them is not always possible".

Comment author: gjm 01 December 2015 05:05:52PM 0 points [-]

Yes, that was the point of my last paragraph.

Comment author: ChristianKl 01 December 2015 04:52:22PM *  0 points [-]

When it comes to dresscode, there are a lot of cultural influences that have little to do with religion. In some cases not wearing a tie will be offensive.

If you wear sandals some people might disapprove of you if you also wear socks at the same time.