All of artsyhonker's Comments + Replies

As a theist, I don't believe in God because I perceive some positive benefit from that belief. My experiences and perceptions point to the existence of God. Of course those experiences and perceptions may be inaccurate and are subject to my own interpretations, so I can't claim that my beliefs are rational. I accept on an intellectual level that my belief could be wrong. This doesn't seem to enable me to stop believing.

However, I am involved in a religious community because there are positive benefits -- chiefly that of being able to compare notes with o... (read more)

I'd quite forgotten about force.

I see a lot of activism that is carried out by groups which, if not specifically secularist, are not explicitly religious, but this tends to be single-issue stuff. Religious communities, in my experience, tend to teach on or examine or respond to every aspect of life (though it is debateable how successful most are, as there is nowadays the problem of people leaving if they don't like what they hear). Are there secular movements which attempt to be so all-embracing?

That makes sense.

Assuming altruism in general is desirable:

• how do we teach or pass on altruistic values outside a religious setting?
• if this is difficult or impossible, is it better to convince people to perform altruistic acts even if that runs contrary to their values? Is that possible without an element of dishonesty?

I think religion can be a vehicle for the transmission of altruistic values, but I dislike the way it is often used to bamboozle people into behaving in certain ways (some of which, in more positive cases, are altruistic). I am also wary of some of the other values religion often transmits.

Additionally, I don't think it's all that accurate to say that the incidence of menstruation was that frequent before birth control. My understanding is that bleeding during pregnancy is comparatively rare, though not unheard of, and that significant numbers of women do not menstruate or have a reduction in menstruation during breastfeeding. It is also my understanding that women have traditionally started reproducing not long after the onset of menstruation, or even sooner (the age of menarche appears to be decreasing, but pregnancy is possible prior to a girl's first period). If these understandings are correct I would expect that the modern Western experience of roughly-monthly ovulation and menstruation is rather novel.

Train hard and improve your skills, or stop training and forget your skills. Training just enough to maintain your level is the worst idea.

Doesn't this depend somewhat on the relevance of the skill to the goal? My skills at cooking are reasonably adequate to the environment in which I live. I would classify them as better than average, but decidedly amateur. I don't particularly want to prioritise them over my skill at playing a musical instrument, for which I get paid, but I wouldn't like to lose too much of what cooking skills I do have as that would... (read more)

I think David_Gerard is getting at the point that because of interconnectedness, helping others also helps us. Mutual benefit is not the same as altruism, but a stronger awareness or understanding of it can encourage good acts.

If I hoover the living room, my housemates benefit more than I do from less dust, but I don't have to listen to them sneezing. If I shovel the snow off my neighbours' front pavement as well as my own, they (who don't own snow shovels) don't have to do it, but my post is easier to deliver. Goodwill from the postman goes a long way!The... (read more)

In terms of the effect on others, I think this is very context-driven. Sometimes I am quite happy to be the brunt of a joke, other times not, and I wouldn't like to try to formulate a rule. I know that in face-to-face interactions I am least comfortable with jeering from complete strangers, and more kindly disposed toward those who I know well enough to jnderstand they don't mean to cause serious hurt, but there may be some bias there too in that those who care about me have learned which topics I find most hurtful and tend to avoid those. Online I general... (read more)

I think it's quite understandable to fear for your future based on the evidence presented.

I find the worst thing about such fears is the way they can detract from my ability to take useful actions.

I find one helpful method is to re-frame my thinking. No, I have no guarantee that everything will turn out "all right" for any given value of that. However, so far I have been through more than I once thought I could cope with. Am I unscarred? Certainly not. But I have work that I enjoy, people in my life I love and who care about me. I have food and s... (read more)

I certainly hadn't realised it was for formatting and might have had a look had I known.

I don't remember believing in Santa Claus. It was always a game to be played with grown-ups.

My experience of other children believing in Santa was very much one of them not quite realising it was a game, and my not wanting to spoil their fun.

Conversely, I did and still do believe in God, though again I have no memory of believing in the old man on a cloud version often given to children.

In a book called "The Happiness Hypothesis", Jonathan Haidt described the unconscious mind as an elephant and the conscious mind as an elephant rider or driver. I wonder if a similar metaphor is useful here. His book certainly spends some time talking about how we might control our emotions to our benefit, though I don't know that it's more useful in that regard than most other pop-psych-with-a-side-of-CBT offerings.

I don't take it as a given that the problems of survival and reproduction are solved, though their context has certainly changed. I've not yet met anyone who could live forever if they so chose, or anyone who can reproduce without the help (with or without permission) of another person.

I came across a post on efficiency of charity, and joined in order to be able to add my comments. I'm not sure I would identify myself as a rationalist at all, though I share some of what I understand to be rationalist values.

I am a musician and a teacher. I'm also a theist, though I hope to be relatively untroublesome about this and I have no wish to proselytize. Rather, I'm interested in exploring rational ways of discussing or thinking about moral and ethical issues that have more traditionally been addressed within a religious framework.

Thanks.

In the world of humans, a bit of hands-on participation makes it far more likely that they will bother to continue to contribute to that charity at all.

Exactly what I was trying to say, but much shorter! Thanks.

The security of one's own access to physical necessities is an interesting factor in this. Are those whose security has been unstable more or less likely to donate time or money to charity?

For me personally, uncertainty about my own circumstances is a double-edged sword. If I am feeling a bit skint I'm unlikely to give money to someone begging on the street, and if I know my budget will be limited I am stingier than usual about charity boxes in shops. At the same time, an awareness that it is only because of the kindness of others that I am not homeless m... (read more)

(Sorry for bad html, I'll try to learn to use the interface when I'm next at a real computer.)

It is not only not obviously moral, it is immoral, if that means anything, for a government, or a person, to spend every last dollar on helping the unfortunate before spending any money on education, roads, defense, art, or even entertainment.

This seems a false dichotomy; the unfortunate will also be helped by money spent on education, roads and other measures which increase the common good (so long as they do not make the plight of the unfortunate worse).

Whether to spend money on medicine for the sick, education for those who cannot get access to it w... (read more)

Thanks for the welcome.

I wonder how it's possible to quantify encouragement and the value of relationships. I have been on the receiving end of a good deal of care and encouragement at a time when my physical health was poor and nothing could immediately be done to improve it. This gave me great hope and is experience I still draw courage from when I find life challenging. I don't have a spare me to experiment on so can only imagine how I might have fared without that support, but I know it has seemed more influential than the practical support I had, and ... (read more)

I think this might be correct but that humans are prone to prioritising the welfare of kin and close friends, and so someone working directly with people and forming some kind of relationship with them may be more likely to donate financial resources to that group in future. The lawyer may be more willing to spend money to keep a beach safe and free of litter if he or she has some personal experience which increases the importance of that beach in his mind. Most of us don't give much weight to mosquito nets because our own experience doesn't even put that ... (read more)