"The most dangerous religious fundamentalisms lead people to do things such as blowing up buildings, committing mass murders, jailing and torturing people for apostasy, and throwing acid in the faces of schoolchildren. This occurs both when dangerous religious fundamentalists occupy positions of formal political power (governments), and when they do not (terrorist groups, militias, abortion-clinic bombers)."
Point taken. The phrase "most dangerous" iis hyperbolic. No, so far I don't see any Less Wrongers blowing up buildings or committing mass murders. But, what is it that drives people to do such things? Is it as simple as, "God told me to do this?" I don't think it's usually that simple. I'm not sure what drives it, but I think that part of it is a basic human tendency to divide people up into groups of "we" and "they." Most of us construct this kind of division to some degree, whether we realize it or not, but fundamentalists take it to the extreme. On LW I encounter this division quite often (sometimes in the tone of posts more than the content). I probably notice it so strongly because, as Manfred comments, I feel myself to be among the "them," (and my natural reaction is to make the same sort of division in my own mind. While this division is nowhere near the extreme in the rationalist communities, I can definitely imagine it becoming so, particularly if technology advances in the ways that many Less Wrongers predict it will.
Some Less Wrongers appear to express the viewpoint that the world would be a better and happier place if all of us were to become rationalists, and I think that this is the attitude that I had in mind when I let the phrase "most dangerous fundamentalists" slip out. Medieval Catholics (and some contemporary ones) wanted to make the whole world Catholic. Stalinists wanted to make the whole world Stalinist. In either case, I think the world would have turned out a much worse place had either one succeeded. To you, rationalism, empiricism and positivism might seem to exist in a different category, but to me any ideology or thought system that gets universalized will probably turn into More's Utopia or Plato's Republic. And, while interesting for a while, such places hardly seem very habitable in the long term.
"Is it that just because we are totalizing and dogmatic about making people happy instead of about hating and killing them? (I am reminded of a Barry Goldwater quote about extremism and moderation.)"
I'd be interested in seeing that Goldwater quote. But, if Less Wrongers are totalizing and dogmatic about making people happy, then why on earth would you want to deconvert people from religion? Religious beliefs, practices, rituals, spiritualities, aesthetics, values, and communities bring vast amounts of happiness to people all over the world, every day. No, it's not for everyone, but why try and take it away from the people who find so much happiness in it?
(A meta remark: The usual way to quote another person's post here is to prefix lines with the > character, not to use quotation marks.)
Point taken. The phrase "most dangerous" iis hyperbolic. No, so far I don't see any Less Wrongers blowing up buildings or committing mass murders.
Of which I am very glad.
...But, what is it that drives people to do such things? Is it as simple as, "God told me to do this?" I don't think it's usually that simple. I'm not sure what drives it, but I think that part of it is a basic human tendency to d
I recently learned that a friend of mine, and a long-time atheist (and atheist blogger), is planning to convert to Catholicism. It seems the impetus for her conversion was increasing frustration that she had no good naturalistic account for objective morality in the form of virtue ethics; that upon reflection, she decided she felt like morality "loved" her; that this feeling implied God; and that she had sufficient "if God, then Catholicism" priors to point toward Catholicism, even though she's bisexual (!) and purports to still feel uncertain about the Church's views on sexuality. (Side note: all of this information is material she's blogged about herself, so it's not as if I'm sharing personal details she would prefer to be kept private.)
First, I want to state the rationality lesson I learned from this episode: atheists who spend a great deal of their time analyzing and even critiquing the views of a particular religion are at-risk atheists. Eliezer's spoken about this sort of issue before ("Someone who spends all day thinking about whether the Trinity does or does not exist, rather than Allah or Thor or the Flying Spaghetti Monster, is more than halfway to Christianity."), but I guess it took a personal experience to really drive the point home. When I first read my friend's post, I had a major "I notice that I am confused" moment, because it just seemed so implausible that someone who understood actual atheist arguments (as opposed to dead little sister Hollywood Atheism) could convert to religion, and Catholicism of all things. I seriously considered (and investigated) the possibility that her post was some kind of prank or experiment or otherwise not sincere, or that her account had been hijacked by a very good impersonator (both of these seem quite unlikely at this point).
But then I remembered how I had been frustrated in the past by her tolerance for what seemed like rank religious bigotry and how often I thought she was taking seriously theological positions that seemed about as likely as the 9/11 attacks being genuinely inspired and ordained by Allah. I remembered how I thought she had a confused conception of meta-ethics and that she often seemed skeptical of reductionism, which in retrospect should have been a major red flag for purported atheists. So yeah, spending all your time arguing about Catholic doctrine really is a warning sign, no matter how strongly you seem to champion the "atheist" side of the debate. Seriously.
But second, and more immediately, I wonder if anybody has advice on how to handle this, or if they've had similar experiences with their friends. I do care about this person, and I was devastated to hear this news, so if there's something I can do to help her, I want to. Of course, I would prefer most that she stop worrying about religion entirely and just grok the math that makes religious hypotheses so unlikely as to not be worth your time. But in the short term I'd settle for her not becoming a Catholic, and not immersing herself further in Dark Side Epistemology or surrounding herself with people trying to convince her that she needs to "repent" of her sexuality.
I think I have a pretty good understanding of the theoretical concepts at stake here, but I'm not sure where to start or what style of argument is likely to have the best effect at this point. My tentative plan is to express my concern, try to get more information about what she's thinking, and get a dialogue going (I expect she'll be open to this), but I wanted to see if you all had more specific suggestions, especially if you've been through similar experiences yourself. Thanks!